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The present paper will not venture into a thorough analysis of the historical data After all, what is the use of venturing to analyse statements of statesmen and government officials made "at times under special circumstances", when a short run consideration is apt to upset any rough conclusion. It is simply important that one should try and defect the overall outline and trends, the projection of events and consequences on the future - in other words the effect on the world of changes made, and what the new political and economic constellation of the world system actually is. Such a concept of the new status can lead to the confirmation of certain new parameters in the world system or of certain variables determining the margins within which countries and economies will function in the years to come. This system of new parameters and variables may restrict freedom of function, create a more monolithic international system with m

Der Aufsatz schildert die Ursachen und widersprüchlichen Folgen der Internationalisierung der kapitalistischen Wirtschaft. Technologische Entwicklung, Massenproduktion und die Enge der heimischen Märkte machen die Transnationalisierung der Unternehmen ökonomisch adäquat. Neu daran ist vor allem die Internationalisierung im Produktionsprozeß selbst im Rahmen derselben Unternehmung, was zugleich eine neue Form der Kapitalkonzentration ist. Drei Widersprüche folgen aus dieser Entwicklung: den Nationalstaaten entgleitet die Kontrolle über die Unternehmen, die Technologieproduktion geht unkontrolliert vor sich, und einer internationalen Klasse aus Managern und Kapitalisten stehen nur national organisierte Arbeiterbewegungen gegenüber. (MH)

[Δε διατίθεται περίληψη / no abstract available] ; I would summarize the argument of this paperin the following points:a) Every scientific research is of political relevancein the Aristotelian as well as in a politoeconomiesense, or it is useless.b) Time and space as the two definitional elementsof comparison give the historical dimensionof the phenomena. Difference or similarity ofphenomena is thus reduced to difference of similarityof conditions at two or more points in timeand in space, which is a question of the reproducibilityof historical conditions.c) Comparison as a method implies the comparabilityof two things and aims at showing equalitybetween them or proving their inequality.d) Comparability is a function of the concept usedto define a phenomenon and in this sense relativeby definition.e) There are two distinct aspects in the process ofcomparison: the one referring to the identificationof a phenomenon—which means defining itsproperties—the other to the degree of similarity(or equality) of two or more phenomena at two ormore different points in time and/or in space.f) Comparison in a narrow sense as a method insocial sciences aims at measuring the degree ofsimilarity between two or more objects in timeand/or in space. The comparative method in anarrow sense is thus the techniques and proceduresof research in the service of the above aim.g) Every technique of measuring phenomena inthe process of comparing needs to be justified inits scope, in its implications, finally in relation tothe object of measurement.h) The operation of identification of phenomenain the comparative method is common to all socialsciences. Comparison as an operation ofmeasuring the degree of similarity between two ormore phenomena is not identical in all social sciences.The techniques of measurement for eachdiscipline differ according to the phenomena to beobserved and compared as well as according tothe general scope of comparing.i) The comparative method in a narrow sense hasbeen proposed and developed in the postwarperiod primarily as a method of comparingphenomena across cultures and nations.j) The main three plausible reasons for crossculturalcomparative research are: 1) the concernwith the economic development of developingcountries in the postwar period (historicalreason); 2) the testing of hypotheses and theoriesbeyond national boundaries aiming at revealing«laws» (comparison as a substitute for experiment)(methodological reason); 3) practical policyaims (political reason).k) The concept of «nation» is to be preferredto the concept of «culture» in discussing comparisonas a method of social research; crosscultur-al is taken, therefore, to mean crossnational.l) Diffusion leads to a homogenisation of phenomenaacross cultures and nations which has been increasingin the postwar period although this hasnot yet led to an elimination of national differences.m) It is possible to observe tendencies across culturesand nations, furthermore to detect developments,but it is questionable whether it is possibleto compare them in a strict sense for three mainreasons referring to the problem of identification,the reliability of data and measurement itself.n) Crosscultural comparison aiming at testingtheories or general hypotheses must find in atleast two systems the causes leading to the sameeffect in both of them (explanation part of atheory), furthermore to fix the conditions that aresufficient and necessary for a reproduction of thesame phenomenon at a later point in time or at adifferent point in space (prediction part of atheory). Such a task has been so far unsuccessful.o) Policy implications arising out of a study inother nations are only of conditional relevance forsome other. Even assuming the similarity of conditionsit is uncertain if the development of aphenomenon will follow the same track in a newcountry that it had followed in one or more othercountries previously.p) Also the comparative method is either uselessor is of political relevance (point a). On thegrounds of conclusion under o, the comparativemethod must be declared either as «useless» orpolitical in terms of politics, and not in terms ofpolicy implementation.

Racism is used to mean a system of values & norms of the majority in respect to a racial minority on the one hand & a legal & instit'al system on the other. Racism is thus the mechanism, discrimination the product. To ask for the pol'al economy of racism is to ask for its reason for existence, its final effects, which can be understood only within the frame of opposing interests on which the econ system is based. Looked at from this aspect racism appears as a variation of the mechanisms developed & used by the capitalist system to serve specific needs & goals. It is since the devlopment of capitalism in the colonial era that racism is practiced in the above sense & actually in a bi-dimensional form; racial groups are either dominated or dominant, the deciding factor being their relation to the surplus value created within the system in which they live. Under this aspect racial conflicts are in reality class conflicts, the discrimination of minorities aiming thus at facilitating or intensifying exploitation. With the help of the basic Marxian formula y = c + v + m, where y stands for production, c for constant capital, v for variable capital, ie wages & m representing precisely the surplus value appropriated by the capitalists, it is shown in 27 equations how racism works both in the case of dominated & dominant groups & to what effects. It is thus shown that the econ's of racism lies beneath its diff appearances as an ethnological, anthrop'al, psychol'al, sociol'al, geographical, historical, soc, or pol'al problem. Racism, if not considered in its econ's, appears as a case where history goes mad! AA.