Contribution to the 13th
International Communist Seminar
Brussels, 2-4 May 2004
www.icsbrussels.org , ics[at]icsbrussels.org
Karl Marx Society
Hungary
András SZÉCHY,
historian,
member of the leadership of the KÁROLY MARX SOCIETY
and the CITIZENS FOR PEACE movement
1. CHARACTERISTICS OF "NEW IMPERIALISM" IN OUR AGE
The new imperialist conquests are rooted in the ground of modern capitalism. Capitalism gained new momentum by implementing the achievements of the scientific-technological revolution. Its superiority first of all in the military sphere is being used for continued threats and blackmailing, for intervention in the life of sovereign countries, their occupation, establishment of "vassal governments" and comprador bourgeoisie by continuously violating international law as well as for the establishment of military bases in every continent of the world. It forces economically and politically dependent countries into economic and military alliances and aspiring to total expansion in order to occupy the globalizing world. (Recent facts indicating these are: the "exsanguinating" of the Eastern European countries including the Soviet Republics by the arms race and their "incorporation" by economic means, the intervention into the life of the peoples of Balkan, South America and Middle East, the war against Afghanistan and Iraq, their occupation under the pretext of "fight against terrorism", storming Haiti, etc., etc.)
"New imperialism" is a new phase of modern capitalism. In the competition for super profit the multinational companies necessarily strive for acquiring new markets, capitalist integrations. Modern technology increasingly replaces manpower, restructures production processes, increases unemployment, semi-employment even in the "developed countries" and divert capital toward cheaper sources of labour force, in less developed areas. Reoccurring crises of overproduction are shaking the world, or certain regions and create enormous difficulties as well as new opportunities for speculation in the financial markets. A mass of small and medium size enterprises go broke and even the competitiveness of the national bourgeoisie is being incapacitated. Ecological crisis also encourages the involvement of new areas in the course of acquiring sources of raw material and energy and for the translocation of hazardous and polluting production to underdeveloped countries. Social tensions are increased by population explosion, spreading of undernutrition, diseases and the new type of not only elementary but the so-called functional illiteracy, the lag of general and vocational education that cannot keep up with the speedy changes of employment. Mind-manipulation via Americanised mass culture aiming at hegemony, fomentation of hostilities among peoples and religions, the sharpening of antagonism between a handful of rich people and the fast increasing poverty in the world cause no less harm, than those mentioned above.
Today, conquest and colonialization put on new forms: it appears first of all in the form of exerting influence on economically dependent pseudo-democracies, pretending parliamentary democracies and "law abiding" states within alliance systems depending on multinational capital. And naturally if they deem it necessary they don’t hesitate to use open violent interventions, local and regional wars waged by high-tech arms. All these necessarily generate broad, multi-coloured anti-imperialist mass movements of resistance against imperialist globalism, self-defence of sovereignty and what is even more, it increasingly brings to the surface the conflicts of interests within the individual economic, political and military groupings.
2. THE USE OF "NEW IMPERIALIST" MEANS IN EASTERN EUROPE, PARTICULARLY IN HUNGARY
Combining "cold war" with partial "hot war" conflicts (North Korea, Vietnam), the fast increase of arms race and fostering internal conflicts (Yugoslavia, Hungary, China, Albania, Czechoslovakia) have deterred the Socialist and anti-colonialist countries from the task of a more dynamical development of their civil spheres and exhausted the countries that belonged to the East European Socialist community bearing the major burdens of securing the peaceful balance in the bipolar world. The individual countries were not able to keep up with the modernisation competition primarily in the civil sphere, and it has become impossible to develop the society, the living standard in a balanced way. CMEA has lost its stamina, the tactics of détente has been replaced by the deliberate policy of disruption. Yugoslavia, Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and even the GDR have increasingly fallen into the debt trap of Western capitalist financial circles and they could not escape the accompanying cultural and political penetration. The so-called "euro-communist" new revisionism has gained ground in the leadership of the party and the state as well as in the field of ideology. Cadres of the change of system had been systematically groomed abroad by providing different scholarships (Fulbright, Soros and others). The economic crises of the 70’s and 80’s have driven the countries of the Eastern European Socialist community to depression and then to bankruptcy, Gorbacsov’s policy disintegrated even the Soviet Union and finally the new imperialism led by USA forced the countries of the strongest Socialist conglomerate to capitulate and suffer defeat. Naturally this created a more difficult situation for the less developed Asian Socialist countries having vast reserves, and Cuba, this small country isolated in Latin America as well as for the entire radical worker’s and democratic national liberation movement.
In Hungary under the imperialist pressure and due to its historical traditions, social composition and geopolitical position the new revisionists-reformists converting to social democracy (splitting the united workers’ party and founding the Socialist Party in the autumn of 1989) have executed the capitalist restoration in connivance with the clerical-nationalist right-wing conservative and radical forces (Hungarian Democratic Forum, Smallholders and Christian Democratic parties) and with the bourgeois liberal groups (Free Democrats Association and the young democrats organisation). The coalition led by the Hungarian Democratic Forum and supported by the German CDU-CSU (historically the German capital had the greatest influence on the Hungarian economy) had come to power and formed the first Government after the change of system. It immediately threw open the door for capitalist privatisation providing preferential treatment to the multinational companies, breaking up the peasant cooperatives and placing their clientele in positions of power on every level of the society. The Hungarian economy and society found itself in a very grave situation due to the restoration of capitalism. Multinational companies had acquired more than two-third of the national property. Production and the standard of living of the population sharply declined and even today it hardly reaches the level of 1989. Unemployment has increased to a great extent. The gap between the level of development of Western and Eastern Hungary, and between the living standard of rich and poor people expanded to an unbearable extent. Hungary has again become the country of "three million beggars", 40% of the population lives under subsistence level. For this reason the conservative government had been replaced by a Socialist-Liberal coalition. However, this Government had to introduce strict economic restrictions in order to ensure the restoring of the balance of the economy. Due to these restrictions the voters punished this government and voted again to a right-wing government. However, this government further increased the state support of well-off people, it has particularly extended benefits to middle-class youth in order to create their future voter’s base. Due to these favouritisms, corruption, en masse illegal acquirement of public property and the deterioration of the living conditions of working people helped again the Socialist-Liberal coalition to come to power and form a government. However, the current government has to face a difficult situation due to the Iraqi war and the sustained world recession, while these circumstances have encouraged the unifying extreme right wing and right wing to become even more aggressive that keeps the country in a permanent state of tension.
Following the change of system the government immediately joined the European Council. It has initiated the termination of CMEA and the Warsaw Treaty. At the same time it has concluded an association agreement with the European Community and applied for membership in the NATO and the European Union. Although 85% voted yes in the plebiscite on the issue of joining NATO but more than half of the population did not participate in the voting.
3. THE HUNGARIAN PEACE MOVEMENT AGAINST THE NEW IMPERILAIST WAR
The Hungarian Government – in order to acquire a few "good marks" - joined in the wars inspired by the imperialist powers (German, British, French) in particular in the disintegration of Yugoslavia even before it has become a member of NATO. The first government after the change of system secretly delivered arms to the Croatians. Following the USA intervention the conservative Boros Government has authorized the use of Hungarian air space by NATO air force, and the next government has authorised the establishment of a military base in Southern Transdanubia. That was followed by sending an armed engineer unit to Bosnia to be included in other units in the Balkan region. Even before these steps had been taken the movement "For the Peace of Balkan" has been launched with the participation of well-known scientists, artists, left wing politicians, public figures, and involving trade unions, progressive civil organisations, pacifists, greens, different peace-loving religious communities. Following the retaliatory wars started under the pretext of fight against terrorism, and particularly after launching the Iraqi war this movement has broadened by the continuous activities of the "Citizens for Peace" movement including frequent street demonstrations, theoretical conferences, petitions addressed and delivered to the Government and Parliament, collecting and delivering aid to those who suffered harm in the wars, participation in international demonstrations and conferences, etc. It is the grave responsibility of the Hungarian Government that it has given authorisation among "the eight signatories" to Bush and Tony Blair for starting the Iraqi war and has sent soldiers although with a subsidiary role to this war and it has not yet recalled them in spite of domestic and international demands.It is the characteristic of the Hungarian peace movement that the fight against imperialist war is strongly connected with their fight for social rights, social justice, for defending and developing democracy and for solidarity with the fight of the peoples for freedom. The Hungarian peace movement is also a multi-coloured cooperation respecting the independence and autonomy of the individual trends; they make their decisions on the basis of consensus leaving ample room for independent initiatives. The participants of the Hungarian movement are the following: a) pacifists, humanists, anti-militarists, progressive religious communities who are against all sorts of aggression and war but also accept the requirement of social justice; b) the ATTAC – Hungary association representing a driving force of the movement, that also fights for social justice; in our country, unlike the international ATTAC movement, this movement has a marked anti-capitalist character, working together with the progressive trade unions and it is closely connected with similar trends within the social world movement; c) "the greens" – who connect their fight for peace and social justice with the protection of environment; d) there is a faction within the Hungarian Social Forum that follows the "euro-communist" trend of the Worker’s Party with the difference that it finds acceptable to cooperate with right wing circles propagating social demagogy and nationalist ideology – and are in sharp dispute with those who follow the teaching of scientific socialism; e) and last but not least the Marxist core including communists, left wing socialists; their civil organisation is the KÁROLY MARX SOCIETY and its members are active in every progressive group trying to broaden – in conformity with the concrete Hungarian situation – the cooperation of the progressive democratic movements.