Hi all,
I’ve been a longtime lurker here and this is my first real post—I wanted to ask folks about the liberalization and subsequent destruction of the USSR versus Deng’s reforms in the PRC.
I know the USSR’s politburo was largely calcified near the end of its existence (with a lot of politicians being in their 60s-70s, lots of corruption, etc.) and the choice to both politically and economically liberalize is what put the last nail in the coffin for the USSR. From what I have read, the party basically gave its power away, let other parties run, and many old party members became part of the new bourgeois class. Most takes I see from other communists these days seem to be of the opinion that it’s the political liberalization that really killed the USSR, not necessarily just the economic opening up.
Which brings us to China: I think it’s an understatement to call the PRC’s development a miracle, and it seems like they’re going to continue a progressive path for the foreseeable future. Deng also opened things up, but in a much more controlled manner, with no political liberalization—it seems this is what has really contributed to the PRC’s success. Using the developmental ability of capital, while ensuring power remains in the hands of a state ideologically committed to improving material conditions, has worked well.
So my question then is: what allowed China’s political system to be adept at managing their economy without caving to bourgeois interests, compared to the USSR’s? What caused the USSR’s political system to fail compared to China’s? Does it have to do with policies made as far back as Stalin or Khrushchev? And what can a revolutionary socialist movement take away from this contrast to ensure it wouldn’t happen again in a (hypothetical) future?
Any responses or resources are greatly appreciated! Thank you.
China got material concessions for opening up as a market providing a large amount of educated labor in exchange for resources and the industrial capital it had long been starved of*, and became less isolated in general as the US started seeing it as an asset to exploit instead of a threat to crush. The USSR only got more hostility from the US for its concessions, and it alienated its allies as it abandoned them in the hopes of winning the US's trust and cooperation (which it did not receive), and then it got looted and torn apart when it opened up instead of seeing any sort of material benefit.
China also didn't make the absurd, unforced error of its ruling party declaring war on itself. Even when the liberal bloc came into power they didn't start castigating figures like Mao and trying to tear apart the legitimacy of the CPC, they didn't allow more extremist liberals to seize power from them, and they didn't systematically undermine the CPC in material ways at the ground level. Gorbachev's bloc on the other hand did all of those things, crippling the CPSU and empowering its enemies and then just passively letting Yeltsin coup the USSR.
* Further, while there were material decreases in the standard of living of the working class in the short term from the concessions to foreign capital the CPC made, these were outweighed in the longer term by the huge material benefit of actually getting access to industrial capital on the level needed to fully industrialize, and they were able to weather consistent violent unrest over material conditions until the communist bloc came back into power and started enacting huge anti-poverty programs that seem to have alleviated those tensions now.