Capitalismo extractivo, imperialismo extractivo e imperialismo: una aclaración

Abstract

In this article the «extractive capitalism», the «extractive imperialism» and the «imperialism» are analyzed in order to clear out the confusion on the debate about neoextractivism caused by the interchangeable usage of these concepts. Urgent attention is required to reinforce the comprehension about the underlying class struggle in the extractive industries. The strating point is the counterpoint developed by Petras and Veltmeyer about the theorical and political issues of the state role in their review concerning the theory of neoextractivism. In order to understand their arguments is necessary to involve the three concepts. Their analysis about the relation between capitalism and imperialism is crucial to understand the extractive capitalism and the extractive imperialism. The argument is that the extractivism is the incarnation of a particular form of productive activity in the capitalist era that deepens the capitalism in the capitalist periphery. The extraction of natural resources is not a purely capitalist process or imperialist; the human beings have extracted their livelihood from the nature since the primitive communalism until the current capitalism. It is not the specific productive activity of extracting natural resources, that is capitalist or imperialist, since the capitalism, and by extension, the imperialism is associated with a variety of productive activities. The productive activity must have a place inside a capital-work salaried nexus in order to belong to a capitalist kind. Some of the first expositions about the definitions of this concepts are reviewed to help the activists to have a clear comprehension about the debate of the neoextractivism.