In the Internet and in everyday conversations there are regular disputes about the “communiousness” or “non-communiousness” of this or that country. China is especially often remembered in this regard. Comments on this topic also appear under our publications on social networks. Some readers are confused in terms of concepts, saying that in theory China is, of course, socialist, but in practice everything is different… We will return to the question of theory and practice later, and now let’s try to apply a scientific approach to the question about China so that it can be applied to any country in the world.

To begin with, it is necessary to define what a socialist (communist) state is. From the moment the socialist revolution took place in some country, this country is called a socialist (communist) country, and the state in this country is a socialist state.

In such a revolutionary period, the defining moment is the political superstructure, which changes in one day. The new class in power aims at changing the economic basis (method of production), in particular the production relationship, which, of course, cannot happen in a single day but it happens much slower. In different countries, with different economic and cultural characteristics, this period lasts a different time. For example, in the USSR it took 19 years (from 1917 to 1935–1936).

In the transition from one exploitative system to another, the relations of the new system first mature in the economy, and then there is a revolution in superstructure. For example, the bourgeois revolution takes place when outdated feudal privileges enter into a sharpened contradiction with the already nascent capitalist relations in society, when the newly emerging capitalists are bored that the nobility and the clergy prevent them from conducting “business” and robbing workers, preventing them from using state power for this purpose.

However, when capitalism, which is obsolete and hindering the development of mankind, is replaced by socialism, then first a political revolution (in the superstructure) takes place, there is a change of class in power, followed by a long process of economic transformation, in parallel with sharply increasing progressive changes in public consciousness.

The old state of the bourgeois dictatorship is being destroyed. Instead of it, a new state is created at the same time – the state of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The political superstructure in China was changed in 1949, when the socialist revolution took place in China. On October 1 of that year, the People’s Republic of China was proclaimed in Beijing. From that moment on, China is a socialist country, and it will be, unless there is a counterrevolution.

With regard to the economic basis, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is currently the only country in the world where socialism has been built. In China, the economic basis now reminds Soviet Russia of the New Economic Policy (NEP) era. It is a multi-layered economy with a large communist sector.

Thus, in a socialist country called China, there is now a transition from capitalism to socialism.

China’s plans openly include bringing the construction of socialism to its ultimate goal. They recognize both the historicity of their “NEP” and the need, ultimately, for the complete destruction of private property. Readers are encouraged to refer not to the abstruse articles of bloggers and liberal “experts”, but to the CPC’s Charter and Program and the documents of recent Congresses. These documents have been translated into Russian, and anyone can read them. ¹

By the way, one more moment, which you can learn from the Communist Party of China: not only that after the congresses documents are translated into many languages of the world, but also directly during these congresses provide their translation into minority languages – for example, Kazakh, Mongolian and Korean.

The program of the Communist Party of China, which is a part of the CPC Charter adopted by the XIX All-Chinese Congress of the CPC on October 24, 2017 begins with the following words:

“Communist Party of China is the vanguard of the Chinese working class and at the same time the vanguard of the Chinese people and the Chinese nation, leading the core of socialism with Chinese specifics and represents the requirements of the development of China’s advanced productive forces, the progressive direction of China’s advanced culture, the root interests of the widest circles of the Chinese people. The highest ideal and ultimate goal of the party is the implementation of communism”.

And here is, for example, an excerpt from Article 2 of Chapter I “Party members”:

“Members of the Communist Party of China should selflessly serve the people and give their lives to the struggle for the cause of communism without stopping at any personal sacrifice”.

In this way, from the main CPC documents we can see that this is a communist force. However, while the documents usually express an essential aspect of the issue, they often differ from reality. Obviously, in reality in China there is a class struggle of communist forces (working class forces) against the forces of the bourgeoisie, both internal and external; and vice versa, the bourgeoisie also sneaks into the government. There is not much factual information about the situation of the working class in China, and it is quite contradictory – visitors rarely meet with workers. There are rumors both about the difficult conditions in China, and about the favorable conditions created by the state for the activity of trade unions, about the protection of trade unions by the state.

It is known that in China, the fight against poverty is in full swing. On the other hand, among the members of the CPC, members of parliament, there are about 75 millionaires, owners of the largest enterprises. Can millionaires represent the interests of the working people? Of course not. They have no place in parliament. And they are openly criticized by other members of parliament and the party. In total, the All-China Assembly of People’s Representatives includes 2,980 people, of whom 2,115 are members of the CPC.

China and the fight against the epidemic

The situation with the epidemic of the new coronavirus in winter and spring has shown that socialist China has successfully coped with the threat, stopping it on its territory, and is already providing active assistance to other countries, which can not be boasted even the most developed (and in fact – the most rotten) countries of capitalism: the United States, England, France, Germany and etc.

In this way, the positive aspects include the reconstruction of the poorest villages, the fight against viruses, a widespread increase in salaries, as well as the recent reduction in the retirement age to 55 years for women and 60 years for men (and under certain conditions, you can retire earlier), and in general, the expansion of the applicability of pensions as such. If in 1990 about 5% of the population was covered by pensions, then in 2018 – already more than 70%.

It can be concluded that China is a socialist country. The question of the victory of the new communist system in China is a question of the class struggle of the Chinese and world proletariat against the Chinese and international bourgeoisie.

And residents of other countries would not hurt to concentrate on building socialism in their homeland, especially where it was taken away.

A few words about theory and practice

As for “theory” and “practice”, there is no theory without practice, insisting on separation of one from the other is a standard and infinitely obvious mistake of an ignoramus.

A theory is not a theory if it is not confirmed in practice. As for the deep scientific, Marxist approach to social phenomena, the discrepancy between theory and practice has not yet been ascertained that the widespread economic and political theories and models that so caress the ears of the representatives of the bourgeoisie and those who dream of becoming a bourgeois have never been ascertained.

Andrew Marsov