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mechaqua
05-08-2008, 02:22 AM
well here is a few arguments: one China is ruled by the communist Party, two the state controls the internet, and many business but there are several billionaires (check Forbes) and from my last visit to Shanghai aside from bad cough, its incredibly huge and incredibly polluted (Beijing was worse) well from what i can tell you from what i ve seen, The PRC is not so much for the people, while i didn't get the chance to visit the country side , i can tell you China's political culture is not communism also to note i don't think a communist nation would have people drving BMWs and Rolls Royce(they could be foreign investors, one person i m pretty sure was a Party Cardre) well to emphzize my point here is an essay i wrote awhile back aside from the grammar errors i got an A i did it before i went to China :rolleyes: its long so you don't have to read it also if the debate gets uncivil i will have the admins close the thread.

so here it is

The Chinese communist party has dominated the mainland of china since the foundation of the Peoples republic of china in 1949. Communism as a notable political culture began in the mid 1930’s during the long march. The long march is pinnacle point in not only in Chinese history, but in world history. The long march is when communist under Mao Zedong retreated from the Northern provinces to the communist strongholds in the south. This would legitimize the future leaders of PRC, and would legitimize communism as political culture. But after the communist took power they try to install communism as dominant political through the Great Leap Forward and, the Cultural Revolution. However these attempts at a creating a dominant communist political culture failed and destroyed the PRC’s economy and the nearly destroyed the PRC it’s self. (C.P Fitzgerald) All that remains of the communist experiment in china is the Chinese communist party itself. Another fact that attributed to is that Confucianism had already existed for thousands of years as dominant political culture. (Chou Hsiang Kuang) The Chinese communist party failed to create a dominant political culture around communism. The key aspects that attributed to this were: The horrible failures of the five year plans in the Great Leap forward; the nonsense of the Cultural Revolution; and the already dominant political culture of Confucianism.

In 1949 the after decades of civil war the Communist party of china succeeded in taking control of the mainland and driving the nationalist party into Taiwan. However there where a myriad of problems for the newly formed Peoples Republic of China. One was the economy for centuries china had been an agrarian economy based so quintessentially it’s had a weak industrial base, which was essential to developing a modern nation. Without an industrial base china could not trade or attain self reliance. At this period of time China was heavily reliant on the Soviet Union for nearly all of its industrial production. Hundred Flowers Movement (Solomon) At first China tried to use a five year plan based off a Stalinist ideals to develop their industry, this failed and resulted in million of deaths. During this time there was a period in which the communist party allowed the people to think of new ideas to develop the country this is known as the Hundred Flowers Movement . Mao Zedong the chairman of the Communist party decided that he would create his own model to modernize china which he called the Great Leap Forward thus the Hundred Flowers Movement ended and the country would go along with Mao’s plan. The great leap forward was a five year plan that would involve four themes, which incorporated several key aspects, the themes were a jump over capitalism to socialism the mass line, correct thinking, and the new man. The aspects of these themes included: collectivization on a massive scale people would be forced to move into collectives and produce steel and grain, which Mao believed was the most essential good to a thriving economy. Also it involved building dams, irrigation systems, growing crops in close proximity to maximize the amount of land and production of steel in “backyard Furriness” that produce steel right in the collective. The point of this was to have both industry and agriculture expand parallel to each other on a massive scale, and allow china to become an economic power and become self reliant. (John M.H. Lindback) Socially the Great Leap sought to improve the status of women, ending child marriage, and end women’s role as house keepers have women work in the fields with the men. Also on a social impact they sought to end opium addiction through the motto of go “to Rehab or get a bullet in the head” was the basic summary of the opium policy. Another policy of the Great Leap was the outlawing of organized religion.(Soloman) The Great Leap was first embraced by many Chinese, who were swayed by the fact that china would be rid of the imperialist and become self reliant. The Great Leap forward however was not so much a great leap but a great fall forward. The Great Leap forward is seen as one of the worst economic disasters in history. Many feel that Mao Zedong should be put on trial for crimes against humanity, for this failure in planning. (P.C.Yu) One particular reason why this failed is the steel production. In order to produce steel you need water lots of it. Mao had proposed that steel production be done in the communes many of which were not close to any real powerful source of water. People would bring any metal they could find to their backyard furnaces, and dump metal into the fire and create steel. This did not produce steel this produced low quality iron. Mao refused to end this process and actually encouraged it to continue to double steel production within a year. The needs for greater steel production lead to lack devotion to farming. This in turn was doomed to fail because of the crops being grown so close to each other, which causes nutrients to be siphoned and makes it easier to be destroyed in a flood. Well in 1958 the Yellow river flooded (most likely caused by the lack of trees which were chopped down for the furnaces) destroying the crops and causing one of the largest famines in history from 1959-1961. (Penny Kane) Another problem which escalated the famine and, would continue to haunt China into the new millennium, was a baby boom. China before the Great Leap was implementing birth control in order to curve its population at the time China’s was the largest in the world. The great Leap forward halted this so the population grew so thus besides the flooding destroying crops there was just not enough food to sustain the population as well. (Greenhalgh &Wincler)The irrigation systems which were supposed provide water to the communes’ crops were poorly planned, a reason why is that engineers where not widely available and so were not used. (P.C Yu) the dams broke causing greater flooding, the effects on the economy from the great leap forward were so horrific that many called the great leap forward a great leap backwards. The human toll was estimated at about thirty million from the famine alone. the total deaths from the Great Leap Forward are greater.(Greenhalgh &Wincler The only member of the party who had the courage to stand up to Mao and call the leap forward to be unsuccessful was Marshall Peng Dehaui. Mao’s response to Dehuai was to purge him and any members of the party thought to be associated with his ideals, thousands died. (Solomon) China was economically ruined the ideals of communism. The fact was the five year plan was a purely communist idea that Mao himself had thought of if it were to fail it would cause the people to look unfavorably on communism. Since the Great Leap failed miserably, communism failed miserably or at least that would be a rational view. However Mao refused to accept or even acknowledge this failure. The Hopes of Communism becoming of a dominant political culture in China were quickly descending, oblivion. Chairman Mao Zedong refused to take responsibility despite being clearly at fault for the whole debacle. Instead he introduced a new direction one that would completely eliminate communism as a dominant political culture in China.

The fact was China in truth needed to reorganize and rethink their economic planned if the CCP was to survive. However many Historians are baffled by Mao’s next move. Mao instead of taking responsibility for the failure of the great leap forward. Claimed the bourgeoisie and the Party Elite in the cities were responsible for the failure. Mao believed that the socialist sprit was not endowed in the people well enough. Mao claimed in order for china to become great the country must be purged of the counter revolutionary thinking of the party elite and bourgeoisie pigs in the cities. Mao encouraged the Youth to implement this purge, which many did with great vigor. These youths where known as the Red Guard, they wore uniforms and carried the red book. The red book was a book comprised of Mao’s teachings. It was mandatory for every family to own this book and read it. The Red Guard enforces this by often going into people’s homes and testing them on this knowledge if the failed they would be tortured or humiliated. (John Gitings) The madness did not end, the Red Guard would often go into schools and force the teachers to confess to being a bourgeoisie pig, in sessions called “struggle sessions” in which the teachers would be tortured into confession. The Red Guard was allowed in 1966 absolute freedom to execute any of these tactics to purge china of it’s so called internal enemies when Mao ordered police to discontinue intervening in Red Guard activates. Those who were considered to be bourgeoisie pig would often go to the country side to work in the communes with the peasants, whom Mao considered to be the embodiment of the socialist sprit many of the party elite where sent to the communes to work including future Chinese primer Deng Xiaoping.(Gargi Dutt & V.P. Dutt) Mao declared the cultural revolution at an end in 1969. The Cultural Revolution had many repercussions, first off hundreds of thousands died either in the communes or at the hands of the vicious tactics Red Guard. Another repercussion is that the intellectuals suffered the bulk of harassment form the Red Guard so many educated whom could be useful to the country were wasted. Many of The Red Guard did not attend School for a decade. The Chinese education system between the lack of students and the educators being purged suffered creating a lost generation who could do very little to benefit china in the future. The lack of educated Chinese and purge of Elite party members did little to help the economic situation in china in fact it made it worse. With all these negative impacts from the Cultural Revolution, communism was doomed to fail which it eventually did. The Cultural Revolution emptied a communist party of any political cultural values thus communism could not become a dominant political culture. (John Gittings) The Cultural Revolution in truth did not end in 1969 but more along the lines after 1974 Mao’s death. The gang of four try to continue the cultural revolution but the People’s Liberation Army (the army of PRC) stepped in and overthrew them in a coup. Deng Xiaoping took over as premier. Xiaoping, did several things to revitalize China: he separated the party form the state to an extent; created a credible socialist legal system; and instituted the four modernizations which included: modernizing the military; allowing some completion between farmers thus creating an quasi open market; Educating Chinese youth in the west thus more Chinese were becoming engineers and scientist. Something china did not have before; and creating industrial zone in which the west could invest. Xiaoping’s (Victor C. Falkenheim) all of this was set to counter the Cultural Revolution. With Xiaoping’s reforms communism cease to exist in china as political culture , so in reality the Cultural Revolution combined with the economic failure of the Great Leap Forward, ended communism as a dominant political culture. The only aspect of communism to survive was the Chinese Communist Party in part not due to the political culture of communism but a much more ancient culture which continues to dominate china

Aside from the obvious failures of Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward ,another factor attributes to the reason why communism failed to become a dominant political culture. The fact is that there has been a dominant political culture Confucianism. Some mistake Confucianism as a religion but in truth it’s more of a philosophy. The philosophy is adherence to those above you. Examples include child to parents; Students to teachers; Citizens to governments.(F.T.Cheng) This political culture has been existent in china for over two thousand years. It was a dominant political culture all the way up to the establishment of the Peoples Republic of China. Confucianism was banned by Mao during the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution it was seen like religion as a threat to the establishment of communism as the dominant political culture. (Kenneth K.S. Cheng) Mao was right about this communism in its purest form preaches equality and redistribution not adherence to those above you. Confucianism also preached if the leadership of the nation was failing to prevent disasters to the country the masses had a right to overthrow the government in favor of a new one. This was especially true during The Great Leap Forward, when disaster were rampant. The fact is communism was relatively new to china and to oust a successful philosophy for one that was producing nothing but failure after failure, is just plain irational. Confucianism in the end probably saved the Chinese communist party in little way, because of its philosophy of adherence to government authority. But it help attribute to the downfall of communism as dominant political culture, like China Confucianism has been around for a long time. The quote “It is easy to cut a tree down but it is very difficult to remove its roots.” unknown is the best way to summarize why communism could not replace Confucianism as a dominant political Culture (Victor C. Falkenheim)

The Chinese communist party failed to create a dominant political culture around communism. The key aspects that attributed to this were: The horrible failures of the five year plans in the great leap forward; the nonsense of the Cultural Revolution; and the already dominant political culture of Confucianism. However the Chinese communist party exists and the Peoples Republic of China still exist. This is true but China today is much different from the china of yesteryears. Today China is relatively open market, highly industrialized; there is a high emphasis on education; no communes; and a lot of western influence. The communist party is just a name it really has no ties to traditional Marxism or, Leninism communism. The leaders of the party have no connection to the Long March which legitimized communism as a political culture and more and more china, becomes the capitalist nation that Mao Zedong try to leap over, The Long march is over.










Works Cited
Dutt, Gargi, and V.P Dutt. China's Cultural Revolution . New York New York: Asia
Publishing House, 1970.
Dutton, Michael. Policing Chinese Politics. Durham North Carolina: Duke
University Press, 2005.
Falkenheim, Victor C. Chinese Politics From Mao To Deng. New York New York:
Paragon House, 1989.
Gittings, John, Harris, Richard, Lindbeck, John M.H, Fitzgerld C.P.China After The Cultural Revolution. New York New York:
Random House, 1969.
Goldstein, A. A Theory Of Poltics In The People's Republic Of China Structural
Constraints on Polltical Behavoir and Outcomes 1949-1978 PT.1 . Ann Harbor
Michigan: University Microfilms International A. Bell & Howell Information
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Greenhalch, Suan, and Edwin A. Winckler. Governing China's Population From
Leninist to Neoliberal Biopolitics. Stanford California: Stanford
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IngenuityGap
05-08-2008, 02:59 AM
Short answer, yes but with rudimentary free markets forming. Long answer, no but with many holdovers in terms of style of governance, mentality towards the west, etc.

cornflakes
05-08-2008, 03:07 AM
Does the Chinese government practise totalitariansm? Yes. Is China still a nominally communist state? Yes. But is China still communist in practise? I'd say no. Capitalism trumps ideology everywhere. It's telling that the first sight one sees upon exiting the Beijing airport's arrival lounge is KFC.

mechaqua
05-08-2008, 03:21 AM
True the fact there is a few holdovers but the traditional Mao Government has very little power the Deng Reforms decimated the old system most of Mao' policies were for the most part stamped out in these reforms, also the Chinese government has recently started to try infuse the principles of Confucianism philosophy back into school because it teaches respect to authority.( i am not i am not going to explain all Confucianism ) but The Chinese Government no longer follows the doctrines of Marx, Lenin, and Mao (its a good thing Mao's policies nearly destroyed china) for now i guess you could classify The Chinese government as a one party "democracy" :sweat communism as a "dominant political culture" for the most part is no more.

Does the Chinese government practise totalitariansm? Yes. Is China still a nominally communist state? Yes. But is China still communist in practise? I'd say no. Capitalism trumps ideology everywhere. It's telling that the first sight one sees upon exiting the Beijing airport's arrival lounge is KFC.


lol :rotflmaoyup you can also see a McDonalds in Shanghai , crowded very crowded

but yes The communist Party is still in power

Inevitable.Exit
05-08-2008, 05:20 PM
China is more communist than not. They have a free-market capitalist economy, however, any opposition of the government is simply crushed. People don't have freedoms that you would see in a democracy. They have a single ruling party from which officials are elected. China may not be as strongly communist as it has been before, but it still has more qualities to call it such.

mechaqua
05-09-2008, 12:00 AM
communism is a more of an economic system, a one party totalitarian regime is technicality a communist practice according to Marx governance should be left up to a council of the people, eventually according to Marx, there would be no more need for governance. the perspective that a communist regime being totalitarian regime, was set by Stalin a totalitarian regime also is also a characteristic of a fascist regime as well as state control of certain sectors. The fact is China's economic system no longer follows a Marxist, Leninist, Mao philosophy, its a quasi capitalist system, with many sectors controlled by the state, also there is a class system, those who are rich in China yes tend to be members of the party are the wealthy ones.

I can understand why people associate totalitarianism to communism Stalin and Mao is responsible for this perception. But neither the USSR or China can be considered a Marxist communist state.

Shdo
05-09-2008, 12:58 AM
communism is a system that fail on a large scale, it just deteriorate into dictatorship after a short time.

but there is a small exception. not exactly a communist society(since i am not an expert about communism but i think its pretty close) in Israel we have the kibbutz which are settlements that have a very unique aspect to them, no matter what your job in the kibbutz you are paid the same, the money that is saved is spent on community things such as a big dinning hall, shared fleet of cars, shared services, cheaper commodities for everyone and so on.
in the past (pre 1970) it was more like a hive, with people not owning anything, not even their children(!) they were all grown in a single place by everyone, its really interesting aspect and very unique.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibutz

the point is that this ultra communist (then), and even the current more capitalist version, was allowed to flourish without descending into dictatorship because it was inside a larger system that allowed intervention and escape if some1 didn't agreed to stay, so only the idealists stayed, others who wanted money and wealth would leave to the rest of the country. i don't think that communism can work on its own without being a option inside a larger system, its just too easy to corrupt.

BioBomber
05-09-2008, 01:25 AM
In a purist sense, China is most definately NOT a communist society. There exists a clear class system with several tiers, the government has a vested interest in remaining in power, and private enterprise exists on a large scale, based around several supercorporations which make it impossible for smaller private organizations to exists. This is one of the most demonstrable facts that China is taking a little from column A and a little from B, producing a staggeringly powerful economy but severely affecting its populace in a highly volatile manner.

rayne_himura
05-09-2008, 07:05 AM
China has embraced capitalism, and, its government is a dictatorship in the form of communism. they have lots of privately owned companies, some of which are american. (they even have McDonald's and Wal-Mart, for goodness' sake!)

mechaqua
05-26-2008, 12:31 AM
I just talk to my Friend who is living in China with his Mother and Father (who works for Nestle corp) for the Summer (he served as a somewhat of a translator (he speaks mandarin apparently not well :p)) he says that he cannot access Wikipedia and some of Facebook is blocked and the news never criticizes the government, he agrees that the economic system barley repersents a communist economic system

Dalma
05-29-2008, 03:08 AM
China has a capatalist ECONOMIC system but a communist POLITICAL system. Although both are bound to collide in some respects, the Chinese government keesp its citizens insulated and censored. China by no means is a pure communist state but nor is a pure capitalist state. However, the communistic aspects in China, at the time being, out do the economic aspects, as people are kept submissive and under strict government control.
This seems to be changing as a compromise between two systems so inherently opposite as are capatalism and communism is difficult to maintain. I believe capatalism is rapidly becoming more dominant, but has yet to surpass the communist policy still in effect.

mechaqua
05-29-2008, 06:13 PM
Well the government system is a one party dictatorship or the way the spin it a one party democracy, but this is not an actual communist system, you see the Stalin and USSR after Lenin created the view of communism being a dictatorship, China has an upper class something that shouldn't exsist in a communist society, China's control and policies are a lot like another system of governance Fascism, this system is identified by Government control of Business, Censorship, Party members making up the upper class, suppression of dissidence only the select few having rule, dealing with countries that are not communist or socialist is something Communist nation is supposed to do, all in all facism and the modern perception of commuism are almost the same. But our modern perception has few things in common with Marx's idea