Socialism with Imperialist Characteristics. A Tale of Four Sino–Soviet Joint-Stock Companies (1950–1955)

Abstract

In the early 1950s, the Soviet Union and China established four joint-stock companies in Xinjiang, Beijing and Manchuria. This essay examines the formation and operation of the four companies and argues that Soviet participation in the companies was part of its imperialist economic practice vis-à-vis China. It proposes a reconceptualisation of Sino–Soviet economic relations situated in the Soviet effort to organise a bloc-wide economic system with a logic that was not confined to socialist ideology.