rafinh2 on Nostr: FAKE NEWS. I also wonder about this. As I moved to China, my initial impression was ...

FAKE NEWS.


https://pt.quora.com/O-que-a-China-hoje-tem-de-comunista/answer/Rafael-Henrique-Zerbetto?ch=10&oid=159492745&share=81bcc92e&srid=uxHlfK&target_type=answer




I also wonder about this. As I moved to China, my initial impression was that socialism in China had ended. However, over time, I began to notice certain nuances in the Chinese model that seemed to be echoes of socialist philosophy, not socialism itself, or at least contrary to the logic of capitalism.
The most relevant point, in my opinion, is public services: there are many state-owned enterprises whose goal is to provide the people with affordable and quality services: public transportation, electricity, water and sewage, parks, public restrooms, museums, and many other services are offered at prices much lower than those offered abroad, or even for free, subsidized by the state. I see this as a socialist heritage since I read an article about Soviet economics, which made me reflect on a point that should be obvious: we tend to analyze socialism with tools typical of capitalism. A capitalist company has profit as its main objective, but in socialism, profit ceases to make sense, so the old formula of cutting expenses with increased revenue does not serve socialism, whose goal is to allow workers to have access to the products they produce. Therefore, the success of the company consists of offering quality services at low prices.
China has balanced socialist logic with capitalism well, offering the people what they need at low prices while producing private companies that aim for profits. I heard, at a public event, a representative of the Communist Party say that communism in which he believes consists of giving people the conditions to realize their dreams, which basically means giving access to goods and services. At the time, I found this phrase disturbing, interpreting it as if the goal of China was to emulate American consumerism, but now, after years in China, I understand what he meant: ultimately, it is the essence of socialism: allowing the working class to enjoy what they produce.
The Chinese pay great attention to science and experimentation. The best scientists are appointed to national academies, and these academies formulate major public policies. The Chinese government experiments a lot: various cities function as pilot projects where public policies are tested. If China were to reform its pension system like Brazil's, it would choose a city and experiment with the new rules there: having good results, it would expand to more places, and finally to the entire country; having unsatisfactory results, the loss would be minimal.
This history of Special Economic Zones that many people comment on is from the past, when the economic opening began. Today, a company can choose where to install itself, as long as it follows the rules, it does not need to be in Shenzhen. What actually exists today are the experimental zones I mentioned earlier: for example, in some port cities, new customs rules are being tested, in Hainan, a new visa policy is being tested, especially for tourists, to study the impact of these measures, both positively and negatively.
I also note that in China, there is a great effort to plan the economy. While in Brazil the government and business believe that if the state stops interfering in the economy, jobs and income will magically appear, in China the government seeks to have the greatest possible control over the variables that affect the country's development. For example, industries were banned in Beijing to reduce pollution and population growth. We have the classic case of population control: the government realized that the population would grow too much, so it limited the number of children per family; now, with the aging population, it seeks to encourage the Chinese to have children. The price of housing increases, so the government limits the number of houses someone can buy, increases interest rates on housing loans, increases requirements, etc. When the price drops too much, interest rates are lowered, credit facilities are increased, etc. What exists in China is state interference in the economy. In fact, I would say that it is the opposite, what exists in China are private sector and nature's interference in the economy regulated by the state.
It is also a lie that China has a single party. Here is a list of political parties in China – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The Communist Party of China is dominant and occupies all high-level positions, simply because it has a large majority of seats in parliament. Technically, if we had a large membership in a smaller party, that party could occupy high-level government positions. Although in parliament the weight of the Communist Party is much greater, China has another organ, a council of representatives of parties, in which all parties have the same decisive weight. This council formulates state policies, giving them a suprapartisan character.
Another peculiarity of China is land ownership: it belongs, in fact, to the state. Buying a property means being its owner for 70 years (currently the government is studying increasing this period to 80, based on the increase in the life expectancy of the Chinese), after which the property returns to the government, unless the owner decides to renew the contract, paying for another 70 years. This is similar to an inheritance tax: both in China and in other countries, each generation of a family must pay to maintain inherited properties. Note that someone who buys a property can rent it to others, the government only sells properties without owners, leaving the owner to manage the property.
It is incredible how similar this is to the model proposed by Henry George, making public land and charging those who appropriate it for private use. This model works in Hong Kong and Singapore, two of the most modern cities in the world.
This logic applies to the field as well, and allowed China to successfully implement its land reform, and today we do not see large farms in China, usually the peasants are owners (for 70 years) of the property where they live and from which they derive their livelihood, being permanently advised by the government, which closely follows agricultural development and encourages modernization of the field, with credit lines for the purchase of greenhouses, machines, etc., construction of roads and other facilities to make the delivery of products to the market faster and cheaper, as well as increasing the efficiency of the system as a whole. Recently, I read an article about a region in China where small properties are developing livestock, resulting in a large volume of manure, capable of causing environmental damage. The government encouraged the opening of a manure factory in the area, and now the peasants sell the manure to this factory, which processes it and transforms it into a valuable item for agriculture. Many fishponds are receiving solar panels on their surface, allowing the farmer to sell both fish and electricity. And so on. I visited a nut plantation that used chickens and geese to combat pests and eat weeds, thus saving maintenance, producing organic food, and also earning extra income from eggs and meat (remember that in China, geese are also food).
Another interesting point of the Chinese government (which has nothing to do with socialism) is that the high-level positions of the executive power of Chinese provinces are held by politicians who came from other provinces, to avoid them using the position to benefit someone. The current Chinese president, for example, began his political career in Fujian, a province where he had no relatives or close friends.