Implications of the conflict between the US and China
Talk-Debate on Claudius Katz, at the National University of Luján, held on March 11, 2021, moderated by Martín Martinelli.
Martinelli: We all know that this struggle between the US and China is the central clash on the world stage, and the first question would be: How do the two contenders stand? Are they on a similar or opposing footing?
Katz: There are many indications that the US is acting as an aggressor. It's an offensive that was already being tested during the Clinton era, and it began with Bush, but in those years the US was very focused on operations in Russia, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East. The pressure on China effectively began with Obama's troop deployment to the East. Obama neutralized a Japanese attempt at autonomy, prevented the closure of the Okinawa base, which a significant group of Japanese personnel were demanding, and China, under Trump, clearly became the strategic enemy.
Trump's entire strategy was aimed at encircling China, and he did so with a mercantilist trade agenda characterized by intense pressure, which extended to finance and technology. Trump accused China of exporting COVID-19 and campaigned to blame China for all contemporary ills, using the logic of military pressure, hybrid warfare, rearmament with new nuclear weapons, and coercion as a central element of US political action. Thus, the US has taken the offensive through naval harassment, especially in the South China Sea, which has become a theater of operations.
At the same time, the US is working to create a Pacific NATO through the so-called "Quad" with Japan, South Korea, and India. The entire Washington establishment unanimously supports the pressure on China. Globalists and Americanists converge with transnational corporations and militarists, with liberal media outlets that endorse the aggressive stance toward China, and I believe Biden is also aligning himself with this approach by renewing demagoguery on human rights and stirring up tensions in Hong Kong and Taiwan.
This aggressive US stance is explained by the need to regain global dominance by deterring competitors with military power through interventions that, paradoxically, generate chaotic scenarios of refugees and the collapse of states. But the US has no other path; it must continue trying to recover its imperial power even though its internal cohesion is fractured, even though it faces an enormous long-term crisis and industrial decline. Therefore, it needs to subdue China to regain a leadership role, a position of global power, and this confrontation is a more important objective than consolidating its advantages over Europe or subduing its Russian rival, which is a geopolitical and military contender but not an economic adversary.
On China's side, the situation is different. China adopts a defensive policy and strategy. It is guarding its own sea, not sending ships to sail to California or New York, while the US is trying to internationalize the South China Sea. China, logically, declares that it is a sea under its authority. While it is true that it is engaged in a process of military modernization with a naval focus—no longer just an army on its territorial border—it maintains a defensive policy along its borders, with the added control of the maritime routes that have become key to China's trade.
In any case, there is a vast difference in military deployment between the US and China; one only needs to look at the difference in military spending. Even China's international stance is very different from Russia's. Xi Jinping is not involved, like Putin, in Syria, Ukraine, or Georgia. China has only one military base abroad, in Djibouti, which is a stark contrast to the staggering constellation of military bases deployed by the US.
China's strategy is far more geopolitical than military because it seeks to economically exhaust its rivals and attempts to wear down the enemy through prolonged attrition without making key concessions in technology, fostering a low geopolitical profile, combining various forms of pressure with a strategy that seeks to break the American leadership of the Western bloc, through agreements with Europe, through business in the Middle East, neutralizing neighbors, avoiding tensions with Japan, Korea, and India, and strengthening economic partnerships throughout the Southeast Asian region.
I believe this defensive stance is consistent with China's intermediate status. It's a country that expanded on socialist foundations, with market-based elements, and a capitalist model centered on retaining surplus locally, based on the absence of neoliberalism. Although capitalism is very present, it doesn't completely dominate Chinese society. The new ruling class hasn't achieved control of the state, and that's why an intermediate form of incomplete capitalism prevails. I think this internal condition determines a non-imperialist foreign policy. This is the key difference with the US. In China, a regime that isn't entirely capitalist can't implement a fully imperialist global policy, and rather, the confrontation with the US will ultimately define China's profile because it's a conflict that will ultimately determine who holds power within China.
Within China, there is a very free-trade neoliberal current among powerful, expansionist capitalist groups with imperialist ambitions. However, there are opposing elements of capitalist moderation, international detachment, and Xi Jinping at the head of state, balancing all the competing forces. It is within this framework that China avoids conflict. It would have preferred to maintain the relationship with the US as it existed until 2008, but the crisis ultimately eroded it when all the trade and financial imbalances came to light. China subsequently sought decoupling, which did not yield much success, but it is subject to internal pressure from capitalist development that multiplies imbalances in the country, generates overinvestment, pressures to offload surpluses, and pressures for a Belt and Road Initiative that reignites tensions with the US.
As a first conclusion, then, I believe there is a conflict between the aggressive imperial power of the US and the defensive, non-imperial power of China that we must analyze as a contradiction unfolding within the logic of imperialism. Not as a clash of civilizations or hegemonic transitions, but neither as bipolarity versus multipolarity. It is a conflict that will define 21st-century imperialism because capitalism already operates with a defined, contemporary model, but imperialism has not yet developed a 21st-century profile. This conflict, this indeterminacy between a categorically defined 21st-century capitalism and an undefined 21st-century imperialism, will ultimately take shape in this conflict between China and the US. Therefore, it is a key area for dividing geopolitics in the analysis of the contemporary scenario.
Secondly, my thesis—that the US is an imperial aggressor and that China adopts a non-imperial, defensive stance—is shared by many authors. The assertion that China has a capitalist economy but not an imperial policy is also accepted, and it is argued that capitalism is highly advanced in the Chinese economy due to the surplus value model and the profit motive, but that imperialism as a policy of domination exercised through the state has not yet materialized because it remains organized around the political supremacy of the Communist Party. There, a bureaucracy prevails that seeks power more than the integration of capital in a state that is not engaged in imperialist actions.
Michael Roberts argues that China is not an imperialist state due to the incomplete nature of its capitalist restoration. Because there is no financialization, no neoliberalism, and therefore no total primacy of private capital, the foundations for imperialist status are lacking.
It is interesting to see how other authors view Chinese foreign policy as being managed by a state that regularly uses external loans, distinct from those obtained through the IMF or World Bank, because private enterprise is subordinated to strategic agreements between states. It is interesting how they deduce that China's geopolitical caution stems from the history of a country besieged by hardship and with a strong memory of its semi-colonial status. This idea aligns with Hobsbawm's assertion that there is a qualitative difference between the imperial replacement of Great Britain by the US, two powers where continuity between the two principalities prevailed, and the current transition characterized by a complete opposition (economic, political, and cultural) between China and the US.
In my view, the most important corroboration of the approach I am presenting comes from a Chinese author who argues that China is not imperialist due to its semi-peripheral status. He considers that China is at an intermediate level and that it transfers surplus value to the core countries while receiving surplus value from the periphery. Therefore, there is a Chinese capitalist class that benefits from the surplus value absorbed from Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia, but is affected by the surplus value transferred from China to the US or Europe.
China is rising because it is transferring less value and capturing more value, quantifying it in labor hours. Previously, China exchanged 16 units of its own labor for 1 foreign unit; now it exchanges 1 for 0.6 international units. It exchanges 1 for 4 units from Southeast Asia and 8 units from the US. The global value transfer ratio is changing, and this is reflected in its currency because China maintains an intermediate status. As a power accumulating reserves with a huge surplus, it cannot finance itself with its own currency and must pay tribute to the dollar and treasury bonds. If a currency were created without caution, it would risk a massive capital flight. Therein lies, once again, the intermediate nature of a power unable to forge its own currency.
This idea of China transferring and absorbing surplus value aligns with a tripolar model that closely resembles the restructuring I present in my book on dependency theory. The difference, in my view, is that China is not a periphery but a center. Center-periphery examples include Brazil, Turkey, and India. In addition to investment in China, we must also consider its growth based on the domestic market and local accumulation, not just on international relations.
The important point is that the thesis that the US is an imperial aggressor and that China is a non-imperial defender is corroborated by numerous studies of Chinese politics, economics, and society. This matters because of its political consequences. I believe that defining the US as imperialist and China as non-imperialist leads us to a situation where they are not equal. Therefore, neutrality is not appropriate on the political level because China has a defensive stance, and the aggressor is the US. However, we must be careful because China is already a power that tends to affect the periphery and, therefore, occupies an intermediate position as a potential ally against imperialism (it could fulfill a counterbalancing role like the one the USSR played in protecting Cuba from US aggression). This is the basis of my thesis of China as a partner to emulate: in Latin America, we must form a resistance bloc against the US and a negotiation bloc with China to reverse the trend toward primary commodity dependence.
The third point is that the theoretical framework of the thesis I am proposing is a view of imperialism very different from the updated versions of Lenin's thesis. I believe we are neither in the classical era of imperialism nor in the subsequent postwar stage. Imperialism is a policy of domination by a capitalist class exercised through state coercion; it is neither a unique nor a final stage of capitalism. Therefore, it is not useful to reason about the problem using Lenin's criteria to determine whether China meets them and, consequently, whether or not it is imperialist. This is Turner's error, because the fact that China exports capital, has monopolies, or uses financial capital tells us what place China occupies in global capitalism, but it tells us nothing about its imperial profile.
Classical imperialism theory also fails to explain the US-China conflict because we are in a global scenario very different from that of the First World War in 1914. A similar error, based on the same reasoning, is made when Lenin's criteria are used not to prove that China is imperialist, but to prove that it is not. China is not imperialist because it does not invade countries, intervene abroad, or operate military bases: it does not replicate US behavior. Furthermore, it occupies an intermediate status that requires more complex concepts than capitalism vs. socialism or imperialism vs. anti-imperialism.
Without these basic notions, we cannot advance a theoretical interpretation of the current problem. For example, an intermediate concept is the idea of China as an empire in formation. There is a debate about the relevance of this concept to China, which I am placing in a gray area. My hypothesis is that it would not correspond to, nor is it applicable to, China because the country is still in a very embryonic phase of an empire in formation: the defensive, not imperial, strategy predominates. Formation is the policy of the liberal wing, the sector that supports the Silk Road, but it would only be consummated after the resolution of that internal dispute. For now, it is only a potential stage, and the difference with Russia is that China has very little developed that geopolitical-military element that is decisive for imperialism.
The idea of an empire in formation is a thesis coined by Rousseff. According to him, there is already evidence of Chinese imperial activity: the Djibouti base, the seven artificial islands it is building in the South China Sea, and, in his view, the abandonment of a defensive military policy. This is the same idea Turner uses when he presents China as an ascending imperial process. I believe this is incorrect; there is a qualitative difference between the US and China. It is a difference of degree between the two powers.
There are other intermediate theses that argue China is already a capitalist power but still a lagging, non-hegemonic empire. They aim to demonstrate that China has grown spectacularly but faces difficulties in becoming a winning empire. They use an intermediate formulation, referring to a dependent capitalist state with imperialist characteristics. This idea is similar to the one that posits China is at a lower rung of imperialism: it is already a superpower and tends to act imperially, but it is not yet strong enough to exercise that potential. Perhaps Esteban is suggesting something similar, viewing China as a fully-fledged capitalist power but with an insufficient level of imperial power.
I believe there are certain problems with this characterization. It's fine to point out the economic limitations, technological fragilities, and monetary weaknesses of the new power. It's fine to seek an intermediate classification, but to be placed on the lower rung of imperialism, China would have to have already completed a capitalist restoration, which is not yet finished. If this hasn't happened, it cannot act as an imperial power. All the fragilities they describe in China stem from this fragility in the consolidation of capitalism. The Chinese ruling class would need to have the capacity to impose harsh geopolitical actions abroad, which the Communist Party doesn't accept because it maintains a policy of non-interference in the world. Therefore, I believe we must study the problem of imperialism more from a geopolitical perspective than an economic one.
As a third conclusion, then, we must analyze the US-China conflict using a Marxist theory of imperialism that allows us to conceptualize China's intermediate social and geopolitical status. This notion is one that must be elaborated upon, recognizing that basic concepts are insufficient. This is a lead we must explore further.
The fourth issue to address concerns the fact that my approach is controversial with the thesis that China is an imperialist power. I disagree with Turner when he says it is as imperialist as the US. Turner's view is influenced by Maoist thought, which posits that, just as Russia evolved from socialism to social-imperialism before becoming a fully imperialist country, China is seen as having a similar status: a social-imperialist phase leading to imperialism. However, as I explained, this is not borne out by China's defensive profile and cautious geopolitics. China does not intervene in Africa, for example, like France; China does not invade Mali, nor does it repeat the trajectory of Germany or Japan at the beginning of the 20th century; it does not follow a path of belligerent rearmament to expand its immediate external sphere.
Therefore, I see the idea of an inter-imperial conflict as unfounded. It is premature and contradicts the reality of what we are observing. I believe the same criticism and objection could be leveled at the idea that China is a new colonizing power, especially in Latin America. In Ramírez's extreme interpretations, China is already a predatory empire in Latin America comparable to 19th-century Great Britain; Bustos used the more moderate variant, and finally, other voices suggest that China is emerging as a new axis, based on the Beijing Consensus, as a colonizing power. I think this has a valid point, which is that China's relationship with Latin America is one of value transfer; in that respect, it is valid: China absorbs value from Latin America more in the form of rent than in the form of surplus value, unlike Southeast Asia. Even so, that doesn't define an imperial policy; rather, that economic component is just one element of the analysis.
In reality, Israel is a colonizing power because it places settlers in occupied territories. The Chinese diaspora around the world is not seen as being sent by Beijing as part of an international colonizing occupation equivalent to what Great Britain did in the past in Ireland or what Israel does in the West Bank. The unequal trade that China has with Latin America does not define a colonial situation, much less an imperial geopolitics. In Latin America, imperialism is the US, Plan Colombia, the Fourth Fleet, and the attempted coups in Venezuela and Bolivia; not the business that China conducts with raw materials or infrastructure.
The problem is that these characterizations have political consequences. If I say that China is a colonial or imperial power, I'm suggesting, as Turner, Ramírez, or Bustos do, that we must denounce both China and the US equally, that we must consider them equivalent in their hostility toward other peoples, and that's a mistake. Today, there is US aggression, and we have to define who is the aggressor and who is the victim. This is important in Latin America because we shouldn't downplay the dominant and interventionist role the US plays in the region, which is not the same as the role China plays.
I'm warning about this because I believe it's very dangerous for us in Latin America to equate China and the US, as it makes us highly susceptible to right-wing ideologies. This discourse demonizing China, which mixes fear with incomprehension and stirs up absurd ideas of Chinese totalitarianism linked to Latin American populism, ends up portraying Cuba and Venezuela as pawns of China. What we're discussing has political consequences for how our countries and people position themselves in the face of the conflict between China and the US.
The fifth point concerns the fact that, as you saw, I share the views that posit that China is not imperialist, but within this common ground there are many nuances and differences. I observe a tendency toward indulgence, toward idealized visions that only foresee how China grows through a process of hegemonic transitions that will lead it to success in a multipolar world. This view omits the consolidation of capitalism in China, a process that undermines China's own stability and forces it to modify its current policies.
I'll give you three examples of this, in my opinion, idealistic view. The thesis of a China that is an empire without imperialism, that China respects international law, that it has its own development path, and that it poses no threat to the West. An idea of China as a peaceful market economy versus a belligerent Western capitalism. Okay, they're not equivalent, but in China a capitalist system is taking hold that expands capital accumulation, profit, and overinvestment, which, if it continues to advance, undermines this idea of a country that respects international law.
The second, very common idea, presents China as leading an inclusive globalization that fosters an inter-civilizational alliance within the world system, and whose project is one of inclusion, not exclusion. The problem is that it is a capitalist system based on the struggle for profit derived from exploitation; there are winners and losers; exploited and exploiters; beneficiaries and the poor; people who endure inequality and labor market deregulation. This idealized world, so prevalent in China's own official discourse extolling the virtues of free trade, in the Davos exaltation of a vaguely universalist ideology sometimes masked by a rather strange socialist rhetoric, is simply not real. It's a kind of inverted communist manifesto that, instead of being presented as a denunciation of capitalism, is presented as a proclamation of the benefits of free trade, supposedly leading to the brotherhood of developing nations worldwide. These are extravagant ideas that fail to grasp reality.
Another example is the argument that China isn't responsible for the problems of the periphery because it expands through investment and productivity without affecting the periphery. That's not true; unequal exchange does exist. The idea that China isn't to blame for the state of the world and is simply doing what it can is somewhat naive. China influences the trajectory of global capitalism and cannot absolve China's ruling classes and political power of their role in the world. It's not true that they are merely a counterweight to neoliberalism, even if they aren't a neoliberal model. The Chinese model, on a global capitalist scale, allowed for a restructuring of the profit rate, a shift in power dynamics, and, with the cheapness of labor, the underpinning of the restructuring of 21st-century capitalism.
For China to fulfill a role in global cooperation, it would need to counteract the external and internal expansion of capitalism. Therefore, the benevolent view held by many who rightly argue that China is not imperialist, but who abandon critical thinking—and whose reason for abandoning it is that China is part of the Global South—would explain these ideas of a country that cooperates and favors inclusive globalization. The problem is that China has a defensive geopolitics, but economically it is already a new center; it is no longer part of the periphery and has even distanced itself from emerging economies by profiting from unequal exchange.
It is not true that China is simply an underdeveloped capitalist country suffering from a drain of funds. These criticisms are built upon such arguments and follow this line of relativizing China's transformation in order to maintain its position in the Global South. This perspective ignores the fact that China is not a subordinate periphery but is battling the US for leadership in the digital revolution. China played a leading role in the pandemic crisis and has potential conflicts with the Global South regarding Chinese ownership of infrastructure investments in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Tanzania. It also competes with the US for markets in Latin America and could face conflict if a debtor, as appeared to be happening in Sri Lanka and Kenya, were to default.
Therefore, we must be careful with this idea: China is not part of the Global South, and for the same reason, I don't think it's accurate to place China within an anti-imperialist camp, a continuation of the Bandung Conference, or within the camp of the non-aligned movements. China is no longer experiencing a situation rooted in the past, like the Opium Wars, the Japanese invasions, and postwar harassment. Now it confronts the US, but not from the perspective of Iraq, Panama, or Libya; China intervenes in the global market and has distanced itself from its own Maoist past. That's why China could be correctly situated within a multipolar, counter-hegemonic, but anti-imperialist bloc—ALBA, not BRICS. This is important because China shouldn't be seen as a whole, as a bloc, since it has an internal dispute between neoliberals, statists, and socialists, and the anti-imperialists in China are the socialists, the Chinese left, which advocates an international project of resistance to capitalist globalization.
In conclusion, China is neither an imperialist power nor does it act in an anti-imperialist capacity. It is a core economy, not part of the Global South, and its future is contested by neoliberal, statist, and socialist projects.
As a final observation within the context of the US-China conflict, what predominates is not a scenario of integration, which is what Robinson's transnationalist idea postulated—that we are moving toward a transnationalized capitalist class associated between the US and China with a transnationalized state. This is not the case. The thesis that China was assimilating into the neoliberal order by strengthening ties with the US was a position predating the 2008 crisis, which has been refuted over time. Greater conflict is looming, and within it, we have a very clear short-term context: China is winning and the US is losing. No one doubts this; the data is overwhelming on every level: geopolitics, economics, and even financial technology. The pandemic crisis confirmed that China is advancing while the US faces ever-increasing limitations and failures. But this is a short-term situation.
This has been the case and continues to be so, but I wouldn't draw any conclusions from it for the medium or long term. That's where the question arises. In this context, the scenario is more uncertain, and we could mention three very general long-term possibilities. The first is that the US wins the power struggle with China and reconstitutes its imperial supremacy, returning to the post-war period. The second is that China wins with a capitalist free-trade strategy, and in that case, capitalism becomes firmly established in China, along with its transformation into an imperialist power. A third is that China wins, but without that outcome; instead, it could happen in another global scenario of popular struggle, of rebellions where the shift in the balance of global power in favor of the people leads to the rebirth of socialist projects and, therefore, a repositioning within an anti-imperialist camp.
In the long or medium term, these are the three open scenarios, serving as a barometer for reflecting on the future without taking any trajectory for granted. We must acknowledge the significant uncertainty surrounding the final outcome, but the crucial point is that, regardless of the alternative—and this is the final conclusion—this conflict will shape the profile of 21st-century imperialism. It resolves the enigma of the current period: the still-unresolved nature of contemporary imperialism. Therefore, it is essential to follow this conflict between the US and China and reflect on it both on the scale of the conflicts themselves and on the level of theoretical reflections.
Martinelli: This raises a number of questions. The first concerns your mention of Russia as a second-tier power. If we arbitrarily cut off from the 2008 crisis to the present, marked by greater consolidation and a stronger Chinese presence, how do you view Chinese geopolitics and geoeconomics both internally and in relation to Eurasia? And, secondly, what role do these second-tier powers play?
Katz: There are several subtopics within those questions. The first is the strictly military issue of the South China Sea, which is becoming a war zone with a concentration of large-scale military forces, where the US, over time, has been creating a very robust encirclement and aggression apparatus. The US Quad is a NATO-like entity they want to be more powerful than NATO itself, and it includes Australia, Japan, South Korea, and India. These are the countries with which the US envisions creating scenarios for regional conflict with China. No one is thinking about a war between the US and China, but rather situations of conflict. Before reaching a conflict between these four, there are more direct and constant points of friction: Hong Kong and Taiwan, two places where the power struggle is playing out.
In Hong Kong, it's complicated because we know the US doesn't have enormous influence there, but at the same time, we know its population rejects the Chinese political system. So there's a contradictory situation that can make us forget that for the US, it's a gamble. In Taiwan, a right-wing sector, the most resistant to any unification with China, won the elections. For China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau are all key. The end of China's colonial era and the reconstitution of the country have the significance of the Falklands War for us, but with the difference that for them, it's the Falklands on the rise. So, I say there's an undeniable level of conflict there.
The US has a military expenditure three times greater than China's, which has 260 nuclear warheads compared to the US's 4500. The entire Chinese naval apparatus, despite having more ships, cannot be compared to the mobile floating bases the US maintains: 25 military bases in Japan alone and 15 in Korea. The US is trying to recreate the rivalry between India and China as it was in the 60s because it is more difficult to recreate conflict with South Korea and Japan, where there are very strong internal pacifist movements that reject all forms of aggression. In contrast, in India, with its more right-wing government, there is indeed strong pressure for aggression against China.
The results of the past year in this contrast between China and the US are remarkable. China's success in managing the pandemic is, at this point, undeniable. Its growth rate is now back to normal, and forecasts predict at least 7% growth as it is already in full economic recovery. Their handling of the pandemic has made the US, with half a million deaths, a complete mishandling of the pandemic, look like a laughingstock, while all the liberals remain silent in the face of a Chinese health and political system that, with an individual traffic light system, managed to control the pandemic. Thus, while in the US the debate raged about whether or not to wear masks, every Chinese family had a traffic light on their cell phone indicating whether or not they could go out.
China, like Russia, is exporting vaccines, while the US is over-vaccinating its population. There's a huge geopolitical difference, but this speaks to the short term. China's trump card is the free trade agreement they just signed with the major Southeast Asian economies, and with this, they'll seek a comprehensive regional economic partnership. They've included Australia, South Korea, and Japan, which are now caught in the middle because they established an economic agreement with China and a military agreement with the US. That's where the dispute begins.
You can see how each side is playing. The US is playing militarily, although it seems Biden can't do that. Biden wanted to offer the Pacific Treaty, as Obama did, but he can't. The key to all this is the Chinese-Russian agreement. Trump didn't manage to break the agreement; his strategy was to reach an agreement with Putin and attack China together, but he failed because the Democrats were more reluctant to break that front due to the similar hostility towards both sides. Whichever way you look at it, the scenario is very complicated for the US.
Martinelli: Based on what you mentioned about the current scenario and the intermediate categorizations, what is the current situation in China? Is it possible to make a forecast?
Katz: The third medium-term hypothesis is the optimistic one, held by those of us in the popular movement, those of us who don't see only opposing scenarios of US imperial domination or Chinese imperial domination. I believe this third possibility exists, but it would involve a shift in the global political landscape, a resurgence of popular struggles.
There are two elements of interest regarding this possible perspective. The first is that before the pandemic, in 2019, there was a well-established moment of global rebellion: there was talk of uprisings in Lebanon, in France, and of precarious youth. The pandemic brought this to a halt, but when it ends, these currents of international struggle will likely be reactivated. A key element of these struggles is the role of the new proletariat in Southeast Asia. We are currently experiencing a moment of enormous struggles in India, with peasant strikes, and in various countries so far removed from our own reality that we don't follow them closely. However, there are significant movements of struggle in South Korea, and throughout this group of countries that, along with China, represent the bulk of the global proletariat.
I believe that a resurgence of that struggle could influence China's internal situation, which still lacks a defined social status. I don't think it's a fully capitalist country because it has potentially present elements of the socialist legacy, manifested at the top in the existence of the Communist Party at the head of the state, and below in the existence of a culture of social conquest and significant currents of Marxism and the Chinese left that exert influence in society.
I believe that a global and regional scenario favorable to social struggles, which in turn places the Chinese proletariat and youth in a prominent political role, would give the Chinese left an unprecedented and undoubtedly leading role. From there, we would begin to see how the Chinese left has a different international political strategy than what we usually hear as China's official policy. For example, it argues that the country must return to its anti-imperialist roots and rejoin the São Paulo Forum and ALBA; pursuing a cautious, rather than an expansionist, international policy of globalization. A cautious policy where there is compatibility between China's international economy and the priority of consumption and improvements in the living standards of the Chinese people.
In summary, a change in the world stage, where Latin America would occupy a very important place, would bring China's socialist potential back to the forefront, and therein lies my third hypothesis of a Chinese recomposition, not as an imperial power or capitalist society, but as a recomposition of the socialist tradition and trajectory adapted to the new reality of the 21st century.
Martinelli: In that sense, how do you interpret the publicity, both recently and last year, that China has achieved its 2030 poverty reduction goals? On the other hand, how do the Chinese portray their conflict with the US? Can it be compared to US propaganda? What is China's position on the Palestinian issue?
Katz: I'm cautious. Our approach to China is necessary because otherwise we can't understand global realities, and that would make it impossible to talk about Latin America. But let's remember that we have a very high knowledge gap, and I wouldn't dare answer the question of how Chinese society views the conflict with the US. However, I would make two observations that, with caution, we can imagine.
The first point is that Chinese society is historically besieged from the outside. It only achieved its definitive constitution as an independent nation with the triumph of the revolution in 1949, and until then it was a country divided by Japanese invasion, British and French colonialism, and American imperial pressure. This memory of external pressure is reflected in China's cautious approach to foreign policy. The comparison with Russia is illustrative, where there is no memory of besieged but rather of a power acting on a global scale, as was the case in the Tsarist Empire and the Soviet Union. While in one case, the constitution of a country is based on a global geopolitical framework, as in Russia, the constitution is based on a geopolitical framework constrained by that trajectory.
The contrast to this observation is the emergence of a middle class of several million people with a Westernized consumer culture for the first time in China's contemporary history. These are not small enclaves like in the past: Hong Kong, Macau, Shanghai. Now, there is a middle class that has altered its status and absorbed Western consumption patterns, and this carries weight because it is the sector that operates as the social base of Chinese neoliberalism. There is a dispute between the political and cultural currents of different groups.
Regarding the second question, I believe it's important to clarify that the idea of China as a sub-empire because it's an underdeveloped and insufficient imperialism is, in my view, incorrect. The notion of sub-imperialism doesn't imply insufficient imperial development. This is the error of those who argue that China isn't a developed imperialism and is therefore sub-imperialist. The interpretation of this notion is flawed, especially for those of us who follow Marín, who argues that sub-imperialism isn't simply a less developed imperialism: the US is a highly developed imperialism, and while France and England today might be considered less developed, all are imperialisms.
Sub-imperialism is a notion applied to those powers that have a relationship of association or conflict with the US. This is the case with Turkey, India, Brazil, and South Africa, but not China because it does not have a geopolitical association with the US; there are no US military bases in China, no geopolitical agreements. Sub-imperialism has another meaning, which is why we have discussed whether the notion of an empire in formation but not a sub-imperial one is appropriate. These are adjustments made through reflection on the concept.
Martinelli: Do you think the Middle East will be one of the battlegrounds of the conflict?
Katz: The next topic will be imperialism in Russia and the Middle East. We're going to explore the Middle East in detail. I would say it's the epicenter of current, not just potential, but actual, hot-button conflicts because there are bombs falling there every day. Biden's first action was to bomb Syria and Iraq because it's the region where conflicts are being handled militarily. For this reason, we're going to study it thoroughly, and I anticipate that China is the area where it most wants to stay out of it; it doesn't want to get involved.
China does business with Saudi Arabia, with Qatar, with everyone, and it won't force the Silk Road initiative in that region if it involves military intervention. This is different from Russia, which is involved in the conflict and actively participating. If China is forced to intervene militarily, it will only do so in its own region, in the South China Sea. This is a topic we'll have to discuss at the next meetings of this group.
Martinelli: More specifically in our region: how can a bloc be formed in Latin America to negotiate with China against the dependence on primary commodity exports if Argentina exports raw materials to China?
Katz: The only way Latin America can change its status with China is by negotiating as a bloc. As long as each country continues negotiating with China on its own, the trend toward primary commodity exports will advance; it's inevitable. It's clearly a negotiation between a giant and a small player, and there's no reason why China would accept different terms unless it faces a bloc that changes them. China is inclined toward a more amicable negotiation that accepts, for example, lithium processing in Bolivia. Some form of reindustrialization can be negotiated, but we shouldn't be naive: China wants soybeans and will buy them abruptly unless Argentina negotiates differently, and that would imply that it would have to rebuild UNASUR and reconstitute ALBA.
Imagine if Latin America had negotiated vaccines with China, with Russia, with everyone like the European Union did; it would have been a bloc that, in terms of currency, the amount of vaccines that can be purchased, in terms of the interest it arouses, the result would have been different.
The key for Latin America has always been the formation of a geopolitical bloc that resists the US and negotiates with China. It's not a bloc that resists both China and the US. We must resist the US for a simple reason: it has its Fourth Fleet in Latin America, it has bases in Colombia, and Latin America has the US embassy preparing coups in every country. We must act by forming a bloc against that. With China, we must establish joint economic strategies that, in turn, will open a different geopolitical path for us. For that, we must create a progressive bloc and revitalize UNASUR. The important thing is not how feasible it is, but understanding what is needed.
Martinelli: The conversation raised another question, can you briefly comment on the evolution of Latin America through the cases you always mention: Brazil, Venezuela and Cuba?
Katz: I think Bolsonaro's failure, which has now been corroborated by the decision to annul Lula's prosecution and Lula's candidacy in 2022 against Bolsonaro, showed that Bolsonaro's delusional idea of following Trump by making a deal with Taiwan and turning his back on China was something that could only fit in the head of a lunatic.
The Brazilian ruling class immediately told Bolsonaro: "You're crazy. We have all our export businesses with China. We're not going to fight over a Trump-and-yous adventure." It's important to note that within Brazil's own structure, the partnership with China was maintained, indicating the stable and enduring nature of political agreements between Latin America and China, even with people like Bolsonaro in power, who may have the political strength to ban Lula but not to reverse a medium-term agreement with China.
The case of Venezuela shows us that without consistent economic policies, China won't save us. Venezuela is experiencing an economic collapse stemming from US attacks, but also partly from the economic inconsistencies of the Bolivarian government, and in that case, no amount of Chinese aid is enough.
In Cuba, we have an interesting case of a vaccine that's almost a miracle, but it shows that with a sensible and consistent policy, one can combine economic agreements with China and decide on a profile of what advantages, in what areas, one can act politically and economically in adverse situations, such as the development of a health project, to move forward and consolidate. Policies that are supportive, socialist, but necessarily intelligent are required to move forward, and Cuba is a good example of this combination of socialism with realism and intelligence.
Full article available at: https://www.lahaine.org/mundo.php/implicancias-del-conflicto-entre-eeuu
Discussion available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9P3CGyXFSBk
