On the one hand, hooray for supporting the development of infrastructure in Africa and stuff. On the other hand, booooo for being a top trading partner with the Zionist Entity, and selling drones to Indonesia, and all that.
So what the Hell do you make of it all! Like I get that there’s this term called “realpolitik” which is somehow relevant, but I’d like a longer explanation than just one word. Like how does the good and the bad fit together at its core?
You could certainly write tomes about this topic — many people have done exactly that — and maybe I’m being a bit incurious to expect someone to serve me a quick answer on a silver platter instead of diving into as many articles and PDF books as I can get my hands on… But I’m also just kind of tired of having such extremely underdeveloped views on the most populous AES state and country in general, after I came to unlearn or mistrust whichever views I’d had on China previously.
“China is capitalist because it still has the law of value” is a bunch of leftcom nonsense.
Fascinating. Explain further? How does commodity production and firms chasing profit not define capitalism? If you are not a Marxist feel free to assert that and come up with some new method of defining these things. Or did the soviet unions failed struggle over commodity production and revisionism under Khrushchev not make that point clear? Is it merely the Communist parties perceived dominance, despite many other commenters on this website explaining how the “Marxist” theory that is produced and consumed by the party being of extremely mediocre quality? Or perhaps the recent plenum’s assertion that the “free market” will continue to define every aspect of state investment? This is fundamental stuff, the ability of the state to stave off the falling rate of profit, but the reality that that continues to define literally every aspect of china’s economy can not be divorced from its politics. http://www.news.cn/politics/20240721/cec09ea2bde840dfb99331c48ab5523a/c.html
How does this opinion square with Lenin and Stalin’s writings on the nature of external trade controls, “the tax in kind” or any other sorts of works on the NEP and its understanding as the literal inverse of what occurred during china’s opening up period, regarding specifically the imposition of capitalism upon collective farming? Stalin would critically ask if the rate of value is predominant or controlled, and clearly the chinese states massive investments in propping up vast portions of the economy that are suffering capitalisms depredations is indicating the economy is critically defined by that aspect, in stark contrast to NEP or stalin era soviet union.
Again, as I have previously laid out here, whether it be the claim that the market is superior to the state, that import substitution is necessary, or that this is just a neo-NEP, all fail with a fairly basic reading of lenin, stalin, or mao’s writings? If you believe capitalism is a superior method of production than socialism than we might as well discard the entirely of the soviet union and north korea’s experiences regarding this and start from square one.
Again comrade, we arent among liberals, we can have sincere and in depth discussions about the nature of the modern political economy and china’s place in that world. and not sugarcoat anything. I am happy to provide additional reading and discuss with you on any of these topics.
I am genuinely curious in the thoughts of a modern dengist. If leftcommunism is just everything to the left of your given ideological strata, then thats a profound disappointment compared to Mao’s intense debates on the topic. if its something more substantial, I would hear it. None of this is to criticize china’s vast accomplishments, although again as laid out in previous comments almost all of those accomplishments can be attributed to the maoist period, with the deng period merely cannibalizing everything the socialist period built up.