Capitalist Economic Development Research Articles

China: the state and the economy under Xi Jinping

How does the Chinese Communist Party navigate its way through the contradictions and tensions of managing a capitalist economy? This article traces the dynamics of recent developments within the Chinese economy and state, particularly the period of President Xi Jinping’s dominance. It explores the paradox of the juxtaposition of Communist Party rule with capitalist economic development. The resulting tensions are evident in the state’s successive changes of strategy, in its efforts to reconcile the antagonistic forces that have arisen during China’s extremely rapid industrialisation. An elite party is ruling without any functional or democratic means of negotiating between such antagonisms. China’s economy is currently shifting to a new phase, away from its emphasis on cheap labour from the rural areas and towards becoming a high‐tech economy. The current plan for growth rests upon a quest for greater self-reliance and vast investment in new technologies. Xi’s regime is attempting this while simultaneously seeking to strengthen its control over capital, labour and civil society. The article discusses recent shifts of policy resulting from Xi’s need to maintain the party’s authority following the financial crisis and the Covid pandemic: including the u-turn over Covid restrictions at the beginning of 2023, and the clampdown on companies such as Evergrande following the property crash.

Coevolutionary decoupling in artisanal fisher communities: A temporal perspective from Chile

The relationship between the exploitation and scarcity of fishery resources is a complex phenomenon that has been broadly examined by studies on fishing sustainability, the governance of the commons and ecology. This study furthers this line of inquiry using a systemic coevolutionary approach that enables the time perspective to be used to examine the negative effects on artisanal fishing. Through a qualitative methodology, document analysis and ethnographic approach, the research into the coevolution of artisanal fishing in Chile enables us to identify how the negative effects on the fishing communities are the outcome of the gradual increase in the decoupling of local socioecological systems which started in the mid-twentieth century and accelerated within the context of neoliberal capitalism. In this process, the value systems, knowledge, organisation, environment and technology change their ability to integrate with each other, leading to mismatches via successive multiple feedback incidents. From a temporal coupling-decoupling vantage point, a path of analysis opens up to understand the negative effects of the capitalist economic development in traditional fishing communities in the global South.

СУТНІСТЬ ПОТЕНЦІАЛУ ПОДОЛАННЯ НАСЛІДКІВ ГЛОБАЛЬНОЇ ЕКОНОМІЧНОЇ КРИЗИ

The technical structure of society and the existing concept of capitalist economic development cannot meet the current challenges of the XXI century, so it is important to consider the anti-crisis potential of countries, taking into account the conditions of its formation and use. Radical changes in the conditions of formation and attraction of anti-crisis potential require clarification of its essence taking into account the adaptability of public administration, technical capabilities of social production, as well as the human ability to make complex decisions on more efficient combination of resources in uncertainty. In terms of the 6th and 7th technological system, the "potential of regional development" is proposed to be defined as the ability of societies of certain territories to create metacognitive technologies to increase resource efficiency and the ability of societies to quickly integrate into the digital world. The development potential provides the system's ability to adapt to crisis phenomena and maintain the trend of economic growth. The anti-crisis potential (as additional), is involved in the impact of crisis phenomena and helps to overcome the negative impact that has led to a sharp decline in economic growth. A characteristic feature of the "crisis potential" concept is the ability to attract additional resources during the crisis, with the decisive role played by the level of adaptability of public administration, technical capabilities of social production, as well as the ability of labor to make complex decisions in uncertainty. Anti-crisis potential is an opportunity that in the process of anti-crisis management is transformed into an effective mechanism for counteracting crisis phenomena. In countries with strong economies (USA, Austria, Germany, France, Spain) there is a significant drop in GDP per capita during the global financial crisis of 2020, which was triggered by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. At the same time, there are countries (Israel, China), whose economic condition not only has not deteriorated, but undergone even further sustainable development. This trend is due to the fact that for some systems the crisis is not only a threat, but also provides opportunities for the formation of new combinations of resources, which leads to a significant economic effect and further development. If we conduct research the trends of countries' response to global crises and exit from crises, we can see different trajectories. It has been proven that some countries in the world are strengthening their economies after economic crises, so the term "economic potential of the global crisis" has been proposed. The economic potential of the crisis is the possibility for strong economic growth in the region, the ability of the national economy to achieve a strategic goal by using changes in the international market, changing the positions on the international arena.

Rethinking of Marxist perspectives on big data, artificial intelligence (AI) and capitalist economic development

AI and big data are not ideologically neutral scientific knowledge that drives economic development and social change. AI is a tool of capitalism which transforms our societies within an environment of technological singularity that helps in the expansion of the capitalist model of economic development. Such a development process ensures the precarity of labour. This article highlights the limits of traditional Marxist conceptualisation of labour, value, property and production relations. It argues for the rethinking of Marxist perspectives on AI led economic development by focusing on conceptual new interpretation of bourgeois and proletariat in the information driven data-based society. This is a conceptual paper which critically outlines different debates and challenges around AI driven big data and its implications. It particularly focuses on the theoretical challenges faced by labour theory of value and its social and economic implications from a critical perspective. It also offers alternatives by analysing future trends and developments for the sustainable use of AI. It argues for developing policies on the use of AI and big data to protect labour, advance human development and enhance social welfare by reducing risks.

A Critique of AI and Capitalist Economic Development

In a recent paper, on “Rethinking of Marxist perspectives on big data, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and capitalist economic development”, we engaged with AI led social and economic transformations which are ideologically concomitant with requirements of capitalism and its future growth. The World Development Report (2019) focuses on the changing nature of work, skills and traditional production patterns due to the growth of technology and digital platforms. The international agencies established to facilitate capitalism and its market forces look at the opportunities offered by the rapid advancement of AI and data driven economic system. The ‘artificial intelligence’ is an ideological tool of capitalism that ensures precarity of labour beyond territorial boundaries. It limits the existing traditional and radical Marxist theories of labour to analyse and understand the constantly evolving information led data driven economic system. The growth of AI led automation is forcing new forms of production relations on working classes based on technological abilities and access to technology. The growth of AI accelerates existing digital divides.

Towards inclusive urban development? New knowledge/creative economy and wage inequality in major Chinese cities

Capitalist economic development and urbanization in recent decades has seen the rise of a knowledge-based economy and a widening income gap. Attempts to pursue a creativity-led urban development strategy amidst the ascent of a knowledge-based economy have led to the popularity of inclusive growth urban and regional policies. However, policy acceptance of the concept of inclusive growth and its cognate variations appears to have run ahead of serious empirical substantiation of a growth-inclusion nexus. This paper contributes to the emerging literature on inclusive growth and urbanization through an investigation of the patterns and determinants of industry-based wage inequality across 35 major cities in China during the period of 2003–2013. The empirical analysis identifies a distinctive process of simultaneous tertiarization and industrialization that contributed to the rise of wage inequalities in Chinese cities. It also reveals the significant role played by the Chinese state as enterprise owner, public employment provider, and social welfare supplier, in ameliorating income inequality in urban China. Our analysis draws attention to the contextualized nature of urban economic growth in order to understand its implications for inequality/inclusiveness.

Innovation, value-neutrality and the question of politics: unmasking the rhetorical and ideological abuse of evolutionary theory

ABSTRACT Since the reconstruction of Joseph Schumpeter’s view of innovation as a key factor of capitalist economic development and the neo-Schumpeterian formation of national innovation systems theory in the early 1990s, there has been an attempt to approach the emergence of new technological products and processes in evolutionary and institutional terms. However, much of this neo-evolutionism has positioned innovation as if it was a value-neutral process of supply and demand, taking place in a free market and having nothing to do with politics. I argue that such value neutrality is defended by some neo-Schumpeterian thinkers who take a socio-biological path to explaining innovation and technical change. In doing so, they abuse evolutionary theory to cloak the de facto strong role of political institutions and the state in innovation. Scholars of responsible research and innovation should unmask the public values involved in technological change and development.

French Colonialists’ Investment in and Exploitation of Natural Rubber in Vietnam

Rubber trees are among the plants which have sustainable economic values. In Vietnam, the discovery, cultivation and exploitation of rubber trees are closely associated with the natural formation and the historical upheavals of Vietnam as well as the world. Rubber was internationalized in the 18th-19th centuries and used extensively in the colonial industry of Vietnam during this period. This paper aims to provide insight into the importation and exploitation of rubber in Vietnam. Over 120 years of cultivating and exploiting rubber trees in Vietnam is the evidence of the plant’s internalization, its significance in the capitalist economic development, and the proof of France’s wisdom and economic strength. Upon this solid foundation, Vietnamese people today still preserve and continue developing rubber trees. The coverage of rubber trees in Vietnam focuses largely on the southeast part of the country, where fertile soil is ideal for perennial crops. Today, rubber growing and exploiting remains the backbone of Vietnamese economy, creating sustainable economic values. Through this paper, the author hopes to create a prospect for the internalization of Vietnamese rubber trees, contributing to the knowledge industry of the human kinds in the future.

Liverpool Merchants in 19th-Century Niger Delta

Abstract How does religion or worldview affect business practices and ethics? This tradition of inquiry goes back, at least, to Max Weber who, in the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, explored the impact of theological suppositions on capitalist economic development. But the connection can also go the other way. So the focus of inquiry can become: How does business ethics or practices affect ethics in a given nation or corporation? This paper inquires into how the political and economic conditions created and sustained by nineteenth-century trading community in the Niger Delta influenced religious practices or ethics of Christian missionaries. This approach to mission study is necessary not only because we want to further understand the work of Christian missions and also to tease out the effect of business ethics on religious ethics, but also because Christian missionaries came to the Niger Delta in the nineteenth century behind foreign merchants.

Television’s “Leftover” Bachelors and Hegemonic Masculinity in Postsocialist China

ABSTRACTThis article looks at the renegotiation of Chinese masculinities by analyzing the gendered performances of participants of a popular TV dating show If You Are the One (Fei Cheng Wu Rao). As symptomatic media texts, the reality TV show points to the quandaries of evolving gender politics faced by singletons of China’s one-child generation within the country’s neoliberal restructuring. The textual evidence shows that male participants follow the rule of a market economic hierarchy and uphold the hegemonic ideal of versatile, successful, and upper-middle-class manhood, which hinges on the patriarchal, heteronormative model of love and marriage. Paradoxically, this disempowering ideal is reinforced by female participants in their relational reconstruction of masculinities. The article argues that the Chinese state media not only discipline masculinities but also naturalize a regressive gender mandate in alignment with neoliberal values and the state’s pursuit of capitalist economic development. Consequently, the multiple, hybridized versions of masculinities emerging in media discourse and popular parlance complicate the cultural repertoire of gender relations yet without challenging deeply entrenched structural gender inequality.

Rising powers and the drivers of uneven global development

ABSTRACTThe emergence of the rising powers has been seen as heralding a fundamental shift in global economic geography. It can also be seen as the latest expression of capitalist economic development. I first consider theorizations of this development as combined, uneven and crisis-prone, with an ongoing tension between processes of differentiation and equalization. I then situate the rising powers in the context of successive patterns of global uneven development, the transformation from an Old to a New International Division of Labour and then to a ‘new’ New International Division of Labour in which the emergence of the rising powers is a major element. There are, however, significant differences among the rising powers in their economic development trajectories, in the role of the state in shaping these, and in their relationships to other economies in both global North and South. Changes at the global scale are linked to changes in the intra-national geographies of economies in the new global economic geography. I conclude with some speculative remarks as to the possible future trajectories of the rising powers and how global economic geographies might evolve in future.

Capitalism in Motion

In this article, we take up Oilman’s (2014) challenge that historical archaeology should explore the motion of capitalism both in space and time. We discuss capitalism as a dynamic totality and use this to develop the implications for historical archaeology in two different but interconnected ways. First, we use the rich context of Lowell, Massachusetts, to provide a detailed analysis of how capitalism developed in a single place. The second case uses several archaeological sites from across the U.S. to highlight capitalism’s motion from the perspective of a single commodity, coal. We link labor and the environment, past and present, to highlight the folly of seeing the exploitation of workers and the environment is as an accepted part of capitalist economic development. Understanding capitalism in motion is more than just a future research direction for historical archaeology because without these critical understandings people may not have a future at all.

Stacked scale frames: building hegemony for fracking across scales

This paper introduces the concept of stacked scale frames and explains how they can legitimate a particular set of interests as general interests. Specifically, it examines how shale gas development proceeded in Pennsylvania, and finds that stacked scale frames were a tool for establishing the legitimacy of fracking. Fracking is a technique for extracting oil and natural gas from shale rock formations using highly pressurised water, sand and chemicals. It has produced dramatic amounts of gas and wealth over the past seven to eight years, but poses risks to the environment and public health that are largely understudied and misunderstood. Previous studies of fracking have explained the rise of fracking in Pennsylvania using analyses of advertisements and corporate promotional materials. This study builds on their work and adds an understanding of the fracking boom seen through the concept of hegemony. The data used in this paper draw from a set of interviews with ‘intellectuals’ in Gramsci's sense of the word: societal elites who mould and shape public opinion. In the case of fracking, these elites included representatives of oil and gas capital, the state, academia, NGOs and civil society living near fracking sites. Overall, the benefits of fracking were recognised by all groups and the costs were less commonly represented. This paper contributes the concept of stacked scale frames to literature on social production of scale in human geography. Stacked scale frames made capitalist economic development appear to benefit a wider section of society spread across multiple scales simultaneously. In contrast, opponents of fracking framed the costs of fracking at individual scales and in a piecemeal fashion. It concludes that anti‐fracking forces, and political ecologists in general, should embrace a critique that draws together social and environmental harms across multiple scales simultaneously.

Revisiting Friedrich List's National System of Political Economy

This paper traces a historical origin of the idea that the state (government) can and should implement a series of industrial policies to nurture domestic infant industries, in order to show how this economic theory sheds new light on contemporary debates regarding the proper relation between the state and market. Many scholars on the East Asian development experience have correctly focused on developmental states’ industrial and trade policies for promoting outward, export-led growth. However, least attention was paid to (the historical origin of) the economic theory that justifies this highly unorthodox policy measures by the state. The author claims that the original idea in the history of economic thought is best exemplified by the early 19th century German political economist Friedrich List, and examines how his infant industry protection policy proposals have been widely used by almost all advanced economies. This historical investigation of economic thought and the survey of actual capitalist economic development process shows that the East Asian development experience is not unique to this region and virtually almost all advanced economies had relied on a certain forms of policy of protection that List once emphasized. In addition, the same policy measures for protecting particular domestic industries are frequently used by the government in advanced capitalist economies even nowadays.

The enduring relevance of Rosa Luxemburg’s The Accumulation of Capital

First published in 1913, The Accumulation of Capital represents Rosa Luxemburg’s quintessential contribution to Marxism and an exceptional, yet equally controversial, ‘modification’ of Marx’s original scheme of accumulation. Built on a cordial critique of Marx’s model of expanded reproduction, Luxemburg’s intervention offers not only a new framework to study capitalist economic development, but also a historical and political compass with which the expansion of capitalist social relations through colonialism and imperialism can be expounded. To celebrate the centenary anniversary of the book in 2013, we assess the enduring relevance of key themes developed by Luxemburg in their conceptual implications, but also in their relevance to understanding dynamics within contemporary capitalism. The first part of the article engages with Luxemburg’s theoretical contribution to the analysis of capitalist expansion with reference to the transformation of peripheral spaces. The second part briefly discusses how the book can be utilised as a starting point to examine the characteristics of today’s crisis-ridden global capitalism. We conclude by highlighting a number of contentious points that challenge Luxemburg’s account, but ultimately claim that The Accumulation of Capital is still an invaluable resource for those who are interested in critically examining international political economy and geopolitics.

Friedrich List’s National Political Economy and the Post-War East Asian Development Experiences

This paper is to trace the historical origin of the idea that the state (government) can and should adopt a series of industrial policies as well as protective measures to nurture domestic infant industries in order to show how this economic theory sheds new insights into previous debates over the role of East Asian developmental states. Many scholars on the East Asian development experiences have correctly pointed out developmental states’ industrial and trade policies for promoting outward export-led growth. However, least attention was paid to the (historical origin of the) economic theory that justifies this highly unorthodox market intervention by the state. The author claims that the original idea from the history of economic thought is best exemplified by the early 19th century German political economist Friedrich List, and examines how his policy proposals for the infant industry protection have been used by almost all advanced economies since then. This historical investigation of economic thought and actual capitalist economic development process can offer a new angle through which we can critically evaluate some of previous debates over the validity and replicability of the state industrial policies for developing countries nowadays. JEL: B3, B15, O24, O25, O53 Keyword: Friedrich List, infant industry protection, comparative advantage, East Asian development model, developmental state, industrial policy

La reinvención de la autenticidad en el contexto de la mercantilización neoliberal

Desde las últimas décadas del siglo pasado, la constatación empírica de que los límites naturales al crecimiento estaban siendo traspasados (García, 2004) supuso un incremento de la conciencia medioambiental y dio lugar a la búsqueda de respuestas de distinto tipo. El concepto de 'Parque Natural', como un intento de preservar determinados espacios, se inscribe en este contexto. En su versión neoliberal dicha preservación no implica ninguna modificación sustantiva de las reglas que impone el desarrollo económico capitalista. De este modo, se convierte en una aplicación del binomio "desarrollo sostenible", un oxímoron (Latouche, 2006) donde se yuxtaponen dos significados contrapuestos, a saber, desarrollo económico capitalista y sostenibilidad medioambiental. En el presente artículo analizamos, en primer lugar, las implicaciones teóricas del concepto 'Parque Natural'. Posteriormente, a partir de las investigaciones realizadas en el parque natural de 'La Albufera de Valencia' (España) reflexionamos sobre los límites y posibilidades de dichos espacios. Tras un análisis somero de la imagen publicitaria del área de reserva natural del 'Tancat de la Pipa' situado en La Albufera, presentamos, posteriormente, las representaciones sociales sobre dicho hábitat producidas mediante entrevistas abiertas y grupos de discusión en cada uno de los sectores sociales implicados. Así vemos, como en los sectores tradicionales el área de reserva natural del Tancat es percibida como una expropiación de su propio espacio; por su parte, los técnicos medioambientales la perciben como un objeto de consumo educativo y científico y, los movimientos ecologistas, como una zona "re-naturalizada" que va acorde con la lógica "desarrollista". Y por último, para el sector caracterizado como 'consumidores de la modernización' el Tancat se concibe como un espacio de consumo 'natural' que a modo de parque temático' se vincula con el ocio familiar.

Georgii Plekhanov and the Communist Manifesto: the Proletarian Revolution Revisited

This article discusses the question of Georgii Plekhanov's contributions to Marxist revolutionary strategy. It argues that the strategy Plekhanov proposed in Our Differences (1885) was very different from the one he had earlier proposed in Socialism and Political Struggle (1883). Plekhanov pretended to model his Russian policies on the Communist Manifesto's policies for Germany in the mid-nineteenth century. However, in proposing that Russia's democratic revolution was to be followed by a protracted period of capitalist economic development, Plekhanov was in fact taking Marxism in a new direction. Plekhanov was the first Marxist to have rejected Marx's scenario of social revolution by numerically small proletariats and to have predicated the proletarian revolution on the proletarianisation of the majority of the population and integral industrialisation.

Steamboats and the Rise of the Cotton Kingdom by Robert Gudemstad (review)

Steamboats and Rise of Cotton Kingdom. Robert Gudemstad. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2011. Pp. xii, 280. Cloth, $42.50.)Reviewed by Calvin SchermerhornThis concise and engaging book tells story of technological and market development, social transformation, and ecological change through history of in interior South. It synthesizes previous scholarship and also adds much that is new. The book begins with hopeful and pioneering passage of New Orleans from Pittsburgh to New Orleans in 1811 and ends with Mark Twain's embroidering into a tapestry of memory, one that helped to obscure history Robert Gudmestad invigorates with incisive analysis and often harrowing detail. By 1830s, he contends, steamboats had become workhorses of economy in southern interior, as they enhanced value of slaves, raised plantation productivity, and provided new sources of revenue for planters (158).The architects of steamboat commerce were engaged in a promethean process of capitalist economic development, and were floating engines of capitalism (155). Steamboat entrepreneurs understood that steamboats stood at intersection of risk, opportunity, and power in burgeoning Southwest (8). Americans quickly awoke to their power and promise, and soon were hauling cotton and other commodities to entrepot cities and ferrying finished goods back into interior, creating economic linkages, information networks, and political ties. Operators sought to maximize their cargo capacities, and ambitious captains bragged that their were 'loaded to guards' with bales of cotton by thousands (142). Most were owned by southerners who operated them with Yankee shrewdness. As cotton production grew, so did boats, which became faster, longer, wider, and more capacious.Steamboats were social spaces, and Gudmestad explores steamboat culture from captains, clerks, and pilots down to waiters, chambermaids, and roustabouts, unskilled laborers - often enslaved - who carried heavy cords of wood, rolled barrels of goods, and stacked bales of cotton. An interior view of reveals how social differences were created and reinforced. For instance, middle-class white female passengers confined in parlors and cabin rooms were ostensibly being protected from aggressively masculine culture of deck. Boats' saloons were filled with games and bluster, tobacco and whiskey. First-class passengers allured by ever-loftier claims of luxury and speed were often frustrated at realities of mediocre fare; noisy, filthy, and cramped accommodations; and delays on account of weather, mechanical failure, or operators' intrigues. Deck passengers, including many immigrants, struggled for space, and workers struggled for sleep amid their unremitting toil. Although there were instances of racial comity, Gudmestad contends, the bulk of surviving evidence points to a pattern of racial intolerance and harassment (48). A greater human tragedy also unfolded on steamers.Steamboat operators became agents of two forced migrations taking place simultaneously. Even though Indian Removal is usually associated with a land journey, Gudmestad argues, the majority of Native Americans traveled all or part of way to Oklahoma in steamers (79). Gudmestad contends that steamers' technological advancements that made them essential to commercial transformation of country also seemed to make them attractive to agents removing Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks, Cherokees, Seminoles, and even enslaved people whom some Indians claimed as property. …

Sundownand “Liquid Modernity” in Pawhuska, Oklahoma

The early twentieth-century oil boom radically transformed the Osage reservation in Oklahoma, and in the early 1920s the Osages became the world's richest community because of their collective sharing of profits from mineral resources. In 1934, John Joseph Mathews, an Osage American tribal historian, publishedSundown, his only work of fiction, a peculiarBildungsromanabout the life of Chal Windzer in the aftermath of oil discovery on the Osage reservation. I argue that Mathews's use of the novel of formation is a particularly important literary and intellectual intervention. First, at a time when the significance of material resources to the American economy and American national imaginary was growing, Mathews uses the generic convention of progress to narrate oil's social “formation,” alongside the tale of Chal's dissolution, his failure, that is, of the very development which the novel's genre implies. Second, Mathews's literary representation of the oil boom as the Great Frenzy – a period of widespread violence and cultural chaos – complicates traditional accounts of capitalist economic development, which define late-stage capitalism and its financial deregulation and IT boom as an era of radical cultural “fluidity” (Bauman, Sennett). By drawing attention to the material and social fluidity of oil culture and the force with which it affected the Osages,Sundownpoints to a specific Osage American colonial, and thus always already transnational, history of (petro)modernity. The character of modernity, Mathews shows us, is inextricably tied to the conditions under which human and natural resources are extracted and allowed to become “social.” The destabilization of reservation culture derives equally from oil discovery itself, and the technological transformations within the energy industry, from the colonialist conditions that impose capitalism upon the Osages, and from the very collectivist modes of wealth distribution that the Osages adopted in order to resist colonial exploitation. Thus Mathews's novel reveals an alternative genealogy of the destabilization of cultural forms to the one that begins with post-Bretton Woods global financial deregulation, the collapse of state institutions in the global North, and the late twentieth-century emergence of new communication technologies. For the Osages in the 1920s and for the characters inSundown, crude oil and colonial exploitation, as well as, paradoxically, anticapitalist legal provisions of the Allotment Act's collectivizing of it, make reservation culture “liquid” and “uncertain” precisely at the time of America's entering into the presumably “solid” econo-political phase of development.