WASHINGTON (AP) — Communism, President Donald Trump says, is the greatest threat the U.S. has ever faced.
This summer, citing similarly grave concerns, he took the rare step of delivering a primetime address to the nation, accusing China of “sinister election meddling” in 2020 and reviving his yearslong push to dispute his loss in that year’s election.
Even as Trump seeks to decry Democrats as communists ahead of November’s midterm elections, he is rolling out the red carpet this week for Chinese President Xi Jinping, the leader of the world’s most powerful communist country.
The state visit comes as the president himself has increasingly directed his administration to take large stakes in private companies to try to stimulate the economy — something even some Republicans decry as corporate socialism.
China practices state capitalism, not communism. News outlets pretending that any major government is truly ‘communist’ provide the far-right with boogiemen that enable them to advance their extremist policies.
China has a socialist market economy. The commanding heights of the economy are publicly owned, while marketization is employed in secondary industries for the purpose of rapid development. It is also run by a proletarian, communist party. State capitalism would be closer to Singapore or the Republic of Korea, where private industry controls and runs the state.
This is laughable, Belgium has a larger public sector than China (percentage not total).
You are literally agreeing that socialism is “when gouvrmint does (owns) stuff”.
Oh my bad Carry on commrade, hopfully one day in the future you will be able to visit the workers paradise that is China. 共产党万岁！
Socialism is not “no private property,” nor is it “has a larger public sector.” Socialism is a mode of production and distribution where public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy, and the working classes control the state. The latter was decided in 1949 with the completion of the revolution, the former is maintained through the aforementioned public ownership of the commanding heights.
Sarcasm isn’t a point. The CPC is overwhelmingly proletarian, and ideologically Marxist-Leninist. These are basic facts about the CPC.
I’m sorry comrade they must have forgotten to invite me to this meeting. Glad you made it and can now report to us!
Jokes aside, how is this different than than a large public sector? Is Belgium only singled out because it doesn’t have a “proletarian” gouvernment? You have not definied what that even is. Just because his party doesn’t call itself Belgian Workers Party or something like that is Bart De Wever less proletarian than Xi Jinping or Li Keqiang? His parents were shop owners and railway workers. Xi and Li are both high ranking bureaucrats who are the children of other high ranking bureaucrats. Not one of them, nor their parents for that matter, were democratically elected.
If socialism is indeed as you say large public involvement in the economy and the working classes controlling the state Belgium is far more socialist than the PRC. They even have trade unions, so direct worker representation with considerable political power which China does not have. China has one trade union for everyone and it’s part of/controlled by the gouvernment. You don’t have to be a genius or even a socialist to come to the conclusion that this is a bad idea.
It’s so proletarian it’s largely made up of chinese buisnessmen like Jacky Ma.
Using China as an example for socialism is either very far removed from reality or cynical.
Regarding the definition of socialism being tied to social ownership being the principal aspect, and not simply a ratio, it’s because the commanding heights of the economy have direct and indirect control over the rest of the economy. If you have a few huge and critical industries, but a huge amount of your production by ratio consists of small proprietors and self-employed people, even if the critical industry is smaller by ratio it still dominates the overall economy.
The identification of social ownership as principal is core for how we understand contradiction, which is the key engine of change in dialectics. As the economy of China develops, the economic base for private property weakens and the economic base for social ownership strengthens, because social ownership’s base is in highly developed and socialized means of production, while private property’s base is in decentralized and scattered production.
Secondly, Xi Jinping was elected by the national congress. You are confusing mass elections for the top representative for democracy itself, but democracy is rule by the majority and has many different forms. As explained earlier, the PRC elects local councils, that then send delegates upward. Xi Jinping rose up through this very process to the head of state, where he was elected President of the PRC.
The identification of a proletarian state is largely determined by class background. If you had read through the links I provided, you would know that the CPC is overwhelmingly proletarian:
The CPC does have a small number of capitalists, including billionaires, but they are not in control of the part and are in fact barred from forward progression. With a proletarian party in charge, and public ownership of the commanding heights of the economy, we can see that the proletariat is the class in power. This is affirmed by the state crackdowns on capitalists that divert from the state and try to subvert it.
China has the world’s largest federation of trade unions, as you correctly identified, and since the state is socialist, the state works with the union in an official and integrated capacity. Independence from this federation is a crack that can be exploited by capitalists, so this is prevented to protect the unity of the socialist system while class struggle is alive and well. You don’t have to be a genius or even a socialist to understand that throughout history, capitalists have leveraged disunity among the working classes to sow chaos and weaken worker power.
China is socialist, and it’s important to have a Marxist analysis that relies on hard data and facts, not simply vibes and emotions. Belgium is controlled by capitalists with private property as its principal aspect. Parties like PTB are good, but Belgium is not a socialist country simply because PTB has a small level of official representation. I encourage you to develop a Marxist understanding of China.