Historical Materialism and the International Question: A Non-Reductionist Theory of International Relations

Abstract

This article develops a methodological and theoretical framework for a historical-materialist theory of international relations that avoids the danger of economistic reductionism. It aims to resolve the so-called ‘international question’ concerning the relationship between historical materialism and the theory of international relations. The proposed solution relies on the method of functional explanation (drawn from analytical Marxism), centred on the concept of overdetermination (taken from the Althusserian tradition) and focused on the concrete phenomena of the exploitation of labour and the centralization of capital. Responding to the criticism that Marxism cannot theorize ‘the international’ without simplistically reducing political phenomena to economic relations between social classes, the article argues that functional explanation provides the methodological key for preserving the scientific character of historical materialism while addressing the complexity of geopolitical phenomena. Drawing on Wolff and Resnick’s spatially disaggregated analysis of class processes, on analytical Marxism’s effort to ground functional explanation in the social sciences, and on the concept of overdetermination, the central thesis establishes that the centralization of capital is functional to the exploitation of productive labour, and that centralization in turn functionally explains the use of political means at both the national and international levels. This framework is used to define contemporary imperialism, analysed through net primary income flows and asset manager capitalism. The research shows that a Marxist theory of international relations can answer concrete political questions – why states exert diplomatic pressure, why conflicts emerge, why imperialism develops – without resorting either to common-sense explanations based on sufficient causes or to theories centred on economic determinism.

Historical materialism; International Relations; Functional Explanation; Overdetermination; Imperialism; Centralization of Capital.