Today, imperialism is routinely pinpointed as the cause for western involvement in foreign affairs. The recent missile crusades in Libya and the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are three examples of western involvement in foreign affairs that are allegedly rooted in imperialism. There is no doubt that imperialism has played a major role in a number of western military operations; however, people disagree about when exactly imperialism became a primary foreign policy goal of western nations. More specifically, some people question whether imperialism played a role in World War I. Some, by contrast, believe that imperialism was not just an after thought, but a primary cause, of the war. In The ABC of Communism, Nikolai Bukharin silences the naysayer by insisting that "only an idiot can continue to believe that the war took place because the Serbs killed the Austrian crown prince or because the Germans invaded Belgium" (Bukharin and Preobrazhensky). In other words, Bukharin is insisting that imperialism caused World War I. While their were a number of complex factors that contributed to the first world war-such as international crises and increased militarism in the west-imperialism undoubtedly contributed to the start of World War I, though to blame imperialism entirely is, in my opinion, to dismiss the role of ongoing international crises and the burgeoning military might that also led to the start of the war.
In evaluating Bukharin's argument, one finds three schools of thought. The first of these, which Bukharin falls into, insists that imperialism was the sole or primary cause of World War I. The second school makes no mention of the role of imperialism in the start of the war. Theorists in this group instead focus on a range of other causes including militarism, nationalism, and capitalism (sometimes in combination); they do not, however, acknowledge imperialism as an integral component to the start of the war-albeit some...