Comercio internacional

The International role of China
by Elisseos Vagenas,
member of the CC of KKE,
responsible for the international section of the CC
The rise of a new global power, China, has provoked a great deal of interest from analysts and ordinary workers all over the world. This interest is even more intense amongst politicized people, who understand the era of social revolutions which began withOctober 1917 in Russia and which led to a series of important socio-political struggles and revolutions in the entire world, among them the Chinese revolution. The interest concerning the rise in China’s power is contradictory, as the increase of its power is taking place under the red flag and with the CP of China in power.
Nevertheless, one of the “lessons” of the counterrevolution in the SovietUnion is that communists should not have accepted unquestioningly whatever the CPSU said but that every CP, while remaining true to the principle of proletarian internationalism, should study with its own resources the developments, the experience of the international communist movement and must attempt to form its own opinion concerning these things, utilizing Marxist-Leninist theory as its tool. TheKKE reserves its right of criticism within the international communist movement with the aim of strengthening it and the strategy of the communists. The KKE confronts deviations from the principles of Marxism-Leninism and the laws of socialist construction, while maintaining bilateral relations with communist parties which have different approaches.
On this basis the KKE, while it continues tomaintain bilateral relations with the CP of China, systematically follows developments and forms its own assessments which it expresses both publicly and to the CPC. As is well-known, the KKE already from its 17th Congress (2005) noted the expansion of capitalist relations in China. In the period since then this tendency has been reinforced and is even more evident.
Developments concerning theInternational position of China
In the Economy
The increase of China’s economic power is unquestionable. It is widely considered that China has overtaken Japan and is now the 2nd largest economy in the world1 after the USA, while in 2010 it outstripped Germany and became the largest exporter in the world. During the period January-October 2009 China exported products worth 957 billion dollars2.Exports make up 80% of the states transactions3. China exports 50 thousand different types of products to 182 countries, while 80 of these countries have signed trade agreements and protocols of cooperation with it. The basic trading partners of China are the major capitalist countries (Japan, USA, EU countries), which account for 55% of its foreign trade transactions4.
A fact which reflects thechanges which have taken place over the last 20 years is that although in 1993 China exported oil, today is compelled not just to import it but in 2009 the amount of oil it imported was comparable globally to the USA.
Ιn 2010 China acquired the second place globally (after the USA) in the list of billionaires per country (130), the fortunes of whom have increased by 222% within a year. It is alsoestimated that the 1,000 richest people in China increased their wealth within a year by 30%-from 439 billion dollars to 571 billion dollars5.
We could also compare these statistics to others which demonstrate the misery and exploitation which hundreds of millions of workers experience in modern China, as a result of the policy of ‘enrich yourselves”, which the CPC has openly followed for 30years. We will mention the following, according to the estimates of the association of Chinese businessmen, as was shown on Chinese television: 8.5% of the 500 largest monopolies in the world are Chinese (43 companies). At this moment American monopolies have double the size of profits in comparison to the Chinese but the trend is for Chinese monopolies individually to be more profitable and to...