Reganoff2 [none/use name]

GMD and CCP are usually much more common. KMT is generally almost only exclusively used to refer to the party as it exists in Taiwan at the moment, though this is a somewhat recent change. I’ve actually never read a historian that uses CPC instead of CCP, poli sci people are somewhat different however.

The class interests are of course real and the Dems will never realize it, but part of materialist analysis is also understanding hegemony and reification of cultural norms that spawned out of material interests long gone. That’s how you get false consciousness - people are willing to act against their best interests precisely because they have been inculcated to believe they are better than the other race, religion, state etc. It is ultimately foolish to not accept that there are deeply reactionary currents in this country that have gripped working people, particularly white rural working people, in such false consciousness.

Perhaps but those feelings long outstrip current day ‘identity politics’. Even much of the policies designed in theory to help workers, such as some of the unionization drives in the 30s, helped white workers disproportionally above black ones, precisely to prevent them from feeling ‘left out’. Any concession to black people or workers cannot be seen as ‘not giving a shit about rural whites’ otherwise we are accepting that 1. The dems really do pander to black people, which is certifiably false and 2. It is worth abandoning commitments to racial justice and equality to appease a minority of white rural people (not all certainly) that will not be happy if any attention is given to POC people ever.

You’d actually be surprised as to what level of care was conducted by the barefoot doctors. Also I might point out that there is nothing in the definition of universal healthcare that suggests you need to have the very advanced equipment (not sure how much of that was largely available in the 1950s anyway). Universal healthcare is simply a system where all citizens are guaranteed easy access to healthcare. FYI the Maoist regime didn’t care for ‘traditional Chinese medicine’ (a nonsense term btw) but it is actually being significantly more espoused TODAY and even by government sources.

The justification as for why basic treatment’s access was changed was because the nature of health care largely changed. It stopped being solely the purview of the state. Private actors were allowed in, provincial governments felt they could let budgets slide. You can say that ah they couldn’t have gotten better tech if not for this budgetary change but I mean most government run healthcare programs would disagree.

While the Adrian Zenz stuff is suspect, there is actually a lot of very good faith analysis of the situation in China by people who (very much unlike the vast majority of people on this website) speak Chinese, have been to China, and actually want to encourage a balanced narrative about the CCP. A couple examples that immediately come to mind are some great articles from Made in China:

https://madeinchinajournal.com/2020/10/05/china-xinjiang-india-kashmir/ https://madeinchinajournal.com/2019/07/09/good-and-bad-muslims-in-xinjiang/

What these articles do a good job of doing is laying out the basis for current policy in Xinjiang (ie shift the centers of cultural and ideological power in order to quell separatist tendencies, terrorist or otherwise) while also showing the clear geneology these policies have with US war on terror rhetoric and broader shifts in the regime against ‘Islamist threats’. You will often here spouted that Muslim countries do not critique China and most of the critique comes exclusively from the NATO powers. This is true, because the former have clear economic ties with China that they are in no position to sever or put in jeopardy, and the US-backed NATO clique is escalating rhetoric against China. You will note that very few Muslim countries said anything about Kashmir, with the exception of Imran Khan in Pakistan, where the stakes are too high to not say anything. And I very much suspect most people on this chat will not approve of India also pursuing policies to defeat ‘terrorism’ and ‘separatism’ via manipulation of the education system, military occupation, securitization etc. The point here is that we should oppose all ideas that Americans are trying to help Uyghurs or promote freedom or whatever nonsense they spout. But to assume immediately that the opposite (that China simply wishes nothing more than to educate its backward populations to defang terrorism) reeks of frankly a colonialist mentality that suggests that wherever ‘Islamist’ politics is gaining traction, there is no material basis in this politics beyond ‘Muslims are mad and must be put in schools to cure them of their disease’. We must understand the material reasons as to why discontent is simmering in Xinjiang (and elsewhere - it is hardly the only restless border region).

Put another way, British policy during their war on Afghanistan in the 19th century was rather simple: Pathans have a violent, radical understanding of Islam, and the only language they will ever understand is that of terror. In other words, justification for a war program that consisted of burning villages, stealing children and putting them into schools to undo their ‘radical indoctrination’, etc. Obviously China isn’t going around butchering anyone (the initial takeover is a slightly different story, but anyway). But there is something to be said about the commonalities in governmental technologies - you securitize, you transform the educational system, you remake the religious landscape, you encourage migration from the center, etc. Just a quick look at demographics in Xinjiang and how quickly the Han population grew after the 70s will tell you a lot about the state of discontent in Xinjiang at the moment. Obviously there are actors who are under the thrall of ‘foreign’ influence, but if we step away from the discussion of camps and reeducation, everyone in Xinjiang is ultimately influenced by the reality of everyday policies in schools, on the street, racial profiling, etc, including those whose version of Islam is basically going to the mosque once a year to say your Eid prayers.

I’ve lived in the American south (South Carolina) and the English North, which has a similar feel in some respects. I am not a stranger to the people you are talking about. Nor am I saying we cannot reach people just because they are reactionary. Reactionary is not even, as I see it, a value judgement. It is simply a product of the dire material conditions you have outlined.

But let us not pretend that racism or xenophobia play no role whatsoever in the attraction that certain groups within the very broad category of ‘white working class’ have to the Republican Party. Again, this is why I mentioned false consciousness. It is really easy to convert even people who had unions and good jobs and care about worker’s rights etc to a reactionary cause if certain conditions are right, which you have outlined. But equally I think we also underestimate how much sway racial narratives and ideas of parochial communities have for people, to the extent that even if you do put good choices up to them, they may not often take it. I canvassed for Corbyn in 2017 even before Brexit shattered him. Plenty of people in the English North were willing to abandon Labour on the grounds of racism alone (me being brown did not help).

That isn’t a reason to give up, but it does need to be part of the conversation. Saying simply that all we need is to reach out and give them good policies and they will flip like a switch is a very vulgar type of materialism that also does little credit to these people or their agency. We need to educate, we need to radicalize, and we need to also combat reactionary tendencies when we see them.

I would be open to it, but tbh I sometimes find talking about it here a little exhausting. It is not that I think people have bad intentions, but there is often just a lot of bad faith interpretations of China from both demsoc AND tankie positions that navigating all the fraught politics of all and arguing with everyone becomes really tiring. But I’ll think about it!

The Soviets did not switch their support to the CCP. Initially, in fact, Stalin told the CCP to stand down, and he signed a trade agreement with Chiang Kai-Shek, and “Even as late as 1949, Stalin advised the CCP leaders to avoid provoking US intervention and stop disseminating forces at the Yangtze River, to reach an agreement with the GMD, and perhaps even to accept a partition of the country through a coalition government”. Cool story.

Also, yes, obviously the British made caste worst. But they also proclaimed that they were in India to destroy the excesses of the system (for example, attempting to outlaw the practice of Untouchability, destroy the practice of sati) etc. I am not saying that the British were somehow a progressive force. The point is they certainly believed they were, that they were there to civilize.

Also, in regards to Japan and China, AGAIN the point was using the EXCUSE OF MODERNIZATION to invade a fucking country. Again, China got rid of slavery in Tibet. Yes. But slavery was not as widespread as people claim, and they did not invade TIbet TO get rid of slavery. There were geopolitical, cynical interests. Whether you want to condemn those is entirely up to you, but to ignore them is just idiocy.

Does he a PhD in political science in China? I’ve a PhD in Chinese History. Should I be writing a book about the French Revolution as an expert? Again, Parenti’s work isn’t bad but it relies on the work other historians did. I say ‘did’, because the scholarship has evolved a lot since then.

So you basically reveal that you are pretty much a chauvinist - that a backward people should be made to be destroyed and progress regardless of the costs. You would’ve fit well amongst the progressives of the British Empire, begging to destroy the cruelties of the caste system in India.

It is necessary and good to study theorists and leaders from past socialist projects, even if you disagree with them, but also necessary to recognize that present material conditions combined with the reality of the anthropocene poses challenges that cannot be solved by the strategies of the past alone.