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National liberation is a pretty key struggle, and I think there is every reason to believe that developing a national bourgeoisie is helpful in that struggle so long as they don’t gain undue influence in politics. Even the phillipines communist party, no fan of China, supports national liberation through the national democratic front. You can’t develop a communist society while imperialism is the principle dialectic in the world.
Love or hate Deng or China, it is undeniable that they are creating a multipolar world that is making it possible for other countries to follow their own socialist path.
The problem ultimately I think is in trying to discern what ‘undue’ influence is. I think what bothers me about this view is that it pretty much erases the historical fact that 1. Maoist China existed, 2. It survived despite imperialism and aggression from both superpowers, 3. The nationalist bourgeoisie were liquidated after New Democracy properly came to an end in 1954. What made China a success in my view compared to say India is in fact that they realized that the bourgeoisie could never be CURTAILED so much as they had to be abolished, which is why Mao was so paranoid about capitalist roaders propping up - the revolution would never be complete without them being sequestered from society.
In my view, what you have in China is a situation where many of the elites that Mao and the left of the Party disdained are suddenly in a much better situation. As a personal anecdote - I knew kids who joined the Party in college because it meant that they would be able to get better finance jobs. The Party has become a sort of quasi corporate entity in that as an institution it doesn’t have a hostility to capital per se so much as it uses certain language to proclaim that it is against capital’s dominance. But my bet is that of Mao’s: an iota of capitalist influence will eventually corrupt any political project to overthrow it.
As a personal anecdote - I knew kids who joined the Party in college because it meant that they would be able to get better finance jobs.
Why is that a bad thing? Would you prefer if success in finanace wasn’t contingent on joinging the party?
I would prefer if the Party had a hostile attitude to the idea of finance, frankly. Having posters at econ schools that have mottos along the lines of “March with the Party - start your own company!” does not scream hostile to capital to me. Yes, I am not joking - it exists.
