China speeds toward environmental catastrophe (part 1):
Notes on Chapters 1 and 2 of Richard Smith’s "China’s Engine of Environmental
Collapse"
by Joseph Green, Detroit/Seattle Workers' Voice list, Dec. 15, 2021
(full text of D/SWV Dec.15 at www.communistvoice.org/DSWV-211215.html)
The following are rough notes based on the discussion held in a Communist
Voice Organization study group which was reading Richard Smith’s book. They
are not a polished summary, but may, however, help encourage others to
examine the book. The study group not only considered what was going on in
China, but made repeated comparisons to other countries, especially the US; the
problems in China are but one example of the environmental practices that may
be found among all the imperialist countries. China isn’t an example of an
alternative to present-day monopoly capitalism; instead, it has become a
record-breaking polluter because it is growing in capitalist style at record-breaking
speed.
Chapter 1: The ‘China Price’: Police-state capitalism and the great acceleration of
global consumption
Chapter 2: ‘Blind Growth’: Scenes of planetary destruction from the Twelfth
Five-Year Plan
From the discussion of February 4, 2021 of the Detroit Marxist-Leninist Study
Group.
The book documents the astonishing extent of pollution in China. China has
environmental laws and agencies, but it doesn't matter -- the rapid growth of
pollution as industries expand proceeds anyway. The many solar panels in China
are often cited as proof of China’s environmental concern, but many of these
panels have been produced in a very polluting way.
The book has some astonishing pictures, such as the Foxconn factory in
Guangdong province which has nets outside the windows to catch desperate
workers who might jump out of the windows in despair. (Page 5, Figure 1.2) This
is reminiscent of the nets that would be hung outside slave ships traversing the
Middle Passage.
The book documents the vast extent of overproduction in China, where things are
built that aren't needed or aren't used. The large network of rapid trains are often
cited as an example of China’s environmentalism, but a lot of the trains don't
have many passengers. There are also entire cities, such as Ordos Kangbashi,
Yujiapu, Binhai New Area, Caofeidian, and Lanzhou New Area, that have been
built rapidly but don’t have many residents. It is doubtful that some of these will
ever fill up, or even that there are many people who can afford to live in such
areas. Capitalists and state-capitalists in China just want to build things, but it
doesn’t matter whether the things will be used or not. They just want to make a
profit on the construction itself. It is reminiscent of what goes on in the US too,
where local bureaucrats have projects that are built without much use, such as
the famous Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska. These projects may not be on the
colossal scale that we see in China, but the motives for building such white
elephants are the same.
This is truly capitalism being built in at incredible speed, at what the Chinese
regime calls "China speed". As it does this, China is imitating the US, but without
even making provision for conditions that differ from the US. For example, land is
wasted or paved over in both the US and China, but there is much less farmland
to begin with in China, much less land to waste.
Among the gargantuan development projects are many dams, some of the
world’s largest, and they are going to be a problem. This includes the fact that key
rivers affecting China, Southeast Asia, and India are being dammed without
proper consideration.
It was noted that part of the reported reductions in carbon emissions in Europe
and the US is because European and American capitalists have moved a number
of polluting factories to China. Their stand is, don’t fix the production process,
instead let China be polluted, while we won't do various dirty things here.
Something similar happened in Detroit, where one comrade recounted how
polluted the city used to be, and it’s somewhat better now. Some of the
improvement is the effect of legislation from the 1970s, but part is due to
production having been moved out of Detroit, so there is less pollution, but also
fewer jobs.
The book compares China to India. On one hand, China has built up more
infrastructure and more industrial parks, schools, research centers and all sorts of
things than India has. On the other hand, the leaders of both countries have the
same disregard for the environment. One comrade noted that, when he was
reading about the worker suicides at Foxconn in China, it brought to mind the
suicides that have occurred for years in India among farmers in the countryside.
India and China have different versions of capitalism, but both end up with the
same disregard of the environment.
Smith writes about the accelerated production of useless things for the world
market, and of things that are designed to have to be replaced soon. Products
may be produced in a way that doesn’t allow them to be repaired or upgraded, or
so that it costs too much to repair them, so new things have to be bought. A few
of Smith’s examples were questioned. There was a discussion about how far, in
the present economy, newer things wear out too fast, whether certain products
are durable, and whether certain examples were overplayed. For example,
contrary to the book, some shoes seem to be quite durable. On the other hand,
shoe repair shops are gone, and most shoes are made in a way that the soles
can't be replaced. Historical examples were noted, such as the planned
obsolescence of cars in the US. And of course, fashion drives constant changes.
It was noted that, if products are to be upgradeable -- or, for that matter, capable
of being junked in an environmental way — they need to be designed that way
from the start. For example, in the European Union, the End-of-Life Vehicles
Directive takes a step in that direction with regard to cars, but how far is it really
followed? Meanwhile Smith raises the issue of when quick change in products
may be desirable, as when a new type of product is just being developed, and
when it isn't.
Smith raised the issue that China is going to have a major problem when the vast
amount of concrete it uses for construction wears out. This is especially so given
that much of the concrete is of substandard quality, and this is a particular danger
to dams. It was noted that the US has similar problems with obsolete
infrastructure, including that its nuclear reactors have been reaching the end of
their planned lifespan. <>
Picture: Nets placed outside windows at a Foxconn plant in China to catch
workers attempting suicide. Destruction of the environment goes hand-in-hand
with oppression of the workers.
https://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/large/public/images/stories/2012/02/Foxconn-suicidenets1.jpg <>
