Early in 1962 Robert F. Kennedy, then Attorney General in his brother's administration, traveled around the world as a sort of good-will ambassador of the United States. On his re-turn he addressed the annual luncheon of the Associated Press. In his talk, printed in the New York Times of April 24th, he related the following incident:
I was introduced in Indonesia to another large student body and a boy at the end of my speech got up and asked a question. In the course of this question he described the United States as a system of monopolistic capitalism. And when he said that expression, half the student body applauded.
So I said, "Well now, I'd like to find out. I am a representative of the United States here. What is it that you mean by monopolistic capitalism. What is it that defines that description in the United States? You said it in a derogatory sense. What is it that meets the description in the United States? What do you mean by monopolistic capitalism?
And he had no answer. And I said, "Well now, anybody who clapped, anybody who applauded when this gentleman used that expression-what is it that you understand by monopolistic capital-ism?" And not one of them would come forward.
If Kennedy thought that the refusal of his audience to debate the subject of monopoly capitalism indicated a lack of knowledge, he was surely very much mistaken. Indonesian students, like their counterparts in the underdeveloped countries all over the world, know a great deal about monopoly capitalism, having seen its ugliest face and suffered the consequences of its global policies in their own lives. But it is hardly surprising if they feel that it is too serious a subject for glib definitions or clever debating points.
Kennedy's questions remain, however, and we may pay him the compliment of assuming that they reflect a state of genuine ignorance which is shared by most of his countrymen. This book is addressed to any of them who are really interested in answers and are willing to put in the necessary time and effort to gain some understanding of an extraordinarily complicated and difficult subject. We hope too that it will be of use to the students of Indonesia and all the other countries of the underdeveloped world in achieving a fuller and clearer comprehension of a reality whose importance they already recognize.
One type of criticism we would like to answer in advance. We shall probably be accused of exaggerating. It is a charge to which we readily plead guilty. In a very real sense the function of both science and art is to exaggerate, provided that what is exaggerated is truth and not falsehood. Anyone who wishes to claim that we have overstepped the bounds of this proviso should be prepared to present his own version of the truth about American society today. Such efforts we welcome. For the rest the final test of truth is not anyone's subjective judgment but the objective course of history.
This book has had an unusually long period of gestation-almost exactly ten years from the first tentative outline to the date of publication. Factual material for illustrative and narrative purposes was gathered and used as needed, but there has been no systematic attempt at updating, nor have we tried to take account of all the significant works bearing on one aspect or another of our subject as they have appeared. This is, as the subtitle states, an essay, not a treatise, and it makes no pretense to comprehensiveness.
Most of our intellectual debts will be clear from the text and footnotes and call for no special mention here. For careful editing and innumerable improvements in presentation and style we are indebted, as both of us have been on many occasions in the past, to John Rackliffe.
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