The public-private distinction in the shadow of China: Uneven and combined development’s critique of liberal IR theory?

Abstract

Social theories of International Relations (IR) are normally premised on a deep distinction between public and private spheres. Whether articulated as ‘capitalism’, ‘the market’, or ‘civil society’, all attribute some analytical priority to the private, with explanatory significance for the public sphere and therefore also central to the critique of realism in International Relations. Liberalism in particular sees the source of peace as a flourishing private sphere that narrows the scope of the otherwise violent, war-prone orientation of the public which defines states. However, we argue that this orientation is ill-equipped to grapple with the world-historical significance of the ‘Rise of China’ that is better understood instead as a form of industrialism not premised on the public/private distinction. This inapplicability of categories foundational to liberal IR theory leaves it unable to meaningfully engage the Rise of China debate. Using Uneven and Combined Development (U&CD), this paper elaborates industrialism as a pattern of state-led development in China that prioritises industrial capacity as an end over strictly private objectives (e.g. profits). Arising in substantial part from the exigencies of political multiplicity, industrialism seeks national unity and vindication of a distinct civilisational identity through the pragmatic means of industrial capacity under conditions of modernity. Whilst this argument partly echoes the developmental state literature, it goes further by visualising this across both the longue durée and the current conjuncture, right up to the much-discussed Belt and Road Initiative. Finally, the argument emphasises U&CD’s potential to originate a simultaneously non-liberal and non-realist account of the implications of China’s rise.