Manoj Singh, ex ACS, UP Govt
Lucknow: For decades, Western analysts predicted that once China embraced markets, capitalism would transform the country into a liberal democracy. Yet, four decades after Deng Xiaoping’s “Reform and Opening Up” in 1978, the picture looks very different. China is today the world’s second-largest economy, a global manufacturing hub, and a rising technological superpower — but it has not turned into the liberal, free-market democracy that the West expected.
This raises a provocative question: Did capitalism change China, or did China change capitalism?
📈 Capitalism Changed China
There is no denying that markets revolutionized China.
Economic Transformation: In 1978, China was largely rural and poor. By 2020, it had lifted over 800 million people out of poverty — the greatest anti-poverty achievement in human history.
Consumer Culture: Shopping malls, smartphones, and luxury brands are now woven into daily Chinese life. Cities like Shanghai and Shenzhen resemble global capitalist hubs like New York or London.
Entrepreneurship: Private giants such as Alibaba, Huawei, and Tencent emerged, symbolizing how capitalism created new forms of wealth and innovation.
From bicycles to bullet trains, from ration cards to cashless apps, capitalism clearly reshaped China’s material life.
🏛 China Changed Capitalism
But the story doesn’t end there. Instead of being absorbed into Western capitalism, China reshaped capitalism into something new.
State Capitalism: Unlike the Western free-market model, China fused markets with strict state oversight. Billionaires like Jack Ma operate at the mercy of the Communist Party.
Global Supply Chains: China became the “world’s factory,” embedding itself in global capitalism while controlling key production nodes. Your iPhone may be American-designed, but it is “Made in China.”
Digital Authoritarianism: Platforms like WeChat and Alipay combine e-commerce with surveillance, showing a version of capitalism where profit and state power reinforce each other.
Belt and Road: China exports its hybrid model through infrastructure projects in Asia, Africa, and beyond, redefining capitalism as a tool of geopolitical strategy.
Here, capitalism is not the path to liberal democracy. It is a weapon of state power.
🔄 Who Wins in the Exchange?
The West expected capitalism to erode authoritarianism. Instead, China has shown that capitalism can thrive under one-party rule. This challenges the neoliberal myth that markets naturally lead to freedom.
China’s blend — sometimes called “socialism with Chinese characteristics” or state capitalism — is now being studied worldwide. For many developing nations, it offers a more appealing model than Western capitalism: rapid growth without political liberalization.
🌍 The Irony
Yes, capitalism changed China — creating cities, markets, billionaires, and consumer culture.
But China changed capitalism — proving it can coexist with authoritarian politics, global ambitions, and surveillance.
In truth, the story is not one-sided. It is a mutual transformation: capitalism gave China speed and scale, but China gave capitalism a new face.
The 21st century may not belong to the capitalism of Wall Street or Silicon Valley, but to the capitalism of Beijing and Shenzhen. If so, the world is entering an era where profit, power, and politics are fused in ways the original architects of capitalism never imagined.
The question is no longer whether capitalism will change China. It already has. The real question is: Will China’s capitalism now change the world?
