“Inherent in the dynamics of capitalism is a powerful drive to earn profits, invest them, innovate and thus grow the economy….These features of capitalism, as they are constituted today, work together to produce an economic and political reality that is highly destructive of the environment.” (7) Much of the book explores this drive of capitalism toward unlimited quantitative growth, the role of the market in this drive, the centrality of the corporation in carrying out accumulation, the wastefulness of consumption under capitalism, and the domination of the corporations over governments.

On the one hand it encloses through its territorial borders, while on the other, through the subordination of people’s imaginaries to patriotic identities

The basis of imperialism is the division of the world into an “anarchic” system of independent nation-states. There is no larger structure of decision-making that regulates human society on a global scale. Nation-states are thus only constrained in their conduct on the world stage by fear of what other states can do to them. Competition between nation-states puts pressure on each state to maximize its power to avoid subordination to others. States that have little power will be under severe pressure to align themselves with more muscular states that have major military and economic forces at their disposal. The logic of the nation-state system is similar to that of competition in the sphere of production. The world’s productive forces are divided into competing business organizations where each can survive only as long as its sales revenue is greater than its costs. Competition forces companies to constantly seek innovations that lower their per unit costs, especially labor costs. A company with greater resources will be much more likely to survive in the constantly changing world of market forces and attempts by competitors to take away their market share. A company must pursue economic expansion to survive in such a world. Competition between nation-states has the same logic, leading inevitably to the “arms race,” that is, technological innovation to enhance the destructive power that a state can bring to bear on the world scene. “Dominate or be dominated” is as much the logic of competition between nation-states as between businesses. The imperialist tendency is inherent in every state. The formation of new nation-states can no more put an end to imperialism than the formation of new businesses can put an end to capitalism. The “defeat” of one empire in this or that region, or the long-term decline of a formerly dominant power, will not bring an end to the system of imperialism but merely facilitate the rise of a new empire, or the rise of numerous mini-imperialist tendencies, with all the dangers of military conflict that implies.

The State, therefore, is the most flagrant, the most cynical, and the most complete negation of humanity. It shatters the universal solidarity of all men on the earth, and brings some of them into association only for the purpose of destroying, conquering, and enslaving all the rest. —Mikhail Bakunin[1]

Stalin’s famous, ‘nations have a common language, territory, economic life and culture’