The following is an analytical review of China in Global Capitalism. Ralf’s more lengthy summary of the book can be found at naoqingchu.1Ralf Ruckus, “Book Summary: China in Global Capitalism,” naoqingchu (blog), July 28, 2024, https://nqch.org/2024/07/28/book-summary-china-in-global-capitalism/.
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) went through massive changes from the late 1970s into the 2000s, raising important questions as to the interpretation of this transformation. The political left, both within and outside the PRC, has not reached consensus in defining the country’s political and economic system: on this most important issue of dissent, some leftists think the country moved from socialism to capitalism, while others think it remained socialist.
Accordingly, some leftists oppose capitalist relations and support social struggles in the PRC, while others defend the supposedly socialist system and support the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regime. This division between the left’s interpretations of domestic relations within the PRC extends onto the global scale, namely onto the geopolitical rivalry between the CCP-governed PRC, as the emerging world’s economic power, and the United States, as the global hegemon. Some leftists see both countries as capitalist and oppose their regimes, while others support the CCP regime versus its US adversary.
The relative dominance of both these interpretations varies depending on region and country. While the pro-CCP faction has remained fairly small in some regions, it plays a bigger (or even dominant) role in others. In any case, the different interpretations of CCP and PRC and the connected political division have led to confusion, conflict, and paralysis—obstructing the development of stronger left-wing movements around the globe against regional and global capitalist forces.
China in Global Capitalism. Building International Solidarity against Imperial Rivalry, by Eli Friedman, Kevin Lin, Rosa Liu, and Ashley Smith, attempts to counter this confusion and division. A first reading, focusing on the general narrative and analysis, convincingly argues for the capitalist character of the contemporary PRC. The book is a good introduction for those seeking a better understanding of the current conditions and social struggles in the PRC, as well as the country’s role in global capitalism.
The first chapter, “China is Capitalist,” gives a clear account of the PRC’s current political system and the capitalist character of the economy—including private and state capital, and class relations in urban industries and agriculture. In the second chapter, “The Emergence of a New Great Power,” the authors lay out the development of the PRC from its founding in 1949 until today. They follow the buildup of the socialist system with its social struggles, the market reforms after 1978 as well as the crises they produced, and the integration of the PRC’s economy into global capitalism since the 1990s in collaboration with foreign capital.
The third chapter, “Class Struggles in the Countryside, the Cities, and Workplaces,” picks up the book’s main argument that the PRC is capitalist. It describes the social struggles of state workers, migrant workers, and peasants against exploitation and dispossession, as well as the regime’s measures in response to them. The fourth chapter, “Feminist Resistance and the Crisis of Social Reproduction,” addresses the current crisis of social reproduction in China. That crisis results from the effects of the commodification and privatization of social reproduction and care work in the countryside and cities beginning in the 1990s. Women have found ways to resist the increasing pressures and sexist CCP policies, and feminist movements have staged protests against male violence and patriarchal rule. The fifth chapter, “China’s National Questions,” discusses the CCP regime’s racist and oppressive policies in the PRC’s peripheral regions of Tibet and Xinjiang and its expansionist maneuvers over the last fifteen years regarding Hong Kong and Taiwan. It also follows different waves of struggle in these regions and the CCP regime’s countermeasures.
The sixth chapter, “The US v. China: The Twenty-First Century’s Central Interimperial Rivalry,” sheds light on the evolving rivalry between capitalist forces in the PRC and in the United States. It describes how US governments have tried to counter the relative decline of the global hegemonic power as well as the policies the CCP regime has used to expand the PRC’s role and influence in the world. In the seventh chapter, “China and Global Capitalism’s Ecological and Climate Crises,” the authors turn to the global ecological and climate crises that cannot be properly addressed due to the growing rivalry between the great powers US and China. The authors argue that only a global mass movement could enforce a program that effectively solves these crises. The eighth chapter, “Pandemics in an Epoch of Imperial Rivalry,” analyzes the trajectory of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Global capitalism created the conditions for the outbreak of such a pandemic. The rivalry between the United States and the PRC prevented a coherent global response. The authors look at these regimes respective failures to deal with the pandemic.