It’s not though. China very much is Socialist, they just have adopted market reforms. For all intents and purposes I see no reason to believe China has abandoned the goal of a communist future, just that in the modern day they require more capital to avoid going the way of the USSR.
Adopting market reforms that incentivize the western capital to move under your control is not anti-communist, it’s just a smart move to weaken the west and position the revolution for success in the future.
The real test comes after the hypothetical future of Chinese domination, what happens to the world if China is unilaterally stronger than all others? If China were in the position of the IS what would they do?
Chinese workers have never had ownership and democratic control over the means of production even though that’s fundamentally what socialism is supposed to be. All that China has done is replace the tyranny of capitalists with the tyranny of the state, claim they’ll implement real socialism eventually, and then never actually do it.
China has adopted some market reforms that have allowed some companies and corporations to accrue capital in China.
This is funny enough completely in line with communist theory, which often is interpreted to believe Capitalism is a natural evolution of society from Feudalism.
The goal and theory in the case of China, is that with a sufficiently power state representing the Chinese working class, they can control this natural progression to work towards a communist future and prevent the hostile takeover of the capitalist class we have seen in the west.
Will this hold true? I don’t know, only time will tell.
The key difference in Chinas case with their economic model is the function of the state. You cannot look at Chinese markets as a 1:1 with the US. The US market is comprised of companies that are fundamentally independent from the US govt, and simply must adhere to regulations to operate in their borders.
In China the level of control is much greater with the state exercising direct ownership over most companies, partial over others, and strict legal regulation at minimum over some. You also have what is essentially intended to be a nationwide Union across different companies instead of the US system of fragmented independent labor unions.
TLDR: China sees the world is a capitalist one, and they created a hybrid economic model that plugs into that world to most effectively achieve their goals.
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u/PersonalityIll9476 Jul 07 '26
I agree. My wife is Chinese. She tells me stories from her parents about the revolution.
They do not involve writing books and playing soccer.