Slaughter said:
Watch it. You're reaching levels of agressive stupidity previously only attained by Sorrow and Was Ist.
Chinese Secret Nuclear Submarine base!
- Thread starter welsh
- Start date
Watch it. You're reaching levels of agressive stupidity previously only attained by Sorrow and Was Ist.
welsh said:
Dictionary definitions aside, Fascist states have a historical tradition and refer to those states that rose (with or without the support of the US) in opposition to communism.
Wooz is right, it's confusing to now use that term for communist or semi-communist states. Especially since "authoritarian state" describes China much better, as its cultural heritage is too distinct from the Western cultural heritage to apply the same rules of nation-state nationalism that Fascism is an exponent of.
Slaughter Manslaught
Vault Senior Citizen
Neamos said:
But I am not Chinese!
We could really use some ridding of people in the genepool, though. Just too many people. 6 billions? Madness, I say.
Slaughter Manslaught said:
How Malthusian
It'll correct itself. Ref: current food crisis.
Slaughter Manslaught said:
well..
Imagine..what would happen if everyone in china donate
their sitting w.c.pans and airdrop them to where you and the
lovely rainforest-monkeys stand?
just imagine~ dont wanna hurt no lovely monkey~
*Please show soma inner quality.*
welsh
Junkmaster
Brother None said:
Historically, yes, Wooz is right. Facism rose as response to facism. I have made the argument in more detail elsewhere on this forum.
The question is really whether a communist state can transform itself into a facist state. I argue that history here might be contingent, but it is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition. A totalitarain communist state can transform itself into a totalitarian facist state.
What you are arguing is that its an authoritaran state.
Wait, but Franco was a facist state.
See the problem?
Authoritarian states are a broad concept that includes totalitarian states, facist states, and other forms of dictatorial regimes. A theocracy can be an authoritarian regime, for instance- should the ruling class be composed of group of priests capable of using the state as the instrument of domination.
Again, if we were to apply Mann- we can argue that authoritaran states are those that possess both high levels of despotic and infrastructure power. But that merely tells us something about the nature of the state's relationship with society.
So labelling it becomes tricky.
You may wish to refer to Giovanni Sartori's ideas on concept stretching and the misuse of concepts.
http://www.ukrainianstudies.uottawa.ca/pdf/1. Sartori 1970 APSR.pdf .pdf
Is China even totalitarian? Not really- a totalitarian state has total control. It seems the CCP lacks that today.
So let us go back to the issue- do facist states require a historical contingency or a critical juncture where the repression of communism was necessary?
Some would argue that the US is becoming a facist state-
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2006/11/28/is-it-fascism-yet/
But I would say that's blowing a lot of smoke up someone's ass. Or at least critical concept misformation and stretch.
Furthermore- not all the "facist movements" seem to be driven by anti-communism-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fascist_movements_by_country
If communism is dead, then is facism- as a response to communism-also in the dustbin of history? So the concept is no longer useful - except as history. Is that all it is?
Is anti-communism necessary? Probalby not unless you are looking merely at historical cases. If so then the concept is essentially dead wiht communism. But perhaps a movement is more than just a response, but driven by an agenda of its own? Not sure.
Is anti-communism sufficient? I don't think so. Lots of other stuff gets tossed in that bag of wickedness we call facism.
SO if anti-communism is neither sufficient nor necessary- then anti-communism is insufficient and unnecessary- historically valid as a causal mechanism but not necessary for the definition of the concept.
But lets say that you don't buy it- that you think the causal mechanims is essential for the concept. Chicken and egg problem?
Ok, then lets think of it in a counter factual- What if Mao were to rise from the grave in China today- a Maoist Jesus image.
Some history-
In the old days of Mao, the Gang of Four, etc.- every once and awhile the great leader would go purging the party for counter-revolutionaries. These were people suspected of bourgeois sentiments or who opposed a Marxist revolution. Such individuals would use the power of the state to privatize wealth. In the Soviet Union, purges were frequently common place.
(This problem became so widespread that individuals were using charges of "counter revolutionary" to payback private grievances, leading to retaliatory charges, not unlike cases in occupied areas where civilians take advantage of guerrilla and national forces to target private, and generally non-political rivals. However, in their zeal to nail the counter-revolutionary, innocense till proven guilty was rarely enforced.).
So what about today's China.
In today's China- the children of party members get to go to the US, members of the party get favorable opportunities to bid on contracts, use their political influence to secure business ties. Corruption in China has become a major problem., so great that extreme cases lead to the death penalty (these are frequently cases that are so extreme they become a political embarrassment and threaten party hegemony over society- to have hegemony, all members of the ruling class must generally abide by the same normative rules- otherwise the class collapses and things get really ugly).
So what about the communists? What happens to the revolutionary who would say, "workers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains!"
450 million chinese living on less than $2 a day. Nearly 2/3 of the population in poverty- and this is a class that is growing, not declining, despite China's huge growth. As argued above- the members of the party are the counter revolutionaries, what Mao would call the bourgeois elements. THat 2/3 of the population that is poor or going in that direction, would overthrow the 1/3 trhat is well to do and enjoying the glitz of China's major cities.
But such masses need leaders who would challenge the hegemony of the CCP.
And what would happen to those who challenge that hegemony? Repression?
So apply the counterfactual- in today's China- would a Maoist communist be repressed? People still venerate Mao as a great leader, but the political establishment has abandoned Mao's economic program (a good thing considered how bad it was).
But even Mao was willing to turn on social discontent when it pleased him, spread out the little red books and trigger a cultural revolution to depose those "counter revolutionaries" that opposed him.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_revolution
Mao may have won the cultural revolution, but in the long run, he lost the war when Deng came up with the 4 modernizations.
Ironic, but I have had Chinese students who have said that the cultural revolution is one of the reasons why they need a CCP. They also use it to justify repression of Falun Gong- a whacky movement, not doubt, but one that my Chinese students says- brainwashes its people into crazy beliefs.
But what is Falun Gong really? A counter-movement to the CCP's hegemony, a challenger. Like the Dalai Lama? Like militant Islam? Like uncontrolled Christianity? And the response- to repress and control on behalf of the CCP's hegemony.
Accepting Wooz's point- today's China would repress a Maoist communist. Why? Such ideas would threatened the hegemony of the CCP and may encourage workers to "rise up and lose their chains."
So- today's CCP and PRC can be seen as facist- anti communist in the traditional sense, because they sure as hell don't want to see the Great leap Forward or the Cultural Revolution replayed.
But this raises an interesting problem- if we understand China's program as promoting economic developmental (State intervention in a capitalist orientated export economy) but its developmentalism for only a narrow class of beneficiiaries.
The ruling class exists to rule- ideology is but a vehicle to justify that rule.
WHich raises some issues-
A state that maximizes wealth for a narrow ruling class and denies it for the masses- that essentially redistributes wealth from the poor to the powerful- is predatory.
But why did it abandon communism? Normally a predatory ruling class (the CCP) isn't interested in broad social development- which could potentially challenge its control. Yet China has growing by most levels of economic indicators- but not in terms of human development.
But then- so did Korea and Taiwan- under authoritarian leadership, and Japan and Singapore under dominant party democracies.
One argument for why a country becomes developmental lies in the constraints on its ruling class. Constraints- frequently geo-political but also domestic, can force a state to become developmental.
Think of this as the play on Tilly's "States made war and war made states." Arguably both Taiwan and South Korea developed because they faced a hostile international environment. But they also faced hostile domestic environments as well- rebellious workers who demanded a greater share in the economic distribution of wealth.
These states were willing to use repressive capacity and economic leverage to keep worker salaries low. Ironically, when workers protested and striked, the state had to give in- and these countries democratized.
Might we see the same thing in China? China may become democracy- when the lower classes finally rise up again to "lose their chains."
Ironic.
Is that you in the picture?
welsh said:
Not really, because the real question is this:
welsh said:
And the answer is "yes, it is useless".
Look, we're talking about a heavily emotional term here. Its practical value as a description is limited now that communism is gone, which means that the de facto reason to use it becomes an appeal to emotion.
That's just useless. We're in a new age now, so we need to apply new terms now. Calling China fascist just draws up unnecessary connotations and expectations vis-a-vis their foreign policy that might not be accurate.
Also, communism aside you seem to have missed my remark on the significant different in cultural heritage of China (or even Russia) as former empires vis-a-vis the strong nation-state centrality of modern fascist states. It is typical Western arrogance to then try to draw China into the same mould as nation-states when its structure isn't necessarily the same.
welsh
Junkmaster
So your arguments is (1) culture matters and (2) old concepts are useless.
If so -
(1) If culture matters, than you need to unpack that concept into something meaningful.
(2) if old concepts are useless- than we might as well dump your argument about empires and nation-states. Afterall, how do we compare empire in Asia vs empire in Europe, or empires anywhere else. You are also making an argument that historical comparison is limited.
Or are you making an argument that concepts are ok, but only when you think they are ok, but not when others think they are ok? That's some pretty flawed reasoning.
Without concepts there is neither the possibility of generalizations, comparisons or even discussion.
Either facism is dead, or it isn't. Given that there are lots of neo-facist and facist political movements- I think killing the concept is a bit premature.
If a state looks like a facist state, operates like a facist state, than we shouldn't call it a facist state simply because it hurts someone's feelings?
Nope- words and concepts have both substantive and emotional meaning.
Your position is bullshit- (you can discern both the substantive and emotional elements of that).
If so -
(1) If culture matters, than you need to unpack that concept into something meaningful.
(2) if old concepts are useless- than we might as well dump your argument about empires and nation-states. Afterall, how do we compare empire in Asia vs empire in Europe, or empires anywhere else. You are also making an argument that historical comparison is limited.
Or are you making an argument that concepts are ok, but only when you think they are ok, but not when others think they are ok? That's some pretty flawed reasoning.
Without concepts there is neither the possibility of generalizations, comparisons or even discussion.
Either facism is dead, or it isn't. Given that there are lots of neo-facist and facist political movements- I think killing the concept is a bit premature.
If a state looks like a facist state, operates like a facist state, than we shouldn't call it a facist state simply because it hurts someone's feelings?
Nope- words and concepts have both substantive and emotional meaning.
Your position is bullshit- (you can discern both the substantive and emotional elements of that).