| Three Represents,
Transnational Cyber-superorganisms, Capitalism,
and the Struggle over Political Policy in China
By Satya J. Gabriel
Jiang Zemin's Three Represents has
been put forth as a new component in the ideology of the Communist Party
of China (CPC), alongside Mao Zedong Thought and Deng Xiaoping
Theory. One can think of it as an upgrade to CPC software, CPC
3.0, if you will. Whereas, Mao Zedong Thought was grounded in the
notion of continual revolutionary struggle to destroy the vestiges of the
pre-revolutionary political economy and Deng Xiaoping Theory was designed
to shift the CPC algorithm from this internal struggle mode to one of
pragmatic experimentation, focused on generating technological advance and
the presumed consequent economic growth, this new algorithm for the CPC
calls for a rearrangement of the internal composition of the Party itself,
in order to solidify the technology/growth mission over the Maoist
revolutionary mission. The core of CPC 3.0 is the idea that the
Party represents i) the majority of the Chinese people, ii) advanced
culture, and iii) advanced technology. The first of the three
represents is probably just a way of formalizing the shift of the Party
from trying to represent (or at least pretend to represent) workers and
farmers to a more "broad-based" Party. This can mean whatever the
Party leadership wants it to mean, although I can't really see how that is
any different from past practices. On the other hand, it does mean
that one does not need "worker" or "peasant" credentials to rise within
the Party ranks and that may be of some consequence in internal struggles
within the Party. The second represent is just a pet concept of
Jiang Zemin, who was enamored with Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore, the model for
"advanced culture" in Jiang's mind's eye. The last of these
represents is more concrete than the other two and therefore more powerful
as an indicator of the underlying Party mission and more influential
as a factor in internal Party decision-making: to promote advanced
technology. The PLA elements within the Party understand this as
meaning they will eventually get the same sort of neat toys that the
American military has to play with. Those who are involved in the
industrial sector understand it to mean that they will get the latest
production technologies. And so on. This focus on technology
is not new for the CPC. As I've argued in other essays,
technological advance, not revolutionary changes in class processes, has
been and continues to be the most persistent defining goal of
the CPC. Jiang Zemin's Three Represents simply reinforces
this prevailing ideology of technological determinism within the CPC.
The pragmatists have solid empirical support for their
technological determinism. It certainly looks as if the innovation (if
not invention) of technology is a
guiding influence on determining winners and losers in the Darwinian
struggle among "civilizations" over the sweep of human history. In the
aggregate, technological invention and innovation has,
on the average, been on an exponential curve for the entire history of the
species homo sapien sapiens, with a few significant bumps along the path
due to wars, pandemics, and other interruptions, although we have spent
the better part of human history on the flatter slope of that
exponential curve and have only of late moved out to an obviously steeper
portion
of the curve. This is probably
not true for social evolution, taken as a whole, because social relations
are less subject to invention and innovation than material
technology. Social inventions are more likely to be stymied by
existing social relationships and institutions.
Nevertheless, social inventions, like capitalism, can
serve as vehicles for not only continuing but shaping the advancing
complexity of technology: the type of technology selected for innovation
is influenced by the social organization of society. And this is
also the case for the manner in which technology (both hard and soft) are
diffused among the species. As Richard L. Brinkman wrote in
Cultural Economics, ". . . in
order to maintain the economic process, as an ongoing function, there is a
need for continuous change in structure, both material and
social." (p. XV) Thus, despite the resistance to social change, we find
within the larger exponential curve of
technological advance that successful economic transformation is
accompanied by dramatic transformations in social organization (combined
with the aforementioned transformation in material technology),
such as the growth in
transnational capitalism and the simultaneous evolution of the
transnational firm into a cyber-superorganism.
It is in this context that we can
observe that 21st century globalization is
the latest stage in a process
of shrinking economic distance and decentering capitalism, interrupted
at certain intervals by world wars, political isolationism, and failed
attempts to create competing political-economic power centers (such as
the CMEA). In the "West" the social technic of the transnational corporation
(within which political, economic, and cultural power is increasingly congealed)
has been the catalyst for this transformation. Transnationals have become
geographically decentered cyber-superorganisms with internal and
external elements connected by increasingly complex
computer/internet/telecommunication/financial/legal networks.
These "high technology" networks facilitate rapid communication and determinate lines of
control between operating and
related units directly inside the corporate structure of the
transnational and quasi-independent firms connected via
outsourcing arrangements for production, design and testing spread around
the globe. They also facilitate similar connections between the
transnational and various local and multinational governmental bodies,
providing the mechanisms by which globalization is programmed to serve the
interests of transnational growth.
The transnational cyber-superorganism is comprised of a
culturally diverse
population of cyberorganically linked workers and managers, with
relatively looser connections to external political, cultural, and
economic agents (such as managers of government regulatory agencies,
trustees of think tanks dependent upon contributions from transnationals
or related parties, and directors of quasi-independent
corporations dependent upon contractual receipts of cash flow from
transnationals). The
ability to rapidly transmit commands and communicate information across
geographic space has become increasingly sophisticated, with the quantity
and quality of data transmission rapidly approaching the boundaries of
virtual presence, where corporate employees can interact across
geographic space in ways that had previously only been possible by
physical travel. These advances in communication technology, coupled with
computer assisted design and manufacturing, has made it possible to
disperse the production process across greater geographic space without
losing centralized control. And managers, attorneys, and sales
personnel within
these cyber-superorganisms use the same technology to facilitate rapid
consummation of agreements as commercial
relationships routinely cross international (and currency) boundaries.
The transnational firm qua cyber-superorganism is the nuclear force
transforming the meaning of community and citizenship --- the USA and other
"Western" nation states have, to a significant extent, been captured by
the transnationals. Transnationals control significant aspects of the culture
producing machinery, either directly (oligopolistic control over major
mass media production and distribution) or indirectly (such as via their
advertising budgets, vendor and clientelist relationships), and increasingly
command the webs of communication technology (broadband, private corporate
communications networks, data collection, storage and processing networks,
including effective control over information on both citizens and firms,
etc.) necessary to the new cyber social formation. By developing patron-client
relationships with political leaders and other government officials (including
promises of corporate life after political death/dormancy), these cyber-superorganisms
connect their power centers directly to the agencies of the state and direct
the flow of public policy in the interest of further enhancing the economic,
political, cultural, and environmental hegemony of the collective of transnationals.
The entire structure of imperial power, emanating primarily from the
United States government and the legitimating institutions of the United
Nations, NATO, and other U.S. dominated multi-national superorganisms, has
been subsumed within the hegemonic sphere of influence of these
transnational corporations. This dynamic process has been exported to Russia, Eastern Europe, and other
emerging competitive capitalist spaces. The interconnectivity of input
and output markets, global trading agreements, and changing technology
(internet, cell phones, satellites, etc.) that allows for rapid and seamless
global communication results in the decentering of both production and
exchange relationships, even as political power is simultaneously decentralized
and recentered within the corporate executive offices and board rooms (from
parliaments and government offices).
China has yet to be fully incorporated into this process. The Chinese
government remains relatively autonomous and plays a significant leadership
role in shaping corporate behavior within the political boundaries of the
People's Republic. Government ministries, under the leadership of the
State Council,
continue to exercise regulatory
control over the expansion of factories and other construction within
China in ways that do not always serve the
interests of the transnationals or local firms (although this does not
necessarily distinquish chinese capitalism from the variant forms of
capitalism in the European Community or North America, where there are
often occasions where local or national interests conflict with the
specific interests of transnational firms).
Nevertheless, there are signs of transformation along
"Western" political lines, in that the relative power balance may be
shifting towards the collective of capitalist firms and away from
relatively autonomous government ministries and agencies. The Chinese government has made significant
changes to the taxation system to accomodate foreign transnationals,
including tax breaks and other subsidies that advantaged foreign firms over domestic
firms and, most importantly, has signed onto the World Trade Organization,
which is a critical mechanism for extending and protecting the political
rights of transnational capitalism against the parochial interests of
local citizenries. These policy decisions do not so much reflect
the clout of foreign firms as
the aggressive strategy of China's pragmatist leadership in seeking to
attract foreign firms into specific locations within China and to
encourage technological diffusion. The "Four Modernizations" required
this diffusion and so China's leaders were consciously trying to find ways
to attract ideas and hard technology into the country. The advance of
China to the status of top recipient of foreign direct investment (FDI) is
one indication of the success of this strategy. (Between 1991 and 1996,
FDI grew by an astounding average rate of 60% per annum.) Transnational
firms from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea,
Germany, the United States, Sweden,
etc. have transported advanced technology (both in material technics, the
hardware of technological development, and in the structure of industrial
organization, the software of technological development) into
mainland China, in many cases sharing the technology with
Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) through joint ventures or
other forms of cooperative arrangements, but in all cases working closely
with local, provincial, and often national political leaders.
A clearer sign that political power is becoming increasingly decentered, with
capitalist firms gaining more influence over public policies can be seen
in the growing clout of domestic capitalists. This has even been
evident in recent changes to the tax code. In 1994 the Chinese government moved
to satisfy the complaints of executives in domestic firms that the tax
code favored foreign firms by adopting a new
uniform taxation system designed to tax all firms, foreign and domestic,
at the same corporate tax rate of 33 percent and value added tax rate of
17 percent. But the most dramatic example of the growing clout of
domestic capitalists has been within the Communist Party of China
(CPC) and is embodied in Jiang Zemin's Three Represents, which
explicitly calls for broadening membership within the Party (and similarly
broadening the constituency the Party serves).
The CPC
has been actively recruiting new members from among those occupying
management positions
within both state-owned and private capitalist firms. The process of changing
the "class composition" of the CPC is shaped, in part, by the growing power
and influence of indigenous capitalist firms, both state-owned (including
town-village enterprises) and private. The distributive payments of surplus
value from state-owned and private capitalist firms, as well as the power
these firms hold over the magnitude and income of wage laborers, spreads
their influence throughout various levels of government and the larger
social formation.
Domestic capitalists are not the only force changing the
internal political dynamics in China. Foreign
capital has become an increasingly important element in the
Chinese economic matrix, both in direct and indirect involvement in
surplus appropriation and distribution. Foreign transnational
directors have been primarily interested in exploiting cheap Chinese labor
to lower unit production costs and gain competitive advantages in sales of
commodities in the U.S. and other higher income economies. However,
the Chinese domestic market has always been a source of lust for these
transnational directors and their managers. It is difficult
(perhaps even foolhardy) to ignore the potential of 1.3 billion people
in the Chinese social formation. Foreign transnationals are
likely to continue their expansion in the Chinese economy. Over
time, these
non-Chinese firms will become more and more embedded in the domestic
economy of China. It may be only a matter of time before
non-Chinese based transnationals, producing increasing amounts of surplus
value, hiring ever more wage laborers within China, paying tax revenues to
various levels of government, and hiring relatively well paid managerial
personnel from among China's educated elite, who have been increasingly
exposed to the hardware and software deployed by foreign transnational
firms in the realization of surplus value (the quantum matter of economic
and social transformation), capture their own elements within the CPC and
Chinese government (perhaps this would necessitate a fourth "represent")
to a significant enough extent to shape and/or reshape public
policy.
Thus, it may simply be that Jiang Zemin was a pioneer in translating
this change in political dynamics into ideological form with his doctrine
of Three Represents, but the policy of opening the Party to the
managerial elite within domestic capitalist firms, as well as other
professionals and private entrepreneurs critical to the development of a
private capitalist (and, to a lesser extent, ancient) economy, may have
already been baked in the reform cake, so to speak. The Engineers have,
therefore, moved to decidely alter the demographics of the CPC in accord
with changes that have already occurred in the linkages between the
political apparatuses of the Party-state and the growing private
capitalist sector. Nevertheless, it is no minor matter that Jiang
set in motion a transformation in the internal composition of the Party by
bringing the agents of capitalism inside to directly participate in
shaping public policies and laws. It is not surprising then that the
"Three Represents" unleashed a fierce struggle within the CPC that seems
to have been won by Jiang and carried forward by new president Hu Jintao.
[1]
Thus, the nature of the internecine struggles over policy within the
CPC may be significantly different in the future from conditions described
in previous essays. The basic Left versus Right struggle may be displaced
by various struggles between politicians linked to different economic constituencies.
And the divisions will not be simply between domestic versus foreign capitalist
firms. Foreign manufacturers seeking easy access to domestic Chinese
markets or low cost labor in China (including low-cost skilled technical
and managerial talent), either through direct operations, joint ventures, mergers with or acquisitions of
Chinese firms, or through subcontractors may cultivate their own group of
loyal politicos within the CPC and government. This will be all the more likely as it becomes easier
for foreign transnationals to become majority/controlling owners of
domestic enterprises, inheriting a complex web of financial relationships
and personal ties.
Similarly, foreign banks, insurance firms, and other financial institutions
may capture their own clique within the CPC. Foreign telecoms may do the
same. These cliques may struggle on the same side for certain policies
and be in opposition on other policies. Similarly, politicians linked to
domestic textile firms may ally with politicians more closely linked to
foreign wholesalers or retailers of clothing
in support of certain policies. The undemocratic nature
of the CPC-dominated state may actually foster this sort of pro-capitalist clientalism.
When and if the Chinese state moves to democratize electoral politics,
the power of capitalist firms over citizens' lives and over which politicians
are funded may be such that the policy choices might not be significantly
altered from those under the present less democratic political arrangements.
After all, politicians under democratic rules are more likely to be
vulnerable to negative shifts in economic conditions and a more privatized
economy will place the levers of employment creating (or
destroying) investment decisions squarely in the corporate board rooms,
rather than in the government ministries. Capital strikes can be a
very effective tool for disciplining wayward politicians (who are subject
to being voted out of office by disenchanted voters).
A shift to more "Western-style" politico-economic arrangements at the
national level would, in a sense, be compatible with the current politico-economic
status quo at the local level. We've already seen, in previous essays,
the dynamic growth effects of the close relationship between local political
leaders and the TVEs (most of which are former commune enterprises). Read
just about any paper on the post-Mao economic reforms and related double
digit growth rates and you will hear about the pivotal role of these TVEs.
As pointed out in the 13th essay in this series, the TVEs are local-government-owned
corporate entities managed by private parties in contractual arrangements
with local authorities. The local authorities closely monitor the activities
of the TVEs, but also provide regulatory support and sometimes access to
resources at favorable prices. In exchange, in the language of post-structuralist
Marxian theory, the TVEs provide the local governments with distributive
class payments from their appropriated capitalist surplus value. These
distributive class payments are a significant revenue source for local
government budgets. In addition, it is not unusual for TVE management to
provide local government politicos with additional "private" payments (in
cash, in-kind, or in favors). The bottom line, so to speak, is that the
local politicos become beholden to TVE management (and vice versa), creating
a politico-economic alliance that can influence policy formation and implementation.
The same dynamic is at play in the relationship between local political
leaders and transnational firms. These local politicos have been
engaged in their own competitive battle to gain favor with the
transnationals in pursuit of foreign direct investment (FDI) for their
areas. Once they have succeeded in gaining an increase in FDI, they
must work just as diligently to keep it.
Thus, the basic mechanism for connecting political bureaucracies to the
transnational networks, distributive class payments and the use of
communicatons technology to transmit information, requests, and commands
is the same under democratic institutional relationships and the less
democratic CPC monopoly political power (over the central government
bureaucracy) arrangements. Indeed, even the mechanism of capital strikes
might be no less effective under the latter arrangement than the
former. A severe drop in FDI (which now represents almost 20% of
productive investment in Chinese industry), for example, might arguably pose an even
larger threat to the CPC under the current monopoly than to democratically
elected politicians. And either arrangement poses serious problems for
those who would favor more local control over public policies (including
policies shaping the quality of the natural environment, employment,
infrastructure, and so on), although the more democratic the political
processes shaping public policy the more likely citizens will be in a
position to exert the primacy of policies that would not be favored by the
transnationals (or the bureaucracy).
In the world of WTO and cybercommunications, it has become
relatively
easy for top-level managers of transnational corporations to transmit information
(e.g. commands and plans) and move financial resources across distant geographic
space. In addition, it has become easier to process information on both
economic and political transactions. The ability to connect "local" politicians
to transnational headquarters should facilitate increasing corporate influence
over political policy. In this case, local would include national level
politicians. A carefully constructed politico-economic strategy for a transnational
corporation might include developing close links to political leaders in
Beijing, Shanghai, and in various provincial locations, as part of their
overall plan for managing production and market conditions and political
risks. The impediments to closing the political distance are now mostly
linguistic and cultural (and the spread of USA culture and American English
language is eroding this barrier). New cybertechnics, especially the Internet,
provide the mechanisms for linking transnational elements across vast geographic
space and for incorporating political agencies into the transnational super
cyber-organism.
I believe the Maoist philosophy of "permanent revolution,"
in its current Dengist pragmatist manifestation, is supportive of these
changes in China. The constant experimentation with public policy, a
by-product of the idea of permanent revolution,
has led to a degree
of uncertainty about national policy. Add to that the decentralization
that has come out of the Dengist-era and you have the ingredients for
strategic behavior by local officials that supports
globalization. Why? Because uncertainty about
future policy shifts has created a willingness on the part of both local
officials and firms to support Chinese participation in WTO and other international
arrangements that might "lock-in" economic liberalization. In addition,
the desire to reduce uncertainties about future economic policies
may increase support for closer
links between political officials and corporate entities, including the
transnational corporations operating within China.
The financial fragilities
created by a growing public debt (particularly when one includes the debt
owed to state-owned banks by state-owned enterprises), rising unemployment
(which is likely to worsen as a result of the increased competition resulting
from WTO), and the difficulties in maintaining legitimacy based on traditional
views of citizenship rights under "socialism" are likely to push the CPC
into the arms of corporate patrons (both domestic and foreign).
[2]
This is
not guaranteed, mind you. The Chinese state is still a strong
state, even if not as strong as the state that Chris Bramall had in
mind when he described the "suppression of growth-retarding interest
groups" as "one of the main achievements of the Maoist era." In
particular, one should not underestimate the continuing influence of the
senior leadership of the People's Liberation Army
(PLA) which has not yet lost
its clout within the Party. And even outside of China the network of
close ties between transnationals and political institutions does not go
unchallenged. Indeed, there is a continuing struggle by grassroots
organizations of citizens to regain popular democratic
control over public policy, if not to
completely sever the lines of transmission connecting transnational power
centers to government agencies and legislative bodies. Nevertheless,
opening up the CPC to a larger number of capitalist
managers and others dependent upon capitalist surplus value for their
livelihood (either directly or indirectly), as well as private
capitalists, linking China to international markets (and cultures) via WTO,
and reorienting the Chinese economy towards market determined levels of
employment and income (including growth in export-oriented manufacturing)
creates connections between the Chinese state
and the transnational firms that will
be difficult to challenge, much less sever, in the future. As more and
more Chinese citizens work for foreign firms (or domestic firms whose livelihood
is linked to foreign markets and/or firms) and political leaders depend
on such firms for distributed surplus value (either for public or personal
well being), it will become less likely that Leftist (much less Maoist)
political policies would gain much acceptance within either the CPC or the
general public.
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NOTES
[1] (Note added December 22, 2003) The
victory of the pro-capitalist wing of the CPC and the leadership of the
Engineers faction of Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao is being
solidified at this point. The Central Committee of the CPC has proposed
amending the 1982 constitution by adding the three represents into
the document as one of the guiding principles of the nation and recognized
as "heritage and further development of Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong
Thought and Deng Xiaoping Theory" according to Wang Zhaoguo, vice chairman
of the National People's Congress Standing Committee. Wang explained this
to NPC representatives in his capacity as a member of the Political
Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. See People's Daily
Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/ (Thanks to Al Sargis for
forwarding this information.)
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[2] (Note added Dec. 27, 2003)
Ironically, the growth in autonomy of domestic firms
(which have been transformed from state-run enterprises to merely
state-owned or privatized enterprises) simultaneously takes away the
central and provincial government's powers to guarantee employment to
millions of Chinese workers but also makes these governments more
vulnerable to the decisions of newly autonomous managers in these
enterprises precisely because it is now the managers who control the
allocation of employment (and other inputs). As firm managers (and boards
of directors) gain greater control over the number of employed and
unemployed in Chinese society, they also gain greater influence over the
public authorities who must learn to respond to the concerns of these
managers or face the prospect of social instability (or greater social
instability) when firms increase layoffs or refuse to invest. At the
extreme, capitalist managers and directors can threaten capital
strikes, refusing to invest and forcing a sharp fall in aggregate
demand, if the government authorities do not satisfy their demands. See He
Qinglian's 1998 text Xiandaihua de Xianjing (The Trap of
Modernization) published in Jinri Zhongguo Chubanshe for a
discussion of the impact of granting firms more autonomy over investments
and hiring practices (rising unemployment and poverty, increased
inequality, etc.).
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Copyright © 2002-2003 Satya J. Gabriel, Mount Holyoke College. All
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