Militarism is deeply integrated into the workings of capitalism. Wars are profitable, and the military and police are useful for quashing opposition. Military might also underpins imperialist capitalist projects. It ‘opens’ new markets and ‘provides’ access to resources. In her contribution to the “Pluriverse of Peace” series, Nela Porobić Isaković calls for deeper engagement with feminist and anti-militarist alternatives.
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There is no gentle way to put this. We live in war economies. We live in fascist states. We live in democracies that are turned upside down, where protesting genocide is considered terrorism and the mass murder and starvation of children are normal government policies. We live in a world where burning down the planet is justifiable, as long as the profits for the 1% keep going up. Our societies are consumed by militaristic thinking, and demanding peace, justice, and equality within and between countries is discounted as a naïve, utopian dream. We live in a world where, every day, someone, somewhere is experiencing, recovering from, or preparing for war. On top of that there is the interpersonal violence, in particular gender-based violence, as well as everyday economic, political, and state violence.
War as our ground zero
Although we have policies and institutions that promote peace, the truth is that our societies are founded on war. We have laws that regulate war, but not those that regulate peace. And if we think of ourselves as part of a global whole, beyond our local experiences, we have never truly lived peace. We have always been stuck in between wars. In between the wars that were and those that will come; those that are waged on our behalf and those that are waged against us. At this very moment we live in societies whose political and economic elites are again on a war path.
Despite of it all
But we also live in a world where many of us, despite the propaganda, violence and oppression, despite economic, political, and social precarity, do our best, across different geopolitical contexts, not just to survive this violence, but also to stand up against it. From decolonial, social justice, and equality struggles to the anti-war and environmental movements, we exercise hope and defiance as a “form of discipline,” to borrow from Mariame Kaba. We do that on a daily basis, not because we don’t understand the odds against us, but despite them.
The system isn’t broken, and their acts are not random
Knowing and understanding what we are up against is imperative for the success of our struggles. We are not experiencing a temporary moment in which a few madmen are leading us into chaos. The system isn’t broken, and their acts are not random. For those of us who have experienced imperialism and (neo)colonialism firsthand – who have lived with wars, genocide, fascism, police brutality, and political, social, and economic violence – the precariousness of the current moment was not sudden, either globally or locally. The processes that have played out on our bodies and in our communities – including military violence, structural adjustment programs, austerity measures, border violence, and the extraction of labor and resources, to name a few – have all led up to this moment. We are living through the evolution of a world order centered on the capitalist projects of expansion, appropriation, extraction, and exploitation of people, communities, states, animals, the environment, and the entire planet. All in the name of profit.
A system evolving
The evolution of this world order started with enclosure processes and violent dispossession of people in Western Europe; continued with colonization and enslavement of people and violent resource extraction in the Global South; followed by imperialism that enabled the continuation and expansion of capitalism, using economic power and influence, as well as military might. Off and on this system takes on different shapes, one of which is neoliberalism. But no matter the shape, it has always been true to its aim: ensuring that capitalist relations become part of every sphere of our lives, from culture, health, and education to interpersonal relations and emotions.
The end of history or the beginning of destruction
By the 1990s it was argued that we had reached the “end of the history.” We were told that with the fall of the Soviet Union, Western so-called liberal democracies had emerged as the best and final form of human governance, even though these ‘supreme’ democracies were all deeply wedded to militarism, capitalism, and Western, white supremacy. Deregulations, privatization, competition, and minimalization of the state were promoted by the mainstream political and economic actors as the ‘next stage’ in global development.
Even though social justice movements pushed back against this, they were violently repressed and the national and international elites diligently carried on the implementation of these neoliberal policies. As David Harvey notes, “Almost all states, from those newly minted after the collapse of the Soviet Union to old-style social democracies and welfare states such as New Zealand and Sweden, have embraced, sometimes voluntarily and in other instances in response to coercive pressures, some version of neoliberal theory and adjusted at least some policies and practices accordingly.” Neoliberal capitalism has become an unquestioned economic and political system, influencing discussions on democratization, peacebuilding, the rule of law, gender equality, and human rights.
International financial institutions, such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group, played a key role in advancing this agenda. Regional organizations such as the European Union also played a key role through their accession and foreign policies. What also proved very useful was Official Development Assistance, which was infused by the neoliberal values of individualism, entrepreneurship, privatization, and competitiveness. But also military interventions came in handy, for example in Iraq, as well as ‘peace building’ (look at the Oslo Agreement and Dayton Peace Agreement), or ‘recovery’ and ‘reconstruction’ processes. Ukraine is a very prominent and most recent example of that.
Prosperity for the few, inequality and destruction for the most
We were promised development, prosperity, and equality in return for accepting capitalism as the only possible economic and political system, but these are nowhere in sight. Instead, an unchecked belief in economic growth, supported by extractive industries, dependency on fossil fuels, high energy consumption, mass production, and unconstrained military spending, has led us straight to ecological and humanitarian disaster.
As if that were not enough, we are facing growing inequalities in access to and distribution of resources, both material and otherwise. Capitalism thrives on divisions, such as those based on gender, class, and ethnicity. People are constantly pitted against each other for the few resources we are given access to. Our public resources and infrastructure are depleted. Our labor is exploited, in particular the social reproductive labor, which is indispensable for capitalism and subordinated to profit. Social reproductive labor encompasses all the work involved in producing life itself. This includes biological reproduction, paid and unpaid care work, social provisioning (e.g., volunteering), emotional support, the reproduction of culture and ideology, and care for the environment and other-than-human life. Basically, everything that is needed for people to reproduce themselves, but also everything that is needed for reproduction of new labor force.
However, although capitalism benefits from social reproduction, it does not pay for it. Capitalism takes social reproduction for granted and treats it as an ever-expandable natural resource. This labor is primarily provided by women, yet it is consistently undervalued – especially the labor of women from racialized communities. Capitalism thrives at the intersection of racist, patriarchal, heterosexual norms, enabling white, cis men (occasionally joined by few white women) to dominate and exploit everyone else.
The masters’ tools have come home
Another consequence of the evolution of capitalism is that democracies no longer exist. We have autocracies. There is oppression and suppression of activism. We have fascist states. We are accustomed to seeing capitalist core countries either export these things to or support them in countries in the periphery and semi-periphery. Well, the masters’ tools have now come home.
That is what we are seeing in Germany with anti-genocide protesters being brutalized on the streets of Berlin. That is what we see in the UK with Palestine Action being put on the terrorist list. That is what we see when EU member states violate people’s rights to freedom of speech and assembly and when people lose jobs because they speak up against genocide. We see this when people in the US are hunted down on the streets and forcefully disappeared; when working for gender equality and believing in everyone’s right to live a decent life becomes an indicator of violent extremism. That is fascism coming home.
Nothing less than the dismantling of capitalism
We did not arrive at this moment by chance, but through political and economic choices imposed on us on a daily basis through institutions and practices built to support capitalism – even if it means killing, starving, and annihilating an entire group. The genocide in Gaza, and all the genocides before, are proof enough. Subsequently, addressing the collapse of our societies necessitates a feminist, anti-capitalist, anti-militarist, and decolonial lens. Nothing less will do. There is no reforming our way out of this.
The patriarchal hierarchies in human relationships and the capitalist extraction and depletion of people and our environment go hand in hand. In imagining our alternatives to capitalism, we must understand how complex experiences and needs, resulting from our gender, class, ability, race, ethnicity, migration status, and more, shape our social, political, and economic realities. This understanding is imperative to dismantling the power structures that lead to the invisibilization and marginalization of our experiences and to our oppression. Thus, unsurprisingly, feminists see a very clear link between demolishing capitalism and getting rid of patriarchy.
Adopting planetary alternatives
Our anti-capitalist alternatives must also have a decolonial perspective. They must reflect on and address colonialism’s role in destroying the environment, people, and entire countries. Our alternatives need to deconstruct the neocolonial and imperialist structures of today that continue to uphold a world in which the capitalist core violently dominates countries in the periphery and semi-periphery in all spheres of life. Echoing discussions from an international feminist collective of which I am a part, in pursuit of anti-capitalist alternatives, we must reject the capitalist worldview’s division of the world and seek alternatives that are planetary, interconnected, and dependent on each other for well-being.
Some years back Ray Acheson and myself co-authored a chapter in their book “Abolishing State Violence: A World Beyond Bombs, Borders, and Cages,” outlining how some of the anti-capitalist alternatives could look like. We argued for a need to move away from the endless pursuit of growth and move towards a more equitable, just, and ecologically sound political economy. We argued for recognition of and reparations for the past and present harms caused by capitalism, including the effects of climate change. The question of who is causing the destruction and who is paying the price must be clearly addressed and rectified.
Beyond militarism
Finally, well-being cannot exist alongside militarism. Militarism is deeply integrated into the workings of capitalism. Wars are profitable, and the military and police are useful for crushing the opposition. Military might also underpins capitalism’s imperialist projects. It ‘opens’ new markets and ‘provides’ access to resources. Currently, military spending is at an all-time high of 2.7 trillion USD. Meanwhile, the estimated cost of ending poverty, addressing inequalities, and tackling the ecological crisis is 4 trillion USD.
Capitalists’ priorities are clear:war over peace, and profit over people. Therefore, anti-capitalist alternatives that are not also anti-militarist, as well as anti-militarist initiatives that are not also anti-capitalist, are not sustainable. We must push for full disarmament and demilitarization. We must change the narrative that our security can only be guaranteed through the use of force and violence and that peace can only be achieved with the very tools that threaten it. This narrative must be dismantled, and a new feminist narrative must be established.
The new narrative must be committed to defining security by policies and institutions that create political, social, economic, and cultural structures allowing all life forms and natural and social environments to coexist and thrive. Only then can we be truly safe and finally live in peace.
This gave me a lot to think about. Thanks for sharing.