China

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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Jun 08, 2024 1:43 pm

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Contrasting the US’s severe urban decay with China’s extraordinary infrastructure development
In the following article, originally published in the Morning Star, Roger McKenzie contrasts the economic priorities of the US with those of China.
Reporting from Washington DC and New York City, and reflecting on the recent Friends of Socialist China delegation to China, he compares the level of investment in infrastructure in the two countries. A train journey between DC and NYC “revealed a picture of severe urban decay in supposedly the world’s most important and richest nation” – a reflection of the fact that, in the US, “the government, of any colour, prefers to spend immense amounts of money on the military as opposed to the people.”

The article continues:

The US is visibly decaying economically as well as politically, while China is clearly stable, able to act on behalf of the people and on the way up. The transport infrastructure, road, rail and airport systems in China have undergone a massive upgrades in length and quality over the last decade. This is a sentence you simply can’t apply to the US.

In the five cities I visited during my 10-day visit to China I never saw a single homeless person and felt entirely safe to walk the streets and speak with anyone I wanted. Nobody stopped me from doing any of those things. I never felt the same level of safety in DC — or New York for that matter.


Roger notes that the US could learn a great deal from China. If it were willing to adapt to a multipolar reality and give up on its dream of a New American Century, it could prioritise the needs of its people over those of the military-industrial complex. However, he warns that the current trajectory is towards leveraging the US’s military power to maintain its global dominance, even as its economic power wanes. “The temptation will be for the empire to strike back as its power crumbles. Unfortunately it is something I think we are already seeing in Ukraine and in its attempts to stoke up tensions in the breakaway Chinese province of Taiwan.”

The challenge for the left is therefore to build a powerful mass movement that combines the struggle for socialism at home with the struggle against imperialism and war.

Roger will be among the speakers at the upcoming webinar China proves that a new world is possible! on 16 June.
EMPIRES always end. All of them. The only question is about the nature of that end. We can see this before our eyes as the United States empire reaches its inevitable end, internationally and domestically.

We can see it happening in front of our eyes if we choose to look. One of the advantages of travelling by train instead of flying is you get to see much more of the reality of a country.

The Acela Express train ride of 230 miles or so for three hours from New York City to the US capital, Washington DC, was depressing in so many ways.

The train itself was better and more comfortable than many I have travelled on in Britain, but the journey revealed a picture of severe urban decay in supposedly the world’s most important and richest nation.

You could see the wealth on the skyline represented by the skyscraper office blocks of the major cities we passed through — Philadelpia and Baltimore — but much of the rest was a picture of severe urban decay.

The industrial base of the country has been gutted. It reminded me of the train journey through the once thriving Black Country in Britain. Once a hive of industrial activity, now hollowed out with miles of left-to-rot former factories.

In the US the choice has clearly been made that the government, of any colour, prefers to spend immense amounts of money on the military as opposed to the people.

I can’t believe that the minority of the US population that actually bother to come out and vote don’t understand this. It’s no secret that the US spends by far the largest amount on the military of any country on Earth.

The US spends more on the military than China, Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, Britain, Germany, France and South Korea combined.

Between them China and Russia account for only around 13 per cent of the world’s military spend. Not the vast amounts the corporate media would have you believe.

But while content to project its power abroad, the US is crumbling. One visit to the vast and imposing US embassy in London will show you just how much the US is intent on projecting its power. To the US size really does matter.

The Romans, along with every other past empire, knew the importance of not just having the means to exercise power, but having the symbols and institutions that constantly remind everyone of this.

As I arrived in DC and left Union Station, everything looked amazing. As the cab left the station, the Capitol building, the scene of the Trump-inspired attempted coup on January 6 2021, peeked out above other buildings.

It acts as a symbol to remind you of what the main business of the city is — the gathering and exercise of power on behalf of capitalism.

A stone’s throw from Babylon Central (the White House) nestled the World Bank, which I didn’t know was actually a group of banks, and the International Monetary Fund. In many ways the three institutions that run the world.

The area, to be fair, was immaculate, as was much of the Georgetown area where I was staying — but not everywhere.

At the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House I saw makeshift campsites on waste ground that people on their way to the swanky shops and restaurants of Georgetown cannot fail to see. No doubt a fair number of these passers-by work at the White House or elsewhere for the administration of the day.

Of course homeless people living rough in a capital city isn’t peculiar to DC, but the fact that it’s so close to the seat of power of the empire is notable.

Last year there was a 39 per cent increase in crime in DC. Earlier on this year data showed an outbreak of armed carjackings, many carried out by desperate teenagers. Put all of this alongside crumbling road and rail infrastructure and a strong picture of decay is painted.

But it isn’t just economic decay. The inability of the (mis)leadership of both main political parties to pass any kind of meaningful legislation for the people, the blatant gerrymandering of voting areas, a political rather than legal Supreme Court makes the case for political decay.

The January 6 attempted coup three years ago illustrates the point better than anything I am able to write. The problem for the US is that few others believe in the power they attempt to project.

The global South is looking elsewhere because it is fed up with being bullied and told who they can and can’t have trade or political relations with. They are sick of having the real decisions about their economies taken by the troika on Pennsylvania Avenue.

One such country the US warns the global South off is China, the world’s other major economic and political superpower. The comparison between the US and China is startling.

I was in Beijing just a few weeks ago, so it is still fresh enough in my mind to be able to compare the two. In reality there is no comparison between the two capitals or, indeed, the two countries.

The US is visibly decaying economically as well as politically, while China is clearly stable, able to act on behalf of the people and on the way up. The transport infrastructure, road, rail and airport systems in China have undergone a massive upgrades in length and quality over the last decade. This is a sentence you simply can’t apply to the US.

Figures from 2022 show the length of China’s highways exceeded 109,982 miles. The length of the country’s high-speed railways expanded by an additional 27,961 miles. The country had some 254 civil airports in operation.

China is clearly a beacon for the rest of the world in understanding the importance of strong domestic infrastructure. The growth shows no sign of slowing.

In the five cities I visited during my 10-day visit to China I never saw a single homeless person and felt entirely safe to walk the streets and speak with anyone I wanted. Nobody stopped me from doing any of those things. I never felt the same level of safety in DC — or New York for that matter.

Making sure people have somewhere to live is also a priority in China. You notice the high-rise buildings on the outskirts of the major cities. The aesthetics of these buildings may not be to everyone’s tastes — it was fine by me — but I think people in China would take the fact that they have somewhere decent to live rather than the tents that I saw in DC.

Instead of warning about a non-existent economic collapse of China — mainly because of its failure to compete — the US needs to look to itself and its own economic priorities. The choice is a simple one. It can continue to prioritise spending money on projecting and using a power that nobody now believes in or it can decide to prioritise the good people of the US.

The temptation will be for the empire to strike back as its power crumbles. Unfortunately it is something I think we are already seeing in Ukraine and in its attempts to stoke up tensions in the breakaway Chinese province of Taiwan.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. The mainstream politicians, already bought and paid for by big business, will not make that choice without grassroots organising forcing them to do it.

The task for socialists of all persuasions is to build the united front that will be necessary to make this happen in the US and elsewhere.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/03/c ... velopment/

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Breakthrough by Shanghai doctors uses stem cells to cure diabetes

The following article from China Daily reports on an extremely promising Chinese innovation in the treatment of diabetes: “Doctors in Shanghai have, for the first time in the world, cured a patient’s diabetes through the transplantation of pancreatic cells derived from stem cells.” The patient has been able to function normally without insulin injections for nearly three years.

Up to now, it has been possible to treat severe diabetes patients with pancreatic cell transplantation, but the shortage of donors and the complexity of the technology have meant that clinical needs are not currently being met. The doctors at Shanghai Changzheng Hospital have shown that it is possible to restore normal insulin production using pancreatic cells derived from the patient’s own stem cells – thus not requiring a donor. Yin Hao, director of the hospital’s Organ Transplant Center, commented: “Our technology has matured and it has pushed boundaries in the field of regenerative medicine for the treatment of diabetes.”

Timothy Kieffer, a professor in the department of cellular and physiological sciences at the University of British Columbia, Canada, is cited by South China Morning Post describing the study as “representing an important advance in the field of cell therapy for diabetes.” If the results of the Shanghai study can be reliably reproduced, “it can free patients from the burden of chronic medications, improve health and quality of life, and reduce healthcare expenditures”.

The funding sources for the study were the Chinese Academy of Science, the National Basic Research Program of China, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality, and the Shenkang Project. The study has been published in the journal Cell Discovery.[/quote]

Doctors in Shanghai have, for the first time in the world, cured a patient’s diabetes through the transplantation of pancreatic cells derived from stem cells.

The 59-year-old man, who had Type 2 diabetes for 25 years, has been completely weaned off insulin for 33 months, Shanghai Changzheng Hospital announced on Tuesday.

A paper about the medical breakthrough, achieved after more than a decade of endeavor by a team of doctors at the hospital, was published on the website of the journal Cell Discovery on April 30.

It is the first reported instance in the world of a case of diabetes with severely impaired pancreatic islet function being cured via stem cell-derived autologous, regenerative islet transplantation, the hospital said. The most common pancreatic islet cells produce insulin.

Diabetes poses a serious threat to human health. Medical experts said that poor blood sugar control over a long period can lead to severe complications, including blindness, kidney failure, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular complications, and amputation. Life-threatening situations may also occur due to hypoglycemic coma, and ketoacidosis, which happens when the body begins breaking down fat too quickly.

China is the country with the largest diabetic patient population. There are 140 million diabetes patients in the country, of whom about 40 million depend on lifelong insulin injections, according to the International Diabetes Federation.

Experts said severe diabetes patients struggling with blood sugar control can only be effectively treated by minimally invasive transplantation, which injects islet tissue extracted from the pancreas of a donor.

However, due to factors such as a severe shortage of donors and the complexity of the islet isolation technology, it is hard for such transplantation to meet current clinical needs. That made how to regenerate human pancreatic islet tissue on a large scale in vitro a worldwide academic focus, the team in Shanghai said.

Yin Hao, a leading researcher on the team and director of the hospital’s Organ Transplant Center, said they used the patient’s own peripheral blood mononuclear cells and reprogrammed them into autologous induced pluripotent stem cells. They used technology they devised to transform them into “seed cells” and reconstituted pancreatic islet tissue in an artificial environment.

“Our technology has matured and it has pushed boundaries in the field of regenerative medicine for the treatment of diabetes,” said Yin, whose team conducted the research with scientists from the Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

He said the patient, who was at serious risk of diabetes complications, had a kidney transplant in June 2017 but had lost most pancreatic islet function and relied on multiple insulin injections every day.

The patient received the transplantation in July 2021. Eleven weeks after the surgery, he was weaned off external insulin, and the dose of oral drugs for sugar-level control was gradually reduced and completely withdrawn one year later. “Follow-up examinations showed that the patient’s pancreatic islet function was effectively restored, and his renal function was within normal range,” Yin said. “Such results suggested that the treatment can avoid the progression of diabetic complications.”

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/04/b ... -diabetes/

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On China’s overcapacity

The article below, written for Friends of Socialist China by Shiran Illanperuma, addresses the latest ideological weapon in the Biden-Trump trade war against China: that of ‘overcapacity’. According to Western politicians and neoliberal economists, China’s industrial subsidies and production capacity are to blame for the US’s trade deficit and its apparent inability to reindustrialise its economy.

Shiran, citing fellow Marxist economist Michael Roberts, observes that the US and EU have sustained trade deficits since decades ago, before China’s emergence as an industrial superpower: “In a previous era, it was Japan and Germany that were the source of the US’s protracted trade deficits.” This rather suggests that “the main problem is the decline in the competitiveness and productive capabilities of the US itself rather than China’s (or, for that matter, anyone else’s) industrial policies.”

The article shows that China’s capacity utilisation and inventory levels almost exactly match those of the US. Hence, according to standard metrics, China is no more guilty of ‘overcapacity’ than the US itself. What is true is that China is actively working to contain excess capacity in mature industries such as coal and steel. However, in emerging technologies – particularly those required for solving the climate crisis – China is leveraging its socialist market economy to rapidly innovate and develop its productive forces. It should be noted that this strategy is responsible for a decrease in solar PV and wind energy costs of around 90 percent over the last decade. From the standpoint of maintaining a habitable Earth, the accusations of Chinese ‘overcapacity’ are beyond absurd.

Ultimately, what’s driving these accusations is that “Western imperialism is in crisis and can no longer sustain the position of its old labour aristocracy.”

The thesis of Chinese overcapacity therefore serves a dual purpose. First, it provides the Western ruling class with a means to deflect criticism of its own neoliberal policies in order to scapegoat China for the destruction of its industrial base. Second, it allows that same ruling class to resort to protectionism and subsidies on behalf of monopoly capitalists.

Shiran concludes:

For its part, China is developing technologies that are crucial for the future of mankind. It has done so while the ruling elite in the West gamble away wealth produced by workers through stock buybacks and real estate speculation. It is up to the Western Left to organise workers against imperialism and anti-China chauvinism, and to fight to liberate the productive forces necessary to address the socioeconomic and ecological challenges of this century.

Shiran Illanperuma is an independent journalist and researcher. He is currently reading for a master’s degree in economic policy at SOAS University of London.[/quote]

In the last few months, there has been an intensified campaign by Western politicians, academics, and mainstream media to popularise the narrative of “Chinese overcapacity.” Like the disproven narrative of the “Chinese debt trap” before it, this appears to be a coordinated attempt by the West to scapegoat China for structural problems and imbalances in the world capitalist economy.

The thesis of China’s manufacturing overcapacity has been in circulation since at least the global financial crisis. In short, the argument goes that China’s investment-driven growth model creates both local and global imbalances. It is argued that higher investment suppresses consumption (as a share of GDP) and drives income inequality and excess production capacity within China. It is further argued that such imbalances are to blame for China’s excessive exports and massive trade surplus, which is said to be at the cost of the United States’ trade deficit.

In academia, this argument has been popularised by Keynesian economist Michael Pettis, who is a Professor of Finance at Peking University. Brad Setser, a former senior advisor to the United States Trade Representative, has also been a champion of this argument. Notably, the overcapacity thesis has also been a consistent theme of the IMF on China.

In May, the IMF Mission to China published a report stating that in order to ensure growth, China’s key priorities should include “rebalancing the economy towards consumption by strengthening the social safety net, liberalising the services sector, and scaling back distortive supply side policies that support the manufacturing sector [emphasis added].”

The IMF is, of course, a Western-dominated institution, where China controls just 6% of voting shares despite contributing to 18% of global GDP.

The overcapacity thesis has been an increasing source of diplomatic tension. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has attempted to rally the G7 on the issue and coax Global South countries such as India and Mexico into the debate. Meanwhile, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has argued that Chinese industrial policy is distorting the EU market for electric vehicles (EVs).

The Chinese side has reacted strongly to these allegations. Chinese President Xi Jinping said that there was no such thing as a Chinese overcapacity problem. Meanwhile, Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesperson He Yadong has said that the accusation of Chinese overcapacity was a typical Western double standard. More recently, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said, “Overcapacity is just a pretext the US uses to try to coerce G7 members into creating fences and restrictions for Chinese new energy products.”

Following in Trump’s footsteps, the Biden administration recently threw up a slew of new tariffs against Chinese products, including 25% on steel and aluminium, 50% on semiconductors, 50% on solar panels, and a whopping 100% on electric vehicles (EVs). As the US-led trade war against China intensifies, it is worth reflecting on the facts behind the overcapacity thesis.

Measuring China’s overcapacity
French entrepreneur and analyst Arnaud Bertrand has argued that the concept of overcapacity can be measured with a few standard metrics: 1. capacity utilisation rates; and 2. inventory levels.

In economics, capacity utilisation refers to the share of production capacity that is in use at any given time. Generally speaking, a prolonged period of high capacity utilisation can indicate a need to expand productive capacity. In contrast, a prolonged period of low capacity may indicate a need to reduce productive capacity. Bertrand points out that the capacity utilisation rate in China is 76%, which is around the same as in the United States, which is 78%.

Inventory levels are generally used as a measure of how well sales are doing. A growing inventory of goods might mean a combination of sluggish demand or overproduction, while a shrinking inventory might mean growing demand and underproduction. Bertrand points out that the finished good inventory index PMI for China stood at 49, while a similar index for manufacturing inventory for the United States stood at 50.

Neither of the above numbers suggests that China has any more overcapacity than the US. On the contrary, the fact that Chinese industrial profits continue to grow suggests that there is ready demand for Chinese manufactures. Several analysts have also argued that China’s drive to increase production capacity for new energy products makes it indispensable in the global fight for ecological sustainability.

Understanding consumption in China
Marxist economist and blogger Michael Roberts notes that while the proportion of household consumption to GDP in China may be low, absolute consumption has soared in the past few years. From 2008 to 2021, average annual private consumption grew by 8% in China, compared to just 5.7% in India, 1.7% in the United States, and 0.6% in the EU. Logically, China could never have lifted 800 million people out of poverty unless there was a substantial increase in their consumption!

Further, traditional statistics on consumption are misleading without taking into consideration the political and economic context. For example, in a situation where essential services are privatised, consumption figures may be misleadingly high due to households paying out of pocket for these services. In China, private consumption is supplemented by several social transfers in kind (including for healthcare, education, and food), which amount to up to 6% of GDP.

Finally, it should be noted that China has signalled that it does not seek to emulate the decadent and extravagant aspects of Western consumer societies. The turn to consumerism in the West has not staved off economic crises but rather led to an erosion in productive capabilities. By contrast, China’s emphasis on investment and productive consumption has helped it avoid major crises while improving the standard of living of its citizens.

China’s industrial production and the West’s trade deficit

Michael Roberts has also pointed out that the United States and European Union have had sustained trade deficits long before China’s industrial rise. In a previous era, it was Japan and Germany that were the source of the US’s protracted trade deficits. This is an important point, as it suggests that the main problem is the decline in the competitiveness and productive capabilities of the US itself rather than China’s (or, for that matter, anyone else’s) industrial policies.

While mainstream economists have often portrayed China’s rise as the result of “export-oriented industrialisation,” the facts are a little more complex. In China, exports as a share of GDP only rose above 20% between 2000 and 2016, the period immediately following China’s ascension to the WTO. In comparison, exports as a share of GDP comprise a much more significant 53% for Sweden, 51% for Germany, and 48% for South Korea, yet we never hear talk of their “overcapacity” distorting world trade in the mainstream media. Unlike China, these countries are US allies and fully integrated into US-led imperialist system and its military industrial complex.

China’s home market has always been a major basis for its development. It should be noted that even foreign companies operating out of China’s Special Economic Zones have been producing more for China’s home market than they do for export since at least 2005. According to research by Barry Naughton, an American economist who focuses on the Chinese economy, foreign companies in China sold 2.7 times more in the home market than they exported in 2017.

To use more contemporary examples, companies like Tesla and BYD have exported only 36% and 8% respectively of the EVs they manufacture in China, with the rest being sold in the home market. This in turn may be due to China’s superior infrastructure for EVs, which raises another point: investment in infrastructure is itself crucial for facilitating consumption.

China’s industrial policy
The question of overcapacity has been the subject of debate within academic circles in China. Lan Xiaohuan, a Professor of Economics at Fudan University, has discussed the issue in his recently published book How China Works: An Introduction to China’s State-led Economic Development. Lan concedes that overinvestment is a downside of China’s industrial policy, which encourages local governments to enact preferential policies for strategic sectors.

However, he explains that, within the framework of China’s socialist market economy, this strategy has certain benefits. First, overinvestment in strategic sectors leads to the rapid development of productive forces in that area. Second, the initial buildup of firms in strategic sectors leads to competitive price wars, which are beneficial to consumers. In that sense, high levels of investment are a feature and not a bug of China’s industrial policy, and stand in stark contrast to Western monopoly capital, which thrives on artificial scarcity.

Given the diplomatic backlash from the West as well as the contradictions inherent in a market economy, the Chinese government has indicated that it will take steps to curtail overcapacity. For example, a work report that was delivered at the 14th National People’s Congress in March had this to say: “We will strengthen coordination, planning, and investment guidance for key sectors to prevent overcapacity and poor-quality, redundant development.”

From the Chinese perspective, however, it is far more urgent to contain overcapacity in mature or maturing industries (such as coal, steel, and perhaps real estate) than in emerging technologies, where there is still massive global demand and much room for innovation. It is precisely this that threatens the West, as China’s socialist market economy allows it to rapidly build up its productive forces in emerging technologies, which fundamentally threaten Western monopoly capital.

The political meaning of overcapacity
For many decades, large sections of the Western Left have taken a chauvinistic attitude towards the question of China’s Reform and Opening Up. As Marxist scholar Roland Boer has noted, the Western Left has tended to see socialism in abstract and idealistic terms as a classless society with collective ownership of the means of production. However, since most revolutions happened in the East, Marxists there were forced to contend with the blight of underdevelopment and to emphasise liberation of the productive forces as a precondition for socialist construction.

Today, there is a tendency towards the inversion of this situation. The development of the productive forces in China has allowed it to undertake more progressive reforms at home. Meanwhile, the West has undergone protracted deindustrialization during the era of neoliberalism, leading to the Western working class themselves demanding reindustrialization and decent manufacturing jobs. The Chinese overcapacity thesis needs to be understood in the context of this conjuncture.

Western imperialism is in crisis and can no longer sustain the position of its old labour aristocracy. The thesis of Chinese overcapacity therefore serves a dual purpose. First, it provides the Western ruling class with a means to deflect criticism of its own neoliberal policies in order to scapegoat China for the destruction of its industrial base. Second, it allows the that same ruling class to resort to protectionism and subsidies on behalf of monopoly capitalists. Such handouts are unlikely to benefit the Western working class, as they fail to adequately challenge monopoly capital and rentier interests, which constitute the main fetters to liberating the productive forces in the West.

For its part, China is developing technologies that are crucial for the future of humanity. It has done so while the ruling elite in the West gamble away wealth produced by workers through stock buybacks and real estate speculation. It is up to the Western Left to organise workers against imperialism and anti-China chauvinism, and to fight to liberate the productive forces necessary to address the socioeconomic and ecological challenges of this century.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/06/o ... rcapacity/

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Black Sea Port Becomes Geopolitical Battleground Between China and the EU
Posted on June 8, 2024 by Yves Smith

Yves here. This story, by what can politely be called a US mouthpiece, illustrates the degree to which China is seen as a strategic competitor and any move that advances their interest, even if arguably mainly economic, is a threat to the West.

By Radio Free Liberty/Radio Liberty staff. Cross posted from OilPrice

China has won the bid to build a deep-sea port in Georgia’s Anaklia, marking the country’s first Chinese-built and operated megaproject on the Black Sea coast.
The deal strengthens Tbilisi and Beijing’s growing ties and pushes China’s presence closer to Europe.
It also influences the future of the Middle Corridor, a global trade route that Georgia serves as a strategic node.
Georgia announced that a Chinese consortium submitted the sole bid to build a sprawling deep-sea port in Anaklia, marking the first megaproject on the Black Sea coast to be built and operated by Chinese firms.

Finding Perspective: The development brings an end to a multiyear political saga inside Georgia over building a deep-sea port at Anaklia, while the role of the Chinese consortium pushes Tbilisi’s growing ties with Beijing into the spotlight.

Georgian Economy and Sustainable Development Minister Levan Davitashvili made the announcement at a May 29 press conference, where he said the government had received bids from a Swiss-Luxembourgish consortium and a joint offer from China Communications Construction Company and the Singapore-based China Harbour Investment.

He added that China Road and Bridge Corporation and Qingdao Port International will serve as subcontractors to build the port.

Davitashvili said Tbilisi only received a final proposal from the Chinese consortium, though, which now looks set to build the country’s first deep-sea port. He said more details would be revealed “in the coming days.”

Why It Matters: Georgia is no stranger to awarding high-profile infrastructure deals to Chinese firms, but the announcement could have far-reaching implications.

For starters, it’s another sign of how close Tbilisi and Beijing are becoming. In July 2023, they signed a strategic partnership pact, and Anaklia marks another attempt to bring Chinese companies to Georgia’s Black Sea after a bid around Poti’s port broke down in 2020.

This deal will also affect the future of the so-called Middle Corridor, a global trade network that ships goods between Europe and Asia in which Georgia serves as a strategic node. The European Union has said developing the route is a goal, especially since Moscow’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine where it provides trade links that bypass Russia.

But China’s new role with a deep-sea port in Anaklia — which would allow larger ships to transport increased volumes at a more efficient rate — changes things and marks a setback for Brussels.

“This is not good news for the EU, and I think the fact that [China is now building] the port shows a lack of strategic thinking in Brussels,” Romana Vlahutin, a former EU ambassador-at-large for connectivity, told me.

What We Know So Far: Many of the details are still to be revealed, as is the actual contract and total price tag. The government said previously it will retain 51 percent ownership of the port project, with 49 percent going to the other partners.

The Chinese companies involved also come with an interesting history. China Communications Construction Company is a massive player in global infrastructure and one of the largest firms involved in construction projects for China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) over the last decade.

But from 2011 to 2019, the World Bank banned the firm and its affiliates from participating in World Bank-funded construction projects due to a fraud scandal in a road project in the Philippines in 2009.

For a more detailed look at the company’s history — and of some past scandals involving other firms involved in the Anaklia bid — check out this article by Luka Pertaia from RFE/RL’s Georgian Service and myself.

What To Watch: This deal marks the second attempt to build a deep-sea port in Anaklia.

Previously, a consortium formed between Georgia’s TBC Bank and the U.S.-based Conti International was canceled by the government in 2020 after years of political controversy that saw TBC co-founders Mamuka Khazaradze and Badri Japaridze facing money-laundering charges.

The pair were charged but released without jail terms, and Khazaradze has claimed the authorities were trying to sabotage the project. The contract for that deal was worth $2.5 billion.

Khazaradze is in the process of taking the Georgian government to an arbitration court in London over what he maintains were politically motivated charges to derail the port. He’s been an outspoken critic of the project’s revival and said in the past that he believes the legal roadblocks with how the previous consortium was pushed aside could derail the new attempt to build it.

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/06 ... he-eu.html
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Jun 15, 2024 2:13 pm

JUNE 10, 2024 BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR
China springs a BRI surprise on US

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China, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan signed an intergovernmental agreement to begin construction of a railway link connecting Xinjiang with Fergana Valley, Beijing, June 6, 2024

The report of the death of China’s Belt and Road Initiative [BRI] was an exaggeration, after all. Within days of the US President Joe Biden’s acerbic remark during an interview last week with the Time magazine that the BRI has “become a nuisance graveyard initiative,” a trilateral intergovernmental agreement to commence construction work on the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan [CKU] railway project was signed in Beijing on Thursday.

Chinese President Xi Jinping offered congratulations on the trilateral intergovernmental agreement with Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan and described the CKU as “a strategic project for China’s connectivity with Central Asia, symbolising the three nations’ collaborative efforts under the Belt and Road Initiative.” Xi hailed the agreement as “a show of determination”.

The idea of such a railway project was first proposed by Uzbekistan in 1996 but it languished for over a quarter century thereafter due to the geopolitical and alliance changes in Central Asia, including reservations reportedly on the part of Moscow and Astana. China, which could unilaterally finance CKU, also lost interest and prioritised its ties with Russia and Kazakhstan.

Principally, the failure of the three countries to reach a consensus on the railway’s route became a vexed issue with China and Uzbekistan favouring a southern route, which would represent the shorter transit route to Europe and West Asia, while Bishkek insisted on the northern route—a longer passage that would connect Kyrgyzstan’s northern and southern regions and boost its economy.

However, the moribund project took new life following the changing geopolitics of Central Asia, as intra-regional integration processes began gaining traction, the rethink in Moscow in favour of strengthening regional connectivity in the conditions under western sanctions, etc.

Indeed, with improved railway connectivity, it is not only the connection between China and the two Central Asian countries along the route that will be strengthened, but the interconnectivity in Central Asian region as well.

However, in a curious reversal of roles, as Central Asia turned into a turf of the great game lately between the US on one side and Russia and China on the other, Washington began taking a dim view of the prospect of such a project to connect the railway systems of China potentially to the European railway network through Turkmenistan, Iran, and Türkiye.

Suffice to say, in the past two years, with renewed interest, China began viewing the 523 km long railway line — 213 kms in China, 260 kms in Kyrgyzstan, and 50 kms in Uzbekistan — optimistically as a shorter route from China to Europe and West Asia than the existing 900 km corridor that passes through the Trans-Siberian Railway in Russia, which lacks modern infrastructure with only a single non-electrified track that makes it incapable of transiting Chinese goods to Europe, and also mitigate the economic costs associated with Western sanctions on Russia.

Above all, the growing geopolitical tensions over the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea have begun posing serious concern and top priority for Beijing to establish alternate land routes to the European market.

Without doubt, CKU has huge potential in geopolitical, geo-strategic and geo-economic terms. Succinctly put, it will complete the southern passage of the New Eurasian Land Bridge, shaping a convenient transport path from East and Southeast Asia to Central and Western Asia, Northern Africa and Europe.

Specifically, apart from integrating Central Asian region with the wider transportation network, and connect it better to the global market, Beijing envisages that CKU could be further extended to other countries in future, such as Afghanistan.

In fact, speaking at the signing ceremony on Thursday alongside Xi and Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov, President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev underscored that “This road will allow our countries to enter the wide markets of South Asia and the Middle East through the promising Trans-Afghan Corridor.”

Of course, the construction of CKU, which is expected to start later this year at a cost of $8 billion, poses formidable challenges, being a trans-national project to be executed by a joint venture of between three countries in the BOT format. No doubt, CKU involves daunting engineering skills with its path traversing the challenging terrain of western China and Kyrgyzstan at altitudes ranging from 2,000-3500 meters and involving the construction of more than fifty tunnels and ninety bridges through Kyrgyzstan’s highest mountains.

But China has vast experience and expertise in pulling it off. Xi said the agreement signed in Beijing provided a “solid legal foundation” for the railway’s construction and it transformed the project “from a vision to a reality”.

The project feasibility study is currently being updated, following the completion of field surveys by Chinese engineers in December. Zhu Yongbiao, a professor at the Research Centre for the Belt and Road of Lanzhou University, told Global Times that construction techniques and financing pose no problems.

The Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson stated at the daily press briefing in Beijing on Friday, “This important milestone was achieved thanks to the tremendous efforts of different departments and experts, as well as the personal attention and support from the leaders of the three countries.”

The spokesperson flagged that CKU is “another testament to the importance of the Belt and Road Initiative and demonstrates the popularity of the vision for a community with a shared future for mankind in Central Asia.”

The CKU originates from the western Chinese hub of Kashgar to the Uzbek city of Andijan in Ferghana Valley, passing through Torugart, Makmal and Jalalabad. It connects the Soviet-era railway grid in Uzbekistan leading to Termez on the Amu Darya bordering Mazar-i-Sharif city in Afghanistan.

Uzbekistan announced last month that the Trans-Afghan railway project is anticipated to be completed by the end of 2027, connecting Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, “facilitating crucial trade routes and bolstering regional connectivity.” Interestingly, the Trans-Afghan Railway project has also figured in the Chinese-Pakistani documents in the past.

The joint statement issued after Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s visit to China last week vowed to make the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor “an exemplary project of high-quality building of Belt and Road cooperation… (and) recognised the significance of Gwadar Port as an important node in cross-regional connectivity” while also agreeing to play a constructive role “in helping Afghanistan to achieve stable development and integrate into the international community.”

Notably, in the first official recognition of the interim Taliban government by a major nation, Xi Jinping welcomed Asadullah Bilal Karimi, the Taliban-appointed Afghan ambassador, in a formal ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in January, along with envoys from Cuba, Iran, Pakistan and 38 other countries, who also presented their credentials.

It is entirely conceivable that the time has come for the realisation of the century-old dream of a Trans-Afghan railway. Qatar reportedly has shows interest in funding the project. At a meeting in Kazan in February with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Mirziyoyev had disclosed that the Russian side had expressed interest in participating in the development of the technical justification for the project and its promotion. The Russian Deputy Prime Minister for Transport Vitaly Savelyev who had earlier visited Tashkent, attended the meeting in Kazan.

Certainly, the restoration of full relationship between Moscow and Kabul, which is imminent, will help speed up matters.

The CKU becomes the lodestar in a phenomenal transformation of regional connectivity in Central Asia and far-flung regions surrounding it. In the current international climate, this has profound geopolitical implications for the Russian-Chinese joint/coordinated efforts to push back the US’ dual containment strategy.

https://www.indianpunchline.com/china-s ... ise-on-us/

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Narrative of ‘overcapacity’ is a complete failure: former UN under-secretary-general
Interviewed by the Global Times, Erik Solheim describes the West’s accusations of Chinese “overcapacity” in relation to solar energy and electric vehicles as “a complete failure”.

From the perspective of combatting climate change, China is doing crucial work and blazing a trail that others should follow: “We have all called for many more high-quality green products from everyone, from China, from Europe, from the US, from everyone. Why start blaming China for doing what is expected from everyone?”

Solheim further notes that, from an economic perspective, accusations of overcapacity make little sense, “because what creates the foundation for trade is overcapacity… My nation, Norway, for example, is a big exporter of salmon… We raise and produce much more salmon than we can eat ourselves. Then we sell some to others. And then, for instance, we can import electric cars from China… We should not fear overcapacity, but we should turn it into a mutual benefit where everyone benefits from Chinese leadership in electric cars as they benefit from our production of salmon.”

Ultimately, tariffs will slow down the green transformation “because China is now the indispensable country for everything green”, given that “60 percent of all green technologies in the world are in China” and “when it comes to solar energy, maybe the figure is even more than 90 percent.”

Solheim also describes some of China’s contribution to sustainable development in the Global South: “I was living in Kenya for quite a number of good years. In Kenya, China has constructed the Mombasa-Nairobi railroad, which goes through some very vulnerable ecological areas. But it is the cleanest and most well-functioning transport system in Kenya. It’s an absolute, wonderful, green contribution to Africa.”

Erik Solheim is former under-secretary-general of the United Nations and former executive director of the UN Environment Programme. He spoke at our event Building a multipolar world – Ten years of the Belt and Road Initiative in November 2023.
GT: During your recent visit to China, you posed a photo of your morning run. What was it like to go for a morning run in Beijing?

Solheim: It was absolutely wonderful. The sun was bright, the sky was blue. You could breathe in the fresh air. It was a nice experience and highlighted a contrast to 10 years ago when the air pollution was thick and the sky was gray. It’s such enormous progress in such a short time. There is more to be done. But China has largely won the war against pollution.

GT: In the same tweet, you mentioned: “Why doesn’t the world start competing and stop complaining about China’s green leadership?” They are complaining about China’s “overcapacity.” Do you think China has an issue of “overcapacity”?

Solheim: I think the narrative of capacity is a complete failure for two reasons.

First, this is exactly what we all have wanted. This is even what the Joe Biden administration in the US has called for. We have all called for many more high-quality green products from everyone, from China, from Europe, from the US, from everyone. Why start blaming China for doing what is expected from everyone? A few years ago, the West was complaining that China’s production was emitting too much pollution. And now they’re complaining that China is making green products.

Second, this is complete nonsense from an economic perspective because what creates the foundation for trade is overcapacity. If the US had no overcapacity in its industries for the last 100 years, it would not have become a great nation. It became great because it had overcapacity – it could produce for global markets.

My nation, Norway, for example, is a big exporter of salmon. Why? Because we have overcapacity for salmon. We raise and produce much more salmon than we can eat ourselves. Then we sell some to others. And then, for instance, we can import electric cars from China. One of the most valuable companies in the world today is Apple, an American company. Why? Because they have an overcapacity in electric smartphones. Otherwise, they would have just been in the American market and they would have been a small company. We should not fear overcapacity, but we should turn it into a mutual benefit where everyone benefits from Chinese leadership in electric cars as they benefit from our production of salmon.

GT: Are there any green cooperation projects between China and other countries that have impressed you? What are the positive impacts of those projects?

Solheim: Absolutely. Two months ago, I was in Bangladesh, where China had constructed a bridge called the Padma Bridge. It is a wonderful rail and road bridge across the Padma River. That one bridge increased the GDP of Bangladesh by 1 percent because it connects the eastern and western parts of the land. That is a wonderful support for Bangladesh.

I was living in Kenya for quite a number of good years. In Kenya, China has constructed the Mombasa-Nairobi railroad, which goes through some very vulnerable ecological areas. But it is the cleanest and most well-functioning transport system in Kenya. It’s an absolute, wonderful, green contribution to Africa.

GT: Some observers suggest that the US doesn’t want to live in a world where the world’s foremost energy provider is China, so they’re making huge efforts to catch up and, at the same time, attempt to slow China down with initiatives like this “overcapacity” rhetoric. What’s your take on this view?

Solheim: I think there are two aspects to this view.

First, the US is deeply concerned about having a peer competitor, such as China. For the past century, the US has been the dominant global power, or the only dominant power in the world, and it’s not used to sharing that position. However, it needs to get used to the reality that China’s economy will surpass that of the US, and China will play an increasingly important role in global affairs. Additionally, the US doesn’t only need to adapt to the rise of China, but also to the rise of other powers like India, Turkey, Indonesia, and Brazil. The era of US dominance is over, and it needs to adapt to the change.

On the other hand, President Biden wants jobs for his people. It’s natural for him to be more concerned about American jobs than the jobs in Liaoning or Guangdong.

But we should also explore how the green energy boom can benefit everyone and how Chinese companies can invest in and be welcomed in Europe and North America.

For instance, Tesla was invited to come to China. China invited Tesla to a large extent to create fair competition in the electric car market in China. It helped shape BYD, Hongqi, Geely, and all the other Chinese brands. Thus, the US should invite Chinese companies to invest in America, shaping the competition in the American market. Then maybe American companies would be more cost-competitive as well.

GT: We are now seeing the US government raising tariffs on Chinese EVs, advanced batteries, solar cells, and other goods. What impact will it have on the world if the US government continues to exclude Chinese new energy products?

Solheim: It will obviously slow down the green transformation because China is now the indispensable country for everything green. 60 percent of all green technologies in the world are in China. When it comes to solar energy, maybe the figure is even more than 90 percent. If we want to go solar without China, we can do it, but it will be much more costly. When it’s more costly, it will be slower. And all historical experiences show that if you create closed-down markets and separate markets from different parts of the world, we will all be poorer, including the Americans.

GT: Do you think Europe will follow the latest policies of the US? From your understanding, how does Europe view China’s green manufacturing capacity – is it more inclined toward cooperation or vigilance?

Solheim: That’s obviously a similar discussion in Europe. I don’t think Europe will automatically follow the US, but there is a concern with jobs in Europe. China can help in that discussion in two ways.

First, making very clear that China is ready to invest in other markets where Chinese companies are, and to create jobs in Europe.

Let me give one example. Very recently, I visited Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) in Ningde, Fujian Province, the world’s largest battery maker for electric vehicles. A Tesla normally comes with a CATL battery. But the guys at CATL repeatedly told me that one of the reasons why they have grown so big was the support from BMW in the early days. BMW was a very demanding customer, it helped with technology and was a partner in the rise of CATL. That’s exactly what we want to see – companies working together across borders. And now when Chinese companies tend to have the highest quality and the best technology, they should work with companies in India, Africa, Latin America, and also Europe to share their knowledge and experience so that we can all benefit from the green transformation.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/14/n ... y-general/

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Solar power farms on plateau fuel China’s green energy revolution
The article below, republished from Xinhua, describes a remarkable story of ‘ecological civilisation’ in action, combining holistic ecological protection with poverty alleviation efforts.

Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, in China’s western Qinghai province, is host to the world’s largest solar photovoltaic power plant, with a generation capacity of 8.4 GW (which would be sufficient to provide energy to the whole of London). Nearly 3,000 meters above sea level, and exposed to extreme levels of solar radiation, it is an area that has experienced significant desertification in recent decades: “By the end of the last century, the desertification rate of the land was as high as 98.5 percent, making the solar panels installed here vulnerable to damage from the sand and gravel stirred up by strong gusts of wind.”

More recently, because photovoltaic panels reduce wind erosion on vegetation, grass has been thriving. Meanwhile, in order to maintain the grass and to prevent the proliferation of weeds, sheep have been introduced to the solar park. This has given a major boost to livestock cultivation in the region, with people in the surrounding villages now raising “photovoltaic sheep”.

The plant is thus “simultaneously generating electricity while making exemplary contributions to poverty alleviation and ecological conservation efforts.”
Amid China’s green energy revolution, the world’s largest solar photovoltaic power plant on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau is forging a unique development path, simultaneously generating electricity while making exemplary contributions to poverty alleviation and ecological conservation efforts.

In late May, greenness finally emerged in the yellow-gray expanse of the Talatan Gobi Desert in Gonghe County, part of the Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in northwest China’s Qinghai Province.

Yehdor, a 48-year-old herder from Xaghelesi Village in Tiegai Township, leisurely rode his motorcycle, driving his flock of sheep into the solar photovoltaic power plant owned by Huanghe Hydropower Development Co., Ltd.

Yehdor is no stranger to solar photovoltaic panels, or what he calls “blue mirrors.” In 2006, he received two of these panels through a government project promoting solar power among locals. Since then, the panels have become part of his essential gear, accompanying his tent and other necessities during his six-month-long shepherding journeys each year.

“I set up the panels outside my tent, and they charged during the day, generating enough electricity to power lights and other small appliances throughout the night,” he said.

“However, they are nothing compared to these,” Yehdor added, pointing to the solar panels arranged in a matrix across 4,000 acres of desert land, sparkling like a silver-blue sea under the sun.

More than 200 sheep, a mix of black and white, were spotted roaming among the panels. As startling as it may sound, these sheep have been tasked with protecting the blue panels. Their voracious appetite, once a headache for environmentalists, has now become essential for maintaining the smooth operation of the solar power station.

In 2012, the prefecture initiated the construction of China’s first 10 million kilowatt-class solar power base in Talatan. Today, covering an area of 609 square kilometers, this solar power base boasts a power generation capacity of 8,430 megawatts, making it the largest in the world, according to Qeyang, deputy director of the administration committee of the Hainan prefectural green energy industry park.

It hosts 91 energy enterprises, which include 63 solar photovoltaic power enterprises and 28 wind power enterprises. “Green energy is the signature industry of Hainan prefecture and our annual output accounts for 54.08 percent of the total energy generated in Qinghai,” Qeyang said.

At a deliberation with the lawmakers from Qinghai during the annual session of the National People’s Congress in March 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping gave instructions to build Qinghai into a highland of clean energies, a destination of international eco-tourism and a source of green and organic farm and livestock products, stressing efforts on fostering a green, low-carbon and circular economic system.

The Qinghai provincial government, since then, has accelerated its efforts to pursue high-quality development of the green energy industry based on local conditions.

Currently, the total installed power generation capacity in Qinghai is 54,970,800 kilowatts, with clean energy accounting for 51,079,400 kilowatts, or 93 percent, of the total. Talatan is also witnessing drastic changes.

Located about 150 kilometers from Qinghai’s provincial capital, Xining, Talatan sits nearly 3,000 meters above sea level and is bombarded with intense solar radiation, which hinders plant growth. By the end of the last century, the desertification rate of the land was as high as 98.5 percent, making the solar panels installed here vulnerable to damage from the sand and gravel stirred up by strong gusts of wind.

Grass seeds have been extensively planted at the base to prevent sand erosion. Surprisingly, the grass has thrived here, turning the photovoltaic panel park into an oasis during the summer months.

According to satellite remote sensing data released by a joint research team of the State Power Investment Corporation Limited and Xi’an University of Technology, wind speed has decreased by 50 percent, soil moisture evaporation has dropped by 30 percent, and vegetation coverage has reached 80 percent in the photovoltaic park over the past three years.

“It’s a pleasant surprise. The land had remained barren for so long due to over-grazing in earlier years. Despite our efforts to combat desertification using various methods, we achieved little success,” Qeyang said, adding that the photovoltaic power plant has unexpectedly transformed everything for good.

The photovoltaic panels reduce wind erosion on vegetation, while the water used for cleaning them infiltrates beneath the surface, nourishing the grass, and the manure can serve as a natural fertilizer, further benefiting the grass, explained Shen Yongping, a researcher with the Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources under the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

As the grass grows and the sand settles, new challenges emerge. Cao Jun, an engineer at Huanghe Hydropower Development Co., Ltd., anticipates that weeds will become a problem for the solar farm, as they could create shade-induced “hot spots,” potentially leading to malfunctions or fueling wildfires in winter.

In an effort to avoid both the environmental costs of herbicide spraying and the financial expenses of manual weeding, Cao and his colleagues turned to sheep, viewing them as living mowers.

“We used to weed twice a year, but with sheep, we only do it once, saving costs,” said Cao. The woolly weed-whackers are efficient, munching their way around the farm.

The solar power park has encouraged surrounding villagers to raise what they call “photovoltaic sheep” since 2018. They have been provided with four free sheep pens, enabling the locals to resume their traditional business at zero cost.

Gonghe, once a poverty-stricken county, was marred by harsh natural conditions and relied solely on animal husbandry. Its per capita annual income in rural areas was less than 12,000 yuan (about 1,688 U.S. dollars) until it finally shook off poverty in 2019.

The rise of photovoltaic parks has brought new job opportunities for locals and transformed their traditional nomadic lifestyle of long-distance grazing.

Yehdor recalled the scarcity of grass near their home pasture, prompting their frequent travels in pursuit of grazing grounds. They spent over half the year away from home.

He said the worst period, which he remembers vividly, was in 1998 when natural grass was insufficient, leading to starvation and weakness among their cows and sheep. Yehdor and his father had to travel to another village to buy hay to feed them, during which Yehdor injured his ankle while pulling a tricycle loaded with hay on their way back home.

Starting from the age of eight, Yehdor helped his family herd sheep and witnessed the ecological changes in his hometown. “Now is the best time for grass growth that I can remember,” he said.

Yehdor is one of the first locals herding sheep at solar farms. He noted that his sheep are now bigger and fatter, fetching higher prices. “The sheep eat well and have a higher survival rate. My flock has almost doubled, and my annual income reached 100,000 yuan last year.”

Other villagers have also seized opportunities to earn extra income at the solar farms by cleaning photovoltaic modules, mowing grass and handling cargo in the park.

According to Chen Kelong, deputy chief of the Academy of Plateau Science and Sustainability at the Qinghai Normal University, “photovoltaic sheep” serve as a great innovation in promoting economic and sustainable development in China.

So far, 12 “photovoltaic sheep farms” have been built in Hainan prefecture. In 2023 alone, these farms sold 13,000 “photovoltaic sheep,” bringing herdsmen a total income of 11 million yuan, according the department of publicity of the prefectural government.

It added that across the prefecture, 173 once poverty-stricken villages generated a combined income of 67 million yuan through involvement in solar photovoltaic farm-related businesses in 2023 while 53,000 locals earned an average additional income of 675 yuan per person.

“The ‘photovoltaic sheep’ farm exemplifies the development of ‘new quality productive forces’ tailored to the plateau’s existing conditions through a scientifically informed approach,” Chen said.

The prefectural government is working at an accelerated pace to upgrade its husbandry industry by establishing the Qinghai photovoltaic sheep brand. It initiated the “photovoltaic sheep” special project in April 2023.

More “photovoltaic sheep” farms will be constructed and a traceability system will be developed, with each sheep equipped with an electronic ear tag. The farms are expected to optimize grazing management and strictly regulate flock sizes to a maximum of 400 sheep per group, ensuring that quality standards are met.



The prefectural government also plans to collaborate with domestic and international social media and e-commerce platforms to promote Qinghai “photovoltaic sheep,” fostering a modern husbandry industry that is beneficial to the economy and people’s livelihood while conserving the environment, according to Chen.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/11/s ... evolution/
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Pentagon ran secret anti-vax campaign to undermine China during pandemic
A healthcare worker inoculates Encarnacion Tan Suan, 86, at a vaccination center in San Juan City, Metro Manila, amid the COVID-19 outbreak in the Philippines. Photo: REUTERS/Peter Blaza. Illustration: John Emerson

The U.S. military launched a clandestine program amid the COVID crisis to discredit China’s Sinovac inoculation – payback for Beijing’s efforts to blame Washington for the pandemic. One target: the Filipino public. Health experts say the gambit was indefensible and put innocent lives at risk.

By CHRIS BING and JOEL SCHECTMAN Filed June 14, 2024, 9:45 a.m. GMT
WASHINGTON, DC

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. military launched a secret campaign to counter what it perceived as China’s growing influence in the Philippines, a nation hit especially hard by the deadly virus.

The clandestine operation has not been previously reported. It aimed to sow doubt about the safety and efficacy of vaccines and other life-saving aid that was being supplied by China, a Reuters investigation found. Through phony internet accounts meant to impersonate Filipinos, the military’s propaganda efforts morphed into an anti-vax campaign. Social media posts decried the quality of face masks, test kits and the first vaccine that would become available in the Philippines – China’s Sinovac inoculation.

Reuters identified at least 300 accounts on X, formerly Twitter, that matched descriptions shared by former U.S. military officials familiar with the Philippines operation. Almost all were created in the summer of 2020 and centered on the slogan #Chinaangvirus – Tagalog for China is the virus.

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This post, identified by Reuters, matched the messaging, timeframe and design of the U.S. military’s anti-vax propaganda campaign in the Philippines, former and current military officials say. Social media platform X also identified the account as fake and removed it.

“COVID came from China and the VACCINE also came from China, don’t trust China!” one typical tweet from July 2020 read in Tagalog. The words were next to a photo of a syringe beside a Chinese flag and a soaring chart of infections. Another post read: “From China – PPE, Face Mask, Vaccine: FAKE. But the Coronavirus is real.”

After Reuters asked X about the accounts, the social media company removed the profiles, determining they were part of a coordinated bot campaign based on activity patterns and internal data.

The U.S. military’s anti-vax effort began in the spring of 2020 and expanded beyond Southeast Asia before it was terminated in mid-2021, Reuters determined. Tailoring the propaganda campaign to local audiences across Central Asia and the Middle East, the Pentagon used a combination of fake social media accounts on multiple platforms to spread fear of China’s vaccines among Muslims at a time when the virus was killing tens of thousands of people each day. A key part of the strategy: amplify the disputed contention that, because vaccines sometimes contain pork gelatin, China’s shots could be considered forbidden under Islamic law.

The military program started under former President Donald Trump and continued months into Joe Biden’s presidency, Reuters found – even after alarmed social media executives warned the new administration that the Pentagon had been trafficking in COVID misinformation. The Biden White House issued an edict in spring 2021 banning the anti-vax effort, which also disparaged vaccines produced by other rivals, and the Pentagon initiated an internal review, Reuters found.

“I don’t think it’s defensible. I’m extremely dismayed, disappointed and disillusioned to hear that the U.S. government would do that.”
Daniel Lucey, infectious disease specialist at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine.

The U.S. military is prohibited from targeting Americans with propaganda, and Reuters found no evidence the Pentagon’s influence operation did so.

Spokespeople for Trump and Biden did not respond to requests for comment about the clandestine program.

A senior Defense Department official acknowledged the U.S. military engaged in secret propaganda to disparage China’s vaccine in the developing world, but the official declined to provide details.

A Pentagon spokeswoman said the U.S. military “uses a variety of platforms, including social media, to counter those malign influence attacks aimed at the U.S., allies, and partners.” She also noted that China had started a “disinformation campaign to falsely blame the United States for the spread of COVID-19.”

In an email, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it has long maintained the U.S. government manipulates social media and spreads misinformation.

Manila’s embassy in Washington did not respond to Reuters inquiries, including whether it had been aware of the Pentagon operation. A spokesperson for the Philippines Department of Health, however, said the “findings by Reuters deserve to be investigated and heard by the appropriate authorities of the involved countries.” Some aid workers in the Philippines, when told of the U.S. military propaganda effort by Reuters, expressed outrage.

Briefed on the Pentagon’s secret anti-vax campaign by Reuters, some American public health experts also condemned the program, saying it put civilians in jeopardy for potential geopolitical gain. An operation meant to win hearts and minds endangered lives, they said.

“I don’t think it’s defensible,” said Daniel Lucey, an infectious disease specialist at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine. “I’m extremely dismayed, disappointed and disillusioned to hear that the U.S. government would do that,” said Lucey, a former military physician who assisted in the response to the 2001 anthrax attacks.

The effort to stoke fear about Chinese inoculations risked undermining overall public trust in government health initiatives, including U.S.-made vaccines that became available later, Lucey and others said. Although the Chinese vaccines were found to be less effective than the American-led shots by Pfizer and Moderna, all were approved by the World Health Organization. Sinovac did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

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Health workers and the government struggled to get Filipinos vaccinated against COVID-19, despite mobile sites like this one, operating in May 2021 in Taguig, Metro Manila, Philippines. At that time, the Philippines had one of the worst inoculation rates in Southeast Asia. The primary vaccine available then was Sinovac. REUTERS/Lisa Marie David
Academic research published recently has shown that, when individuals develop skepticism toward a single vaccine, those doubts often lead to uncertainty about other inoculations. Lucey and other health experts say they saw such a scenario play out in Pakistan, where the Central Intelligence Agency used a fake hepatitis vaccination program in Abbottabad as cover to hunt for Osama bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind behind the attacks of September 11, 2001. Discovery of the ruse led to a backlash against an unrelated polio vaccination campaign, including attacks on healthcare workers, contributing to the reemergence of the deadly disease in the country.

“It should have been in our interest to get as much vaccine in people’s arms as possible,” said Greg Treverton, former chairman of the U.S. National Intelligence Council, which coordinates the analysis and strategy of Washington’s many spy agencies. What the Pentagon did, Treverton said, “crosses a line.”

‘We were desperate’

Together, the phony accounts used by the military had tens of thousands of followers during the program. Reuters could not determine how widely the anti-vax material and other Pentagon-planted disinformation was viewed, or to what extent the posts may have caused COVID deaths by dissuading people from getting vaccinated.

In the wake of the U.S. propaganda efforts, however, then-Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte had grown so dismayed by how few Filipinos were willing to be inoculated that he threatened to arrest people who refused vaccinations.

“You choose, vaccine or I will have you jailed,” a masked Duterte said in a televised address in June 2021. “There is a crisis in this country … I’m just exasperated by Filipinos not heeding the government.”

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Then-Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte pleaded with citizens to get the COVID vaccine. “You choose, vaccine or I will have you jailed,” a masked Duterte said in this televised address in June 2021.

When he addressed the vaccination issue, the Philippines had among the worst inoculation rates in Southeast Asia. Only 2.1 million of its 114 million citizens were fully vaccinated – far short of the government’s target of 70 million. By the time Duterte spoke, COVID cases exceeded 1.3 million, and almost 24,000 Filipinos had died from the virus. The difficulty in vaccinating the population contributed to the worst death rate in the region.


A spokesperson for Duterte did not make the former president available for an interview.

Some Filipino healthcare professionals and former officials contacted by Reuters were shocked by the U.S. anti-vax effort, which they say exploited an already vulnerable citizenry. Public concerns about a Dengue fever vaccine, rolled out in the Philippines in 2016, had led to broad skepticism toward inoculations overall, said Lulu Bravo, executive director of the Philippine Foundation for Vaccination. The Pentagon campaign preyed on those fears.

“Why did you do it when people were dying? We were desperate,” said Dr. Nina Castillo-Carandang, a former adviser to the World Health Organization and Philippines government during the pandemic. “We don’t have our own vaccine capacity,” she noted, and the U.S. propaganda effort “contributed even more salt into the wound.”

The campaign also reinforced what one former health secretary called a longstanding suspicion of China, most recently because of aggressive behavior by Beijing in disputed areas of the South China Sea. Filipinos were unwilling to trust China’s Sinovac, which first became available in the country in March 2021, said Esperanza Cabral, who served as health secretary under President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Cabral said she had been unaware of the U.S. military’s secret operation.

“I’m sure that there are lots of people who died from COVID who did not need to die from COVID,” she said.

To implement the anti-vax campaign, the Defense Department overrode strong objections from top U.S. diplomats in Southeast Asia at the time, Reuters found. Sources involved in its planning and execution say the Pentagon, which ran the program through the military’s psychological operations center in Tampa, Florida, disregarded the collateral impact that such propaganda may have on innocent Filipinos.

“We weren’t looking at this from a public health perspective,” said a senior military officer involved in the program. “We were looking at how we could drag China through the mud.”

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As the COVID pandemic swept through the Philippines, a man lit a candle atop a tomb in a flooded cemetery there in October 2021. Many citizens were hesitant to be vaccinated. REUTERS/Lisa Marie David

A new disinformation war

In uncovering the secret U.S. military operation, Reuters interviewed more than two dozen current and former U.S officials, military contractors, social media analysts and academic researchers. Reporters also reviewed Facebook, X and Instagram posts, technical data and documents about a set of fake social media accounts used by the U.S. military. Some were active for more than five years.

Clandestine psychological operations are among the government’s most highly sensitive programs. Knowledge of their existence is limited to a small group of people within U.S. intelligence and military agencies. Such programs are treated with special caution because their exposure could damage foreign alliances or escalate conflict with rivals.

Over the last decade, some U.S. national security officials have pushed for a return to the kind of aggressive clandestine propaganda operations against rivals that the United States’ wielded during the Cold War. Following the 2016 U.S. presidential election, in which Russia used a combination of hacks and leaks to influence voters, the calls to fight back grew louder inside Washington.

In 2019, Trump authorized the Central Intelligence Agency to launch a clandestine campaign on Chinese social media aimed at turning public opinion in China against its government, Reuters reported in March. As part of that effort, a small group of operatives used bogus online identities to spread disparaging narratives about Xi Jinping’s government.

COVID-19 galvanized the drive to wage psychological operations against China. One former senior Pentagon leader described the pandemic as a “bolt of energy” that finally ignited the long delayed counteroffensive against China’s influence war.

The Pentagon’s anti-vax propaganda came in response to China’s own efforts to spread false information about the origins of COVID. The virus first emerged in China in late 2019. But in March 2020, Chinese government officials claimed without evidence that the virus may have been first brought to China by an American service member who participated in an international military sports competition in Wuhan the previous year. Chinese officials also suggested that the virus may have originated in a U.S. Army research facility at Fort Detrick, Maryland. There’s no evidence for that assertion.

Mirroring Beijing’s public statements, Chinese intelligence operatives set up networks of fake social media accounts to promote the Fort Detrick conspiracy, according to a U.S. Justice Department complaint.

China’s messaging got Washington’s attention. Trump subsequently coined the term “China virus” as a response to Beijing’s accusation that the U.S. military exported COVID to Wuhan.

“That was false. And rather than having an argument, I said, ‘I have to call it where it came from,’” Trump said in a March 2020 news conference. “It did come from China.”

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President Donald Trump explained his repeated use of the terms “Chinese virus” and “China virus” during a White House COVID briefing in March 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

China’s Foreign Ministry said in an email that it opposed “actions to politicize the origins question and stigmatize China.” The ministry had no comment about the Justice Department’s complaint.

Beijing didn’t limit its global influence efforts to propaganda. It announced an ambitious COVID assistance program, which included sending masks, ventilators and its own vaccines – still being tested at the time – to struggling countries. In May 2020, Xi announced that the vaccine China was developing would be made available as a “global public good,” and would ensure “vaccine accessibility and affordability in developing countries.” Sinovac was the primary vaccine available in the Philippines for about a year until U.S.-made vaccines became more widely available there in early 2022.

Washington’s plan, called Operation Warp Speed, was different. It favored inoculating Americans first, and it placed no restrictions on what pharmaceutical companies could charge developing countries for the remaining vaccines not used by the United States. The deal allowed the companies to “play hardball” with developing countries, forcing them to accept high prices, said Lawrence Gostin, a professor of medicine at Georgetown University who has worked with the World Health Organization.

The deal “sucked most of the supply out of the global market,” Gostin said. “The United States took a very determined America First approach.”

To Washington’s alarm, China’s offers of assistance were tilting the geopolitical playing field across the developing world, including in the Philippines, where the government faced upwards of 100,000 infections in the early months of the pandemic.

(More at link.)

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/sp ... ropaganda/

Thanks to 'b' at MoA for the heads up.
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Fri Jun 21, 2024 2:26 pm

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UN expert: Unilateral sanctions against China are illegal
Following a 12-day official visit to China, Alena Douhan, UN Special Rapporteur on the negative impact of the unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights, has called on the US and its allies to lift their sanctions against China, which she says are illegal and are having a negative impact on the human rights of the Chinese people.

These sanctions, imposed in 2017 and since significantly expanded (most notably with the 2021 ‘Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act’ (UFLPA)), target key sectors including agriculture, construction, trade, green technologies, energy, finance and telecommunications. The sanctions contravene the most fundamental legal norm by placing the burden of proof on the accused, rather than the accuser. The UFLPA in particular demands that Chinese companies prove that their products are not made with forced labour.

Douhan notes: “Access to justice and the fundamental principles of due process and the presumption of innocence are also seriously undermined by the listing and de-listing procedures, based on the rebuttable presumption of wrongfulness of everything with any nexus to Xinjiang or designated companies.”

A report on the UN Human Rights Council website cites Douhan as saying that a “decline in business activities and the significant loss of global markets either due to unilateral sanctions per se or due to over-compliance with such measures by foreign businesses and entities have led to job losses, with consequent disruptions in social protection schemes, by disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable, particularly in labour-intensive sectors, including women, older persons, and all those in informal employment”.

That is to say, not only are the sanctions illegal, they are also adversely affecting the human rights of precisely those people they are purportedly intended to protect.

Alena Douhan’s visit took her to Beijing, Urumqi, Shihezi, Changji, Hotan, and Shenzhen, and included meetings with representatives from national and local government institutions, NGOs, humanitarian actors, businesses, UN entities, academics, businesses and diplomats.

The full text of Douhan’s statement can be found here.

The report below is republished from Global Times.
Unilateral sanctions against China do not conform with a broad number of international legal norms, are introduced to apply pressure on the country, and can be qualified as unilateral coercive measures, the UN Special Rapporteur on unilateral coercive measures and human rights, Alena Douhan, said in a press conference in Beijing on Friday after a 12-day official visit to several cities in China, including Urumqi, Shihezi and Hotan in Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

Unilateral sanctions have been imposed against China since 2017 with mounting US pressure on Chinese technological companies and the imposition of export controls, designation of companies’ officials and the launch of administrative and civil charges. These have been followed by further sanctions and restrictions related to China’s Xinjiang region and Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, by expanding the list of targets to include key sectors, including in agriculture, construction, trade, green technologies, energy, finance, telecommunications and others.

As the Special Rapporteur on the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights, Douhan visited China from May 6 to 17 to gather firsthand information on the negative impact of unilateral sanctions in China. During her stay in China, she met representatives from national and local government institutions, non-governmental organizations, associations, humanitarian actors, businesses, UN entities, academia, businesses, as well as the diplomatic community.

One day before the UN expert’s press conference, the US announced on Thursday that it was adding another 26 Chinese cotton traders or warehouse facilities to the entity list of the so-called Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) that bars goods related to so-called forced labor in the Xinjiang region, Reuters reported.

The UFLPA, which was enacted in December 2021, has been widely criticized as “one of the most notorious laws of the 21st century.” It creates a “rebuttable presumption” that all goods partially or wholly produced in the Xinjiang region are “tainted by forced labor” and it requires corporations to prove with “clear and convincing evidence” that imports from the region are not made by forced labor.

During the Friday meeting with media, Douhan noted that the establishment of a “rebuttable presumption” regarding the “wrongdoing” of companies with any connection to Xinjiang or designated entities, particularly those involved in recruiting individuals from ethnic minority groups in China or operating within designated sectors of the economy, places the burden of proof on business actors.

It violates fundamental principles of international law, as well as provisions outlined in resolutions of the UN General Assembly and UN Human Rights Council and represents an attempt to supplement legal standards with a so-called rules-based order, said Douhan.

Sanctions against broad sectors of the economy in China’s Xinjiang region coupled with those against large companies affect the overall economy of the region, result in disruptions of industrial and trade relations, adversely affect all those involved in the supply chains with a link to this region, even outside China, including third country employees, and consequently result in rising unemployment, particularly affecting the most vulnerable, said Douhan.

The UN expert also noted that minorities in the Xinjiang region would also be affected and those who have been lifted out of poverty may face the risk of falling into poverty once again in an interview with the Global Times on Friday.

There are no legal grounds from the perspective of international law to impose sanctions against specific types of industry, cotton or high-tech area or batteries or any others. And “transparency does not exist” when companies submit explanations to related departments to protect their rights by judicial means, said Douhan.

Douhan also called on sanctioning parties to lift and suspend all unilateral sanctions applied to China, Chinese nationals and companies without authorization from the UN Security Council.

“I wish to reiterate the illegality of extraterritorial application of unilateral sanctions and I call on states, in particular sanctioning states, to effectively address over-compliance of businesses and other entities under their jurisdiction in order to mitigate or completely eliminate any adverse humanitarian impact,” said the expert.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/18/u ... e-illegal/

The US’ Planned Reopening Of The “Tibet Question” Is Part Of Its “Pivot (Back) To Asia”

ANDREW KORYBKO
JUN 20, 2024

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Biden’s impending signing of the “Resolve Tibet Act” will reopen this political containment front in the Himalayas and immediately increase the strategic importance of Indian-based Tibetan exile groups ahead of the predictable succession crisis that’ll follow the Dalai Lama’s passing.

Chair of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee Michael McCaul said during his visit to India’s Dharamshala as the head of a bipartisan delegation of American lawmakers meeting with the Dalai Lama that Biden is expected to soon sign the “Resolve Tibet Act” that was approved by Congress last week. The public isn’t all that aware of what this law entails since it didn’t receive much media coverage in the run-up to its passing, but the following points encapsulate the change in policy that it’ll bring:

* The US will revive its former concerns over the means through which China came to control Tibet;

* Accordingly, it’ll once again openly support the Tibetan people’s “self-determination”;

* This will also include promotion of their separate identity vis-à-vis China’s majority ethnic Han;

* As could have been expected, the US will now actively counter “disinformation” on this issue too;

* And it’ll redefine the geographic scope of Tibet to include neighboring regions claimed by exile groups.

Essentially, American policy towards Tibet will tacitly come to resemble the one that it earlier applied towards the Baltics, namely “non-recognition” of the legitimacy behind that region’s incorporation into its larger neighbor while still recognizing the ground realities when formulating defense policy. China reacted furiously to the delegation’s trip, but that’s not expected to deter the US from going through with its plans since reopening the “Tibet Question” is part of its “Pivot (back) to Asia”.

The US is currently tightening its containment noose around China in the first island chain through its newly assembled “Squad” of Australia, Japan, the Philippines, and (informally) Taiwan. This replicates the Ukrainian model of weaponizing a regional security dilemma in order to manipulate its rival into commencing military action in preemptive self-defense. President Xi reportedly warned about this plot during a private meeting with von der Leyen in April 2023 so China is well aware of it.

These efforts are expected to ramp up once the Ukrainian Conflict inevitably ends and the US reprioritizes its anti-Chinese containment efforts in the Asia-Pacific over its anti-Russian ones in Europe. Biden’s impending signing of the “Resolve Tibet Act” will reopen this political containment front in the Himalayas and immediately increase the strategic importance of Indian-based Tibetan exile groups ahead of the predictable succession crisis that’ll follow the Dalai Lama’s passing.

This move parallels India’s tacit reopening of the “Tibet Question” via its planned renaming of 30 places in that region, which is a response to China renaming places in the Indian State of Arunachal Pradesh that Beijing claims as its own as “South Tibet” despite only briefly controlling a sliver of it in 1962. Indo-US ties have been troubled over the past year for the reasons that can be learned about here since they’re beyond the scope of this piece to explain, but this strategic convergence can help improve them.

India’s problems with China are independent of the US’ so it would be inaccurate for observers to speculate that the first will become the second’s proxy for waging another round of Hybrid War on China in the Himalayas. Nevertheless, closer political coordination between them on this issue is possible if Sino-Indo ties continue deteriorating. Even so, India won’t ever allow the US to control Tibetan exile groups on its soil, with their activities remaining autonomous and under Delhi’s ambit if anything.

Returning to the bipartisan US delegation visit to Dharamshala that provoked China’s fury, this wouldn’t have been possible without the Indian government’s approval, so Beijing might partially blame Delhi for the inflammatory rhetoric that those members spewed while there and thus politically respond to it. India isn’t the US’ keeper, but it must have known that this trip would make headlines given that it followed Congress’ passing of the “Resolve Tibet Act” and included high-profile participants like Pelosi.

Former Indian Ambassador to Russia and incumbent Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University Kanwal Sibal explained India’s calculations in a tweet that can be read here. He said that denying visas to the delegation or telling them that they can’t make any public statements would have looked weak after everything that China did to India. Ambassador Sibal added that India didn’t need the US to “provoke” China since it could have simply invited Taiwanese and Tibetan representatives to Modi’s inauguration.

His insight is important to keep in mind since members of the Alt-Media Community, the majority of whom sympathize with China (largely due to the leftist views that many of them espouse), will likely claim that this development supposedly proves that India is the US’ “Trojan Horse” in BRISC and the SCO. That’s not true for the reasons that were already explained, not to mention India rebuffing US pressure to dump Russia and then defiantly redoubling their ties afterwards, so nobody should take that seriously.

Altogether, Indo-US efforts in support of Tibet’s “self-determination” (whether independently or jointly and regardless of the extent to which they go) won’t change the ground reality of Chinese control there, thus making them media and political means for signaling their displeasure with Beijing. As ties with both predictably deteriorate even further as a result, the speed at which the center of the New Cold War moves from Europe to Asia will accelerate, thus inadvertently relieving some pressure on Russia.

https://korybko.substack.com/p/the-us-p ... -the-tibet

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How does the US want to fight China?
June 19, 2024
Rybar

In a recent article about the threat of massive drone use, we expressed concern about a sharp increase in the number of UAVs on the battlefield. Many promising technologies are already being finalized and tested in real conflicts in the so-called territory. Ukraine and the Gaza Strip.

Well, it will hardly be a secret that the Pentagon is already actively using the budget to prepare for future potential conflicts, where the main opponent of the United States will, of course, be China.

In August 2023, the US Department of Defense unveiled Replicator , its initiative to deploy thousands of "all-domain, attack autonomous systems ( ADA2 )". This is what the Pentagon calls inexpensive ( and potentially AI-controlled ) devices.

These are naval BECs and ships, large aircraft-type UAVs, swarms of small kamikaze drones. According to the American military, the devices need to be used and used en masse to overwhelm the Chinese forces.

At the same time, the two Pentagon units leading this effort announced that four unconventional weapons manufacturers have been selected to participate in another program to create drones, the Enterprise Test Vehicle, which is scheduled to test flights later this year.

From more than 100 applicants, Anduril Industries , Integrated Solutions for Systems , Leidos Dynetics and Zone 5 Technologies were selected .

Companies building this Enterprise Test Vehicle, or ETV, will have to prove that their drone is capable of flying more than 500 miles and delivering a kinetic payload , with an emphasis on weapons that are low-cost, easily mass-produced and modular.

These requirements are reflected in the 2023 application and a recent announcement by the Air Force Weapons Directorate and the Defense Innovation Office, the Pentagon unit charged with accelerating the development of off-the-shelf designs.

As we see, work on the development of unmanned weapons is in full swing. The concept of their use is being rapidly improved based on the experience of current conflicts.

Therefore, the sooner we begin holding similar events (albeit on a smaller scale) involving both leading domestic enterprises and teams of talented developers, the more effectively we can prepare for future conflicts.

https://rybar.ru/chem-ssha-hotyat-voevat-s-kitaem/

Google Translator

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The inevitable revolution in AI military applications
June 19, 15:00

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An inevitable revolution in the military application of AI. Confrontation between the USA and China.

The US military's long-standing technological superiority is rapidly eroding. Over the past 25 years, China has invested heavily in its military, the People's Liberation Army (PLA), putting it on a path to "complete national defense and military modernization by 2035" and making the PLA "the world's leading army by mid-century." China's increased military power now poses a serious challenge to the US-led international order.

One technology in particular will define military supremacy in the coming decades: artificial intelligence (AI). With the advent of self-driving cars and ChatGPT, AI has moved beyond science fiction and is now beginning to spread throughout society. This revolutionary technology also creates new capabilities for the military. Dual-use AI applications provide tools for quickly analyzing large volumes of data, improving communication, and improving decision-making speed.

The coming military revolution in artificial intelligence is part of a broader geopolitical rivalry between the United States and China. The stakes in this competition are high and the outcome is unclear. China views the United States as a superpower in decline. As the PLA gains power, its actions become more aggressive. Over the past two years, the United States has documented more than 180 incidents of dangerous PLA air interceptions. directed against US allies and partners. The South China Sea remains a flashpoint where China has asserted territorial claims and continues to signal its readiness to use military force against Taiwan. Tensions are high and the risk of conflict is real.

Amid China's determination to "intelligentize" warfare, the PLA is rapidly developing an entirely new generation of artificial intelligence-enabled military systems, with the Chinese Communist Party devoting significant public and private resources to it. Progress continues to accelerate, and the gap with the United States is rapidly closing.

In response, the US Department of Defense has embarked on its own path of military modernization. Accelerating AI adoption is now a top priority for the Department of Defense as it seeks to harness the innovative power of the American private sector, home to the world's leading AI companies. By deploying AI-enabled systems on a large scale and using them on the battlefield in conjunction with new ways of warfare, the US military intends to compensate for the PLA's progress.

The consequences of the coming military revolution in the field of artificial intelligence are difficult to overestimate. If developed effectively, AI will permeate all military systems and processes. Huge efficiency gains will come as AI reduces the demands on humans to process data, preventing cognitive overload and enabling more thorough analysis. Situational awareness will increase, operations will become more precise, and decisions will become more informed. The speed of combat operations will increase. Those with the best AI tools will constantly be in charge, while those without them will struggle to make sense of what's going on.

In various niche applications, AI is already winning. Both the United States and China understand this and are seeking to incorporate AI into their military strategies. In 2018, the US Department of Defense published its first concept designed to accelerate the adoption of AI by the US military, in its report the Americans highlighted the fact that China is “making significant investments in AI for military purposes” that “threaten to undermine our technological and operational advantages.” .

In 2019, China published the so-called The White Paper on Defense, which claimed that a "revolution in military affairs with Chinese characteristics" was taking place. Building on advances in new technologies, the Chinese have emphasized the importance of AI in future wars as big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things "gain momentum in the military field." The idea that AI would change the nature of war was now at the forefront of both countries' military strategies.

Unlike some important military innovations of the past, such as the longbow, gunpowder or tank, which had relatively specific applications, AI is a general-purpose technology with a diverse range of applications. Just as the advent of electricity led to advances in lighting, heating, transportation and communications, AI will extend to many other technologies, greatly increasing their capabilities and efficiency. Today, both the U.S. and Chinese defense sectors are seeing a proliferation of artificial intelligence research and development for a variety of military applications, including autonomous vehicles, intelligence gathering, predictive logistics, cybersecurity, and command and control. The outcome of the AI ​​race will not be determined based on one specific application, but rather will be determined by the party that can best integrate AI into various systems and processes across all domains of warfare.

China's approach to military technology development is a civil-military fusion strategy characterized by direct military participation in research and development with private Chinese enterprises and synchronized and centralized government control. China has made significant progress in recent years by deliberately focusing on military modernization. However, both countries are facing a new challenge in the race for AI-enabled military systems. Unlike many technological innovations of the past, which were developed through government-sponsored research programs, the most advanced artificial intelligence technologies today are found in the private sector. To gain access to this technology, the Department of Defense and the PLA will need to forge new partnerships with commercial firms to develop dual-use applications. Traditional defense contractors and government-owned enterprises in both the US and China simply cannot keep up with the pace of AI innovation in the private sector.

China's approach to solving this problem is to use the power of the state to deepen public-private integration through a strategy of civil-military fusion. In recent years, several aspects of the strategy have successfully promoted closer integration between the PLA and private Chinese businesses. These include the establishment of joint laboratories to facilitate dual-use research between military, academic and commercial enterprises, the creation of an Agile Innovation Defense Unit that focuses on providing the PLA with access to commercial technologies, and the PLA's sponsorship of competitions aimed at promoting creative solutions to military problems. Additionally, the civil-military merger proved successful in expanding the PLA's influence in the commercial sector. One recent study by China's Center for Security and Emerging Technology found that the PLA purchased most of its artificial intelligence equipment from private Chinese technology companies rather than laggard state-owned enterprises.

In contrast to China's top-down approach, the US strategy is to use its dynamic and innovative market economy to create new military technologies based on artificial intelligence. In doing so, the Department of Defense is seeking to balance the force away from aging combat platforms that are manned and expensive to a new generation of systems that are expendable, autonomous and relatively inexpensive. In an initiative called Replicator, the US Department of Defense has set a goal of deploying these systems at a scale of "several thousand in various areas over the next 18 to 24 months." Designed to offset the PLA's conventional advantage, Replicator seeks to complement conventional US capabilities with a large concentration of AI-enabled systems that can operate effectively in a highly competitive environment.

In contrast to the approach of the People's Liberation Army of China, the US Department of Defense relies heavily on private enterprise and economic competition between private enterprises in its defense technology development programs. This approach assumes that free enterprise promotes greater freedom in creativity and innovation.

The confrontation on the issue of military AI is intensifying at an accelerating pace, and no one understands what this will lead to in the end.

@neinsider - zinc

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/9216886.html

American training airfield in China
June 19, 20:13

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Full-size training model of an American air base with models of American aircraft.
Designed to train PLA Air Force pilots in the event of a direct war between the United States and China.
Also in China, there are similar complexes simulating aircraft carrier strike groups of the US Navy, where the Chinese are practicing attack scenarios on American AUGs on mock-ups.
All these experiments are carried out in sparsely populated areas of central China, away from prying eyes, but are sometimes detected by satellites.

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/9217538.html

Google Translator

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A Month Traveling in China
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on JUNE 20, 2024
Stansfield Smith

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My Chinese-speaking wife and I recently traveled to nine different cities and towns in China over the course of a month, our fourth trip since 2005. We were also to go in 2020, but the covid lockdown canceled it. That year we could have booked a train ticket to Xinjiang and traveled around that province no questions asked, though Western media claimed we’d be in the midst of the bogus Uyghur “genocide.” One example of the endless disinformation about China.

Of our most significant impressions of China, the first is the contrast between the stories the corporate media tell us about China, what they don’t want us to know, and the reality we see. The Wall Street Journal for example asserted “China’s economy limps into 2024”, whereas in contrast the US was marked by a “resilient domestic economy.” In reality, China grew 5.3% in the first quarter of 2024. The US grew at 1.6%, Germany and France grew just 0.2%, Britain at 0.6%, and Japan -0.5%. But economic crisis is racking China!

Two, China’s infrastructure surpasses anything in the US. Jimmy Carter said “How many miles of high-speed railroad do we have in this country [zero]? China has around 18,000 miles (29,000 km) of high-speed rail lines.” That was in 2019. Now it is 28,000 miles and trains can travel 220 miles per hour. A train from Shanghai to Kunming, the distance from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, takes 11 hours 40 minutes and costs the equivalent of $127.

What we live with here in the US appears hugely backward in comparison. Their subway systems are decades ahead of those in the US; the US train system seems a century behind. Videos such as this show what they have achieved.

Three, after experiencing China’s incredible infrastructure, you realize how the trillions of dollars spent on endless war have impoverished us. The US blows things up instead of building things to improve public well-being. Carter said the US “has wasted, I think, $3 trillion” on military spending ($5.9 trillion between 2001-2018). “Since 1979, do you know how many times China has been at war with anybody? None, and we have stayed at war. China has not wasted a single penny on war, and that’s why they’re ahead of us. In almost every way… We’d have high-speed railroad. We’d have bridges that aren’t collapsing, we’d have roads that are maintained properly. Our education system would be as good as that of say South Korea or Hong Kong.”

Four, clean and safe cities. We don’t see the omnipresent litter we do here. Every day a veritable army of public workers cleans the streets, sidewalks, subways, parks, and other public places. These are not simply litter-free, but clean. Workers making sure of it. In the US we would expect this in private buildings, universities, hospitals, fancy hotels, but not in public spaces.

Cities are not just visually clean – the noise pollution is less. Vehicle noise – and exhaust – is much less than here because buses and many cars are electric. The streets are full of people riding motorbikes, all electric ones. One in four Chinese, 350 million, have an electric scooter.

City parks are not simply clean, but make people feel welcomed and provided with activities to engage with others – ping pong, mahjong, badminton, dancing clubs, music groups, Tai Chi, exercise groups. Many elderly take part in these free public activities. Men retire at age 60, blue-collar women at 50, white-collar women at 55. Workers in health-harming professions such as underground, high-altitude, labor-intensive jobs enjoy a five-year reduction.

The pleasant, well-designed and well-kept parks often have monuments to Chinese heroes from battles against Japanese or Chiang Kai-Shek’s troops.

You can take the metro and walk anywhere and not worry about it being dirty or worry about crime.

Chinese cities have very cheap public bicycles for people on a massive scale. In Hangzhou in 2023 they had 116,000. It cost me 75 cents to use one for a day. A monthly pass drastically reduces that. In Guangzhou a monthly pass costs only $1.40.

That infamous Chinese air pollution? We went to Shanghai, Hangzhou, Suzhou, Chengdu, Kunming, Guangzhou, all of which had an air quality index lower than the much less populous city of Chicago (you can check on the weather app on your phone). Today, of the world’s hundred most polluted cities, 83 are in India, just 4 in China.

Everyone seems to have a phone, used for everything – paying for what you buy through QR codes, making train, museum, hotel, bus, airplane reservations. Cash is becoming almost obsolete.

Five, an array of social services and benefits for the people. Besides very cheap public transport, China has public bathrooms everywhere. They are not like gas station bathrooms here, but decent ones like you find in big private hotels here and kept clean like them. You need not worry about where you and your children can go when in public. You don’t have to buy something from a store just to use a bathroom. You don’t smell pee anywhere. Some public bathrooms even have an electric board at the entrance telling you which stalls are occupied and which are vacant.

Seniors, even me, generally get half-price, such as at museums, national parks, on subways and trains. Many signs and regular announcements in public places ask you to mind and assist the elderly, children, and pregnant women around you.

Public service workers are everywhere, available to answer any questions you have. If they don’t know, they look it up on their phones. I saw hundreds of these public service workers in the cities and towns we toured. A downtown subway station with four entrances has four workers at each one to check your bags and belongings, a customer service office with one or two more, besides the workers cleaning the station, and the one or two on the platforms assisting riders. That may be 20-25 service workers. At a Chicago CTA stop you would find one worker. A telling reminder of how public service jobs have been cut here, and expanded in China.

WageCentre.com states the average Chinese salary is 9,500 yuan per month ($1,315) in major cities, which Statistica calls the average wage (which I think is overstated). But we did find prices (and taxes) far less than here (save gas), except in Western stores, so you could at least double the buying power of a Chinese income. A subway ride was often under 50 cents (3 yuan), a bus is less – which a monthly pass cuts almost in half. A sit-down breakfast in a Chinese shop can be $5 for two; on the street, less.

Six, the complete absence of homeless people. You don’t come across unbathed people asking for money, people forced to sleep in tents in public parks, next to roadways, or on the subway. We were in nine different cities and saw just one down-and-out person on the street asking for money. The US, in the midst of wealth, has hundreds of thousands of homeless, including children, pregnant women, and the elderly. How many freeze to death in the winter, how many face hunger, seems a US state secret.

Seven, the qualitatively different nature of police relations with the people. The police don’t even look like US ones, armored as if for battle. I met only one with a gun; they simply carry a radio and a phone. They bear a closer similarity to our marshals at rallies than to US police. The police, like the other public workers, are there to assist you, answer your questions – when something would open, how we take public transportation to some place, the nearest ATM.

I recount two experiences with the Chinese police, which show the role Chinese police play as public servants. One day we took a train and then a bus to visit the Leshan Giant Buddha statue. When we were buying our entrance tickets, I found I had lost a little jacket from my backpack containing my wallet and our passports. Alarmed, we went to the local police station to report this.

Without passports, we cannot get back on the train to return to our hotel, check into any hotel, take our next flight, let alone leave the country. I resigned myself to spending the rest of our time in China trying to get new passports from the nearest US consulate. The local police asked us for a photo of my jacket and where we think we lost it.

Like in the US, China has video cameras most everywhere. But there, the police actually searched videos of where we told them we had been in the previous town, and in two hours reported they found where I lost it, but someone had taken it. They had to track him down. In just three hours since we reported it missing, the police had my jacket with everything and had driven to where we were to give it to us.

With cameras everywhere, many told us, China has greatly reduced crime. The difference between China and the US lies in the use cameras are put to. While cameras are omnipresent in US cities, there is zero chance police would search them to locate my jacket. Even if the US police did bother to devote any time to it, could they recover my jacket in a month?

We told the police how grateful we were for saving us, that the police wouldn’t do this in the US. The head of the station replied, “Yes, we know about the police in your country. No need to thank us. This is our job. We are just doing our job.”

My second noteworthy police experience is our arrival, after a day touring by taxi, four hours early to a small airport near Jiuzhaigou National Park. Ours was the one flight that day, and three kilometers away, the road to the airport was gated shut. The police there said it would open in two hours. But rather than have us stand outside the gate with our luggage, they opened the gate for us and four Chinese travelers, invited us to sit in their office, made us tea, and chatted with us. I cannot imagine police doing that in the US.

In Summary

The Chinese have devoted immense public funding to public services, making you feel the world outside your front door is clean, safe, and well-organized. As a result, you feel welcomed in public places, you feel your well-being is respected. What US subway system feels like a pleasant and welcoming space? New York City’s makes you feel you have entered Purgatory. Public transport here serves to move you from one place to another at the least expense to the government. Your comfort and well-being is irrelevant.

The overall feeling created in litter-free, clean, safe cities, with no homeless, staffed with many workers who keep it in order for the people, is that in contrast to here, the Chinese government has created a society that cares about you. In the US, you feel government is indifferent to your concerns – unless you have money.

We do have quality social programs here, including for the elderly. But these have been privatized. You must pay good money for it. As the 1960-70s social movements died down, the neoliberal approach began to prevail, social services were steadily cut and privatized, no longer next to free – quality senior centers, community health centers, public universities. They still exist – for those who pay for them. Quality social services here are not a human right. In China they are. There, more and better social services are increasingly provided – and maintained in top condition – for the people.

This reduces the daily stresses and discomforts we are accustomed to living with here. It creates a more civilized environment. As we know, when we are less stressed, we feel better about ourselves and act better towards others. That’s an achievement the impressive infrastructure and social services have created in China – reducing the general stress level of the whole population. China is creating a more humane place to live. Chinese who live here and go back to visit can tell you every year China gets better.

Similarly, when the US blockades a country, like Cuba, Venezuela, or Iran, it greatly increases the stress level in the population. It causes scarcities, which drives people to compete over scarce goods. That causes more personal and social conflicts.

Remember, at the founding of the People’s Republic just 75 years ago, China’s illiteracy rate was 80%. Now it is the most technologically advanced country on the planet. Equally world historic are the revolutionary gains in human rights for the hundreds of millions of women, progressing from beasts of burden owned by men to full and (nearly) equal citizens, all in the space of one lifetime. Moreover, in a mere forty years, as the Asian Development Bank states, China raised 750 million out of poverty, reducing poverty from 88% in 1981 to 0.1% in 2023.

China stands out today as the only country to ever surpass the US in development. The US rulers do not take this as an example to learn from, but as a mortal threat. China carefully accomplished this feat without being “regime changed,” attacked, or economically disabled by the US. The US succeeded in undermining the Soviet Union, then sabotaged the growing power of Japan and the European Union, and then broke the increasing closer relations between Russia and Europe by instigating the Ukraine war. But the various US strategies to disable China have failed one after another. As a result, today China presents a progressive and growing alternative force to the world power of the US empire.

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2024/06/ ... -in-china/

*****

China Urges Philippines to Stop Provocation on Ren’ai Jiao Issue

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A Philippine supply ship approaches a Chinese vessel in waters off China’s Ren’ai Jiao in the South China Sea, June 17, 2024. Photo: X/ @globaltimesnews

June 21, 2024 Hour: 7:58 am

The Philippine military carried out a mission to reinforce the grounded warship at Ren’ai Jiao to extend its service life.
On Friday, Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian urged the Philippines to immediately stop infringement and provocations on the Ren’ai Jiao issue, and return to the right track of properly managing differences through dialogue and consultation as soon as possible.


He made the remarks at a regular news briefing when asked to comment on the recent moves by the Philippine military at Ren’ai Jiao, China’s Nansha Qundao. The Financial Times said the Philippine military carried out the mission to reinforce the grounded warship at Ren’ai Jiao to extend its service life.

“Reports once again confirm that the Philippine side’s claim of sending only living necessities for its grounded warship on Ren’ai Jiao is a complete lie,” Lin stressed.

In fact, as pointed out by the Chinese side on multiple occasions, the Philippine side has been trying to send construction materials and even weapons and ammunition to its illegally grounded warship in an attempt to carry out large-scale repair and reinforcement in order to achieve long-term occupation of Ren’ai Jiao, he added.


Such actions by the Philippine side seriously infringe upon China’s sovereignty, which China will never accept. China will respond resolutely in accordance with the law and regulations, Lin said, noting that the cause of the current situation on Ren’ai Jiao is very clear.

The root cause is that the Philippine side violated its promise, refused to tow away the warship that had been illegally grounded on Ren’ai Jiao for 25 years, and insisted on sending construction materials in an attempt to reinforce it, the Chinese diplomat pointed out.

This warship is irrefutable evidence of the Philippines’ long-standing infringement and provocation against China in the South China Sea, its treachery and violation of the spirit of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea, and its destruction of the ecological environment in the South China Sea, Lin noted.

“We urge the Philippine side to immediately stop its infringement and provocative actions and return to the right track of properly managing differences through dialogue and consultation. China’s determination to safeguard its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests remains unwavering,” Lin said.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/china-ur ... iao-issue/
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sun Jun 30, 2024 5:11 pm

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Class character of People’s China: interview with research economist
The following text is the English translation of an interview with Rémy Herrera, a research analyst at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) at the Sorbonne in Paris. The interview was first published in the magazine Harici (Istanbul, Türkiye), and the newspaper Cumhuriyet (Istanbul) in May 2024. The original French has been translated by John Catalinotto for Workers World.

Herrera, who has co-authored a book by Long Zhiming called Dynamics of China’s Economy: Growth, Cycles and Crises from 1949 to the Present Day, makes several important points about the nature, history and trajectory of China’s socialist market economy. First, contrary to Western neoclassical economists who see China’s emergence as a function exclusively of its adoption of market mechanisms and its integration into the global capitalist economy, Herrera argues that “accelerated growth was made possible only by the efforts and achievements of the Maoist period.” When opening up was introduced, it was “firmly and continuously controlled by the Chinese authorities, and it is under this condition that it can be considered as having contributed to the country’s indisputable economic successes”.

China has engaged with the process of globalisation, but the crucial condition for the success of this experiment has been subjecting it “to the constraints of satisfying internal objectives and domestic needs, … fully integrated within a coherent development strategy”. Engaging with the global economy is not by itself a solution to all problems; after all, “for more than a century before the victory of the Revolution in October 1949, ‘opening up’ had meant above all submission, devastation, exploitation, humiliation, decadence and chaos for the Chinese people”.

Herrera also discusses the nature of China’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs). These “are not managed in the same way as Western transnational corporations”; their primary goal is not the pursuit of shareholder profit at all costs. Rather, they are duty bound “to stimulate the rest of the domestic economy, and go beyond a vision of immediate profitability when higher strategic, long-term or national interests so dictate”.

On the underlying socialist basis of China’s economic system, Herrera makes the fundamental point that, in China, “the state controls capitalism, not the other way around”. For example, China’s authorities have “successfully confronted the power of the financial markets”, building a “great monetary wall” to defend the national currency. “Powerful strategic planning, whose techniques have been relaxed, modernized and adapted to today’s requirements — which is what makes it so effective — is a distinctive feature of a socialist approach. State control of the currency and all the major banks is an absolute requirement, as is close monitoring of the activities of financial institutions and the behavior of foreign firms operating on national territory.”

He continues:

The coexistence of public and private activities, stimulated by each other within a mixed, hybrid system, is the means chosen to develop the country’s productive forces to the maximum − including by attracting foreign capital and importing advanced technologies − and thus raising its level of development, with the stated aim of improving the population’s living conditions, and doing this not by abandoning socialism, but by deepening the socialist transition process that began in 1949.

Herrera also addresses the ongoing crisis of neoliberalism and its manifestation in an increasingly aggressive New Cold War on China. “All the conditions are in place for the system’s contradictions to become even more pronounced, especially as few reforms have been carried out since the 2008 crisis”. All progressive and peace-loving forces must unite in opposition to the US and its allies’ escalations. “The defence of peace is the priority”.
Q: Let’s begin with your books on China. Based on your research and observations during your visits to China, how do you interpret the Chinese miracle that everyone is discussing?

RH: Many commentators on the very high rate of growth in China’s gross domestic product (GDP), which has been observed for several decades now, use the term “miracle” to describe this phenomenon. I, for one, believe that this is no miracle, but rather the result of a development strategy that has been patiently conceived and effectively implemented by the country’s leaders and senior officials in successive governments, under the authority of the Communist Party.

We read and hear everywhere, in academic circles and the mainstream media, that the “take-off” of the Chinese economy is due solely to its “openness” to globalization. In my view, it’s necessary to add that such accelerated growth was made possible only by the efforts and achievements of the Maoist period. This opening up was firmly and continuously controlled by the Chinese authorities, and it is under this condition that it can be considered as having contributed to the country’s indisputable economic successes. It is because it has been subject to the constraints of satisfying internal objectives and domestic needs, and fully integrated within a coherent development strategy, that this opening up to globalization has been able to produce such positive long-term effects for China.

Let’s be clear: without the elaboration of such a development strategy, which is clearly the work of the Chinese Communist Party — let’s not forget that — and without the energy deployed by the Chinese people to implement it during the revolutionary process, the country’s insertion into the capitalist world system would inevitably have led to the destructuring of the national economy, or even its destruction altogether, as is happening in so many other countries in the South, or in the East. One fundamental point must be borne in mind: for more than a century before the victory of the Revolution in October 1949, “opening up” had meant above all submission, devastation, exploitation, humiliation, decadence and chaos for the Chinese people.

Q: How does China’s success differ from Western development models?

RH: The success of the Chinese government’s development strategy and the many benefits it has brought to the country’s people contrast sharply with the failure of neoliberal economic policy measures applied in Western countries, which have had catastrophic consequences for workers in the North, whether in economic, social, or even moral and cultural terms.

Let me give you a specific example. One explanation for the strength of Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is that they are not managed in the same way as Western transnational corporations. The Western ones — listed on the stock exchange and oriented towards the logic of shareholder value which demands the maximization of dividends paid to their private owners, shareholder value and rapid returns on investment — operate by squeezing a chain of subcontractors, whether local or relocated abroad. Chinese state-owned groups don’t behave like this. If they were to behave in such a rapacious manner, they would be acting to the detriment of local small and medium-sized enterprises and, more broadly, of the entire national industrial fabric. But this is clearly not the case.

Most of China’s large state-owned enterprises are (or have become) profitable again because their guiding compass is not the enrichment of private shareholders, but the priority given to productive investment and customer service. In the final analysis, it doesn’t matter if their profits turn out to be lower than those of their Western competitors as long as they serve, at least in part, to stimulate the rest of the domestic economy, and go beyond a vision of immediate profitability when higher strategic, long-term or national interests so dictate.

Q: Can this model be defined in terms of the neo-classical or neo-Marxist model?

RH: First of all, I don’t think the Chinese see their development strategy as a “model.” Nor do they seek to impose or export it. They simply believe that certain lessons can be learned by the peoples of the world, but that it is up to them to define the objectives and means of their own development in their own specific historical, social and cultural conditions. This also differs markedly from the Western vision, which would like its “model” to be followed by every country in the world.

Neoclassical models have no application in China. If you’ll allow me, I’d like to add that neoclassical economics, which today constitutes the hegemonic or mainstream current in economics, basically serves no other purpose than to attempt to provide a theoretical and supposedly scientific justification for neoliberal political practices whose ideology is situated at the opposite end of the spectrum from measures for social justice and the development of public services. In reality, neoclassical economics is not a science, but science fiction or, as I put it in a recent book (“Confronting Mainstream Economics for Overcoming Capitalism,” Palgrave Macmillan), an ideology with scientific pretensions.

I am convinced, on the other hand, that Marxism has not yet been scientifically overtaken. Today, it has no serious competitor. It remains relevant, not least because we still live in a world where the capitalist system remains dominant on a global scale, even if its changes have been substantial, and need to be carefully accounted for. Despite the many attacks on Marxism since its foundation, and the repeated announcements of its death, it is enduring, resilient, “indestructible” dare I say, and the indispensable theoretical benchmark for anyone thinking about the ways and conditions of a better world.

Despite the demise of the USSR and the Soviet bloc, within which it had all too often become dogmatized and sometimes turned against itself, Marxism remains indispensable today, an irreplaceable point of reference for those fighting for socialism. So it’s hardly surprising that it is still an important theoretical reference for China.

Q: Has China grounded the practice of its economic model on theoretical foundations?

RH: I’d say that China’s development strategy, whose objective remains that of continuing and deepening the socialist transition, is based on a theoretical combination of elements drawn both from the great philosophical currents of traditional Chinese thought (particularly Confucianism and Taoism, but not exclusively) and from a modernized and mixed Marxism, reinterpreted in the Chinese way. But it’s important to understand that this theory is closely associated with the analysis of practical experience. All of this has led to relevant solutions to the challenges of the present day, and especially to answers to the many contradictions that arise from them.

The Chinese concept of “new-age socialism” is patient, enduring, pragmatic and effective, not Manichean; it takes the long view and is not afraid to confront oppositions and contradictions (those of individual initiative or entrepreneurship, for example), seen more as complementarities and potentialities than as exclusions and substitutions.

One of the lessons to be learned from Marxism “à la chinoise” is the idea of harmony between opposites, within human beings, between human beings, and between human beings and nature. Chinese political discourse emphasizes “social harmony” and “stability” as essential values, and “conciliation” and “consensus” as the means to achieve them. These are all notions that differ from the “class war” espoused by Western Marxism, and which the latter often regards as suspect, since they are generally characteristic of conservative regimes. This overlooks the particular meaning they take on in Chinese thought, as “conciliation of opposites” and “positive dialectics.”

This means, for example, that there are dynamic balances to be found within the individual between personal interests and social needs, between individual and collective interests, and between needs and moral requirements. In simple terms, we could say that since Mao, the Chinese have believed in a form of progress based on a spiral development that tends to blur contradictions. In this context, socialism ceases to be a project oriented towards perfection — a vision foreign to Chinese thought, which rejects absolutes — and becomes a construction process in motion.

Q: How would you assess the similarities and differences between China’s economic model and those of the Soviet Union and the Eastern or Balkan countries post-World War II?

RH: For a few years immediately after the victory of the October Revolution in 1949, the People’s Republic of China followed a “Soviet-style” economic model. However, it abandoned this model after the break with the USSR in the early 1960s. China, which joined the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or COMECON) in 1950, left in 1961 and decided to forge its own development strategy, by itself and for itself. And clearly, it was far more effective than those of the Soviet Union or the countries of Central and Eastern Europe.

China experienced a series of economic problems between 1978 and 1982, reflecting the difficulties of the post-Mao transition and the implementation of the so-called “opening” structural reforms. The 1985-1986 period saw, in particular, the implementation of the 1984 fiscal and tax reform, which represented one of the turning points toward a market economy.

Then, with the collapse of the USSR and the Soviet bloc, a very brief experiment, quickly cut short and abandoned, which could be described as “neo-liberal,” was tried, but the result was a sudden and brutal economic downturn in 1990-1991, accompanied by an explosion in corruption — against which the Chinese central government has been fighting ever since with great energy and, it must be recognized, with some success. Fortunately, China has rejected this neoliberal option, which is destroying so many economies around the world. It preferred to stay on the course of socialism, which today ensures the well-being of the vast majority of its population.

Q: To what extent are Western Marxists who allege that China is adopting capitalist methods accurately judging China’s financial/wealth growth?

RH: In the debates between Western Marxist authors, a clear majority assert that the Chinese economy is now capitalist. David Harvey, for example, believes that, since the 1978 reforms, China’s economy has undergone “neoliberalism with Chinese characteristics,” where a type of market economy has incorporated more and more neoliberal components operated within a framework of centralized control that he deems very authoritarian. I disagree with him.

Leo Panitch and Sam Gindin, for their part, analyze the implications of China’s integration into the circuits of the global economy, seeing it less as an opportunity to reorient global capitalism than as China’s duplication of the “complementary” role once held by Japan, providing the United States with the capital flows it needs to maintain its global hegemony; hence a trend towards the liberalization of financial markets in China, leading to the dismantling of instruments for controlling capital movements and undermining the power base of the Chinese Communist Party. I think these authors are wrong.

Other Marxists, certainly rarer but no less important, both Chinese and foreign, continue to defend the idea that the political-economic system currently in force in China, although comparable to or close to “state capitalism,” would leave open a wider range of possible trajectories for the future. For my part, I would go so far as to argue that the Chinese system still contains key elements of socialism. Starting from this point, I believe that the interpretation of the nature of this system becomes compatible with that of a “market socialism,” resting on pillars that still distinguish it quite clearly from capitalism.

For my part, I’d say that, while there are of course capitalists in China (and billionaires abound), it’s impossible to describe the Chinese system as capitalist. There are certainly elements of “state capitalism,” but I’d rather call it “market socialism,” or even better, “socialism with the market.” I think we should take the Chinese seriously when they talk about “socialism with Chinese colors.” It’s not just propaganda; it’s a reality, their reality.

On the monetary and financial front, for example, it’s worth noting that China’s public authorities have not only successfully confronted the power of the financial markets, but have also built a “great monetary wall” by defending the national currency, the yuan. They have succeeded in placing currency at the service of development. Powerful strategic planning, whose techniques have been relaxed, modernized and adapted to today’s requirements — which is what makes it so effective — is a distinctive feature of a socialist approach. State control of the currency and all the major banks is an absolute requirement, as is close monitoring of the activities of financial institutions and the behavior of foreign firms operating on national territory. Once again, in China, the state controls capitalism, not the other way around. So far, at least.

Q: What is the significance of Deng Xiaoping for China currently? Is there a connection or a break in Xi Jinping’s political and economic decisions with Deng Xiaoping?

RH: Deng Xiaoping’s definitive ascent to the pinnacle of power began in August 1977, with the Eleventh Congress of the Chinese Communist Party and the subsequent push for far-reaching economic reforms from the end of 1978. Deng’s idea was not to renounce socialism, but to find ways of lifting the great mass of Chinese people out of poverty, and to ensure that the country became a “middle-income” society, or a society of “moderately satisfactory well-being.”

The old socialist structures were transformed, market mechanisms were generalized, elements of capitalism were introduced, inequalities began to increase, but the system did not become capitalist again. Since Xi Jinping, the development strategy has been reaffirmed as socialist, and the orientation of the country’s general policy is more in favor of the less fortunate sections of the population and the least developed regions of the country.

One difficulty in grasping this “Chinese-style socialism” is the refusal of its leaders to interpret this socialism as the generalization of shortages or a “sharing of misery.” What the leaders of the Chinese Communist Party sought to do, and succeeded in doing, in Mao’s time, was to lift the great mass of the Chinese people out of their misery, and then, in the Deng Xiaoping era, to lead them into a society of “average affluence.” As a logical extension of this revolution, they now wish to pursue a socialist transition during which the vast majority of the population will be able to enjoy prosperity − including a wide range of consumer goods − and abundance. Wouldn’t this prove that socialism can, and must, surpass capitalism?

Q: Also, evaluate China’s economic growth precisely.

RH: It’s not true to say that China’s high GDP growth rate is due to capitalism, which, as we often hear, has been in place since 1978. Quite the opposite is true. It is because the Chinese state, under the authority of the Communist Party, has succeeded in preventing capitalism from taking control of the country that growth has been so strong, and that its positive spin-offs have to a large extent been redistributed to the people.

I would add that, even if you absolutely want to believe that the Chinese system is capitalist (which I don’t), it would be wrong to maintain that China’s strong growth has only been observable since 1978, because the country’s economic growth was already very strong in Mao’s time, much stronger than in other countries with administered economies at the time, and even than in many industrialized Western countries. Western leaders want to hide this reality, because it’s unbearable for them to acknowledge that a socialist country can succeed, and succeed even better than capitalism.

I would say that the aim of the Chinese Communist Party is not to appropriate everything economically, but rather to retain political control over everything − which is really not the same thing. Chinese leaders have said it over and over again: The coexistence of public and private activities, stimulated by each other within a mixed, hybrid system, is the means chosen to develop the country’s productive forces to the maximum − including by attracting foreign capital and importing advanced technologies − and thus raising its level of development, with the stated aim of improving the population’s living conditions, and doing this not by abandoning socialism, but by deepening the socialist transition process that began in 1949.

Paradoxically, China is still a developing country, as its still modest GDP per capita shows. This process will be long, difficult and fraught with contradictions and risks. Its trajectory remains largely undetermined. But, and I think it’s worth stressing this, the persistence in this system of many features that are still clearly distinct from capitalism, and which, in my view, are part of the implementation of a socialist project, as well as elements with the potential to reactivate it, means that we should take the speeches of China’s political leaders seriously.

Q: Did China’s recent meeting with President Biden signal a shift from its economic dominance to a more pronounced political presence in the international arena, particularly in Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East, and with its stance on Russia? Is China looking to become the focal point of the multipolar world?

RH: China has no ambition to become the world hegemon, replacing the United States. That’s neither its will nor its mentality. On the other hand, it is clear that China is striving to contribute to the construction of a multipolar world, as opposed to the unipolar world over which, until now, the United States has reigned unchallenged (and, we must recognize, by using extremely aggressive tactics). China’s political leaders aspire to universal peace and balance in international relations. But it is quite clear that they will defend their country’s sovereignty, without submitting to any further foreign domination.

As regards the “trade war” between the U.S. and China, I demonstrated, in an academic article written with Chinese co-authors (entitled “Turning One’s Loss into a Win? The U.S. Trade War with China in Perspective,” in Monthly Review), that the labor time incorporated into trade between the two countries since 1978, relative to the same volume traded, was greater in the case of China than for the USA. This reveals an unequal exchange in value between them, in favor of the USA and to the disadvantage of China.

In other words, the fact that China has recorded growing bilateral trade surpluses over the last few decades needs to be qualified by the observation − which we have calculated − that it is above all the United States that has benefited, in terms of labor time incorporated into exports.

In such a paradoxical context, the outbreak in 2018 of the trade war against China could be interpreted as an attempt by the U.S. administration, then led by President Donald Trump, to curb the slow and steady deterioration of the U.S. advantage observed for decades in trade with China, its main emerging rival.

Q: How is China arranging international economic relationships for a world with multiple powers in opposition to U.S. dominance? Considering the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and BRICS as examples, could a global payment method be established to counterbalance the dominance of the U.S. dollar in the near future?

RH: China has understood that the two fundamental pillars of U.S. domination of the capitalist world system are military and monetary. That’s why it has played an active role in building networks of strategic alliances, such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and economic alliances, such as the BRICS group [Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa]. It also understands that these two pillars are mutually dependent, and therefore vulnerable. That’s why it has also launched a series of bold, innovative initiatives.

In another of my books (“Money,” Palgrave Macmillan), I present some of them. China, for example, intends to challenge the prevailing order on the oil market, where it is the world’s leading importer. In 2018, it decided to promote oil futures contracts in yuan, accessible to foreign investors on the Shanghai International Energy Exchange, in order to compete with the hitherto unchallenged benchmarks of London Brent and New York West Texas Intermediate (the standard for defining crude oil prices and futures contracts on Wall Street).

Against this backdrop, China and Russia − countries forming an economically dynamic (and militarily dissuasive) alliance likely to represent a credible counterweight to the United States − have decided to launch a new currency, called “petro-yuan-gold,” and open up prospects for establishing it as a global reference alternative and replacing the dollar as the dominant currency. The petro-yuan-gold is a project for a global currency based on oil, a key commodity, and anchored to gold − a feat no longer within Washington’s grasp.

China’s advantage lies not only in its high GDP growth rate, but also in the fact that it happens to be the world’s leading producer and buyer of gold, with Russia coming in third, ahead of the U.S. [5th] In 2018, Beijing took the initiative of promoting a vast oil-yuan-gold exchange on the global energy exchange. Then it was the turn of metal-yuan-gold. China proposed to exchange yuan received in gold for oil deliveries and metal purchases. These events will have a considerable impact on the global system.

Q: Could China, having persuaded Iran and Saudi Arabia to engage in diplomatic talks, achieve similar success in resolving the conflicts between Russia and the West, as well as the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

RH: China has certainly played an increasingly important and positive role in calming current international conflicts in recent years. We recently saw this during the war in Ukraine between NATO − led by the USA − and Russia, and then in the war between Israel − supported by the USA and the European Union − and Palestine. Just a few days ago, China made its voice heard in an attempt to halt the start of a dispute between Iran and Pakistan. China is arguably the voice of many countries in the South, which are not seeking the path of war, but that of development. This is another reason why it is so important to carefully analyze what China wants and what it is saying.

China’s international strategy is based on the affirmation of five principles, which are: 1) respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity; 2) mutual non-aggression; 3) non-interference in internal affairs; 4) equality and mutual benefit; and 5) peaceful coexistence. It takes bad faith not to recognize that their declarations in favor of peace and peaceful conflict resolution are respected. And remember that, in its modern history, China has never practiced an expansionist colonial policy.

Today, China has no desire to resurrect a “Cold War” climate, which would be contrary to its conception of peace between nations. It rejects any form of military alliance, and has never participated in a military coalition – not even against Daesh [ISIS]. It has never set up a military base abroad, with the exception of one in Djibouti, which it describes as a “simple logistical installation” in a particularly sensitive location for maritime traffic. This is in stark contrast to the Western powers, above all the United States, which have engaged in multiple coups d’état and military interventions. Cooperation is the watchword of Chinese policy, with a “win-win” principle and priority given to supporting development.

Q: Could China take a more proactive stance in advancing regional and global peace amidst the U.S. war economy? How should the Belt and Road Project be appraised in this situation?

RH: The military-industrial complex plays an essential role in the U.S. economy, but it has also reached an extremely worrying dimension, threatening what the West likes to call “democracy” − which it respects less and less at home, and almost never outside its borders. The United States, which accounts for more than half the world’s military spending and has more than 1,150 military bases worldwide (I calculated this in an article entitled “Notes on U.S. Bases and Military Staff Abroad,” in Innovations), is in an economic crisis and is increasingly pushing the whole world towards total war.

The U.S. administrations are beginning to aim more and more explicitly toward shifting the axis of new confrontations to the Far East, and especially to Taiwan. China must resist this U.S. provocation and resist this march to war, but of course it also wants to defend its territory and its interests. One of these interests is Taiwan. Reunification therefore remains a priority for Beijing.

The U.S. administration is stepping up the arms race that was once used to bring the USSR to its knees. But this dangerous escalation can no longer impress an economically healthy China that possesses sufficient weapons of deterrence.

More generally, the important thing to understand is that capitalism, trapped in a systemic crisis, can no longer find solutions through the logic of maximizing immediate profits, and is thus becoming more dangerous. With corporate bankruptcies and mass unemployment, stock market crashes and bank destabilization, the probability of a worsening systemic capital crisis is extremely high. All the conditions are in place for the system’s contradictions to become even more pronounced, especially as few reforms have been carried out since the 2008 crisis.

The urgent need remains to stop the “regulation” of the global system by war, under the hegemony of the United States. The defense of peace is the priority. Consequently, we need to pull the plug on the infernal war machine operated by the financial oligopolies, by imposing public and democratic control on them.

This brings us back to the vast Silk Road project, which has already been partly implemented: in fact, land routes − “The Belt” − and sea routes − “The Road.” Cooperation primarily concerns the countries of Asia, because these are China’s neighbors, or more distant countries, as in the Middle East, which lack the investment they need to develop, and also because China sees the advantage in promoting the development of its own western provinces, which are lagging behind those on the east coast.

Africa is involved

Africa is also involved, because it is the African countries that are most affected by “underdevelopment” (as the West calls it). This cooperation is not perfect, as it focuses on the supply of raw materials, but the quid pro quos are there and important for African countries, with China providing infrastructure in exchange: hospitals, roads, etc.

The Silk Roads extend as far as Europe, and this is what is irritating, coming from a strategic competitor. Since European economies have, in principle, the means to develop, why are some of them receiving so much Chinese investment? The reason is clear: in stagnation or even decline, victims of neoliberal policies of austerity, spending cuts and debt reduction, and privatization imposed by the European Union, some European governments are willing to sell their assets to the highest bidder, and see Chinese investment as a means of development.

China has also invested outside the European Union, notably in the Balkans, which are also being left behind. Not surprisingly, 17 Eastern and Southern European countries, including 11 members of the European Union, have joined the Silk Road initiative.

The Silk Road does not stop at the Eurasian continent and Africa. Cooperation is already well advanced with the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, especially the poorest ones. Development support is provided mainly through low-interest loans from the Silk Road Fund (a sovereign wealth fund) and state-owned banks. But China doesn’t want to be the sole funder, and would like to encourage all countries with the means to do so, and who don’t impose politico-economic conditions (unlike the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund), to take part in these loans targeted at [building up] the infrastructures that are the foundations of rapid development.

This is also the reason for the creation of the Asian Bank for Infrastructure and Investment (BAII), which today has some 100 members (including France, Germany and Britain, but not, of course, the USA, which cannot control it, as it does with the IMF and the World Bank, while China, despite being the BAII’s biggest shareholder, expressly excludes any right of veto).

All in all, in the space of just a few years, the Silk Road has taken off in leaps and bounds: 124 countries have signed agreements, as have 24 international organizations, representing two-thirds of the world’s population. It’s important to emphasize that the Silk Road is intended to be exclusive of all political considerations. “Open to all countries,” its sole objective is co-development. But there are also partnerships focused on economic cooperation and the construction of multilateral trade zones, as in the case of the Global Regional Economic Partnership, which will constitute the largest zone of its kind in the world, corresponding to three billion inhabitants and 30 percent of world GDP, and which will challenge the hegemony of the United States, especially as trade and investment will no longer be conducted in dollars, but in national currencies.

Ultimately, capitalism itself is becoming unsustainable. Intended by its very nature for infinite accumulation, it is incompatible with a finite planet. Its logic generates ever greater inequalities and destroys all forms of social cohesion. China has taken the gamble of using the dynamic mechanisms of capitalism to emerge from its underdevelopment, by strongly controlling them. However, it is these dynamics that now need to be limited.

Market socialism “à la chinoise” will have to gradually distance itself from capitalism if it is to embody a genuinely alternative path for humanity. This is indeed its ambition: According to Chinese leaders, and even more clearly today, borrowing from capitalism has been no more than a way of “crossing the river,” and will never be more than a long “detour” in the socialist transition on the road to communism.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/27/c ... economist/

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China’s movement to end poverty
We are pleased to reproduce this detailed and useful analysis by the US-based University of the Poor of China’s long war on poverty.

The article makes the important point that poverty alleviation did not start with the targeted program from 2013 onwards, but is in fact core to the whole Chinese revolutionary project, starting with the liberated territories in the 1930s and 40s, continuing with socialist construction in the 1950s and 60s, and expanding again with the Reform and Opening Up process from 1978.

The targeted program, initiated by Xi Jinping in 2013, “set and achieved the goal of lifting all 98.99 million out of poverty before the end of 2020.” This was achieved through the most incredible mobilisation: “approximately 10 million cadres participated for periods of one to three years, often living in very harsh conditions”. In addition to ensuring a minimum income, the program made sure that people had secure access to food, clothing, safe housing, clean water, electricity, and health and education services.

To guarantee this baseline living standard in a developing country of 1.4 billion people is an astonishing achievement, made possible to a large degree by China’s political system – in particular the leadership of the CPC – which “enables the state apparatus to be wielded for strategic organizing campaigns like the campaign to eradicate extreme poverty and also the current Common Prosperity campaign”. It’s a state apparatus “that can meet the needs of a huge diversity of people, with a particular focus on the poor”.

The article also includes an interesting section on housing, comparing the policies of the US and Chinese governments. “In 2008, the US government responded to the housing crisis largely by bailing out the large banks that had created the problem.” Meanwhile in China, “the government has intervened in the housing market to curb speculation, moderate growth, and avoid a housing crash”.

During his 2017 CPC National Congress address, Xi Jinping declared, “Housing is for living in, not for speculation.” This principle has been the guide for PRC policy which has since served to rein in speculation and investor profiteering in the housing sector, which is fundamentally for providing housing.

The authors make clear that the working class and progressive forces in the US should under no circumstances support the US ruling class’s escalating New Cold War on China. After all, this is the same US ruling class “whose violence and threat of violence is our fundamental obstacle in our pursuit of power for poor people”. Ultimately, “the scapegoating and propaganda on China from our ruling class is a clear divide and conquer strategy for keeping the global poor and dispossessed disorganized”.

Rather than participating in an attack on China, or swallowing anti-China propaganda, “our movement to end poverty in the US can draw inspiration and many lessons from this campaign in China.”

As we build the movement to end poverty in the United States, this example in China can help to illustrate what is concretely possible when state power is taken, held and wielded by the poor and dispossessed. This campaign that centered the revolutionary social force was both made possible and developed by party cadre 100 years after the founding of the CPC. The power of this example and the other policies focused on the poor of China also shed light on what is at stake for the ruling class in the US State’s “strategic competition” with China. We anticipate redbaiting and misinformation around China will escalate as our crises deepen in the US, so our cadre must understand anti-China propaganda as a “divide and conquer” tactic of our ruling class.
Introduction
The UPoor Think Tank’s China Task Force was established to study the Chinese revolutionary process to identify lessons for our struggle. Many things about the Chinese situation are extremely different from our context in the US, but we can draw lessons from their cadres’ use of strategy and tactics. China’s revolutionary process is at a very different stage from our own, and it started from a very different material situation than what we are experiencing in the United States. At the same time, the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) is in escalating conflict with the same US State, which is the primary state power wielded in service of the global capitalist class. This is also the same US State whose violence and threat of violence is our fundamental obstacle in our pursuit of power for poor people.

The Reform and Opening Period initiated by Deng Xiaoping in 1978 focused on using foreign direct investment to develop the forces of production in China. This helped to grow and develop the Chinese economy and raised 770 million rural residents out of extreme poverty. This also increased income and wealth inequality in China. When Xi Jinping, the current general secretary of the CPC and President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) came into office in 2012, there were still 98.99 million people living in absolute poverty in China, out of a total population of about 1.4 billion. These were commonly in isolated and undeveloped rural areas and regions that faced the most extreme challenges. This population was the focus of the successful Extreme Poverty alleviation project, which set and achieved the goal of lifting all 98.99 million out of poverty before the end of 2020.

This article will focus on the recent work of the CPC to continue the revolutionary process in China, especially during Xi’s tenure since 2012. We see the Campaign to Eradicate Extreme Poverty as having multiple goals, including the strategic development of party cadre with the clarity, connectedness, commitment, and competence to continue their revolutionary process forward across generations and also to continually develop a state apparatus that can meet the needs of a huge diversity of people, with a particular focus on the poor. There are many lessons we can draw from this campaign in both of these areas, which we identify as areas for future study.

Example of the Chinese and US State’s relationship with the Poor
There is a notable and rare consensus of the Democratic and Republican parties of the United States that China is a threat. Both parties see it as a source, albeit in different forms, of diverting attention away or at times scapegoating domestic issues to ‘foreign enemies.’ In the U.S. our culture of pragmatism prevents us from seeing this integral relationship between domestic and foreign policy ‘issues,’ and is made to believe they are separate when in fact it is the very same U.S. state purporting and implementing these policies with overlapping goals. The scapegoating and propaganda on China from our ruling class is a clear divide and conquer strategy for keeping the global poor and dispossessed disorganized. The specific points of criticism made on China, especially on domestic issues impacting the poor, parallels points of weakness for our ruling class.

COVID response

China’s Zero Covid response was heavily criticized in Western media, and the spike in cases and increase in deaths at the end of 2022 and beginning of 2023 has been highlighted as evidence of the policy’s failure. However, according to January 2023 WHO data, China had suffered a total of 111,171 deaths from COVID, compared with 1,093,540 deaths in the United States, a country with less than one-third the population. China’s evolution of its COVID policy was responsive to the evolving threat and best public health information available. In spite of this, there were almost daily reports and analysis in US media characterizing the Zero Covid policy as “harsh”, “faltering”, “authoritarian”.

Housing and Homelessness

Similarly, mainstream reporting on China in the US consistently describes the Chinese housing system as failing or in crisis. Yet one way to see differences between how the United States and China address housing includes looking at the two government’s responses to a housing crisis. In 2008, the US government responded to the housing crisis largely by bailing out the large banks that had created the problem. People continued to be foreclosed on, and many of these properties were purchased by real estate investors who used their new assets to fuel renewed waves of gentrification and speculation.

In contrast, China’s financial sector is dominated by State Owned Enterprises, which creates a wide range of additional tools for the PRC to influence capital-intensive industries like real estate. The US State also heavily shapes the real estate and housing market, but it generally prioritizes subsidizing capitalist accumulation. Since the reform and opening period, when China started allowing private developers to enter the real estate market, the rate of housing development and standard of living have both increased across China. The government has intervened in the housing market to curb speculation, moderate growth, and avoid a housing crash. The type of speculation that drove the 2008 crisis across much of the rest of the globe was not allowed in China and the level of other financial risks that developers are permitted to take have been reined in even more since then.

During his 2017 CPC National Congress address, Xi Jinping declared, “Housing is for living in, not for speculation.” This principle has been the guide for PRC policy which has since served to rein in speculation and investor profiteering in the housing sector, which is fundamentally for providing housing. China’s largest real estate developer, Evergrande, has fallen into challenges in part because the PRC announced new restrictions on the amount of debt it could take on. Evergrande’s CEO has lost a huge amount of his personal wealth in the process, but the company, under new leadership, has continued to build housing while working to restructure debt. The PRC set rent regulations to restrict increases to not more than 5%, and many provincial governments have purchased housing units from Evergrande to convert to low rent social housing, especially for young people. The current plan is for 6.5 million such units to be added across 40 major cities by 2025.

China has a household registration system called Hukou which structures its deployment of important systems like education, healthcare, and housing. This system has many critics, largely having to do with its rigidity and restrictions on which region or city people can live and access services. However, if you are in your registered region, the government has a mandate to find you housing. This means that migrant populations seeking employment or opportunities in other parts of the country are the most likely to experience homelessness, away from their designated social safety net. There are efforts through Xi Jinping’s Common Prosperity agenda to reform this system, but it will take time to be fully implemented. Even in its current state, when Chinese people are in their registered region, there largely isn’t a problem of homelessness in the way that we see in the United States with people living on the streets or in housing encampments. Even among migrants, a substantial shelter system exists to keep people off of the streets.

Western news coverage of these issues characterizes the Chinese policies as failures, reflecting a lack of democracy or accountability to the desires of the people. What we see when we dig deeper is a deep level of collaboration between the PRC and CPC and the people of China. Certainly not that there are no issues, but that the earnest goal pursued by both is raising the standard of living of especially the poorest members of society. An excellent example of this is the Campaign to Eradicate Extreme Poverty. Here in this country, there might be a temptation to compare this to Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty” in the 1960s, but those programs were piecemeal, often discriminatory and funded only at a tiny fraction of the rate that the US war in Vietnam was funded. In his Beyond Vietnam speech, Rev. Dr. King said “and you may not know it, my friends, but it is estimated that we spend $500,000 to kill each enemy soldier, while we spend only fifty-three dollars for each person classified as poor, and much of that fifty-three dollars goes for salaries to people that are not poor.” Our movement to end poverty in the US can draw inspiration and many lessons from this campaign in China.

Historical Context and Significance of 2013-2020 Campaign to Eradicate Extreme Poverty
Xi Jingping initiated the massive undertaking to eradicate extreme poverty in China when he first took office as President in 2013. However, this campaign is better understood as a continuation of an approximately 100 year struggle (since the founding of the CPC in 1921) by the poor of China to take control of State Power and to attempt to wield it in the best interest of the people of China. The campaign was in total alignment with the revolutionary trajectory of China. The Long March from 1934 to 1935 was a period of strategic retreat to the countryside which consolidated and developed the core revolutionary cadre who went on to lead the Red Army to victory in 1949. During this period of retreat, the Red Army partnered with peasants along the way to redistribute land and other resources from rural warlords to collective ownership and management.

In addition to this history, Xi’s personal experiences and development as CPC cadre also heavily informed the campaign. Xi’s family went through many challenges during the cultural revolution and at the age of 15, as an alternative to juvenile detention, he volunteered to work in the countryside in Yanan. He lived a quite brutal existence there in a cave dwelling called a yaodong and did manual farm labor until he was 22. While this was difficult, it established his deep connection with and commitment to the rural poor. He joined the CPC and took on local leadership at the age of 20. Throughout his career as an official in municipal and provincial government, he always focused on economic development centering the poorest parts of the region he served.

Here, Xi Jinping reflects on the contemporary campaign’s continuity with the strategy of the Party’s work during the revolutionary war and the Long March.

“Our guideline should be clear: we Communists must conform to the common will of the people in order to represent the interest of the people. Only then can we organize and guide the people and fully develop the core leadership role of Party organizations. During the years of the revolutionary war, our Party was able to unite rural people and gain their support because the Party led the people to liberation. By penalizing local tyrants and distributing farmlands to the peasants, and launching land reform, the party brought tangible benefits to peasants. In today’s ever-changing situation, economic development and common prosperity are their common aspiration. So, rural Party organizations must lead the vast numbers of farmers to join in the cause of developing a commodity economy, promoting material and cultural progress, and forging ahead toward prosperity for all.” Xi Jinping, Up and Out of Poverty

This campaign was about meeting the needs of the people, but also deeply rooted in the strategic development of the Party through the development of cadre for party leadership, which is essential for the success of its ongoing revolutionary project. Also in Up and Out of Poverty, Xi Jinping reflected, “When we talk of cohesion, we must also speak of our core strength; in the countryside, it lies in rural Party organizations. Whether our rural Party organizations can develop their core strength is directly related to our cohesion in eliminating poverty and seeking prosperity.”

How did they actually do it?

This task of moving nearly 100 million people out of extreme poverty in only 7 years (2013-2020) was a massive endeavor. The CPC set out to accomplish this goal through the precise identification of people in extreme poverty and also through the flexible use of the state apparatus. Rather than relying on sampling to document trends on average, they made connections with the specific individuals, families and communities suffering from poverty and worked on specific solutions that people could play a role in enacting.

The Communist Party of China is structured as a broad-based political organization pursuing its goals of developing a moderately prosperous socialist state. It includes more than 96 million members, organized within a system which includes more than 40,000 local grassroots organizations that engage in participatory, “whole process” democracy and local policy development. The party apparatus works in collaboration with the government of the People’s Republic of China and many members of the party also hold government positions to use state resources to implement the goals developed through Party organizing and debate. The close partnership between the CPC and the PRC is often red-baited and characterized as autocracy. However, it is this close partnership that enables the state apparatus to be wielded for strategic organizing campaigns like the campaign to eradicate extreme poverty and also the current Common Prosperity campaign.

Between 2014 and 2015, 2 million of these party cadres were involved in identifying and verifying the poverty status of households across the country. In the process, they identified 14 areas of extreme poverty, 832 impoverished counties and 128,000 impoverished villages. After identification, 225,000 teams were deployed including 3 million cadres who relocated as poverty elimination commissioners. They worked with nearly 2 million township cadres and millions of village-level cadres. They estimate that approximately 10 million cadres participated for periods of one to three years, often living in very harsh conditions. An estimated 1,800 cadres lost their lives.

The cadres were working with government resources at their disposal and metrics for poverty collected and plans developed were not limited to individual or household income. This broader framework is summarized in the slogan: one income, two assurances, and three guarantees. This means that in “addition to a minimum income, China’s poverty alleviation program ensures that five other indicators are met: the ‘two assurances’ of food and clothing and the ‘three guarantees’ of basic medical services, safe housing with drinking water and electricity, and free and compulsory education, which in China is for nine years.”

This level of cadre deployment both served to develop the cadre deployed, to build their commitment, clarity, connectedness and competence through the execution of a concretely defined but very difficult task, and to build grassroots rural leadership. This dual goal is key for distinguishing this campaign from one of charity or a “state handout.” The campaign included something called the Ferryman strategy which is critical as a “poor organizing the poor” element.

The Ferryman Strategy: Cadre deployment and the poor as agents of poverty elimination

One essential element of this campaign that aligns with its goal of cadre and party development is the Ferryman Strategy. The Ferrymen are the local party cadre responsible for implementing the campaign at the village level. The massive urbanization in China over the past 40 years left many rural party organizations depleted. The investment in Ferrymen with critical responsibilities at the very local level was aimed at addressing this gap. The responsibilities of the role includes implementation of policy, allocation of resources, addressing concerns of the poor. They are responsible for coordination across multiple governmental bodies. The term Ferrymen reflects the two-way nature of their role, that they bring resources and support but also serve as a conduit for communicating back, for voicing the demands of the poor and incorporating those perspectives and insights into the policy design and improvement.

Here are a few key excerpts from a government report on the details of the campaign that describe the Ferryman Strategy:

“Unlike many countries that rely heavily on non-governmental organizations and international assistance to help the poor, China relies on its administrative personnel at various levels to fight poverty on the frontlines and boost rural development. These personnel serve as a link between “national governance” and “rural self-governance.” China’s village-based poverty relief cadres are “ferrymen.”

“The poor are not merely recipients of poverty alleviation, but also serve as agents of poverty elimination and prosperity. Looking back at China’s fight against absolute poverty, the key is to recognize the “duality” of the subject and the object of the poor, and utilize external forces to stimulate inner motivation.”

The cadres working on these projects were in communication at the grassroots and individual level with ferrymen and sharing the specific needs. This led to insights and creative projects that had so many ripple effects from reforestation to e-commerce and tourism in rural areas. Further, it reflects that the real basis of the revolutionary process in China continues to be the unity of the poor established by the CPC. This deep unity continues with dedicated commitment from party leadership and in 2020 near the end of the campaign there were 255,000 village-based working groups largely coordinated with the CPC.

Forward Together!
The cumulative effect of this massive undertaking was that before the end of 2020, even with the unanticipated challenge of the COVID pandemic, Xi Jinping was able to report that the campaign had reached its goal of lifting 98.99 million out of extreme poverty. With the level of individual family data they had compiled, they even accomplished this accounting for some families having advanced out of poverty then sliding back in. They went back to support those families to ensure the thorough accomplishment of this important goal. Having met this goal, the CPC is continuing to push forward to new goals for raising the standard of living in the county under the Common Prosperity agenda.

As we build the movement to end poverty in the United States, this example in China can help to illustrate what is concretely possible when state power is taken, held and wielded by the poor and dispossessed. This campaign that centered the revolutionary social force was both made possible by and developed party cadre 100 years after the founding of the CPC. The power of this example and the other policies focused on the poor of China also shed light on what is at stake for the ruling class in the US State’s “strategic competition” with China. We anticipate redbaiting and misinformation around China will escalate as our crises deepen in the US, so our cadre must understand anti-China propaganda as a “divide and conquer” tactic of our ruling class.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/06/26/c ... d-poverty/
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Jul 06, 2024 2:02 pm

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Developed countries must prioritise climate cooperation over China containment
The article below, republished from Global Times, reports on the high number of abnormal weather events this spring and summer, including unusually high temperatures in Northern China, heavy rainfall in Southern China, Hurricane Beryl in the Americas, and a series of droughts, floods and heatwaves elsewhere. “These scenes once again sound the alarm on climate issues for all of humanity.”

The author observes that “people generally hope that governments worldwide can work together to address the frequent occurrences of extreme weather globally”; that is, ordinary people expect their governments to pursue intense cooperation with countries around the world in order to tackle this existential issue. However, in spite of talking a good game on environmental questions, “developed countries such as the US and Europe have failed to fulfill their commitments in actual implementation”. Alarmingly, these issues seem to be increasingly sidelined in the US. The article cites Jeff Goodell, author of the book The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet, remarking on the recent presidential debate between Trump and Biden: “More time discussing golf than climate. What a world we are living in.”

Meanwhile, as China races ahead in renewable energy and other green technologies, the US and Europe are imposing tariffs and sanctions on Chinese EVs and solar power materials, the objective of which is to suppress China’s rise.

The author concludes:

Global climate change is a common enemy of all humanity. Countries around the world must work together, share responsibilities and take positive and effective actions. This is not only to protect our planet but also for the well-being of future generations. Only through global cooperation can we make substantial progress in addressing climate change, which especially requires developed countries to broaden their mind and take pragmatic actions.
Abnormal climate and frequent severe weather events have been a common experience for many people this summer. Recently, northern China has experienced prolonged high temperatures, while southern China has been hit by frequent heavy rains. Floods exceeding warning levels have occurred in 98 rivers in the Yangtze River Basin, the Xijiang River in the Pearl River Basin and the Taihu Basin, said the Ministry of Water Resources on June 30. On a global scale, since the beginning of this year, extreme weather events such as heavy rains, floods, heatwaves and droughts have frequently occurred in many places. Hurricane Beryl has intensified into a Category 3 storm and is making landfall in the Americas, while “deadly heatwaves are scorching cities across four continents.” These scenes once again sound the alarm on climate issues for all of humanity.

The latest Global Risks Report released by the World Economic Forum warns that in the next decade, the primary global risk will not be armed conflicts or social division but extreme weather events. For this reason, people generally hope that governments worldwide can work together to address the frequent occurrences of extreme weather globally. A survey report released by the UN Development Programme on June 20 shows that 80 percent of respondents globally hope for a stronger climate action.

Addressing climate change requires the full co-operation of the international community and both developed and developing countries need to fulfill their respective responsibilities and obligations. As early as 1992, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change enshrined the principles of equity, common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, recognizing the historical responsibility of developed countries for their emissions. However, developed countries such as the US and Europe have failed to fulfill their commitments in actual implementation despite having shown a positive attitude in international negotiations on global climate governance. This has directly slowed down the process of global green and low-carbon transformation.

As the largest global economy and most advanced developed country, the US plays a crucial role in the process of global climate governance. Especially, the commitments and actions of the US not only set an example for other developed countries but also bring expectations and confidence to the international community as a whole. Unfortunately, the US is the only signatory that has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement to date, showing significant regression in its stance on addressing global climate change, which has severely undermined the confidence in international cooperation on global climate governance. Although the Biden administration announced US’ return to the Paris Agreement in 2021, it is hard to hide the wobbly nature of US climate policy, especially under the highly politicalized landscape of bipartisan competition, where climate issues are not purely scientific topics but highly politicized ones.

It is worth noting that the importance of climate issues ranks far lower on the US political spectrum than economic, diplomatic, or even China-related issues. The recent first televised debate among candidates for the 2024 US presidential election was a prime example. Despite the New York Times emphasizing beforehand that “no election has more potential to affect the planet’s warming climate than the rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump,” the two candidates only devoted a very short amount of time to climate issues. Author Jeff Goodell, of the book The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet, expressed frustration on social media, perhaps representing the thoughts of most Americans: “More time discussing golf than climate. What a world we are living in.”

As an important player in the global arena, Europe also has room for improvement in its approaches to addressing global climate change. The EU has initiated several anti-subsidy investigations against Chinese new energy companies and recently, the European Commission announced plans to impose tariffs on pure electric vehicles imported from China starting in July. British scholar Martin Jacques recently warned in the Global Times, “What compromise will it finally reach between protecting European carmakers and prioritizing its commitment to decarbonization? Or, to put it another way, what role does it see Chinese EVs playing in Europe’s fight against global warming?” Such reminders not only question European decision-makers but also question Europe’s sincerity and determination in promoting global climate governance.

To push forward global climate governance, China has always been a firm activist. We are not only promoting sustainable development at home but also actively cooperating with all parties, continuously injecting stable momentum into global climate governance. China has exceeded its 2020 climate action targets ahead of schedule and will realize carbon neutrality from carbon peaking in the shortest time in global history. The green and low-carbon transformation that China promotes is not just a transformation at the technological and energy levels but involves the transformation of the entire social system, as well as the economy, culture, finance and other aspects. This is an important strategic decision and action statement made by China in response to global climate change.

Global climate change is a common enemy of all humanity. Countries around the world must work together, share responsibilities and take positive and effective actions. This is not only to protect our planet but also for the well-being of future generations. Only through global cooperation can we make substantial progress in addressing climate change, which especially requires developed countries to broaden their mind and take pragmatic actions.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/07/03/d ... ntainment/

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Xi Jinping: Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence a groundbreaking achievement in the history of international relations
A conference marking the 70th anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, a cornerstone of Chinese foreign policy, was held in Beijing on June 28. With guests from around the world, including former political leaders from some 20 countries, President Xi Jinping made an important speech, and the event was moderated by Premier Li Qiang.

In his speech, President Xi said that the five principles, “marked a groundbreaking and epoch-making achievement in the history of international relations.”

He noted:

“The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence answered the call of the times, and its initiation was an inevitable historic development. In the wake of the Second World War, national independence and liberation movements swept across the globe, and the colonial system around the world crumbled and collapsed. At the same time, the world was overshadowed by the dark clouds of the Cold War.”

Meanwhile, newly independent countries aspired to safeguard their sovereignty and grow their national economy. New China followed the principle of independence, actively sought peaceful coexistence with all countries, and endeavoured to improve its external environment, especially in its neighbourhood.

Having been endorsed in joint statements with India and Myanmar, in 1955, “more than 20 Asian and African countries attended the Bandung Conference. They proposed ten principles for handling state-to-state relations on the basis of the Five Principles, and advocated the Bandung spirit of solidarity, friendship and cooperation. The Non-Aligned Movement that rose in the 1960s adopted the Five Principles as its guiding principles. The Declaration on Principles of International Law adopted at the 25th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 1970 and the Declaration on the Establishment of the New International Economic Order adopted at the Sixth Special UNGA Session in 1974 both endorsed the Five Principles.”

Xi Jinping went on to note that:

*The principles fully conform with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, with the evolving trend of international relations of our times, and with the fundamental interests of all nations.

*When following the Five Principles, even countries that differ from each other in social system, ideology, history, culture, faith, development stage, and size can build a relationship of mutual trust, friendship and cooperation.

*Inspired and encouraged by the Five Principles, more and more countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America have voiced and extended support to each other, stood up against foreign interference, and embarked on an independent path of development. The Five Principles have also boosted South-South cooperation and improved and further developed North-South relations.

*The Five Principles were initiated with the purpose of protecting the interests and pursuits of small and weak countries from power politics. They categorically oppose imperialism, colonialism and hegemonism, and reject belligerent and bullying practices of the law of the jungle.

Seventy years ago, the Chinese leader continued, “our forefathers, who experienced the scourge of hot wars and the confrontation of the Cold War, concluded that the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were the crucial way to safeguard peace and sovereignty. This answer has withstood the test of international vicissitudes and has become more appealing rather than obsolete. Seventy years later today, challenged by the historic question of ‘what kind of world to build and how to build it,’ China has answered the call of the times by proposing a community with a shared future for humanity.”

Xi went on to say that both the five principles and the concept of a community with a shared future for humanity “demonstrate the broad vision of the Communist Party of China to contribute more to humanity.”

“Looking at the past and future at this critical moment in history, we believe our exploration for the betterment of human civilisation will not end, and our efforts for a better world will not end. No matter how the world evolves, one basic fact will not change. There is only one Planet Earth in the universe, and the whole humanity have one common home.”

On this basis, Xi set out a number of imperatives:

We need to uphold the principle of sovereign equality.
The five principles reject the big subduing the small, the strong bullying the weak, and the rich exploiting the poor.

We need to cement the foundation of mutual respect.
We must jointly uphold the “golden rule” of non-interference, and jointly oppose acts of imposing one’s will on others, stoking bloc confrontation, creating small circles, and forcing others to pick sides.

We need to turn the vision for peace and security into reality.
All countries must work together to seek peace, safeguard peace, and enjoy peace. In today’s interdependent world, absolute security and exclusive security are just not viable.

We need to unite all forces to achieve prosperity.
Here Xi invokes a Latin American proverb: “The only way to be profitably national is to be generously universal.”

We need to commit to fairness and justice.
China believes in true multilateralism. Our goal is that international rules should be made and observed by all countries. World affairs should be handled through extensive consultation, not dictated by those with more muscles.

We need to embrace an open and inclusive mindset.
All countries are on board the same giant ship. It carries on it not only aspirations for peace, economic prosperity and technological advancement, but also the diversity of civilisations and the continuation of the human species.

Whilst the Five Principles are intended to address the full spectrum of international relations, Xi emphasised that:

“Of all the forces in the world, the Global South stands out with a strong momentum, playing a vital role in promoting human progress. Standing at a new historical starting point, the Global South should be more open and more inclusive and join hands together to take the lead in building a community with a shared future for humanity.”

Addressing the Global South, he made the following calls:

Together, we should be the staunch force for peace.
Together, we should be the core driving force for open development.
Together, we should be the construction team of global governance.
Together, we should be the advocates for exchange among civilisations.

He continued by outlining a series of concrete measures that China will take to better support Global South cooperation.

Noting that, “the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence has been written into China’s Constitution long before,” Xi said that:

“China’s resolve to stay on the path of peaceful development will not change. We will never take the trodden path of colonial plundering, or the wrong path of seeking hegemony when one becomes strong. We will stay on the right path of peaceful development. Among the world’s major countries, China has the best track record with respect to peace and security. It has been exploring for a distinctly Chinese approach to resolving hotspot issues. It has been playing a constructive role in the Ukraine crisis, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and issues relating to the Korean peninsula, Iran, Myanmar, and Afghanistan. Every increase of China’s strength is an increase of the prospects of world peace.”

The conference also adopted a Beijing Declaration, summarising key viewpoints of the participants.

We reprint below the full text of President Xi Jinping’s speech and of the Beijing Declaration. They were originally published on the website of the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
Carrying Forward the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence and Jointly Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind

Address by H.E. Xi Jinping
President of the People’s Republic of China
At the Conference Marking the 70th Anniversary of the
Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence

June 28, 2024

Distinguished Guests,
Diplomatic Envoys,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

Seventy years ago, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were officially initiated. It marked a groundbreaking and epoch-making achievement in the history of international relations. Today we gather here to commemorate its 70th anniversary for the purpose of carrying forward these principles under the new circumstances, building together a community with a shared future for mankind, and providing a strong driving force for human progress.

At the outset, on behalf of the Chinese government and people and in my own name, let me extend a warm welcome to all distinguished guests and friends present here!

In the course of the modern history of human society, handling well state-to-state relations, jointly maintaining world peace and tranquility, and promoting development and progress for humanity have always been big topics on the minds of all nations.

The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence answered the call of the times, and its initiation was an inevitable historic development. In the wake of the Second World War, national independence and liberation movements swept across the globe, and the colonial system around the world crumbled and collapsed. At the same time, the world was overshadowed by the dark clouds of the Cold War and menaced by the rampant clamors that “Might is right.” Newly independent countries aspired to safeguard their sovereignty and grow their national economy. New China followed the principle of independence, actively sought peaceful coexistence with all countries, and endeavored to improve its external environment, especially in its neighborhood. Against this backdrop, the Chinese leadership specified the Five Principles in their entirety for the first time, namely, mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, mutual non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence. They included the Five Principles in the China-India and China-Myanmar joint statements, which jointly called for making them basic norms for state-to-state relations.

The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were born in Asia, but quickly ascended to the world stage. In 1955, more than 20 Asian and African countries attended the Bandung Conference. They proposed ten principles for handling state-to-state relations on the basis of the Five Principles, and advocated the Bandung spirit of solidarity, friendship and cooperation. The Non-Aligned Movement that rose in the 1960s adopted the Five Principles as its guiding principles. The Declaration on Principles of International Law adopted at the 25th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 1970 and the Declaration on the Establishment of the New International Economic Order adopted at the Sixth Special UNGA Session in 1974 both endorsed the Five Principles. With their inclusion in important international documents, the Five Principles have been widely recognized and observed by the international community.

Over the past 70 years, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have transcended time and space and overcome estrangement, showing robust resilience and everlasting relevance. They have become open, inclusive, and universally applicable basic norms for international relations and fundamental principles of international law. They have made indelible historic contributions to the cause of human progress.

First, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have set a historic benchmark for international relations and international rule of law. They fully conform with the purposes and principles of the U.N. Charter, with the evolving trend of international relations of our times, and with the fundamental interests of all nations. In addition, they stress the importance of mutuality and equality in handling state-to-state relations, thus highlighting the essence of international rule of law, i.e. the intercorrelation of rights, obligations and responsibilities of all countries. The Five Principles provide a whole set of basic norms for peaceful coexistence among countries across political, security, economic and diplomatic domains. They constitute an unequivocal and effective code of conduct for all countries to follow in promoting the spirit of international rule of law and finding the right way to get along with each other.

Second, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have served as the prime guidance for the establishment and development of relations between countries with different social systems. When following the Five Principles, even countries that differ from each other in social system, ideology, history, culture, faith, development stage, and size can build a relationship of mutual trust, friendship and cooperation. The Five Principles offer a new path toward peaceful settlement of historic issues and international disputes, triumphing over obsolete, narrow-minded, antagonistic and confrontational mindsets such as bloc politics and sphere of influence.

Third, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have been a powerful rallying force behind the efforts of developing countries to pursue cooperation and self-strength through unity. They mirror the deep thoughts of developing countries about improving their future and about reform and progress. Inspired and encouraged by the Five Principles, more and more countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America have voiced and extended support to each other, stood up against foreign interference, and embarked on an independent path of development. The Five Principles have also boosted South-South cooperation, and improved and further developed North-South relations.

Fourth, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have contributed historic wisdom to the reform and improvement of the international order. The Five Principles were initiated with the purpose of protecting the interests and pursuits of small and weak countries from power politics. They categorically oppose imperialism, colonialism and hegemonism, and reject belligerent and bullying practices of the law of the jungle. They have laid an important intellectual foundation for a more just and equitable international order.

Having traversed an extraordinary journey of 70 years, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence are a common asset of the international community to be valued, inherited and further promoted. At this moment, I recall with deep admiration leaders of the older generation who jointly initiated the Five Principles. I also wish to pay high tribute to the visionaries from all countries who have been promoting the Five Principles with perseverance over the years!

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

The baton of history is passed from generation to generation, and the cause of human progress moves forward from one era to another as mankind seek answers to the questions of the times. Seventy years ago, our forefathers, who experienced the scourge of hot wars and the confrontation of the Cold War, concluded that the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were the crucial way to safeguard peace and sovereignty. This answer has withstood the test of international vicissitudes, and has become more appealing rather than obsolete. Seventy years later today, challenged by the historic question of “what kind of world to build and how to build it,” China has answered the call of the times by proposing a community with a shared future for mankind. Today, this Chinese initiative has become an international consensus. The beautiful vision has been put into productive actions. It is moving the world to a bright future of peace, security, prosperity and progress.

The Vision of Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind carries forward the same spirit of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. Both are rooted in traditional Chinese values such as “Be kind to your neighbor,” “Seek amity through integrity,” and “Promote harmony among all nations.” Both attest to China’s diplomatic tenets of self-confidence, self-reliance, justice, protection of the disadvantaged, and benevolence. Both demonstrate the broad vision of the Communist Party of China to contribute more to humanity. Both manifest China’s firm resolve to follow the path of peaceful development. The Vision of Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind is the most effective move to sustain, promote and upgrade the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence in the new circumstances.

The Vision captures the reality that all countries have a shared future and intertwined interests, and sets a new model of equality and coexistence for international relations. China believes that all countries, regardless of their size, strength and wealth, are equal members of the international community. They have common interests, common rights, and common responsibilities in international affairs. All countries should join hands to overcome challenges, achieve shared prosperity, build an open, inclusive, clean and beautiful world of lasting peace, universal security, and shared prosperity, and realize peaceful coexistence with greater security and prosperity for mankind.

The Vision responds to the world’s prevailing trend of peace, development, cooperation and win-win, and opens up new prospects for peace and progress. China calls on all countries to bear in mind the future of humanity and the wellbeing of the people, and uphold their essential commitment to equality, mutual benefit and peaceful coexistence. We should all champion the common values of humanity, promote global governance that features extensive consultation and joint contribution for shared benefit, and cultivate a new type of international relations. We should all work together to implement the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative and the Global Civilization Initiative, advance high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and deliver more benefits to all peoples.

The Vision keeps pace with the historic trend toward multipolarity and economic globalization, and inspires new ways to achieve development and security. China has been working together with all sides to take profound and real measures to build a community with a shared future for mankind. We have together enabled the Vision to make historic achievements—expanding from bilateral to multilateral, regional to global, development to security, and cooperation to governance. This has guided and boosted the efforts for an equal and orderly multipolar world and a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization. It has given the international community broad prospects of peace and stability, and presented the world with more prosperity and development.

Looking at the past and future at this critical moment in history, we believe our exploration for the betterment of human civilization will not end, and our efforts for a better world will not end. No matter how the world evolves, one basic fact will not change. There is only one Planet Earth in the universe, and the whole mankind have one common home. Our shared future depends on Earth. We must take good care of it, and leave a happy land for our future generations.

The future beckons with promise, and challenges must be tackled. At this historic moment when mankind have to choose between peace and war, prosperity and recession, unity and confrontation, we must champion more than ever the essence of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and we must always strive tirelessly for the lofty goal of building a community with a shared future for mankind.

We need to uphold the principle of sovereign equality. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence center on the principle of sovereign equality. And on that basis, they promote equal rights, equal opportunities and equal norms for every country. They reject the big subduing the small, the strong bullying the weak, and the rich exploiting the poor. An equal and orderly multipolar world means every country can find its place in a multipolar system and play its due role pursuant to international law, so that the process of multipolarization is stable and constructive on the whole.

We need to cement the foundation of mutual respect. Countries must make equality, mutual respect and mutual trust the ground rules of engagement. They should show respect for different historical and cultural traditions and different stages of development, for each other’s core interests and major concerns, and for the development paths and systems independently chosen by people of all countries. We must jointly uphold the “golden rule” of non-interference, and jointly oppose acts of imposing one’s will on others, stoking bloc confrontation, creating small circles, and forcing others to pick sides.

We need to turn the vision for peace and security into reality. The past and present have enlightened us that all countries must shoulder their common responsibility for peace, and commit to a path of peaceful development. They must work together to seek peace, safeguard peace, and enjoy peace. In today’s interdependent world, absolute security and exclusive security are just not viable. The China-proposed Global Security Initiative is aimed to advocate the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security. It strives to achieve development and security through cooperation, and put in place a more balanced, effective and sustainable security architecture.

We need to unite all forces to achieve prosperity. An ancient Chinese philosopher observed, “The benevolent treat others with love, and the wise share with others benefits.” As a Latin American saying goes, “The only way to be profitably national is to be generously universal.” An Arab proverb has it, “With unity, the fire grows; without unity, the fire extinguishes.” In the era of economic globalization, what is needed is not gaps of division but bridges of communication, not iron curtains of confrontation but highways of cooperation. China has been advocating a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, promoting high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and endeavoring to deliver on the Global Development Initiative. Our goal is to benefit all with the opportunity of development, to diversify development paths, to help all nations share development fruits, to encourage common development and prosperity for all countries in the global village, and to turn win-win into a solid consensus.

We need to commit to fairness and justice. Without them, power politics will be the order of the day, and the weak will be at the mercy of the strong. In face of the new developments and challenges, the authority and central role of the United Nations can only be strengthened rather than weakened. The purposes and principles of the U.N. Charter are never outdated, and they are getting ever more important. China advocates the vision of global governance featuring extensive consultation and joint contribution for shared benefit, and China believes in true multilateralism. Our goal is that international rules should be made and observed by all countries. World affairs should be handled through extensive consultation, not dictated by those with more muscles.

We need to embrace an open and inclusive mindset. All countries are on board the same giant ship. It carries on it not only aspirations for peace, economic prosperity and technological advancement, but also the diversity of civilizations and the continuation of the human species. In history, different civilizations helped each other prosper through interactions, and brought about great progress and prosperity for mankind. This has left us with splendid chapters of mutual reinforcement and mutual learning among various civilizations.  The Global Civilization Initiative proposed by China is aimed at increasing understanding and friendship among peoples and promoting tolerance and mutual learning among civilizations. The world is big enough to accommodate the common development and common progress of all countries. It is entirely possible for different civilizations to prosper together and inspire each other through mutual learning on an equal footing.

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

The past 70 years have proved time and again that an effective way for countries to meet challenges together and create a better future is to enhance unity, cooperation, communication and understanding. Of all the forces in the world, the Global South stands out with a strong momentum, playing a vital role in promoting human progress. Standing at a new historical starting point, the Global South should be more open and more inclusive, and join hands together to take the lead in building a community with a shared future for mankind.

Together, we should be the staunch force for peace. We should promote peaceful settlement of international disputes, and participate constructively in the political settlement of international and regional hotspot issues. Together, we should be the core driving force for open development. We should restore development as the central international agenda item, reinvigorate global partnerships for development, and deepen South-South cooperation as well as North-South dialogue. Together, we should be the construction team of global governance. We should actively participate in reforming and developing the global governance system, expand the common interests of all sides, and make the global governance architecture more balanced and effective. Together, we should be the advocates for exchange among civilizations. We should enhance inter-civilization communication and dialogue, and strengthen experience sharing on governance. We should deepen exchanges in education, science, technology and culture as well as subnational, people-to-people and youth interactions.

To better support Global South cooperation, China will establish a Global South research center. It will provide 1,000 scholarships under the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence Scholarship of Excellence and 100,000 training opportunities to Global South countries in the coming five years. It will also launch a Global South youth leaders program. China will continue to make good use of the China-U.N. Peace and Development Fund, the Global Development and South-South Cooperation Fund, and the Climate Change South-South Cooperation Fund, and will work with interested parties to set up a tripartite center of excellence for the implementation of the Global Development Initiative, so as to facilitate growth in Global South countries. It will renew the China-IFAD South-South and Triangular Cooperation Facility, and make an additional Renminbi contribution equivalent to US$10 million to be used to support agricultural development of the Global South. China is ready to discuss free trade arrangements with more Global South countries, continue to support the WTO’s Aid for Trade initiative, and renew its contribution to the WTO’s China Program. It welcomes more Global South countries to join the Initiative on International Trade and Economic Cooperation Framework for Digital Economy and Green Development. Between now and 2030, China’s import from fellow developing countries is expected to exceed US$8 trillion.

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence has been written into China’s Constitution long before. They are the bedrock of China’s independent foreign policy of peace. At present, China is working to build a great modern socialist country in all respects and achieve national rejuvenation through the Chinese path to modernization. On this new journey, we will continue to champion the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, work with all countries to build a community with a shared future for mankind, and make new and greater contributions to safeguarding world peace and promoting common development.

China’s resolve to stay on the path of peaceful development will not change. We will never take the trodden path of colonial plundering, or the wrong path of seeking hegemony when one becomes strong. We will stay on the right path of peaceful development. Among the world’s major countries, China has the best track record with respect to peace and security. It has been exploring for a distinctly Chinese approach to resolving hotspot issues. It has been playing a constructive role in the Ukraine crisis, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and issues relating to the Korean Peninsula, Iran, Myanmar, and Afghanistan. Every increase of China’s strength is an increase of the prospects of world peace. 

China’s resolve to develop friendship and cooperation with all countries will not change. We will actively expand global partnerships based on equality, openness, and cooperation, and commit to expanding shared interests with all countries. China will promote coordination and sound interactions among major countries, and work to foster major-country dynamics featuring peaceful coexistence, overall stability, and balanced development. In its neighborhood, China will adhere to the principle of amity, sincerity, mutual benefit, and inclusiveness as well as the policy of developing friendship and partnership with its neighbors. It will seek to deepen friendship, trust and common interests with its neighboring countries. With developing countries, China will stay committed to the principle of sincerity, real results, amity, and good faith, and take the right approach to friendship and interests. It will strengthen unity and cooperation with developing countries and safeguard our common interests. China will practice true multilateralism, and take an active part in the reform and improvement of the global governance system.

China’s resolve to promote common development across the world will not change. High-quality development of the Chinese economy will provide strong impetus to world economic growth. Modernization achieved by 1.4 billion Chinese people means the addition of a new super-large market larger than all developed countries combined. China will only open itself ever wider to the outside world. Its door will never close. We are planning to take, and in some cases already taking, major steps to further deepen reform across the board and expand institutional opening up. We will build a business environment that is more solidly based on market and rule of law and is up to international standards. “Small yard with high fences,” decoupling, and severing industrial and supply chains simply run counter to the tide of history. They will do nothing but harm the common interests of the international community.

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

A forerunner of Chinese revolution wrote a century ago, “The course of history is never smooth. It is sometimes beset with difficulties and obstacles. Nothing short of a heroic spirit can help surmount them.” Today, the historic baton of advancing world peace and development has been passed to our generation. Let us take the 70th anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as a starting point, shoulder the historic missions, and forge ahead together to build a community with a shared future for mankind and usher in an even better future for humanity.

Thank you.

Beijing Declaration Of the Conference Marking the 70th Anniversary Of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence
On June 28, 2024, the Conference Marking the 70th Anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence was held in Beijing. President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China attended the conference and delivered an important address. Premier Li Qiang of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China moderated the conference. Former political leaders from countries including Viet Nam, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Laos, Thailand, Indonesia, the Maldives, Egypt, Ethiopia, South Africa, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Brazil, Guyana, Japan, Republic of Korea, Italy, France, Croatia and Slovenia, representatives of international/regional organizations, and diplomatic envoys, academics, friends, as well as representatives of the press and the business community from more than 100 countries were present at the conference. The conference issued the Beijing Declaration.

Under the theme of “From the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind” and with four sub-forums focusing respectively on the Contemporary Value of Asian Wisdom, the Vision and Mission of the Global South in a Shifting Landscape, Contributing to Global Prosperity through Chinese Modernization, and Promoting Global Governance Featuring Extensive Consultation and Joint Contribution for Shared Benefits, the commemorative events broadened consensus among the parties on building a community with a shared future for mankind.

As the host of the commemorative events, the Chinese side summarized the key viewpoints of the participants as follows:

I

1. Seventy years ago, Chinese leaders put forth in full the following Five Principles, i.e. mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, mutual non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence. These principles were included in China’s joint statements with India and Myanmar, which called for establishing the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence as the basic norm in state-to-state relations. The appeal has had an epoch-making significance.

2. Over the past seventy years, the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have shown everlasting relevance. Informed by Asian wisdom, they have become open, inclusive, and universally applicable basic norms for international relations and fundamental principles of international law. They have made indelible historic contributions to the cause of human progress.

3. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence are consistent with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, and reflect the underlying trend of international relations. With a greater emphasis on mutuality and equality, these principles provide a whole set of basic norms for peaceful coexistence among countries across political, security, economic and diplomatic domains, and have a far-reaching impact on the development of international relations and international law.

4. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have opened a new path for the establishment and development of relations between countries with different social systems. These principles enable countries to break free from antagonistic and confrontational mindsets, coexist peacefully on the basis of equality and mutual respect, and resolve disagreements and disputes by peaceful means.

5. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence have bolstered the efforts of developing countries to deepen solidarity and cooperation and seek strength through unity. These principles have inspired developing countries to find independent paths of development, and contributed to the improvement and development of North-South relations.

6. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence were designed to protect the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries, and redress the systems of imperialism, colonialism and hegemonism. These principles have laid an intellectual foundation for and lent impetus to a more just and equitable international order.

II

7. The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence are showing greater vitality amidst global transformations not seen in a century. Building a community with a shared future for mankind is a natural step for carrying forward the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence under the new circumstances, and enriches the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence with the imperatives of the new era.

8. The Vision of Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind carries forward the essence of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and builds on them to better reflect the reality that all countries share the same future. The overarching goal is to build a world of lasting peace, universal security and shared prosperity and one that is open, inclusive, clean and beautiful, which points the direction for all countries to work together on Earth, the planet we call home.

9. The participants spoke positively of China’s proposals for advancing high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, and the Global Civilization Initiative, and recognized their great significance for safeguarding international peace and security, promoting global sustainable development, and contributing to human civilization and progress. These initiatives offer concrete and workable pathways toward building a community with a shared future for mankind.

10. The essence of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence is sovereign equality, which is the most important norm in state-to-state relations. All countries are equal. The big should not subdue the small, the strong should not bully the weak, and the rich should not exploit the poor. World multipolarity should be characterized by equality and order. International law should be applied in an equal and uniform manner to all countries. Double standards and exceptionalism should be rejected.

11. Mutual respect is a ground rule of state-to-state interaction and the basis of building a new type of international relations. Considering that countries differ in historical and cultural traditions and development stages, it is imperative to respect the development paths and systems  chosen independently by the people of other countries, not to impose one’s will on other countries, and not to interfere in their internal affairs. Major countries should set an example.

12. All countries should take the path of peaceful development, act on the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security, work for building a more balanced, effective and sustainable security architecture, and resolve major international and regional issues through dialogue rather than confrontation.

13. In the era of economic globalization, it is important to promote development and achieve mutual benefit through cooperation. It is also important to make the global economy bigger and let more countries have an equitable share in the benefits of development, thus making globalization more universally beneficial and inclusive. Unilateral and protectionist measures in violation of the laws of economics and market principles will end up harming all sides.

14. Promoting the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence is conducive to safeguarding international fairness and justice and upholding true multilateralism. It is important to jointly defend the international system with the United Nations at the center and advance global governance characterized by extensive consultation and joint contribution for shared benefit. Hot-spot issues, such as the Ukraine crisis and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, can only be resolved by a political settlement through dialogue and consultation. Global challenges, such as those emanating from climate change and artificial intelligence, must be addressed through open cooperation.

15. Exchanges and mutual learning between civilizations drive human progress. It is important to respect the diversity of civilizations in an open and inclusive spirit, reject the discriminatory and exclusionary notion of “civilizational superiority,” and refrain from inciting clashes of civilizations. Peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom are humanity’s common values. They command the greatest global consensus and should be upheld by all. 

16. The Global South is a key force that advocates and practices the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. It should be the staunch force for peace, the core driving force for open development, the construction team of global governance, and the advocates for exchange among civilizations. It can make a greater contribution to South-South and North-South cooperation as well as human progress.

17. The participants commended the announcements by China for supporting Global South cooperation, which include:

Establishing a Global South research center, providing 1,000 scholarships under the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence Scholarship of Excellence and 100,000 training opportunities to Global South countries in the next five years, and launching a Global South youth leaders program;
Further leveraging the China-U.N. Peace and Development Fund, the Global Development and South-South Cooperation Fund, and the Climate Change South-South Cooperation Fund, and working with interested parties to set up a tripartite center of excellence for implementing the Global Development Initiative, so as to facilitate growth in Global South countries;
Renewing the China-IFAD South-South and Triangular Cooperation Facility and making an additional Renminbi contribution equivalent to U.S.$10 million to be used to support agricultural development of the Global South;
Discussing free trade arrangements with more Global South countries, continuing to support the WTO’s Aid for Trade initiative, renewing contribution to the WTO’s China Program, and welcoming more Global South countries to join the Initiative on International Trade and Economic Cooperation Framework for Digital Economy and Green Development; and
Between now and 2030, China’s import from fellow developing countries is expected to exceed U.S.$8 trillion. 
III

18. The participants spoke highly of the enormous achievements in Chinese modernization and China’s relentless efforts for and contribution to safeguarding world peace, promoting friendly cooperation with other countries, and advancing common development of the world.

19. The participants were grateful for China’s thoughtful organization of the commemorative events. They expressed readiness to work with China to turn into reality the wide-ranging consensus reached at the events, continue championing the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and build a community with a shared future for mankind in order to create a better future for human society.

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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Jul 13, 2024 2:28 pm

Nina in Xinjiang: ‘We are moved by the confidence and joy of your children’
The transformative effect of a visit to China on a communist teacher from Britain.

Image
Meeting children who are being educated in socialist values that give them a strong sense of identity and shared humanity was an extremely emotional experience for our party delegates to Xinjiang, one of whom is a teacher and the other a youth worker. What they saw there stood in stark contrast with the alienation and criminally under-developed state of so many of our own children today, products of a broken educational system and a decaying and decadent society. The inscription under this statue, which stands outside the school, reads: ‘Education is the key to unlocking the 21st century.’
Nina Kosta

Sunday 7 July 2024

The following speech was delivered by CPGB-ML vice-chair Nina Kosta (who is also a teacher) in Ürümqi, capital of the Xinjiang autonomous region of China, where she and others were visiting on a tour organised by the Communist Party of China (CPC).

*****

When we first arrived in Xinjiang, we had only a theoretical understanding of its geostrategic and cultural significance. Echoes of its mythical past as a caravan trade junction mingled with my historical knowledge, as someone of Greek origin, recalling that the eastern Romans and their capital Constantinople were part of the Silk Road network through trade agreements and cultural exchanges.

As communists, we came with an awareness that US-led Nato imperialism has been targeting Xinjiang, spreading venomous lies about repression of the Uyghurs and the banning of islamic education and religion to stir hatred and social divisions.

However, through the dedicated and visionary approach of your foreign policy, and the impeccable efficiency and humanity of your foreign affairs staff, who guided us on this trip, I can confidently say that I am leaving completely transformed, enlightened and utterly charmed by the lived experiences and sensory delights.

A humane, socialist approach to nation-building and cultural respect
I now have a concrete understanding of the miracle unfolding in this region, characterised by an advanced economy built by the Communist Party of China and shared by all 56 ethnic groups living in harmony here. I now understand why imperialists target Xinjiang with their propaganda.

I fully grasp how you have chosen to let the happiness of your own people provide all the evidence needed to passionately share the truth and defend the beauties and virtues of your nation and all its people against malign capitalist slanders.

My expertise in pedagogy and social inclusion gave me a lens through which to perceive and be amazed by the authentic integration and honouring of cultural diversity that I witnessed in Xinjiang.

I experienced firsthand, on numerous occasions, the embodiment of the highest humanist values of empathy, comradeship and collective spirit. Every time I heard people describe their efforts at creating a harmonious and prosperous society, they used the pronoun ‘we’, encapsulated in the phrase “we are building”.

It is not an exaggeration to say that what I saw in the cities and developing rural areas of Xinjiang sets the standard for a new stage of civilization and shared humanity. No society in the west can compare with these levels of genuine human connection, communication and equality in human exchanges that your people are capable of.

This is not only due to the special, legendary cultural attributes of the Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Tatars, Mongols and others, but most crucially because of the socialist society that preserves and protects these values, allowing them to flourish.

Socialist values in education create healthy and confident children
This was evident in the flourishing children we saw at the 11th Primary School of Kashi. We were deeply moved by witnessing your happy children in the safety of their school thrive in their warmth, emotional intelligence, respect for their teachers and openness towards us as visiting foreigners.

They approached us with such confidence and kinaesthetic awareness, looking us in the eyes, smiling, dancing with us and teaching us a new common language of connection. I have never seen prouder people: proud in their sense of belonging and oneness with their nation and their land.

It painfully reminds us that our own people are deprived of such feelings because alienating capitalist relations, commodification and economic dependence have destroyed all chances of belonging and pride, leaving us fragmented and in disharmony with one another.

I can now leave Xinjiang equipped to counter anyone who attacks the achievements of your society simply because they cannot match them. Your achievements, rooted in communist principles, showcase the effectiveness of state-led planning and collective ownership in driving industrialisation and lifting millions out of poverty.

We share in those achievements as communists. We are proud of you and share in your people’s history.

Socialism emphasises our common history and shared humanity
Having experienced the simple, happy lives full of hospitality and dignity of the Uyghur families we visited, I now also realise how much ‘east’ exists in what we see as ‘the west’; how many traditions we share, and how much central Asian culture exists in my own language and customs.

Your people have shown us this, your land has taught us this, and now your land feels like our land, your people feel like our own people.

The Belt and Road initiative is reigniting in the present the ancient links between the Silk Road civilisations and will undoubtedly reconnect east Asia with the Mediterranean in new creative exchanges of goods, ideas and technologies.

So we leave with Xinjiang in our hearts and an urgent need to share with the world the truth about its wealth and development, the prosperity and access to quality of life that it strives to offer to all its citizens.

Workers in Britain need to know that such equal access to quality social welfare, education and culture exists in China, so they can stand up to their warmongering ruling class, demand it and build it for themselves.

I leave with a deeper understanding of Xi Jinping’s concept of what it means to have a shared history and build a shared future for humanity. I wish my comrades back home could see and feel what I feel and take heart in their struggle to make this shared world a reality.

We have a long struggle ahead of us. As we fight for our survival and daily existence in Britain, we might forget the sunshine and grapes of Turpan, the heat of Ürümqi and the taste of horse milk in Nalat. But we will not forget how we saw your party cadres serve the people, inquire after them and attend to their needs.

We want to serve our people, we want them to live in harmony with the world, and there is indeed a world for us to win. So let every single one of us in this delegation spread the message of cooperation with China, of its different peoples not as commodified fragments in a market for profit but as a unified whole whose national integrity forms the basis for internationalism and solidarity with the working people in other nations.

Like the hexagon-shaped city centre in Yining, with its six different sections spreading out from a united core, united in our willingness to defend China, let every delegate and our different organisations do their best to organise people in our country so we can defend, win and share in the heritage of humanity that China has so well preserved. Let us spread the hope we saw thriving here in Xinjiang.

Thank you for this transformative trip and the materialist education and dialectical insight into socialist development in the 21st century. You can count on my party and our readiness to work together for a world without exploitation and individualist gain, to leap forward to happiness and fulfilment for all, not just for a few.

Our dedication to this common future is strengthened by yours and our work will continue with renewed vigour.

https://thecommunists.org/2024/07/07/ne ... ren-china/

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The Islamic Centre in the city of Urumqi — which has received millions in funding from the Chinese government for its development to teach its around 1,000 students.

The Xinjiang I saw was a hub of diversity, not oppression
Originally published: Morning Star Online on July 5, 2024 by Roger McKenzie (more by Morning Star Online) | (Posted Jul 10, 2024)

THE Chinese autonomous region of Xinjiang is at the geographical centre of Eurasia.

The region borders eight other countries which makes it a vital part of Chinese plans for the greater integration of Eurasia and the westward opening up of this nation of 1.4 billion people.

The Comprehensive Bonded Zone in the city of Kashi is central to co-ordinating the booming trade links that China has established with its immediate neighbours.

Xinjiang, one of the largest regions in China, is a gateway to Russia, India, Pakistan, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Afghanistan.

It occupies around 643,000 square miles of China–a space larger than six Britains.

Its sparse population of approximately 25 million is mainly Muslim and made up of around 65 different ethnic groups including Chinese Han, Uighurs, Kazakhs and Hui, among others.

I lost count of the number of mosques that I saw during my recent trip.

I visited a thriving Islamic Centre in the city of Urumqi–which has received millions in funding from the Chinese government for its development to teach its around 1,000 students.

I had the honour of sitting in the mosque’s main hall attached to the centre alongside the imam and hearing him talk about the support the centre had received from the government.

I also visited the magnificent and extremely busy Id Kah Mosque in the city of Kashi.

Both times the imams took the time from their busy schedules to speak about how grateful they and worshippers at the mosque are for the support provided by the government.

They told me about how the right to worship any religion is considered a private matter in China and protected in law.

That’s why it provides funds to a wide range of religious bodies representing Muslims, Buddhists and Christians among others.

None of this is recognised in the West. Instead tall tales are told about supposed widespread religious persecution.

In particular Western politicians and their stenographers in the corporate media continue to spin untruths about the treatment of religious minorities.

To be crystal clear: at no time did I witness any attempt to block anyone from being able to worship according to the Islamic faith or, for that matter, any other religion.

I heard no criticism of the government over religious persecution from senior religious figures or anyone else I met during my visit.

I was never stopped from speaking with anyone in any of the large crowds of people that I found myself in across the region.

Having made the effort to actually visit five cities in 10 days in the region rather than pontificate from thousands of miles away, I can honestly say that for a country that supposedly routinely oppresses ethnic minorities China seems to spend an inordinate amount of time celebrating them.

By that, I don’t mean the half-arsed patronising so-called celebration of diversity that now appears customary across Britain.

Leading figures in Britain trip over themselves to take a knee and say how much black lives matter to them but continue to do nothing about racism in their organisations.

It doesn’t look to me like a Black History Month-type gig where a big show is made for a short tokenistic period and then ignored for the rest of the time.

Talking up the richness of the region’s cultural diversity wasn’t just an isolated thing in Xinjiang–it was everywhere. Celebrations of the Islamic culture were everywhere for anyone to see.

I can already hear some saying that either I wasn’t looking hard enough or I was having the wool pulled over my eyes. I did look hard and I don’t believe an elaborate hoax was being played on me.

I spoke with lots of people in private with no restrictions placed on me whatsoever. In fact, my dreadlocks, and I dare say, the colour of my skin, meant I was a target of curiosity, especially among the young, many of who wanted to come and chat and have a photo taken with me.

That was frankly the most uncomfortable thing about the trip!

What I saw was lots of people going about their business in much the same way as I have seen people trying to do in many parts of the world.

I met many Communist Party officials who were questioned over the allegations made against them and their country. All of them said the only way to counter the propaganda war being waged against them was for people to come and see for themselves.

They told me how hard they were working to open up the region to more tourism so that people could experience this beautiful area but also so more people could bear witness to the truth about them.

So why is this propaganda war being waged against China in general and in particular against Xinjiang?

The geographical position of the region provides the answer. As the centre of the Silk Road renaissance, the region will be the focal point of Chinese trade and its economic heartbeat.

It means the continuing economic growth of China is disproportionately linked to Xinjiang.

Its trade routes through its eight neighbours to its wider partners will be critical to sell Chinese-made goods as well as to buy the resources needed to continue to power the country’s economy.

The U.S. is the world’s leading economy and wants to keep it that way. Its doctrine of Full Spectrum Dominance asserts that it will use any means necessary to maintain the pre-eminence of U.S. capital.

I think we can take this to mean that the U.S. will not hesitate to spread misinformation about China. After all, it’s not as if the U.S. does not have form for this type of behaviour.

They have been doing it for years, particularly across Africa and Central America where they buy organisations to ferment internal dissent against governments deemed not to be compliant.

Sprinkled with an always unhealthy dose of sinophobia the move by the U.S. to undermine the reputation of China has largely economic foundations and false allegations of mistreatment against ethnic minorities–particularly the Uighurs–are completely without foundation.

On the contrary, there seems to me to be far more evidence of the Chinese at a national and regional level actively celebrating cultural diversity as well as striving to put in place the economic prosperity that looks as though it is undermining attempts by terrorist groups–likely funded by the West–to sow discontent in Xinjiang.

I will talk about this and the allegations of forced labour in some detail in the second part of this three series about my visit to China. In the meantime, to anyone reading this article in disbelief and who believes that either I am lying or have been the victim of what would be a truly elaborate hoax my suggestion is: go and see for yourself.

It’s a long way away but I honestly believe you will be surprised by the wonderful vibrant people and cities that will greet you.

https://mronline.org/2024/07/10/the-xin ... ppression/

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Inside China-focused Congressional Hearings, panic, paranoia, and hypocrisy reign
Originally published: Countercurrents on July 9, 2024 by Megan Russell (more by Countercurrents) | (Posted Jul 11, 2024)

On June 26th, the Committee on Oversight and Accountability sat down for a Congressional Hearing titled, “Defending America from the Chinese Communist Party’s Political Warfare.” This was one of many Congressional hearings aimed at tackling the “China threat.”

As a general premise, I didn’t have a lot of hope for the hearing. Language is crucial, and the title says it all: any action by the U.S. is merely “defense” against acts of political warfare committed by China. And still, I was disappointed. Not only was it filled with racist, paranoid rhetoric, but it was supremely unjust, lacking any level of self-awareness, and almost certainly operated solely as an agenda-pushing cover for whatever act of warfare our government sought to commit next.

Three witnesses took to the stands. The first was Erik Bethel, a finance professional selected to represent the U.S. at the World Bank. He was followed by Mary Kissel, Former Senior Advisor to the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Third was James E. Fanell, the Former Director of Intelligence and Information Operations for the U.S. Pacific Fleet and current Government Fellow.

Big people with big titles. That is the usual order of things: a few “experts” are selected to “teach” members of Congress about complex subjects they may lack background in. The Committee of Oversight and Accountability certainly lacks China expertise. Representative Lisa McClain spent ten years working for American Express before she was elected to represent the state of Michigan. Chairman James Comer was a Kentucky farmer. Representative Paul Gosar was a dentist in Arizona. Marjorie Taylor Green was a part-time CrossFit gym coach. Many of them have never traveled to China, let alone held a productive conversation with a member of China’s government.

Their lack of expertise didn’t stop them from sounding their opinions. I listened carefully, hoping to give them the benefit of the doubt. It was a fruitless endeavor.

Representative McClain spoke about her district:

In Michigan, we have the Gotion plant… We have a Chinese-owned company and the only spot they can figure out that is feasible for them to build is next to a university and next to a military base. Anybody think that’s a coincidence?

In the audience, the new summer Hillterns listened with rapt attention.

“I’m not much for coincidences,” McClain continued.

We talk about, well it’s gonna create jobs. Jobs for who? I’m very concerned, and I’m not much for coincidences.

She was talking about the plans to build a new plant in Michigan for electric vehicle components under the company Gotion, which has headquarters in Shanghai. The plan is speculated to bring thousands of jobs to the area, with wages about 150% of the current average. McClain, having no substance on which to defend her opposition to the plant, instead decided to speculate on its geographic location, implying the company is purposefully building near a university and military installation. Clearly, the plant is a spy base for the Chinese government, as surely as any 18 to 26-year-old Chinese immigrant is an undercover Chinese soldier sent to wreak havoc upon our country–all baseless, unfounded claims that promote Asian American hate and shift public perception to support anti-China policies.

The military base she’s talking about is Camp Grayling, which is actually over 100 miles away from Big Rapids, where the EV plant will be built. As for the proximity to Ferris State University, the relevance of that statement is questionable. There are around 77 colleges and universities in the entire state– 198 if you include community colleges and trade schools. It would be difficult not to build near one. But that’s beside the point. This is merely one example of the outlandish and absurd claims made in the hearing, backed by anecdotal and unreliable “evidence” based on feelings and a strange paranoia that anything with links to China has malicious intentions.

In response to McClain’s statements, Mary Kissel said, “Let’s not give them too much credit as long-term thinkers. Let’s remember they almost destroyed their country several times over.” The words were spoken derisively, reaffirming my suspicion that Ms. Kissel boasts severe negative prejudices towards China and Chinese people. She continued to cite the Cultural Revolution, the debt crisis, and “etcetera.” In truth, the U.S. is a mere baby in comparison to China’s 5,000 years of history. As for Ms. Kissel’s claims, to say Chinese people nearly destroyed their country is misleading and tinged with a disturbing colonialistic self-superiority that the West does everything better.

Ms. Kissel also stated her opinion of how China operates:

China is a party state. The function of China is not to better the interests of the Chinese people– it is to promote, strengthen, and expand the power and influence, and reach of the Chinese Communist Party.

I challenge this claim, not just for its wrongful absolutism, but because China has repeatedly shown immense interest in improving the everyday lives of its citizens. China is unparalleled in its developmental growth aimed at providing infrastructure and opportunities to the people. Housing, public transportation, health care, and education are all convenient and affordable. The average retirement age is 54 years old. Over the past few decades, the government has been working ceaselessly to eradicate extreme poverty with tremendous success. Over 800 million people have been taken out of poverty and afforded a better quality of life. Not only that, but China continues to emphasize the importance of green energy in building a sustainable future. Shenzhen, one of the country’s biggest high-tech cities, has even switched over all public transportation to electric vehicles. This isn’t pro-China propaganda, it’s simply fact.

Along with forged criticism of China’s internal dynamics and history, the hearing also challenged China’s position when it comes to the U.S.

The overall goal of China, Ms. Kissel proclaimed, is to “upend our way of life and to dominate and change our way of life.” They are “committed to destroy(ing) us.”

At first glance, it sounds absurd that an individual so ostensibly high up on the policy advisory hierarchy would make such a condemnatory and extreme claim. But considering that Ms. Kissel served under Mike Pompeo during Donald Trump’s presidential term, it is not so surprising. It was not an administration known for its truth-telling.

First and foremost, China has no plans to destroy the United States. We can easily cipher this through both statement and action. To claim otherwise is false and promotes a dangerous narrative that guides our policy-makers down a one-way path to war.

Erik Bethel’s claim that “China is encircling us” is also highly deceptive. Adversely, it is the U.S. that has encircled China with over 300 military bases and countless troops. China has no military bases in the entire Western hemisphere. There is no “encircling” occurring.

Former U.S. Representative Tom Malinowski criticized China for trying to make the U.S. “look bad to the rest of the world.” This is, at best, overwhelmingly hypocritical. Just recently it was uncovered that the U.S. launched a secret anti-vax operation in the Philippines during the deadliest months of the COVID-19 pandemic to undermine China’s influence in the region. According to a senior U.S. military official,

We weren’t looking at this from a public health perspective. We were looking at how we could drag China through the mud.

As the hearing drew on, the claims grew more and more unhinged.

“They’re teaming up with the Mexican drug cartels and they’re killing Americans,” Congressman Fallon told everyone, backing his claim that China is killing nearly as many Americans per day as died during WW2.

“They know how many paperclips you all are using in the Longworth building,” Representative Tim Burchett said, reminiscing on a Mike Pompeo quote.

“What if they were to develop some kind of biological entity that can, say, wipe out females of child-bearing ages or something?” Burchett queried.

“If you’re using this app (Tiktok), they can listen to you,” Another added.

“We should do the opposite of what China wants us to do,” Malinowski put forth as a general solution.

“We need to construct not just a defensive strategy, but an offensive strategy,” Ms. Kissel spoke decisively. Twice it was mentioned that her last name rhymes with missile–nominative determinism perhaps.

It was as if the hearing took lines straight out of an SNL skit. It’s unfathomable that these are the people sitting in our Congressional hearing rooms, talking about war. These are the people voting on legislation that could propel us into a conflict with China that would bring death and destruction to millions, and most likely end in nuclear catastrophe or total destruction of the planet.

Our politicians, although ignorant and lacking expertise, are willing cogs in the war machine. They bring the most anti-China and pro-military witnesses to the stands to reaffirm their own paranoid delusions about an all-knowing, all-hateful “other” across the sea that seeks to destroy everything bright and beautiful about the world. This is happening on a weekly basis.

https://mronline.org/2024/07/11/inside- ... isy-reign/

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China rebuts NATO declaration as ‘defamatory, provocative, belligerent’
The article below, originally published in Global Times, reports on China’s response to the NATO Summit declaration of 9 July 2024, which accused China of being “a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine” through the supply of so-called dual-use technology, which the US and its allies claim is critical to Russia’s military efforts.

The accusation marks a significant escalation in the US-led New Cold War – a “major departure for NATO” according to the New York Times. NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg stated: “I think the message sent from NATO from this summit is very strong and very clear, and we are clearly defining China’s responsibility when it comes to enabling Russia’s war”.

The charges against China are of course utterly ridiculous and unfounded. Of all the major countries, China has been most active in pursuit of a peaceful negotiated settlement to the Ukraine crisis. Indeed last year it put forward a comprehensive document outlining the essential steps towards peace. Meanwhile the role of the US and its allies has been to escalate the conflict by arming Ukraine, imposing sanctions on Russia, and preventing Kiev from entering into negotiations.

China has not been supplying war materiel to Russia, but has simply maintained normal economic relations – as opposed to joining in with the West’s illegal and unilateral sanctions. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian pointed out: “Most countries have not participated in sanctions against Russia or cut off trade with it, so the US cannot blame China for its own actions. The US has passed large-scale aid bills for Ukraine while baselessly accusing China and Russia of normal economic and trade exchanges. This is blatant hypocrisy and double standards.”

The reasons for NATO’s accusations are two-fold. First, Ukraine and its backers are losing on the battlefield, and the well-advertised “counteroffensives” have not had the desired effect. As such, the imperialist powers “need to find an excuse, and the ready-made excuse now is that China is supporting Russia”.

Second, there are ongoing efforts to create a global NATO and expand its area of operations to the Pacific so that it can participate more directly in the campaign of China encirclement. According to Li Haidong, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University, “they are attempting to achieve NATO’s globalisation by hyping the so-called ‘China threat’ and inciting challenges against China… The hype and intensification of the China issue serve as a catalyst for NATO to accelerate and strengthen its presence, influence, and actions globally, especially in the Asia-Pacific region.”

The US is the leading protagonist of the New Cold War, and it is using NATO to bring Europe onboard with its anti-China strategy. However, European states have their own interests and only stand to lose by blindly following the US.
China voiced strong opposition and lodged stern representations on Thursday with NATO after the Cold War mentality-driven bloc issued a direct warning to China for the first time regarding the so-called support to Russia in the Ukraine crisis, which, some experts said, is essentially another attempt to shift the blame and smear China.

The NATO Washington Summit Declaration exaggerates tensions in the Asia-Pacific region, which is filled with Cold War mentality and belligerent rhetoric, containing prejudiced, defamatory, and provocative content regarding China, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said during a press conference on Thursday.

NATO’s so-called security comes at the expense of others’ security, and much of the security anxiety NATO peddles is of its own making. The so-called success and strength NATO boasts of pose a significant threat to the world, the spokesperson said.

Establishing imaginary enemies to maintain existence and expand power is NATO’s usual tactic. Its persistence in the erroneous positioning of China as a systemic challenge and smearing of China’s domestic and foreign policies are exactly that, the spokesperson added.

The Chinese Mission to the EU also refuted NATO’s claims on Thursday, emphasizing that China’s position on Ukraine is open and above board, and it is known to all that China is not the architect of the Ukraine crisis. China aims to promote peace talks and seek political settlement, and this position is endorsed and commended by the broader global community.

After decades of viewing China as a distant threat, NATO on Wednesday accused Beijing of becoming “a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine,” and demanded that it halt shipments of “weapons components” and other technology critical to the rebuilding of the Russian military, the New York Times reported.

The US media also called the statement “a major departure for NATO,” which until 2019 never officially mentioned China as a concern, and then only in the blandest of language.

“I think the message sent from NATO from this summit is very strong and very clear, and we are clearly defining China’s responsibility when it comes to enabling Russia’s war,” NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg was quoted as saying in a report by The Guardian. Stoltenberg also called the statement an important message.

“NATO’s shift in rhetoric toward China is partly driven by the US and partly due to NATO’s own difficulties as it is struggling with the Ukraine issue, and the more they struggle, the more they look for excuses,” Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Thursday.

From the beginning, the US and NATO’s narrative was that Russia would fail quickly, and they have been talking about launching a counteroffensive, whose effects we have not seen, Lü said, noting that as the conflict drags on, “they need to find an excuse, and the ready-made excuse now is that China is supporting Russia, backing it from behind.”

Baseless accusation
Besides NATO’s accusation against China on the Ukraine crisis, the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken claimed at a public forum at the NATO summit that China is being “the major contributor to Russia’s defense industrial base.” The Chinese Foreign Ministry also voiced strong opposition, saying that the US has been spreading false information.

“Most countries have not participated in sanctions against Russia or cut off trade with it, so the US cannot blame China for its own actions. The US has passed large-scale aid bills for Ukraine while baselessly accusing China and Russia of normal economic and trade exchanges. This is blatant hypocrisy and double standards,” Lin said.

The China-Russia cooperation is important as it acts as a balance force against the reckless actions of the US and the West, ensuring the world operates fairly and orderly, Cui Heng, a scholar from the Shanghai-based China National Institute for SCO International Exchange and Judicial Cooperation, told the Global Times on Thursday.

“The China-Russia cooperation is mainly in energy production chains and agricultural sectors, which is normal cooperation. The US-led West severed its cooperation with Russia while forcing others to do the same, which only demonstrates its arrogance, narrow-minded and self-centered mindset,” the expert added.

Some experts also pointed out that NATO is essentially a military alliance that maintains its functionality and reinforces its existence through crises, conflicts, and even wars. The recent escalation in NATO’s rhetoric toward China indicates that NATO is eager to achieve a globalized functional and institutional framework with global influence.

They are attempting to achieve NATO’s globalization by hyping the so-called “China threat” and inciting challenges against China, Li Haidong, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times on Thursday.

The more they talk about China and the more aggressive their rhetoric, the more it indicates that NATO is using the China issue to showcase its role in the Asia-Pacific region and globally, Li noted.

“The hype and intensification of the China issue serve as a catalyst for NATO to accelerate and strengthen its presence, influence, and actions globally, especially in the Asia-Pacific region,” the expert said.

Washington’s strategic tool
Although the US President Joe Biden did not name China in his address at the NATO Summit, experts believe that the escalated rhetoric of the bloc toward China was pushed by Washington as NATO has been serving as a strategic tool for the US.

Such a NATO will inevitably be pushed by the US onto the track of the US-planned global strategic competition with China, therefore, the increase in NATO’s current rhetoric and foreseeable actions against China is being orchestrated under the US’ direction, Li noted.

“Also, by pulling NATO into the Asia-Pacific region to engage in geopolitical competition against China, the US is likely to adopt a strategy of ‘gathering allies to confront opponents’ or forcing parties to take side,” the expert said.

NATO forges closer ties with Asia partners to counter China, some US media reports said, and White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan was quoted as saying in a Fox News report that NATO allies and the Indo-Pacific partners will launch four new joint projects, which will be on Ukraine, artificial intelligence, disinformation and cybersecurity.

However, some experts said the likelihood of European military forces being projected into the Pacific remains quite low.

“Many European countries within NATO do not share the same view as the US. While NATO may issue strongly worded statements against China, truly pivoting to contain China is something NATO is neither capable of nor likely to achieve,” a Beijing-based military expert who preferred not to be named told the Global Times on Thursday.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/07/12/c ... lligerent/

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Xi Jinping: We must consolidate our unity and safeguard the right to development

Between July 2-6, Chinese President Xi Jinping paid state visits to the neighbouring Central Asian states of Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. Whilst in Kazakhstan, he also took part in the 24th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), which, along with the first Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Plus Meeting, was held in the capital Astana on July 4, as well as holding a number of bilateral meetings with other heads of state who participated in the meetings.

The SCO Summit admitted Belarus as the organisation’s tenth full member and at its conclusion China assumed the rotating chair for 2024-25.

In his speech to the Heads of State Meeting, Xi Jinping welcomed Belarus to attend the SCO Summit for the first time as a member state. He pointed out that the SCO was established at the turn of the century, when the antagonism and division left over from the Cold War had yet to be bridged. The founding members of the SCO have made a historical choice to pursue peaceful development, committed to good-neighbourliness and friendship, and built a new type of international relations, and the “Shanghai Spirit” has become a common value and action guide for the member states. Twenty-three years after its founding, the number of SCO member states has increased to 10, and the “SCO family” embraces 26 countries on three continents. The SCO stands on the right side of history, on the side of fairness and justice, and is of vital importance to the world.

Xi went on to make a number of calls to the gathering, including:

In the face of the real threat of the Cold War mentality, we must guard the bottom line of security.
In the face of the real risk of “small courtyards and high walls”, we must safeguard the right to development.
In the face of the real challenge of interference and division, we need to consolidate our unity.
He stressed that the reason why the SCO has been able to withstand the test of the changing international situation is that we have always adhered to the fine tradition of solidarity and cooperation, the way of cooperation on the basis of equality and mutual benefit, the pursuit of the values of fairness and justice, and the broad-mindedness of inclusiveness and mutual learning.

The leaders of the SCO member states signed and issued the Astana Declaration of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO Member States; approved the SCO initiative on solidarity and joint efforts to promote justice, harmony and development in the world; proposals on improving the operational mechanisms of the SCO; a statement on the principles of good-neighbourliness, mutual trust and partnership; and a series of resolutions on cooperation in the fields of energy, investment and information security.

The Astana Declaration begins by stating that:

“The political and economic situation in the world is undergoing major changes. The international system is developing in a more just and multipolar direction, providing more opportunities for countries to develop and carry out international cooperation on an equal and mutually beneficial basis. At the same time, the rise of power politics, the intensification of trampling on the norms of international law, and the intensification of geopolitical confrontation and conflicts pose more risks to global and regional stability.”

Among the many issues covered in the declaration, member states advocate respect for the right of the peoples of all countries to independently choose their path of political, economic and social development, and emphasise that the principles of mutual respect for sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity, equality and mutual benefit, non-interference in internal affairs, and non-use or threat of use of force are the basis for the sustainable development of international relations.

They reaffirmed their commitment to building a more representative, democratic and just multipolar world system based on the universally recognised principles of international law, diversity of cultures and civilisations, equality and mutually beneficial cooperation, and the central coordinating role of the United Nations.

They expressed deep concern at the intensification of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and strongly condemned the acts that caused numerous civilian casualties and a humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip; Emphasising the importance of ensuring a comprehensive and sustainable ceasefire as soon as possible and facilitating humanitarian access and intensifying efforts to bring peace, stability and security to the population of the region, it was noted that the only possible way to ensure peace and stability in the Middle East was a comprehensive and just settlement of the question of Palestine.

They also reaffirmed their commitment to helping Afghanistan become an independent, neutral and peaceful country, free from terrorism, war and drugs, and supported the efforts of the international community to achieve peace and development in Afghanistan and reaffirmed that the formation of a government that is truly inclusive of representatives of all ethnic and political sectors of Afghan society is the only way to achieve lasting peace and stability in the country.

Member States support the prevention of the weaponisation of outer space, believe that strict adherence to the existing legal system for the peaceful uses of outer space is of paramount importance, and stress the need to sign international instruments with mandatory legal force to enhance transparency and provide strong guarantees for the prevention of an arms race in outer space.

With the exception of India, all the other SCO member states reaffirmed their support for the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by the People’s Republic of China and affirmed the work done by all parties in the joint implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative, including the promotion of the synergy and cooperation between the Belt and Road Initiative and the Eurasian Economic Union, as well as the cooperation in the implementation of joint projects.

Underlining moves to dedollarisation and to promote mutual support in areas of banking, investment and finance, the SCO member states stressed the importance of continuing to implement the Roadmap for Expanding the Quota of SCO Member States in Local Currency Settlements. They further stressed the need to secure project financing in order to fully exploit the investment potential of the SCO and will continue consultations on the establishment of the SCO Development Bank and the SCO Development Fund (Special Account).

They agreed to declare 2025 the SCO Year of Sustainable Development. Member States noted the need to strengthen cooperation in the field of environmental protection, ensure ecological security, rationally use natural resources, expand cooperation in technology transfer and resource allocation, especially to meet the needs of developing countries, and mitigate the negative impacts of climate change.

The SCO initiative on the solidarity of all countries to promote justice, harmony and development in the world declared that:

“Nearly 80 years ago, the United Nations was established to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war. Nearly 80 years later, the international system with the United Nations at its core is facing multiple threats and challenges unprecedented in modern history, with tensions and uncertainties escalating.”

Against this background, the SCO is firmly committed to upholding the central coordinating role of the United Nations, supporting the universally recognised norms of international law, building a more representative, just and democratic multipolar world system, and advocating that all countries, regardless of their geographical location, territorial size, demographic, military or resource strength, or political, economic and social structure, should be ensured equal opportunities for development.

And the SCO believes that it is essential to provide adequate financial support for the realisation of ambitious plans to combat climate change and calls on developed countries to fulfil their commitments to finance climate change projects and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Later on July 4, Xi Jinping addressed the SCO Plus Meeting, which was attended by a number of leaders from the organisation’s growing network of observers and dialogue partners, a number of whom have expressed interest in graduating to full membership.

Xi Jinping said: “Today, we get together for our first ‘SCO Plus’ Meeting, with good friends and new partners in the same room holding important discussions. This shows that under the new circumstances of the new era, the vision of our organisation is widely popular, and that SCO member states have friends across the world.”

He proceeded to make a number of proposals, including:

We should build a common home of solidarity and mutual trust. A few days ago, China held the Conference Marking the 70th Anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. The Shanghai Spirit is consistent with the essence of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.
We need to bridge our differences, build more consensus, and enhance mutual trust through strategic communication. China proposes that SCO member states do more to share their experience on governance and hold the SCO Political Parties Forum at an appropriate time.
We should build a common home of peace and tranquillity. Real security is premised on the security of all countries.
Afghanistan is indispensable for the security in the region. We need to make best use of the mechanism of coordination and cooperation among Afghanistan’s neighbours and other platforms to increase humanitarian support to Afghanistan, and encourage Afghanistan to establish a broad-based and inclusive political structure and embark on a path of peace and reconstruction.
We should build a common home of fairness and justice. The current SCO Summit has issued the Astana Declaration, the SCO initiative on world unity for justice, harmony and development, and the statement on the principles of good-neighbourliness, trust and partnership. It is a strong message of the new era, one that calls for solidarity, cooperation and justice rather than division, confrontation, and hegemonism.
In his conclusion, the Chinese President noted that: “A Chinese adage reads, ‘Victory is ensured when people pool their strength together; Success is secured when people put their heads together.’ The SCO owes its success to solidarity and cooperation throughout the years. This is also naturally the inevitable way for us to respond to the changing world and open new horizons on the new journey ahead.”

We reprint below the report of President Xi’s speech to the 24th Meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO, the summary of the Astana Declaration, the text of the initiative on the solidarity of all countries to promote justice, harmony and development in the world, and the Statement of the Council of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on the principles of good-neighbourliness, mutual trust and partnership. These were originally published in Chinese on the website of People’s Daily. They have been machine translated and lightly edited by us.

We also reprint the full text of President Xi Jinping’s speech to the SCO Plus meeting. It was originally published by the Xinhua News Agency.

(Much more at link.)

https://socialistchina.org/2024/07/10/x ... velopment/
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Jul 20, 2024 3:12 pm

China To Implement Policies To Promote ‘Quality Development’ Until 2035

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View of a Chinese city, 2024. Photo: X/ @CHINA_PICTORIAL

July 18, 2024 Hour: 9:05 am

The new policy goals were set at the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party.

On Thursday, the Communist Party of China (CPC) pledged to place reforms in a “more prominent position” and double down on “high-quality development,” opening the country further to the rest of the world to achieve a “high-level market socialism” system by 2035.

These objectives were among those set by the party in a communiqué released immediately after the conclusion of the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party, a quinquennial meeting that traditionally outlines the nation’s economic plans for the next five or ten years.

The initiatives outlined in that document are set to be completed by 2029, the year when the 80th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China will be celebrated.

“The current period and the future are key for comprehensively promoting the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation with Chinese-style modernization,” the document states, calling to “lay the foundations” to “build a modern socialist power by the mid-century.”


Balancing National Security and Economic Growth

To achieve this, the main task will be to foster “high-quality development,” which involves seeking “the development of new quality productivity” or improving security levels of industrial and supply chains.

The CPC will seek to balance national security with growth, emphasizing the need to “ensure that the interaction between high-quality development and high-level security is positive.”

Chinese authorities promised to maintain the policy of national openness to the rest of the world to embrace the “advantages of its super-large market,” generating a “new momentum” for foreign trade.

While the Communist Party advocates for an “independent and peaceful” foreign policy, it also calls for maintaining “national sovereignty, security, and development interests” in its relations with the rest of the world.


Better Macroeconomic Management

In response to the slowing economic growth, the Communist Party will seek greater consistency in macroeconomic policies and deepen fiscal, tax, and financial reforms.

Additionally, there is a need to create a “fairer and more dynamic market environment” where both public and private enterprises enjoy the same opportunities and protection, “better maintaining market order and correcting its errors” to “stimulate society’s motivation and innovative vitality.”

The Chinese communists also aim to reduce the gap between rural and urban areas, improve basic public service systems, expand domestic demand, and enhance citizens’ living standards.

The CPC insisted on paying more attention to the actual results of the economic system reforms, which should be carried out under the principle of “seeking progress while maintaining stability.”

https://www.telesurenglish.net/china-to ... ntil-2035/

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Xinjiang genocide “a total fabrication manufactured by the West”
In the second of three eyewitness articles from Xinjiang, Roger McKenzie addresses the widespread allegations that China is engaged in authoritarian repression (up to and including genocide) of the Uyghur people. He notes that the accusers “appear to have created their own definition of genocide while singularly failing to apply such a label to Israel and its onslaught against the Palestinians in Gaza”.

Meanwhile the facts of the case in Xinjiang are perfectly clear: “There is no genocide taking place in Xinjiang. I saw zero evidence of any kind of oppression of the Uighurs. All the evidence was in fact to the contrary.” The very idea of there being such a genocide is a “total fabrication manufactured by the West” with the purpose of manufacturing consent for the New Cold War on China.

What is true is that China is engaged in long-term counter-terrorism efforts in Xinjiang, in response to a series of deadly terrorist incidents carried out by extremist and separatist forces. As Roger points out, “in most countries where deadly terrorist attacks take place, one would expect the authorities to take steps to protect its citizens”. But as far as Western media and politicians are concerned, terrorist attacks aren’t the problem in China but rather the government’s understandable response – which it should be noted has been far more humane and measured than that of the US, which to this day maintains a torture camp in occupied Guantanamo Bay.

Roger observes that, while the Western imperialist countries are hurling these lurid accusations against China, the countries of the Global South – including the vast majority of Muslim-majority countries – are defending China’s record. Indeed Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan stated that it was a “hard fact … that residents of various ethnicities are living happily in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region thanks to China’s prosperity”.

It’s essential that progressive and anti-war forces in the West reject the propaganda war on China. That some elements buy into these lies is based on “an opportunistic anti-communism laced, in some quarters, with a nasty dose of Sinophobia”.

This article originally appeared in the Morning Star.
There are 56 ethnic groups in the Chinese autonomous region of Xinjiang in the north-west of the country.

These groups help to form a Chinese population of 25 million.

The Uighurs were one of these groups and I was fortunate enough to spend some time with them as I travelled across five cities in nine days in the region.

They represent around 51 per cent of the region’s population.

In the past, the West has accused the Chinese government of committing genocide against the Uighurs. They appear to have created their own definition of genocide while singularly failing to apply such a label to the Israelis and its onslaught against the Palestinians in Gaza.

I am the first to admit that I am no international legal expert but the word genocide conjures up images in my mind of what is taking place in Gaza and what we have seen in Rwanda and in Sudan’s Darfur in the past.

There is no genocide taking place in Xinjiang. I saw zero evidence of any kind of oppression of the Uighurs.

All the evidence was in fact to the contrary.

My firm belief is that all the evidence points towards the accusation being a total fabrication manufactured by the West.

Some elements of the ultra left have sadly bought into this lie in what I believe is an opportunistic anti-communism laced, in some quarters, with a nasty dose of Sinophobia.

In this second part of a series written during my latest visit to China, I want to try to show what I really believe is going on.

The West is using these lies — aided and abetted by their stenographers in the corporate media — to help them to ramp up the cold war against China.

The US-led Western powers are once again attempting to undermine the reputation of a nation it opposes and using what can only be described as hired guns to go into China and attempt to cause mayhem.

The fact that Xinjiang borders eight countries — some of which have ready-made groups with some discontent or another — presented the Western powers with an opportunity to repeat the funding for terrorist groups that they have tried and tested in other places in the past such as in Afghanistan and Libya.

The corporate media stenographers have singularly failed to report the atrocities that have taken place and have instead decided to portray attempts by the Chinese government to stop the random attacks on their citizens as authoritarianism or, worse still, genocide.

Xinjiang has for many years been the target of attacks by Islamic fundamentalist as well as separatist groups.

In most other countries where deadly terrorist attacks take place, one would expect the authorities to take steps to protect its citizens.

One would expect the authorities to root out the terrorists and take firm action against them within their own laws.

Of course, the exception to this is any country that the imperialist Western powers oppose.

Any clampdown on terrorist attackers by the Chinese or any other country that is deemed a threat to US hegemony is denounced as authoritarian and somehow typical of communism.

But let the facts in Xinjiang speak for themselves.

On February 5 1992 terrorists planted four bombs on buses, in Qunzhong Theatre and a residential block of the Xinjiang Literary Federation. The attacks killed three people and left more than a dozen injured.

Between June and September 1993, terrorists carried out 10 bomb attacks in Kashagan, Yeching County, Yingjishan County and Sache County. In Kashgar, the attack on an agricultural machinery company — critical to the area’s economy — killed two people.

On March 22 1996, Akmudik Aji, the vice-president of the Islamic Association of Xinhe County in the Akse Prefecture was shot dead by gunmen in his home after terrorist groups had denounced him as a heretic.

Barely a word from the corporate media.

February 10 1996 saw seven terrorists disguised as police officers in Wensu rob the homes of local people at gunpoint — killing three.

Terrorists instigated riots in Yining on February 5 1997 during which they murdered four and injured hundreds as they smashed up homes and cars.

Barely a murmur from the corporate stenographers other than to portray any attempts by the authorities to tackle this violence as an overreaction by the state.

In 2009 the authorities placed the region’s capital Urumqi in a quasi-lockdown after a week of rioting instigated by the terrorists left 140 dead and 828 injured.

The terrorists had chosen to target Uighurs and Han people who did not support their separatist and Islamic fundamentalist principles.

But it was the understandable actions of the Chinese authorities to stop the violence that drew criticism from the West rather than the original attacks on local people.

There has been much said in the media about so-called harsh labour camps in which the Uighurs are allegedly routinely subjected to all sorts of torture.

I never saw or visited any such places. It makes no sense to me that the Chinese would need to resort to this sort of behaviour. It also simply does not fit into anything else that I have seen in the region.

There is plenty of evidence to show that the terrorists carrying out these atrocities — from organisations such as the East Turkestan Liberation Organisation and the Eastern Turkestan Islamic Movement — are being sent to detention and re-education camps.

But why let evidence to the contrary get in the way of a chance of some China bashing?

In 2019, 22 countries sent a joint letter to the UN Human Rights Council condemning the alleged mass detention of Uighurs and other Xinjiang ethnic minorities.

China and 37 other countries responded by setting out the sort of facts I mention above and their belief that the issue of human rights was being politicised.

They asked the UNHCR to approach the situation in Xinjiang on a fact-based basis and “in an objective and impartial manner.”

Weeks later, 50 nations, including 23 Muslim nations, issued another letter refuting the allegations made against China.

The Signatories included major Muslim countries such as Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was moved to say during an official visit to China that it was an undeniable “hard fact” that “residents of various ethnicities are living happily in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region thanks to China’s prosperity.”

In a phrase I have never used before — Erdogan is right. The Chinese have attempted to tackle extremism in Xinjiang by building economic prosperity but also by underlining that they celebrate the religious and cultural diversity of their people.

Rising prosperity is what will continue the opposition of the people in Xinjiang to the terrorists. China is clearly making giant strides in this direction.

But we all need to call out the lies about ethnic clampdowns and forced labour being levelled at China.

As I have said before, if you don’t believe me, visit the region and see for yourself.

In the third part of this short series, I will turn my attention to some developments in China’s approach to international affairs.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/07/19/x ... -the-west/

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China Has Just Gained First-Mover Advantage In Nuclear Fusion
Posted on July 20, 2024 by Yves Smith

Yves here. Nuclear fusion technology is over my pay grade. Nevertheless, assuming charitiably that human civilization gets climate change enough under control so as to assure modern lifestyles continue, a proposition very much in doubt, nuclear energy seems destined to be a big part of base energy supplies given more reliance on variable solar and wind power. Even though this article touts the professed accomplishments of one Chinese company, it isn’t in the normal interest of a Western business outlet to tout that in the absence of at least some substance to the claims.

Nevertheless, there is also the question of how long it would take to commercialize this advance. My understanding was it would normally take 20 years. However, China still makes heavy use of coal-fired electricity and so has the incentive to greatly accelerate the timetable. But do they have the means?

Reader sanity checks encouraged.

By Alex Kimani, a veteran finance writer, investor, engineer and researcher for Safehaven.com. Originally published at OilPrice

For nearly two decades, the world’s hopes of building a practical nuclear fusion plant have rested on France-based International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor.
The ITER project costs have surpassed €20 billion ($21.8 billion), more than four times the original budget of €5 billion.
Shanghai-based Energy Singularity has effectively completed the engineering feasibility verification of high-temperature superconducting for its Honghuang 70 (HH70) tokamak device.
It’s been seven decades ever since scientists started working on nuclear fusion technology, with the allure of almost limitless clean energy proving too powerful to resist. Unfortunately, milestones have fallen time and again, giving rise to the running joke that a practical nuclear fusion power plant could be decades, if not centuries, away.

For nearly two decades, the world’s hopes of building a practical nuclear fusion plant have rested on France-based International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), funded and run by seven member countries since 2006. Like many nuclear power projects, ITER has come under scrutiny for repeated delays and massive cost overruns. Indeed, Charles Seife, director of the Arthur L. Carter Institute of Journalism at New York University, recently sued ITER for lack of transparency.

According to Seife, ITER project costs have surpassed €20 billion ($21.8 billion), more than four times the original budget of €5 billion (then $5.5 billion) and nearly a decade late from its 2016 delivery date.

Now, however, the fusion sector might finally have something to show to the world for all its troubles thanks to a major milestone by a Chinese startup. Shanghai-based Energy Singularity has effectively completed the engineering feasibility verification of high-temperature superconducting for its Honghuang 70 (HH70) tokamak device, giving China a first-mover advantage in the critical field of high-temperature superconducting magnetic confinement fusion. Energy Singularity has also become the world’s first commercial company to build and operate an all-superconducting tokamak.

“The design work of the device began in March 2022, and the overall installation was completed by the end of February this year, setting the fastest record for the research and construction of superconducting tokamak devices worldwide,” Yang Zhao, Energy Singularity’s Chief Executive Officer, has revealed.

So, how did this little-known Chinese company manage to pull off in two years what ITER has failed to achieve in nearly two decades?

According to Yang, using high-temperature superconducting materials can reduce the volume of a device to about 2 percent of that of traditional low-temperature superconducting devices, allowing the construction period of the device to be shortened from ~ 30 years to just 3-4 years.

According to Yang, the company owns independent intellectual property rights of HH70, with a domestication rate of over 96 percent, adding that all of the device’s magnet systems are constructed using high-temperature superconducting materials. Despite its commendable success, Energy Singularity is not resting on its laurels, with Yang revealing the company plans to complete the next generation high magnetic field high-temperature superconducting tokamak device dubbed HH170 with a deuterium-tritium equivalent energy gain (Q) greater than 10 by 2027. In fusion parlance, the Q value reflects the energy efficiency of the fusion reactor, that is, the ratio of the energy generated by the device to the energy input required to sustain the fusion reaction. Q values greater than 1 means the reactor generates more energy than what it consumes, which is essentially what fusion research has been trying to achieve in a commercial reactor for decades. Currently, the greatest Q factor that scientists have achieved is just 1.53.

Small Reactor Design

Energy Singularity is not the only fusion startup that’s pursuing small reactor designs. Deven, Massachusetts-based Commonwealth Fusion Systems is collaborating with MIT to build their small fusion reactor. Dubbed Sparc, the reactor is ~1/65th the volume of ITER’s reactor. The experimental reactor is expected to generate about 100 MW of heat energy in pulses of about 10 seconds – bursts big enough to power a small city.

That said, small reactors are hardly unique to the nuclear fusion sector. The Biden administration has been a strong proponent of Small Modular Reactors (SMR) that have been making the waves in the nuclear fission space.

Three years ago, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC)8 approved Centrus Energy Corp.’s (NYSE:LEU) request to make High Assay Low-Enriched Uranium (HALEU) at its enrichment facility in Piketon, Ohio, becoming the first company in the western world outside Russia to do so. Applications for HALEU are currently limited to research reactors and medical isotope production; however, HALEU will be needed for more than half of the SMRs currently in development across the globe. HALEU is only currently available from TENEX, a Rosatom subsidiary.

Last November, Centrus Energy announced that it had made its first delivery of 20 kilograms of HALEU UF6 to the DoE, completing Phase One of its contract. The company managed to complete the first phase under budget and ahead of schedule. Centrus will now immediately proceed to Phase Two of the contract–requiring HALEU production at the rate of 900 kilograms per year.

In January, the DoE issued a request for proposals (RFP) for uranium enrichment services to help establish a reliable domestic supply of fuels using HALEU. The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) will provide up to $500 million for HALEU enrichment contracts selected through this RFP.

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/07 ... usion.html
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Wed Jul 31, 2024 2:05 pm

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China’s Third Plenum
By Michael Roberts (Posted Jul 30, 2024)

Originally published: The Next Recession on July 24, 2024 (more by The Next Recession) |

The Third Plenum of the Communist Party of China ended last week. The Third Plenum is a meeting of China’s Communist Party Central Committee composed of 364 members which discusses China’s economic policy for the next several years. As China is a one-party state, in effect this sets out the policies of the government and, in particular, that of President Xi.

What did we learn from the Third Plenum about China’s economic policies? Not very much that we did not already know. According to the state media release, the Plenum agreed that economic policy should concentrate on achieving a new round of “scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation,” Chinese-style. In the next decade,

education, science and technology, and talents are the basic and strategic support for China’s modernization.

So it appears that the CPC leaders are looking to sustain economic growth and meet all their proclaimed social objectives through what they have called ‘quality growth’. The expansion of the economy mainly through using plentiful labour from the countryside coming into the cities to work in manufacturing, property development and infrastructure is over. It has been over for some time. Urbanisation is slowing.

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Instead, the Chinese economy has rocketed upwards mainly from a massive increase in productive investment in industry and export-oriented sectors. But that too has reached somewhat of a peak since the Great Recession of 2008-9. The global economic slowdown and stagnation in the major economies since then—what I have called a Long Depression—have also affected the rate of economic growth in China. World trade growth has stagnated and so has China’s share.

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China’s real GDP growth has slowed since the Great Recession, although the economy is still expanding at around 5% a year, more than twice as fast as the US economy, the best performing of the top seven capitalist economies.

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But other causes of slowing growth include the relative exhaustion of labour from the rural areas and also the expansion of unproductive investment in real estate, which eventually ended in a property bust that is still being managed. As I have argued in many previous posts, this was the result of the huge policy mistake that the Chinese government made back in the 1990s in trying to meet the housing needs of a fast-urbanising population through the private sector: ie. homes to buy, financed by mortgages and built by private developers. This housing model used in the West triggered the global financial crash in 2008 and eventually led to a similar property slump in China.

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But the key issue for the Third Plenum is the ‘demographic challenge’. China’s population, like many others, is set to fall over the next generation and its working age population will also drop.

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Economic growth and further improvements in living standards will increasingly depend on raising the productivity of the labour force. I have argued in previous posts that this is perfectly possible to achieve.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas shows that China’s ‘total factor productivity’ (which is a crude measure of innovation) is growing at 6% a year, while it has been falling in the US. Slower growth but still much faster than G7 economic growth and based on technological success.

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But Western media and mainstream economists continue to argue that China’s economy is in deep trouble. Here is the assessment of the UK’s Financial Times:

China’s growth is too slow to provide jobs for legions of unemployed young people. A three-year property slump is hammering personal wealth. Trillions of US dollars in local government debt are choking China’s investment engines. A rapidly ageing society is adding to healthcare and pension burdens. The country has continued to flirt with deflation.

I could deal with these issues one by one. But I have already done so in many previous posts. Suffice it to say that the size of youth unemployment is a serious challenge. There is a sharp mismatch between young graduate students looking for well-paid high -tech jobs, while available employment is still concentrated in lower-paid less skilled work. This is a problem in many economies, including the advanced capitalist economies. The solution, it seems to me, is in the expansion of high-tech sectors, but also in re-training for other jobs.

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2) the property slump has been severe. It is no bad thing, however, for property prices to fall sharply so that housing becomes more affordable. The solution from here must be an expansion of public housing, not more private development.

3) as for the debt issue, it’s true that China leverage ratios have surged in past decades, but they are manageable, especially as most of the debt is concentrated in local government sectors and so can be bailed out by central government. And China has a state banking system, state-owned companies and massive FX reserves to cover any losses.

China: debt to GDP

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4) Apparently falling consumer prices in China is a bad thing, according to the FT. But is it so bad that basic purchases get cheaper? Is it better to suffer the inflationary spike that consumed Western economies and households in the last two years?

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The other critique continually hammered by the likes of the FT and Western economists is that: “Beijing pledged to reorientate its growth model away from an over-reliance on investment and exports towards household consumption. This, western governments have long hoped, would help reduce China’s huge trade surpluses and invigorate global demand.” But “Not only has China failed to deliver on its rebalancing pledges, it has actually regressed.” The FT is upset that “The plenum communique does not pledge to boost consumer spending or rebalance the economy away from investment and exports.”

The FT then goes on to blame China for the US tariff war likely to be accelerated if Donald Trump rewins the presidency in 2025. “Xi and his politburo should realise that China’s trade imbalances are becoming an ever more incendiary issue. Its monthly trade surplus reached an all-time record in June. The resurgence of Donald Trump, who imposed hefty tariffs on Chinese imports during his term as US president, should give real pause for thought.” China is apparently at fault for the trade war, not US government attempts to curb Chinese export success and technology advances.

Once again, the Western media and economists argue for a ‘rebalancing’ by which they mean a switch to a consumer-led, private sector-led economy from the current investment-led, export oriented, state directed one. “The Chinese economy is foundering,” said Eswar Prasad, professor of trade policy at Cornell University and former head of the International Monetary Fund’s China division. “More stimulus to pep up spending and economic overhauls to revive private-sector confidence in China are urgently needed”, he said.

But for me, trying to boost consumer spending and expand the private sector are just not what the Third Plenum should aim for. Actually, the Third Plenum release reminds us that China still has planning, not the centralized one of the Soviet Union, but ‘indicative planning’ with targets set for many sectors. The release said that “We must summarize and evaluate the implementation of the “14th Five-Year Plan” and do a good job in the early planning of the “15th Five-Year Plan”.”

China is fast developing a ‘new economy’ based on high value-added tech sectors. These sectors have significantly outpaced headline GDP growth in recent years. Between 2017 and 2023, the new economy grew by an average of 10.2% per year, far faster than the 5.5% average overall GDP growth.

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As a piece in the Asian Times put it:

A common narrative bandied about by the Western business press is that China’s subsidized industries destroy shareholder value because they are not profitable—from residential property to high-speed rail to electric vehicles to solar panels (the subject of the most recent The Economist ‘meltdown’). But what China wants from BYD and Jinko Solar (and the US from Tesla and First Solar) should be affordable EVs and solar panels, not trillion-dollar market-cap stocks. In fact, mega-cap valuations indicate that something has gone seriously awry. Do we really want tech billionaires or do we really want tech? Value is not being destroyed; it’s accruing to consumers ins lower prices, higher quality and/or more innovative products and services.

This is very visible in environmental investment. China’s carbon intensity has dropped at an unprecedented pace.

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As the Asian Times writer put it:

what is economic success, what is value creation? Maybe, just maybe, it’s the approach that delivers the most tangible improvements in people’s lives, instead of trillion-dollar companies and billionaire CEOs.

https://mronline.org/2024/07/30/chinas-third-plenum/
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Re: China

Post by blindpig » Sat Aug 10, 2024 2:38 pm

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Remy Herrera: the foundations of China’s economy clearly distinguish it from capitalism
The following text is the English translation of an interview with Rémy Herrera, a research analyst at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) at the Sorbonne in Paris. The interview was carried out by Tang Xiaofu for the Observers’ Network, Beijing, and was recently posted in Workers World. While covering similar ground to the interview we published in June 2024, it contains a number of additional insights and is well worth reading in full.

In the interview, Herrera firmly rejects the characterisation of China by David Harvey and others of “a neoliberalism with Chinese characteristics”, and points to the foundations that clearly distinguish China’s system from capitalism:

1) The persistence of powerful and modernized planning; 2) a form of political democracy, obviously perfectible, but making collective choices possible; 3) extensive public services, conditioning political, social and economic citizenship; 4) ownership of land and natural resources that remains in the public domain; 5) diversified forms of ownership, adequate to the socialization of productive forces and boosting economic activity; 6) a general policy which consists of increasing labor remuneration more quickly compared to other types of income; 7) a desire for social justice displayed by public authorities in the face of rising social inequalities since 1978; 8) the priority given to the preservation of the environment, the protection of nature being now considered inseparable from social progress; 9) a conception of economic relations between States based on a win-win principle; and 10) political relations between States based on the search for peace and more balanced exchanges between peoples.

Herrera goes on to discuss the unique role of the state-owned enterprises in China’s economy, in particular that “the compass that guides them is not the enrichment of private shareholders, but the priorities given to productive investment and the service provided to their customers”.

The public sector “still represents a large part of industrial assets (in construction, steelmaking, basic materials, semi-finished products, etc.) and almost all of them in strategic areas for the country’s, like infrastructure in energy, transport, telecommunications, and of course armaments — in addition to the banking and financial sectors.” As such, public ownership sits at the heart of – and is able to guide – China’s development strategy.

The planning system “is the place where collective choices are developed and decided, as expressions of a general will. It is the authentic space where a nation chooses a common destiny and the means for a sovereign people to become its own master, in all areas of its existence: way of life, ways of consuming, housing and occupying or developing the national territory, precise definition of the relationships maintained by human beings with their environment and nature.”

Herrera also addresses the US’s trade war, launched by Trump and continued by Biden, assessing that the “problem” from the US’s point of view is that the unequal relationship between the US (an imperialist country) and China (a developing country) is becoming less unequal – “there is an erosion of the advantage of the United States in the exchange”. The trade war “was an attempt by the administration led by President Trump to curb the slow, continuous erosion of the advantage of the United States, observed for decades in trade with its emerging rival, China.”

The interview concludes with an appeal to move beyond a moribund imperialism. “We must dismantle the logic of crisis and war driven by high finance by imposing democratic control on it, and therefore think about alternatives to capitalism. The defense of peace and the reactivation of the socialist project are today’s priorities. In this context, China has a fundamental role to play in these transformations.”
I. How the West interprets China

Tang Xiaofu: 1) You have visited China multiple times, but now many scholars are trying to distort Socialism with Chinese Characteristics into State Capitalism. What’s your view towards State Capitalism? And what’s the difference between State Capitalism and Socialism with Chinese Characteristics?


Rémy Herrera: The speeches of many current leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) suggest that China would still be in the “first phase of socialism,” that is to say, in a stage considered essential for developing the productive forces and which would take a long time to reach its goal. According to them, the historical goal sought would indeed remain that of developed socialism — even if, it is true, the contours of the latter are far from being clearly and precisely defined. However, in Western countries, many researchers claim that these official political declarations claiming the persistence of socialism in China are only a facade, or the cover-up of a hidden form of capitalism, and that socialism is really dead and buried in China. I do not share the opinion of these Western researchers. On the contrary, I think that these statements by Chinese leaders deserve to be taken seriously.

Moreover, even within the debates among Western Marxists, a clear majority of them affirm that the Chinese economy would henceforth be purely and simply capitalist. This is the case of certain well-known Marxists, such as David Harvey, who believes he has seen, since the 1978 reforms, “a neoliberalism with Chinese characteristics” where a particular type of capitalist market economy has incorporated more and more neoliberal devices operated in the framework of very authoritarian centralized control. This is also the case of Leo Panitch, for example, who analyzes the contemporary integration of China into the circuits of the world economy as the duplication by China of the role of “capitalist complement” formerly held by Japan, as a support that China would provide to the United States through capital flows allowing the latter to maintain its global hegemony, and as the trend towards the liberalization of financial markets in China leading to the dismantling of instruments of control of capital movements and undermining at the same time the bases of the power of the CCP. I do not agree with these researchers either. I defend the idea that today, the Chinese system still contains key elements of socialism, and the interpretation I give of its nature is compatible with socialism.

Thus, I read the Chinese political-economic system as a market socialism, or socialism with a market, based on some pillars which still distinguish it quite clearly from capitalism. I will cite, among these foundations: 1) the persistence of powerful and modernized planning; 2) a form of political democracy, obviously perfectible, but making collective choices possible; 3) extensive public services, conditioning political, social and economic citizenship; 4) ownership of land and natural resources that remains in the public domain; 5) diversified forms of ownership, adequate to the socialization of productive forces and boosting economic activity; 6) a general policy which consists of increasing labor remuneration more quickly compared to other types of income; 7) a desire for social justice displayed by public authorities in the face of rising social inequalities since 1978; 8) the priority given to the preservation of the environment, the protection of nature being now considered inseparable from social progress; 9) a conception of economic relations between States based on a win-win principle; and 10) political relations between States based on the search for peace and more balanced exchanges between peoples. Socialism “with Chinese characteristics” is not very far from this reading grid.

Is this state capitalism? Through the contradictions it conveys, this expression allows us to narrow down a little the range of possibilities between the poles of capitalism and socialism, but it leaves too much vagueness in the definition of a mixture of institutions unique in the world. I therefore prefer to discard the term “state capitalism” to account for the Chinese situation — while admitting that this expression could be relatively close to its reality. Rather than a state capitalism, which refers to the form of a “capitalism without capitalists” — the logical tendency of which will be to evolve towards a “capitalism with capitalists,” as was the case of the Soviet Union — the system experienced by current China is rather similar, in my opinion, to that of an economy “with capitalists, but which is not capitalist.” It is not a question of playing with words, but of remembering that the presence of capitalists in a given social formation does not mean, by this very fact, that such social formation is capitalist. Ultimately, the Chinese experience shows that the objective of the CCP was not to appropriate everything economically, but rather to keep political control over everything — which is not the same thing.

TX: 2) Recently, [U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet] Yellen has visited China and brought up the issue of China’s overcapacity in the new energy sector. As the previous world’s largest industrial country, the United States also had overproduced. As a Marxist economist, what role do you think the government and the market should play in this issue?

RH: It is indeed highly probable that, over recent decades, China has encountered, in a certain number of economic sectors, a so-called “overproduction” problem. My point here is not to claim that “socialism with Chinese characteristics” represents the completed ideal of the communist project. Some imbalances exist, numerous insufficiencies persist, and the challenges that this society will face are colossal. My approach is also not to ask whether the Chinese “counter-model” (i.e., socialist, not capitalist) could be reproduced elsewhere. For me, it is just a matter of modestly, and as objectively as possible, trying to understand the original nature of the Chinese political-economic system, without discrediting, transfiguring or schematizing — as is unfortunately frequently the case in the West — the path in which CCP leaders have engaged their country.

As a matter of fact, to the extent that the owners and holders of national private capital are effectively limited in their ambitions by very powerful public ownership of the most strategic means of production, and to the extent that these same owners and holders of national private capital have not been able so far to conquer and exercise power over the apparatuses of both the state and the Communist Party, I therefore think that this system is not capitalism — even if the risks of its restoration of capitalism are obviously real — but a form of market socialism, or socialism with a market, in which the role of central planning remains decisive; a form inserted, as a “first phase,” of course perfectible, in a process of socialist transition operating in the long term, and not without contradictions.

I will put forward several arguments to justify the importance of the role played by large public companies in the case of China: they can first distribute more to their employees; then, the state is free to define the most appropriate management method; and finally, public authorities can more easily put them at the service of its collective projects. Added to this, through various tools available to the participation management institution, the state allocates the profits received to a special fund in order to support public entities that require it. Besides, state-owned enterprises also enjoy certain advantages, particularly in terms of credit lines and interest rates granted by state-owned banks. All this is rather, as we can see, part of a path of socialist development.

One explanation for the strength of Chinese state-owned enterprises is that they are not managed like Western transnational firms. The latter are entirely oriented towards the logic of shareholder value, requiring the maximization of the distribution of dividends to their private owners, the valuation of shares and rapid returns on investments, and operate by squeezing a chain of subcontractors, domestic or relocated.

If Chinese public groups behaved in this way, in such a rapacious manner, they would act to the detriment of local small and medium-sized businesses and, more broadly, of the entire national industrial fabric, which is clearly not the case. We would then be dealing with a wild form of “state capitalism” — as is so often claimed in the West — and we no longer see how this could lead to such dynamic economic growth. Most of the large Chinese public companies are (or have become) profitable again because the compass that guides them is not the enrichment of private shareholders, but the priorities given to productive investment and the service provided to their customers. It ultimately does not matter that their profits turn out to be lower than those of their Western competitors as long as they serve, at least in part, to stimulate the rest of the domestic economy and go beyond a vision of immediate profitability, since superior strategic interests, whether long term or national, dictate it.

In my opinion, Chinese state-owned enterprises, including those operating in industrial sectors, should not be managed as private groups. “Market socialism with Chinese characteristics” is in fact based in part on the maintenance of a powerful public sector whose role is fundamental to the whole economy. Everything suggests that this is one of the essential explanations for the good performance of the Chinese economy — no offense to the neoliberal ideologues who advocate the generalization of private property and the maximization of individual profit.

TX: 3) Since Trump’s presidency, the United States has been waging a trade war against China in an attempt to reduce its trade deficit with China. However, in recent years, instead of decreasing significantly, the U.S. trade deficit with China reached $419.4 billion in 2018 and $382.9 billion in 2022, which are the top two deficits in history. Why is this happening? Is there unequal trade between China and the U.S., as the U.S. claims?

RH: The (almost) continuous widening of the trade balance between the two countries for several decades, largely unfavorable to the United States, constituted the pretext used by Washington to launch a trade war against Beijing. According to the U.S. administration, the deficit recorded by the United States in its trade of goods and services with China would provide “proof” that President Trump was right in declaring that the Chinese are extracting from the United States “hundreds of billions of dollars every year” and injecting them into China. It is undeniable that wealth is transferred from the deficit country (the United States) to the surplus country (China). But is it that simple? Is this logic solidly founded? What “wealth” are we talking about exactly in this debate?

I mean that it is not so much a question of contesting the idea that China benefits from its trade relations with the United States, but rather of questioning the “fair” nature of these exchanges. This is a question that Marxist and other heterodox theorists have been asking for a long time. Unequal exchange, which is measurable using a variety of methods, reveals that, for a given volume exchanged, the total labor time provided by workers in one economy may turn out to be higher than that of workers in the partner country, thus causing a transfer of value from the first country to the second, which thereby appropriates the value produced by the other country. Only taking into account the transfer of international value — which corresponds to the socially necessary work time required to produce a commodity — will reflect the true redistribution of wealth carried out between the two trading countries.

In a scientific study that I had the honor of carrying out with fellow Chinese professors, we were able to seriously calculate the unequal exchange between the United States and China. These calculations are carried out using several different methods but lead to very similar results. These results confirm the existence, observable over the last four decades, of an unequal exchange between the United States and China; an unequal exchange which operates in favor of the United States and at the expense of China.

The labor contents integrated into the products exchanged are different in the two countries: there are many more hours of labor incorporated in the goods and services that are exported by China to the United States than there are hours of labor embodied in goods and services that are exported from the United States to China. But, over this period of four decades, we can observe a very clear reduction in unequal exchange, without the latter disappearing completely, since we calculated that, just before the appearance of the Covid-19 pandemic, in goods moving between the two countries, approximately 6.5 hours of labor of Chinese workers are in fact exchanged for one single hour of labor of workers from the United States. And, on average, over the entire 40-year period, workers in China had to work more than 121 hours to obtain, in bilateral trade with the United States, one single hour of work from U.S. workers.

Unequal exchange concerns most sectors of activity, which record transfers of value directed from China to the United States. This is especially the case for the textile, clothing and leather goods sector, for furniture and other supplies, but also for the sectors of electrical equipment and machinery, air transport, wooden items, rubber and/or plastic items, chemicals, and even accounting and management consulting activities.

As a consequence, there is an unequal exchange to the detriment of China which persists, but there is also an erosion of the advantage of the United States in the exchange. And it is precisely, in our opinion, because there is a deterioration of the United States advantage that the U.S. administration, under the mandate of President Donald Trump, launched this trade war. In fact, a trade war is nothing other than the organization by the State of a commercial crisis. But the cure can be worse than the disease, and this is what has happened since the United States trade deficit, after having stabilized a little, began to increase again. Clearly, this trade war was an attempt by the administration led by President Trump to curb the slow, continuous erosion of the advantage of the United States, observed for decades in trade with its emerging rival, China.

II. The current predicament of the Western development path (criticism of capitalism)

TX: 4+5) Since the last century, financial capitalism has dominated the economic growth of Europe and America, creating a huge debt. Do you think this debt-driven growth is sustainable? How will debt-driven growth and financial capitalism affect the future economic growth of Europe and America? During the pandemic, most countries, especially the United States, stimulated their economy through measures such as expanding the central bank balance sheet rapidly, which has also contributed to a rapid rise in inflation rates in most countries outside of China, and asset prices have skyrocketed. As a Marxist economist, what’s your opinion of the impact of this round of inflation on the future economic growth and social inequality in the West and third world countries?


RH: The capitalist world system has been going through a deep crisis for almost half a century, of which the debt crisis — or rather many debt crises — are only one of the multiple manifestations. It is, in fact, the aggravation of a single structural crisis of the expansion of capital — and one of the visible and publicized manifestations of which has revealed itself in the “financial sphere,” due to extreme financialization of contemporary capitalism. So we are dealing with a systemic, multidimensional crisis, now affecting the center of power of high finance which has controlled accumulation for more than 40 years of neoliberalism. This results in an excess of salable production, not due to an insufficient number of people wanting to consume, but rather due to an excessive polarization of wealth which excludes growing proportions of populations from the possibility of purchasing goods which they need.

Nonetheless, instead of observing an overproduction of commodities, what we see is above all a boom in credit and financial markets which now allows capital to accumulate itself in ever more abstract and “fictitious” forms of money. It is therefore important not to confuse money with financial operations on debt securities which are no longer really money, but which are already “money capital.” The concept of “fictitious capital” — the principle of which is a capitalization of income derived from future surplus-value — can help us to better understand the current crisis of capital. The place of formation of this fictitious capital can be found, among others, in the credits granted by banks to private agents as well as in public debts — through which capitalists completely take control of capitalist states — but also, of course, in securities on the stock market or in pension funds or speculative funds. This is the current capitalist logic of accumulating money for money’s sake.

But in this context, economic growth in the West, already weak, has only been maintained by piling up debt, drawing on credit lines and boosting private consumption. This expansion of credit ended up revealing the crisis of overaccumulation in its modern version. Nevertheless, this cannot last forever. Sooner or later there will be an inevitable, brutal “return to reality.” After the 2008 crisis, the exhausted U.S. Federal Reserve (or FED) had to be recapitalized and the most decisive measure that this institution took to plug a monetary system that threatened to collapse was, in October 2008, the “unlimited” extension of swap lines for the benefit of the Central Banks of other Northern countries and certain strategic allies of the South (including South Korea), to ensure them access to the U.S. dollar, and therefore guarantee relative stability.

At the domestic level, monetary policy became “unconventional” with the implementation of Quantitative Easing through which the Central Bank massively purchased private or public debt securities from commercial banks and transnational firms in order to provide them with cash and guarantee their liquidity and solvency. Then, in 2020-2021, with the Covid-19 pandemic, there was a very large-scale return to measures combining asset buybacks, interest rate cuts, special credit lines and business aid. We therefore see that current devices give central banks the possibility of creating money without limits, apparently — just as private banks can also push credits to the maximum. In reality, however, there are limits to the creation of money: those posed by the problems of convertibility of these credits into Central Bank currency (for the private banks) and of the national currency itself into foreign currencies (for the State); but also those linked to the credibility of monetary authorities and the confidence of agents in these institutions. However, as the economic recession deepens, these constraints become stronger, with the risk of falling into a “debt trap” — especially when interest rates rise.

Today, Quantitative Easing has stopped, because inflation has become a very serious problem, which especially affects the poorest social categories of the population. It must be understood that inflation is one of the manifestations of the class struggle within a society: inflation reflects the degree of intensity of the conflict between all the owners of the means of production and the workers for the distribution of added value. Currently, in the West, the balance of power between capitalists and workers is very clearly in favor of the former and to the disadvantage of the latter — especially since the leadership of most workers’ unions and left-wing parties (including communists) have become pro-systemic, that is, pro-capitalist and pro-imperialist.

But in times of acute crisis, the level of inflation also reflects some of the contradictions between capitalists for sharing the profit rate, which is then oriented downward when the crisis worsens. Thus, the combination of these two phenomena leads to the fact that inflation today finds its root causes more in decisions to increase the prices of goods and services in an arbitrary and unjustified way on the part of capitalists, as well as in their speculative behavior on the markets. Of course, other phenomena, real this time (such as shortages due to epidemics or even wars) can aggravate this inflation rate — the cause of which remains currently mainly speculative, and the fault of capitalists who gorge themselves on profits which do not correspond to any production activity.

III. China’s global contribution to development

TX: 6) As China achieves the fastest industrialization in human history, global scholars and politicians have increasingly focused on China’s economic development model and values in recent years. How do you view the similarities and differences between the industrialization processes of China and Western countries?


RH: China has implemented a coherent and self-centered, effective development strategy. One of the features often highlighted to describe the success of the Chinese economy is the very rapid growth of its export of goods and services since the 1990s, and even more so since the 2000s — a growth that the impacts of the global financial crisis of 2008, then the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, have certainly diminished. In the Western countries, many commentators conclude too hastily that these exports would constitute the fundamental engine of growth of the country. Nevertheless, this forgets the essential, that is to say, that the development strategy, designed and implemented with determination and regularity by the Chinese leaders, is based on a self-centered “model.”

This “model” (even if China does not seek to export it) is based — and this is one of the “secrets” of its performance on world markets — on the maintenance of a vast and very powerful state sector, with a dynamic role for the entire national economic fabric, especially the industrial sectors, including small and medium-sized businesses. Although more limited than in the past, the public sector still represents a large part of industrial assets (in construction, steelmaking, basic materials, semi-finished products, etc.) and almost all of them in strategic areas for the country’s, like infrastructure in energy, transport, telecommunications, and of course armaments — in addition to the banking and financial sectors.

The expansion of Chinese exports was therefore carried out on the basis of successful, deep industrialization — a process which was very long, difficult and costly — and on the affirmation of rigorous control of openness to the global system by integrating it into the framework of a development strategy which has been mastered. Thus, the content of these exports could be modified to concern increasingly more sophisticated production, high-tech goods and services which now represent more than half of the total value of goods exported by China.

Today, a majority of Chinese entrepreneurs in industrial sectors — whose patriotic feeling and attachment to the image and success of their country must not be neglected — are interested in domestic markets for their production. It is then above all the growth in domestic demand which guides their investment programs towards optimism. And this domestic demand is stimulated by increasing household consumption and by very active state spending, in particular thanks to public infrastructure work throughout the country (including and especially in its least developed regions), the promotion of new intermediate-sized urban areas towards the interior of the country, but also the adoption of measures favorable to the agricultural world.

Thanks to the stimulating progress of technological innovation in all fields (such as robotics, nuclear power, space, etc.) and increasingly dominated nationally, the country’s productive structures have been able to evolve from “made in China” to “made by China.” As a result, the accelerated rate of increase in labor productivity gains has made it possible to support increases in industrial wages, without the increase in Chinese labor costs relative to other competing countries in the South deteriorating the competitiveness of national companies in China.

In addition, social services (education, health, etc.) are entirely or largely in the hands of the Chinese state — either the central government or, more often, local governments. These services do not provide commodified goods, but social goods, giving individuals the capacity to be fully political, social and economic subjects, well trained, in good health, with access to good jobs, with transport facilities, well informed. … The scope of public services is broad and extended to “strategic” goods which provide essential inputs to the entire economy. Compared to the private sector, the public sector is voluntarily favored by the state. This expanded concept of public services constitutes one of the main forces of the current economy. What is at stake here, fundamentally, is the defense of national sovereignty.

A remarkable feature of the Chinese political-economic system is its powerful planning which, although it has changed greatly in its objectives and instruments in recent decades, continues to be used. And very powerfully. This planning, which projects itself towards the future in a world full of uncertainties, is the place where collective choices are developed and decided, as expressions of a general will. It is the authentic space where a nation chooses a common destiny and the means for a sovereign people to become its own master, in all areas of its existence: way of life, ways of consuming, housing and occupying or developing the national territory, precise definition of the relationships maintained by human beings with their environment and nature. …

TX: 7) China has long adhered to the Five Principles of Peaceful Co-Existence. In recent years, China proposed the Community of Common Destiny and three major initiatives, including the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative and the Global Civilization Initiative. How do you view these principles and initiatives? Do you believe there are some differences between the views of China and the West on global governance?

RH: There are very big differences between the conceptions of “global governance” according to China and the United States. Since the beginning of the 1990s, the main international institutions, first and foremost the IMF and the World Bank, have regularly made recommendations on “good governance” to their member states. Nevertheless, the definitions of this notion, and with them the scope of its content, vary considerably from one organization to another, which makes it impossible to establish precise legal contours — all the more so since governance can also, as we know, refer to “global governance,” or “corporate governance,” or even “environmental governance,” etc.

In the context of its lending and “surveillance” operations, the IMF has sought to promote good governance covering “all aspects of the conduct of public affairs.” Applicable by countries receiving its technical assistance, and closely associated with the fight against corruption, its code of good governance aims, among other things, to try to make economic policy decisions more transparent, to gain access to the maximum amount of information on public finances, to standardize control practices and, more recently, to “combat the financing of terrorism.”

As to the World Bank, it intends to broaden the scope of this good governance of countries to “go beyond public sector dysfunction to help them integrate reforms” aimed at improving mechanisms for allocating public resources and “institutional arrangements of the State, processes of policy formulation, decision-making and implementation, and relations between citizens and government.” While the Asian Development Bank most often emphasizes private sector participation, the OECD focuses on accountability, transparency, both efficiency and effectiveness, foresight as well as the rule of law. …

Despite the indeterminacy of the concept of governance, and the most varied criteria of normative judgment that are attached to it, the objectives formulated by these international institutions are quite clear and convergent: what is aimed at, ultimately, is the inflection of the policies followed by national states — or “client countries,” as their experts say — in the direction of the establishment of institutional environments that are the most favorable to the opening up of the economies of the South to the globalized financial markets.

However, this strategy, which has been uniformly imposed on these countries since the early 1980s through structural adjustment programs (SAPs), deregulation and privatization programs, and the free movement of capital, among other measures, has proven to be a failure in all areas and on all continents. Reflecting the now hegemonic power of high finance, neoliberalism is not a model of development, but a model of domination and exploitation. Its economic destructions, its social disasters, its human dramas are too well known to be recalled here.

Faced with the impossible “management of the crisis” of the world system by neoliberalism and the refusal of international institutions to recognize the urgency of an alternative that would add to the dynamics of capital’s expansion some limits external to its profit maximization logic, this good governance could only harden the criticism of “state failures.” However, the coincidence of moralistic discourses on the responsibility of states that would be solely to blame for all the problems encountered, and on the irresponsibility of civil servants, is nothing other than a legitimization of the ultraliberal option of abandoning the major functions of the state, going in some cases as far as the delegation to a foreign power of national defense, the substitution of the national currency by a strong foreign currency or the privatization of the collection of taxes graciously entrusted to a few private companies. …

Indissociable from the pursuit of neoliberalism and the societal project that is the objective of its deployment, the new anti-state ideological dogma of good governance can only be seen as the inverted symmetry of good government. The aim is not the development of democratic participation of individuals and peoples in the processes of discussion and decision concerning them, nor the respect of their fundamental right to development, but to push states to deregulate markets, that is to say, to re-regulate them by the sole forces of globally dominant capital.

Managing the state apparatuses of the South (and of the East) directly from the center of the capitalist world system (that is, from the North), while neutralizing their state power, divesting them of all real prerogatives, constraining their margins of maneuver to the extreme, and recolonizing them with a smile — this is, seen from the United States, the secret of “ideal” global governance. Nothing to do, therefore, with the vision of peaceful and cooperative governance desired and implemented by the Chinese government.

TX: 8) With the increase in the intensity of regional conflicts such as Russia-Ukraine and Palestine-Israel, the lack of global security and global governance capabilities is significantly affecting economic growth around the world. What role do you think China will play in global governance in the future? If there is a struggle for “world dominance,” how will the West respond to its declining influence?

RH: The current global situation is very serious and worrying, but we must be aware of its causes. In my opinion, due to the very fact that the United States continues to exercise (for a while yet) its hegemony over the world and that in the United States itself, the high-finance oligopolies, which control the military-industrial complex, push for military interventions in an attempt to continue to impose their domination, we can observe that the world system finds itself trapped in a destructive and extremely dangerous spiral of capitalist crisis and imperialist war. Overaccumulation is a chronic disease of capitalism, which marks its structural tendency to enter into crisis — and into decadence. A terribly dramatic “solution” exists for the capitalists: the devalorization of capital through its massive destruction by war.

Today, within finance itself, there is a systemic crisis: capital will not find internal solutions to the contradictory dynamics it deploys. This is the reason why the extreme form of devaluation of capital —that is to say, war — is more and more often used by the dominant factions of capital, those of high finance. In the United States, instead of having economic growth driven by a strategy oriented towards production, these fractions of the dominant classes, at least those with “globalist” interests, have chosen to promote an accumulation of fictitious capital of both a financial and military nature.

The imperialist war is there to reproduce the conditions for maintaining the command of finance over the global capitalist system. These factions only maintain their power through their interests in the military-industrial complex which offer new outlets, as well as new opportunities for speculation. Under their domination, the world system functions through the armed force of the United States and NATO, which it commands — the basis of this visible violence being the invisible one of capitalist relations of production. Today, total militarization has become the mode of existence of the capital of financial oligopolies.

Today, and in reality since the fall of the USSR, U.S. military spending is mainly carried out through debt in dollars, which is achieved through the issue of Treasury bonds — therefore, by resorting to fictitious capital, whose financing burden is transferred to third countries. This type of expenditure thus becomes a source of profitability for financial capital, because it can transform unproductive capital, financed by public debt, into fictitious capital. Then, faced with the downward trend in the rate of profit in civilian production, the war economy can constitute the “alternative” for capitalists.

In times of crisis, war is integrated into the cycle of capital as destruction of capital. However, the U.S. government will not be able to revitalize capitalist accumulation through war, because the destruction of capital caused by these armed conflicts, considerable for the societies which suffer them, is insufficient to stimulate a new long cycle of economic expansion. Insufficient, unless these imperialist wars expand and become permanent within the systemic crisis, through an aggravation of the North-South confrontation. Nevertheless, this strategy of total war led by high finance is at a dead end.

U.S. hegemony is in crisis and its difficulties are insurmountable. Its capacity to support its armies is exhausted. And it would be even worse for it if the anchor of the petrodollar escaped. The destabilization of the dollar, the pillar of this hegemony, could unbalance the other one, i.e., the military pillar, which depends on the country’s debt capacity. As soon as U.S. Treasury bonds are no longer in demand, the source of financing for the military-industrial complex will dry up, revealing its unproductive nature.

And if the United States could no longer maintain its network of [more than 1,150] military bases abroad, the current unipolar world would be called into question. Among the options for ending the crisis considered by the dominant factions of globalist financial capital, there is unfortunately that of the generalization of a project of warlike destruction — even if, ultimately, imperialist wars further aggravate the capitalist imbalances. The contradictions of capitalism are so serious today that the present situation resembles less the beginning of the end of the systemic crisis than the beginning of a process of slow, gradual collapse of the current stage of oligopolistic financialized capitalism.

However, the “peaceful coexistence” between the two superpowers of yesterday [United States and USSR] had led to a substitution of military war — with the exception of localized conflicts — by economic war. Today, the new “Cold War” between the United States and China has recently taken the form of a trade war launched by Washington against Beijing — adding to a currency war launched by the U.S. dollar against the whole world. But the seriousness of the situation is such that the risk is re-emerging today that we will move from monetary-commercial war to military war, which would take on a global scale.

The urgency at present is therefore to stop the “regulation” of the world by war under U.S. hegemony. We must dismantle the logic of crisis and war driven by high finance by imposing democratic control on it, and therefore think about alternatives to capitalism. The defense of peace and the reactivation of the socialist project are today’s priorities. In this context, China has a fundamental role to play in these transformations. If it is helped by state support and popular solidarity at the global level, it has the capabilities because, unlike the United States, it deploys a non-financial and non-war strategic project.

https://socialistchina.org/2024/08/08/r ... apitalism/

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State intervention an indispensable factor in China’s economic success
The following article by Michael Roberts reviews and summarises a new book by Brazilian Marxist economists Adalmir Antonio Marquetti, Alessandro Miebach and Henrique Morrone, entitled Unequal Development and Capitalism: Catching Up and Falling Behind in the Global Economy.

The central focus of the book is measuring the progress of Global South countries in catching up with the imperialist countries in terms of economic development. Roberts summarises the authors’ key finding as follows: “The ‘follower’ countries (the Global South) will generally have higher profit rates than the ‘leader’ countries (the imperialist Global North) because their capital-labour ratio (in Marxist terminology, the organic composition of capital) is lower.” However, “as these countries try to industrialise, the capital-labour ratio will rise and so will the productivity of labour.” As a result, “capital productivity will tend to decline and this eventually will slow the rise in labour productivity.”

Consequently, “many Global South countries will never ‘bridge the gap’ on labour productivity and thus on living standards because the profitability of capital in the Global South will quickly dissipate compared to the Global North”.

How to overcome this contradiction where increased productivity of labour leads to a falling rate of profit, thereby decelerating development? The book’s authors write: “This issue is observed in many middle-income trap countries. In these cases, state intervention becomes essential, expanding investment even as the profit rate declines, as in China.” To which Roberts comments: “Exactly. China’s success in catching up, which so frightens US imperialism now, is down to state-led investment overcoming the impact of falling profitability on capital investment.”

China has “a model of development based on dominant public ownership of finance and strategic sectors and a national plan for investment and growth”. As a result, “only China is closing the gap on per capita GDP with the imperialist bloc”. This chimes with Samir Amin’s observation that “China is the only authentically emergent country”.
Brazilian Marxist economists Adalmir Antonio Marquetti, Alessandro Miebach and Henrique Morrone have produced an important and insightful book on global capitalist development, with an innovative new way of measuring the progress for the majority of humanity in the so-called Global South in ‘catching up’ on living standards with the ‘Global North’.

In this book Marquetti et al argue that unequal development has been a defining characteristic of capitalism. “Throughout history, countries and regions have exhibited differences in labor productivity growth – a key determinant in poverty reduction and development – and although some nations may catch up with the productivity levels or well-being of developed economies at times, others fall behind.”

They propose a model of economic development based on technical change, profit rate and capital accumulation, on the one hand, and institutional change, on the other. Together these two factors should be combined to explain the dynamics of catching up or falling behind.

They base their development model on what Duncan Foley called the ‘Marx-bias’ and what Paul Krugman has called ‘capital bias’; namely that in capitalist accumulation there will be a rise in the organic composition of capital (rising mechanization compared to labour input) leading to an increase in the productivity of labour, but also a tendency for the profitability of accumulated capital to fall.

Surprisingly, however, the authors do not use Marx’s specific categories to analyse this development of capitalism globally. They adopt what they call is a model in the ‘classical- Marxian tradition’ (so not actually Marxist), which is composed of two variables: rising labour productivity (defined as output per worker); and falling capital productivity (which is defined as output per unit of capital or fixed assets). The problem with this model is that the Marxist categories of surplus value (s/v) and the organic composition of capital (C/v) are now obscured. Instead, we have labour productivity (v+s)/v) and ‘capital productivity’ (v+s/C)). Cancelling out v+s, we get C/v or Marx’s organic composition of capital.

In Marx’s theory of development, the key variable is the rate of profit. Put in its most general terms, if total assets grow, due to the labour-shedding nature of new technologies, employment grows less (or even falls) than the growth in total assets (C/v rises). Since only labour produces value and surplus value, less surplus value (s/v) is generated relative to total investments. The rate of profit falls and less capital is invested. Thus, the rate of change of the GDP falls.

To me, it seems unnecessary to use their particular measures over Marx’s own categories, which I think provide a clearer picture of capitalist development than this ‘classical-Marxian’ one. At one point, the authors say that “The decrease in capital productivity in the follower country reduces the profit rate and capital accumulation.” But using Marx’s categories should lead you to say the opposite: a falling profit rate will reduce capital accumulation and lower ‘capital productivity’.

Nevertheless, it is these two measures that the authors measure, using the fantastic Extended World Penn Tables that Adalmir Marquetti has perfected over the years from the Penn World Tables. “The dataset we employ is the Extended Penn World Tables version 7.0, EPWT 7.0. It is an extension of the Penn World Tables version 10.0 (Feenstra, Inklaar and Timmer, 2015), associating the variables in the data set with the growth-distribution schedule. The EPWT 7.0 allows us to investigate the relations between economic growth, capital accumulation, income distribution, and technical change in the processes of catching up and falling behind.”

Using these two measures the authors confirm that the ‘Marx-biased’ pattern of technical change of capital-using and labor-saving occurred in 80 countries. The authors then compare their two measures of ‘productivity’ and argue that economies can ‘catch up’ with the leading capitalist economies, with the US at the head, “if accumulation rates are higher in the follower country, leading to a reduction in disparities in labor and capital productivities, the capital-labor ratio, the average real wage, the profit rate, capital accumulation, and social consumption between countries.”

The authors’ model argues that capital productivity will tend to fall as labour productivity rises for all countries. Countries with lower labor productivity tend to exhibit higher capital pro­ductivity, while countries with high labor productivity tend to have lower capital productivity.

The ‘follower’ countries (the Global South) will generally have higher profit rates than the ‘leader’ countries (the imperialist Global North) because their capital-labour ratio (in Marxist terminology, the organic composition of capital) is lower. Marx too reckoned that a less developed country has lower ‘labour productivity’ and higher ‘capital productivity’ than the developed one. However, he described it as: “the profitability of capital invested in the colonies … is generally higher there on account of the lower degree of development.”

Not surprisingly, the authors find that the capital-labour ratio and labour productivity have a positive correlation. “For countries with low capital-labor ratios, there exists a concave relationship between these variables. Furthermore, the fitted lines illustrate a movement toward the northeast between 1970 and 2019, indicating that countries have been increasing their capital-labor ratios and labor productivity along the path of economic growth.”

As these countries try to industrialise, the capital-labour ratio will rise and so will the productivity of labour. If the productivity of labour grows faster than in the leader countries, then catching up will take place. However, capital productivity (and more important to me, the profitability of capital accumulation) will tend to decline and this eventually will slow the rise in labour productivity. In a joint work by Guglielmo Carchedi and me, using Marxist categories, we also found that the dominated countries’ profitability starts above that of the imperialist ones because of their lower organic composition of capital BUT also “the dominated countries’ profitability, while persistently higher than in the imperialist countries, falls more than in the imperialist bloc.”

The authors also identify the trajectory of the relative profitability of capital between the leaders and the followers in the process of development and the importance of this in ‘catching up’. “The advantages of lower mechanization in follower countries, implying in smaller labor productivity and higher capital productivity and, therefore a higher profit rate, begin to erode when capital productivity declines more rapidly than labor productivity increases. It indicates that the follower country is gradually losing its backwardness advantage as the disparities in profit rates and incentives for capital accumulation diminish relative to the leading country, potentially jeopardizing the catching-up process.”

What this tells me is that many Global South countries will never ‘bridge the gap’ on labour productivity and thus on living standards because the profitability of capital in the Global South will quickly dissipate compared to the Global North. This is what we found in our study: “Since 1974, the rate of profit of the imperialist (G7) bloc has fallen by 20%, but the higher rate of the dominated bloc has fallen by 32%. This leads to a convergence of the two blocs’ profit rates over time.”

Through their model, the authors were able to analyse the dynamics of the catching up process. They found that “there is no consistent pattern of catching up, about half of the sample fell further behind. The increasing data spread as the labor productivity gap and the distance from the leader expanded suggests that while some countries benefit from their backwardness, others in a similar situation do not take advantage of it. “

Asia was the continent with the highest number of successful countries in catching up, in contrast to Latin America which generally failed to make much progress. Many Eastern European economies also experienced ‘falling behind’ while African countries in general “still suffer from the consequences of decolonization” – or to be more accurate, I think, from previously lengthy and vicious colonization.

What this shows is the importance of institutional factors in the development process – which the authors correctly emphasise. “The interplay between institutional organization, on one side, and how technical change and income distribution affect the profit rates, which is a key determinant of capital accumulation and growth, on the other, is crucial in addressing the fundamental question of how developing countries can initiate and maintain rapid labor productivity growth over time.”

And here we come to an important conclusion in relation to the theory of imperialism in the 21st century. Marx once said that “the country that is more developed industrially only shows to the less developed the image of its own future.” The book’s economic model aligns with Marx’s view that underdeveloped countries should follow the path of technical change set by developed capitalist nations. But as the authors recognize “this trajectory often leads to a decline in the profit rate and, therefore, a decrease in the incentives for investment and capital accumulation. How to circumvent this problem is one of the central issues that a national development plan must face.”

Without strong state intervention, the contradiction between a falling rate of profit and increasing the productivity of labour cannot be overcome. As the authors put it “This issue is observed in many middle-income trap countries. In these cases, state intervention becomes essential, expanding investment even as the profit rate declines, as in China.” Exactly. China’s success in catching up, which so frightens US imperialism now, is down to state-led investment overcoming the impact of falling profitability on capital investment.

In recognizing this, the authors strangely refer to the “Keynesian proposition of socialization of investment, contrasting sharply with the policies pursued by most Latin American countries during neoliberalism, when there was a decline in investments by the state and public enterprises.” Apparently, the authors seem to suggest, if Latin American governments had adopted Keynesian policies, they would not be locked into the so-called ‘middle income trap’ but instead be catching up like China. But China is not a model of Keynesian ‘socialised investment’ (which, by the way, Keynes never promoted in his economic policy prescriptions); instead, it is a model of development based on dominant public ownership of finance and strategic sectors and a national plan for investment and growth (something Keynes vehemently opposed), with capitalist forces relegated to following not controlling.

Indeed, as the authors say: “the aspects discussed above point to the fundamental relevance of state capacities as the primary locus where strategies and conditions for industri­alization are conceived and implemented. Unlike the market, which allocates resources primarily to maximize profits without guaranteeing national development, the state remains, in the XXI Century, the political and economic entity capable of intentionally driving industrialization.” And they point out that “China increased its investment rate, even in the face of declining profitability ….. China has demonstrated a capacity to adapt to developmental challenges, suggesting that the labor productivity gap between China and the US, even if at a lower velocity, will continue to decline.”

The reality is that in the 21st century, catching up is not happening for nearly all countries and populations of the ‘Global South’. Take the so-called BRICS. Only China is closing the gap on per capita GDP with the imperialist bloc. Over the last 40 years, South Africa has fallen further behind, while Brazil and India have made little progress.

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The authors provide us with a startling statistic. In 2019, the average worker in the Central African Republic, one of the poorest countries worldwide, produced 6.8 dollars per day when measured at 2017 pur­chasing power parity. In India, the average worker produces 50.4 dollars daily, while in the United States, the average worker produces 355.9 dollars. “The rapid expansion of labor productivity is a fundamental step in reducing poverty and improving the well-being of the poor population. However, it has been an enormous challenge for backward nations to achieve high growth rates in labor productivity and catch up with the developed countries.”

https://socialistchina.org/2024/08/06/s ... c-success/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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