Good question. First thing to note is that I’m no expert. I’ve just become increasingly curious and begun to try to understand the place. Second note: I’ll speak as if you have limited knowledge of Marxism for the benefit of other readers rather than assuming that of you personally.
This may seem pedantic but the answer depends what you mean by Marxism, communism, and capitalism. What counts as a capitalist state? What counts as a communist state? What does it mean to be governed by Marxists?
We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things.
The present state is a class society of global capitalism. The only way to avoid that while it exists is by (extreme) isolationism. (Even then, does one really ‘avoid’ it? Western imperialists won’t leave you alone if you close the borders to them, so….) The only way to abolish global capitalism is world revolution, which takes time.
A revolution is a transformation in the mode of production. Given the interconnectedness of human society, I’d argue it’s impossible to have that revolution for as long as capitalism is the dominant political economy. Is it possible to share the world between socialism and a weaker capitalism? Time will tell. For now: capitalist social relations cannot be avoided.
The early stage of moving away from capitalism towards communism is called socialism. This socialism can be broken into several stages of ‘socialist construction’. Until Deng, China wasn’t quite isolationist but it went through two processes that made external relations difficult:
conducting a revolution and
starting the task of socialist construction.
The first was achieved. The landlords and imperialists were kicked out. The second process is well underway. China is in a stage of ‘primitive’ socialism. The CPC seems reluctant to claim too much.
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Inviting capital inside China
The question is: where is China now i.e. where has it been since Deng’s reforms or the ‘opening up’? These reforms saw China open its borders to foreign capital and letting domestic capital develop. This is the point at which China began to gain, as you say, the ‘trappings of capitalism’.
Why did they do this? During the revolution and the early days of afterwards, China rapidly developed the relations of production (bye bye exploitative relations between foreign imperialists / local landlords and super exploited peasants). But its forces of production only developed so far.
Deng, realising something must be done, applied dialectical and historical materialism to the situation. There’s no such thing as poor socialism but when producing the means of subsistence (food, shelter, clothing, medicine, etc) requires lots of labour-hours because you don’t have machines, computers, reliable energy sources, etc, you simply cannot lift people’s standard of living very far.
The solution was ‘market’ reforms. Foreign capital would be given favourable conditions to invest and build factories, infrastructure, etc, in return for sharing intellectual property with China (the designs and knowledge for building everything).
–
Staying in charge
Since then, China has come to rival the ‘most advanced’ capitalist states in terms of research and development and has surpassed them in terms of productive capacity. This makes China well defended against sanctions. So much so that the US can cut Huawei off from chips and China will brush it off by catching up and making its own chips in a matter of months (if writing for a Chinese paper / a ~couple of~ years, if writing for a western paper).
Which is to say, Deng was right: with ‘capitalist’ development, China could advance more rapidly than without. Does this mean China ‘became’ capitalist?
–
What is a capitalist state?
A capitalist state is one in which ‘capital’ is at the top, as it is in liberal democracies (and fascist attempts at ethno-states). Marx and Engels:
the bourgeoisie has at last, since the establishment of Modern Industry and of the world market, conquered for itself, in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway. The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.
In e.g. France or Japan, it goes: capitalist class > state > working class.
Since opening up (after Xi’s anti-corruption drive, at least), the CPC has remained in charge of the country. In China, the executive—the government—is a ‘committee for managing the affairs of the whole…’ proletariat. According to its constitution:
Article 1 The People’s Republic of China is a socialist state under the people’s democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants.
The socialist system is the basic system of the People’s Republic of China. Disruption of the socialist system by any organization or individual is prohibited.
Article 2 All power in the People’s Republic of China belongs to the people.
The National People’s Congress and the local people’s congresses at various levels are the organs through which the people exercise state power.
The people administer State affairs and manage economic and cultural undertakings and social affairs through various channels and in various ways in accordance with the provisions of law.
It goes, working class > state > capitalist class. The workers control the party, the party controls the state, and the state controls the capitalists.
For evidence of this, we might look at high speed rail (HSR). As you might know if you live in any other capitalist country, affordable, efficient, well-maintained, wide-spreading public transport is not profitable enough for capitalists. They want us all to buy a personal vehicle. They want to tarmac and concrete over everything to build inefficient roads and car parks.
China can avoid the profit-motive trap because it’s run by Marxists who don’t much care for the profit motive, except as a tool for developing the country to prepare it for a higher, wealthier stage of socialism. Which does mean that capitalists aren’t allowed to sell cars and (I assume) lobby for building roads, etc. But their power is limited. They don’t have the power to shut down and torpedo public infrastructure projects as they do in capitalist states.
In Marxist theory, there are concepts of an economic base and a superstructure. These are connected but separate. The base ‘overdetermines’ the superstructure, meaning that although the superstructure is influential, it cannot, of itself, fundamentally change the base.
Law is often said to belong to the ‘superstructure’. China appears to have built and is continuing to build a socialist legal system. It is on the path and/or road to socialist ‘rule of law’ construction.
Roland Boer has explained this partly means abolishing the public/private distinction in law and governance, which is distinction is characteristic of capitalist law and governance. This is related to and part of China’s ‘democratic centralism’. Both are based on a dialectical materialist (read: Marxist) logic of ‘both this—and that’ rather than a bourgeois logic of ‘either-or or zero-sum’ (Boer, page 59 citing Engels, Dialectics of Nature).
The fact that these moves are possible and coherent suggests that China’s political economy is not capitalist even if it contains elements of capitalism. It would not be possible to achieve the above superstructural changes within a bourgeois, i.e. capitalist state because these changes fundamentally contradict the logic of capital, private property, liberal individualism, etc.
In addition, China has opened Schools of Marxism in its universities. As communists well know: the only thing it really takes to make revolutionaries is to teach them Marxism. That’s why it’s so difficult to achieve in the west. The bourgeois prevent and propagandise against it at every turn. In China they embrace it, encourage specialists to develop Chinese Marxism, and require students to study it.
…Marxism has an incomparable influence on contemporary Chinese politics, culture, and social life that no other humanities or social science disciplines can match.
–
Conclusion
In conclusion, your intuition is correct. There are capitalists in China, which is seen as a necessary step in developing socialism. It does not contradict core Marxist theory. The CPC keeps control of its capitalists by ensuring Marxist knowledge is widespread and maintaining a dictatorship of the proletariat. A higher stage of socialism will appear in time if China continues along its present trajectory and bourgeois social relations whither away.
Good question. First thing to note is that I’m no expert. I’ve just become increasingly curious and begun to try to understand the place. Second note: I’ll speak as if you have limited knowledge of Marxism for the benefit of other readers rather than assuming that of you personally.
This may seem pedantic but the answer depends what you mean by Marxism, communism, and capitalism. What counts as a capitalist state? What counts as a communist state? What does it mean to be governed by Marxists?
What does it mean to be Marxist revolutionary?
Marx and Engels:
The present state is a class society of global capitalism. The only way to avoid that while it exists is by (extreme) isolationism. (Even then, does one really ‘avoid’ it? Western imperialists won’t leave you alone if you close the borders to them, so….) The only way to abolish global capitalism is world revolution, which takes time.
A revolution is a transformation in the mode of production. Given the interconnectedness of human society, I’d argue it’s impossible to have that revolution for as long as capitalism is the dominant political economy. Is it possible to share the world between socialism and a weaker capitalism? Time will tell. For now: capitalist social relations cannot be avoided.
The early stage of moving away from capitalism towards communism is called socialism. This socialism can be broken into several stages of ‘socialist construction’. Until Deng, China wasn’t quite isolationist but it went through two processes that made external relations difficult:
The first was achieved. The landlords and imperialists were kicked out. The second process is well underway. China is in a stage of ‘primitive’ socialism. The CPC seems reluctant to claim too much.
–
Inviting capital inside China
The question is: where is China now i.e. where has it been since Deng’s reforms or the ‘opening up’? These reforms saw China open its borders to foreign capital and letting domestic capital develop. This is the point at which China began to gain, as you say, the ‘trappings of capitalism’.
Why did they do this? During the revolution and the early days of afterwards, China rapidly developed the relations of production (bye bye exploitative relations between foreign imperialists / local landlords and super exploited peasants). But its forces of production only developed so far.
Deng, realising something must be done, applied dialectical and historical materialism to the situation. There’s no such thing as poor socialism but when producing the means of subsistence (food, shelter, clothing, medicine, etc) requires lots of labour-hours because you don’t have machines, computers, reliable energy sources, etc, you simply cannot lift people’s standard of living very far.
The solution was ‘market’ reforms. Foreign capital would be given favourable conditions to invest and build factories, infrastructure, etc, in return for sharing intellectual property with China (the designs and knowledge for building everything).
–
Staying in charge
Since then, China has come to rival the ‘most advanced’ capitalist states in terms of research and development and has surpassed them in terms of productive capacity. This makes China well defended against sanctions. So much so that the US can cut Huawei off from chips and China will brush it off by catching up and making its own chips in a matter of months (if writing for a Chinese paper / a ~couple of~ years, if writing for a western paper).
Which is to say, Deng was right: with ‘capitalist’ development, China could advance more rapidly than without. Does this mean China ‘became’ capitalist?
–
What is a capitalist state?
A capitalist state is one in which ‘capital’ is at the top, as it is in liberal democracies (and fascist attempts at ethno-states). Marx and Engels:
In e.g. France or Japan, it goes: capitalist class > state > working class.
Since opening up (after Xi’s anti-corruption drive, at least), the CPC has remained in charge of the country. In China, the executive—the government—is a ‘committee for managing the affairs of the whole…’ proletariat. According to its constitution:
It goes, working class > state > capitalist class. The workers control the party, the party controls the state, and the state controls the capitalists.
For evidence of this, we might look at high speed rail (HSR). As you might know if you live in any other capitalist country, affordable, efficient, well-maintained, wide-spreading public transport is not profitable enough for capitalists. They want us all to buy a personal vehicle. They want to tarmac and concrete over everything to build inefficient roads and car parks.
China can avoid the profit-motive trap because it’s run by Marxists who don’t much care for the profit motive, except as a tool for developing the country to prepare it for a higher, wealthier stage of socialism. Which does mean that capitalists aren’t allowed to sell cars and (I assume) lobby for building roads, etc. But their power is limited. They don’t have the power to shut down and torpedo public infrastructure projects as they do in capitalist states.
While the west gets ‘trickle down’ economics, China gets ‘[common prosperity]’(https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21598282.2022.2025561)'.
–
Superstructure
In Marxist theory, there are concepts of an economic base and a superstructure. These are connected but separate. The base ‘overdetermines’ the superstructure, meaning that although the superstructure is influential, it cannot, of itself, fundamentally change the base.
Law is often said to belong to the ‘superstructure’. China appears to have built and is continuing to build a socialist legal system. It is on the path and/or road to socialist ‘rule of law’ construction.
Roland Boer has explained this partly means abolishing the public/private distinction in law and governance, which is distinction is characteristic of capitalist law and governance. This is related to and part of China’s ‘democratic centralism’. Both are based on a dialectical materialist (read: Marxist) logic of ‘both this—and that’ rather than a bourgeois logic of ‘either-or or zero-sum’ (Boer, page 59 citing Engels, Dialectics of Nature).
The fact that these moves are possible and coherent suggests that China’s political economy is not capitalist even if it contains elements of capitalism. It would not be possible to achieve the above superstructural changes within a bourgeois, i.e. capitalist state because these changes fundamentally contradict the logic of capital, private property, liberal individualism, etc.
In addition, China has opened Schools of Marxism in its universities. As communists well know: the only thing it really takes to make revolutionaries is to teach them Marxism. That’s why it’s so difficult to achieve in the west. The bourgeois prevent and propagandise against it at every turn. In China they embrace it, encourage specialists to develop Chinese Marxism, and require students to study it.
The BBC isn’t a fan But it has been said that
–
Conclusion
In conclusion, your intuition is correct. There are capitalists in China, which is seen as a necessary step in developing socialism. It does not contradict core Marxist theory. The CPC keeps control of its capitalists by ensuring Marxist knowledge is widespread and maintaining a dictatorship of the proletariat. A higher stage of socialism will appear in time if China continues along its present trajectory and bourgeois social relations whither away.
–
Hopefully this answers your question.
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