The Revolutionary Socialist Network, Workers
No united movements - self interest checks
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No united movements - self interest checksGao 06 (Gao is a Chinese-Australian professor of Chinese studies, who is also the director of Confucius Institute in the University of Adelaide, 11/8/2006, Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, “China and capitalism: If market capitalism is good for the West, Why is capitalism with Chinese characteristics bad?: Critical Asian Studies: Vol 37, No 3 (tandfonline.com), DOA July4 2022” - EM We really need to problematize the assumption that there is such a thing as the international proletariat class. The trouble with the traditional style of the socialist movement today is that for most working-class people, “holistically” speaking, they only care about now and me, because to them, “in the long run we will all be dead.” Workers all over the world have never united and will probably never do so. Colonial historical evidence shows that in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, workers and laborers were among the fiercest opponents of poor Chinese migrants. Take the example of Australia during the nineteenth century. It was workers and trade union activists who opposed Chinese settlers on the grounds that the Chinese coolies’ willingness to work for lower wages was an obstacle to the creation of an equal society. This ideology fits well with the then prevalent social Darwinism and the Yellow Peril paranoia. Thus the first act of the Australian federation in 1901, the first nation-building act of the first parliament, was an immigration exclusion act against the colored races. This act, in the name of democracy and equality (everyone is equal but some are more equal than others) pushed forward the White Australian policy that remained in full force until the 1960s. To avoid any misunderstanding, let me state categorically that I have no problems with Hart-Landsberg and Burkett’s criticisms of China’s development and growth model. My concern is that we may be barking up the wrong tree. China’s development and growth model has to be examined within the international context of the Western dominance of material wealth and lifestyle. For one and a half centuries, the Chinese have been seeking the secret of making China as wealthy as a Western country and of living the lifestyle of a Westerner. They tried Gao / China Roundtable 471 democracies (though only briefly), and they tried what they understood to be socialism (for thirty years). Download 2.09 Mb. Share with your friends:
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