By LU XINYU*

Although socialism originated in Europe, “Chinese-style modernization” represents its successful implementation in China, exploring ways to break free from the shackles of capitalist globalization.

In Western ideology, China is no longer seen as a socialist country, although some traces of its revolutionary legacy remain. According to this view, China's goal of modernization has replaced that of revolution, which in turn has played an important role in stabilizing the global capitalist system. In other words, China's integration into world capitalism has helped to consolidate the process of capitalist globalization.

Consequently, modernization and revolution, as well as globalization and revolution, are presented as dichotomies similar to those between democracy and authoritarianism, freedom and autocracy, and state and society. These dichotomies can be seen as an extension of Cold War ideology into the politics of the 1990s, subtly incorporated into theories of “globalization” and “modernity.”

Today, the world remains trapped in dichotomous thinking, which underpins the intellectual and ideological continuity of the so-called “New Cold War” and, to a large extent, also serves as a boundary between the global North and South. This thinking, however, does a disservice to understanding the development path followed by China toward socialist modernization and national sovereignty since the formation of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949.

Looking back at the 20th century, the fragility of the Soviet Union’s agricultural model was one of the main causes of the structural crisis experienced by Soviet socialism. Conversely, the agribusiness system developed in the United States played a key role in the country’s victory in the Cold War. After World War II, the United States gradually achieved global hegemony, and one of the means used to consolidate it was to transform food into a geopolitical weapon. This strategy systematically dismantled the peasant economies of the Global South and exacerbated the polarization of the world economy.

From 1929 onwards, with the onset of the Great Depression in the United States, there was a sharp drop in global food prices. The Soviet Union was then at a crucial stage of industrialization, relying heavily on agricultural exports, so much so that it had to pay twice the planned amounts of raw materials and agricultural products to purchase machinery.

To make matters worse, agricultural production as a whole was also in decline. Economist Yevgeny Preobrazhensky had argued in The New Economics (1926) that industrialization would come at the cost of a relentless phase of socialist primitive accumulation (original expropriation), the most challenging period for a developing socialist country, involving the expropriation of the peasantry.

Some, like Nikolai Bukharin, advocated a more gradual approach. Still, as an underdeveloped country confronted by powerful enemies in the West, the Soviet Union had no choice—and on this all analysts agreed—but to expropriate the peasantry to some extent in the process of industrialization, leading to inevitable and violent conflicts between the peasantry and the state.

In his 1929 speech, The Year of the Great Turnaround[i] Joseph Stalin explained that no industrialization would be possible without the development of heavy industry. The history of industrially backward countries indicated that without substantial long-term loans they would not be able to advance in their development: “It is precisely for this reason that the capitalists of all countries refuse us loans and credits, assuming that we shall not be able to cope with the problem of accumulation through our own efforts; that we shall be shipwrecked in the task of rebuilding our heavy industry and shall be obliged to go to them, hat in hand, subjecting ourselves to slavery.”[1] The solution was to develop in the same way as capitalism had originally developed—through a kind of “primitive accumulation,” by appropriating the agricultural surplus of the peasantry. But in the case of capitalism, this “original expropriation,” as Karl Marx called it, had occurred over a longer period of time, and was facilitated by a system of global plunder via colonialism.

The Soviet Union adopted high rates of capital accumulation while keeping consumption levels low and focused on developing heavy industry in its industrialization process. As a result, it quickly established an industrial system dominated by the defense industry. This agricultural country dependent on foreign capital successfully transformed itself into a major industrial power.[2] During World War I, industrially backward Tsarist Russia was defeated by an industrialized Prussian Germany. During World War II, the Soviet Union won a crushing victory over fascism, albeit at the cost of twenty million Soviet lives. This victory was directly associated with the pre-war strategy of developing the heavy and military industries at all costs.

However, the development of industry at the expense of agriculture came at a price. After succeeding Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev carried out a series of agricultural reforms, decentralizing political power and economic interests. But just as Khrushchev was implementing these reforms, the Soviet Union faced another grain shortage in 1963. The shortage was so severe that the country had to reinstate the ration card that had been abolished after the war. During Khrushchev’s ten years in power, the grain received by collective farm members decreased as their remuneration fell year by year. Farm income fell short of the cost of inputs and rising prices, while the amount of grain requisitioned by the state continued to rise. Agricultural conditions were deteriorating. By 1963, collective farms were receiving less than half the remuneration in grain compared to what they had received before the war, leading to the failure of the agrarian reform.[3]

By the time Leonid Brezhnev came to power, the Soviet Union's agricultural problems had become much worse. To address the shortages, Brezhnev extensively reformed the New Economic System, increasing farm autonomy, raising grain purchasing prices, and improving the collective contract system. In addition, the state also substantially increased investment and financial subsidies to agriculture. However, the value of agricultural output in the Soviet Union fell sharply, causing a serious chain reaction in the national economy. The continued decline in grain production forced the country to become dependent on imports.

In 1972, the Soviet Union spent 860 tons of its gold reserves on importing 28 million tons of grain from the world market, 18 million tons of which came from the United States. This helped the United States resolve its prolonged crisis of surplus food after World War II, giving a strong boost to American agriculture and creating a series of contradictions.[4] In 1973, the Soviet Union became a net importer of grain for the first time. Before large-scale industrialization, Russia was already a major exporter of this agricultural product.

From 1981 to 1982, world markets were once again shocked by the massive purchase of wheat by the Soviet Union. Grain became the second largest import item in Soviet foreign trade (after machinery and equipment), leading to exchange rate restrictions. The shortage of foreign exchange did not provide the necessary support for the development of other sectors of the economy, thus limiting the restructuring of the economy as a whole. Since raw materials for both light industry and the food industry come from agriculture, the agricultural crisis prevented the expansion of industrial production. The lack of supply of manufactured goods on the market made it difficult to improve the living conditions of the population. Since consumer demand could not be met, savings increased. The mismatch between savings rates and retail turnover foreshadowed the subsequent inflation[5].

Under the strict containment policy implemented by the United States, combined with the needs imposed by the arms race, the economic model of the Soviet Union was configured to prioritize heavy and military industries, to the detriment of agriculture and light industry. Economic reforms, from Khrushchev to Mikhail Gorbachev, failed to solve the problem of stagnation in agricultural development and revive the economy. Consequently, the problems of the agricultural sector were largely responsible for the economic stagnation of those years, contributing to the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

China has faced many of the same problems as the Soviet Union, but has followed a different path, reflecting its entire history. A distinct dynamic between agriculture and industry has been instrumental in China-style modernization.

Revisiting the Worker-Peasant Alliance and Chinese-Style Modernization

Behind the frequent criticism that China is an authoritarian state lies a fundamental question: could agrarian societies, burdened by the pressures of imperialism and colonialism, achieve industrialization through a socialist path? This question, in fact, constituted the most significant ideological struggle and theoretical debate in the early days of the Communist International.

How rural issues are addressed has become a central factor in determining the trajectory of industrialization and modernization in the Third World—with land reform emerging as the defining factor. Among China’s economic reforms since 1978, land reform stands out as the most complex, bringing about profound transformations in both urban and rural areas. Land reform is currently ongoing and will ultimately shape China’s future trajectory.

For late-developing countries, it is essential to carefully balance the relationship between industrialization and agriculture. One of the most significant lessons learned from the Russian and Chinese revolutions is the importance of a “worker-peasant alliance” as the basis for a successful socialist path. This understanding comes from hard-won historical lessons that demonstrated that any deviation from the worker-peasant alliance resulted in political and social crises.

China, in particular, has been continually compelled to find new ways to navigate these challenges. In recent decades, its development strategy has oscillated between left-wing and right-wing approaches, with the “worker-peasant alliance” at the heart of this oscillation.

The so-called “Chinese-style modernization” has its origins in the 1950s, and was initially formulated during the first session of the First National People’s Congress in 1, when a modernization based on the worker-peasant alliance was proposed. At that session, the first constitution of socialist China was ratified, declaring the PRC to be a people’s democratic state led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant alliance. At the same time, in the Government Work Report, Premier Zhou Enlai indicated four areas that should be prioritized, aiming at “modernizing industry, agriculture, transportation and national defense.”

In the following decades, building on the foundation laid in the 1950s under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the idea of ​​Chinese-style modernization would develop further. The first session of the Third National People’s Congress[ii] held in late 3 formally introduced the goal of the “Four Modernizations” to transform China into a socialist power with modernized agriculture, industry, national defense, and science and technology. This perspective was reiterated in the Government Work Report delivered at the Fourth Session of the Fourth National People’s Congress in 1964, which also introduced a two-stage approach: establishing a relatively comprehensive and independent economic and industrial system by 4, and achieving the “Four Modernizations” by the end of the 1975th century.

In 1978, the Third Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) shifted its focus to addressing the structural imbalances in the economy. At this pivotal plenum, the decision was made to initiate rural reform by implementing the Household Responsibility System, redistributing land to households, introducing independent accounting and profit and loss accountability—the starting point of China’s economic reform. This is widely believed to have unleashed the vitality of economic production in rural areas, indicating that China’s industrialization process had moved beyond the wartime economic model and no longer relied on agricultural expropriation. China subsequently adopted an export-oriented industrialization strategy that facilitated its rapid economic growth.

Central to these changes was the Household Responsibility System, established during the economic reforms of the 1980s. This system granted rural households the right to contract and operate land without dissolving their collective ownership, emphasizing that the land belonged collectively to the village. If someone left the village or abandoned the collective, their right to operate the land would be returned to the collective and redistributed among village members based on demographic changes. Within this framework, the village collective could autonomously determine the scale and mode of land cultivation to achieve maximum efficiency.

The introduction of the Household Responsibility System can be seen as a form of transformation involving 700 million rural inhabitants—equivalent to 70% of the population—who moved from collective to family production. This rapidly increased grain production and generated benefits for both rural and urban sectors.

Yet it is important to note that the reforms were only possible, and indeed carried out, because of the achievements of Mao-era agricultural modernization. For example, after US President Richard Nixon visited China in 1972, China seized the opportunity to import four types of chemical fibers and thirteen sets of fertilizer-making equipment. The move to synthetic textiles instead of traditional cotton textiles allowed more land to be devoted to cereal cultivation. At the same time, the widespread use of fertilizers rapidly increased grain production.

The transition to “oil agriculture” was supported by the great progress of the oil industry during the Mao era in the 1960s, including the development of the Daqing oilfield, which helped ensure self-sufficiency and a surplus of oil. In addition, superior crop varieties—such as Yuan Longping’s 1975 hybrid rice, initially developed during the Mao era—significantly increased yields per hectare. As a result, the long-standing tension between limited arable land and a large population in China was considerably alleviated, helping to overcome challenges related to food and clothing. Furthermore, this marked a successful shift away from “socialist primitive accumulation” of capital in China, leaving behind the era of agricultural extraction known as “price scissors”—which followed the economic crisis caused by the growing mismatch between industrial and agricultural prices and triggered by the Soviet New Economic Policy in the 1920s.[6]

However, it is important not to underestimate the damaging implications of these reforms. The Household Responsibility System and export-oriented industrialization led to the decoupling of agriculture from industrial development. Furthermore, the withdrawal of state support for the agricultural sector resulted in a rapid urban-rural divide and an imbalance in east-west regional development. While coastal cities prospered, the rural economy deteriorated, leading to social disintegration. China’s agricultural modernization suffered a prolonged stagnation and even setbacks, causing a crisis in the peasant economy after a brief resurgence. In 1984, despite bumper harvests, China faced difficulties in selling the grain produced by family farmers, marking the decline of food self-sufficiency, rural desolation, the abandonment of farmland, and a huge wave of rural-to-urban migration.

After the economic reforms, the CPC’s understanding of the relationship between industry and agriculture has undergone continuous changes, as evidenced by the adjustments in national policies. The CPC Central Committee issued a series of No. 1 Central Documents (中央一号文件; Zhōngyāng Yī Hào Wénjiàn) focusing on agriculture, rural areas, and farmers for five consecutive years from 1982 to 1986. During this period, as the fifteen-year land contracting program was implemented, the former state-run unified purchase and sale system (统购统销; tǒnggòu tǒngxiāo) of grain and other important agricultural products, in place for three decades, was abolished. This marked the end of the Mao-era practice of extracting agricultural surpluses to drive industrialization and promote an economic structure oriented toward heavy industry. At the time, the peasant motto was: “Give enough to the country, reserve enough for the collective, and the rest is all ours.”

Another crucial change during this period was China’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, which involved substantial concessions in agricultural trade and had far-reaching consequences that are still felt today. The resulting trade dynamics eventually led to widespread bankruptcy of small farmers, triggering severe social and ecological crises. The urban-rural divide exacerbated regional disparities between eastern and western provinces, and also brought ecological and environmental challenges. It became clear that the crises China was facing could not be effectively resolved through Western development theories alone.

Precisely for this reason, in 2003, under the leadership of Hu Jintao, the CCP introduced the “Scientific Outlook on Development” (科学发展观; The Great Wall of China), [in the document] entitled “Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning the Perfection of the Socialist Market Economy System.” This concept emphasizes the needs for “coordinated urban-rural development; coordinated regional development; coordinated economic and social development; harmonious and coordinated development between humanity and nature; and coordinated domestic development and opening up to the outside world.” In addition, in 2007, the CPC officially incorporated the “Scientific Outlook on Development” into the Party Constitution.

In 2004, the formulation of the “Three Rural Issues”—concerning agriculture, rural areas, and farmers—was the focus of China’s “No. 1 Central Political Document,” setting out major tasks for the country. Indeed, for twenty consecutive years, work related to agriculture and rural areas has been China’s top policy priority. Each No. 1 Central Document, published annually, covers a wide range of measures, including increasing farmers’ income, strengthening rural infrastructure and water conservation, as well as systematically increasing total investment in rural areas, among others.

In 2005, a major milestone was reached when the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress passed the document abolishing the Agricultural Tax Regulations, alleviating the economic burdens of farmers and dramatically improving the social welfare of rural residents. The abolition of the agricultural tax, which had lasted for thousands of years, marked a pivotal moment in China’s history, ending the long-standing tax burden that had weighed heavily on the country’s 900 million family farmers.[iii] However, these efforts have not completely reversed the crisis. Rural areas, where the food self-sufficiency rate continues to decline, are often desolate, with land being abandoned and the flow of migrant workers increasing, requiring China to identify the most suitable development path among various alternatives.

In 2017, the 19th CPC National Congress reaffirmed the Tasks of a New Era (新时代; Xīn Shídài) launched in 2012, focusing on the most pressing issues of “unbalanced and insufficient development.”[iv] The Rural Revitalization Strategy and the Regional Coordinated Development Strategy were elevated to the status of national strategies. National-level efforts for “targeted poverty alleviation” in rural areas resulted in the successful eradication of extreme poverty in the country by 2022. However, this historic achievement was only a starting point for the next phase of rural development. In 2022, the concept of “Chinese-style modernization”—which aims to revitalize rural areas and reduce regional development disparities—was introduced by the CPC amidst a backdrop of increasing international pressure, with both development risks and opportunities present, and an increasing degree of unpredictability. This modernization path aims to establish a “dual circulation” development pattern, led by the domestic economic cycle, with the international economic cycle playing a complementary role. In May 2020, dual circulation was announced by the Chinese government as a strategy to stimulate domestic demand and innovation, as well as promote greater independence in terms of technology and resources, while remaining open to foreign investment and international trade.

Whether or not China can resolve the agricultural issues that have persisted since the 1980s and reverse the deterioration of agricultural production becomes a decisive factor in its strategic goal of bridging the urban-rural divide and achieving “common prosperity.” How China now addresses the agrarian issue plays a crucial role in countering the New Cold War containment efforts initiated by the United States and protecting China’s national sovereignty. In this sense, Chinese-style modernization presents itself as a possible alternative development path to the Western capitalist model, especially important for countries in the Global South seeking to free themselves from the shackles of colonialism and imperialism.

The importance attached to internal circulation in China implies the need to rebuild the reciprocity of the relationship between industry and agriculture, and establish a favorable mobility structure between rural and urban areas. The worker-peasant alliance faced great challenges in the 1990s, when the reform of state-owned enterprises led to the unemployment of millions of workers, while hundreds of millions of farmers flocked to the cities in search of jobs. Today, to restore a robust worker-peasant alliance, it is essential to rebuild the unique political, economic and cultural foundations of rural areas.

The rural revolution led by Mao succeeded in incorporating the CCP into the peasant majority through the “mass line” approach. This integrated the disintegrating rural society, transforming the countryside into an inexhaustible source of revolutionary strength. Mao’s rural revolution fulfilled the historic tasks of resisting imperialist aggression from abroad and consolidating national power internally. After 1949, socialist China incorporated the worker-peasant alliance into its constitution and greatly accelerated industrialization through the newly established urban-rural relations. These relations compelled the absorption of agricultural surpluses to sustain industrialization, while providing assistance to agriculture, farmers, and rural areas through top-down state initiatives. For example, sending medical services to rural areas and mobilizing educated young people to the countryside were aimed at reducing the “three great disparities” in socialist China—the disparities between manual and mental labor, between industry and agriculture, and between workers and peasants.

However, the economic reforms that followed in the 1980s dramatically widened these disparities. Resources quickly concentrated in urban areas, intensifying the urban-rural divide and threatening the viability of the worker-peasant alliance, which was in danger of becoming mere rhetoric. In the 1980s, rural society gradually disintegrated, and the state’s inability to reach out to rural areas reappeared. During the Mao era, despite the existence of “price scissors” and the irrational disparity between industrial and agricultural products, emotional and material ties between urban and rural areas persisted. Sun Liping called this the “dual structure under administrative leadership,” referring to the Mao era. [7] Today, a rupture between urban and rural areas has emerged as a result of the market economy, which Sun referred to as a “dual structure led by the market.” In his view, under market relations, the link between China’s urban and rural areas, as well as between agriculture and industry, has been broken—and this trend is likely to be irreversible. While the Mao era’s “dual structure under administrative leadership” aimed to eliminate the three disparities, this goal has been abandoned under the “market-led dual structure.”

To address critical rural problems, it is imperative to reshape the relationship of urban-rural alliance and reciprocity in the urbanization process. Since the 1980s, China’s rapid urbanization has been based on public ownership of urban land and collective ownership of rural land. First, it is the capitalization of public land by local governments that has significantly boosted urbanization, serving as the primary source of financing for public construction in urban areas. Second, the Household Responsibility System has not abolished collective ownership of rural land. Village land distribution is still adjusted on the basis of equality. per capita, which has provided a social safety net for rural residents. Migrant workers who lose their jobs in the cities can still return to the countryside and rely on their land for subsistence, thus avoiding the problems of widespread slumming commonly seen in the urbanization process of other developing countries. If land privatization were implemented, rural land would soon fall under the control of capital outside the villages, leaving migrant workers with nowhere to return to, leading to the rapid disintegration of rural society. Thus, for the proper functioning of the market economy in China, collective land ownership needs to be maintained, not abolished.

Collective ownership of rural land requires reassessment in light of its contribution to market-oriented development. In this system, rural areas serve as a vast labor pool for the urbanization process, with labor flowing between urban and rural areas as needed. In addition, the smallholder economy supports the largest population group—the farmers themselves—which allows China to avoid relying on the global food market to feed its 1,4 billion people. In China’s “socialist market economy,” collective ownership of rural land remains a fundamental “socialist” element. The challenge now is whether retaining this element can provide the conditions for China’s agricultural modernization beyond the global capitalist market economy.

Rural and urban issues are interconnected. Major Chinese cities such as Shanghai and Beijing have resident populations of over twenty million, exceeding the total population of many European countries. In 2017, Beijing saw controversial evictions involving “low-level people” (低端人口; dīduān rénkǒu), a highly discriminatory term that has sparked widespread criticism. After a fire broke out in a low-income area, the Beijing municipal government conducted a special operation to eliminate security risks, and many low-income migrant workers were expelled from the city. Solving security issues in areas with large migrant populations is not something that can be achieved through micromanagement alone. Coordination of urban-rural relations at the macro level is necessary; otherwise, urban problems will continue to emerge in different forms and will be difficult to resolve. The distinctiveness of China’s socialist path, compared with other countries in the Global South, lies in the collective ownership of land and the rural revitalization strategy built on it.

Neoliberal advocates in China are eager to promote the privatization of rural land for two main reasons: first, privatization facilitates rapid urban expansion and large-scale capitalization of land; second, it paves the way for capitalist agriculture. American-style capitalist agriculture is the desired (but not yet realized) goal of Chinese neoliberals, who envision the concentration of rural land in the hands of a few large landowners through privatization, turning rural residents into agricultural workers or migrants in urban centers. However, such neoliberal conceptions would ultimately harm agriculture and rural areas in China.

The Doha Development Round[v] demonstrated the reluctance of developed countries to abandon protectionist policies on their agriculture, which include high subsidies, various non-tariff barriers, and limits on market access. Even if China were to privatize its land, its agriculture would still struggle and eventually go bankrupt in its attempt to compete with developed capitalist nations. The only motivation for Chinese capital to buy rural land is the expectation of appreciation from urban expansion, not agricultural production. Thus, in a developing country like China, land privatization would not benefit agricultural modernization.

Measures taken since the 18th CPC National Congress, when Xi Jinping assumed leadership, have included attempts to reestablish the “mass line” approach and strengthen the worker-peasant alliance. This is evident in the Targeted Poverty Alleviation (精准扶贫; Jingzhuang Fupin), which sent three million CCP cadres to live and work in the countryside, as well as mobilizing thousands of private and state-owned companies, students and teachers, health professionals and other sectors of society to ensure that the remaining nearly 100 million people were lifted out of extreme poverty.

In addressing the problem of the urban-rural dichotomy, China has strived to eliminate the three major disparities that date back to the Mao era. In contemporary times, China deals with this challenge through the concept of “Urban-Rural Integrated Development” (城乡融合发展; Chéngxiāng Rónghé Fāzhǎn), seeking solutions that prevent urbanization from further widening the urban-rural gap and instead promote its convergence. The establishment of a new type of urban-rural relationship constitutes the basis for the search for these solutions, with the reorganization of rural areas playing a central role in this process.

The main concern of the contemporary collective rural economy is to cultivate endogenous vitality within it. The CCP’s Targeted Poverty Alleviation and Rural Revitalization programs represent two distinct strategic approaches in this regard. The former involves injecting resources into rural areas like a blood transfusion, enabling rural residents to overcome poverty. Rural Revitalization, on the other hand, seeks to foster endogenous economic growth in rural areas, making them self-sustainable or, in other words, capable of generating their own “blood.”

Food security, urban-rural relations and socialism with Chinese characteristics

In China, the export-oriented economy has led to industrial overproduction on the one hand and insufficient agricultural production on the other. In 2006, the country introduced the concept of the “1,8 Billion Red Line for Preservation” mu of Arable Land”, indicating the implementation of a rigorous protection system that ensures that the total area of ​​arable land in the country remains above 1,8 billion mu (120 million hectares). Today, China still faces this historic challenge, having less than 10% of the world’s arable land and one-fifth of the world’s population to feed. Whether or not this “red line” should be maintained is a controversial issue, with many Chinese liberals arguing that arable land should be made available for real estate and urbanization due to the growth of the urban population. They believe that the red line measure hinders industrialization, urbanization, and economic growth. Influenced by this thinking, China has reduced its arable land by more than 1 million hectares during the process of urbanization[5]. Contrary views point out that the annual volume of global grain trade is over 10 million tons, while China’s annual grain demand exceeds 8 million tons—indicating that the country cannot rely solely on the global grain market to meet its food needs. The reason why China has been able to keep food prices low despite high demand is due to the self-sufficiency of small farmers and the existence of non-market-oriented institutions (nonmarket institutions) such as the grain reserve system, which requires provinces to maintain a minimum stock of strategic commodities, and the Provincial Governor Accountability System for Food Security, created in 2015 to accurately assess each province's work in this area.

In many countries in the Global North and South, grain supplies depend on the global capitalist market, which means ceding global grain pricing power to Wall Street. After China joined the WTO in 2001, the country became a de facto dumping ground for genetically modified agricultural products from the United States. A prime example is the transformation of the soybean market in China. Before joining the WTO, China was a net exporter of soybeans. However, in 2004, the country faced a severe shortage of soybeans, with the closure of many crushing plants that produced soybean meal and oil, dealing a severe blow to the domestic industry. Transnational agribusiness giants such as ADM, Bunge, Cargill and Louis Dreyfus began exporting genetically modified soybeans to China, disrupting the domestic supply chain. The influx of foreign capital has caused China to lose control over soybean prices, making it highly dependent on the world market for domestic supplies and making soybeans the most vulnerable component of China’s food security. Over the past decade, China’s self-sufficiency rate in soybeans has remained around 15 percent, with imports accounting for over 60 percent of global soybean exports.

China’s soybean situation is not, in fact, an isolated case. Since the 1990s, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, developing countries have been progressively opening their agricultural markets, subject to various coercive measures imposed by the United States. This has led to widespread bankruptcy and famine among peasant populations in these countries. Meanwhile, in developed nations, capitalist megafarms geared towards foreign markets have been exporting food on a large scale and reaping substantial profits. The capitalist reorientation of agriculture in the developing world has undermined the well-being of local populations.

Since the start of the Sino-US trade war in 2019, Brazil has replaced the United States as China’s main supplier of soybeans, benefiting big agribusiness at the expense of peasant producers. China’s agricultural trade with countries in the Global South such as Brazil has drawn criticism from the left, including from João Pedro Stédile, national leader of the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST), who expressed bewilderment and dissatisfaction with the intense soybean trade between China and Brazil. According to Stédile, soybean producers in Brazil are essentially large landowners who often reside in Miami. These large landowners monopolize land, public financing, and technical assistance for agro-export production. While these capitalist farms and agribusiness in Brazil profit enormously from trade with China, they fail to benefit the Brazilian people. In the pursuit of profits, large tracts of arable land for food cultivation, including lands of indigenous peoples, are converted to soybean cultivation, pushing the Brazilian people towards hunger due to monoculture, and generating the paradoxical need to import food despite the abundance of productive land. In fact, during the years of Jair Bolsonaro's presidency, backed by agribusiness interests, thirty million Brazilians have once again gone hungry in one of the world's largest agricultural producers. These issues stem from an unjust land tenure system that excludes the majority of small farmers and landless farmers in developing countries from the modernized agricultural system. As a result, large-scale urban slums and the recurrence of peasant resistance movements have emerged in these countries, such as the MST and the farmers' protests in India in 2020.

Since the turn of the century, global agribusiness has tightened its grip on the global food supply chain, controlling 80% of the volume of grain traded. These corporations exert influence over the grain markets of major producing countries such as the United States, Brazil and Argentina, and dominate the global grain transportation and storage infrastructure. They have also expanded their reach into several segments of China’s food market, posing a threat to the country’s food sovereignty and security.

Since 2012, China has been actively working to address the issue of multinational corporations’ control over seed supplies. Xi Jinping has elevated seed security to a strategic priority, closely linked to national security. In addition, Xi has placed particular emphasis on soybeans, expressing a desire to accelerate additional biotechnology research projects aimed at genetically improving soybeans.[9] This effort aims to establish China’s independent research capacity and control over soybeans, a crucial agricultural commodity, and thus prevent other nations from manipulating China’s supply.

Chinese-style modernization can only be achieved by comprehensively resolving issues related to agriculture, rural areas, and farmers. The current Chinese leadership seems to have recognized this. In 2022, Xi's collection of writings entitled “The Chinese Revolution: A Comprehensive Approach to the Future” was published.On 'Three Rural' Work” (On the Three Rural Questions[vi]). This collection includes 61 articles and speeches written by him, since the 18th National Congress. Some texts explicitly portray the current period as a “historical moment to address the relationship between industry and agriculture, as well as the relationship between urban and rural areas”. The speech “Effectively Implementing the Rural Revitalization Strategy”, from 2018, provides a comprehensive discussion of these issues. Below are some excerpts from the text:

“In the process of modernization, how we manage the relationship between industry and agriculture, as well as the relationship between urban and rural areas, determines to a certain extent the success or failure of modernization. As a socialist country led by the Communist Party of China, our nation must have the ability and conditions to manage the relationship between industry and agriculture, as well as the relationship between urban and rural areas, in order to harmoniously advance the process of socialist modernization in our country.”

Since the 18th CPC National Congress, we have been dedicated to adjusting the relationship between industry and agriculture, as well as the relationship between urban and rural areas. We have adopted a series of measures to promote the principle of 'industry supports agriculture and cities support the countryside'. The 19th National Party Congress introduced the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy precisely to comprehensively understand and deal with the relationship between industry and agriculture, as well as the relationship between urban and rural areas, from a global and strategic perspective.

The coexistence of prosperous cities and struggling rural areas contradicts our Party’s governing purpose and does not conform to the essential requirements of socialism. Such a form of modernization is doomed to failure. Forty years ago, we embarked on the path of reform and opening up through rural reforms. Now, after four decades, we must revitalize the countryside, ushering in a new phase of integrated urban-rural development and modernization.”[40]

Reshaping the relationship between urban and rural areas, as well as the relationship between industry and agriculture, requires a deep reflection on the development patterns since the 1980s and the implementation of adjustments accordingly. This poses a new challenge for socialist China.

Collective land ownership in rural China differs from the land tenure systems in socialist countries such as the Soviet Union, which may have played a decisive role in the success of Chinese-style modernization. The nationalization of urban land and the collectivization of rural land form the basis of the Chinese worker-peasant alliance. From a Marxist perspective, the urban-rural dichotomy is considered an inevitable consequence of capitalist development and a challenge commonly faced by countries in the Global South during their development processes.

Collective land ownership in China, through the Household Responsibility System, essentially consists of communal ownership of rural land. However, the current collective land ownership system may be weakened by the tightening of land contract and management rights. These rights allow community members to use and profit from land through contracts, while limiting its use to agricultural production. Community members can transfer management rights, enabling large-scale agricultural operations and resolving the issue of idle land. However, a potential problem arises: the village collective no longer has priority in land management, leading to the inability of internal capital to effectively manage investment and control over the land. In this scenario, collective ownership would exist only on paper.

The current Chinese land tenure system is undergoing significant changes, and it is of fundamental importance to know whether collective land ownership in rural areas can be sustained and whether it is necessary to maintain this model. If collective land ownership becomes difficult to maintain, a considerable number of absentee landlords may emerge. This implies the need to establish a completely new rural entity that not only fulfills a politically vital role but also assumes a crucial economic function to contain the predatory expansion of foreign capital into rural areas.

There is a prevailing consensus that the [rural] family economy needs to undergo a process of reorganization. In this sense, the debate revolves around the methodology for this restructuring. First, there is the neoliberal solution, which advocates the transfer of land to major corporations or urban capital, aiming at large-scale, market-oriented agricultural operations as a way to achieve agricultural modernization. Although this perspective enjoys greater prominence among economists in the mainstream, it also faces criticism. Once operational land rights are transferred, recovering them becomes extremely difficult. Ultimately, villagers may find themselves becoming landless overnight, losing both their land and their jobs. The potential scale of this problem could pose significant political challenges to the legitimacy and stability of the CCP government, and is one of the politically sensitive consequences for which the Chinese socialist system may find itself ill-prepared.

Second, there is the socialist solution, which involves a return to the collective ownership model as a comprehensive solution to a range of issues. In this approach, grassroots party organizations will take a leading role, and collective land ownership will serve as the cornerstone of rural reorganization. The village collective will act as the entity responsible for implementing economies of scale, replacing individual farmers in this role. Operational rights will be confined to the village and allocated through bidding processes conducted by the collective itself. This approach does not exclude the market economy, but rather designates the village collective as its main participant. By strengthening the negotiation capabilities of the village collective, this model seeks to address agricultural challenges and unite small rural households to collectively confront market obstacles. The ultimate goal is to achieve an organic integration of economic efficiency and social equity, thus offering a promising socialist path for the development of rural China. In the process of creating a new synergy between grassroots party organizations and rural development in China, it is essential to combine institutional support. top to bottom and social practices upwards, in order to provide effective solutions. This approach relies on the CPC’s grassroots organizations to facilitate the reorganization of rural areas. China’s socialist system provides rural areas with organizational resources that go beyond the typical scope of a market economy—rural residents are relieved of related organizational costs, and the CPC’s grassroots organizations can assist them in harmonizing endogenous and exogenous developments.

Such transformations may attract criticism and be seen as a regression to an “ultra-leftist line” because they require strong and effective party leadership from the CCP. In fact, my conception of a “neo-collectivist rural China” as an emerging collective development model continues to evolve through diverse social practices in various regions of China. Each case is deeply rooted in the local political, economic, and cultural contexts, bringing unique and valuable insights. These practical examples have accumulated significant experiences that deserve systematic documentation and wide dissemination. What unifies these diverse cases is their ability to leverage the strengths of the collective economy to attract the voluntary participation of rural residents, thus rediscovering paths for the development of a socialist market economy in which rural residents use their collective power effectively to cope with market risks and strengthen their competitiveness. At the same time, they help combat rural social fragmentation and mitigate the potential deterioration of urban-rural relations. Through such efforts, the noble goal of achieving common prosperity can genuinely be realized. In fact, there are different experiments underway across the country to find development approaches suitable for socialist rural China.

How can urbanization be a driver of integrated development between urban and rural areas, rather than exacerbating the disparities between them? How can a mutually beneficial urban-rural relationship be cultivated? At present, China is actively promoting a dual-circulation development pattern, taking the domestic market as its main fulcrum while allowing the external and internal markets to reinforce each other. What new urban-rural dynamics will this innovative development model bring? As scholars, we should be patient and wait for the answers to these questions, or directly engage in practical efforts to answer them.

Conclusion – a view from the global South

The challenges, setbacks, and misfortunes experienced along the Chinese-style modernization journey are, in fact, a microcosm of the various crises faced in the modernization process of the Global South. The rise of China serves as an emblematic case of the emergence of the Global South, breaking away from a long-established and imposed unequal world order. China’s development trajectory is intrinsically intertwined with the history of the Russian and Chinese revolutions, with Leninism, and with the fate of the Soviet Union in the 20th century. This is a fundamental historical fact. The challenge lies in how to interpret it. In this regard, it is vitally important to address criticisms—especially those coming from Western Marxism about “populism” in the Chinese Revolution. At the same time, it is necessary to respond to criticisms and rejections of the Russian and Chinese revolutions coming from right-wing liberalism. These critiques and rejections, echoing the post-Cold War “end of history” narrative, attempt to pave the way for a new Cold War by challenging the legitimacy of Leninism and the Russian and Chinese revolutions. Western Marxism and right-wing liberalism, though representing fundamentally opposing political views, find common ground when discussing the agrarian issues of these revolutions. Both revive clichés about “Oriental despotism” and the “Asiatic mode of production,” jointly striving to obscure the meaning of Chinese-style modernization, that is, the exploratory search for a socialist path in world history.

This development represents the aspirations of the Global South to free itself from Western global hegemony, echoing the expectations that Samir Amin had for China in his later years. Amin saw a path of “decoupling”—independent and socialist-oriented—as the hope for the development of the Global South. He advocated the formation of a new united front to deal with and resist the deepening systemic crisis of capitalism, and believed that a united and powerful China should take a leading role in confronting this crisis, which would be decisive for global development. In a 2015 interview in Beijing, Amin again expounded the concept of “decoupling”:

“In my view, ‘decoupling’ should be considered a strategic principle encompassing several aspects. First, it strongly emphasizes the development of sovereign nations, placing it as a priority. Second, it advocates openness, calling on countries to engage with the rest of the world and participate in global competition. This can be understood as sovereign nations using globalization to meet their development needs, seizing growth opportunities, and gradually achieving social transformation. Thus, when we discuss ‘decoupling’, we are appropriating globalization. On the one hand, monopoly capitalism uses globalization to accumulate capital and expand its domination. On the other hand, we can also use it to meet national development needs as a priority. We should attach utmost importance to this internal growth-oriented transformation, which involves continuous and progressive changes.”[11]

Amin's vision, according to which sovereign nations harness globalization and successfully "decouple" themselves through internal transformation, closely resonates with China's development path. As early as 1997, in his book Capitalism in the Age of Globalization (Capitalism in the Age of Globalization), Amin expressed his hope for China and predicted changes in Sino-American relations. He initially described how the US-led process of capitalist globalization had resulted in a polarized world and left globalization in an extremely fragile and precarious state. At the same time, right-wing neoliberal policies (often supported by the so-called left) came to power in the United States and the European Union, obstructing all hope for “humanitarian” globalization. Therefore, like V. I. Lenin before and after World War I, Amin turned his focus to Asia and prophesied: “It hardly needs saying that the future development of China threatens all global balances. And that is why the United States will feel threatened by its development. In my opinion, the United States and China will be the main antagonists in any future world conflict.”[12]

In a 2018 interview, Amin repeatedly warned China that even if it sought to become a capitalist country, the triad of major capitalist powers—the United States, Japan, and Europe—would neither accept nor permit China’s rise. The aspiration to surpass the developed capitalist countries within the capitalist system is naïve. If China were to fully embrace the system, ideology, and globalization of capitalism, and even voluntarily become part of it, then the capitalist powers, led by the United States, could move swiftly to dismantle the country. Should this happen, China would revert to being a subordinate nation supplying raw materials to the imperialist camp.[13] In fact, Amin’s warning functions as much as a warning about China’s future as it does a description of the experiences of the former Soviet Union.

Another key point of Amin’s vision is that “the Global South must achieve political solidarity; with China playing a leading role in the pursuit of this solidarity. In this process, we must not allow the lack of effective communication to harm our common interests.” In this regard, the most urgent task at hand is to promote solidarity and communication among the countries of the Global South, with a view to establishing a “New International Economic Order”[vii] and a “New International Communication and Information Order”[viii]. These new international orders are prerequisites for socialist development, global communication, and genuine economic advancement. In order to resist the alliance between the comprador bourgeoisie of the Global South and the imperialism of the Global North, we must seek a consensus similar to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and the socialist movements of the 20th century. Furthermore, we must reassess, from a theoretical perspective, all the successes and failures of the industrialization processes of China and the Soviet Union over the past century.

Although socialism originated in Europe, “Chinese-style modernization” represents its successful implementation in China, exploring ways to break free from the shackles of capitalist globalization and seeking a new path for human development. “Chinese-style modernization” does not belong to China alone—it carries profound implications for global peace and development. This exploratory quest is far from over, encompassing not only challenges and crises, but also a glimmer of hope.

Lu Xinyu  is the holder of the Zijiang Chair of the School of Communication, East China Normal University.

Chinese-Style Modernization: Revolution and the Worker-Peasant Alliance by Lu Xinyu

Translation: Ricardo d'Arêde.

Originally published on Monthly Review [https://monthlyreviewarchives.org/mr/article/view/6382]

Notes

 [1] STALIN, Joseph. Sidalin Quanji (Collected Works). Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1955. v. 12, p. 112-120.
[2] LU, Nanquan et al. Sulian Xingwang Shilun (Theoretical Analyzes on Rise and Fall of Soviet Union). Beijing: People's Publishing House, 2002. p. 406-409.
[3] Sun, Zhenyuan. Sulian Sige Shiqi de Nongye Tizhi ​​Gaige (Four Periods of Agricultural System Reform in the Soviet Union). Shenyang: Liaoning People's Publishing House, 1985. p. 119.

[4] LU, Nanquan et al. Sulian Xingwang Shilun. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 2002. p. 562-563.

[5] SCHERTZ, Lyle P. et al. Youyici Geming's Meiguo Nongye (Another Revolution in US Farming?). Translated by Wang Qimo. Beijing: Agriculture Press, 1984. p. 35.

[6] LU, Nanquan et al. Sulian Xingwang Shilun. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 2002. p. 634-637.

[7] CHEN, Jinhua. Guoshi Yishu (Memoirs of National Affairs). Beijing: History of Chinese Communist Party Publishing House, 2005. p. 1-32.

[8] WANG, Shaoguang et al. China in the 1970s. Open Times, [sl], n. 1, p. 70-73, 2013.

[9] LIPING, Sun. Duanlie: Zhongguo Shehui of Xinbianhua (Rupture: The Urban-Rural Divide in Changing Chinese Society). Southern Weekly, [sl], May 16, 2002. p. A11.

[10] XINPING, Xi. Lun “Sannong” Gongzuo (Xi Jinping's Speech on “Three Rural” Work). Beijing: Central Party Literature Press, 2022. p. 332.

[11] XINPING, Xi. Lun “Sannong” Gongzuo. Beijing: Central Party Literature Press, 2022. p. 8-10.

[12] XINPING, Xi. Lun “Sannong” Gongzuo. Beijing: Central Party Literature Press, 2022. p. 247-246.

[13] AMIN, Samir; XIAOMENG, Zhang. The Systemic Crisis of Capitalism and the Way Forward: An Interview with Egyptian Economist Professor Samir Amin. Studies on Marxist Theory, [sl], v. 2, no. 1, p. 8, 2016.

[14] AMIN, Samir. Capitalism in the Age of Globalization. Translated by Ding Kaijie. Beijing: China Renmin University Press, 2005. p. 8-9.

[15] AMIN, Samir; XIAOMENG, Zhang. The Systemic Crisis of Capitalism and the Way Forward. Studies on Marxist Theory, [sl], v. 2, no. 1, p. 18, 2016.

Translator's notes

[i] In this article we read in English “A Year of Great Change” (“A Year of Great Change”). The said year marks a radical change in the economic policy of the USSR between 1928 and 1929, when the New Economic Policy (NEP) was abandoned and collectivization accelerated. The expression is taken from the article by Josef Stalin published on November 7, 1929, entitled “Great fracture” (“The Year of the Great Turnaround”). The same can be read at the link https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1929/11/03.htm (In English)
[ii] There is an inaccuracy in the English text regarding the plenary session and legislative term of the National People’s Congress. The text states “Third Session of the First National People's Congress, held in late 1964”. However, from 1964 to 1975 the 3rd National People's Assembly took place, which, due to the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), only had the opening session (the first session). Apparently there was an inversion of terms in the original sentence, corrected in this translation,

 [iii] According to data from National Bureau of Statistics of China, in 2005 the rural population was estimated at 744 million inhabitants, equivalent to 57% of the country's total population (cf. https://www.stats.gov.cn/english/NewsEvents/200603/t20060322_25744.html, accessed on 24/05/2025).

 [iv] cf. the full document can be read on the website of the Chinese embassy in Brazil, at http://br.china-embassy.gov.cn/por/ssht/SJD/201711/t20171118_4953282.htm

 [v] For further context, the Doha Rounds began in November 2001 in Qatar, with the 2003th Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization, the organization's highest body. The objective was to eliminate trade barriers to facilitate developing countries' access to international markets and encourage global trade. Due to the difficulties, a four-year deadline was established for negotiation, during which two more ministerial conferences would take place, the so-called Doha Rounds, which would continue the debates initiated at the meeting in Qatar. As Andréa Wolffenbüttel explains, “The 20 conference in Cancun was a resounding failure. The most developed economies refused to reduce agricultural subsidies and decided to maintain tariff barriers. On the other hand, developing countries reacted and created the G-20, a group of 2005 nations willing to fight for their interests. In December 2013, there was another ministerial conference in Hong Kong, at which little progress was made, but an agreement was signed providing for the elimination of all subsidies on agricultural goods for export by 2006. Given the impossibility of reaching a consensus, the deadline to reach an agreement was extended until the end of 2006.” (cf. Andréa Wolffenbüttel, Revista de Informações e Debates do Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada/IPEA. 3. Year 24. Issue XNUMX),

 [vi] On Three Rural Work refers to the concept of the Three Rural Issues and is a compilation of specific writings on the subject, not published in Portuguese. However, a collection of writings and speeches by Xi Jinping, which began publication in the same year, is available in Portuguese in four volumes entitled “The Governance of China”, addressing, among others, issues related to agriculture, rural areas and farmers, which constitute the Three Rural Issues.

 [vii] NIEO; New International Economic Order. Political and economic proposal represented by the countries of the Global South, initially in the 1970s, aiming to reform an unequal economic order, centered on the interests of the Global North, and reflecting the aspirations and needs of newly independent and developing countries. Its historical milestones date back to the debate on economic sovereignty in the wake of the 1973 oil crisis, the main one being the UN General Assembly resolution, approved in 1974 (Declaration on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order/NOEI) that “consolidated the collective political experiences and understandings of the newly independent countries” and “called on the world to build a new global system 'based on equity, sovereign equality, interdependence, common interest and cooperation among all States'. This resolution, together with the UN Environmental Program (1972) and the UNCTAD Cocoyoc Declaration (1974), directly challenged the world capitalist system and reimagined development centered on the needs of humanity, not capital” (cf. https://www.brasildefato.com.br/2023/03/21/dossie-tricontinental-soberania-dignidade-e-regionalismo-na-nova-ordem-internacional/) [viii] NWICO; New International Information and Communication Order. Debates on NWICO emerged in the 1970s and 1980s, aiming at a fairer, more democratic and balanced distribution of information and communication in the world, in contrast to the dominance of the powers of the Global North over media flows. The founding and legitimizing milestone of NWICO was the report Many Voices, One World (also known as the MacBride Report) released at the UNESCO General Conference in 1980. The report proposed a new communication order that would promote peace and human development, recognizing communication as a fundamental right, and denounced the concentration of information production in rich countries, the information dependence of countries in the Global South on news agencies from the North, and the need for developing countries to build their own media systems and autonomous communication infrastructure (cf. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000040066

the earth is round there is thanks to our readers and supporters.
Help us keep this idea going.
CONTRIBUTE