Link: “What should socialists say about China?”
China is ruled by a Communist Party, and has been for seven decades—but it’s a “Communist” party more committed to international free trade and globalisation than many major pro-capitalist parties in the West. The state controls all of China’s most important industrial sectors and the financial system, and treats the private sector as a tame subordinate—yet China is producing new billionaires faster than anywhere in the world, has only the shadow of a welfare state and produces more consumer commodities for massive corporations like Apple and Honda than any other country. What kind of a society is this, that so freely and easily mixes the features of a capitalist market economy with an old-school Stalinist dictatorship?
(Spoiler: It’s a state capitalist one 😉)
Jessica Smith is a socialist and a feminist who loves animals, books, gaming, and cooking; she’s also interested in linguistics, history, technology and society.