Volume 23, Number 2, November 2013
Paul Graham’s article on p. 24 of this issue of the magazine pointed out that since the economic crisis the left has not thrived in developed Western economies. However, what about in less developed countries? This article looks at a series of case studies of purportedly socialist states and asks if socialism is in renewal or retreat in these countries.
Cuba has been a one-party socialist state since Fidel Castro seized power in 1959. It depended on
Soviet aid until the collapse of the USSR in 1991. Today, Cuba is still ruled by a Castro — Fidel’s brother Raul took over in 2008 at the age of 76. Raul has introduced essential economic reforms, allowing private enterprise to develop, but is determined to ensure that Cuba remains a socialist country.
Socialism has ensured full employment, and delivered a health service with one of the highest ratios of doctors to population in the world. However, poverty is widespread, partly as a result of US economic sanctions, and even doctors are forced to supplement their meagre incomes by taking on other jobs, such as driving taxis at night. The Cuban economy and social services are hugely dependent on aid from Venezuela and the bloated public sector is notorious for encouraging waste and corruption — a guaranteed job provides little incentive to work hard, and often underpaid workers supplement their income by stealing work supplies and selling them on the black market. Raul Castro is due to retire in
2018, so at that point Cuba will face a crossroads — will it continue to cling to socialism, struggling along with microeconomic reforms which allow a limited private sector to exist, or will it embrace capitalism, potentially reaping large economic benefits but abandoning its ideology and revolutionary heritage?
Learn more
Watch this video clip showing Cubans talking about their country: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-23452727
Read The Economist ’s special report on Cuba: www.economist.com/node/21550418
Read this National Geographic article on Cuba: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2012/11/new-cuba/gorney-text
Watch this video discussion of Cuba’s reforms: www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2013/07/economic-change-cuba
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The populist leader Hugo Chavez was elected president in 1998 and immediately began transforming this underdeveloped and unequal country. Chavez was determined to enact a ‘Bolivarian revolution’ that would create socialism in Venezuela and, in the tradition o f Simón Bolívar (the nineteenth-century
South American independence hero), provide a focal point for Latin American unity. Chavez nationalised Venezuela’s oil industry and used the income from oil exports to fund social services. He was highly critical of US influence in Latin America, and gave vast amounts of aid to Cuba to prop up its socialist regime, while developing links with Russia, Iran, Syria and Libya.
Chavez died in March 2013. His successor, Nicholas Maduro, was elected promising to continue to develop socialism in Venezuela. However, while socialism is clearly popular with a significant section of Venezuelan society, it remains controversial. Poverty and inequality have undoubtedly been reduced by socialist policies but many economists argue that this could have been achieved faster in a capitalist system, given that Venezuela enjoys some of the largest oil reserves in the world. Almost a third of Venezuelans still live in poverty and inflation hit 25% in 2009. The rule of law has also been threatened — Chavez’s rule saw a reduction in human rights, the abolition of presidential term limits, and increasing politicisation of the judiciary.
Learn more
Watch a video clip exploring Venezuela’s current problems: www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3iOacYl1dI
Read the BBC’s Venezuela profile: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-19649648
Read an article and watch video clips on Hugo Chavez’s legacy: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/05/opinion/ghitis-hugo-chavez/index.html
China has been under Communist Party control since 1949, when Mao Tse-Tung led the party to victory in the civil war. Maoism was a uniquely Chinese ideology aimed at developing socialism within the peasantry rather than the proletariat, as China lacked an urban proletariat. Mao’s Great Leap
Forward was a failed attempt to modernise agriculture and industry using a rural commune system, causing a famine in which some 20 million people died. In the late-1960s, Chinese society was rocked by the Cultural Revolution, which saw Mao imposing his authority on the country and encouraging the victimisation of ‘liberal elites’ within the Communist Party.
Following Mao’s death in 1976, China’s leaders changed direction. Private enterprise was encouraged and China regularly enjoyed growth rates of more than 10% in the 1990s and 2000s. Today, much of
China remains rural and poor, but more than 1 million Chinese are millionaires and China is the second-biggest economy in the world.
However, capitalism has not been allowed to operate unchecked in China. It is directed by the state, which also owns many companies. The Communist Party has also made it clear that, while it is willing to allow economic liberalisation, it will not tolerate political dissent. The 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre of protest ing students, China’s treatment of Tibet, and the massive internet censorship
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imposed by the Great Firewall of China, all show that human rights are routinely ignored in order to ensure stability.
China’s new premier took power in 2012 and faces various challenges. The country’s growth rate is currently 7.5%, high by global standards but disappointing compared to the eye-wateringly high rates which the Chinese have become accustomed to. China’s one child policy has produced an ageing population that will need to be paid for and a shortage of women, which affects Chinese men looking for wives. The Communist Party will be most worried by the widespread frustration with the repressive nature of politics and society, and the growing anger about endemic corruption within government at a local and national level. If the Chinese leadership cannot maintain brisk economic growth then calls for political reform could grow even more strident.
Learn more
Watch a video news clip of China’s leaders pledging to keep China socialist: www.youtube.com/watch?v=frIEjJ5lWvk
Read the BBC’s China profile: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13017877
Rea d a report on China’s future: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-21666152
Read an explanation of the p remier’s ‘Chinese dream’: www.economist.com/news/briefing/21577063-chinas-new-leader-has-been-quick-consolidate-hispower-what-does-he-now-want-his
Like China, Vietnam is a one-party state. The Communist Party has ruled a unified country since the
1975 reunion of north and south. This followed the end of the war in which the USA fought unsuccessfully to prevent the spread of communism in the region. Today, the USA is reconciled with its former enemy and is its biggest trading partner. Vietnam has made good economic progress, partly through exporting petroleum, and is now defined as a lower middle-income country. However, in recent years Vietnam’s currency has fallen in value and problems with its banking system and stateowned companies have been exposed. Furthermore, economic liberalisation has not been accompanied by political reform. Human rights abuses, censorship and corruption are widespread.
Political dissenters face up to 7 years in prison for crimes such as writing a blog that is critical of the government.
Learn more
Read the BBC’s Vietnam profile: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-16567315
Socialism faces challenges in each of the four countries examined above. Each state allows private enterprise to exist to varying degrees, which represents a retreat from socialist ideology. In China, the move to state-directed capitalism has been economically successful, whereas Cuba is just beginning
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to create a private sector. But the leaders of these countries see the acceptance of a limited form of enterprise as the means to renew socialism and ensure that it continues into the future. In effect, citizens are offered economic growth in return for their political rights. This has worked well in China, which has exploited its vast territory and population to become a global superpower. Venezuela and
Vietnam have both been blessed with oil reserves, which their regimes can exploit. However, Cuba lacks these advantages and may therefore find the transition to a mixed economy more painful, perhaps forcing a further retreat from socialism.
1. What are the positives and negatives of socialism in the four countries examined in this article?
2. Why is political dissent so fiercely repressed in these states?
3. Is socialism always anti-democratic?
4. Why is China the most successful of the four socialist countries?
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