THE CONCEPT OF ECONOMIC IMPERIALISM
T HE term 'imperialism' has in the course of its rapid career become variegated and elusive to a degree. The word has been accepted as a key to the understanding of contemporary history. But there is reason to doubt whether the writers, who in the past used it most confidently in this sense, were certain of what they meant by it, and did not, in fact, become enmeshed in its ambiguity. There is, however, one connotation which tends to overshadow all others and to convey to the reader a clearcut meaning tantamount to a great historical revelation. This connotation is implied most clearly when the noun 'imperialism' is qualified by the adjective 'economic'. Indeed authors and propagandists are sometimes so certain of the economic interpretation as to drop the adjective and to assume that the reader cannot but think of special economic interests whenever the word imperialism is brought out.' The meaning of the word in this application is as follows. The men representing the interests of capital in the greater countries of the West have obtained control of the foreign and colonial policy of their governments. The nations which are commonly referred to by the term of 'western civilization' have been goaded by their capitalists into bringing weaker peoples oversea within their grip and into exploiting them. The same had been done by Venetians, Dutchmen and Englishmen in former centuries; but-so the doctrine runs-getting hold of undeveloped countries did not become a dominant factor in politics until capitalism reached its full efflorescence-that is to say, until the last decades of the nineteenth century. It is then that the age of imperialism-or of economic imperialism or of modern imperialism-Came into being. How long it lasted-whether imperialism is still vigorous in our days or already far on its decline-on this question opinions differ. They differ on other points too. Is the capitalist interest which dominates the whole movement rooted in the first