Competing Hegemonic Projects within China's Variegated Capitalism: ‘Liberal’ Guangdong vs. ‘Statist’ Chongqing

China’s ideological spectrum: a two-dimensional model of elite intellectuals’ visions

“…Two initially innocuous institutional experiments in local governance became politicized under the influence of leading left-leaning intellectuals, such as Cui Zhiyuan and Wang Shaoguang, seen to support Chongqing's neo-statist development mode which was being developed by the city's then-Party secretary, the flamboyant Bo Xilai. Meanwhile liberals instead favored a cautious civil society-oriented liberalization agenda emerging in Guangdong under his counterpart, Wang Yang (Mulvad 2015). Second, the 2013 'Constitutionalism Debate' at the hopeful beginnings of Xi Jinping's term involved a fierce public discussion on whether China's constitution should be allowed to override the power of the CCP leadership (Kellogg 2015).…”

“…In 2011 Xiao Bin became the key spokesperson of a liberal-leaning alternative to the "Chongqing Model" discourse of some "New Left" intellectuals (Mulvad 2015). Xiao worried that the "Chongqing Model" would gain the ideological upper hand nationally, and thus felt the need to confront the "individual arbitrariness and authoritarianism" that he identified in Bo Xilai's "red," populist platform (interview with Xiao Bin, December 8, 2013).…”

‘Emptying the cage, changing the birds’: state rescaling, path-dependency and the politics of economic restructuring in post-crisis Guangdong

“…This complicates the popular portrayal of Wang as a market-oriented reformer and illustrates the decidedly protectionist undercurrent of the restructuring strategies (cf. Mulvad, 2015). In fact, the intention was not only to ensure the big businesses (in particular those of the SOEs) were shielded from the crisis: it was to provide these businesses with new opportunities for capital accumulation in other parts of the province (or, failing which, in other parts of the country).…”

“…Ironically, it was precisely the institution Wang tried to reform in Chongqing -the hukou system -that enabled the Guangdong government to effect labor force relocation at will (ref. Lim, 2014b;Mulvad, 2015).…”

Asian varieties of service capitalism?

“…or that Chinese capitalism can be only understood as diverse and fractured(Mulvad 2015;Csanádi 2016;Zhang & Peck 2016) need careful qualification and examination. Rather, we suggest that whilst recognising diversity, identifying mid-level commonalties in Asian economies has merit in seeking to understand the nature and ongoing development of service activity.…”