China already surpassed the US in terms of the real productive economy. The US includes financialized nonsense in its GDP, things that aren’t productive at all but are rather weights on production and individuals. Examples:
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When someone has to pay an overdraft fee, that gets counted in GDP as a financial service. A situation that is actually a personal debt is counted as creating and selling a commodity.
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Increasing housing values / prices are included as well. A house sits there doing squat for a decade doubles in value and gets sold. Hundreds of thousands get added to the GDP even though the price difference is due to financial speculation and a physical monopoly (location). Also, housing costs outpace inflation, so this scenario is actually increasing the cost of living.
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Don’t even get me started on health insurance.
China has surpassed the US because it has become vastly more productive in its real economy, in its ability to make real things and useful services. It has been able to do that by increasing capital intensive production and technology by dangling cheaper costs in front of the international bourgeoisie, which they gladly accept. A bit of an imperialism switcheroo and a risky yet successful gambit.
Is this good for socialism? Of course. International capital, seated in the white supremacist North Atlantic countries, depends on imperialism, ultimately through hybrid warfare (military and financial weapons). A strong China undermines imperialism in several ways:
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Directly in their own country by creating a geopolitical position in which they can set their own terms of governance, including economic. Compare China’s situation to that of India since the 90s. India went in precisely the opposite direction and suffers tremendously by imperialism. Also China is literally run by a communist party
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By providing an alternative trading partner that undermines US sanctions, a real weapon of war.
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By providing alternative financial systems, e.g. what BRICS may deliver. Groups like the IMF are an arm of imperialism and they are increasingly undermined. Dollar debts are used to trap countries on imperialized suicide paths. Watch Argentina nosedive straight into that trap.
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By providing an alternative model that is entirely realizable, arguably more realizable, through socialist anticolonial revolution.
US/UK-led imperialism has been the primary barrier to socialism for over a century. It has murdered millions upon millions to keep the ruling class at its perceived advantage. This is usually why revolutions failed and nearly always why they were dismantled after early success. Hell, the imperialists don’t even allow us to exist when we win elections, with examples in Latin America, Africa, and Asia (the global south, not coincidentally). They are an ontological evil, the greatest threat to socialism, and they must be destroyed at all costs.
US/UK-led imperialism has been the primary barrier to socialism for over a century. It has murdered millions upon millions to keep the ruling class at its perceived advantage. This is usually why revolutions failed and nearly always why they were dismantled after early success. Hell, the imperialists don’t even allow us to exist when we win elections, with examples in Latin America, Africa, and Asia (the global south, not coincidentally). They are an ontological evil, the greatest threat to socialism, and they must be destroyed at all costs.
Correct. The US-led Global North must be decapitated before any serious discussion of revolution or socialism can be made.
Agreed. This is the primary contradiction of our time.
Capital will only ever do the most profitable thing. This is an iron law. China used it to their advantage to develop the productive forces in their country.
Capital does what the individual capitalists perceive as gaining the most profit for themselves, albeit sometimes as cartels. The capitalist system makes sure that they know this is things like cutting wages and destroying competition.
By this I just mean that capital can actually fail to find even higher profits so long as the more profitable regime would require a coordinated effort or would give up some of their power. Capitalists would make more profit if they reined in finance, but they constantly fail to do so, in part, because they gain short-term profits from dealing with finance. They can only see what’s right in front of themselves as the ruling class cogs in the machine of capital.
Capital will do what it takes to survive, not necessarily what makes the most profit. Capital absolutely will do protectionism and autarky if it’s deemed necessary for some form of capitalist class to administrate some working class. China’s gamble worked out because it was in the interests of the international bourgeoisie at the time.
Now that we’re seeing a re-emergence of ideologically coherent fascism/chauvinism there could arise a situation where the western nations cut off their own nose and break away from China in order to keep their own domestic bourgeoisie in power.
Thanks for this very well written explanation. May I save it so I can share it with others?
Of course! Feel free to fix my typos lol
Thanks
Isn’t there also something ridiculous like mortgage payments get double counted towards GDP as some sort of imputed “rent payment”?
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A good rule is that anything that’s bad for the US is good for socialism.
Yea… The US’s imperialist wealth is based on exploitation. Less exploitation is good for the world, but bad for the United States
Absolutely, China has been consistently helping socialist countries around the world, and providing an alternative to the exploitative US based institutions such as the IMF. It’s worth noting that China offers its experience for others to learn from, but doesn’t try to impose it on other countries.
The first step towards advancing socialism globally is to roll back US hegemony over the world to allow countries to develop independently and in the interest of their own people. China is playing a pivotal role in achieving this goal. China is also acting as an example that socialist model is more effective than a capitalist one.
I like to say, if you want a different model of socialism than China’s, then you should still support China because China is necessary for other models to survive Western sanctions/embargos. Without China, every developing country would be forced to implement exploitative neoliberal policies, while China enables them to follow their own path.
complicated question, imma pull a socialist brand of enlightened centrism.
china being number one in economics doesn’t directly mean anything that meaningful to revolutionary movements, other than a morale boost to CPs and some sympathy among some people, since china isn’t yet in the phase of sponsoring revolutionary movements out there like ussr did.
buuuuut, since they are a well develop and industrial powerhouse, they have the material conditions to withstand imperialists assaults and keep the revolution alive, whilst doing fair trade with the global south, weakening a little colonial nations like france and bringing about the multipolar world.
China is already first in GDP PPP, which is arguably better than nominal GDP as a measure of living standards and economy size.
I’d say it’s a good start but it’s not enough for any material change. That can only come from the collapse of the American empire (as we know it). Also, imperialism from the global north is not limited to the US.
In the end, it’s not size, but control. The implication that size = control is only applicable in a globalized economy. If the core countries adopt more isolationist policies then China’s influence on core countries will be reduced.
A larger China would strengthen bipolarity/multipolarity, which is a good thing, and would stabilize the situation we are observing currently, and aid in the development of socialist states. But having a strong China wouldn’t necessarily mean the collapse of the core.
It’s a question of quantitative change vs qualitative change, as described by Mao. Reform vs revolution.
Yes.sounds like better news that US recovering itself…
not really but maybe it will help to weaken US imperialism which may help the left wing forces around the world.
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I agree, but probably for another reason: China’s development model (socialist market economy) was developed in consideration of China’s unique historical circumstances. So, it’s not necessarily a bad thing that other nations are better off developing another economic model.
That’s a good point. Easy to overlook. China had to open up to develop technologically. Much of the west has the technological development but lags behind in development of the relations of production. The west may have to catch up again with industrial capacity. Otherwise, it’s may take a very different set of steps to achieve socialism in the west.
No nation’s system is directly transferable to any other nation. But it is incredibly heartening and powerful to see a socialist nation thrive and surpass the capitalist world.
China doesnt have a significant landlord class and 90% of people there own a house, whatever the fuck they have going on I want it lol.
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You’re a fan of when there’s a lot of hype but then nothing gets done and liberals take power anyway?
Their evil regime versus our wholesome owned by 15 companies democratic system 🥰
Western Doublespeak™ ladies and gentlemen
So, support for Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, which always seem to be the result Bernie gets? That “democratic socialism”?
Or the one where you do imperialism abroad to pay for healthcare and schools at home?
They barely have either of those things though, i wonder where that cash goes… oh yes, bombing Yugoslavia. That “democratic socialism” too.
Just the imperialism, then. Imperialiberalism.
Must be a big fan of Sanders’ hand in the NATO destruction of Yugoslavia then I guess ?
Common misconception. Do you think the US is less authoritarian than China or Russia? The correct answer should be no.
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Bernie is a socdem at best, not a demsoc
I consider socdems to be barely better than liberals.
Socdems ARE liberals, what they advocate for is not socialism, but “Welfare Capitalism”
I agree. I’m just talking about how Social Democrats at least on paper recognize some of the problems of capitalism. They just downplay them, which is a step above standard neoliberals. They just don’t follow it to the logical conclusion. I would consider Demsocs to be a bit better than SocDems, but in my opinion the difference between SocDems and socialists should be or seems to be a bigger relative jump than between DemSocs and socialists. Maybe I’m phrasing this wrong.
Because with Democratic Socialism, you already have a foot in the door, and with SocDems, its a way bigger jump.
Imperialist socdems like sanders want to fund US social services off the backs of workers in the global south (via a tax on imports from commodities produced by workers making pennies, if you’re wondering how this functions).
This is why he and AOC have voted in support of every US war, and why when it comes to foreign policy, they’re indistinguishable from neocons and other liberals.
Socdems like yourself just want to uphold the status quo of imperialist wealth extraction, just with a little more of that stolen wealth allocated to social services.
so you like socialists that fail, and not those that win?
Edit: of course Bernard doesn’t even advocate socialism
There is no version of socialism that could be “what we want overall”. In each country where it is implemented, and within that country in each province, socialism changes its form to address the practical demands of the situation at hand, as they are dictated by the current local topography, climate, vegetation, state of infrastructure and material conditions, culture, demographics, history, law, foreign relations, military capabilities, advancement of urbanisation, education, bureaucratisation, and familiarity with technology, prevalence of diseases and their countermeasures, pollution, availability of public activities and facilities, et cetera.
The socialism in China is the socialism of China, and the socialism of neighbouring nations such as Vietnam, Laos, and the DPRK already looks very, very different; even moreso than the variation between and within China’s cities and provinces. Neither is its current form of socialism the same as what they did in the 1960s or in the 1990s. I suppose you don’t live in China - that much one can read into your takes - therefore I can already promise (disappoint?) you that when socialism develops where you live, it will be nothing like the Chinese version.
