How the Communist Party Guided China to Success

[enkidu_]

(...)
A key question you pose is how much of China’s success can be ascribed to this political system. What’s the answer?

There are several important elements. One is the party successfully sets long-term political goals, such as the modernization of industry or technology, or infrastructure planning. As Deng Xiaoping made clear in the 1980s, it can concentrate resources in priority areas. I see this as a strength in the initial phase of development, from say the 1980s to the mid-2000s.

Another crucial element is experimentation. This is something we ignore in the West — how unexpectedly flexible China’s deeply bureaucratic system can be. This flexibility has been demonstrated in the ability to set up pilot projects in special economic zones, in local tests — such as for housing reform or bankruptcy in state enterprises. Very difficult measures were regularly tested in pilot projects for several years before national laws were enacted.

You show how this flexibility arose from the Communist Party’s revolutionary experience.

This is very important. Because we have to ask ourselves, how did a socialist bureaucratic system get this kind of adaptability that you didn’t see in Eastern Europe ? It’s due to the specific historical experiences of this party [in the 1930s and 1940s before coming to power]. It controlled very spread-out and not contiguous districts. So when it tried something like land reform it was done experimentally and in a decentralized fashion. This was fundamentally different from the Soviet Union.
(...)
Ironically, it’s only now that some countries are looking at China as a model. Can it be a model?

For many years I would have said no, but many countries are struggling with how to deal with pressing basic problems like maintaining internal security, building physical infrastructure and providing jobs. These are the basis of populist movements around the world. China is a point of orientation. It can’t be duplicated because these other countries don’t have a Communist Party with the special history and features of China’s. But in terms of considering illiberal, state-directed solutions, China is often cited as an example of how an authoritarian government can deal with things differently. China’s experience is thus a permanent question mark for the world when they ask if the Western model is the best.
(...)

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/22/world/asia/china-politics-xi-jinping.html?_r=0

 

[DW44]

One of the great economic myths of our time is that western countries used their current economic policies of free trade and open markets to develop which couldn't be further from the truth(apart from the special cases of Switzerland and the Netherlands). While the finer points vary to account for the specific situations in different countries, virtually all developed nations, from Britain in the 1600s onwards to Taiwan in the 1970s used variation of mercantilism to develop, only adopting liberal free market policies once they were developed. China since the Deng era has been the poster child for mercantilism so I find it a little strange when western commentators try to use the either-or approach towards the Chinese model and theirs when, in fact, both used highly customized version of the same basic model to develop. China, in fact, has a far more liberal economic policy for it's level of development compared to what countries that got there before them had at a similar point and that goes some way towards explaining why they are experiencing a slow down so early in their development cycle.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

One of the great economic myths of our time is that western countries used their current economic policies of free trade and open markets to develop which couldn't be further from the truth(apart from the special cases of Switzerland and the Netherlands). While the finer points vary to account for the specific situations in different countries, virtually all developed nations, from Britain in the 1600s onwards to Taiwan in the 1970s used variation of mercantilism to develop, only adopting liberal free market policies once they were developed. China since the Deng era has been the poster child for mercantilism so I find it a little strange when western commentators try to use the either-or approach towards the Chinese model and theirs when, in fact, both used highly customized version of the same basic model to develop. China, in fact, has a far more liberal economic policy for it's level of development compared to what countries that got there before them had at a similar point and that goes some way towards explaining why they are experiencing a slow down so early in their development cycle.

Very interesting analysis. I don't know much about economics or China, but one of my major arguments against Islamic rule was that it would kill invention. I get that the western world didn't become rich (comparatively) through liberal free trade, but their general freedom and lack of censorship does spark invention. Take music and entertainment in general for example. Would we have high end music systems without music? Would we have 4k resolution TV screens without films and TV shows to drive demand?

This is where I think China falls short. Maybe I don't know enough about their culture being quite far removed from it, but it seems somewhat stale and uninspiring. The western world still leads the way in invention, the eastern world seems to do a good job of copying those inventions then improving and polishing them.

 

[Syed1]

95% of China is same kind of people who speak the same language, have the same social structure and have the same religion (or lack of). People are easier to govern when they are almost identical (double entendre not intended).

 

[DW44]

Very interesting analysis. I don't know much about economics or China, but one of my major arguments against Islamic rule was that it would kill invention. I get that the western world didn't become rich (comparatively) through liberal free trade, but their general freedom and lack of censorship does spark invention. Take music and entertainment in general for example. Would we have high end music systems without music? Would we have 4k resolution TV screens without films and TV shows to drive demand?

This is where I think China falls short. Maybe I don't know enough about their culture being quite far removed from it, but it seems somewhat stale and uninspiring. The western world still leads the way in invention, the eastern world seems to do a good job of copying those inventions then improving and polishing them.

The west, while not nearly as repressive as the Islamic world in its current form, was still extremely repressive during middle ages and the freedom they have was acquired gradually over a considerable length of time, coinciding with their economic rise. Generally, as you grow economically and education levels rise, society tends to get freer and more liberal, the exception being nations that got rich in relatively short order by selling commodities a'la the gulf states. As disposable incomes rise and living standards improve, demand for services like entertainment increases and where there's demand, someone will come up with a product to satisfy it. The west(and Japan for that matter), got rich first through basic industries(steel, coal, railways, shipbuilding) and by the time TVs, or even radios came around, they were already significantly richer than Pakistan or India are today.

With China, it's not the culture so much as it is the government that's the problem. There's plenty of innovation to go around but their levels of press freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, state backed censorship etc are entirely disproportionate to their economic stature. Korea, at a similar point, was already embracing democracy. Chinese are anything but derivative, the issue is that their economy is dominated by state owned enterprises while the bulk of innovation there comes from private enterprises. AMD, an American chipmaker, uses its Chinese R&D operations to develop their high end GPUs, something only one other company in the world makes and that company was also started by a Taiwanese immigrant. Huawei and ZTE, a privately owned and state owned manufacturer of telecom equipment respectively, couldn't be in a more different position today. The former is now the biggest player in the game, innovating like there's no tomorrow, while the latter is in dire straits because the Chinese government is inefficient. The Chinese have more patents related to Graphene, which was developed in Manchester, than the British themselves. If the government ever takes a step back and conditions ease, the Chinese will innovate the same way the Japanese and Koreans do who, for the record, beat the west into a pulp when it comes to innovation.

As to why the west was able to liberalize as it developed while China didn't, that's something I couldn't possibly comment on but suffice to say it's not because the Chinese are inherently idiots while the west was always a bastion of creativity. Early on, a lot of western inventions were essentially stolen from Asian civilizations, mostly the Chinese.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

The west, while not nearly as repressive as the Islamic world in its current form, was still extremely repressive during middle ages and the freedom they have was acquired gradually over a considerable length of time, coinciding with their economic rise. Generally, as you grow economically and education levels rise, society tends to get freer and more liberal, the exception being nations that got rich in relatively short order by selling commodities a'la the gulf states. As disposable incomes rise and living standards improve, demand for services like entertainment increases and where there's demand, someone will come up with a product to satisfy it. The west(and Japan for that matter), got rich first through basic industries(steel, coal, railways, shipbuilding) and by the time TVs, or even radios came around, they were already significantly richer than Pakistan or India are today.

With China, it's not the culture so much as it is the government that's the problem. There's plenty of innovation to go around but their levels of press freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, state backed censorship etc are entirely disproportionate to their economic stature. Korea, at a similar point, was already embracing democracy. Chinese are anything but derivative, the issue is that their economy is dominated by state owned enterprises while the bulk of innovation there comes from private enterprises. AMD, an American chipmaker, uses its Chinese R&D operations to develop their high end GPUs, something only one other company in the world makes and that company was also started by a Taiwanese immigrant. Huawei and ZTE, a privately owned and state owned manufacturer of telecom equipment respectively, couldn't be in a more different position today. The former is now the biggest player in the game, innovating like there's no tomorrow, while the latter is in dire straits because the Chinese government is inefficient. The Chinese have more patents related to Graphene, which was developed in Manchester, than the British themselves. If the government ever takes a step back and conditions ease, the Chinese will innovate the same way the Japanese and Koreans do who, for the record, beat the west into a pulp when it comes to innovation.

As to why the west was able to liberalize as it developed while China didn't, that's something I couldn't possibly comment on but suffice to say it's not because the Chinese are inherently idiots while the west was always a bastion of creativity. Early on, a lot of western inventions were essentially stolen from Asian civilizations, mostly the Chinese.

Eye opening stuff, and all pretty new to me. We don't hear a lot about China over here, we just assume they are a robotic people forced to work grinding long hours for a pittance by their faceless leaders. But then that's probably not far from the truth in many ways.

 

[DW44]

Eye opening stuff, and all pretty new to me. We don't hear a lot about China over here, we just assume they are a robotic people forced to work grinding long hours for a pittance by their faceless leaders. But then that's probably not far from the truth in many ways.

Mostly yes.

 

[Moiza]

The west, while not nearly as repressive as the Islamic world in its current form, was still extremely repressive during middle ages and the freedom they have was acquired gradually over a considerable length of time, coinciding with their economic rise. Generally, as you grow economically and education levels rise, society tends to get freer and more liberal, the exception being nations that got rich in relatively short order by selling commodities a'la the gulf states. As disposable incomes rise and living standards improve, demand for services like entertainment increases and where there's demand, someone will come up with a product to satisfy it. The west(and Japan for that matter), got rich first through basic industries(steel, coal, railways, shipbuilding) and by the time TVs, or even radios came around, they were already significantly richer than Pakistan or India are today.

.

Good stuff. People expect change overnight which sadly isn't realistically possibly. The idea which are implanted into us while we are young rarely leave us so it's takes a couple of generations before any visible change can be seen in the society as a whole. Pakistan too is showing positive change but it's very slow for now.

If you don't consider Saudia in the Islamic world benchmark, then the West was easily more repressive than the Islamic world for a very considerable part of their existence.

 

[DW44]

Good stuff. People expect change overnight which sadly isn't realistically possibly. The idea which are implanted into us while we are young rarely leave us so it's takes a couple of generations before any visible change can be seen in the society as a whole. Pakistan too is showing positive change but it's very slow for now.

Nope. If anything, Pakistan is going in the opposite direction. The current generation, the Taliban generation, is the worst by far, and more conservative and intolerant than the previous one, Zia's children, who, in turn, were much worse than the Gen Xers.

If you don't consider Saudia in the Islamic world benchmark, then the West was easily more repressive than the Islamic world for a very considerable part of their existence.

Not really. Even if you use Pakistan or Iran as a benchmark, you have to go back hundreds of years to find a comparable western example.

 

[Moiza]

Nope. If anything, Pakistan is going in the opposite direction. The current generation, the Taliban generation, is the worst by far, and more conservative and intolerant than the previous one, Zia's children, who, in turn, were much worse than the Gen Xers.



Not really. Even if you use Pakistan or Iran as a benchmark, you have to go back hundreds of years to find a comparable western example.

I get that impression too judging by the stuff gets reported or the stuff you see on social media but it's not necessarily true. Our religion ummah fighters are extremely vocal and hence get the stop light whereas the more liberal sections of the population don't indulge themselves in this sort of rubbish so you don't see them or hear from them a lot. Pakistan is a huge country and there will always be places here are there which are full of stupid people but as the middle class grows and as the people start pulling themselves out of poverty and get themselves and their children educated, the mindsets will change. Pakistan's middle class is certainly growing and soon enough the positive effects will show too. The hardest problem to solve is the severely outdated books that are taught to the common population from a young age, these books on their own are enough to rid yourself of 30 IQ points.

Pakistan has a growing number of hard-core islamists too, who think that this liberalism is an agenda by the Americans and yahoodi and the Indians to destroy our beautiful culture and religion but this is expected. It's in human nature to go be extreme, even arguments on PP have no middle ground, likewise the population of Pakistan is also dividing itself onto two portions, a portion who supports forwards thinking and the Zia portion. The desired change will not be seen for many many year but to get the process started you need to have some sort of penitration into the society and thankfully we have that, good to see our entertainment industry picking up liberal ideas too.

We don't have well documented history. You have history books but if you were to determine how repressive the countries in based on those books then you will get varied results. Things weren't like now a days back then, every intolerant conservative fool didn't have his whole life documented on the web so you can't determine how things were deep within the country. When I said the West was more repressive than us I was atleast think about the mid 1800s and early 1900s. Judging on historical facts can't be a very subjective thing, you could have credible sources conflicting each other. If Ptv were to write a history book then Pakistan would be depicted as the model liberal country. I based my judgements on the fact that scientists of that era had a firm belief in God , compare it with today and you'll see that almost every scientist is an atheist. Considering the forerunners of progressive thought were religious, it's not hard to imagine how entrenched the society as a whole was in religion and with that comes a repressive society.

 

[DW44]

I get that impression too judging by the stuff gets reported or the stuff you see on social media but it's not necessarily true. Our religion ummah fighters are extremely vocal and hence get the stop light whereas the more liberal sections of the population don't indulge themselves in this sort of rubbish so you don't see them or hear from them a lot. Pakistan is a huge country and there will always be places here are there which are full of stupid people but as the middle class grows and as the people start pulling themselves out of poverty and get themselves and their children educated, the mindsets will change. Pakistan's middle class is certainly growing and soon enough the positive effects will show too. The hardest problem to solve is the severely outdated books that are taught to the common population from a young age, these books on their own are enough to rid yourself of 30 IQ points.

Pakistan has a growing number of hard-core islamists too, who think that this liberalism is an agenda by the Americans and yahoodi and the Indians to destroy our beautiful culture and religion but this is expected. It's in human nature to go be extreme, even arguments on PP have no middle ground, likewise the population of Pakistan is also dividing itself onto two portions, a portion who supports forwards thinking and the Zia portion. The desired change will not be seen for many many year but to get the process started you need to have some sort of penitration into the society and thankfully we have that, good to see our entertainment industry picking up liberal ideas too.

We don't have well documented history. You have history books but if you were to determine how repressive the countries in based on those books then you will get varied results. Things weren't like now a days back then, every intolerant conservative fool didn't have his whole life documented on the web so you can't determine how things were deep within the country. When I said the West was more repressive than us I was atleast think about the mid 1800s and early 1900s. Judging on historical facts can't be a very subjective thing, you could have credible sources conflicting each other. If Ptv were to write a history book then Pakistan would be depicted as the model liberal country. I based my judgements on the fact that scientists of that era had a firm belief in God , compare it with today and you'll see that almost every scientist is an atheist. Considering the forerunners of progressive thought were religious, it's not hard to imagine how entrenched the society as a whole was in religion and with that comes a repressive society.

I live here, travel all over the country, have lived in all four provinces, interact with people from all faiths and ethnic backgrounds, social classes and levels of education, and all I can say to what you're saying is that based on what I've seen(in real life, not on facebook or TV), I strongly disagree. The middle class that you're pinning your hopes on are the biggest problem area when it comes to the rise of intolerance and religious extremism here. From what I understand you're still in school. Having gone through that phase, I can now look back and say just how limited one's perspective is until they step into the real world. I stupidly returned to Pakistan after completing my education because I had a similarly idealized view of the country(I still recall telling a Spaniard just days before I returned pretty much exactly what you're telling me here) but it was only when I left my sheltered environment and got to see the real Pakistan, lived in places most people that live one town over from those places haven't even heard of, that my views reached where they are today.

 

[Moiza]

I live here, travel all over the country, have lived in all four provinces, interact with people from all faiths and ethnic backgrounds, social classes and levels of education, and all I can say to what you're saying is that based on what I've seen(in real life, not on facebook or TV), I strongly disagree. The middle class that you're pinning your hopes on are the biggest problem area when it comes to the rise of intolerance and religious extremism here. From what I understand you're still in school. Having gone through that phase, I can now look back and say just how limited one's perspective is until they step into the real world. I stupidly returned to Pakistan after completing my education because I had a similarly idealized view of the country(I still recall telling a Spaniard just days before I returned pretty much exactly what you're telling me here) but it was only when I left my sheltered environment and got to see the real Pakistan, lived in places most people that live one town over from those places haven't even heard of, that my views reached where they are today.

Have to give it to you since your experience with Pakistan was much more than and mine. My perspectives are a little limited to the major cities, I know it's naive to judge the whole country based on the population of the major cities but the mentioned population are certainly showing signs of more liberal people, but there are also the ones who being confronted with newer ideas run to their caves and label it an attack on Islam, so while you can't clearly judge which part of population is more but there's every reason to think that it's the latter population. The thing the makes me a little hopeful is the fact that there's atleast a portion of the general population that has moved on out of conservative thinking and maybe in the long run they'll influence other around them. Now that I write about it, it seems more of a distant dream than any real hope.

 

[Moiza]

An important thing to note is that when I talk about liberal Pakistanis, I talk about them in comparison to the general population. A liberal Pakistani here doesn't mean one that is as liberal as the people in the West rather one who doesn't believe in flogging people from other sects to death , who believes in the rights of women and transgenders and who don't let religion influence their entire lives etc.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

An important thing to note is that when I talk about liberal Pakistanis, I talk about them in comparison to the general population. A liberal Pakistani here doesn't mean one that is as liberal as the people in the West rather one who doesn't believe in flogging people from other sects to death , who believes in the rights of women and transgenders and who don't let religion influence their entire lives etc.

I know this thread isn't about Pakistan, but as you have brought it up, why do you think it is that the general population in Pakistan is so conservative with regards to the rights of women, transgenders etc?

 

[Moiza]

I know this thread isn't about Pakistan, but as you have brought it up, why do you think it is that the general population in Pakistan is so conservative with regards to the rights of women, transgenders etc?

When for generations you enforce the idea that only the male population has right and women are some sort of ornament that should best be kept hidden then looking down upon the females becomes second nature. In current time it's a contest of who can keep their females hidden inside the houses, any that step out bring shame to the family. As far as the rights of transgenders go there are none, never have been. They have always been treated as outcasts and the situation is going to stay they same, although there is some awareness now about the rights of transgenders people in major cities. This awareness too was created by social media and other media platforms.

People blame Islam for this but it's more cultural than anything else. If Islam hadn't come here, I doubt things would be any different today. Islam may have speed things up but apart from that we were always going to end up this way with or without Islam.