Asian Communism

[Anonymous No.19690476]

I have developed an intense interest in modern mainland China, then their political situation, and now in Asian ‘faux-Communism’. I am a centrist religious person; but I’d love to discuss China, North Korea, Laos, Vietnam, etc. And learn about them or share books relevant to the topic.
>t. Got Covid and started looking into China more closely, read Mao, Xi, Kim Il Sung, etc.

[Anonymous No.19690481]

>>19690476
The point of a thread topic is to have a topic.

[Anonymous No.19690483]

>>19690481
The point of my dick is up your ass

[Anonymous No.19690492]

>>19690481
The topic is Asian communism
Communism as practiced, implemented, or theorized in literary form in the cultural and geographic context of Asia as broadly understood.
For the record, I did not say this: >>19690483

[Anonymous No.19690498]

>>19690492
I mean what about them? You can't just say "food" and expect a real discussion

[Anonymous No.19690505]

>>19690492
Please don't pretend to be me? What do you gain by doing this?

[Anonymous No.19690507]

>>19690476
Communist poster again? Are you the same person who asked about NK? Seems like more commie spam.

[Anonymous No.19690512]

>>19690507
Lol oh I have my very own stalker do I now? Glad to have you at the party, grab a seat, it's going to be a wild ride.

[Anonymous No.19690516]

>>19690476
It’s fascism

[Anonymous No.19690518]

>>19690507
I answered that guy but no, I didn’t ask about it.
>>19690498
Thoughts on the writings of Xi or Mao- I find Xi to be vacuous compared to Mao but I enjoyed reading both
If you’ve read either, tell me what you think

[Anonymous No.19690520]

>>19690512
Stalker? You flatter yourself, spammer.

[Anonymous No.19690543]

>>19690476
I greatly enjoyed "The Perfect Dictatorship: China in the 21st Century" by Stein Ringen. Also "China's World: The Foreign Policy of the World's Newest Superpower" by Kerry Brown, though it's obviously more focused on China's geoplotical ambitions.

[Anonymous No.19690560]

>>19690476
The funny thing is that communists will tell you straight up to your face that you cannot criticize China for being socialist because it's not socialist, and then they will turn around and cheer with their friends that a marxist-leninist country is succeeding in overpowering the west. Maoism failed, brutally, with the deaths of tens of millions of people. China determined that the only way to achieve communism would be through dengism. Dengism is the practical implementation of marxist leninist princples. To quote from the communist texts themselves:

Marx, German Ideology:

it is only possible to achieve real liberation in the real world by employing real means, that slavery cannot be abolished without the steam-engine and the mule and spinning-jenny, serfdom cannot be abolished without improved agriculture, and that, in general, people cannot be liberated as long as they are unable to obtain food and drink, housing and clothing in adequate quality and quantity. “Liberation” is an historical and not a mental act, and it is brought about by historical conditions, the development of industry, commerce, agriculture, the conditions of intercourse

Lenin, The Tax in Kind:

Capitalism is a bane compared with socialism. Capitalism is a boon compared with medievalism, small production, and the evils of bureaucracy which spring from the dispersal of the small producers. Inasmuch as we are as yet unable to pass directly from small production to socialism, some capitalism is inevitable as the elemental product of small production and exchange; so that we must utilise capitalism (particularly by directing it into the channels of state capitalism) as the intermediary link between small production and socialism, as a means, a path, and a method of increasing the productive forces.

Lenin again, Third Congress Of The Communist International, 1921:

Within the limits indicated, however, this is not at all dangerous for socialism as long as transport and large-scale industry remain in the hands of the proletariat. On the contrary, the development of capitalism, controlled and regulated by the proletarian state (i.e., “state” capitalism in this sense of the term), is advantageous and necessary in an extremely devastated and backward small-peasant country (within certain limits, of course), inasmuch as it is capable of hastening the immediate revival of peasant farming. This applies still more to concessions: without denationalising anything, the workers’ state leases certain mines, forest tracts, oilfields, and so forth, to foreign capitalists in order to obtain from them extra equipment and machinery that will enable us to accelerate the restoration of Soviet large-scale industry…

[Anonymous No.19690563]

>>19690560
Deng Xiaoping:

"In a country as big and as poor as ours, if we don't try to increase production, how can we survive? How is socialism superior, when our people have so many difficulties in their lives? The Gang of Four clamoured for "poor socialism'' and "poor communism'', declaring that communism was mainly a spiritual thing. That is sheer nonsense! We say that socialism is the first stage of communism. When a backward country is trying to build socialism, it is natural that during the long initial period its productive forces will not be up to the level of those in developed capitalist countries and that it will not be able to eliminate poverty completely. Accordingly, in building socialism we must do all we can to develop the productive forces and gradually eliminate poverty, constantly raising the people's living standards. Otherwise, how will socialism be able to triumph over capitalism? In the second stage, or the advanced stage of communism, when the economy is highly developed and there is overwhelming material abundance, we shall be able to apply the principle of from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. If we don't do everything possible to increase production, how can we expand the economy? How can we demonstrate the superiority of socialism and communism? We have been making revolution for several decades and have been building socialism for more than three. Nevertheless, by 1978 the average monthly salary for our workers was still only 45 yuan, and most of our rural areas were still mired in poverty. Can this be called the superiority of socialism? That is why I insisted that the focus of our work should be rapidly shifted to economic development. A decision to this effect was made at the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee, and it represented an important turning point. Our practice since then has shown that this line is correct, as the whole country has taken on an entirely new look."

[Anonymous No.19690570]

>>19690563
Or if you prefer from other resources:

It's not really Deng who is the "revisionist", "Dengism" is quite literally a return to more classical Marxism. It was Mao who thought he could update it, and had some interesting ideas, but in practice they didn't really work. Of course, Maoists believe they just weren't implemented properly, but that's a whole other discussion.

From a more classical Marxist point of view, a socialist economy is not something you can just go implement by decree under any conditions. Marxism is not a list of tenets to be followed, but a scientific theory of societal development, and socialism is a prediction Marx made based on the development of capitalism.

Capitalism develops into a more centralized system system over time. Markets are slowly done away with and replaced with more and more planning as the scale of production increases. This is sometimes called "monopolization". All capitalist economies follow this trend. The monopolization brought about from the development of capitalism is what lays the foundations for socialism, which requires monopolies big industries to be owned by the public.

It is market competition which, over time, abolishes itself as the scale of industry develops, and replaces competition with "association".

The advance of industry, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the labourers, due to competition, by the revolutionary combination, due to association. The development of Modern Industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie therefore produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers.


1/?

[Anonymous No.19690577]

>>19690570
— Marx & Engels, Communist Manifesto

Of course, Maoists will posit that you can build up this big industry even from poverty using economic planning. They will argue that in fact socialism is more efficient at building up this big industry. But this is itself a new idea that is not to be found in classical Marxism.

Free competition is necessary for the establishment of big industry, because it is the only condition of society in which big industry can make its way.

— Engels, The Principles of Communism

For Marxists, it is the level of the productive forces that ultimately determine production relations. When guns were invented, battle tactics had to be changed. You couldn't use the same old battle tactics you used prior to guns after the guns came into existence, they wouldn't work. In the same sense, how humanity organizes itself around the productive forces always changes respective to those productive forces.

These social relations between the producers, and the conditions under which they exchange their activities and share in the total act of production, will naturally vary according to the character of the means of production. With the discover of a new instrument of warfare, the firearm, the whole internal organization of the army was necessarily altered, the relations within which individuals compose an army and can work as an army were transformed, and the relation of different armies to another was likewise changed.

We thus see that the social relations within which individuals produce, the social relations of production, are altered, transformed, with the change and development of the material means of production, of the forces of production. The relations of production in their totality constitute what is called the social relations, society, and, moreover, a society at a definite stage of historical development, a society with peculiar, distinctive characteristics. Ancient society, feudal society, bourgeois (or capitalist) society, are such totalities of relations of production, each of which denotes a particular stage of development in the history of mankind.

2/?

[Anonymous No.19690580]

>>19690577

— Marx, Wage Labor and Capital

We thus see that to it is the level of the productive forces that determine the productive relations. Maoists instead believe that you can inverse this process, that you can implement a fully planned economy with incredibly backwards productive forces, and that this could be a long-term stable arrangement. Yet, in practice, it didn't work.

What merits our attention here is that our socialist state was established by a proletarian party that has a grasp of historical materialism and is dedicated to communism. With such a party controlling the state power, it is possible for our country to promote changes in the relations of production according to its own will. If, instead of proceeding from realities, we try to change the relations of production according to our wishful thinking, the result may be that the relations of production will go beyond the requirements of the growth of the productive forces, which may thus be disrupted. In 1958, for instance, people’s communes, “large in size and having a high degree of public ownership” as Mao Zedong put it, were set up throughout the country, and there rose the premature “communist wind” characterized by the attempt to effect a transition to communism. All this made agricultural production drop greatly.

3/?

[Anonymous No.19690582]

Today I learned of Kōtoku Shūsui. Now I can be an anarchist and a weeb.

[Anonymous No.19690587]

>>19690580
— Xue Muqiao, China’s Socialist Economy

Insisting that China could become a fully planned economy, that it could establish advanced productive relations with backwards productive forces, is in and of itself a departure from classical Marxism, a revision of classical Marxism.

Mao and Maoists thought/think this contradiction can be resolved simply by a relentless focus on class struggle. That if you just constantly purge bourgeois ideas from the country and promote a proletarian culture, that you can make it work. But in practice this solution, the Cultural Revolution, did not work either, and practically led to civil war in the country.

Due to the hasty and early entry into socialism, we didn’t accumulate enough experience to enable us to have a very clear understanding on the issues of social development. Throughout the ‘Great Leap Forward’ and the People’s Commune Movement in 1958, there had occurred a blind optimism of targeting ‘the realization of communism in our country, which is no longer a distant future’, and thus made a serious and erroneous estimation on the development stages of socialism….As Deng Xiaoping pointed out: As early as the second half of 1957 we began to make ‘Left’ mistakes. To put it briefly, we pursued a closed-door policy in foreign affairs and took class struggle as the central task at home no attempt was made to expand the productive forces, and the policies we formulated were too ambitious for the primary stage of socialism. After the 3rd Plenary Session of the Party, after the comparison of our both positive and negative experiences, the Chinese Communist Party has gradually made a scientific conclusion that China is in and will be in the Primary stage of socialism.

— Xu Hongzhi & Qin Xuan, Basics of the Theoretical System of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics

Mao's path didn't work in practice, so they changed course from experience. This wasn't "revisionism". This was quite literally going back to a more classical understanding of Marxism. Mao had placed the productive relations miles ahead of the productive forces, and so they could not progress forwards unless they at first took one step back and restored some markets in the economy.

Our sole aim is to win by taking advantage of given conditions. If we want to restore agricultural production, we must also take advantage of actual conditions. That is to say, we should not stick to a fixed mode of relations of production but adopt whatever mode that can help mobilize the masses’ initiative. At present, it looks as though neither industry nor agriculture can advance without first taking one step back. Can you not see this? Is agriculture not now taking a step backwards? Are communes not taking a step backwards? The accounting unit has regressed from the commune through the production brigade to the production team, because only by stepping back can they go forward.

4/?

[Anonymous No.19690594]

>>19690587
— Deng Xiaoping, Restore Agricultural Production

This is not some original idea. It was well understood by Lenin too. There were a lot of ultra-Leftists during Lenin's time who wanted to nationalize everything at once. Lenin pointed out that this was economically impossible and would be suicidal to the revolution.

What is to be done? One way is to try to prohibit entirely, to put the lock on all development of private, non-state exchange, i.e., trade, i.e., capitalism, which is inevitable with millions of small producers. But such a policy would be foolish and suicidal for the party that tried to apply it. It would be foolish because it is economically impossible. It would be suicidal because the party that tried to apply it would meet with inevitable disaster. Let us admit it: some Communists have sinned “in thought, word and deed” by adopting just such a policy. We shall try to rectify these mistakes, and this must be done without fail, otherwise things will come to a very sorry state.

— Lenin, The Tax in Kind

It confuses me how so-called "Dengists" are the ones who are being called revisionists when it is the opponents of Deng Xiaoping Theory who are advocating for an update to Marxism, that it is apparently possible to inverse the historical process as long as you have some sort of a Cultural Revolution to back it up. When this deviation didn't work, their economic problems were resolved with a return to more classical Marxism. But apparently Deng Xiaoping was a "revisionist".

[Anonymous No.19690807]

>>19690560
>>19690563
>>19690570
>>19690577
>>19690580
>>19690587
>>19690594
A TLDR, because I feel like the ADHD dopamine-addled zoomers on this website have the attention span of a goldfish, and rather then engaging with what I wrote, they will simply soijak or reply 'I'm don't read, so I'm not reading that.'

Modern day China IS communism, or at least the path to achieving communism, as according to marxist leninism. They tried to go straight to it with Maoism, and it failed, miserably. You need a super authoritarian state, akin to fascism. If you argue with a leftist, they will cite some theory, and say 'but look here, the definition of communism is a stateless classless society'.

But this is as if I created a 'utopianist' party. Our princples are to create a utopian society. Wherever we are voted in, following the utopianist texts down to the letter, we institute utopianist parties. And even if, every single time this is tried, in ends in authoritarianism, we will simply dodge that by saying 'Well the definition of utopianism is a perfect society, so that wasn't real utopianism'. The problem with zoomers is that they don't read history. I can guarantee that many communists would not be socialist any longer, if they actually read the complete history of china. Thousands if not millions of man hours in China have been spent on studying theory, and how to properly implement it.

I really wanted to believe in the leftist cause, but nothing turned me away more from it then actually reading leftist literature. Google 'communist library discord'. Its fairly popular, with about 5000 members total. You don't need any sort of vetting to get in, because it's just channels of resources and leftist content. I actually took the time to watch through almost all of it. What you will find, is that communists actually support China. And not just support China, they love it.

I used to be under the impression that they viewed it as state capitalist, and that they abhorred it. I thought that if it was tried again in the west, then that isn't what they would do.

They know that China's implementation of Communism is proper. Their popular content creators talk about how other countries can't be as successful as China, because they didn't properly study theory, and that they have not liquidated the upper class (committed genocide) like China has. And they secretly work to support and bolster China, while putting on a face for the people they think they are fooling.

The worst thing is, is that they are incredibly practice oriented. I think it's because they are materialists, but their discussions are almost entirely practical, on how to get the average person to support the institution of a system like China's.

[Anonymous No.19690851]

>>19690807
Quite honestly, the right completely underestimates the ability of the left, and how far they have developed. The worst thing is, that without extensive reading, the average person will never know about this stuff. They'll just be duped by the false facade of lefty tubers. Sometimes I wonder how I managed to be duped in this exact same way. But if you DO want to know, read Frank Dikotter's three part series.

I would invite a leftist to give their own view on this topic.

Quite honestly, now I have no idea what to believe. I read most relevant stuff: egosim, communism, fascism, liberalism, conservatism, traditionalism, anarchism, populism, everything. It's weird, but I'm almost coming to the conclusion that history is always right. Its really hard for me to explain, but essentially that history will continue according to the complex system that is the human race, and that's simply the way that it should and will be. I feel as though should just stop caring about politics entirely. I don't even know.

[Anonymous No.19690946]

>>19690851
It certainly is complex and tiring. And one thing that I saw while quickly reading through what you wrote, for it is late here, that should be pointed out again, is that China is embracing bits of capitalism in order to achieve communism. And this doesn't mean that they're not communist. It's just that they have tried to no avail, and have reworked their process. Young people need to study this shit wholeheartedly, or just sit on the sidelines. It takes a lot of commitment to be a part of the process of deciding how civilizations are ran. Because people's suffering is at stake.

[Bombard !FNtGEvNJ8M No.19691127]

>>19690807
I'm aware that state capitalism is a "necessary sacrifice" on the road to communism, but do you believe that the government will wilfully hand over their power when the time comes to do so? And how long would it take to get to such a time in the first place? I'd imagine that world domination would be necessary?

And good post. I've almost never seen anyone state the obvious about wealth accumulation being a necessary precursor for communism; it's usually either idiots completely misunderstanding the system.

[Anonymous No.19691145]

>>19690594
Unironically fascinating post. I'm saving this to sound smart when I next talk to my left wing friends kek

[Anonymous No.19691172]

>>19690851
>I feel as though should just stop caring about politics entirely. I don't even know.
I'm honestly at that stage too.
I kinda have agreed with everything I read? All these isms have something captivating, along with all their shortcomings and failures. Nowadays of course I realize that none of these isms exists or ever will exist exactly according to their doctrine and paperwork, which just makes it all the more maddening.

[Anonymous No.19691188]

>>19691127
The transition is the part I'm always sceptical of. Can the CCP maintain some decades long party discipline and ideological commitment? It's bold to presume that successors will be in line with their teachers always

[Anonymous No.19691213]

>>19690543
>>19690560
>>19690563
>>19690570
>>19690577
Thank you for participating in such a substantive dialectical progression- but can I pester you with a simple question: ‘Asian Communism’ appears to have a conservative streak; even Marxist-Leninists seem to have a conservative underpinning with the notion of a revolutionary vanguard; hierarchy. One way we could look at general reactionary or conservative thought (not a condemnation) is adherence to, or promotion of, hierarchy. Social hierarchy for social conservatives, materially based hierarchy for libertarians, and governance based(?) state oriented hierarchy or cult, or mystical thinking like patterns (Mao good luck charms). Would you be able to logically synthesize Marxist-Leninist thought with any substantial degree of conservatism?

Also, I would like someone to elaborate on ‘On The Governance of China’ if you could. I don’t have much to say about it in any interesting way

[Anonymous No.19691246]

>>19691127
But that's the thing. I don't think they ever will. I feel as though the absolute power that would be required to create it, will corrupt absolutely. Another problem is this: if the only way to see if your theory works is to implement global authoritarian communism dictatorship, then it is unfalsifiable.

[Anonymous No.19691366]

>>19690476
>I am a centrist religious person
So you're a nazi fuck. Thanks for being honest.

You'll want to start with Zhao Enlai as singularly representative of the common sensical, utterly facile in line following, privately reformist, fundamentally bourgeois in an aristocratic-intelligentsia sense. Enlai embodies both the humanism and the bourgeois capitalisation of the party.

In contrast North Korea went off the rails during the war when the factions fell out. Vietnam is basically Le Duan crushing Giap's humanist/reformists.

The most important thing is to read. You'll unfortunately have to read the scissors crisis debate on soviet development since all asian "communist" societies respond to the problem the Soviet Union faced in 1927: capitalism, revolutionary anti-party working class, strong peasantry, failing "new class" society.

Strauss' book on Soviet Economics is worth a go through. You'll also want to read some new-class / red-capitalism critiques of the soviet union. Yes this means trots. Cliffites are your best bet.

[Anonymous No.19691422]

>>19690476
No such thing. Communism in China was the most short lived one, they had only Mao and called it quits.
China was the world leader in dismantling communism (the domino started to tumble afterwards). North Korea is still a laughing stock of the world granted.

[Anonymous No.19691580]

>>19691366
>>19691422
Did either of you even bother to read through the thread

[Anonymous No.19691584]

>>19691366
>>19691422

[Anonymous No.19691592]

>>19691366
>>19691422
Did either of you even bother to read through the thread first before posting?

[Anonymous No.19691605]

>>19691213
>Also, I would like someone to elaborate on ‘On The Governance of China’ if you could. I don’t have much to say about it in any interesting way
Kissinger: On China

[Anonymous No.19691627]

>>19691592
Who's Ðilas and what's the import of his work in terms of analysing China in 1968?

fuck off kiddie trot.

[Anonymous No.19691646]

>>19691627
>Who's Ðilas and what's the import of his work in terms of analysing China in 1968?
>fuck off kiddie trot.

[Anonymous No.19691667]

>>19690481
>'faux-Communism'
what did he mean by this

[Anonymous No.19691677]

>>19691667
He's a furry who thinks french is chic.

[Anonymous No.19691686]

>>19690851
>Sometimes I wonder how I managed to be duped in this exact same way. But if you DO want to know, read Frank Dikotter's three part series.
What's his diagnosis? It seems to me that when your rulers make a concerted effort to dupe you, it's normal to be duped.

[Anonymous No.19691727]

>>19691127
>I'm aware that state capitalism is a "necessary sacrifice" on the road to communism, but do you believe that the government will wilfully hand over their power when the time comes to do so?
What I'm about to say is entirely based on my guts but Xi Jinping's leadership has been fundamental in this. Before Xi, it seemed China's path was uncertain at best, but Xi's heavy handed reforms and ideological commitment have vindicated the path they are on. And this vindication of the past vindicates the future, illuminating and edifying the path going forward.
TLDR: trust da plan

[Anonymous No.19691747]

>>19691727
>bourgeois individualist ideology
nice praxis mate

[Anonymous No.19691851]

>>19691747
?

[Anonymous No.19691862]

>>19691213
Stalinism had a very social conservative streak. All even somewhat sucessful marxist states were social conservative. Otherwise how you even plan society if you had 50 genders coming in and out every year.

[Anonymous No.19691890]

>>19691213
All ML states have historically been socially conservative. China banned femboys not long ago.

[Anonymous No.19691918]

>>19690543
I believe that Deng Xiaopeng (for all his wrongdoings) was the superior statesman. Xi appears to aspire to the status of a quasi-emperor.

[Anonymous No.19691924]

>>19691918
>Xi appears to aspire to the status of a quasi-emperor.
western MSM bs

[Anonymous No.19691927]

>>19691918
whoops. Meant for
>>19690560

[Anonymous No.19691931]

>>19691924
Westerners are unaware of how much of a flex it is to sit on a big dragon chair while using/serving drinks in yellow vessels, especially in context of being the current head of state.

[Anonymous No.19692397]

>>19690476

[Anonymous No.19692401]

>>19691931
I literally bought and own the same tea set from a holiday in China.

[Anonymous No.19692610]

>>19691890
>>19691862
Not too sure about other ML countries but I'm from East Germany and the GDR was much more progressive than the west. Being openly homosexual was totally legal and men and women were treated equal in pretty much every regard (to the point where GDR women mocked western feminists). Meanwhile in West Germany it was totally legal for a husband to rape his wife, even years after reunification.

[Anonymous No.19692712]

>>19690476
'Mao's China and After' by Maurice Meisner is a good one-volume history of the modern PRC through Deng.

The Marxist economist Michael Hudson pointed out recently on George Galloway's show that a lot of people believed that socialism would emerge from advanced industrial capitalism assisted by the state which is how the U.S. and Germany developed. But he claims there was a counter-revolution in the west by a financial oligarchy / rentier class. He thinks China is basically doing what the U.S. and Germany once did but they're transitioning straight into socialism.

I think a lot of westerners get caught up in communism being X rather than an implication of a whole developing process. I think China is run by people who believe themselves to be committed communists and Marxists and they're reemphasizing ideology after laying low for a bit. They still blame Khrushchev for de-Stalinization. The interesting thing about this is that it completely scrambles a lot of how westerners interpret recent history where communism is something that existed in the past and ended with the Cold War, and they don't quite know how to deal with a modern, updated form of the ideology that learned from the mistakes of the Soviet Union (including trying to export the ideology everywhere whether people wanted it or not) while being way more economically powerful than the USSR ever was:

https://youtu.be/-_XdVsOKe3Y

>>19691213
It depends on how you look at it. There are a lot of virtues that I've detected in communist history (you could call them military virtues) that conservatives like but I don't know if those are inherently "conservative." I'm talking about discipline, collective order, sacrifice, and doing one's duty. I think those are good values. I don't think that's inherently "right wing." Perhaps they are within a liberal context. Here's a recent propaganda film about the Wuhan outbreak and you see those values here:

https://youtu.be/c3hHPsawnUA?t=531

The red flag pins on the doctors indicates CPC membership.

I think the Chinese tend to claim that their hierarchy is a hierarchy of competence. A meritocracy. Each according to his ability, right? Now, that might not really be true and there's a lot of corruption and nepotism. But the anti-corruption purges under Xi are real, so they recognize that it's a problem.

That said, whatever you believe about them, I think their successes owe in part to that Homer Simpson line about the Chinese combination of crisis and opportunity being "crisitunity." Like, they have this sense that anything could go wrong any minute, so they're constantly on their toes and are able to marshal resources to unfuck whatever the new problem is. I think that DNA comes from the party's guerrilla days when you had to stay flexible and couldn't get caught up on the particulars. Also see the Vietnamese and the Cubans. The CPC's biggest danger probably lies in "going through the motions" like the USSR.

[Anonymous No.19692719]

What is "chinese characteristics"?

[Anonymous No.19692757]

>>19692712
Western communists also have a rather idealist conception of socialist states where "revisionism" stealthily alters their class character. "Maoists" in particular (and I'm talking about the kind of "Maoism" which exists outside of China) also like to define socialism as an "unbroken march" to communism, so even if a country's economic logic isn't dominated by capital, revisionism means that "socialism is dying and capitalism is rising," therefore making revisionist states capitalist.

This is undialectical though, because if contradiction is the primary law of dialectics, an "unbroken march" to communism is impossible. Like, look at capitalist states for example. The proletariat can make gains under capitalism. The bourgeois state can weaken. The masses can become more conscious. But the state is still capitalist, and will continue to represent the interest of capital in the last instance until there's a qualitative break from a capitalist state to a socialist state. So the idea that setbacks in policy in a socialist state marks a break back to capitalism is ridiculous. Until there's a qualitative break, the state will retain its proletarian character in the last instance.

There's also a massive difference between a proletarian state on the eve of counter-revolution and a post-counter-revolution bourgeois state; i.e. see the Soviet Union and post-Soviet Russia. The actual break-up of the USSR occurred during several years of political turmoil, culminating in blatant counter-revolution, fighting in the streets, selling off of state property en masse, etc.

So this leaves us with the idea that China did break with socialism, and it just happened relatively easy, underneath everyone's noses, and without a precise moment in time that anyone can pinpoint. That requires believing that breaking states apart is easy. I think the truth is that states are ultimately a relationship between classes, a relationship reinforced through manifold legal structures, political forms, and economic binds that severely limit and push on the decisions of the individual actors within them. A capitalist state might increase the public sector for any given reason (perhaps wisely, or perhaps mistakenly, in terms of the bourgeoisie's interests), just as a socialist state might increase market mechanisms for any given reason (perhaps wisely, or perhaps mistakenly, in terms of the proletariat's interests). But to expect these states to break apart and turn inwards on themselves surreptitiously betrays logic and observed facts.

[Anonymous No.19692804]

>>19692757
The last thing, Chinese Marxists regularly talk about the many contradictions in China's society, such as between rich and poor, laborer and payer, rural and urban, and China and foreign nations. But ironically, this alone does not substantiate anything new from the era of Mao Zedong what is the ultimate end of such analysis (a guy who wrote a whole book called "On Contradiction"). They say that if China is no longer a socialist democracy, that is if China no longer serves the people, and if China were to repeat grand errors like becoming a hegemonic superpower like the USSR, then ultimately the demise of the CPC is very much in the horizon. But that doesn't seem to be on the immediate horizon.

So the second such people turn to arguing about the collapse of the CPC the jig is up because quite frankly they are no different from The Economist, or listening to Gordan Chang. Any contradiction they don't like they'll point to, but if China continues to be effectively led by the CPC and the masses continue to uphold the CPC year after year they can never be content.

The idea that a party could have led to such contradictions sharpening and deepening in society yet the masses did not overthrow them must be infuriating. For the western leftist, how do the Chinese not see clearly a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie? One that takes advantage of people??? Then the only path one can go from here is that Chinese people are foolish and stupid, they are easily deceived and misled and that they lack class consciousness and are unable to push their interests which clearly must align with overthrowing such an abhorrent rule?

And when you understand this, it's just the mirror image of something people already know. It's the mirror image of western criticisms and desires. One from the right, the other from the left. Two sides of the same coin.

I talk of this because in reality Chinese masses are the total opposite. If anything Chinese social media will be the first to drag people like Jack Ma through the mud and criticize the excessive liberalism and western fetishism such people have. China has hundreds of labor strikes every year. When village-level democracy did terrible things in rural china, people walked all the way to Beijing to complain to the government to intervene. Their desires and criticisms of the CPC ultimately do not deal with the reality that actually, despite all the problems, the CPC serves the people enough for them to continue to support it. They are not brainwashed by nationalism or CPC propaganda, they just have had their lives continuously and materially improve.

[Anonymous No.19692838]

>>19692719
I think all that really means is applying Marxism to the particular Chinese context. The particulars vary. Marxism was created in the west and tried to synthesize and also challenge various trends in European philosophy. China also has its own philosophical traditions and you see dialectical thinking in Daoism and Confucianism.

[Anonymous No.19692865]

>>19692719
So, you have Confucianism, right? This moral theory about self cultivation and such. Then, you have Song-Ming Confucianism (Westerners often call it "Neo-Confucianism", modeled after "Neo-Platonism", but here as there, there's nothing "Neo-" about it), which attempts to craft a metaphysical theory to backup this moral self cultivation.

In Korea, in the 1600s, there's an interesting experiment. tl;dr Catholicism is introduced. The Confucian scholars are intrigued by monotheism, and use it as a way to solve a series of conundrums that they'd been chewing on. The orthodox Confucians eventually shut this down and kick the Vatican out (the "Korean Catholics" were arguing that Korea could subvert Catholicism, take over the Vatican, and rule the West via it, and the Confucians were of the opinion that this was too risky and would invite an attack on Korea by China if Korea was perceived as growing too strong). However, it set forth an interesting trajectory.

Up until this point, Chinese thought had lacked the idea of universal teleology. True, Taoist thinkers had long postulated a general flow of the Tao, set forth by Heaven, but this was basically unknowable to man. You could only craft elaborate correlative, rather than causal, maps. They did a LOT of this correlative mapping. However, the Catholics introduced he novel idea of causal mapping.

Marxism for the Chinese tradition, really, is a means of introducing a causal teleology to a world that up until then had only really known correlative teleology. When we say "Marxism with Chinese Characteristics", what we really mean is introducing a fourth conversation. Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, these are three conversations that the Chinese are having. Taoism, for example, is about health, wealth, and longevity. If you wish to discuss that, you take up Taoism. Marxism, then, is a conversation about causality and historical teleology. It is indeed a conversation, which is why it eventually drifts away from a Rabbinical obsession with a return to primary texts (because the texts are only as important as their relationship to the conversation). Marxism, for the Chinese, in truth has little to do with Marx, other than his historical role in the conversation.

The real interesting question is, when the CCP inevitably collapses, what historical teleology will the Chinese take up?

[Anonymous No.19692882]

>>19692804
>Their desires and criticisms of the CPC ultimately do not deal with the reality that actually, despite all the problems, the CPC serves the people enough for them to continue to support it.
Literally this simple
Western tankies seem to have this delusion that the entire country of China is comprised of passionate Marxist-Leninists. The reality is that the CCP lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese out of poverty and created the largest middle class on earth. The CCP stays in power because of this, not because all the Chinese people have some loyalty to communism. If China ever experiences a major economic crisis which worsens the life of the average Chinese, the CCP will be on shaky ground.

[Anonymous No.19693126]

>>19691727
Fucking scum piece of shit why don’t you live in china and suck their fascist cocks all day instead of posting here. This thread is so retarded you can only be either a paid psyop shill or a westerner so I’ll equipped to succede in a capitalist world that your only hope is worshipping fake, bullshit ideas made up by power mad retard fascist like the Chinese. Guess how I know which of the two are, looser. Like unironically boot licking a retarded nazi world domination party of morons, looking forward to the end of this decade when they collapse

[Anonymous No.19693568]

>>19691605
Thanks bud. I read his description of Mao and I literally ruminate on it sometimes how visceral and insightful Kissinger was in that moment (evil man I think tho and I don’t even know much about him)
>>19691366
Good post despite you calling me le hecking fashoid

[Anonymous No.19693588]

how china escaped shock therapy by weber

[Anonymous No.19693619]

>>19692719
>flow and practicality in all respects to uphold the mandate(DoTP)

[Anonymous No.19694575]

>>19693126
>Fucking scum piece of shit why don’t you live in china and suck their fascist cocks all day instead of posting here. This thread is so retarded you can only be either a paid psyop shill or a westerner so I’ll equipped to succede in a capitalist world that your only hope is worshipping fake, bullshit ideas made up by power mad retard fascist like the Chinese. Guess how I know which of the two are, looser. Like unironically boot licking a retarded nazi world domination party of morons, looking forward to the end of this decade when they collapse

[Anonymous No.19694860]

>>19692610
Yes, you're right, but I have a feeling the gays of the GDR were much more masculine and dignified than what is often portrayed of gay men in current year.

[Anonymous No.19695021]

>>19693126
>t. seething ultra
you're no different than liberals

[Anonymous No.19695725]

>>19692757
Look up the proletariats abandonment of the value form. Marx himself makes the argument that Communisation is cataclysmic for a set of relations rather than gradual.

Also seriously I’m an ultra and one of my best comrades is a pro China from a tankie party. Another is an ex Cliffite Leninist. Yet another is a collectivist anarchist. Tkv0y

[Anonymous No.19696346]

Hi, is this the Infrared thread?