ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a contextual framework and sets the stage for an analysis of the forces of change that have swept across the political landscape in Latin America in recent years. The focus is on the development and resistance dynamics of these forces of change. The chapter is organised as follows. First, it reviews the dynamics of what might be understood as the new geoeconomics of capital in Latin America and the corresponding politics and reality. The chapter then elaborates on certain dynamics associated with the advance of resource-seeking ‘extractive’ capital (productive investments in the extraction of natural resources and the export of these resources in primary commodity form) in the development process. At issue here is the interaction between two modalities of capital accumulation—one based on the exploitation of labour, the other on extraction of natural resource wealth and the exportation of these resources in primary commodity form. The chapter ends with a discussion of the geopolitics of capital in the current context, with reference to the forces of resistance engendered in the capitalist development process.
