StruggleSession [undecided]

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?

Some more excerpts from Deng and Mao if you're interested:

Deng Xiaoping in his own words:

Since the downfall of the Gang of Four an ideological trend has appeared that we call bourgeois liberalization. Its exponents worship the "democracy" and "freedom" of the Western capitalist countries and reject socialism. This cannot be allowed. China must modernize; it must absolutely not liberalize or take the capitalist road, as countries of the West have done. Those exponents of bourgeois liberalization who have violated state law must be dealt with severely.

Bourgeois liberalization would plunge our society into turmoil and make it impossible for us to proceed with the work of construction. To check bourgeois liberalization is therefore a matter of principle and one of vital importance for us.

By carrying out the open policy, learning foreign technologies and utilizing foreign capital, we mean to promote socialist construction, not to deviate from the socialist road. We intend to develop the productive forces, expand socialist public ownership and raise the people's income.

Without the Communist Party's leadership and without socialism, there is no future for China. This truth has been demonstrated in the past, and it will be demonstrated again in future. When we succeed in raising China's per capita GNP to US$4,000 and everyone is prosperous, that will better demonstrate the superiority of socialism over capitalism, it will point the way for three quarters of the world's population, and it will provide further proof of the correctness of Marxism. Therefore, we must confidently keep to the socialist road and uphold the Four Cardinal Principles.

(the Four Cardinal Principles established by Deng that are not up for debate within the CPC: upholding the socialist path, upholding the people's democratic dictatorship, upholding the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and upholding Mao Zedong Thought and Marxism–Leninism)

This time, we have to take action against those who openly oppose socialism and the Communist Party.

The struggle against the bourgeois Rightists in 1957 was carried somewhat too far, and the mistakes made should be corrected. But that doesn't mean that we have negated the necessity for this struggle as a whole.

The struggle against bourgeois liberalization is indispensable. We should not be afraid that people abroad will say we are damaging our reputation. We must take our own road and build a socialism adapted to conditions in China -- that is the only way China can have a future. We must show foreigners that China's political situation is stable. If our country were plunged into disorder and our nation reduced to a heap of loose sand, how could we ever accomplish anything? The reason the imperialists were able to bully us in the past was precisely that we were a heap of loose sand.

Deng in 1992:

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?

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 Xiaoping in his own words:

Since the downfall of the Gang of Four an ideological trend has appeared that we call bourgeois liberalization. Its exponents worship the "democracy" and "freedom" of the Western capitalist countries and reject socialism. This cannot be allowed. China must modernize; it must absolutely not liberalize or take the capitalist road, as countries of the West have done. Those exponents of bourgeois liberalization who have violated state law must be dealt with severely.

Bourgeois liberalization would plunge our society into turmoil and make it impossible for us to proceed with the work of construction. To check bourgeois liberalization is therefore a matter of principle and one of vital importance for us.

By carrying out the open policy, learning foreign technologies and utilizing foreign capital, we mean to promote socialist construction, not to deviate from the socialist road. We intend to develop the productive forces, expand socialist public ownership and raise the people's income.

Without the Communist Party's leadership and without socialism, there is no future for China. This truth has been demonstrated in the past, and it will be demonstrated again in future. When we succeed in raising China's per capita GNP to US$4,000 and everyone is prosperous, that will better demonstrate the superiority of socialism over capitalism, it will point the way for three quarters of the world's population, and it will provide further proof of the correctness of Marxism. Therefore, we must confidently keep to the socialist road and uphold the Four Cardinal Principles (the Four Cardinal Principles established by Deng that are not up for debate within the CPC: upholding the socialist path, upholding the people's democratic dictatorship, upholding the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and upholding Mao Zedong Thought and Marxism–Leninism).

This time, we have to take action against those who openly oppose socialism and the Communist Party.

The struggle against the bourgeois Rightists in 1957 was carried somewhat too far, and the mistakes made should be corrected. But that doesn't mean that we have negated the necessity for this struggle as a whole.

The struggle against bourgeois liberalization is indispensable. We should not be afraid that people abroad will say we are damaging our reputation. We must take our own road and build a socialism adapted to conditions in China -- that is the only way China can have a future. We must show foreigners that China's political situation is stable. If our country were plunged into disorder and our nation reduced to a heap of loose sand, how could we ever accomplish anything? The reason the imperialists were able to bully us in the past was precisely that we were a heap of loose sand.

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.

According to the IMF ’s house price-to-wage ratio, China has seven of the world’s top ten most expensive cities for residential property. All through the country's tier-one, tier-two, and even some tier-three cities, housing prices are severely out of proportion with the incomes of the people who live there.

However, the people of China can afford to buy these extremely expensive properties. In fact, 90% of families in the country own their home, giving China one of the highest home ownership rates in the world. What’s more is that 80% of these homes are owned outright, without mortgages or any other leans. On top of this, north of 20% of urban households own more than one home, according to Nomura. So with wages so out of whack with real estate prices, how can so many people afford to buy so many houses?

When we talk about how people afford houses in China today, more often than not we’re not talking about individuals going out and buying property on their own — as is the general modus operandi in the West. No, we’re talking about entire familial and friend networks who financially assist each other in the pursuit of housing.

Why there is so much liquid cash available for these relatively large down payments is straight forward: the Chinese are some of the best savers in the world. In fact, with a savings rate that equates to 50% of its GDP, China has the third highest such rate in the world.

Another way that Chinese home buyers are able to afford their down payments is via the country’s Housing Provident Fund... Part of this fund included a government initiated savings plan where employees are given the option to invest a portion of their monthly earnings and have it matched by their employer to assist them with buying a house.

Although we must remember here that China’s banks are fully owned by the Communist Party, and social stability often takes precedence over the raw pursuit of profit, so their lending practices cannot be compared like-for-like against those of Western banks.

According to a 2017 HSBC survey, 70% of Chinese millennials already own their own homes which is nearly double the global average. 91% of Chinese millennial non-owners also plan to buy a house in the next five years, according to the survey. By comparison, America has only a 35% home ownership rate among millennials and the UK has 31 percent.

Having significantly lower student debt also certainly helps

Since the downfall of the Gang of Four an ideological trend has appeared that we call bourgeois liberalization. Its exponents worship the "democracy" and "freedom" of the Western capitalist countries and reject socialism. This cannot be allowed. China must modernize; it must absolutely not liberalize or take the capitalist road, as countries of the West have done. Those exponents of bourgeois liberalization who have violated state law must be dealt with severely.

Bourgeois liberalization would plunge our society into turmoil and make it impossible for us to proceed with the work of construction. To check bourgeois liberalization is therefore a matter of principle and one of vital importance for us.

By carrying out the open policy, learning foreign technologies and utilizing foreign capital, we mean to promote socialist construction, not to deviate from the socialist road. We intend to develop the productive forces, expand socialist public ownership and raise the people's income.

Without the Communist Party's leadership and without socialism, there is no future for China. This truth has been demonstrated in the past, and it will be demonstrated again in future. When we succeed in raising China's per capita GNP to US$4,000 and everyone is prosperous, that will better demonstrate the superiority of socialism over capitalism, it will point the way for three quarters of the world's population, and it will provide further proof of the correctness of Marxism. Therefore, we must confidently keep to the socialist road and uphold the Four Cardinal Principles (the Four Cardinal Principles established by Deng that are not up for debate within the CPC: upholding the socialist path, upholding the people's democratic dictatorship, upholding the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and upholding Mao Zedong Thought and Marxism–Leninism).

This time, we have to take action against those who openly oppose socialism and the Communist Party.

The struggle against the bourgeois Rightists in 1957 was carried somewhat too far, and the mistakes made should be corrected. But that doesn't mean that we have negated the necessity for this struggle as a whole.

The struggle against bourgeois liberalization is indispensable. We should not be afraid that people abroad will say we are damaging our reputation. We must take our own road and build a socialism adapted to conditions in China -- that is the only way China can have a future. We must show foreigners that China's political situation is stable. If our country were plunged into disorder and our nation reduced to a heap of loose sand, how could we ever accomplish anything? The reason the imperialists were able to bully us in the past was precisely that we were a heap of loose sand.

It's always important to not misrepresent his views regardless of whether or not we supported or opposed his development strategy for China and whether or not such a strategic retreat from certain aspects of Mao's strategy was completely necessary in going back to more of a NEP model for more gradual development. Many of the worst reforms of the "reform and opening-up" era actually occurred well after he was out of power as paramount leader and even well after he died in the later years of Jiang Zemin's leadership.

The socialist former Greek Minister of Finance and Marxian economist Yanis Varoufakis' perspective on the claim of Chinese "imperialism" or "neo-colonialism": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBgbYQ5QAM0

Keep in mind that Yanis is by no means any sort of ML or tankie. He has been highly critical of the Chinese government and has personally dealt with negotiating with them.