Following a recent visit to China in which he talked to many top-level intellectuals, Engdahl reports on his impressions. In contrast to capitalists under the US-led Empire who prefer trading debt instruments and proxy wars to accumulate wealth and power, China is pursuing a program of building infra-structure to facilitate the trade of goods across the Eurasian continent linking all the economies from Asia to Europe.
Today’s China is far more complex than simply being the world’s great economic colossus, the so-called “workshop to the world.” Yet despite serious problems with the development path the country’s Communist Party leadership took beginning in 1979, when Deng Xiaoping opened China to foreign investment and a global market with a pragmatic market economy whose slogan was “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” China today is the key to any future positive world economic growth in a peaceful context. Unlike Trump’s demagogic slogan, “Making America Great Again,” China’s OBOR infrastructure undertaking is no demagoguery. It’s very richly real.Personally, I would like to see the Chinese Communist Party which guides China's policies start to restrict what their industries produce in favor of necessities like food, shelter, education, and information structures rather than producing for capitalist markets.
The Chinese Communist Party have used China's abundance of cheap labor to serve capitalist economies in order to develop their economy and technology. They have been wildly successful. But now its time to change to producing only necessary goods and services that are required to raise the quality of lives across the world. To do this, they must create genuine democratic structures that empower people to play an increasing role in deciding what is really necessary.