No, you're not. Exactly what do you consider significant? Do you expect workers to suddenly leap forward, articulating a full revolutionary analysis of the current and future prospects of China? I think the protests than have developed, whether the precipitating event and/or focus is factory layoffs or land expropriations etc. are parts and parcel of the whole, of the opposition, sometimes more self-conscious sometimes less self-conscious, to the direction of the CCP's economic program.
Again you assume you know exactly what and to what degree items, elements, programs are being disputed inside and outside the part when you write: " There's undoubtedly debate within the circles you mention - as well as > within the CCP - about the the scope and regulation of foreign investment, > the revalution of the yuan, the diversification of the state's foreign > currency reserves, and overreliance on export-led growth at the expense of > domestic consumption. You'd hardly expect there to be otherwise, and these > discussions have been well reported in the press and scholarly > publications. > > But you've positioned yourself well outside of these Chinese reform > currents " You can expect anything you want, but you do not know what the content of the debates are unless you have some inside source. According to my inside source, at our last discussion prior his elevation to exalted status in the CPUSA, the debates are not about reform, overreliance, revaluaton of the yuan, etc. but about exaclty those social relations, those class relations being prompted, quickened, promoted precipitated through this turn to capitalism. And for the record, I have never opposed "in principle the presence of foreign firms, the PBC's purchase of USD-denominated securities." I would oppose those things no more than I would oppose say, the government of France allowing China, Japan, or Germany to establish auto factories, steel plants in France, no more than I would oppose the European Central Bank purchasing US Treasury instruments. I wouldn't oppose it, I wouldn't support it. No more than I would support or oppose Lula's government in Brazil building a dam or a HSR network. No more for example than I think any socialist would or should have supported or opposed the establishment of a transcontinental railroad hookup in the 19th century USA, even if some jingoists, flim-flam artists, tried to sell it as necessary to a "national front," and to protecting US national sovereignty from the destructive predation of imperial Britain. I would neither oppose nor support the presence of foreign firms anymore than I think socialists in the US today should support the construction of dams in the Imperial or San Joaquin Valleys of California, even though the big landowners there are quick to point out the "benefits to all" of such efforts, of the number of jobs of agricultural workers that will be saved with "effective flood control." We are not about opposition or support of infrastructure, investment, or the accumulation of foreign hard currency reserves. The bourgeoisie and their agents do what they do to maintain the stability and dominance of their property, their mode of production, their profits, as the actual actions behind the bullshit from the landowners in the San Joaquin Valley have proven so many times. What is at stake is the social relations of production established in those actions. The opposition doesn't come in some misguided isolationism, or nationalism, just as the support doesn't come in the mindless flogging of gross numbers. The opposition or support is opposition to one class and support of the other class in establishing the social relations of production, not the instruments of production. As for your "spark a run on the dollar would lead to a grave international economic and political crisis whose outcome would more likely than not be catastrophic rather than positive for both the Chinese and American working classes," that is simply absurd and is nothing but the same type of baloney that some, in particular Doug Henwood spews to justify his support of the US bailout of the banks-- because to not support that bailout would have consequences that would supposedly by catastrophic. Do you support the bailouts, Marv? What makes you think that the current course of the CCP, the current symbiosis of the US Treasury and the PBC, is not going to prove disasterous and not just for the US and Chinese workers, but for workers all across Asia, Latin America, Europe, North America? Haven't we seen enough of capitalism to know what it's response to declining profits, overproduction, must be? Or as Ripley put it in Aliens, "Did IQs drop drastically while I was away?" Yesterday, or the day before, LW and Nestor were arguing how the Chinese revolution has to be given credit for stimulating capitalism to develop Taiwan, Korea, Thailand, etc. etc. even if only in defense, response to the revolution. [Note to Nestor: Marshall Plan, known as European Recovery Program, developed by Clayton and Kennan in the US State Dept. named for US Sec of State Marshall, in effect 1948-1952 involving capital injections and transfer to rebuild the economies of the Western European countries and contain the threat of revolution within those countries, while simultaneously contain the Soviet Union]. Well, you don't get the credit without taking the responsibility. So if the CCP gets "credit" for that, then they have to take responsibility for the subsequent strengthening of capitalism ----- Original Message ----- From: "Marv Gandall" <marvgand...@videotron.ca> To: "David Schanoes" <sartes...@earthlink.net> Sent: Thursday, September 03, 2009 9:38 PM Subject: Re: [Marxism] China's high speed rail plans ________________________________________________ YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
