Social spending and underdevelopment in the advanced periphery : mid-Wales and northern Saskatchewan

• Main Author: Collier, K. D.
• Published: Swansea University 1991
• Subjects: 337
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.636276

The process of peripheral capital formation in Wales and in Saskatchewan required not only the subjugation of local capital, import of monopoly capital from the centre, and the intervention of the state to sculpt the form of accumulation. It also required state intervention to mould the social relations of underdevelopment. This project tests hypotheses on the role of social spending in forming these relations. The subjected economies of northern Saskatchewan and mid-Wales were unable to develop independently at the same pace as the centres, and thus were underdeveloped, in roles characteristic of peripheral economies vis-a-vis the centres. The functioning of the world capitalist economy created an overlay of dominant forces on each economy. Mid-Wales and northern Saskatchewan, as parts of that system, are portrayed through data of varying kinds. Some means by which the relations of domination and subordination are constructed are found in the roles of the local and national states, which enhance and maintain the ability of capital to turn a surplus competitively against others in the world system. These state activities act as antidotes to class issues and struggles internally. State activities, alongside those of capital and labour in their struggles, shape the manner in which the peripheries are attached in specific 'articulations of modes of production'. Attachments of particular peripheries in mid-Wales and northern Saskatchewan were theorized, and data was collected for relevant time periods. Capital relations - meaning the social relations of owner and worker under capitalist processes - were examined in relation to the operations of the state roles described, and specific reference was made to the way in which social policy, social welfare and social programming in general is used to sculpt these capital relations.