What if the US encouraged communism in China?

Great Debates
1

Alright, I know it’s kind of a crackpot idea, and I’m not advocating it, but it struck me as a bit of a novel thought when it occurred to me a little while ago. Suppose that the US decided it was very VERY concerned about China’s coming economic dominance. Now, communist countries, to the best of my knowledge, don’t have a very good track record economically. So what if the US slyly decided to make its peace with communism in China, to the point that it advocated strictly communist economic policies in China – none of this pseudo-capitalism nonsense; send them straight back to Marx and Engels.

What would this do? Would China’s economy sputter and fall, leaving America’s (and the West’s) economic dominance unchallenged? Would our economy collapse with it? Would more hardline communist economic policies necessarily lead to more of the bad old Mao-ist terror? What would happen to the security situation?

2

I would argue that the United States’ browbeating China about becoming more free and open actually slows their progress to becoming more free and open. The more we push the more recalcitrant they are if only to “prove” they are masters of their own fate and will do as they see fit and not bow to US bullying.

Reverse psychology :wink:

3

So in a way we already are encouraging them to hold on to the Communist ideology?

4

Well yes and no. While I do think US actions encourages China to remain stubborn to prove they are independent I am not sure how far that really goes and I seriously doubt the US is consciously choosing to do that to try and keep China more restrictive. Indeed the US probably does want them to be more open as it is the US who has more to gain if they were. A billion Chinese is a market many American companies drool over getting in to.