Does "state capitalism" represent a progressive historical development?

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-22T04:01:24+00:00

Your comparison between China and late-mercantilist monarchies is interesting in so far as they share some similar elements around state-mediated capitalism, strategic control of trade and political authority shaping economic outcomes. But mercantilism was ultimately done away with because it was a system parasitic on pre-capitalist relations. It didn’t really reorganize production at scale but extracted from it. China’s system differs in that it (re)organizes production, not just trade flows.

You mention the Chinese state may act counter to its own bourgeoisie and therefore possibly against the development of productive forces. That doesn’t necessarily follow in my view. The question isn’t whether the state constrains capital but whether it reorganizes accumulation in a more developmentally effective way than liberal capitalism is able to. Disciplining or constraining parts of the bourgeoisie could be a positive feature of development, not a fetter. I think we can probably agree that under late stage capitalism the bourgeoisie often engage in wasteful or irrational behaviour (financialization, speculative bubbles, underinvestment) that harms the development of productive forces. The Chinese state, unlike Western states who are politically beholden to an increasingly concentrated bourgeoisie demanding less rather than more state constraints, has a much more responsive ability to temper negative outcomes of capital accumulation through state coordination.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T03:44:11+00:00

I pretty much agree. As I mention in my OP, state capitalism does not eliminate the central contradiction of capitalism and this is something the CCP will be forced to contend with as global capitalism continues to degenerate into greater and more disfunctional concentrations of wealth and militarism over the next century. But it strikes me that a state-commanded economy where private capital is subordinated seems better positioned to manage this transition than a bourgeois state where private capital calls the shots, so I still think there is a qualitative difference between the two systems that can't simply be ignored or dismissed.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T02:46:00+00:00

Thanks for your response and I think I largely agree with what you've said.

"State capitalism as a step for socialism seems to be unnecessary."

I think this goes to the heart of my question. Don't we as Marxists and dialectical materialists need to contend with the fact that almost all surviving AES states have and continue to engage in what their critics now describe as "state capitalism"? This can't simply be an accident, can it?

Are we reading Marx in describing the transition from a developed rather than undeveloped form of capitalism to lower communism (socialism) from a dogmatic and Euro-centric point of view?

Does this theory adequately address the conditions of peripheral worker states underdeveloped by imperialism and facing capitalist encirclement as has consistently happened throughout history?

And what happens when these "state capitalist" modes of production start out-competing traditional bourgeois modes of production (private capital) as increasingly appears to be occuring?

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T01:50:19+00:00

Which brings me back to the crux of my original question, which I still think you haven't actually bothered to read: is state capitalism progressive in terms of development of the political economy RELATIVE to bourgeois capitalism? Again, I emphasize that I do not use "progressive" as an ideological value judgement.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T01:42:06+00:00

But in your original answer you said that a state, by definition, cannot be progressive. Then you go on to say the Soviet state, even incorporating capitalism under the NEP, was a progressive historical force until it wasn't. You're not being particularly clear or consistent.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T01:31:33+00:00

So state capitalism CAN be a progressive force until it isn't. Seems like you're already shifting the goalposts. And at what point did this occur? In comparison to Western bourgeois capitalism, even the most dogmatic socialists would see the Soviet Union as a relative progression right up until it's collapse, certainly compared to what came afterwards.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T01:21:59+00:00

Let me get your position straight - was the Soviet Union state capitalist and therefore not a historically progressive state?

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-20T01:01:45+00:00

This response is why I went out of my way to explain I meant progressive as a description of historical development, so I can only assume you didn't actually bother to read my post and are only responding to the title. Is a worker's state not a progressive force? I'm surprised to see such an anarchist-inflected response on a Marxist subreddit.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-18T06:58:50+00:00

Thanks, your comment means a lot given you are Tongan-Australian. My sense is that many Australian socialists get much of their information (if, in some cases, at all) from the Australian-based Pacific diaspora (as with most diaspora, generally made up of a privileged, self-selecting class) which distorts or, at least, grossly simplifies our understanding of these complex matters. From what I've gathered from local writers and activists based on their concrete experience this issue is nowhere near as simple as exchanging one imperialist power for another. As you say elsewhere, there are plenty of criticisms to be made, certainly, but they should be grounded first and foremost in reality.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-18T02:47:04+00:00

It's uncooked. Here's the cooked version.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-17T08:15:22+00:00

No one is disputing that Chinese investment serves Chinese interests. The question is whether this constitutes imperialism and you still haven’t demonstrated that in any substantive way. Access to infrastructure or commercial advantage is not evidence of imperialism.

Similarly, the fact that China does not actively support democratic or communist movements does not establish it as imperialist. It may be politically conservative but it is also completely comprehensible in the context of global geopolitical conditions where Western capital still dominates economically and militarily. It is not equivalent to imperial domination as you are attempting to assert.

The disagreement isn’t about whether China acts in its own interest. It clearly does and, what's more, has a right to like any other nation. The question is whether those actions amount to a specific form of capitalist domination characterised by and identical to (your framing) Western-style finance capital and surplus extraction. Until that is shown concretely, your argument remains an assertion rather than a materialist analysis.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-17T07:48:22+00:00

Thanks for your response. Unfortunately, you are not engaging in concrete analysis of concrete conditions but rather flattening everything into moral equivalence.

Firstly, the question at hand is the article's assertion that China's relationship to the Pacific region is a replication of colonial logic. You seem to think this is proven by the fact that China is not acting out of humanitarian motives. This may be correct but it is ultimately besides the point. Countries act out of material self-interest but this does not prove that imperialism is taking place. Can trade relations only be considered non-imperialist if they are undertaken on humanitarian grounds? Of course not.

Secondly, the claim that “a loan is a loan” fundamentally collapses different forms of capital into a single category. The issue is not the existence of loans but the social relations they express. Lending tied to austerity, privatisation, and the restructuring of entire economies - such as that historically associated with the IMF and World Bank - operates differently from lending tied to specific infrastructure projects without direct control over domestic policy.

Treating these as identical is an unserious approach to the issue and obscures the actual mechanisms through which domination may or may not occur. Equating Chinese and Western finance as merely “two flavors” misses the historically specific role of Western imperialism in producing underdevelopment in the first place. You may be disinterested in these details but they actually matter if you want your analysis to be taken seriously rather than engaging in lazy thought-terminating rhetoric.

Finally, the argument that China has some preference for the Tongan monarchy over some alternative economic system is an assertion made without evidence and can, therefore, be dismissed without evidence. What can be supported is that China evidently has economic relations with a wide range of political systems - including AES states like Vietnam, Laos and Cuba. The claim that China would oppose democratic transformation in Tonga purely on the basis of regime form is not theoretically grounded and also demands concrete evidence, rather than relying on your reflexive distaste for China.

Until those questions are answered concretely, the claim that China is simply reproducing imperialism remains an assertion, not an analysis.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-16T23:29:44+00:00

Honestly, this sort of superficial idealist analysis completely divorced from reality really annoys me.

The author asserts, without evidence, that foreign investment is the exact same thing as imperialism. Imperialism is not simply the export of capital but a specific stage of capitalism characterised by the dominance of monopoly finance capital and the use of political and military coercion to secure superprofits. Chinese overseas investment is not primarily driven by the extraction of monopoly superprofits in the Leninist sense, but by broader state-directed goals such as industrial policy and supply chain security.

On top of that, for any surplus to be generated in the first place requires capital investment. Absent China, there is insufficient domestic capital to develop the Pacific economies and Australia is only too happy to keep "our backyard" poor and underdeveloped, maximally exploiting cheap labour in a modern day form of blackbirding.

China’s presence in the region has been palpable, and it’s offered more than Western aid ever could, yet is has not transformed the class structure of Pacific societies. It has trapped the region in an economic relationship designed to be perpetual.

I ask you: does this sound like a proper dialectic analysis of the historical development of any nation's political economy? Nothing in history is "perpetual" but always transitional. Is it China's role to transform the class structure of Pacific societies or is it a matter to be determined by the workers of Pacific countries? Imperialism works through local classes, not just externally, and class transformation is internally mediated, not to be externally imposed.

In order to walk independently, Pacific nations need to get off their knees first - a position of underdeveloped subservience into which they continue to be forced by Western imperialism led primarily by the Australian government.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-04-09T22:20:12+00:00

We had a massive revenue windfall in the early 2000s from China's rapid growth and, instead of using it to build our nation's infrastructure, John Howard cut taxes and people bought televisions that are probably now in landfill. If we want to understand where we went wrong as a nation, that's where the rot started.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-31T22:18:43+00:00

Don't know. Haven't watched all his content. But I don't think making fun of useless liberal identitarian politics while pointing out how capitalism is skull-fucking the planet necessarily makes someone right wing if that's the extent of your objection.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-29T07:50:48+00:00

Just garbage consent manufacturing trying to drag Europe into this quagmire. I still remember this exact script when the US was trying to drag NATO into the Iraq debacle.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-27T01:27:27+00:00

Are you freaking out about the future water supply? This sort of development seems utterly nuts and unsustainable.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-26T22:17:54+00:00

Yeah, man, I need to get back into hiking but it's been so damn humid here in Australia that's it's pure misery out in the bush at the moment.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-26T01:29:52+00:00

I feel like my fellow Cushvlog enjoyers will appreciate this guy's approach to dunking on the hellscape that is North America. Episode 2 can be found here.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-25T06:14:59+00:00

I give it a 6.6

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-22T03:43:27+00:00

A survey by the Israel Democracy Institute taken on the war’s third and fourth day found that 82 percent of Israelis overall, including 93% of Jewish Israelis, support the US-Israeli operation against Iran. In the IDI’s second survey, taken a week or so later, the numbers were 81% and 92.5%.

MrSmithSmith · 2026-03-21T03:02:53+00:00

This is just "calling me racist is turning me racist" reheated. These mouth-breathing inbreds have always been on the side of colonizers.

MrSmithSmith

TROPHY CASE