Chapter 16. The largest economic crises. The phenomenon of state-monopoly economy

16.1. Economic crises of the first half of the twentieth century.

One of the essential features of the functioning of a market economy is the cyclical recurrence of economic phenomena. It is in this case about cyclical crises that have accompanied the history of capitalism since the beginning of the XIX century. down to the present. Today, economists have enough material to answer the question about the nature of this terrible phenomenon and what is most important is to work out recommendations for its prevention.

The economic crisis of 1900-1901 In the XX century. The world entered into a crushing industrial crisis of 1900-1901, which began almost simultaneously in Russia and the United States. First of all, he struck the metallurgical industry, and then the chemical, electrical and construction industries. Soon the industrial crisis of the beginning of the century became general, i.e. swept England, Austria, Belgium, Germany, Italy, France and other industrial countries, leading to the ruin of the mass of enterprises and causing a rapid increase in unemployment. Despite the brunt of the crisis, as it developed, more and more signs of a speedy recovery appeared: the prices of goods fell more and more, expanding demand, and with it the investment process was revived.

However, after the First World War, the nature of regularly repeated crises becomes somewhat different. This was most clearly demonstrated by the world's largest economic crisis of 1929-1933 in the history of capitalism.

The change in the nature of crises was associated with the transition of the economies of the world economy as a whole to the imperfect market regime, i.e. the market has lost its former capacity for self-regulation.

The formation of state - monopoly capitalism. The rapid development of production under the influence of the NTR at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries. strengthened the process of its concentration and centralization, the process of formation of monopolistic associations. The merging of industrial and banking capital led to the formation of the largest financial groups that occupied key positions in the main sectors of economic life. All-powerful corporations were not slow to interfere in the domestic and foreign policy of their states, putting it under control. The process of the formation of state-monopoly capitalism began, having acquired a special scope in the period of the First and Second World Wars.

Monopolies as the most powerful subjects of the economy in the pursuit of profit increasingly influenced the sphere of pricing. This not only led to serious imbalances in the national economy of individual countries, but also intensified international economic contradictions. Thus, the economic crises of the XX century. they are connected mainly not with hypothetical failures in the sphere of commodity and money circulation, but with the mercenary policies of monopolies. This is what determined the features of the course of crises, their cyclical nature, scale, depth, length and consequences. So, in the first half of the XX century. crises are becoming more frequent than in the previous period, while the stages of recovery and growth are shorter. Before the First World War, two significant crises were noted: the already mentioned crisis of 1900–1901, the crisis of 1907, and the pre-crisis state of 1913–1914. During the interwar period, there were three major crises of general overproduction: 1920-1921, 1929-1933, 1937-1938. At the same time at the stages of economic upsurges in the 20-30s. in most countries, unemployment and inflation persisted, becoming permanent, chronic, which was not observed previously.

The economic crisis of 1929-1933 The most protracted, deep and all-embracing crisis was the years 1929-1933, from which the USA and Germany suffered the most. Thus, industrial production in the United States decreased by 46.2% over the years, in Germany - by 40.2%, in France - by 30.9%, and in England - by 16.2%. The crisis has seized all countries of the world, and the decline in production in less developed countries was often deeper than that of the four economic leaders. For example, the industrial production index in Czechoslovakia fell by 40%, in Poland - by 45%, in Yugoslavia - by 50%, etc. Unprecedented scope reached unemployment. Thus, according to official data, in 32 countries the number of unemployed over the three years of the crisis (1929-1932) increased from 5.9 million to 26.4 million, there was a massive ruin of farmers, etc.

The fight against the crisis, the search for new methods and forms of counteraction against it have determined the general line of the policies of the governments of all countries. At first, the anti-crisis policy was guided by a well-known liberal approach. However, it soon became apparent that the doctrine of “non-interference” of the state in economic life, based on the concept of market self-regulation, is unsuitable in modern conditions.

Options out of the crisis. In this regard, since the beginning of the 30s. the activity of the state in the economic and social spheres increases markedly, the tendency towards the development of state-monopoly capitalism is clearly manifested. However, in various countries, the degree of state intervention was determined by the peculiarities of their historical development, the level and specificity of socio-economic and political relations. Nevertheless, it is possible to conditionally identify three main areas, three options, within which this phenomenon developed. One of them (liberal reformist) received its most vivid expression in the anti-crisis policy of the "new course" of President F. Roosevelt in the USA; the second (social reformist) is characteristic of the Scandinavian countries, France; The third (totalitarian) version of state regulation was most fully used in Germany.

The American version was based largely on the traditions of liberal economic doctrine, and therefore the emphasis was placed on indirect methods of influencing the economic and social spheres of life. The banking and financial reforms carried out by Roosevelt served as the starting point for the subsequent transformations. With the help of a strong budgetary and monetary policy, the state carried out major investment measures aimed at achieving optimal rates of economic growth; eliminated social tensions by funding programs for helping the unemployed, organizing public works, etc. The policy of state financing was supplemented with a complex of legal acts, skillful regulation of the tax system, protectionist measures, etc.

Despite the fact that the results of this trend were not felt immediately, but only after a rather long period of time, it turned out to be very acceptable in the foreseeable future. So, by the beginning of the Second World War, the United States had almost completely recovered from the effects of the crisis, however, like the UK, as well as a number of countries that applied the "new course" policy. It should be noted that this direction was chosen by countries with a higher level of economic development and strong democratic traditions.

The social reformist trend was characterized by a combination of strengthening the regulatory role of the state and the “socialization” of the economy, i.e. transition of individual enterprises and sectors of the economy to the state. Thus, in the 30s, the state sector in the economy grew significantly in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. The social democratic governments of these countries put foreign trade and capital outflow under state control, eased production credit by lowering loan interest, financed capital construction, agricultural production, etc. These measures were supported by a no less strong social policy that provided for a substantial improvement in pension benefits. , the creation of a state insurance system, the issuance of laws on the protection of motherhood and childhood, the development of labor law islation, finally, public financing of housing.

Similar trends in government regulation manifested themselves in France and Spain after the left anti-fascist forces came to power in them.

This trend was characteristic of countries where, for various reasons, the bourgeoisie did not have wide opportunities for socio-economic maneuvering and at the same time the positions of the left parties were strong. It should be noted that this option also did not lead to immediate positive results. Moreover, not all countries reformers managed to maintain an optimal balance in the activities, i.e. meet the needs of various social groups of citizens in a severe crisis. This created an instability in the domestic political situation, deprived the reforms of the sequence, and sometimes interrupted them, as happened in Spain and France with the victory of the right-wing forces. Nevertheless, the direction of state-monopoly capitalism turned out to be very promising, because today we have the phenomenon of “Swedish socialism” in the prosperous countries of Scandinavia.

Finally, a different picture was observed in countries that used a totalitarian direction, like Germany. It should be noted first of all that the liberal-reformist and social-reformist models were based on the system of market relations, and the totalitarian essentially eliminated them. This fundamentally different economic mechanism, characterized by over-centralization, took shape in the 30s-40s. also in Italy, Japan, Spain (after the victory of General Franco (1892-1975) and some other countries. They all tried to solve not only the task of overcoming the crisis, but pursued the more distant goal of the armed redivision of the world. Or rather, the super-task of the redistribution of the world and methods of overcoming the crisis.

Thus, the total militarization of the national economy becomes the main feature of the anti-crisis policy. To this end, the Fascist states widely used direct methods of intervention along with indirect methods. Moreover, the latter, as a rule, with the development of state intervention, became predominant. Suffice it to say that in these countries there is a constant increase in the public sector in the economy. In addition to enterprises of the military industry itself, there was a nationalization of the raw materials industries, the fuel and energy base, transport, etc. Along with this, compulsory cartelization was carried out (the incorporation of individual enterprises into the composition of large monopolistic associations, closely connected with the state). On this basis, the proportion of government orders increased steadily, and elements of directive economic planning developed.

As a result of this policy, unemployment disappeared in Germany a year later, from which countries that chose other models of state-monopoly capitalism continued to suffer. Economic growth, especially in heavy industries, has risen sharply. This model gave an instant positive effect that favorably distinguishes it from other models. It should be noted that after the end of the crisis of 1929-1933. most countries, with the exception of Germany and Japan, were in a state of sufficiently prolonged depression, feeling the impact of recurrent crisis.

And yet, despite the excellent rates of economic growth, Germany was on the verge of economic catastrophe: it should not be forgotten that the basis of its prosperity was an artificially promoted military situation, the collapse of the market based on forced over-centralization of the national economy. The continuation of the policy of militarization of the national economy not only did not solve the problem of restoring optimal, economic proportions, expanding the internal and external market, improving the financial system, harmonizing social relations, etc., but on the contrary, pushed these problems into a dead end. Only the unleashing of external aggression could put off an inevitable economic catastrophe. Therefore, since 1935, Germany, other fascizing countries are more and more actively drawn into military conflicts and ultimately begin World War II, the most widespread in the entire history of mankind.

The militarization of the fascist countries caused an intensification of the process of the arms race in the world. In this regard, in countries such as the United States, Britain, France and others, there was a tendency to strengthen state-monopoly capitalism before the war. However, this did not change their economic mechanism of the type of totalitarian model.

During the Second World War, as already noted, there was a rapid development of state-monopoly capitalism, and the intervention of states in economic life increased markedly. However, with its completion, a reverse process was observed, which indicates the extraordinary nature of this phenomenon. A confirmation of this can be the refusal of a number of countries to use state-monopoly capitalism with a centralized economic mechanism and return them to a market system. Its effectiveness was confirmed by the presence of rather long periods of rapid economic growth in these countries, which were called the German, Japanese, Italian “economic miracle”.