The Chinese Communist Party has an interesting problem of its own making. Its leader, Xi Jinping, has made the pursuit of “new quality productive forces” the signature theme of his national strategy. The idea is to make China the world leader in artificial intelligence, biotechnology, electric vehicles, quantum computing, and advanced manufacturing. Few doubt China’s accomplishments on this front over the last few years.
But success raises questions too. The phrase, new productive forces, is rooted in Marxist theory. It argues that new technologies are the engine of historical progress. But Marx’s theory contains an awkward corollary that the CCP is struggling to reconcile with.
Marx argued that “productive forces” or the technological means to produce goods and services shape everything else: the society’s institutions, laws, and political arrangements. These he called the “relations of production.” The interaction between the two is dynamic. As they develop, productive forces will inevitably come into conflict with the political superstructure. The transition from feudalism to capitalism, for example, Marxists argue, was rooted in the new productive forces that emerged in the 17th and 18th centuries. China’s drive to master the current technological revolution, then, should over time generate pressures for a different kind of politics in which the CCP could become marginal.
Marx argued that the technological means to produce goods and services shape everything else: the society’s institutions, laws, and political arrangements. As they develop, productive forces will inevitably come into conflict with the political superstructure
Xi, however, is betting he can have it both ways: unleash the revolutionary power of new technology while keeping firm political control over the Chinese state and society. To make Xi’s bet look credible in Marxist theory, the CCP ideologues are engaged in some tortuous intellectual gymnastics.
One way out is to claim that the CCP is not subject to the forces of history, but has the ability to guide them. They insist that the CCP leadership can manage a smooth transition to the deployment of new productive forces while retaining the dominance of the party. The second argument is rooted in the affirmation that the Chinese political system has already adapted. They claim that the Chinese party-state is more responsive than the bourgeois democratic states in managing technological transformations without political disruption. The third trick is to change the definition of “relations of production” to focus on the disruptions at the firm-level. They claim that the CCP is already dealing with this challenge by initiating appropriate reforms at the operational level.
Critics of the CCP will say effective technological transitions require open societies: free exchange of ideas, tolerance of failure, and researchers who can collaborate internationally without fear. These are not conditions the party has shown much interest in providing. Its crackdown on China’s own tech giants just a few years ago — which wiped out hundreds of billions in value and frightened entrepreneurs across the country — showed what happens when the CCP’s imperative for domination runs into the forces of innovation. The scepticism is unlikely to deter the CCP ideologues from suggesting that Xi can override the logic of history. This of course not the first time a bunch of courtiers have proclaimed that their sovereign is immune to historical forces. History is littered with such claims.