The Capitalist World System and Economic Imperialism in East Asia

Historically, East Asia accounted for about two-fifths of the world population and economic output. It was incorporated into the capitalist world-system in the mid-nineteenth century. As the East Asian countries responded to the challenges imposed by the British-led Western capitalism, their economic and geopolitical fortunes diverged. While China, Korea, and Taiwan were peripheralized, Japan became a member of the imperialist club by the early twentieth century. After World War II the US-led geopolitical restructuring created favourable political conditions for economic take-off in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and eventually China. As China becomes the world’s largest economy measured by purchasing power parity and makes investments throughout the world, a growing number of scholars now call China a new imperialist power. This chapter evaluates the value flows (represented by labour time embodied in export commodities) between China, Japan, South Korea, and the rest of the world. It is expected that the results should show that China continues to transfer more surplus value to the rest of the world than it receives from the rest of the world. China would be best characterized as a non-imperialist semi-peripheral country. As China’s demand for energy commodities and raw materials grows, it intensifies global ecological and geopolitical contradictions. These contradictions are unlikely to produce a world war fought between China and the United States. But it does contribute to the acceleration of global environmental crisis and sets limits to China’s long-term economic growth.