China

I’m specifically talking about that American-style free market libertarianism (as opposed to say, libertarian socialism or even neoliberalism to an extent). It’s the ideology that says “the government shouldn’t be in the business of doing ______”. This notion that the most successful (hypothetical) economies are those that remove all regulations and restrictions, let business owners do their thing, keep taxes to a minimum, and keep the government limited to only the most basic functions like police, military, courts, and very limited infrastructure (so like, just roads and maybe rails and power lines, but the private sector should run the trains and power companies).

What China has done with its economy over the last 40 years clearly disproves these libertarian hopes and dreams that the free market is best and any state intervention is doomed to failure. This thought occurred to me when a libertarian family member asked why I wasn’t a libertarian, and because I didn’t want to really get into it with this person, I just let out “because China exists!” with a generous helping of derision. This person’s response was “well… but they’re aUtHoRiTaRiAn”, and clearly didn’t want to engage any more with me on it, and I was happy to oblige.

But I’ve been thinking about the implications of what I said since then. Looking objectively at what China has accomplished, it is inarguable that this could only be accomplished with heavy intervention by the state. Of course myself and everyone here knows that’s thanks to socialism, but even if you’re someone who thinks China is merely “state capitalist”… it strains credulity to think China could accomplish all it has and be on the trajectory it is now if it embraced free market libertarian capitalism and let “the market” decide all outcomes at every level.

I know it’s not just China, but the entire history of capitalism shows it’s needed heavy state intervention to keep things running. But highlighting China is I think useful just because it’s such a stark example that people can see with their own eyes right now. I especially enjoy how you can contrast present day China (the success of socialism) with Milei’s Argentina (the failure of libertarian economics).