Cpgb-ml?

When it comes to defending Stalin the CPGB-ML provides pretty standard and uncontroversial (for us, of course) efforts. The issue is their contemporary politics: they praise present-day China as socialist, and they praise ZANU-PF as well.

I'm sure he doesn't mean "socialist" in the same sense as he considers USSR to be socialist during the Stalin period. I mean, he has (multiple times) explained his complete opposition to introducing any kind of capitalist reforms. And there's a whole playlist of him explaining how he thinks Khrushchevite Revisionism was one of the main factors that led to the fall of the USSR.

They claim it's a socialist state. See for example: http://www.cpgb-ml.org/download/leaf...a_20080831.pdf

Keep in mind that, officially, the CCP still "upholds" Stalin, but that means nothing in practice when it is so obviously a capitalist state and the CCP so clearly a revisionist party.

Lastly, I don't think anybody would say that China is "capitalist" or "imperialist" in the same sense as US, UK, etc..? Most of their key industries are still state owned - and they also provide aid to DPRK.

Its "Communist" Party openly admits millionaires into its ranks and claims that they are workers. Actual workers are subject to pretty extraordinary exploitation. CCP "theorists" claim that labor-value is a commodity under socialism. It is far closer to the "free enterprise" model of the USA than the state-capitalist USSR ever was.

It "aids" the DPRK by exploiting it. The "joint-venture" enterprises operate on a capitalist basis. It has called on the DPRK to be "reasonable" in its dealings with the USA and pretty much tries to force its hand to capitulate to US demands. It only supports the DPRK for geopolitical reasons, since South Korea is obviously in the US camp.

State ownership has little to do with if a state is capitalist or not. India had state ownership of various industries as well, I doubt you'd call that socialism.

But, one more thing, if they're indeed capitalist as you say, then why don't they simply drop the name "Communist Party", stop pretending to be a socialist state, and introduce a multi-party capitalist system like in the US? Wouldn't that make their system much more US friendly and less unstable?

Actually many bourgeois commentators in the West praise China for its one-party system, claiming that it provides stability for the country and is in accord with some supposed "Chinese psychology" unaccustomed to Western conceptions of democracy.

It keeps the "Communist Party" name because it gives them legitimacy as "heirs" to the Chinese Revolution and its gains. They not only have bourgeois nationalism to rely on, but also Marxist arguments for the leading role of the proletarian vanguard. Transforming into a generic bourgeois party would ruffle the feathers not only of the party bureaucracy, but also of the armed forces which collaborates closely with the CCP and which would quite likely oppose such a drastic move with military force.

And why would it want to be "more US friendly"? It's an emerging imperialist superpower which is entering into ever greater economic competition with the USA.

Why is that so?

Because it's tied to the CCP bureaucracy, just as the army was tied to the CPSU and there were fears in 1990-1991 that it would overthrow Gorbachev.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is this - (Assuming China is capitalist)
1) Do the people in the CCP believe they're Marxists? Or do they know they're capitalists and this is all just to delude the people the same way Bush knows that US is not a "democracy"?
2) Do the armed forces believe that CCP is communist or do they also know what you said?
3) Finally, is there any way, short of a socialist revolution in China, for it to go back to being a socialist state?

1. Pretty much no one in the CCP cares about ideology. Two Westerners with experience in China have said as such to me. Being a CCP member gets you personal benefits and career options, which is why people join it. Same with the CPSU.
2. The armed forces are the final weapon of the bourgeois Chinese state, they don't care about ideology. Chinese citizens in general are pretty much uniformly apolitical. Many in the army are, of course, nationalists, and the CCP gains much of its legitimacy from promoting nationalism.
3. Of course not, it's a capitalist state, ruled by the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.

There's nothing whatsoever "socialist" about it, and in fact many leftist currents in China compare it to fascism. In the USA even some of the most conservative commentators declare that China is capitalist.