You don't get it, the difference between the Dengist and the Gorbachev approach is simply the prioritisation of native capital and aesthetics over foreign ones. Gorbachev and his clique were suckers for anything western. You can ascribe it to his naiveté, or the neurotic wish to be admired, or the general Russian feeling of inadequacy vis à vis the West which was a thing long before the revolution and remained a thing in many sections of the populace (especially the so-called intellectual circles) to this day. It has zero effect on the restoration of capitalism as such. So yeah, the CPC saw very clearly where the wholesale surrender to the West would lead, so that's the one path they avoided, but the general capitalist trajectory remained all the same. Which is why I'm saying what they concocted is an improved version of capitalism, a capitalism 2.0 where the state reserves the right to intervene in matters of economy, technology and culture unbeholden to the private interests of the individual bourgeois. You can call it state capitalism, or collective capitalism, the label doesn't matter. This was in a way where the US was moving after the Great Depression, only there the "libertarian" faction turned things back again, because they thought they are strong enough as it is and don't need the state guidance any more. China has learned from this, so their capitalism is more effective. Obviously they are also in the unique position where they are also beholden to their origin mythology, so they need to at least pay lip service to the communist creed and keep the aesthetics intact, because this is their formal source of legitimacy. The upside of this is that not only is Chinese capitalism more effective in terms of industrial production but is also a somewhat "gentler" one (for now), which honestly is to be expected from a Keynesian offshoot.
Now yeah, by all appearances Xi has shifted the course somewhat, but neither you nor I know what their end goal is. Maybe you're right and they are slowly moving towards socialism again but it's at least just as plausible that they are just optimising the economy towards greater internal harmony (a term that gets repeated in official propagandistic statements) and a stronger projection of power internationally. I know where Occam's razor is pointing for me for the moment. But obviously you have a different outlook.
There are several end-goals in mind within the CPC. There are people that want to continue capitalist development ad infinitum. There are people who have rejected all reforms. There are people who think the bourgeoisie in China have served a progressive role, but their usefulness is coming to an end.
I tend to agree with the last line. I think Xi is carrying out that line right now. But that may change, or he may lose power.
The bourgeoisie are becoming less useful in China. They used to be the all-important connection to western technology and expertise. Now, China has caught up in all but a handful of fields.
I'm hopeful that Xi Jinping is not an anomaly.That he is the product of the conditions in China. The bourgeoisie are less important to socialist construction in China, and therefore, their political power is waning.
I tend to think the membership of the CPC are (mostly) genuine Marxist-Leninists. Marxist-Leninists who believe the color revolutions in the Eastern Bloc were only possible because stagnation in peoples' quality of life. Their political line centers constant improvements to peoples' quality of life above all else, and preventing a color revolution from gaining popularity.
I think, I hope, I believe... that's way too vague mate. What you're basically admitting is that you also don't really know. Which is exactly what I'm saying: maybe China will transition to socialism down the road but at the moment there are precious few concrete signs of this, the likelihood of it happening is not strong and I have yet to see a convincing motivation for the leadership (whether current or future) to commit to it. At the same time I'm not denying the good things China has achieved and the unmistakably better deal they offer for the developing world, but "good things" do not by themselves constitute socialism.
I think, I hope, I believe… that’s way too vague mate.
I cannot read Chinese and I only know a handful of CPC members. There's only so much I can glean about how the Party functions. I won't claim to know more than I do.
What you’re basically admitting is that you also don’t really know
I just said that... The future is not decided. Anything can change. The direction the Party goes will be the product of political maneuvers and the voting membership.
I have yet to see a convincing motivation for the leadership (whether current or future) to commit to it.
The Party Congress has been pretty explicit about finishing the development of their economic base by 2035, and finish their transition to socialism by 2050.
Every conspiracy theory claiming that China lies about their timelines - from economic growth projections, to alleviating extreme poverty, to constructing public infrastructure, to filling their "ghost cities", etc - have been unfounded. Therefore, the official timeline set out by the CPC must hold some weight.
I wouldn't even say that the Chinese Communist Party was only paying lip service to Communism, Capitalism must be fully developed and matured for Communism to replace it. While the Americans are letting Capital forces run amok, the CPC is developing capitalism to be a system that they will later be able to remove and replace.
What bullshit idealism is this? Capitalism does not magically lead to communism! It is not a linear progression, it is not some upgrade. Capitalism does not essentially differ from feudalism, or ancient slave-owning societies, etc. except for in details. The fault line lies between exploitative socio-economic systems, that arose during the Neolithic and constituted a paradigmatic shift from seeing nature as a resource to be exploited to seeing humans themselves as a resource to be exploited, on the one hand and cooperative socio-economic systems on the other. There is no natural law that automatically enables a "phase transition" from the one to the other once we arrive at the capitalist iteration of the exploitative socio-economic paradigm. So the question here is: is the CPC actively working towards shedding the exploitative nature of its economy? If the answer is yes, then it is measurably moving towards socialism, if the answer is "I don't know", "maybe later", "let's just wait and see" then that's functionally the same as no movement to everyone but the innermost party insiders.
Read my other reply. And I have never said that capitalism will magically lead to communism, what I said is that capitalism must be used to develop productive forces until communism can replace it just like how feudalism was to mature before capitalism can replace it.
And it's pretty strange to say that Capitalism is not fundamentally different from feudalism because there is exploitation. I suppose then all states are the same because they have laws.
To extend a little bit, the French Revolution cannot have happened in the 8th century, and Marx would not have written Das Capital had he not studied the industrial revolution brought about by British capitalism.
Capitalism must be fully developed and matured for Communism to replace it.
Does this mean that the revolutionaries of years past were wrong to push for communism? Should they instead have become capitalists and try to "fully develop" capitalism?
Maybe I worded it wrong. But productive forces of a society must be adequately developed for communism to take hold. What this means, and what the revolutionaries of the past has done is to seize the state to take control of the development of the productive forces. I'm saying is that the CPC is using certain elements of capitalism to acquire the capital to develop while maintaining enough state control in the economy to dictate the direction the economy will develope.
You don't get it, the difference between the Dengist and the Gorbachev approach is simply the prioritisation of native capital and aesthetics over foreign ones. Gorbachev and his clique were suckers for anything western. You can ascribe it to his naiveté, or the neurotic wish to be admired, or the general Russian feeling of inadequacy vis à vis the West which was a thing long before the revolution and remained a thing in many sections of the populace (especially the so-called intellectual circles) to this day. It has zero effect on the restoration of capitalism as such. So yeah, the CPC saw very clearly where the wholesale surrender to the West would lead, so that's the one path they avoided, but the general capitalist trajectory remained all the same. Which is why I'm saying what they concocted is an improved version of capitalism, a capitalism 2.0 where the state reserves the right to intervene in matters of economy, technology and culture unbeholden to the private interests of the individual bourgeois. You can call it state capitalism, or collective capitalism, the label doesn't matter. This was in a way where the US was moving after the Great Depression, only there the "libertarian" faction turned things back again, because they thought they are strong enough as it is and don't need the state guidance any more. China has learned from this, so their capitalism is more effective. Obviously they are also in the unique position where they are also beholden to their origin mythology, so they need to at least pay lip service to the communist creed and keep the aesthetics intact, because this is their formal source of legitimacy. The upside of this is that not only is Chinese capitalism more effective in terms of industrial production but is also a somewhat "gentler" one (for now), which honestly is to be expected from a Keynesian offshoot.
Now yeah, by all appearances Xi has shifted the course somewhat, but neither you nor I know what their end goal is. Maybe you're right and they are slowly moving towards socialism again but it's at least just as plausible that they are just optimising the economy towards greater internal harmony (a term that gets repeated in official propagandistic statements) and a stronger projection of power internationally. I know where Occam's razor is pointing for me for the moment. But obviously you have a different outlook.
There are several end-goals in mind within the CPC. There are people that want to continue capitalist development ad infinitum. There are people who have rejected all reforms. There are people who think the bourgeoisie in China have served a progressive role, but their usefulness is coming to an end.
I tend to agree with the last line. I think Xi is carrying out that line right now. But that may change, or he may lose power.
The bourgeoisie are becoming less useful in China. They used to be the all-important connection to western technology and expertise. Now, China has caught up in all but a handful of fields.
I'm hopeful that Xi Jinping is not an anomaly.That he is the product of the conditions in China. The bourgeoisie are less important to socialist construction in China, and therefore, their political power is waning.
I tend to think the membership of the CPC are (mostly) genuine Marxist-Leninists. Marxist-Leninists who believe the color revolutions in the Eastern Bloc were only possible because stagnation in peoples' quality of life. Their political line centers constant improvements to peoples' quality of life above all else, and preventing a color revolution from gaining popularity.
I think, I hope, I believe... that's way too vague mate. What you're basically admitting is that you also don't really know. Which is exactly what I'm saying: maybe China will transition to socialism down the road but at the moment there are precious few concrete signs of this, the likelihood of it happening is not strong and I have yet to see a convincing motivation for the leadership (whether current or future) to commit to it. At the same time I'm not denying the good things China has achieved and the unmistakably better deal they offer for the developing world, but "good things" do not by themselves constitute socialism.
I cannot read Chinese and I only know a handful of CPC members. There's only so much I can glean about how the Party functions. I won't claim to know more than I do.
I just said that... The future is not decided. Anything can change. The direction the Party goes will be the product of political maneuvers and the voting membership.
The Party Congress has been pretty explicit about finishing the development of their economic base by 2035, and finish their transition to socialism by 2050.
Every conspiracy theory claiming that China lies about their timelines - from economic growth projections, to alleviating extreme poverty, to constructing public infrastructure, to filling their "ghost cities", etc - have been unfounded. Therefore, the official timeline set out by the CPC must hold some weight.
I wouldn't even say that the Chinese Communist Party was only paying lip service to Communism, Capitalism must be fully developed and matured for Communism to replace it. While the Americans are letting Capital forces run amok, the CPC is developing capitalism to be a system that they will later be able to remove and replace.
What bullshit idealism is this? Capitalism does not magically lead to communism! It is not a linear progression, it is not some upgrade. Capitalism does not essentially differ from feudalism, or ancient slave-owning societies, etc. except for in details. The fault line lies between exploitative socio-economic systems, that arose during the Neolithic and constituted a paradigmatic shift from seeing nature as a resource to be exploited to seeing humans themselves as a resource to be exploited, on the one hand and cooperative socio-economic systems on the other. There is no natural law that automatically enables a "phase transition" from the one to the other once we arrive at the capitalist iteration of the exploitative socio-economic paradigm. So the question here is: is the CPC actively working towards shedding the exploitative nature of its economy? If the answer is yes, then it is measurably moving towards socialism, if the answer is "I don't know", "maybe later", "let's just wait and see" then that's functionally the same as no movement to everyone but the innermost party insiders.
Read my other reply. And I have never said that capitalism will magically lead to communism, what I said is that capitalism must be used to develop productive forces until communism can replace it just like how feudalism was to mature before capitalism can replace it. And it's pretty strange to say that Capitalism is not fundamentally different from feudalism because there is exploitation. I suppose then all states are the same because they have laws.
To extend a little bit, the French Revolution cannot have happened in the 8th century, and Marx would not have written Das Capital had he not studied the industrial revolution brought about by British capitalism.
Does this mean that the revolutionaries of years past were wrong to push for communism? Should they instead have become capitalists and try to "fully develop" capitalism?
I hope you can see how absurd this take is
Maybe I worded it wrong. But productive forces of a society must be adequately developed for communism to take hold. What this means, and what the revolutionaries of the past has done is to seize the state to take control of the development of the productive forces. I'm saying is that the CPC is using certain elements of capitalism to acquire the capital to develop while maintaining enough state control in the economy to dictate the direction the economy will develope.