A Marxist critique of postcolonial theory

A presentation by Priya De at Socialism 2021

Postcolonial theory and Marxism share an opposition to colonialism and imperialism and its ongoing impact on the developing world. Marxism and postcolonialism offer counter-posed theories to understanding both the history of colonialism, postcolonial societies and struggle in the postcolonial world.

In opposition to Marxists, many postcolonial theorists argue that in the postcolonial world ideology, discourse and culture are in some sense primary. This is in contrast to the centrality that Marxists place on class. Postcolonial thinkers such as Edward Said have accused Marxism of eurocentrism. Other schools of post-colonial thought, such as subaltern studies suggest that Marxist social theory developed only to explain and understand Western societies and is incapable of understanding how capitalism manifests in the postcolonial world. This talk presents a critique of postcolonial theory and a defence of Marxism as a theory of revolutionary change in the postcolonial world.

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[EurekaRepublic]

How do you mention India so many times without once mentioning the drain of wealth from 1757 to 1947? Have you ever read the Patnaiks?

[TheRamenofs]

Israel is mainly backed by America and west militaristically and logistically and financially, the biggest foreign aid that sent from America alone is normally spent on Israel. Incomparable to the Arab regimes.

[lecheflan]

Epifanio San Juan, Jr. has been writing about this stuff since forever.

[MegaTambourineman]

Benificiaries of the system... are but naturally counter argumentative!

[TheRamenofs]

Even Lenin claimed the same about the bribed western workers when answering the question why capitalist class is able to maintain dominance in in the core west. And it’s one of the main reasons why there will be no revolution in west. Even if you look at the major upheavals in modern Europe, most of it did not happen in the core capitalist countries, it happened in the peripheries and China, even the Portuguese and the French movements that happened in 60s and 70s was triggered by the revolution in Algerian and the ex colonies. It’s a historic fact, the Core capitalist countries will never have a revolution, even the French Revolution regressed and it relapsed few years after

[pungvsbobawhoami]

There is a long tradition within marxism itself that theorizes regarding imperialism and world systems. I fear that alot of your points here seem to negate some of the theoretical advancements made in the Marxist tradition

[MegaTambourineman]

Talk about how Stalin failed to control Kuomingtan ! And the narrative was split between backward countries and industrial nations !

[zacnieprawisz]

I think the economic difference between workers of poor and rich countries had always been an issue. I have heard German workers didn't care about the Russian revolution and average Russian peasant had been living entirely different live to an average German worker who had water, electricity, etc. Now Russia and Germany are more similar but we still don't feel the same class solidarity towards Bengali or Congolese workers. We should but the majority of our working class doesn't. It is like Lenin predicted in the "On the United States of Europe": real work had switched to global South, while we, the "working class of the first world", are basically just servants for the global capitalist class (most of us work in services, take care of global capitalists' finances and entertainment).

[TheRamenofs]

You are so wrong almost about everything

[kh-bmgn]

Sorry, but this was a pretty poor critique built on Marxist insecurity.