A Guide to Understanding the US-Ruled World System

Post Information
Print & pdf

MAPPING THE DYNAMICS OF EMPIRE AND DOMESTIC DECAY.
Rulers and Ruled in the US Empire: Bankers, Zionists, Militants (Clarity Press: Atlanta, 2007).
This book by James Petras* provides a comprehensive guide to the systemic dimensions of the US empire.

A Guide to Understanding the US-Ruled World System

A brilliant and succinct guide to the systemic dimensions of the US Empire: the social forces which rule it, the politico-economic and military means whereby US domination is assured, and the current state and possibilities of resistance.

Expanding upon his highly successful book, The Power of Israel in the United States (now available in translation in Japanese, Indonesian, German, Italian and Arabic), Petras reviews how financial capital dominates the US economy, and sets the parameters for political debate on the US role in the world economy and its implementation.

Questions of war and peace in the Middle East, however, are set not by oil interests or by finance capital, but by the Israel-Zionist power configuration, which exerts tremendous leverage over Congress, the mass media and the executive branch. This conflict of interests within the US ruling elite has led to a mounting schism. In pushing the US to engage in the disastrous Iraq war and promoting a further potentially catastrophic assault against Iran, the Zionist/militarist sector of the ruling elite has come into conflict with the interests of US finance capital, which seeks to entrench itself worldwide through the global liberalization of trade.

Finance capital and its political representatives in the US government depend on the support of client regimes in other countries, including those considered relatively ‘center left’, to sustain the US empire. However, in pursuit of freedom, justice, national independence and peace, powerful social movements and in some circumstances armed national resistance forces have emerged to challenge the power of the financial ruling class, the Zionist power configuration and their collaborator client rulers.

Faced with a world in which the rule of financial, Zionist and collaborator elites brings us to the brink of catastrophic war in the Middle East and social decay at home, Americans need to know who is calling the shots, how they do so, and why their interests do not coincide with the common good­of either the USA or the rest of the world.

These questions have more than academic interest, ­the answers affect our everyday lives. From the crises of workers’ rights, forced emigration and our health care system to the false panaceas of foreign investment and trade liberalization, from the plunder of domestic infrastructure in support of foreign wars to the infliction of genocides upon distant populations, ­this is the window we need to get a clear grip on the calamitous impacts of the US-dominated world system, and assess the possibilities of global resistance.

~*~

*James Petras, a former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York, is the author of more than 62 books published in 29 languages, and over 600 articles in professional journals, including the American Sociological Review, British Journal of Sociology, Social Research, and Journal of Peasant Studies. He has published over 2000 articles in nonprofessional journals such as the New York Times, the Guardian, the Nation, Christian Science Monitor, Foreign Policy, New Left Review, Partisan Review, TempsModerne, Le Monde Diplomatique, and his commentary is widely carried on the internet.

He has a long history of commitment to social justice, working in particular with the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement for 11 years. In 1973-76 he was a member of the Bertrand Russell Tribunal on Repression in Latin America. He writes a monthly column for the Mexican newspaper, La Jornada, and previously, for the Spanish daily, El Mundo.

The James Petras website

He can be reached at: jpetras@binghamton.edu



Comments

Leave a Reply






Anwaar’s articles appear simultaneously here at Truth Spring and at Soul Vibes in The Pakistan Tribune.


US loses its status as economic world power
DAVOS, Switzerland, 2008
.: ARTICLE BLOCKED :.
ON MARCH 2008
Who links to my website?