The development in the world the past year has sharpened the contradictions inherent within the imperialist system and has thus also accentuated the need for a deepened analysis of the mechanisms that push the development forward.

To be able to do this, this presentation will focus on the analysis presented by Lenin in his pamphlet Imperialism as the Highest Stage of Capitalism. Here, he explored the mechanisms that decided and decide the development of international capitalism. In the course of this article, the mechanisms and features that he identified will be discussed, and light will be shed on problematic approaches that readers take to Lenin.

The main theoretical points, which will also be substantiated throughout the text, will be laid out in the following sections. The basis of this analysis is the simple statement that imperialism is capitalism in its modern form. This statement is simple enough, but as we move forward, we will see that it harbours much more than meets the eye.

First of all, it becomes necessary to not separate modern capitalism and imperialism. Rather, capitalism today exists in its final stage: the imperialist stage, or the stage of monopoly capital. Apart from representing the stage where the objective conditions for the transition to socialism have matured, it means that it has ceased to be characterized by free competition, but is instead characterized by monopoly capital. Hence, there is no difference to be made between capitalist and imperialist states. In fact, the argument will be made that the two adjectives can be used interchangeably when referring to the contemporary mode of production.

Within this system, every capitalist state struggles to advance within the hierarchy that is capitalist competition. Representing their respective bourgeoisie, the capitalist states will struggle for market shares, for raw material, for transport routes, for different geopolitical advantages and so on. Naturally, this also implies preventing every other state from achieving their own goals.

This does not mean that divisions do not exist within this system or between these states. However, the point is that these differences are quantitative and not qualitative. These states are not different by nature, but rather in strength and development.

Perhaps the most quoted passage from Imperialism… is where Lenin presents his brief summary of the main features of imperialism. This might also have been his biggest mistake.

However, the mistake is not theoretical, but rather pedagogical, as it has invited readers to be satisfied with the summary and not go beyond it. In turn, this invites a reading that is sloppy and his warning that all definitions have a “conditional and relative value” that “can never embrace all the concatenations of a phenomenon in its full development” have too many times not been heeded, but rather ignored. [1] The features, which most readers will be familiar with, read as follows:

(1) the concentration of production and capital has developed to such a high stage that it has created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life; (2) the merging of bank capital with industrial capital, and the creation, on the basis of this "finance capital," of a financial oligarchy; (3) the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities acquires exceptional importance; (4) the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves and (5) the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed. [2]

In the most extreme cases, this sloppiness amounts to an assumption on how to use these features. Too often, they are uncritically used as a way to decide whether an individual country is imperialist or not. This presents a whole array of theoretical and scientific problems.

When one uses Lenin in this way, one necessarily encounters several problems. These problems are unavoidable and show very clearly the scientific shortcomings of translating the main features of imperialism into criteria that are applied to every country. Certainly, not everyone uses Lenin like this, but some of the questions that will be discussed in the following are relevant as a critique to most ways of using Lenin that one encounters today.

The first problem that one encounters is the issue of quantification:

1. When dividing the capitalist nations of the world into either capitalist or imperialist, one must necessarily deal with the issue of quantification. To put it simply: at what point does a capitalist nation turn into an imperialist one? How concentrated does production and capital need to be? How developed must finance capital be? How much must the role of capital export have grown as compared to the export of goods?

The attentive reader will immediately acknowledge the problems. In order to decide whether a country is imperialist or capitalist, one must necessarily quantify the features. If this is not done, the decision to label them in either way becomes arbitrary and loses any scientific meaning. On the other hand, if one attempts a quantification of the features, one must simply choose a level of concentration, of development of finance capital and of capital export where a given country changes from capitalist to imperialist. How does one do this? Where does one find these levels and how does one justify them?

These are not the only problems with reading Lenin in this way. If one claims that there are capitalist and imperialist nations, one must also acknowledge that there are qualitative differences between them. Several questions arise: does a capitalist nation act differently compared to an imperialist one? Are the motives behind their actions different? If not, what are the analytical gains to be made from such a division?

The insistence of separating capitalist and imperialist nations also begs the question: who rules the capitalist nations? Lenin made it very clear that “[c]artels [have] become one of the foundations of the whole of economic life" in discussing the concentration of production and capital; logic dictates that this would not be the case in capitalist nations. [3] So, if cartels and monopolies do not constitute the foundations of the whole of economic life in capitalist nations, what does?

Likewise, if imperialism is monopoly capitalism and non-imperialist capitalism is characterized by free competition, it would also be logical to assume that this is what characterizes capitalist countries that have not only yet reached their imperialist stage. Consequently, one must reach the unavoidable conclusion that these nations are ruled by the petite-bourgeoisie, because they are certainly no peasants' or workers' states. As will be shown later on in the text, this argumentation will not hold, as there is no capitalist nation that does not go through the process of creating a finance capital.

These analytical and theoretical problems not only apply to those using Lenin in such a manner as described above, but also to those insisting on a separation of capitalist and imperialist states in general, regardless of method.

Moving on, one encounters even more problems in using Lenin in this way:

2. When applying Lenin's features to individual countries, the question arises: how to deal with the last two features? How are "the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves" and "the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed" supposed to be applied to an individual country?

To avoid this problem, there are two main ways forward: one can ignore these two features and focus on the ones previously mentioned or one can interpret this as the participation of given monopolies in the "formation of international monopolist capitalist associations" or a given state's participation in the division of the world.

It is obvious that the first route leads to a complete falsification of Lenin and it is nothing but intellectual dishonesty. It is a dead end.

The second route is more reasonable, but one necessarily faces the question: if this was the way Lenin intended his analysis to be interpreted, why did he not simply write of the participation of countries and monopolies in the division of the world?

Now, we reach a crucial point: this is not at all the way in which Lenin understood his own analysis and it certainly is not the way he wanted others to interpret it. Instead, one can use the two last features as clues - they hint at the object of analysis: namely, the capitalist system at its imperialist stage.

Just as above, the place of departure will be the features that Lenin identified, but in opposition to the views presented above, the features will not be treated as criteria, but rather as just features. This means understanding them as processes, which are at all times pushing development forward in every capitalist country. [4]

So, in the following, the different manifestations of these features - or rather, processes - will be discussed as they appear in a variety of different capitalist nations.

This process is the first object of analysis in Imperialism... and from the start Lenin makes clear his debt to Marx. He writes about bourgeois economists who try to…

...kill the works of Marx, who by a theoretical and historical analysis of capitalism had proved that free competition gives rise to the concentration of production, which, in turn, at a certain stage of development, leads to monopoly. [5]

In the same passage, he writes about…

…[t]he facts show that differences between capitalist countries, e.g., in the matter of protection or free trade, only give rise to insignificant variations in the form of monopolies or in the moment of their appearance; and that the rise of monopolies, as the result of the concentration of production, is a general and fundamental law of the present stage of development of capitalism.

What Marx claims and Lenin accentuates is that this tendency is present in every capitalist country, at every point. The policies pursued in a given capitalist country at a given time will not stop this tendency, as evidenced by reality, and a given country cannot, as Kautsky maintained, choose to follow an imperialist policy or not. [6]

The top one richest percent in the US owned 31.4 percent of the wealth in the United States in 2020, while the same number in India was 40.5 percent. However, in Britain and France, the top one percent merely owned around 22-23 percent of the total wealth of their respective countries in 2020. In Sweden, the top one percent owned 34.9 percent of all the wealth; in Nigeria and South Africa, the same number was at 44.2 and 40.8 percent respectively. Topping the league is Brazil, where the richest one percent of the population owned 49.6 percent of all the wealth.

These numbers say quite a lot but at the same time, they do not give the whole picture. What they do not say anything about, is the level of development of each country and their place in the capitalist hierarchy. The concentration of capital within a given country does not say much about the character of the wealth, from where it is derived and so on. On the other hand, it is evident how useless these numbers become when one tries to use them to decide whether or not a country is imperialist or not. Using these numbers in such a way, would indicate that after Brazil, Nigeria would be the most developed imperialist country in the world, while both Britain and France would be at the other end. The point is very simple: one cannot use the numbers in this way. Rather, one can conclude that capitalism will concentrate ownership of capital and production in every country and as a tendency inherent in capitalism, it plays its role in every capitalist country.

Just as before, Lenin stresses that this process is intimately connected to capitalism as such. In fact, he begins his analysis by writing the following:

We now have to describe how, under the general conditions of commodity production and private property, the "business operations" of capitalist monopolies inevitably lead to the domination of a financial oligarchy. [7]

In other words: it is not possible to imagine a capitalist country that does not develop a financial oligarchy.

What we see is the development of capital to a higher level, forming the basis for the concentration of capital and production, but also for the export of capital, which is the next feature to observe. But first, Lenin will be tested against reality.

The readers will be more or less familiar with the situation in the western countries, which is why the spotlight will be directed to another country, usually never mentioned in any discussion on imperialism, and yet it is torn between the two biggest imperialist blocs: Ukraine. This will serve as an example, but it is of course possible to observe the same tendencies in every country.

When examining the pre-war economic reality of Ukraine, one can clearly observe the formation of a finance oligarchy, concentrated in the hands of a few people.

The richest man in Ukraine, Rinat Akhmetov, is the owner of SCM Holding, one of the biggest holding companies in the country. Connected to SCM Holding are companies active in metallurgy, energy, telecommunication, real estate, banking and insurance. Within the SCM-sphere, one can find the First Ukrainian National Bank, which was the 9th largest bank in the country in 2018 and the mining and steel company Metinvest, the biggest company in Ukraine and able to compete internationally.

Behind Akhmetov, we find Viktor Pinchuk. He is the founder of Interpipe, one of the leading manufacturers of steel pipes in the world. From this group, he branched out into several different industries. The group has been active in aviation, investment and finance, transport, media and real estate, to mention a few areas.

Just as revealing is the activity of the Privat Group, one of the biggest conglomerates in Ukraine. The group's assets are varied and not limited to Ukraine. Among them are investments in steel, metallurgy, oil, agriculture, food, media and chemical industry. Until a few years ago, the group also controlled the Privatbank. However, this was nationalized following a financial crisis.

It is possible to continue in this manner, but the object of the analysis is not Ukraine per se. Instead, it has been shown that the merging of industrial and banking capital into finance capital occurs in every capitalist country. Also in Ukraine, "the 'business operations' of capitalist monopolies inevitably lead to the domination of a financial oligarchy."

Of course, this does not mean that the Ukrainian finance capital can compete with the financial oligarchies of the more developed countries, but it is irrefutable that also the weaker and less developed capitalist countries form financial oligarchies. This being so, it is clear that there exists quantitative differences between capitalist states, and not qualitative ones - in every country one can observe a financial oligarchy, albeit on various levels of strength.

When discussing the export of capital, it is important to note that before Lenin, Marx noted the same tendency. In the third volume of Capital, he wrote the following:

As concerns capitals invested in colonies, etc., on the other hand, they may yield higher rates of profit for the simple reason that the rate of profit is higher there due to backward development, and likewise the exploitation of labour, because of the use of slaves, coolies, etc. [8]

The basis for this part of Marx’s analysis is that capital seeks out the branches of industry with the highest rate of profit. Capital must simply seek the most profitable investments. Lenin repeats this conclusion, although he uses other words:

The need to export capital arises from the fact that in a few countries capitalism has become “overripe” and (owing to the backward state of agriculture and the poverty of the masses) capital cannot find a field for “profitable” investment. [9]

To this effect, colonies served the capitalist nations well and offered further opportunities for investments, partly denied by the backward level of agriculture and poverty in the home countries.

However, one must also note that the export of capital is not simply a question of an export from richer countries to poorer ones. While the import of capital to the United States is only marginally lower than its export of capital, [10] and one can see that the top destination of Swedish capital is the United States. In 2021, the US absorbed 18.5 percent of all capital exported from Sweden, while the rest of the Nordic countries accounted for 18.9 percent of the capital exported from Sweden. [11]

However, this disproves neither Marx's nor Lenin's contention. Rather, it is necessary to understand "profitable investments" in a broader sense. These can be made with regards to access to markets, technology, transport routes, an educated workforce, infrastructure and so on.

Further, one must consider Lenin's phrasing. What does it mean that capital in "a few countries" has become overripe? Does it mean that one must find these "few countries" today and that there will always exist only "a few countries" that are overripe? This would be to leave the field of Marxism.

During Lenin's time, he could easily speak of "a few countries" because there were only a few countries where capitalism had developed! It would have been impossible for him to speak of developed capitalism in Africa or Asia, as these areas were either colonies or semi-colonies. Certainly, there was capital in the colonies, but it was not yet “overripe”.

Today, the situation has radically changed and it is possible to speak of capitalism in large parts of both Africa and Asia; as a twist of fate, Indian capital now controls the automobile industry in Great Britain!

All of this means that the system of capital export is much more multifaceted and that it criss-crosses the entire capitalist world. To accentuate this, the case of Lithuania will briefly be discussed. [12]

Lithuania is an important market for Swedish capital, with big companies like Ikea, ABB, Tele2, Telia Sonera, Swedbank and SEB. Many of these investments are made into the free trade zones of Klaipeda and Kaunas. It is relatively easy to draw the simple conclusion that due to lower wages and worse working conditions, Lithuania offers more profitable investments for Swedish capital. In fact, the investments made in Lithuania accounted for around one fifth of the total foreign investments made by Swedish companies in 2016. To stop here, would mean to have a classic example of an oppressed nation. However, this would paint an incomplete picture of the situation.

While capital is being exported from Sweden to Lithuania, capital is simultaneously being exported from Lithuania to other countries. [13]

In Belarus, Lithuanian capital can be found in more than 500 Belarusian companies and one Lithuanian lawmaker made the claim that "[e]very second rich Lithuanian has business in Belarus". Every year, investments in the range of 80 million USD flow from Lithuania to Belarus.

Apart from Belarus, investments have been made in Poland, where Lithuanian capital can be found in the energy sector, as well as in retail. Also in Ukraine, investments have been made in the retail sector. In Latvia, Lithuanian capital flows into the construction sector, where hundreds of millions of Euros have been invested.

Why is this relevant? Because it shows very clearly the hierarchy that exists within the capitalist system, which in turn highlights the very problematic idea that some nations are oppressed, while others are doing the oppressing. At the same time, the flows of capital show clearly the strength of the different capitalist countries, and their ability to assert their influence. One also arrives at a very important conclusion at this point: this is the expected development of capitalism.

The export of capital influences and greatly accelerates the development of capitalism in those countries to which it is exported. While, therefore, the export of capital may tend to a certain extent to arrest development in the capital-exporting countries, it can only do so by expanding and deepening the further development of capitalism throughout the world. [14]

Although short, this paragraph speaks a lot. One must recognize – as Lenin did before it had happened - that capitalism has developed; it has expanded and deepened its roots across the entire globe. This means that it is not possible to speak of "a few countries" but instead it is necessary to speak of a system of capitalist countries, struggling within a hierarchy.

As previously mentioned, the division of the world is intimately tied up with the existence of colonies:

As there are no unoccupied territories—that is, territories that do not belong to any state in Asia and America, it is necessary to amplify Supan's conclusion and say that the characteristic feature of the period under review is the final partitioning of the globe-final, not in the sense that repartition is impossible; on the contrary, repartitions are possible and inevitable-but in the sense that the colonial policy of the capitalist countries has completed the seizure of the unoccupied territories on our planet. [15]

It is necessary to acknowledge that the world has changed. Colonialism no longer exists, apart from leftovers; the division of the world cannot look like it did during Lenin's time. Development has not gone backwards and capitalism has spread, all areas of the world remain occupied, not as colonies, but as independent actors on a capitalist stage. We simply have many more actors vying for a place in the sun.

In Latin America, Chile, Brazil and Mexico have emerged as regional powers; in Africa, South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt contend for regional influence; in the Middle East, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran have clashed in both Syria and Yemen; in Asia, strong powers, able to compete on a world level are challenging the old order; in both Europe and Asia, Russia is reversing its previously defensive policy in relation to the Euro-Atlantic bloc to better match the aspirations of the Russian bourgeoisie and to meet the expansion of Euro-Atlantic imperialism.

There are also a lot of smaller agents that tie their lot to their bigger counterparts. Swedish capital is moving ever-closer to American and German capital; Kazakh capital is balancing between Western and Eastern imperialism; countries such as Hungary are members of one imperialist alliance but still unable and not entirely interested in severing ties to Russia, one of the main imperialist competitors of the EU.

This reality forms the basis of the competition between the capitalists and their respective countries. We cannot speak of a division and redivision of the world in the same manner as Lenin did. Rather, we must speak of the competition within the imperialist hierarchy.

Within this hierarchy, which constitutes the capitalist system in its imperialist stage, all capitalist nations act. They form alliances with each other based on the common interests of the monopolies. However, since capitalism develops unevenly, intra-imperialist contradictions emerge and the alliances become inherently fragile and inevitably become rearranged. In other words, the existence of imperialist alliances, such as the EU or NATO, are not eternal and unchanging.

This does not mean that the stronger countries do not exert influence over or impact the weaker ones, based upon their position in the imperialist system. However, this is not merely a matter of subordination, but rather reflects the alignment of the weaker with the stronger so as to better accommodate the interests of their respective bourgeoisie. In this vein, we maintain that the membership of Sweden in NATO is not a matter of occupation or forceful subjugation, but rather in line with the interests of the Swedish bourgeoisie, which needs to act more forcefully in a world characterized by sharpening contradictions.

In the text, the argument has been made that instead of separating capitalist and imperialist nations, one should view the system as imperialist, not differentiating between capitalist and imperialist nations. To further substantiate this claim, it is fruitful to look at how Lenin himself viewed Czarist Russia.

In Imperialism..., Lenin touches upon the subject of Russia several times, which gives the reader a very clear idea of how he viewed both Russia and imperialism. In his chapter on financial oligarchies, he discusses the Russian banks and makes clear that their size does not come close to those of the Western banks, especially when we consider the fact that one fourth of their relatively modest assets were "national" - the rest were foreign:

According to these figures, of the approximately 4,000 million rubles making up the "working" capital of the big banks, more than three-fourths, more than 3,000 million, belonged to banks which in reality were only "daughter companies" of foreign banks. [16]

In the sixth chapter of Imperialism... he writes of Russia that it is "...a country most backward economically, where modern capitalist imperialism is enmeshed, so to speak, in a particularly close network of pre-capitalist relations." [17] This certainly makes for an interesting – as well as at first sight contradictory – analysis; what to make of a nation where pre-capitalist relations dominate and whose banks are dominated by foreign capital?

He gives the answer himself. In his text The Discussion On Self-Determination Summed Up, which he wrote at approximately the same time as he wrote Imperialism..., he writes about how "...Russia set a world record for the oppression of nations with an imperialism that is much more crude, medieval, economically backward and militarily bureaucratic." [18]

There is no doubt that if a country like this emerged today, many would hesitate to call it imperialist, citing Lenin himself and his features. Left would be categories such as capitalist or pre-capitalist, perhaps semi-colonial or oppressed. All of these would in turn open the door to catastrophic conclusions, such as the assumption that a country like this could be anti-imperialist. Unfortunately, this analysis has found its way into the communist movement and it is deeply opportunist and anti-socialist. Had Lenin and the Bolsheviks embarked upon such a route, it is reasonable to assume that they would have ended up on the wrong side of history, and the single most important event in the history of the world would never have occurred.

It is obvious that Lenin himself never tried to differentiate between capitalist and imperialist nations based on his own analysis. If nothing else, one must assume that if he had intended for his analysis to be used in such a way, he would have actually presented such an analysis.

With this text, certain theoretical and analytical difficulties that arise when one tries to apply Lenin in such a manner as described above have been highlighted. Several problems arise, for which there are no answers: which class holds power in what country? At what point does a capitalist nation become an imperialist one? Where are the analytical gains by making such a distinction?

As mentioned in the beginning of the text, this route is a theoretical and political dead end. Instead, one must stress the importance of seeing the dynamics within the system. What is meant by this is to see the world as it is, to see its complexity. It is evident that capitalism has evolved, that it has pulled almost the entire world into its sphere and created a national bourgeoisie in many countries that previously lacked one, which has made competition much sharper and more complex. Capitalism has moved away from the division of the world as Lenin discussed it, which accentuates the need to use his method, not interpret every word he wrote as if we were dealing with a holy scripture.

Every country acts according to the same principles - to sum, they better the position of their own monopolies in the international struggle, so as to secure a maximum profit both in the long and short term - and in this regard, there is no qualitative difference between the weakest and the strongest capitalist nation. This makes the division between capitalist and imperialist nations superfluous, and it serves to cloud the workings of the capitalist system.

This is especially dangerous in times of sharpening international contradictions, as it has moved too many communists to side with one capitalist against the other, abandoning any pretense of proletarian internationalism. To side with the weaker capitalist against the stronger is to allow oneself to be caught in an unending loop, as there will always be weaker and stronger capitalists. The object of the communist parties must instead be to form a proletarian standpoint, completely apart from any bourgeois and capitalist influence.