On the photo is Jack Ma, one of the richest capitalists in China, the owner of Alibaba, the Chinese billionaire who said the working hours of the workers should be extended to 12 hours a day.

Many leftists and even people who call themselves marxists say China is still socialist, while other leftists/marxists say it has nothing to do with a socialist country today. Some people also argue that the reinstauration of capitalism in China, after Mao Zedong, was a treason against the revolution and socialism and there is now a lot of rhetorics to justify this opportunism.

If China is still socialist, as some people advocate, how to explain about the billionaires, capitalists, supposed explotation of workers etc.?

  • Fenix
    241·
    2 years ago

    It’s complicated but here is my take on it: (it might be wrong though, comrades, feel free to correct me!)

    China IS socialist, but it’s still in transition between full socialism (where the modes of production are 100% controlled by the proletariat, but still not a utopia.) and capitalism. Reason being the Deng reforms, which allowed the economy to progress much faster with the influx of foreign capital. Capitalists found in China a way to make cheaper products and the Chinese a way to quickly develop the country (after the Japanese Invasion and the Civil War, which destroyed the country.) You could compare the Deng reforms with the NEP from Lenin.

    The Chinese government controls 24 of the 25 biggest companies, 60% of the companies are state-owned (and state-owned companies are mandated by law to have democratic votes from the workers on how the company should act. Which is a way of letting the proletariat control the means of production). China has also announced the goal to socialize all the companies until 2050.

    As other comrades have pointed, billionaires are kept on tight bounds, go out of them, and you will be held accountable. How many billionaires you have seen being accountable on America? Though I do think billionaires existing is a problem that should be corrected (and, that IS being corrected!)

    I also would like to point that the Chinese government has used many Socialist characteristics, like the 5-year planning and protecting extreme important industries and not allowing them to be privatized.

    TLDR: Billionaires existing is a side effect of the Deng reforms, much significant to the quick development of China, but that does not mean China is not full socialist yet, but just a transitory state to full socialism.