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Economy with Chinese characteristics|Zuo Ding-shan

蘋果日報 2020/12/30 10:24


When he came up with the theory of communism and wrote “Das Kapital”, Karl Marx was driven by his hatred of ruthless capitalism and the way the bourgeoisie oppressed the working class. He dreamed of building a utopia on earth where everybody would be equal and there would be no profit-making, interest-driven exploiters of workers. In the utopia, everyone would do their best and get what they need and live in harmony.
Communism is an ideal and a dream, but when put into practice, it translates into nightmares and vain hopes. After Vladimir Lenin started the Russian Revolution of 1917 and seized power from the Tsar, he was not capable of handling the Russian economy. Later, Josef Stalin succeeded him and purged all his rivals. The Soviet Union then implemented an economic system that was the complete opposite of capitalism in Western European and the US. Moscow had full control of the national economy of Russia. Market norms were abolished. From cars to soap, everything was planned. The result? It was all a mess. People joined long queues to buy basic necessities. Whatever they needed, the market could not provide. Between 1949 and 1976, when Mao Zedong was in power, China adopted the Soviet system. The central government was the one to plan the economy. Consequently, many people were poor and famines took the lives of tens of millions. The whole country was in abject poverty. In 1976, China had USD580 million worth of foreign reserves, compared with USD157 million in 1950. After Mao died, the Gang of Four fell in 1976 and Deng Xiaoping took power in 1979. He launched the reform and opening up policy, allowing capitalist elements to get into China’s economic system. That incentivized peasants to produce. Hong Kongers played the role of a mentor, investing in the Pearl River Delta region and teaching locals how to run private companies in light industry. China then experienced striking growth. Its foreign reserves increased from USD840 million in 1979 to USD105 billion in 1996, representing a 125-fold increase in the space of 16 years. The growth rate was 3.7 times faster than during the 16-year period between 1959 and 1976. Both Mao and Deng were state leaders of China. How come China’s economy soared after Deng introduced capitalism to the economy? Communism advocated by Marx, Friedrich Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao was detrimental to a country’s economy. Capitalism is superior, isn’t it?
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) surely does not want to recognize the superiority of capitalism, and so they have defined the Chinese system as “socialism with Chinese characteristics”. Today, they call it “socialism with Chinese characteristics in Xi Jinping’s new era”. By “characteristics”, it means the operations of the capitalist market, under the watch of the CCP, can easily make people get rich and start and run their own businesses. A large number of private enterprises can thus be established and market forces can induce state-owned enterprises to strive for profits and adopt competitive operating methods. To cope with the pressure on the trade front exerted by Donald Trump, China has since last year been subtly and overtly promoting the fact that it is opening up to the world. In particular, it now allows foreign firms to set up wholly-owned companies in China to compete for profits with their Chinese counterparts. The idea is to make its economy look freer and more open. Yet at the same time, Beijing is tightening its grip on private companies in China. In the name of fighting monopolistic practices, it is furtively implementing an approach whereby “the state enterprises advance, the private sectors retreat”. Which is why the garrulous Ma Yun has now got into trouble.
(Zuo Ding-shan, columnist)
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