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Concept
Anti-imperialism
Summary
Anti-imperialism in political science and international relations is a term used in a variety of contexts, usually by nationalist movements who want to secede from a larger polity (usually in the form of an empire, but also in a multi-ethnic sovereign state) or as a specific theory opposed to capitalism in Leninist discourse, derived from Vladimir Lenin's work Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism. Less common usage refers to opponents of an interventionist foreign policy.
People who categorize themselves as anti-imperialists often state that they are opposed to colonialism, colonial empires, hegemony, imperialism and the territorial expansion of a country beyond its established borders. An influential movement independent of the Western Left that advocated religious anti-imperialism was Pan-Islamism; which challenged the Western civilisational model and rose to prominence across various parts of the Islamic World during the 19th and 20th centuries. Its most influential ideologue was the Sunni theologian Muhammad Rashid Rida, a fierce opponent of Western ideas, who called upon Muslims to rise up in armed resistance by waging Jihad against imperialism and re-establish an Islamic Caliphate. Through his resolution in the Second World Congress of Comintern (1920), Lenin accused the anti-imperialism of Pan-Islamists of favouring the interests of the bourgeoisie, feudal landlords and religious clerics; and enjoined fellow communists to compulsorily fight Pan-Islamism. Since then, Soviet authorities regularly employed the charge of Pan-Islamism to target Islamic dissidents for anti-Soviet activities and fomenting anti-communist rebellions.
The phrase gained a wide currency after the Second World War and at the onset of the Cold War as political movements in colonies of European powers promoted national sovereignty. Some anti-imperialist groups who opposed the United States supported the power of the Soviet Union, while in some Marxist schools, such as Maoism, this was criticized as social imperialism.
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