Economics
Social Sciences
Ideology
Imperialism
Cultural studies
Cultural Critique
Eurocentrism
Uneven Development
Post-colonial studies
Samir Amin critiqued cultural views of Orientalism and proposed alternative, structural analyses of imperialism, Eurocentrism, uneven development and ideology.
What can contemporary development economics and quests for decolonization learn from this?
aeon.co
What can contemporary development economics and quests for decolonization learn from this?
aeon.co
In this piece I try to make Samir Amin's ideas more accessible to a wider contemporary audience (thanks @samhaselby for the push!).
Many already know Edward Said, who became very influential with his 1978 Orientalism. I therefore start with Amin's critique of Said from the Left.
Many already know Edward Said, who became very influential with his 1978 Orientalism. I therefore start with Amin's critique of Said from the Left.
With his ‘Eurocentrism’ (1988), Amin offers an alternative materialist understanding of how capitalism and imperialism have shaped global colonial inequalities and ideologies, which contrasts with Said's understanding based on discourse.
Amin argued that the widespread idea of capitalism emerging from endogenous European characteristics of rationality etc was flawed, as it disguises the imperialist nature of the capitalist system. Rather than objective scientific explanation, Amin saw Eurocentric ideology.
For Amin, Eurocentrism was a polarising, ideological global project that reinforced systemic inequalities by legitimising a global exploitative system, with real material impacts, especially for people in the periphery.
So while for Said challenging attitudes and culture might be enough to challenge imperialism, for Amin opposing imperialism always returned to the matter of capitalism.
For Amin, assuming that capitalism can develop in the periphery in the way that it allegedly did in Europe was a logical impossibility. This led him to develop alternative views of development, centering Marxist understandings of capitalism & uneven development.
Amin contributed with many specific concepts, but as I argued with @ushehweduk and @mariadyveke in @ROAPEjournal last year, it is perhaps his APPROACH to political economy that holds the most potential for restructuring development economics as a field. roape.net
We argued that his approach pushes us to think structurally, temporally, politically and creatively about global economic problems in a way that defies disciplinary boundaries. (elaboration here 👇)
Now that much of economics has come to rely on either methodological individualism or methodological nationalism, Amin's insistence on the global structures underpinning the global system of exploitation provides an important counterweight.
This focus on global structures led him to contribute to the development of dependency theory - a rich and diverse South-centred tradition that takes the polarising tendency of capitalism and the constraints it places on the postcolonial world as its starting point.
As a proponent of global historical materialism, the temporal aspect of understanding contemporary problems was also important as he saw the historical spread of global capitalism is the key to understanding the polarisation between the core and the periphery.
Amin’s approach was also fundamentally political. He never denied that his ultimate goal was to change the world for the better. This distinguishes him from economists that claim that social science is neutral and apolitical.
Using concepts from the centre to understand the world from the periphery, Amin called himself a ‘creative Marxist’. He emphasised that he would start from -rather than stop at- Marx. So he extended ideas of class struggle & exploitation to analyse imperialism, unequal exchange.
Our ROAPE issue (w/@mariadyveke @ushehweduk @raymondobush) shows how Aminian concepts like delinking, imperialism, unequal ex & eurocentrism can be adapted to understand issues today, ft @Jayati1609 @sjndlovugatshen @platanomics @Musthaq_F @maxajl @nssylla
Amin's approach to political economy and commitment to a South-centric social science may also offer a more radical approach to decolonizing the university and to challenging Eurocentrism in the social sciences, which many scholars are now rushing to Said for guidance on.
Following Said, much of the efforts to decolonise the social sciences has been limited to challenging racist tropes and Eurocentric portrayals in the curriculum and in academic discourse. This is, ofc incredibly important, so what would an Aminian perspective add?
1: Taking an Aminian perspective would highlight the need to promote South-centric understandings of the world, as well as critiques of capitalism & imperialism. This matters because such critical scholarship has largely been marginalised from economics curricula worldwide.
2. Amin can help us see the ideological foundations of mainstream economics, as well as social science theorising at large. In this, he gives us the necessary starting point to challenge a field that remains Eurocentric.
3. Amin's lived political experience also stands in sharp contrast with many initiatives from universities in the core that try to incorporate scholars from the periphery into their (often Eurocentric) institutions, rather than supporting Southern institutions and epistemologies.
4. Amin’s work serves as a crucial reminder that colonisation and imperialism were and are about material resources, and therefore decolonisation or anti-imperialism cannot be pursued through changes in epistemology alone.
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