Samir Amin

1960 to 1963. In 1963 he was oered a fellowship at

the Institut Africain de Dveloppement conomique et de
Planication (IDEP). Until 1970 he worked there as well
as being a professor at the university of Poitiers, Dakar
and Paris (of Paris VIII, Vincennes). In 1970 he became
director of the IDEP, which he managed until 1980. In
1980 Amin left the IDEP and became a director of the
Third World Forum in Dakar.

2 Work
Samir Amin has written more than 30 books including
Imperialism & Unequal Development, Specters of CapitalSamir Amin (Arabic: ( ) born 3 September 1931) ism: A Critique of Current Intellectual Fashions, Obsolesis an French-Egyptian Marxian economist.[1] He lives in cent Capitalism: Contemporary Politics and Global Disorder and The Liberal Virus. His memoirs were published
Dakar, Senegal.
in October 2006.
Samir Amin at the 2012 Subversive Festival in Zagreb.

For Samir Amin (1997), the ascent and decline is largely

determined in our age by the following ve monopolies

Biography

1. the monopoly of technology, supported by military

expenditures of the dominant nations

Samir Amin was born in Cairo, the son of an Egyptian

father and a French mother (both medical doctors). He
spent his childhood and youth in Port Said; there he attended a French High School, leaving in 1947 with a
Baccalaurat. From 1947 to 1957 he studied in Paris,
gaining a diploma in political science (1952) before graduating in statistics (1956) and economics (1957). In his
autobiography Itinraire intellectuel (1990) he wrote that
in order to spend a substantial amount of time in militant action he could devote only a minimum of time to
preparing for his university exams.

2. the monopoly of control over global nances and a

strong position in the hierarchy of current account
balances
3. the monopoly of access to natural resources
4. the monopoly over international communication and
the media
5. the monopoly of the military means of mass destruction

After arriving in Paris, Amin joined the French Communist Party (PCF), but he later distanced himself from Soviet Marxism and associated himself for some time with
Maoist circles. With other students he published a magazine entitled tudiants Anticolonialistes. In 1957 he presented his thesis, supervised by Franois Perroux among
others, originally titled The origins of underdevelopment
- capitalist accumulation on a world scale but retitled The
structural eects of the international integration of precapitalist economies. A theoretical study of the mechanism
which creates so-called underdeveloped economies.

The economic performance over the last few years

teaches us an important lesson about the evolving mechanisms of the future Kondratie cycle, that began in the
mid-1980s. Let us recall, that for Dependency and World
Systems theory in the tradition of Samir Amin (1975),
there are four main characteristics of the peripheral societal formation:
the predominance of agrarian capitalism in the national sector

After nishing his thesis, Amin went back to Cairo,

where he worked from 1957 to 1960 as a research ocer
for the governments Institution for Economic Management. Subsequently Amin left Cairo, to become an adviser to the Ministry of Planning in Bamako (Mali) from

the formation of a local bourgeoisie, which is dependent from foreign capital, especially in the trading
sector
1

5 PUBLICATIONS BY SAMIR AMIN

the tendency of bureaucratization

these are nothing more than works of charity and means

of indoctrination, insofar as they are not means of support
specic and incomplete forms of proletarisation of for the working class struggle against the system which is
the labor force
responsible for its misery.
Besides, beyond being reactionary on denite matters
In partial accordance with liberal thought, (i) and (iii) ex(see the status of women in Islam) and responsible for faplain the tendency towards low savings; thus there will
natical excesses against non-Muslim citizen (such as the
be
Copts in Egypt), political Islam even defends the sacred
character of property and legimitises inequality and all
huge state sector decits and, in addition, their twin the prerequisites of capitalist reproduction. One example is the Muslim Brotherhood's support in the Egyptian
chronic current account balance decits
parliament for conservative and reactionary laws which
empowers the rights of property owners, to the detriIn the peripheral countries. High imports of the pe- ment of the small peasantry. Political Islam has also alriphery, and hence, in the long run, capital imports, are ways found consent in the bourgeoisie of Saudi Arabia
the consequence of the already existing structural defor- and Pakistan, as the latter abandoned an anti-imperialist
mations of the role of peripheries in the world system, perspective and substituted it for an anti-western stance,
namely by
which only creates an acceptable impasse of cultures and
therefore doesn't represent any obstacle to the developing
rapid urbanization, combined with an insucient imperialist control over the world system.
local production of food
Hence, political Islam aligns itself in general with
capitalism and imperialism, without providing the
excessive expenditures of the local bureaucracies
working classes with an eective and non-reactionary
changes in income distribution to the benet of the method of struggle against their exploitation.[3]
local elites (demonstration eects)
It is important to note, however, that Amin is care insucient growth of and structural imbalances in ful to distinguish his analysis of political Islam from
the industrial sector
islamophobia, thus remaining sensitive to the antiMuslim attitudes that currently aect Western Society.[4]
and the following reliance on foreign assistance
Samir Amin is one of the advocates of Marxian dependency theory.
The history of periphery capitalism, Amin argues, is full
of short-term miracles and long-term blocks, stagnation
and even regression.

4 Awards

Samir Amins views on political

Islam

According to Samir Amin, Islam leads its struggle on the

terrain of culture, wherein culture is intended as belongingness to one religion. Islamist militants are not actually interested in the discussion of dogmas which form
religion but on the contrary they're concerned about the
ritual assertion of membership in the community. Such
a world view is therefore not only distressing as it conceals an immense poverty of thought, but it also justies Imperialism's strategy of substituting a conict of
cultures for a conict between the liberal, imperialist
centres and the backward, dominated peripheries. This
importance attributed to culture allows political Islam to
obscure from every sphere of life the realistic social dichotomy between the working classes and the global capitalist system which oppresses and exploits them.[2]
The militants of political Islam are only present in areas
of conict in order to furnish people with education and
health care, through schools and health clinics. However,

The Ibn Rushd Prize for Freedom of Thought for

the year 2009 in Berlin.

5 Publications by Samir Amin

1957, Les eets structurels de lintgration internationale des conomies prcapitalistes. Une
tude thorique du mcanisme qui a engendr les
onomies dites sous-dveloppes (thesis)
1965, Trois expriences africaines de dveloppement: le Mali, la Guine et le Ghana
1966, Lconomie du Maghreb, 2 vols.
1967, Le dveloppement du capitalisme en Cte
d'Ivoire
1969, Le monde des aaires sngalais
1969, The Class struggle in Africa

3
1970, Le Maghreb moderne (translation: The Magrheb in the Modern World)
1970, Laccumulation lchelle mondiale (translation: Accumulation on a world scale)
1970, with C. Coquery-Vidrovitch,
conomique du Congo 1880-1968

Histoire

1971, LAfrique de lOuest bloque

1973, Le dveloppement ingal (translation: Unequal development)
1973, Lchange ingal et la loi de la valeur

1984, Transforming the world-economy? : nine

critical essays on the new international economic order.
1985, La dconnexion (translation: Delinking: towards a polycentric world)
1988, Imprialisme et sous-dveloppement en
Afrique (expanded edition of 1976)
1988, Leurocentrisme (translation: Eurocentrism)
1988, with F. Yachir): La Mditerrane dans le systme mondial

1973, Neocolonialism in West Africa

1989, La faillite du dveloppement en Afrique et

dans le tiers monde

1973, 'Le developpement inegal. Essai sur les formations sociales du capitalisme peripherique' Paris:
Editions de Minuit.

1990, Transforming the revolution: social movements and the world system

1973, Lchange ingal et la loi de la valeur

1990, Itinraire intellectual; regards sur le demisiecle 1945-90 (translation: Re-reading the post-war
period: an Intellectual Itinerary)

1974, with K. Vergopoulos): La question paysanne

et le capitalisme
1975, with A. Faire, M. Hussein and G. Massiah):
La crise de limprialisme
1976, Unequal Development: An Essay on the
Social Formations of Peripheral Capitalism New
York: Monthly Review Press.
1976, Limprialisme et le dveloppement ingal
(translation: Imperialism and unequal development)
1976, La nation arabe (translation: The Arab Nation)
1977, La loi de la valeur et le matrialisme historique (translation: The law of value and historical
materialism)
1979, Classe et nation dans lhistoire et la crise contemporaine (translation: Class and nation, historically and in the current crisis)
1980, Lconomie arabe contemporaine (translation: The Arab economy today)
1981, Lavenir du Maosme (translation: The Future
of Maoism)
1982, Irak et Syrie 1960 - 1980
1982, with G. Arrighi, A. G. Frank and I. Wallerstein): La crise, quelle crise? (translation: Crisis,
what crisis?)
1984, 'Was kommt nach der Neuen Internationalen Wirtschaftsordnung? Die Zukunft der
Weltwirtschaft' in 'Rote Markierungen International' (Fischer H. and Jankowitsch P. (Eds.)), pp.
89 110, Vienna: Europaverlag.

1991, LEmpire du chaos (translation: Empire of

chaos)
1991, Les enjeux stratgiques en Mditerrane
1991, with G. Arrighi, A. G. Frank et I. Wallerstein): Le grand tumulte
1992, 'Empire of Chaos New York: Monthly Review Press.
1994, LEthnie lassaut des nations
1995, La gestion capitaliste de la crise
1996, Les ds de la mondialisation
1997, Die Zukunft des Weltsystems. Herausforderungen der Globalisierung. Herausgegeben
und aus dem Franzoesischen uebersetzt von Joachim
Wilke Hamburg: VSA.
1997, Critique de lair du temps
1999, Judaism, Christianity and Islam: An Introductory Approach to their Real or Supposed Specicities by a Non-Theologian in Global capitalism, liberation theology, and the social sciences: An
analysis of the contradictions of modernity at the
turn of the millennium (Andreas Mueller, Arno
Tausch and Paul Zulehner (Eds.)), Nova Science
Publishers, Hauppauge, Commack, New York
1999, Spectres of capitalism: a critique of current
intellectual fashions
2000, Lhgmonisme des tats-Unis et leacement
du projet europen
2002, Mondialisation, comprehendre pour agir

8
2003, Obsolescent Capitalism
2004, The Liberal Virus: Permanent War and the
Americanization of the World
2005, with Ali El Kenz, Europe and the Arab world;
patterns and prospects for the new relationship
2006, Beyond US Hegemony:
Prospects for a Multipolar World

EXTERNAL LINKS

[3] page 84, The World We Wish To See; Revolutionary

Objectives In The Twenty-First Century, Samir Amin
and James Membrez, ISBN 1-58367-172-2, ISBN 9781-58367-172-6, ISBN 978-1-58367-172-6, Publishing
Date: Jul 2008, Publisher: Monthly Review Press
[4] http://www.monthlyreview.org/090330amin.php

Assessing the

8 External links

2008, with James Membrez, The World We Wish to

See: Revolutionary Objectives in the Twenty-First Some writings by Samir Amin available on-line:
Century
2009, 'Aid for Development' in 'Aid to Africa: Redeemer or Coloniser?' Oxford: Pambazuka Press

Third World Forum: An Interview with Samir

Amin, Z Magazine

2010, 'Eurocentrism - Modernity, Religion and

Democracy: A Critique of Eurocentrism and Culturalism' 2nd edition, Oxford: Pambazuka Press

Empire of Chaos Challenged: An Interview with

Samir Amin

2010, 'Ending the Crisis of Capitalism or Ending

Capitalism?' Oxford: Pambazuka Press

U.S. Imperialism, Europe, and the Middle East

2010, 'Global History - a View from the South' Oxford: Pambazuka Press
2011, 'Maldevelopment - Anatomy of a Global Failure' 2nd edition, Oxford: Pambazuka Press
2013, 'The Implosion of Contemporary Capitalism'
: Monthly Review Press

Maldevelopment: Anatomy of a Global Failure

India, a Great Power?". Monthly Review 56 (09).

2005. Archived from the original on 2011-07-27.
Imperialism and Globalization
World Poverty, Pauperization & Capital Accumulation
U.S. Hegemony and the Response to Terror
Empire and Multitude

Writings about Samir Amin

Aidan Forster-Carter: The Empirical Samir Amin,
in S. Amin: The Arab Economy Today, London
1982, pp. 1 40
Duru Tobi: On Amins Concepts - autocentric/
blocked development in Historical Perspectives, in:
Economic Papers (Warsaw), Nr. 15, 1987, pp. 143
163
Fouhad Nohra: Thories du capitalisme mondial.
Paris 1997
Gerald M. Meier, Dudley Seers (eds.): Pioneers in
Development. Oxford 1984

References

[1] Samir Amin at 80. Red Pepper. Retrieved 28 March

2015.
[2] page 83, The World We Wish To See; Revolutionary
Objectives In The Twenty-First Century, Samir Amin
and James Membrez, ISBN 1-58367-172-2, ISBN 9781-58367-172-6, ISBN 978-1-58367-172-6, Publishing
Date: Jul 2008, Publisher: Monthly Review Press

A Note on the Death of Andr Gunder Frank

(19292005)
The Political Economy of the Twentieth Century
Africa: Living on the Fringe
Samir Amin: The New Challenge of the Peoples
Internationalism
The Center Will not Hold, the Rise and Decline
of Liberalism, Review of Wallersteins The Modern
World System IV: Centrist Liberalism Triumphant
Samir Amin. New Empire? In Search of Alternatives to Global Hegemony of Capital. (video at Red
TV)
The Political Economy of the Twentieth Century,
Monthly Review, Volume 52, Issue 02 (June 2000)
Critical review:
A review of Samir Amins Re-reading the Postwar
Period: An Intellectual Itinerary

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