Why in News?

Prabhat Patnaik writes: Its development strategy since the 1980s has not been oriented towards building socialism, but towards turning China into a big power.

Syllabus—GS2: India & its Neighbourhood relations

• The context within which the Chinese Communist Party(CCP) was formed a century  ago & the context within which it operates today, have fear of imperialist encirclement it’s a desire to lead China out of such a predicament is, common
• Even after 100 years, the threat of encirclement has not lifted.
• Though there was an actual imperialist presence on Chinese soil a century ago but today there is no actual occupation but the threat persists.

Birth of Communist Party in China:

• The Bolshevik Revolution had an electrifying effect on Asian countries suffering from the dehumanizing impact of imperialism.
• For the first time, its project of the world revolution addressed their needs.
• Immediately after the Bolshevik Revolution, Communist parties were formed all over Asia :
  • Indonesia (1920), India & China (1921).
• On July 1, 1921, 13 Chinese delegates meet to found the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that had a vision of the world for a century that is vastly different from what the world is today.
• Their vision would have been of world capitalism, imperialism, unemployment, poverty, exploitation & an egalitarian China with a sense of community ensconced within a universe of socialism.

100 years of Progress:

• China had made enormous strides over these hundred years under the CCP leadership.
• A nation that imperialist powers sought to convert into opium addicts through the Opium Wars of the 19^th century & Japanese imperialism into colonial appendage has now become today as world’s 2^nd largest economic power.
• Its technological prowess has been impressive.
• Additionally, its recent ambitious space program further manifested its tech power.
• Most importantly, it is the only third-world country of significance that appears to have climbed out of its state of underdevelopment.

The Issues in the Chinese Progress:

• Income inequality is quite pronounced but not as great as in other undeveloped nations.
• The official claim of zero poverty is untenable because it is arrived at by taking a very low poverty line of 9 yuan per day in early 2020 which is insufficient for meeting all one’s basic needs.
• The persistence of poverty is not surprising because China still has large unutilized labour reserves with which poverty is usually correlated.
• China’s unemployment & poverty are proportionately much lower than in countries like India but they are not disappeared.

Chinese Path to Progress:

• China’s experience is very different from that of the Soviet Union & other socialist nations which had used their labour reserves & achieved full employment, a feat unparalleled in the contemporary world.
• Most criticize China & communist nations for being one-party states & for imposing restrictions on individual freedom,
  • But at the same time, they also agree China has eliminated unemployment & absolute poverty.
  • This is considered as the chief hallmark of actually-existing socialism &,
  •  Also, economist Janos kornai remarked that classical capitalism is demand constrained while classical socialism is resource-constrained.
• China’s development trajectory since the 1980s has not been oriented towards building socialism in the sense of creating a community with which the individual can lead an unalienated life.
• It has not even been oriented towards achieving full employment & eliminating poverty.
• Rather its orientation has been towards making China into a big power.
• Its project has been essentially nationalist rather than socialist which has been caused by the ever-present threat of imperialism.

Way forward: –

• There is a lot of debate on the economic trajectory followed in China because China has become more powerful through the pursuit of a strategy that also harnesses the private capital resources of both domestic & foreign.
• The CCP has followed this strategy over the last four decades, though it has made several course corrections to ensure that popular anger in its economic policies does not reach a flashpoint.
• Likewise at different stages along the reforms path the CCP has used different props to keep its high growth rate going.

Question: –

Though China with its own modified socialism has been performing well but it is a mistake to think that a socialist strategy based on the development of the communes would have been less effective in thwarting the imperialist encirclement of China. Comment.