Seriously, what a load of old tiresome tosh, what have the Romans ever done for us:
Without the threat of socialism capitalists would not have had to invent bonded slavery.
For someone from the UK who most likely benefited from some of the best and and most cost effective educations and health cares in the world this really smacks of hypocrisy,
And the usual old drivel about socialists being the most corrupt, simply put corrupt people are corrupt they do not have political preferences they exploit opportunities wherever they find them, a rather capitalist behavioural characteristic, the irony in his point about his corrupt acquaintance in the seventies bribing corrupt councillors appears to be lost.
As for too much government intervention, he'll be a socialist when it comes to security both military and civil prioritising assets over anyone else's life. Meanwhile not a single major positive life changing advance in Human history was made without government investment, all the way back to the Roman Empire's roads and sanitation.
All technical and medical advanced research in the last 100 years was initiated and supported by government grants R&D when these show promise the government is usually pressured by the capitalists to hand over the work to their friends who waste no time in in demanding an arm and a leg from the original investors, the tax payer. When the capitalists are left to their own R&D devices we usually end up with deadly results, aye, socialists are responsible for the ongoing corporate genocide of drugs and pesticides, Its socialists fault that the corporate strategy to obfuscate their destruction of the planets ecosystem with pollution while they refuse to clean it up, instead blaming the prols on changing a climate that never has and never will stop changing. It was not socialists that came up with climate change and carbon taxes that one was all down to BP.
Capitalism is exactly why the world is in the mess its in, still trying to blame socialism when its been extinct in the UK since that evil bitch Thatcher, trying to say the labour party is socialist is a lie.
Socialism works, China has proven that beyond doubt, properly restrain and regulate capitalists and force them in the right direction that benefits the community and kill anyone who is caught stealing from the community is the only way humanity will move forward. If capitalists want access to a community market then they will contribute or they can move on. We keep hearing about how capitalism lifts people out of poverty, in the last 200 year no one has lifted more people out of poverty than China, when capitalists do pay a fair wage it is because they are forced to not because they are trying to help anyone but themselves.
Seriously, if socialism doesn't work why do capitalists invest so much money and time trying to overthrow governments freely elected by their populations?
If you want to rant about Burnham then do it but stop conflagrating him with socialism, neither he or the Labour Party have been socialist for45 years. everything after Thatcher has been two hue's of capitalism tory or liberal.
Of course socialism doesnt work. Everyone keeps ranting about the evils of capitalism, but Capitalism is simply a pejorative term. The real challenge for Socialist is not Capitalism, it's Free Enterprise. What we mean by Capitalism today is more like corporatism or even fascism (the partnership of state and corporation).
To compare Corporatism to Free Enterprise, look at GM/FORD compared to Tesla. Look at NASA compared to SpaceX. Tesla and SpaceX are enterprises owned by a human being. GM and FORD are corporate artificial beings. None of the corporate beings has a prayer in competition with freely acting individual human beings .
Free Enterprise is activity carried on by human owners. Capitalism in the US and most of the west today is activity carried on by artificial beings.
China is perhaps the most Capitalist economy in the world today. It provides only a minimal saftey net and promotes ferocious corporate competition in the middle along with a degree of Industrial policy on top.
That "pejorative" term of capitalism was fashioned because "free enterprise" unchecked will always be controlled by capital and those who control the flow of capital.
A simple exercise of comparing who controlled the flow of capital throughout history provides all the evidence you need to assess the merits of both socioeconomic philosophies.
In every case, where capital flow control was in private hands it evolved into consolidation and empire with no regard for lifting people out of poverty.
Previously the East India Trading Company and its world wide franchises of the Dickensian times was one of the capitalisms golden era's brought nothing but war, hunger and oppression world wide.
When the idea of Socialism interrupted this, two things happened, countries that adopted socialist ideas all seen benefits after the initial struggle to take control of their resources, many suffered greatly but those who persisted seen significant improvements in all aspects of their standards of living.
It also forced the capitalists to change strategy and create a new myth about a "trickle down effect" allowing a temporary redistribution of wealth, while they worked on perverting and fighting the socialist threat.
We are now seeing the results of that strategy. The "left" is now what was previously known as liberalism and socialism is considered extreme left while as you say the current fascist union of government and corporations is advocated as the center.
I say temporary redistribution because we have now returned to the exact same conditions of the East India Trading Company with a lot more control technology.
The whole "free enterprise" myth is born from the fairy tale that the unicorn "point of equilibrium" where supply meets demand exists and it can be achieved, that's a bigger pill to swallow than people cooperating for the benefit of the community.
The problem for most capitalists like Alasdair is they see any interference in their "enterprise" as the red hand of socialism not allowing them to profit by any means.
What is most amusing is that capitalists always use "human nature" as an argument to dismiss socialism as unworkable.
Generally we are told humans cannot cooperate to benefit the community as a whole as there is always some who are corrupt that will grab more than their fair share of resources and power, while ignoring the fact the same problem is far more prevalent in free enterprise capitalism.
It is a more logical argument that the corrupt so called socialists, are in fact capitalist wolves in sheep clothing who believe they deserve more than the rest. And from all of our experience we see daily, corruption is a far bigger problem for capitalism than socialism.
"Free enterprise" died with the introduction of usury which is the true meaning of capitalism. Even Smith ended his book with the warning that capitalism will always tend to corporate feudalism.
The irony is the elephant in the room that capitalists always refuse to look at, the inevitable results of implementing "free enterprise", without acknowledging that the target of capitalism is to become a monopoly.
This is where that dreaded "government interference" "Alasdair keeps complaining about) came into play, to control and ensure what is inevitable can be controlled. The Chinese understand this, they must have read Smith's books all the way to the end.
Yep, millions died in China under Mao post revolution, China has allowed academics in to read and study their records and have admitted to approximately 125 million people perished, they have regrets and are learning from their own history. Can we say the same of our own ruling Epstein Class?
In the last 50 years they have lifted 80 million out of abject poverty and leapfrogged every capitalist controlled industry and institution while maintaining their socialist perspective on who should benefit most from their advances.
As an aside, I worked on a thesis on corruption seven years ago, what I found was amazing, the vast majority of contemporary research into every aspect of corruption is done in China. The shocking part about the research from the "free market" western countries was that a significant proportion was about how corruption is useful, seen as something we can't control and should just get used to it and use it. That right there is for me, the difference between capitalism and socialism.
In short, brilliantly clear sentences, Macleod critiques socialism, asserting that it is a form of communism that leads to economic destruction. He cites Ludwig von Mises’ argument that socialism, lacking a system of prices and interest rates based on risk, cannot allocate resources efficiently. To support this, he contrasts free-market systems, such as Hong Kong's success, with Mao's China. Macleod also highlights historical examples of corruption within socialist regimes and warns that socialist politicians often succumb to bribery and power-induced corruption. He concludes that socialism doesn't deliver on its promises, resulting in a decline in Britain’s status and increased government regulation, ultimately harming the economy. The author claims that any dissent against this system is quashed, portraying a bleak outlook for the future under socialist leadership.
In America, the situation is different since we live under a fascist system; the response will be a complete bankruptcy so total that the workforce will not face demands for a socialist order since there will be no overarching federal government to appeal to. Instead, the workers will likely take the bankrupt, but still useful enterprises and turn them into cooperatively owned firms. Those export-oriented firms doing business with economies that have gold standards, such as China and Russia, will probably recover first.
Can't speak for what's happening in Britain and its past but WE the People in America have been led to believe a lie that socialism destroys capitalism. To mix socialism, communism, and capitalism together is to make the point that socialism is the enemy and capitalism the savior of society is frankly disingenuous. As WE are witnessing in the US the wealth gap is growing and WE are witnessing unharnessed greed and a president that is grifting to the tune of $2.4B. And his musing about how the equity market is doing so great that he should do great. The Nazi Republican party is completely complicit in this greed.
To demonize socialism(bit.ly/4y4HXNy) as the damaging influence of society is for me ridiculous and disinformation. Yes there are problems with socialism as well as with the greed in capitalism but "free stuff" as capitalists point out is not "free stuff". WE all pay into it for roads judiciary infrastructure and helping those who need a helping hand because WE are part of a society who supports each other.
Interestingly Socialism and Islamic Sharia are very complimentary. Maybe that is why "elites" in Europe, the UK and USA are so happy to import the Islamic poison. They see Sharia as a tonic and stimulant and more congenial population host for Socialism.
Sharia is not an ideology you bellend lol but Zionism is, and it does complement it so well, because when they have to kiss there ass to get a bank loan after they played russian roulette with the economy, then they go to the same ass holes asking for handouts. Do you remember 2008, which sharia counciller was invested in playing that game?
A number years ago, I subscribed to Paul Craig Roberts' site, and at the time he had a comment section. He had published a book, which he was touting on his site, called The Failure of Laissez-faire Capitalism. I asked him where, in the world, was laissez-faire capitalism practiced, as I couldn't recall such a place. The economy closest to practicing it might be Hong Kong.
He was upset with my comment and went on to explain how I was wrong. My reply was that it seems to be a recurrent problem in the social sciences to constantly revise its terms and definitions - a fluidity that makes a mockery of a supposedly, serious field of study, macroeconomics. Laissez-faire used to mean commerce without interference but still subject to the rule of law, primarily contract law and property rights. His definition in the book, wasn't close to that.
Likewise, I'm not sure that what's practiced in China is communism, or socialism, just as in the West, it's called capitalism but isn't really. I prefer the description of modern economics as centralized state, economic command and control via financial, tax, subsidy, legal, and regulatory incentives/disincentives - a high-profit, state-condoned, cartelized economy at the top level, coupled with what remains of a low profit, struggling, small enterprise lower level.
Social and cultural control is collectivist, in a cultural marxist framework, and the state has built itself a large dependent, parasite class - comprised of low and high income - benefitting from big controlling, government. The result of all this centralized social and economic engineering is astronomical debt, low productivity, stagnation, poverty, and social collapse. Change, under the current political system, appears futile. However, its hard to believe the system can continue on its current trajectory.
In China they call their system capitalism with Chinese characteristics, where it exists to serve the people. ie they put the State above Capital whereas Western economies allow Capital to sit on top of the State causing the worsening corruption and concentration of wealth in fewer hands.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, it’s astonishing that anyone supports socialism. Yet in both our countries socialist politicians make their goals perfectly clear and are getting elected. I wonder if any have actually been to a socialist country. As an Air Force officer many years ago I spent a couple of weeks in the two “jewels” of the Soviet Union—Moscow and Leningrad. The poverty was shocking. People lined up in the middle of the night to buy bread. Special stores that required a foreign passport to enter to buy a few so-called luxury goods like lacquered jewelry boxes and other souvenirs. My wife returned to our hotel’s breakfast table one morning to retrieve a guide book and saw the staff eating our scraps. No consumer goods anywhere. Huge building with cracks down the middle from shoddy construction practices. It was the most depressing place I ever visited and my assignments too to real third world countries.
Once a nation decides that it is moral and ethical to take one man's property by force and give it to another for his own personal needs, the rest is just a matter of time.
"If Parliament may take from me one shilling in the pound, what security have I for the other nineteen?" ~ Richard Henry Lee
Well you vote your way into socialism and most likely will have to shoot your way out of it. Since the English population has been effectively disarmed, your options are very. limited. Leave or tolerate. You’re not voting your way out of this.
You might enjoy the movie "Citizen Vigilante" - not entirely what you expect. It's hallucination like quality probably tells you that it describes a fantasy whose time for realization has long past
Americans have plenty of guns but have shown little inclination to stop the descent of the nation into progressivism. Americans are like the frog on the stove top and they'll do nothing to jump out of the pot.
I think the more mature way of looking at this is to realize that a balance between "both" perspectives is the best, rather than a simplistic "either-or". Psychic projection of the "other side" as the evil has caused a lot of trouble through history of humanity - and yes it will continue to do so.
Alasdair, don't forget that China is socialist. Labels, whether capitalist, socialist or democratic are inevitably misleading because they come in multiple flavours.
China is socialist but one that provides very few socialist benefits to it's people. At the same time China is in many ways the most capitalist country on earth. It seems to be a hotbed of competition, with a minimal saftey net at the bottom and a layer of Industrial planning on top.
you're saying what I'm saying, there are many flavours of capitalism and socialism. China is a hierarchical system of capitalist family networks linked by patronage, where the safety net is internal to each network, and an overall system as in 'rational socialism' isn't expected. China is unreadable from a western lens, just as their economy is uncalculable using westrn macro categories.
However you underestimate how evil and nasty he is. Have a listen to this and see how deep he is in with Blackstone (who founded Blackrock) and what evil Special Economic Zones and Free Ports are.
Burnham plans to "burn 'em". He is going to privatise the state at knockdown prices to big business, given half a chance.
Wow! That was a jolly good rant. And every word the truth.
Aye. Macleod is on fire this morning 🔥🤭
There is only one thing in this world that Andy Burnham gives a shit about and that is ……Andy Burnham😂😂😂
That is an excellent article Alasdair! Thanks
Seriously, what a load of old tiresome tosh, what have the Romans ever done for us:
Without the threat of socialism capitalists would not have had to invent bonded slavery.
For someone from the UK who most likely benefited from some of the best and and most cost effective educations and health cares in the world this really smacks of hypocrisy,
And the usual old drivel about socialists being the most corrupt, simply put corrupt people are corrupt they do not have political preferences they exploit opportunities wherever they find them, a rather capitalist behavioural characteristic, the irony in his point about his corrupt acquaintance in the seventies bribing corrupt councillors appears to be lost.
As for too much government intervention, he'll be a socialist when it comes to security both military and civil prioritising assets over anyone else's life. Meanwhile not a single major positive life changing advance in Human history was made without government investment, all the way back to the Roman Empire's roads and sanitation.
All technical and medical advanced research in the last 100 years was initiated and supported by government grants R&D when these show promise the government is usually pressured by the capitalists to hand over the work to their friends who waste no time in in demanding an arm and a leg from the original investors, the tax payer. When the capitalists are left to their own R&D devices we usually end up with deadly results, aye, socialists are responsible for the ongoing corporate genocide of drugs and pesticides, Its socialists fault that the corporate strategy to obfuscate their destruction of the planets ecosystem with pollution while they refuse to clean it up, instead blaming the prols on changing a climate that never has and never will stop changing. It was not socialists that came up with climate change and carbon taxes that one was all down to BP.
Capitalism is exactly why the world is in the mess its in, still trying to blame socialism when its been extinct in the UK since that evil bitch Thatcher, trying to say the labour party is socialist is a lie.
Socialism works, China has proven that beyond doubt, properly restrain and regulate capitalists and force them in the right direction that benefits the community and kill anyone who is caught stealing from the community is the only way humanity will move forward. If capitalists want access to a community market then they will contribute or they can move on. We keep hearing about how capitalism lifts people out of poverty, in the last 200 year no one has lifted more people out of poverty than China, when capitalists do pay a fair wage it is because they are forced to not because they are trying to help anyone but themselves.
Seriously, if socialism doesn't work why do capitalists invest so much money and time trying to overthrow governments freely elected by their populations?
If you want to rant about Burnham then do it but stop conflagrating him with socialism, neither he or the Labour Party have been socialist for45 years. everything after Thatcher has been two hue's of capitalism tory or liberal.
Amen well said
Of course socialism doesnt work. Everyone keeps ranting about the evils of capitalism, but Capitalism is simply a pejorative term. The real challenge for Socialist is not Capitalism, it's Free Enterprise. What we mean by Capitalism today is more like corporatism or even fascism (the partnership of state and corporation).
To compare Corporatism to Free Enterprise, look at GM/FORD compared to Tesla. Look at NASA compared to SpaceX. Tesla and SpaceX are enterprises owned by a human being. GM and FORD are corporate artificial beings. None of the corporate beings has a prayer in competition with freely acting individual human beings .
Free Enterprise is activity carried on by human owners. Capitalism in the US and most of the west today is activity carried on by artificial beings.
China is perhaps the most Capitalist economy in the world today. It provides only a minimal saftey net and promotes ferocious corporate competition in the middle along with a degree of Industrial policy on top.
That "pejorative" term of capitalism was fashioned because "free enterprise" unchecked will always be controlled by capital and those who control the flow of capital.
A simple exercise of comparing who controlled the flow of capital throughout history provides all the evidence you need to assess the merits of both socioeconomic philosophies.
In every case, where capital flow control was in private hands it evolved into consolidation and empire with no regard for lifting people out of poverty.
Previously the East India Trading Company and its world wide franchises of the Dickensian times was one of the capitalisms golden era's brought nothing but war, hunger and oppression world wide.
When the idea of Socialism interrupted this, two things happened, countries that adopted socialist ideas all seen benefits after the initial struggle to take control of their resources, many suffered greatly but those who persisted seen significant improvements in all aspects of their standards of living.
It also forced the capitalists to change strategy and create a new myth about a "trickle down effect" allowing a temporary redistribution of wealth, while they worked on perverting and fighting the socialist threat.
We are now seeing the results of that strategy. The "left" is now what was previously known as liberalism and socialism is considered extreme left while as you say the current fascist union of government and corporations is advocated as the center.
I say temporary redistribution because we have now returned to the exact same conditions of the East India Trading Company with a lot more control technology.
The whole "free enterprise" myth is born from the fairy tale that the unicorn "point of equilibrium" where supply meets demand exists and it can be achieved, that's a bigger pill to swallow than people cooperating for the benefit of the community.
The problem for most capitalists like Alasdair is they see any interference in their "enterprise" as the red hand of socialism not allowing them to profit by any means.
What is most amusing is that capitalists always use "human nature" as an argument to dismiss socialism as unworkable.
Generally we are told humans cannot cooperate to benefit the community as a whole as there is always some who are corrupt that will grab more than their fair share of resources and power, while ignoring the fact the same problem is far more prevalent in free enterprise capitalism.
It is a more logical argument that the corrupt so called socialists, are in fact capitalist wolves in sheep clothing who believe they deserve more than the rest. And from all of our experience we see daily, corruption is a far bigger problem for capitalism than socialism.
"Free enterprise" died with the introduction of usury which is the true meaning of capitalism. Even Smith ended his book with the warning that capitalism will always tend to corporate feudalism.
The irony is the elephant in the room that capitalists always refuse to look at, the inevitable results of implementing "free enterprise", without acknowledging that the target of capitalism is to become a monopoly.
This is where that dreaded "government interference" "Alasdair keeps complaining about) came into play, to control and ensure what is inevitable can be controlled. The Chinese understand this, they must have read Smith's books all the way to the end.
Yep, millions died in China under Mao post revolution, China has allowed academics in to read and study their records and have admitted to approximately 125 million people perished, they have regrets and are learning from their own history. Can we say the same of our own ruling Epstein Class?
In the last 50 years they have lifted 80 million out of abject poverty and leapfrogged every capitalist controlled industry and institution while maintaining their socialist perspective on who should benefit most from their advances.
As an aside, I worked on a thesis on corruption seven years ago, what I found was amazing, the vast majority of contemporary research into every aspect of corruption is done in China. The shocking part about the research from the "free market" western countries was that a significant proportion was about how corruption is useful, seen as something we can't control and should just get used to it and use it. That right there is for me, the difference between capitalism and socialism.
Since WWI, every nation has been State Capitalist. Just varying degrees of centralization of power, and the concentration of wealth.
In short, brilliantly clear sentences, Macleod critiques socialism, asserting that it is a form of communism that leads to economic destruction. He cites Ludwig von Mises’ argument that socialism, lacking a system of prices and interest rates based on risk, cannot allocate resources efficiently. To support this, he contrasts free-market systems, such as Hong Kong's success, with Mao's China. Macleod also highlights historical examples of corruption within socialist regimes and warns that socialist politicians often succumb to bribery and power-induced corruption. He concludes that socialism doesn't deliver on its promises, resulting in a decline in Britain’s status and increased government regulation, ultimately harming the economy. The author claims that any dissent against this system is quashed, portraying a bleak outlook for the future under socialist leadership.
In America, the situation is different since we live under a fascist system; the response will be a complete bankruptcy so total that the workforce will not face demands for a socialist order since there will be no overarching federal government to appeal to. Instead, the workers will likely take the bankrupt, but still useful enterprises and turn them into cooperatively owned firms. Those export-oriented firms doing business with economies that have gold standards, such as China and Russia, will probably recover first.
That’s pretty much what the great economist Thomas Sowell says in his books
Can't speak for what's happening in Britain and its past but WE the People in America have been led to believe a lie that socialism destroys capitalism. To mix socialism, communism, and capitalism together is to make the point that socialism is the enemy and capitalism the savior of society is frankly disingenuous. As WE are witnessing in the US the wealth gap is growing and WE are witnessing unharnessed greed and a president that is grifting to the tune of $2.4B. And his musing about how the equity market is doing so great that he should do great. The Nazi Republican party is completely complicit in this greed.
To demonize socialism(bit.ly/4y4HXNy) as the damaging influence of society is for me ridiculous and disinformation. Yes there are problems with socialism as well as with the greed in capitalism but "free stuff" as capitalists point out is not "free stuff". WE all pay into it for roads judiciary infrastructure and helping those who need a helping hand because WE are part of a society who supports each other.
Interestingly Socialism and Islamic Sharia are very complimentary. Maybe that is why "elites" in Europe, the UK and USA are so happy to import the Islamic poison. They see Sharia as a tonic and stimulant and more congenial population host for Socialism.
Sharia is not an ideology you bellend lol but Zionism is, and it does complement it so well, because when they have to kiss there ass to get a bank loan after they played russian roulette with the economy, then they go to the same ass holes asking for handouts. Do you remember 2008, which sharia counciller was invested in playing that game?
A number years ago, I subscribed to Paul Craig Roberts' site, and at the time he had a comment section. He had published a book, which he was touting on his site, called The Failure of Laissez-faire Capitalism. I asked him where, in the world, was laissez-faire capitalism practiced, as I couldn't recall such a place. The economy closest to practicing it might be Hong Kong.
He was upset with my comment and went on to explain how I was wrong. My reply was that it seems to be a recurrent problem in the social sciences to constantly revise its terms and definitions - a fluidity that makes a mockery of a supposedly, serious field of study, macroeconomics. Laissez-faire used to mean commerce without interference but still subject to the rule of law, primarily contract law and property rights. His definition in the book, wasn't close to that.
Likewise, I'm not sure that what's practiced in China is communism, or socialism, just as in the West, it's called capitalism but isn't really. I prefer the description of modern economics as centralized state, economic command and control via financial, tax, subsidy, legal, and regulatory incentives/disincentives - a high-profit, state-condoned, cartelized economy at the top level, coupled with what remains of a low profit, struggling, small enterprise lower level.
Social and cultural control is collectivist, in a cultural marxist framework, and the state has built itself a large dependent, parasite class - comprised of low and high income - benefitting from big controlling, government. The result of all this centralized social and economic engineering is astronomical debt, low productivity, stagnation, poverty, and social collapse. Change, under the current political system, appears futile. However, its hard to believe the system can continue on its current trajectory.
In China they call their system capitalism with Chinese characteristics, where it exists to serve the people. ie they put the State above Capital whereas Western economies allow Capital to sit on top of the State causing the worsening corruption and concentration of wealth in fewer hands.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, it’s astonishing that anyone supports socialism. Yet in both our countries socialist politicians make their goals perfectly clear and are getting elected. I wonder if any have actually been to a socialist country. As an Air Force officer many years ago I spent a couple of weeks in the two “jewels” of the Soviet Union—Moscow and Leningrad. The poverty was shocking. People lined up in the middle of the night to buy bread. Special stores that required a foreign passport to enter to buy a few so-called luxury goods like lacquered jewelry boxes and other souvenirs. My wife returned to our hotel’s breakfast table one morning to retrieve a guide book and saw the staff eating our scraps. No consumer goods anywhere. Huge building with cracks down the middle from shoddy construction practices. It was the most depressing place I ever visited and my assignments too to real third world countries.
Once a nation decides that it is moral and ethical to take one man's property by force and give it to another for his own personal needs, the rest is just a matter of time.
"If Parliament may take from me one shilling in the pound, what security have I for the other nineteen?" ~ Richard Henry Lee
This is really what it comes down to. Agreed.
"Every socialist is a disguised dictator." ~ Ludwig von Mises
Well you vote your way into socialism and most likely will have to shoot your way out of it. Since the English population has been effectively disarmed, your options are very. limited. Leave or tolerate. You’re not voting your way out of this.
You might enjoy the movie "Citizen Vigilante" - not entirely what you expect. It's hallucination like quality probably tells you that it describes a fantasy whose time for realization has long past
https://rumble.com/v7bw4ti--viewer-discretion-is-strongly-advised-citizen-vigilante-full-movie.html
Americans have plenty of guns but have shown little inclination to stop the descent of the nation into progressivism. Americans are like the frog on the stove top and they'll do nothing to jump out of the pot.
I think the more mature way of looking at this is to realize that a balance between "both" perspectives is the best, rather than a simplistic "either-or". Psychic projection of the "other side" as the evil has caused a lot of trouble through history of humanity - and yes it will continue to do so.
Completely agree
Alasdair, don't forget that China is socialist. Labels, whether capitalist, socialist or democratic are inevitably misleading because they come in multiple flavours.
China is socialist but one that provides very few socialist benefits to it's people. At the same time China is in many ways the most capitalist country on earth. It seems to be a hotbed of competition, with a minimal saftey net at the bottom and a layer of Industrial planning on top.
you're saying what I'm saying, there are many flavours of capitalism and socialism. China is a hierarchical system of capitalist family networks linked by patronage, where the safety net is internal to each network, and an overall system as in 'rational socialism' isn't expected. China is unreadable from a western lens, just as their economy is uncalculable using westrn macro categories.
Interesting Alasdair.
However you underestimate how evil and nasty he is. Have a listen to this and see how deep he is in with Blackstone (who founded Blackrock) and what evil Special Economic Zones and Free Ports are.
Burnham plans to "burn 'em". He is going to privatise the state at knockdown prices to big business, given half a chance.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ktMoevfp1Ww
Or if you prefer to read here is the article written by the interviewee
https://europeanpowell.substack.com/p/the-zone-builder-how-andy-burnham?r=2w9sq7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true