China and the world economy and world working class.

The past few years have seen the emergence of the giant Chinese economy. This is affecting every part of the world. Over the same period there has been the strengthening of the Chinese working class as tens of millions have moved into the cities and the factories. Part of this has been the transformation of relations between male and female workers as female workers are increasingly moving into the factories and at the end of the week have wages of their own.

People such as ourselves who run this blog have always believed that if we are to work correctly and be able to help build a socialist movement then we have to have a perspective for economic events. What we mean by this is that economic events affect working class consciousness and its willingness or unwillingness to take up the struggle to change society. Of course there are other elements involved. The existence or non existence of mass workers parties are also big factors in this equation.

In China at present, with the development of that giant economy, we see the biggest transformation in the class composition in any society in history. Hundreds of millions of people are in the process of moving from the countryside and the peasantry to the cities and the working class. This not only means a physical movement but also a change in consciousness. What it also means, and this would be hard to exaggerate, is that a new working class, the largest in the world, is coming into existence in China. As Marx said, the capitalists create their own gravedigger. Not only that. But it is not excluded that the Chinese working class will become the leadership of the world working class in the period ahead, that the epicenter of the world working class will move to China.

This process is already under way. The question is how far will it go? This partly depends on the economic developments on a world scale. The crisis of 2008/2009 has been temporarily ridden out by the hand over of trillions of dollars from the US taxpayers and the tax payers of other countries to the capitalists. However the crisis is only ridden out for the moment but it is not resolved. It is most likely that the second shoe will fall soon. There is still the over capacity in production, there is still the massive financial speculation and indebtedness and swindling, this crisis of over production and financial swindling still lies ahead to be dealt with. This will most likely lead to a new world recession or slump or depression. This cannot but have an affect on China with its exports going to every area of the world.

A factor in how the coming world downturn will affect China will be how deep this world recession/slump/depression will actually be. If it is like that of 2008/2009 then it is likely that China can ride it out with another half or one trillion dollar stimulus. It has the reserves. But if, as is possible, the rest of the world economy goes into a deep slump or depression then this would severely test the Chinese economy's ability to itself avoid a deep slump or depression. In this situation it is most likely that this new working class of hundreds of millions would move to protect itself and to put its imprint on the situation in a defensive struggle. We would be likely to see the first real mass movement of the Chinese working class in this new modern China and with this the building of new mass workers organizations such as trade unions. This would be a great step forward not only for the Chinese working class but for the world working class.

If the world economy manages to avoid a recession/deep slump/depression for a period and this in turn allows the Chinese economy to continue to grow and with this the present labor shortage there to continue, then we can still see a serious movement of the working class there. In this case it would be an offensive movement of the working class moving to demand its share of the growth and wealth. Out of such a struggle new trade union organizations would also likely be built. This also would be a big step forward for the chinese and world working class.

A recent article in the New York Times gave some interesting information in relation to this. There is presently an acute labor shortage in China, especially in the coastal regions. Factory wages have risen by up to 20% in the past months. This labor shortage is giving increasing confidence to workers in general and putting upward pressure on wages across the board. In some cities minimum wage is being exceeded by up to 20 and 25 per cent.

Part of the labor shortage is the increase of youth into post secondary education from 2.2 million in 2,000 to 6.4 million last year. Part of the reason is that many workers who returned home for the Chinese New Year did not return to the cities. But another is the half a trillion dollar government stimulus program which has created many new jobs in the interior. A government survey of 2 ,749 villages in 17 provinces found that in 74% of them not a single worker could be found who was fit to work.

It looks like whichever way the Chinese economy develops, either a serious downturn or continued fast growth as at present, the hundreds of millions of new workers who have joined the working class in the last decades are liable to be pushed into struggle. A dramatic escalation in class struggle and class division is likely. In such a situation the ideas of socialism as an alternative to capitalism would once again begin to come on the mass agenda. Activists like the organizers of this blog would begin to get a wider echo. And the socialist traditions and history of the Chinese working class would once again begin to get a base.

This is certainly something to look forward to. Our brothers and sisters of the giant Chinese working class taking on world capitalism.

Sean