The Cold War
After WWII, the world was divided into two competing camps, the eastern bloc, and the western bloc. The USSR led the eastern bloc, and the USA led the western bloc. The two blocs had two different economic systems: state ownership in the East and private ownership in the West.
The two blocs were competing in dominating the world, and that’s Cold War. They engaged in proxy wars and regime changes. The Cold War game was that each bloc aimed to enlarge its bloc at the expense of the opposite bloc. If the East bloc wins, the whole world will comprise countries with a planned economy with state ownership. If the West bloc wins, then the whole world will comprise countries with a market economy with private ownership.
Substructure and Superstructure
Marx analyzed society as two parts: the substructure and the superstructure. The substructure is also called the economic base. The economic base comprises the production force and production relations. The superstructure comprises law, culture, institutions of the state government, etc.
Marx concluded that the production force is the fundamental force to propel the progress of human society. Production force determines the substructure, and the substructure determines the superstructure.
Why did the cold war end with the collapse of the USSR? The cold war is a competition between USSR and the US. The rule of the game is to compete about who can dominate the world. There were many proxy wars between USSR and the US in Africa and Latino America. USSR tried to create more socialist countries with a state-ownership economy. The US tried to have as many countries as possible submit to its hegemony.
USSR failed for a scientific reason. State ownership is production relations. The production relations are not quite suitable for the production force yet, especially in Africa and Latino America, where the level of the production force is low. Even in USSR, the level of production force is not high enough that we can characterize the society as a scarcity society. As USSR had the dilemma about guns or better: spend more on the military or on improving living standards? In short, turning every country into a socialist country is not possible at the level of production force in the last century.
Another reason for the failure of the USSR is the superstructure. Even though the substructure determines the superstructure, the superstructure changes slowly and lags behind the change of the substructure. USSR already established the socialist substructure, but the culture of five thousand years of private ownership did not die. As a result, the cadres’ children may easily become cadres again, forming a privileged class in a supposedly no-class society.
Mao observed the problem that cadres in USSR were forming a new privileged ruling class. Mao didn’t want China to follow the path of the USSR. So Mao launched the Great Proleteriot Culture Revolution. The Culture Revolution was aimed at the communist party itself to prevent the formation of a privileged ruling class.
Even though the substructure determines the superstructure, the superstructure can act on the substructure and prevent the change of the substructure. This is the revolution theory: when technology advances, the production forces want to establish a new substructure, and the superstructure will resist the change. When the conflict between the need for a new system and the resistance of the superstructure intensifies to a magnitude, a revolution breaks out to change the superstructure. But a revolution usually only changes the institution part of the superstructure; the culture may not change accordingly.
This revolution theory is for humans in itself. Mao made a key historical contribution to human progress. His Culture Revolution is to prepare a Human for itself. Mao made communism spiritual. He advanced the culture, part of the superstructure, ahead of the production force. This is impossible when people are in themselves. It is scientifically feasible when the communist party is in power to prepare people for themselves.
The Culture Revolution is a revolution to change the five thousand years of the culture of private ownership and also a revolution within the ruling class itself. The communist party is in power, and the communist party launched a revolution, asking the mass to rebel against the party’s authority. This is the first time the superstructure did not wait for the production force to push the change. It is the cultural transition by humans deliberately. This is the Human for itself. Cultural Revolution emphasizes a lot about the awareness of the proletariats and communist culture.
In summary, USSR fell apart because 1) the level of production force in the world as a whole is not advanced enough to scale the USSR system to the whole world; 2) the USSR culture as the superstructure had not changed accordingly to fit the substructure of the USSR.
USSR fell because the people were in themselves, and the superstructure resisted the change of the substructure. China avoided the collapse with the USSR because people are for themselves as Mao reshaped the culture, a part of the superstructure, ahead of the production force. The effect of the Culture Revolution persists till today the color revolutions fueled by the US swiped the world but failed in China. Ten years of the Culture Revolution is more extensive in scale and longer in time than all the color revolutions added together.
The New Cold War
Let’s put aside the question of whether there is a new cold war. Instead, we want to assess who will dominate the new world order: the US or China. Or even domination is not a proper word for this question. Instead, we would say who will win in the competition between the US and China in international politics.
First, China has no intention to replicate its system in other countries. This is different from the USSR in the cold war. If USSR could not make other countries adapt its system, nor can China. All China does is advance the production force, domestically and internationally. According to Marx, the advancement of the production force is the determining factor of human progress. Therefore, according to historical materialism, it is futile to impose a superstructure on a country where the level of the production force is low, and the people are in themselves.
China is weaker than the US by all physical measures, military power, technological advancement, and capital accumulation. The US is maintaining its hegemony world order in which the world economy is divided into the North, the developed countries, and the South, the developing countries. In such a world order, the surplus value of the world economy is flowing from the South into the North, the exploitation of the world order. China also contributes the surplus value to the North in this world order. Yet, by the proletariat power and the people for itself, China managed to retain a portion of the surplus value for its development. This is a win-win for China and Wall Street. As we see in the last few decades, whatever China buys from the global market, the price is high; whatever China sells to the global market, the price is low. China developed not by imperialist war, not by colonization, not by the slave trade, not by the opium trade. China rising is a new industrialization path different from all previous industrialized powers.
In this epoch of competition, China is focused on creating wealth in the global economy by advancing production power. In contrast, the US is focused on the distribution of wealth around the globe. China is occupied with economic development while the US is occupied with making the rules, interpreting the rules, enforcing rules, breaking the rules, and revising the rules. China is developing the world substructure under the superstructure of the world framed by the US. China changes the world’s substructure, while the US changes the world’s superstructure. Today, especially under Trump, whatever the US changes the superstructure of the world, it cannot fit the substructure. That’s why the foreign policies of the US have failed one by one.
The US is to maintain the hegemony superstructure of the world that resists the progress of the production force. China is advancing the production force wherever possible. China is working on the physical level, the production base in the world order, while the US is working on the organizational level, the superstructure of the world hegemony order. China advances the production force of the world while the US is resisting the advancement. China is on the side of peaceful development while the US engages in perpetual wars. China is on the progressive side of history, while the US is on the reactionary side of progress.
China is acting according to the science of Marxism, following the trajectory of the historical trend, while the US is countering the historical trend. Therefore, the historical trend is with China, and China will prevail.
USSR fell apart in the cold war, and the US will fall apart if it initiates a new cold war against China. The Washington think tanks think the US can repeat the Cold War drama to crash China, and they are making a big strategic mistake.