Because they are no longer the top dog in the Olympics, the US now wants to expand its kinetic and trade wars into the sporting arena, or at least the anti-drugs section of the sporting arena. 

China was once an insecure country, but a lot has changed.

Not just the space station which is clean, tidy and accessible, nor an undisputed moon landing and return, nor the fact that it now has the world’s largest army and a bigger navy than the USA.

Not even the communications, because 5G is literally everywhere in this vast country. Nor the microchip issues because after China suffered a setback, it’s the US which is hurting from a self-inflicted wound.

No, China has nothing at all to be insecure about with increasing wealth, the complete eradication of absolute poverty, stark reductions in crime and increases in life expectancy.

Which all lead to a country that is well managed, well governed and with a healthy environment. A good place to live.

Because of this, they’re now able to do something they couldn’t do 50 years ago; produce great athletes.

Many of those developments, and there are many more, exist – at least in part – because of one factor. That factor is US insecurity. The US pushed China into being self-sufficient and self-sustaining. Now they want to share China’s success and borrow some of China’s moon rocks, despite writing their own legislation to prevent that ever happening. They have a military which has a record of failure, or at best a record of not succeeding, and they have an industry, not specifically, but including their military industry, which, by their own admission, relies on the adversary they’ve created to survive.

Lance Armstrong was the greatest cyclist in history, until it was confirmed he was a drug cheat, his excuse at the time was that everyone was doing it, he wasn’t just a cheat, he was the best of all of them.

It’s very sad that today, in the US, we see a nation that reflects those fallen values, an entire government that is prepared to cheat to remain in a position of primacy, a position their predecessors earnt but, now, like an ageing athlete, are not strong enough to keep. The US has found it can’t maintain hegemony through skills, experience or prowess and has decided that cheating in the global arena, in trade, military and economics, is the best way forward and then, when that fails too, hobbling the opposition is the fallback strategy.

Waking athletes up at 5am on the day of a competition, is not fair or reasonable, testing an athlete more than once in a day is not fair or reasonable, being tested 7 times a day is downright abusive and when all these tests are finished, what’s even more unreasonable is the lack of acceptance of the results.

The US has questioned WADA, the Canadian based World Anti-Doping Agency about how Chinese swimmers were allowed to continue competing after being tested for a banned substance a year ago. China informed WADA of this situation, it happened during a training session, in China, during the Covid Pandemic and WADA were not present at the training camp.

Note the important part of the story, it happened in China, and the Chinese anti-doping agency informed WADA. WADA investigated and cleared the swimmers because the kitchen of the hotel was found to be tainted with the same banned substance. Now, both the White House, and the US Anti-Doping Agency want answers to questions that have nothing to do with them.

Furthermore, the US has now opened a criminal investigation and wants to issue arrest warrants for people they deem guilty of cheating in sports, but here’s the rub, they aren’t interested in pursuing US Athletes, only the Chinese.

Just imagine, what would happen if China or Russia issued an arrest warrant for every American cheat, there would be an outcry in the English language media and the Chinese and Russian courts would be full because the USA have made an art form out of cheating any and every system they’re in.

What many didn’t know until a supposed Russian hack in 2016 is that, like lobbying legalised corruption, Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) legalise taking banned substances in sport and the US have taken advantage of it. The US team is awash with athletes who need their TUEs. Between 2014-16, there was an increase in applications for TUEs with 63% of those issued being to just three countries: USA, Australia and France.

Is it possible that such countries have such seriously ill people performing at the very peak of the world’s athletic tables?

But let’s consider for a moment what the US is actually contemplating: they want to issue arrest warrants for people who have not only committed no crime, but have actually been tested and then exonerated by WADA as being innocent. Then, just so they can make more of a media circus of the entire spectacle, the US have subpoenaed the head of the International Swimming Federation to appear before their Criminal Investigation, for an alleged crime that didn’t happen in the US, didn’t happen under any US jurisdiction nor were they crimes against any US national and in fact, are not even crimes at all because there are no criminal statutes in the world for people cheating at sport, the US want to make it a crime but only if the defendant is Chinese or Russian. WADA, for the record describes the allegations as “highly charged, politically motivated criticism.”

Western media however, is full of outrage about how the impossible has occurred, an impoverished nation just a generation ago, has overtaken the leaders in sport as well as every other measurable economic and lifestyle metric. The only response left available to the US is to double down and do their best to “hobble the competition” in every field they can because, if the recent hacked and leaked information about the US use of TEUs is to be relied upon, they are already the world’s greatest sporting cheats and this is yet another of their deflection tactics to point critics in another direction.

https://johnmenadue.com/will-the-real-olympic-cheats-please-stand-up/

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

While the US has ramped up efforts to discredit Chinese athletes with doping allegations, a media investigation report revealed on Saturday that a deeply entrenched doping industry has taken root in the US over recent decades, from athletes to coaches and agents, and from pharmaceutical companies to government bodies.
 
With the US indulging doping practices meanwhile struggling with domestic drug abuse, Chinese experts said Washington is throwing mud at others with its “polluted culture,” warning that global sport industry should remain vigilant against its ill intentions particularly in the next Olympics to be held on its soil.
 
The revelation by Yuyuantantian, a media arm of China Media Group, comes from a comprehensive review of US doping scandals in the past 20 years. 
 
From the outset, most US professional leagues and the National Collegiate Athletic Association have not signed the World Anti-Doping Code, leaving them beyond its control and creating a foundation for internal doping cover-up in the country. And thus from a young age, American athletes are exposed to the allure of doping, often encouraged by their coaches, agents, and sports institutions, Yuyuantantian said in the report.   
 
Coaches play a crucial role in this area, particularly in youth swimming teams, where they have been known to secretly administer painkillers and other prescription drugs under the guise of treating injuries. Many of these drugs are banned by WADA, alongside performance-enhancing steroids, the investigation report said. 
 
An earlier study by the AP found that among 61,000 US college athletes, thousands exhibited unnatural weight gain — an indication of steroid use, the report noted. “The widespread doping practices are sustained by collusion between coaches and pharmaceutical companies, forming a critical link in the doping ecosystem,” it said.
 
By the time American athletes reach the international stage, many are already addicted, the investigation has noted. The report cited American cyclist Lance Armstrong, a seven-time Tour de France champion, as a prime example. 
 
He admitted that doping helped him for each of his seven Tour de France wins, by using EPO, human growth hormone, and diuretics. He also admitted to falsifying documents saying he passed drug tests, according to media reports. 
 
The Yuyuantantian report disclosed that his team manager and doctor were complicit in the scheme, and team doctors fabricated his illnesses to justify the “legal” use of drugs.
 
The US government is the most influential manipulator behind the scenes, the investigation report said.  
 
On the global stage, it leveraged its power to protect US athletes, often ensuring they avoid testing to gain an unfair advantage. In addition, the US Olympic Committee frequently “overlooks” such actions, leading to widespread abuse of substances like testosterone, it revealed. 
 
According to media reports, US athletes applied for Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) at a rate more than ten times that of other countries. 
 
As international anti-doping efforts expanded, countries established independent agencies outside the IOC. In response, the US government enacted legislation granting its anti-doping agencies "long-arm jurisdiction," enabling them to investigate and harass athletes from other nations – in this case, the Chinese swimmers, the report said.  
 
“This stems from an arrogant sense of exceptionalism of the US, which regards itself unique and superior to others. Thus, it tries to disrupt international norms by imposing its domestic rules on the global stage, not only in sports but in almost all arenas,” Li Haidong, a professor from the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times on Saturday.
 
Industry insiders have revealed that in the lead-up to the Paris Olympic Games, the US deliberately sought to stir up controversy around Chinese doping allegation by rehashing unsubstantiated reports from three years ago. This move is intended to disrupt Chinese team’s preparations for the Paris Games and even attempt to disqualify Chinese athletes.
 
The International Testing Agency (ITA) confirmed on Friday that related reports from the US have led to the excessive anti-doping tests on the Chinese Olympic swimming team.
 
The smearing of Chinese athletes is also a result of jealousy, as the US cannot bear to see their traditionally-dominant sports like swimming being surpassed by China, observers noted. This approach again mirrors the zero-sum logic that characterizes US policy in other areas.
 
What’s more, Li noted that as the US struggles with widespread issues like marijuana, doping, and prescription drug abuse, it is exporting this same “polluted culture” to the global stage. “This is an attempt to throw mud at the whole world,” Li said. 
 
Sports also are, in the mind-set of US politicians, a geopolitical tool to undermine its rivals’ soft power, the expert added, warning that the world should be vigilant against the weaponization of sports in the Paris Games as well as the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028.
 
International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach on Friday called on the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) to respect the supreme authority of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), while emphasized the IOC's full confidence in WADA.

Bach made the remarks during a press conference while responding to a controversy that stems from allegations by WADA that USADA allowed athletes who violated anti-doping rules to continue competing without sanctions. In exchange for their cooperation in providing information on other doping violations, these athletes were reportedly shielded from public exposure and penalties.
 
WADA recently came under US attack, as the agency confirmed China was blameless after US media hyped a 2021 incident in which 23 Chinese swimmers tested positive for trimetazidine (TMZ) due to inadvertent contamination.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202408/1317752.shtml

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

BY Bruno GUIGUE

The People's Republic of China was proclaimed by Mao Zedong on October 1, 1949. When they celebrate this anniversary, the Chinese know well what their country has become. But they also know what state it was in in 1949. Devastated by decades of civil war and foreign invasion, it was a field of ruins. Incredibly poor, the country represented only a tiny part of the world economy, while it still represented a third in 1820. The decline of the Qing dynasty and the intrusion of predatory powers ruined this prosperity. With the “century of humiliations”, China suffered the agonies of a long descent into hell. The country was occupied, pillaged and ruined. In 1949, it was nothing more than a shadow of itself. Ravaged by war, the infrastructure is dilapidated. Unable to feed the population, agriculture suffers from the glaring absence of equipment, fertilizer and seeds.

In 1949, China presented the spectacle of staggering poverty. Made up mainly of poor farmers, the Chinese population has the lowest standard of living on the planet, lower than that of former British India and sub-Saharan Africa. On this earth where existence hangs by a thread, life expectancy is 36 years. Abandoned to its ignorance despite the wealth of a centuries-old civilization, the Chinese population is 85% illiterate. This poverty is not inevitable: the consequence of shameless exploitation, it is the expression of social relations of a semi-feudal type. Fortunately, this unfair society was not made to last. Tired of languishing in destitution and filth, the peasants ended up destroying the old social order by siding with Mao Zedong and the Communist Party. An unprecedented event, this peasant revolution shifted a quarter of humanity to the side of socialism. Liberated and unified by Mao, China embarked on the narrow path of development from a backward country. Unimaginably poor, isolated and without resources, it explored unknown paths.

Seventy-five years later, the Chinese economy represents 20% of global GDP in purchasing power parity, and it overtook the US economy in 2014. In 2023, Chinese GDP (PPP) represents 142% of GDP of the United States. China manufactures 50% of the world's steel. Its industry is double that of the United States and four times that of Japan. It is the world's leading exporting power. The leading trading partner of 130 countries, it has contributed to 30% of global growth over the last ten years. This dazzling economic development has dramatically improved the material living conditions of the Chinese. With 400 million people, China's middle classes are the largest in the world. In 2019, 140 million Chinese went on vacation abroad: interrupted by the health crisis, this appetite for travel will experience new vigor. Average life expectancy increased from 36 to 64 years under Mao (from 1950 to 1975) and today it reaches 78.2 years (compared to 76.1 years in the United States and 67 years in India). The infant mortality rate is 5.2‰ compared to 30‰ in India and 5.4‰ in the United States. Illiteracy is eradicated. The enrollment rate is 100% in primary and 97% in secondary. At the end of the international comparative survey on education systems for the year 2018, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development awarded first place to the People's Republic of China.

Certified by the UN, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the OECD, the scale of the progress made by China is dizzying. According to the former chief economist of the World Bank, the appearance of a huge middle class in China is the main cause of the reduction in global inequalities between 1988 and 2008: in twenty years, China managed to extract 700 million people from poverty.¹ Colossal results, out of all proportion to the progress recorded in countries, like India, which had a comparable level of development in 1950. Better still, “extreme poverty” (according to international standards) was eradicated in 2021 after ten years of efforts. Nearly 100 million people have finally obtained the “five guarantees”: food, clothing, housing, education and health. This disappearance of poverty can also be seen in the statistics relating to income. Calculated in purchasing power parity, the average annual disposable income per capita of the Chinese reaches $19,340, or 83% of that of the French. Each year, it increases by around 5%. With the generalisation of social protection, 95% of Chinese have health insurance, while half of the world's population has none. Correcting the effects of the structural reforms of the 1990s, the Communist Party placed emphasis on reducing inequalities and the search for “common prosperity”. The real average wage has quadrupled in twenty years, notably as a result of worker mobilization, and foreign companies have begun to relocate their activities in search of less expensive labor.

By developing the domestic market, Xi Jinping’s policy is pushing up all wages. A peasant society until the 1980s, Chinese society became a predominantly urban society. The education system massively trains highly qualified engineers, doctors and technicians. One of the fundamental questions facing developing countries is that of access to modern technologies. Mao Zedong's China benefited from aid from the USSR until its interruption in 1960 during the Sino-Soviet schism. It was to overcome this difficulty that Deng Xiaoping organized in 1979 the gradual opening of the Chinese economy to external capital: in exchange for the profits made in China, foreign companies would transfer technology to Chinese companies. In forty years, the Chinese have assimilated the most sophisticated technologies. Today, China's share of high-tech industries reaches 28% of the world's total and has surpassed the United States. It is true that China has considerable human resources. It sends 550,000 students abroad and receives 400,000. With 80 technology parks, the country is number one in the world for the number of graduates in science, technology and engineering, and it trains four times more than the United States.

This technological breakthrough from the Chinese giant goes hand in hand with the energy transition. Signatory to the Paris Climate Agreement, China is the world's leading investor in renewable energies: in 2023, its investments represented two-thirds of global investments. It has 60% of the solar panels and 50% of the wind turbines on the planet. Most electric buses in service around the world are made in China. It contains 50% of the world's electric vehicles and it manufactures three times more than the United States. China has the largest high-speed rail network in the world (42,000 km), and the public company CRRC is the world leader in TGV construction. To shrink the desert, China has undertaken the largest reforestation operation in human history (35 million hectares). Taking the disastrous pollution of the atmosphere seriously, it managed to curb this phenomenon, and we can now admire the blue sky above Beijing. Wanting to build an “ecological civilization”, Xi Jinping is not skimping on means. In addition to massive investments in renewable energies and the fight against air, water and soil pollution, an ambitious nuclear program will make China number one in the world: the first fourth generation reactor has been installed into service in Shandong in November 2023.

The spectacular development of the People's Republic of China is the result of seventy-five years of titanic efforts. Adopting an original path to development, the Chinese invented a system that the categories used in the West generally struggle to describe. Far from being a “totalitarian dictatorship”, it is a popular democracy whose legitimacy rests exclusively on improving the living conditions of the Chinese people. The country's ruling body since 1949, the Communist Party knows that the slightest deviation from the line of collective well-being would cause its downfall. Compared to an ideal democracy which does not exist anywhere, this system is not without its drawbacks: the opacity of decision-making centers, the monolithic nature of official media, the impossibility of debating prohibited subjects. But if we compare it to existing “democracies”, it also has advantages: concern for the common interest, the primacy of the long term, the culture of results, the meritocratic selection of leaders. No more than the Western system, the Chinese political system is not free from contradictions. Will it last much longer? No one knows, but its resistance to change for seventy-five years speaks in its favor. Believing that democracy is based on electoral free-for-all, Westerners do not understand Chinese politics. No doubt an effect of the divergence between two cultures which do not have the same symbolic universe. Perhaps also because Westerners are blind to the reality of their system: they do not see that in their country the president is appointed by the banks, while in China the banks obey the president.

Far from being despotic, communist power is accountable to the population. This is why the image conveyed by Western media of a population paralyzed by fear is completely erroneous. Chinese society is crossed by multiple contradictions, and social protest is commonplace: “For most observers, China comes down to its political system, or even to the immense shadow of its president, Xi Jinping,” notes the sinologist Jean-Louis Rocca. “Society seems to have disappeared. In general, the Chinese are reduced to a mass of individuals subjected to Communist Party propaganda, incapable of having an opinion for themselves. This speech is doubly problematic. First, it is contemptuous of those involved, especially those who are critical of the system without being dissidents. It is also true for the now numerous bicultural citizens who certainly know the faults of Chinese society, but also the democratic crisis that European societies are going through. Second problem: this speech in no way corresponds to reality. Far from being amorphous, Chinese society demonstrates undeniable dynamism and expresses itself through various means.”

Punctuated by “mass incidents”, multifaceted protest can push back local authorities, and even the top of the party-state. “The field of social conflicts covers a very broad spectrum. Since the end of the 1990s, employees of state enterprises undergoing restructuring, exploited migrant workers, apartment owners dispossessed by developers or residents of polluting factories have not hesitated to defend their interests. More recently, delivery workers have rebelled against their working conditions and remuneration, and savers robbed by the real estate crisis against banks ruined by their speculative practices. We also remember the demonstrations of November 2022 during which thousands of people took to the streets to demand a lifting of the so-called zero Covid policy adopted as part of the fight against the pandemic. Even if the Chinese Communist Party had already decided to relax control measures, it was these demonstrations which definitively led Beijing to emerge from health isolation. The Chinese also express their opinions on social networks. Despite censorship, these have become a real place for the exchange of information and points of view.”²

To face popular demands, should the Communist Party not return to the sources of its political experience and follow what Mao called “the mass line” (qúnzhòng lùxiàn 群众路线)? Applied for the first time in the “red bases” of the 1930s, it consists of communist cadres merging with the people, understanding their concerns, assimilating the knowledge they can transmit and formulating solutions to their difficulties. Rooted in the population, the party can transmit its demands to the governing bodies and influence the decisions taken at the top. The experience of the end of “zero Covid” showed that those in power were quick to respect the verdict of the masses, and the Chinese know that its legitimacy has a lot to do with this ability to listen. They are aware that they will not be able to replace the party, but they also know that it has an obligation to take their demands into account. If he evades his duties, does he not run the risk of losing popular consent? In China, you cannot change the government, since the role of the party is not negotiable, but you can change your policy. In Western countries, conversely, you can change government, but you cannot change policy, since the ruling class sets the a priori limits of any possible policy. This is why liberal democracy is actually an oligarchy, not a democracy, while the Chinese regime is a popular democracy, even if not liberal.

For Zhang Weiwei, director of the China Institute at Fudan University, "the dominant Western narrative on Chinese politics is based on an extremely superficial and biased analytical paradigm: the so-called democracy versus dictatorship argument, where democracy and dictatorship are defined unilaterally by the West. This narrative defines the multi-party system and universal suffrage practiced in the West as a democratic system and believes that only by adopting this model can China become a normal country and be accepted by the so-called Western-led international community. The Chinese political system is portrayed as authoritarian and the antithesis of democracy. If you do not accept this Western political logic, then you support dictatorship. If you are not moving towards the Western political model, then you are not pursuing political reform. This paradigm has long been an ideological tool for the West to foment color revolutions and overthrow non-Western regimes. But because the Western political model is problematic, many people are starting to question it. In this system, democracy means election campaigning, election campaigning means political marketing, political marketing means money, public relations, strategy, image and acting. Many leaders know how to play this game, but few know how to get things done.”³

If the Chinese seem to be okay with their system, moreover, it is because they hardly see the point in changing it: “From a Western point of view, this society has a major flaw,” underlines Jean-Louis Rocca. “A large part of citizens today have doubts about the possibility, or the interest, of establishing a representative democracy in China. But these doubts are not ideological, they are based on a pragmatic analysis of the situation. It’s about answering a simple question: can democracy do better than the CCP? Is it worth taking risks by opposing the CCP? Is the game worth it?".⁴The Chinese know that they own their home, that they have access to healthcare, that their education system is efficient, that transport is modern and cheap, that they can travel as they want, that wages are increasing, that work is valued, that jobs are not outsourced abroad, that ethnic minorities are respected, that China is a great sovereign country, that it is the leading industrial power, that "it is building infrastructure all over the world, that it is not at war with anyone, that its borders are secure, that it is resolutely pursuing the energy transition, that security in the streets is ensured, that terrorism has been eradicated, that leaders are selected according to their competence, that the rich and powerful are not above the law, etc. They can express their discontent, and they do not hold back. But why would they want to change the system?

Without promoting systemic change, some Chinese intellectuals believe that the country will not do without political reform. Retired Central Party School professor Cai Xia argues that “democratic politics” is not contradictory to the “socialist revolution” predicted by Marx, but rather its fulfillment. This is why one of the missions of the Chinese Communist Party is to carry out a democratically inspired reform intended to complete the process of emancipation initiated in 1949: "The Chinese Communist Party established the new China through a violent revolution on the ruins of autocracy, and guiding the construction of the new China has been the fundamental mission of the Communist Party as the ruling party. However, the construction that New China needs is not only economic and cultural, but at a more fundamental level, it is the construction of a political community that will place New China in the category of modern democratic countries. But if we face reality and take seriously the lessons of history since the party assumed this mission as the ruling party, we must admit that even today this mission has not been fully fulfilled or accomplished.”⁵

No one knows what tomorrow will bring, but such a debate of ideas shows that the political situation in China is not fixed. In the eyes of many intellectuals, democratic development is desirable, provided that it does not disrupt a system that has proven itself. To ensure the future of the country, the essential thing is to follow a Chinese path towards modernity, far from a declining Western model. In China, since Antiquity, political power has drawn its legitimacy from the delegation of sovereignty granted by Heaven. An impersonal principle which governs the movement of things, it attributes responsibility for royal, then imperial, power to those who prove themselves worthy of it. But this celestial mandate has as a corollary the possibility of a change of agent. If the holder of earthly power proves unworthy of the office, Heaven can withdraw his mandate. He then entrusts it to a new sovereign, in turn founder of a new dynasty. For Mencius, a Confucian philosopher from the 4th century BCE, the source of legitimacy is found in the people, and this legitimacy coincides precisely with the mandate of Heaven: when the people place their trust in the new sovereign, handing him the keys to imperial power, he manifests the express will of Heaven to grant him the mandate: “Heaven sees as my people see, Heaven hears as my people hear.”

This is why Mencius assumes the logical consequence of the primacy granted to popular consent: the sovereign is like a boat carried by the waves, and if he behaves unworthily, it is legitimate for the people to overthrow him. “Political legitimacy is none other than the mandate from Heaven of the political order. If the mandate of Heaven is lost, there is revolution. Power devoid of legitimacy can only be maintained through violence. But great violence is unfit to establish an effective society, and an ineffective society inevitably leads to political collapse,” comments Zhao Tingyang, professor at the Institute of Philosophy of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. "In light of this tradition philosophically, we measure the civilizational gap between China and the United States: for American Protestantism, individual success is the sign of a divine election; for Chinese Confucianism, collective well-being is a heavenly commandment. The antithesis of Western individualism, Chinese society is a holistic society where personal interest must give way to the common interest. The Confucian tradition makes the individual the element of a whole defined by a network of relationships which encompasses and exceeds him. For Chinese thought, being is not substance but relationship. Individual rationality is a rationality of competition, while relational rationality is a rationality of coexistence,” writes Zhao Tingyang. “If it is true that coexistence precedes existence, then relational rationality also takes precedence over individual rationality.”

This is undoubtedly what explains the acceptance by the Chinese of a unified political leadership under the aegis of the party. To fulfill the mandate of the people and promote the common good, political power must give itself the means to achieve its ambitions. In China, centralism and discipline are not burdens from which we should free ourselves, but the conditions for efficiency of which the people are the sole judge. Unlike liberal oligarchies which prefer surface agitation, popular democracy with Chinese characteristics favors in-depth action and the long-term development of the country. This constant in Chinese politics spans all eras. With “reform and opening up” initiated in 1978, China entered the era of “socialist modernization”. Crossing a new stage in its historical journey, the Communist Party has given itself the task of continuing the construction of socialism by developing the productive forces. As specified by the central committee in its resolution adopted on November 11, 2021, this new policy aimed to “lift the people out of poverty and enrich them as quickly as possible, while providing a more dynamic institutional framework for the great national renewal” . It is this policy which is being pursued today, not without adjustments whose necessity has been imposed by experience, in accordance with the principle, affirmed by Mao Zedong and recalled by Xi Jinping, of “the primacy of practice”.

With economic reforms and openness to trade, in fact, China has acquired a true “socialist market economy system”. It established, at the “primary stage of socialism, an economic system based on public ownership and the simultaneous development of various forms of property”. At the cost of a thousand difficulties, the Chinese communists have built a mixed economy driven by a strong state whose priority objective is growth. Given the colossal needs of the country, its content was initially quantitative, and the surge in GDP took the Chinese economy to unprecedented heights. But since Xi Jinping came to power, the government has placed greater emphasis on quality of life and common prosperity. Even if the increase in GDP is still much higher than that of rich countries, it is experiencing a deceleration which marks the start of a new cycle. With the reforms of the 1980s and 1990s, development policy was based on the modernization of public enterprises, the creation of a powerful private sector and technology transfers from more advanced countries. Today, it aims for first place in innovative technologies where China has ended up conquering its strategic autonomy.

Will economic results be enough to guarantee political consensus? For Cao Jinqing, professor of sociology at the University of Shanghai, the ability of the ruling elite to be virtuous is a determining factor: "If those who hold power within the party are unable to resist the temptation to obtain material gains through the exercise of power, or if, once material interests have become the most important thing, these power holders seek to privatize these interests, rejecting the banner of the Communist Party and socialism, and only work for themselves, without defending the people, then it is a betrayal of the mandate of heaven. If corruption is not controlled, it is the ruling party itself that will suffer the most. Only if power is exercised in the public interest will it win the hearts of man. Otherwise, we can only count on continued economic growth and ever-increasing job creation to maintain political power. But relying solely on material factors is an insufficient approach, and if there are ever major setbacks on this front, things can become extremely dangerous. This is why the fight against corruption is not an empty slogan. Everyone, regardless of their position, must be severely punished for any infraction of party discipline or state law. The heavenly mandate has been given to you, and you cannot act only in your own interest, but rather you must defend the people.”⁷

With the “new era socialism”, China has experienced a clear change of course compared to the Maoist period. But make no mistake: the construction of socialism is still on the agenda, and economic openness in no way means a change of system. Those who saw the reform as an abandonment of socialism confused the end and the means. Taking their desires as realities, they favored the elements of rupture and ignored the elements of continuity. Would current socialism have come into existence without previous advances? This is what Jiang Shigong, professor of law at Tsinghua University, explains: “Xi Jinping clearly said that the thirty years before reform and opening up and the thirty years after them could not be considered mutually contradictory. In the early period of reform and opening up, there were a few people who wanted to completely repudiate Mao Zedong, but Deng Xiaoping resolutely opposed these proposals, clearly emphasizing that if it were not for the Comrade Mao Zedong, our Chinese people would have been groping in the dark for a much longer period. And it was under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping that the party center arrived at an objective assessment of Mao Zedong's contributions and failures. Likewise, in the absence of the reform and opening-up and modern reconstruction pushed by Deng Xiaoping, China would not have been able to rise so quickly, making such a historic leap: with Mao Zedong , China stood up (zhànqǐlái 站起来), with Deng Xiaoping it got richer (fù qǐlái 富起来), and with Xi Jinping it became strong (qiáng qǐlái 强起来)”.⁸

The originality – and perhaps the excess – of Mao Zedong was the attempt to accelerate the development of productive forces by accentuating the transformation of social relations. To consolidate the socialist path, he said, we must continue the class struggle within the country. This revolutionary voluntarism laid the foundations of industrialization, contributed to generalizing education, liberated women from patriarchy, and eradicated epidemics. Under Mao, Chinese life expectancy increased from 36 to 64 years. China grew at a higher rate than many developing countries for the entire period 1949-1976. But this undeniable momentum was slowed down twice: by the crisis of the “Great Leap Forward”, responsible for the last famine that China experienced (1959-1961), and by the convulsions of the Cultural Revolution in its most recent phase. more subversive (1966-1967). During this chaotic episode where China seemed to falter, Mao and the Red Guards mobilized the masses against the party in order to prevent it from “restoring capitalism”. But this revolution within the revolution quickly encountered its limits. The ideological effervescence of fanaticized youth has caused unnecessary violence. Running in vain, this agitation generated chaos which called for its negation, and Mao Zedong himself put an end to it.

The Cultural Revolution was the heroic attempt to found an egalitarian society. It left good memories among the poorest, but it traumatized intellectuals and executives. Even if the figure of Mao Zedong is still the subject of almost religious respect, the Chinese do not wish to relive this troubled period of their history. They aspire to make a living from their work in a peaceful climate and to enjoy comfort that their elders never knew. In a resolution adopted in 1981, the Communist Party passed a harsh judgment on this experience described as “leftist slippage”. It gradually initiated reforms that went against the Cultural Revolution. Marxist in its own way, “socialism with Chinese characteristics” defined in 1997 is based on the idea that the development of productive forces is the essential condition for the transformation of social relations, and not the other way around. As Jean-Claude Delaunay writes, “the revolution was conceived by the founders of Marxism as a fruit to be picked when it was ripe, and which would in all likelihood be because the orchard was provided”. But for Chinese communists, the revolution is rather “the fruit of an orchard that must first be cultivated, then made to grow and pruned accordingly.”⁹ Clearly, socialism is not pauperism. And to initiate the transformation of social relations, a certain level of development of the productive forces must first be ensured.

We will not easily erase the record of Maoism: Mao Zedong liberated and unified the country, abolished patriarchy, carried out agrarian reform, initiated industrialization, endowed China with the nuclear umbrella, obtained international recognition, defeated illiteracy and gave the Chinese twenty-four years of extra life expectancy. In China, almost no one disputes such achievements. The Chinese know where they come from, and they do not see the break between Maoism and post-Maoism in the same way as Western commentators. Changing trajectory while retaining the essentials, Mao Zedong's successors took into account the changes in international life and took advantage of globalization. They transformed the country by implementing the “four modernizations” whose program Zhou Enlai, Mao's closest companion, had defined in 1964. Lucid about the past and confident in the future, they never let go rudder that the Grand Helmsman had bequeathed to them. They modernized the economy at an accelerated pace, overcame mass poverty, raised the scientific and technological level of the country in a way that no Chinese had probably imagined.

The historical experience of the People's Republic of China is unique: it is the success of an exit strategy from underdevelopment on an unprecedented scale, under the leadership of a communist party which mobilized the population over the long term. Certainly, the problems remain immense: the population is aging, the real estate crisis threatens, the debt of communities weighs on their capacity for intervention. The country is experiencing astonishing paradoxes: odes to socialism which alternate with the saga of billionaires, persistent inequalities which contrast with the official discourse on “common prosperity”. Contemporary China carries its share of contradictions, it has its weaknesses and fragilities, but it intends to continue the movement. It intends to develop its internal market, promote the ecological transition, and become a “powerful and prosperous socialist country”. We must come to terms with this: closing the parenthesis of Western domination, China aspires to regain its rightful place.

Westerners have demanded that it participate in the globalization of trade, and they lament the market shares that its companies are winning hands down. Multiplying contradictory injunctions, they accuse China of doing too much and not enough, of being desperately poor and scandalously rich, decidedly too liberal when it is not too interventionist. They are asking it to save global growth – which Beijing did in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, caused by the rapacity of American banks – but without being too greedy in raw materials. They would like it to continue to develop, but by renouncing the tools of its development, such as its monetary sovereignty and its public sector. The Western attitude sometimes borders on the comical. When China, after having experienced exceptional growth rates, gently drops back to 5.2% (2023), we hear the experts of a European country which is dragging itself at 0.7% being choosy and predicting catastrophe. In the West, we like to say that China remains a poor country, with hundreds of millions of underpaid workers. But the Chinese reality is changing more quickly than the representations of Western experts, because the struggles of industrial employees — in a country which experiences social conflicts resolved by negotiation — have resulted in a significant increase in wages, to the point of worrying foreign investors.

When you travel to China, you don't see a developing country, but a developed country. The modernity and reliability of the means of transport are impressive. The metros are brand new, extremely clean, functional and secure. There is no homeless person, no pickpocket, no tag, no cigarette butt, no paper on the ground. Passengers wait quietly for their turn if the train is crowded, and during rush hours the trains come every 30 seconds. Despite their gigantic size, train stations and airports function like clockwork. Delays are rare, the ticket offices are automated and the signage is impeccable. China is a country without slums where poverty has disappeared for good. It is significant that the Chinese, when praising Xi Jinping's policies, cite both the fight against corruption — which is extremely popular — and the fight against poverty. In Chinese villages, we see publicly displayed boards listing the timetable for poverty eradication programs. Everyone knows what to expect, and evaluating the results in full view of everyone is made easier. This painting is also displayed in front of the building of the local committee of the Communist Party, which testifies to the interest shown in it. The social framework necessary for the mobilization of all contributes, in the eyes of the Chinese, to a virtuous circle whose effectiveness is patent.

If there is an idea rooted in the minds of Westerners today, it is that China is a police state where arbitrary power is accompanied by widespread surveillance. Living in permanent fear of repression, the Chinese would suffer without flinching a tyranny based on the terror it inspires. But does this representation have any relationship with reality? When the Beijing metro management wanted to introduce a facial recognition system, a renowned lawyer, Lao Dongyan, publicly denounced the project. Widely distributed on social networks, his indictment is severe: “The people who control our data are not God. They have their own desires and their own weaknesses. In addition, we do not know how they will use our personal data or how they want to manipulate it. Without privacy, there is no freedom.” A lawyer from Beijing, Lu Liangbao, added: “The people only feel safe when the state takes care of them. But those in power are even more maniacal and want to control everything. This reassures them. Cameras would do better to monitor civil servants and leaders on how they spend public money, rather than monitoring ordinary citizens.” Cases of this type have multiplied. On November 19, 2019, the People's Daily relayed the controversy with the headline: “Facial recognition provokes a national debate”. To date, the Beijing metro has still not adopted facial recognition.¹º I was able to verify it on site in October 2023.

In terms of prejudices about China, the idea that orthodoxy places a heavy burden on intellectual life also occupies a prominent place. However, you only need to consult countless online sources for proof to the contrary. Since the 1980s, the debate has been ongoing. The liberals form a very influential movement in the country. Enthusiastic supporters of economic reforms, they want the expansion of the market, the opening of financial capital and the pursuit of internationalisation which they hope will ultimately provoke systemic change. The most daring do not hesitate to demand an institutional evolution that would bring China closer to Western countries. Unlike liberals, nationalists emphasize Chinese specificities and act as vigilant guardians of national sovereignty and integrity. During the recurring crises caused by the presence of foreign naval forces at the gates of China, they are the first to advocate firmness. Faced with [American] imperialism, China must definitively abandon its low profile and prepare for an inevitable confrontation. For their part, neo-Confucian intellectuals advocate a return to traditional values ​​and China's affirmation of its cultural identity. They invite China to recharge its batteries in the oldest traditions to regain confidence in itself. Some go so far as to advocate the establishment of a “civil religion” intended to support the cohesion of society, battered by individualism and consumerism.

The New Left, finally, appeared in the 1990s in an intellectual climate marked by resistance to triumphant liberalism. According to the dominant narrative, the West's victory in the Cold War meant that capitalism had won and that there were no other options for humanity. For many Chinese, this affront was all the more intolerable as the reforms threatened to sacrifice the socialist heritage on the altar of development at all costs. Didn’t “socialism with Chinese characteristics” strangely resemble capitalism? He seemed to endanger the party, corrupted by the new possibilities of private enrichment. Were we going to abandon the Chinese people to their fate, while new elites shared the benefits of the reforms? The reorientation of the development strategy in favor of the popular sectors, from 2002, changed the situation. Workers' struggles have won significant wage increases and new rights for workers. Does Xi Jinping's political line mark a new inflection point? The merciless fight against corruption has shown that the powerful can incur the wrath of the law. The eradication of extreme poverty, the generalization of social protection and the bringing into line of large private groups illustrate the determination of leaders to achieve “common prosperity”.

This is how China is going, a thousand miles from what we imagine in the West. Continuing their odyssey, the Chinese are not going to replace their system with the Western system. It has been accepted since 1949 that the Communist Party is the governing body of society and that it sets its political orientations. This party accepts internal debate but does not want an external competitor. We can deplore it, but it is up to the Chinese to decide. This unified direction gives cohesion to the entire system. It is judged on its results, in accordance with a Confucian-inspired ethic where leaders are required to serve and not to serve themselves. For the Chinese, society comes first. The family prevails over individuals, the clan over the family, society over clans. Each person is in a relationship of dependence on the other. Society is a set of structural subordinations in the image of nature, where the Earth is subject to Heaven. Participating in the collective effort is not a constraint, but a reward. Every Monday, in schools, the director raises the colors and gives a mobilizing speech in front of the students in line and in uniform, supervised by their teachers. The ode to “socialism of the new era” rises in the fresh morning air in front of the neatly lined up schoolchildren. Moralistic phrases like “be civilized, be studious and diligent” adorn the schoolyard in large letters. This half-patriotic, half-educational ritual inaugurates a long day of work where everyone will strive to do their best.

https://www.legrandsoir.info/ainsi-va-la-chine-en-2024.html

GUSNOTE: THIS IS WHY MANY TAIWANESE SEE THEIR FUTURE BACK IN MAINLAND CHINA... BUT THE AMERICAN EMPIRE IS CORRUPTING TAIWAN WITH WEAPONS AND CASH...

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

This short history of China over the last three decades is mainly based on the first of a three part series in the SCMP. It describes how the adoption of neo-liberalism by President Deng made China rich but also created social problems that President Xi is trying to fix.

President Deng enabled China to become prosperous and restore its dignity by shifting from a failed command economy to a guided free market one.

In other words embracing neo-liberalism by calling it “Socialism with Chinese characteristics”.

Deng also realised China needed a firm dictatorship to implement this painful transition or it would collapse as happened to the Soviet Union under Gorbachev who tried to liberalise both the economy and society.

After Deng, his successors tried to share leadership with all the CCP factions only to see the country descend into paralysis, indecision, and corruption.

President Xi came to power because he recognised that the party and nation could only survive if it addressed the major problems that arose from uncontrolled neo-liberalism and weak post-Deng leadership.

These problems were rampant corruption at all levels of government, a growing divide between city and rural dwellers, millions still living under the poverty line, large scale environmental degradation, and CCP factional infighting causing policy indecision and inertia.

He set about arresting top officials taking bribes, redirecting resources to improve housing and infrastructure in smaller towns, completely eradicating poverty as defined by the UN, making renewable energy a top priority with China making more solar panels , wind turbines and lithium batteries than the rest of the world combined, and centralising power again so the personality based factional system gave way to public interest policy making with obstructors removed from their posts.

Whether Xi makes the mistake of killing entrepreneurial capitalism by replacing it with timid risk averse state owned corporations only time will tell.

He has already learned that banning borrowing by over indebted property developers killed off the construction industry and caused a local government financial crises as their land sale revenues dried up.

Also cracking down on tech industry entrepreneurs because they were becoming more popular on social media than him, slowed down China’s race against Silicon Valley.

Finally he needs to improve social security so households can reduce their large precautionary savings so they spend more on consumer goods.

That would make China less dependent on Western markets that are trying to throttle its huge export drive.

https://johnmenadue.com/how-china-moved-from-a-command-to-a-free-market-economy-and-is-now-restoring-socialism/

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

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China's railway network has surpassed 160,000 kilometers, with high-speed rail reaching 46,000 kilometers — an increase of 64.2 percent and 392.2 percent, respectively, since 2012, China State Railway Group announced on Saturday.

The country's rail infrastructure and modernization are now considered world-class, excelling in passenger and freight transport, technological innovation, energy efficiency, and safety.

https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202409/14/WS66e50d13a3103711928a805e.html

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.