There was a lot of criticism when I posted Gowan's last blog post yesterday titled 'Why China Is Not Socialist' but I saw Gowans posted a follow-up post today which clarifies his arguments and addresses some of the counter-argument that have been posted here. So for sake of argument I'll post his reply.
May 13, 2022
By Stephen Gowans
Empiric, a word infrequently used these days, refers to a quack. This seems odd, considering that empiric and empirical (based on observation) are related. In antiquity, empirics were physicians who relied on their experience and observation rather than on the texts of Aristotle and other philosophers to treat patients. Medicine based on the thinking of philosophers was the realm of the scholastics, or schoolmen, the established medical authorities of their day. Challenging the pure reason of Aristotle with facts was considered an act of quackery.
Soon after writing a blog post titled Why China Is Not Socialist , whose title expresses a conclusion based on the same empirical method the established authority of the ancient world so reviled, I received a rebuke, in the form of an e-mail, from a scholastic, citing chapter and verse from Chinese Communist Party texts. Had I not read any of these texts, the outraged schoolman demanded?
According to my correspondent, my quackery was based, not in any of the following observations, which I was assured the omniscient Chinese CP, endowed with an Aristotelian authority, had already taken into account and factored into its plans.
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China’s development is proceeding along capitalist lines.
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Capitalism is in command.
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China is integrated into the world capitalist economy of exploitation, as one of its most important players, if not the most important.
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The vast fortunes of such Western billionaires as Elon Musk, and the wealth of such Western CEOs as Tim Cook, is minted out of the exploited labor of Chinese workers.
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As a major power integrated into the world capitalist system, China vies with other capitalist powers for access to markets, raw materials, investment opportunities, and strategic territory, i.e., is part of an imperialist system.
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China is not socialist.
But if my observations were already well known to China’s CP, and factored into its plans, why was I being excoriated by an agitated scholastic? After all, I was being censured for the alleged sin of “assuming that 100 million small oriental minds could not figure this out themselves,” another way of saying I was only stating the obvious.
The answer appears to be that while these observations are apodictic, making them is considered bad form. China may be a capitalist power fully integrated into an imperialist system as a major participant, but you’re not supposed to say so.
Having objurgated me for my lapse in etiquette, my schoolman sought to instruct me on proper form. The rules for polite discourse, it turns out, are contained in Chinese CP texts (the one’s my aggrieved correspondent demanded to know whether I had ever read.) Therein one learns that the word socialism can be made infinitely plastic. Indeed, where it was once the antithesis of capitalism, correct form demands it now be used as a synonym of capitalism. In short, Chinese scholastic etiquette redefines capitalism as various stages of socialism, from primary, to intermediate, based on the degree of capitalist prosperity. This allows the schoolmen in Beijing to approach the problem of a capitalist and imperialist China run by Communists as a branding problem. Simply call Chinese capitalism and the country’s integration into an imperialist system of rivalry among capitalist states, “socialism”, and poof, the branding problem disappears.
No longer is it necessary to cast about vainly for an answer whenever someone asks, “How can a capitalist behemoth be run by Communists?” All you have to say is “What do you mean? China is socialist. Haven’t you read the CP documents? C’mon, get an education!”
If one were to observe the punctilios of Chinese proper form, China would be referred to as “primary stage socialist China.” If anyone as unversed in proper form as I am, were so bold as to ask, “What does primary stage socialism mean?”, the honest answer would be “capitalism at a low level of development.” In other words, if you read Chinese CP texts closely, China ought to be referred to as “capitalist China at a low level of development.” You can call “capitalist China at a low level of development” “socialist China” if you like, but then again, you can also call moon rocks Swiss cheese.
In short, “socialist China” is a euphemism for “capitalist China,” in the way “lavatory” is a euphemism for “crapper”. Euphemisms are useful for concealing delicate truths you don’t want mentioned publicly (such as that this vampire, who Beijing has indulged with innumerable subsidies and advantages, is accumulating profit on a Pantagruelian scale on the backs of cheap labor supplied by Chinese workers, or that Chinese President Xi Jinping is in the habit of justifying the exploitation of proletarians in the same manner every Republican does, namely, by invoking the aphorism ‘a rising tide lifts all boats.’)
I replied to my aggrieved correspondent with this:
You remind me of Christians who scream at me that I should read the bible. I have read the bible, which is why I’m not a Christian.
I have also read Chinese CP plans. Having done so, I know that even Chinese Communists do not consider China socialist. Not yet. At least not in any ordinary meaning of the word.
You mention plans. In 2100, when China expects to have achieved a fully publicly-owned, fully-planned economy, our grandchildren can have a conversation about whether the plan has been achieved. If it has, I’m sure they will be quite happy to call China socialist. Until then, the term “socialist China” is purely aspirational and until the time China achieves its goal, if indeed that time ever arrives, I’ll call China what it is, and what the Chinese acknowledge in their plans their society is, and will continue to be for quite some time: capitalist.
Long before 2100, and long before the day arrives when we can assess whether China actually arrives at the destination its Communists have mapped out for it, we can have a conversation about whether there are roads to socialism other than those that follow the path of capitalist industrialization; that is, other than the one the Chinese CP has chosen to follow.
Is there a path of socialist industrialization, following along the lines explored by the Soviets, one, which, unlike the Chinese path, isn’t based on integration into the world capitalist economy of exploitation; one that doesn’t compel a people to participate in the project of minting the wealth of billionaires like Elon Musk out of their exploited labor; one that doesn’t enmesh a country in a system of imperialist competition for raw materials, investment opportunities, export markets, and strategic territory?
One senses that you are embarrassed about the capitalist path the Chinese CP has chosen to take, with all its ugliness in exploitation and imperialist rivalry, and that you seek to assuage your embarrassment and burnish China’s reputation by transposing an aspirational distant socialist future onto the present. It’s an exercise in deception. There is no socialist China. All that exists at this point is a China that hasn’t eliminated the exploitation of man by man but embraces it; a China that doesn’t plan to eliminate exploitation fully for decades to come, and may never eliminate it; all that exists today and will continue to exist until the next century is a capitalist China which exhibits all the ugliness that capitalism contains within it.
Have I read the Chinese CP texts? Yes. My question to you is, have you understood them?
The question of whether China is prescriptively socialist or not is, for Western socialists, academic. Masturbatory even. As this whole stuffy fart-smelling exchange between nerds proves. Whether it is or isn't socialist is something they have no control over.
Like if China really does abandon any pretext of transitioning to "higher" socialism from its present embrace of party-guided capitalism, it will be a tragedy. A betrayal of absolutely Biblical proportions. It will also be something no socialist living in any five-eyes country will ever be able to do anything about.
The point of stanning China in the Core isn't to say, "look, they're socialist," it's 1) to get people to think about why they're doing pretty much everything better than us - "Why don't we have high speed rails and a booming push for renewables and a retirement age of 55?" - and 2) to fight back against the violent sinophobia here that's only getting worse.
The expectation of a simple binary (it's 100% socialism or 100% not socialism!) is a very Anglo lib "Marxist" thing that exposes how much one hasn't internalized the basics of the dialectic.
All that exists at this point is a China that hasn’t eliminated the exploitation of man by man but embraces it; a China that doesn’t plan to eliminate exploitation fully for decades to come, and may never eliminate it; all that exists today and will continue to exist until the next century is a capitalist China which exhibits all the ugliness that capitalism contains within it.
Trotsky arguing against NEP and calling the USSR capitalist.
This also glosses over the fact that China's government acts nothing like the capitalist governments around it, i.e poverty alleviation, infrastructure investment and COVID (crisis) response.
As a major power integrated into the world capitalist system, China vies with other capitalist powers for access to markets, raw materials, investment opportunities, and strategic territory, i.e., is part of an imperialist system.
Are points like this idealist or are you instead saying part of the article is idealist?
article
he's largely complaining that china isnt instantly socialist or that there is some mythical better path to take
Except he isn't vaguely gesturing a mythical path. He said the Soviet Union shows that you can do industrialization without being integrated into the world capitalist system like China now is.
"The Soviet Union collapsed" does not necessarily mean that "The Soviet Union collapsed because they industrialized without integrating into the world capitalist system"
yep, even cuba, everyone's favorite socialist underdog, is integrated with the world capitalist society. just not with america, but with everyone else
and even the most isolated country, the dprk, has the benefit of china's success and alliance on their border
its really telling that the only socialist countries that still exist are the ones that integrated with and broker for tech and resources from other countries in a large scale fashion
So you're saying socialism will collapse without integrating into the world capitalist system?
Is socialism in one country incorrect in your view then?
Socialism in one country doesn't remotely preclude trade with capitalist countries. You're saying socialism would collapse without integrating into the world capitalist system when the concept here is that a socialist country under seige would collapse when attacked and isolated from the rest of the world.
Socialism in one country only applies to the Soviet conditions, specifically contrasted to the alternative of permanent revolution.
Siege socialism is clearly a state of affairs that is preferably avoided, if theres nothing else you can do then you can do your best in just one country, but modern countries are not designed to work in isolation from everyone else, and if the majority of other countries are capitalist then you're gonna need some degree of integration to have access to them.
That was...exhausting...
No, no there's not another road to Socialism post USSR, save autarky and siege socialism. If you want to bring down the global system you need to interact with it and outresource it. The USSR understood this, China understands it, even Cuba, probably the most "Orthodox" socialist state understands it. Why can't this guy?
Because he's a Western leftist that doesn't realize he's actually the supposed Aristotlean scholastic, or in normal leftist terms, an ultra who's up his own ass.
angloid when criticize China for being 1/10ths as bad as th westoid nations:
:morshupls:
this guy writes like a fucking dick
that's my response to this
To be fair I was a dick in my message to him so it's not really that surprising that his response has the same tone I had.
Do you think the 100million members of the CPC are sitting idly and that their small oriental brains simply could not comprehend the mindblowing thoughts of you, a western white man from a country that has yet to successfully have any kind of revolution?
His tone would make more sense if he actually printed my message to him but he didn't want to do that because it would have convinced some of his audience he was wrong and turned them onto reading more about China.
He also repeatedly says "Chinese CP" which just seems weird and kinda racist.
He's trying to "cleverly" say CCP. basically just a lib dog whistle.
Literal reddit tier shit.
What is the origin of this dog whistle? Like why did the libs and chuds begin to insist on switching a letter around in the first place?
People who don't know the difference spell it that way by accident, people who do know the difference do it on purpose to signal which "side" they're on.
You can watch it on Reddit and Twitter a ton. It was constant during the whole Winnie the poo is banned in China overwatch shit a couple years back. People intentionally choose to use CCP when writing out a hate spiel, especially like here where the guy definitely knows better.
It's extremely funny that it reads like a parody of the sort of nerd that uses a thesaurus to make his rant overly verbose and smart sounding while having very little if anything to actually say.
Literally what he's doing as far as I can tell. He's just parroting information back but snarky and with shit wording
Love how he ping pongs between sophistry and anti-intellectualism fast enough to cause whiplash, all the while needlessly using a bunch of ten dollar words that would have the average worker just glazing over at the site or sound of.
Mixed economy doesn't strictly fit scholastic definitions of Capitalism or Socialism, expect more paragraphs over the next week.
I don't care what Gowans think. I am not listening to some white guy talk shit on China
Mao in 1944 in a message sent to Washington via John Service, a deputy to the US Ambassador to China:
China must industrialise. This can be done … only by free enterprise and with the aid of foreign capital. Chinese and American interests are correlated and similar. They fit together, economically and politically … The United States would find us more cooperative than the Kuomintang.
Po Ku, the founder and director of Liberation Daily and a CPC Politburo member working directly under Mao’s leadership, expounded to the deputy to the US Ambassador to China:
China at present is not even capitalistic. Its economy is still that of semifeudalism. We cannot advance at one jump to socialism. In fact, because we are at least two hundred years behind most of the rest of the world, we probably cannot hope to reach socialism until after most of the rest of the world has reached that state.
First we must rid ourselves of this semifeudalism. Then we must raise our economic level by a long stage of democracy and free enterprise.
What we Communists hope to do is to keep China moving smoothly and steadily toward this goal …
It is impossible to predict how long this process will take. But we can be sure that it will be more than thirty of forty years, and probably more than a hundred years.
Deng in 1992 after the fall of the Soviet bloc:
One of the basic concepts of Marxism is that the socialist system must be defended by the dictatorship of the proletariat. Marx once said the theory of class struggle was not his discovery. His real discovery was the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat. History has proved that a new, rising class that has just taken power is, generally speaking, weaker than the opposing classes. It must therefore resort to dictatorship to consolidate its power. Democracy is practised within the ranks of the people and dictatorship over the enemy. This is the people’s democratic dictatorship. It is right to consolidate the people’s power by employing the force of the people’s democratic dictatorship. There is nothing wrong in that. We have been building socialism for only a few decades and are still in the primary stage. It will take a very long historical period to consolidate and develop the socialist system, and it will require persistent struggle by many generations, a dozen or even several dozens. We can never rest on our oars.
I am convinced that more and more people will come to believe in Marxism, because it is a science. Using historical materialism, it has uncovered the laws governing the development of human society. Feudal society replaced slave society, capitalism supplanted feudalism, and, after a long time, socialism will necessarily supersede capitalism. This is an irreversible general trend of historical development, but the road has many twists and turns. Over the several centuries that it took for capitalism to replace feudalism, how many times were monarchies restored! So, in a sense, temporary restorations are usual and can hardly be avoided. Some countries have suffered major setbacks, and socialism appears to have been weakened. But the people have been tempered by the setbacks and have drawn lessons from them, and that will make socialism develop in a healthier direction. So don’t panic, don’t think that Marxism has disappeared, that it’s not useful any more and that it has been defeated. Nothing of the sort!
We shall push ahead along the road to Chinese-style socialism. Capitalism has been developing for several hundred years. How long have we been building socialism?
Also purely ad hominem but this dude writes and lays out an argument like a dipshit
I do think that this site can be a little heavier on the China-stanning than it needs to be, and I think good criticism and analysis of the modern government can be pretty interesting. After seeing the comments including yours, I went back up to skim what this guy is saying, and... yep really annoyingly pompous tone.
Glad you got something out of it pffft. As for China stanning, when people go overzealous on that it is usually as a defense because of how easy it is to fall into the liberal impulse to besmirch what China has actually accomplished and continues to accomplish in terms of actual good. It may serve "China stans" better to emphasise the pointlessness/chauvinism of bagging out the Chinese state so often (or even at all) when the real enemy should ALWAYS be considered the one at home.
Insert research about there being more poor people in the US than in China
And per the hexbear mockery: no those indebted Americans are all just Harvard grads with school debt they'll pay off in two years trust me bro
It's not even a rising tide in a passive sense, China is directly funnelling money to the rural areas via infrastructure, communist party presence, and programs.
Lmao. This is a response to me.
@bopit are you Gowan?
One senses that you are embarrassed about the capitalist path the Chinese CP has chosen to take, with all its ugliness in exploitation and imperialist rivalry, and that you seek to assuage your embarrassment and burnish China’s reputation by transposing an aspirational distant socialist future onto the present. It’s an exercise in deception.
Embarrassed? Why? This is idealist projection. They can only carry out the policy set out by the material conditions of a post-USSR neoliberal world. Had they carried out any other path they would have been destroyed already.
I'm not embarrassed in the slightest. I'm incensed that this man would write criticisms that they have of their own conditions and publish them in a way that implies they have not thought of them already.
A communist acting in good-faith would write these criticisms and discuss how China recognises them and what they are doing about them. But since Gowan is OBVIOUSLY anti-China he comes at it from a position of trying to undermine their project rather than to collaborate with it and aim to make sure it succeeds, to the benefit of ALL socialists in the world.
are you Gowan?
hexbear submissions from gowan's blog and/or questioning china's socialism seem to go back several months, looking at their page
here's a post they made 7 months ago about this same subject
No, I'm not Gowans. Though I did have a hunch that you were the one he was responding to considering you posted his email in the previous post
I'm basically cackling to myself right now.
How reasonable is he? I don't know much about the man only some of the things he's written. Is there actually much point in engaging with him with the intent to turn him from being destructive towards being constructive?
Right now the shit he's churning out is just intent on convincing western leftists "china bad". It serves no value to helping the western left achieve socialism and it serves no benefit to the Chinese left either because he's saying nothing they don't already know. If I were going to spend any time on this my intent would be to convince him to stop being destructive and start being constructive instead, but it really depends on what kind of person he is whether that can be achieved. I don't even need him to change his opinion that much, just acknowledging that China already say most of what he says and explaining what they're trying to do to solve for it would be a hugely constructive improvement.
If he's too comfortable inside a fart cloud of his making it will be a waste of time though.
Hmm, I'm not sure how reasonable he is. I'm biased because I sort of feel indebted to him for writing this essay , which finally convinced me to become a communist. If you already told him all your counter-arguments I don't really think it's useful to try to spend more time trying to persuade him, it's not like he's a very influential commentator or anything. Also, I think it would be useful if you reposted your email to him here if you feel like Gowans didn't summarize it correctly.
Just finished reading. That's a good essay. Shame he's not so generous towards China as he is towards the USSR. He clearly cares about socialism at least.
The man seems hung up on the notion of socialism being the abolishment of private property as opposed to socialism being the transitionary stage of society in which the proletariat control the state and steer it in a manner to maintain their control while aiming to bring about the pre-requisites necessary for world communism. The exact mode of production that the proletariat employ during this transition are secondary to the fact that the proletariat are in control and use the state to prevent counter-revolution.
I will respond to him after I've slept on it I think. I need to process the fact that someone just used "schoolman" and "scholastic" with insulting intent while simultaneously using the word "apodictic". I got my leftist education while bouncing between squats so getting sneered at for being "scholastic" by an "acclaimed author" between words I need to look up in the dictionary is an interesting emotion.
I'm not sure if Gowans is really worth the time debating. He's developed some truly contrarian nuclear takes recently like that "US capitalism is as state-led as Russia's and China's", which either reveals profound economic ignorance on his part or he's simply seeking attention with trolling and is no longer willing to engage in good faith.
Sorry, can't hear that armchair anglo whinging over the deafening sound of the improvement of the material conditions of the working class. There are thousands of these guys comfortably ensconced in an uncontested dictatorship of the bourgeoisie fed-posting attacks on AES and I'll only respect the opinions of whichever one wins a revolution. Hope this cracker gets his slice of that fed anti-china budget or the negative attention for contrarianism that he was seeking or whatever
Condescending, pedantic, and too cowardly to present the arguments he's supposedly contending with, relying on clear hyperbole and therefore straw men.
Fundamentally, just repeating himself that he's right in his conclusions without revisiting the arguments or the challenges. He's so precious.
This is much dumber than his original post.
The main pointlessness of things like this is attempting to slap absolutes onto transitions. It's expecting China to just one day "become socialist" by adhering to his definition of it.
If you think like that then you really need to ask "when did America become capitalist?" and if you can't then you're admitting that these things aren't all neat little boxes you can just slot countries in to.
