Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

Editor's Note:

In the face of failures dealing with the novel coronavirus pandemic, the US' capitalist system has been exposed--it values money more than lives. The pandemic has also damaged the US' institutional advantages and discourse power. Has the capitalist system become dysfunctional in the face of major crises? The US' CIA has planned many assassinations and infiltrations in various places. US imperialism has been resisted on a global scale. What is the fate of American imperialism? Indian Marxist intellectual Vijay Prashad (Prashad), Executive Director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, shared his thoughts with Global Times (GT) reporter Lu Yuanzhi on these issues.

GT: The novel coronavirus epidemic and the long-term US blockade have severely hit Cubans' wellbeing. By exploiting Cuba's current hardships, the US is inciting Cuba's situation. As the sole superpower, the US has long pursued a hostile policy toward this small socialist country to its south. Why can't the US tolerate a small socialist country in its periphery?

Prashad: Cuba, since 1959, has offered an alternative vision for humanity, one that puts the well-being of people before the requirements of profit. That Cuba - a poor country - was able to vanquish hunger and illiteracy rather quickly, while the US - a rich country - continues to be plagued by such elementary problems illustrates the humanity at the core of the socialist project. This is unforgivable for the elites in the US. Hence, they continue to tighten the wretched blockade of Cuba. In fact, they use all kinds of means - including social media warfare, a part of the hybrid war strategy - to undermine confidence of the Cuban people. This was attempted on 11 July, but it failed. Tens of thousands of Cubans took to the street to defend their Revolution.

GT: Although the UN has overwhelmingly condemned the US blockade of Cuba for many years in a row, Washington has continued its inhumane policy. What does it mean for the US' international image? US President Joe Biden said, "The US stands firmly with the people of Cuba," but his administration has no intention to lift blockade. Who are the audiences of such hypocritical diplomatic rhetoric?

Prashad: The US does not stand firmly with the people of Cuba. In fact, the US stands on the neck of the Cuban people. This is clear to the 184 member states of the United Nations (UN) that voted on June 23 to send a message to the US to end the blockade. The fact is that President Joe Biden has refused to even roll back the 243 coercive measures by Donald Trump. The world recognizes the cruelty of the blockade on Cuba and of the illegal sanctions policy that the US exercises against at least 30 countries around the world. But, because of the power of the US, there are only a few countries that are willing to do more than vote in the UN General Assembly on behalf of Cuba. Cuba needs material support, which is lacking from the international community; this material support would include supplies for the Cuban pharmaceutical industry, and it would include food. If the US does not roll back the blockade, will key countries of the world come together to break it?

GT: The US' handling over the COVID-19 epidemic is obviously a failure, with the highest death toll across the world. In the face of the epidemic, the US capitalist system's value of economics over human life has been fully exposed. The epidemic has hit the US' institutional advantages and discourse power. Has the capitalist system become dysfunctional in the face of major crises?

Prashad: The capitalist system is very good at generating vast amounts of commodities, and very high qualities of certain kinds of commodities. It is good at the production of high-value medical care, for instance, but not so good at the production of quality public healthcare. This has to do with the profit motive. What makes money in a capitalist system is what advances. Since there is great social inequality, most of the public do not have cash in their pockets for quality health care, so health care for the vast majority simply is not affordable or possible. It is this attitude towards health and education that shows us the inhumane side of capitalism. During the pandemic, 64 countries spent more to service their external debt than on healthcare. Such is the ways of the capitalist system, to ensure that wealthy bond holders in the developed world make their money while the poor struggle to survive.

Vijay Prashad Photo: Courtesy of Prashad

GT: China's response to the epidemic has clearly demonstrated the strengths of its people-oriented philosophy and its political system. What's your take on the increasing influence of China's political system after the epidemic? How can the outside world better understand the unique advantages of China's political system under the leadership of CPC? How can China better counter the West's slander on the CPC?

Prashad: China's approach to the pandemic was along the grain of the World Health Organisation's recommendation: use science, compassion, and collaboration to tackle the pandemic. The Chinese people volunteered to help each other, doctors who are Communist Party member volunteered to go to the frontlines, and the Chinese state opened its coffers to ensure that the disease was vanquished and that the people did not suffer from a prolonged economic downturn. There is much to be learned from this approach. It stands in stark contrast to the anti-science, inhumane, and narrowly nationalistic attitude of many of the Western countries and several others in the developing world; their approach led to chaos. It is because of the failure in places such as the US that Trump - for instance - began to blame China in a racist way for the emergence of the virus. We know scientifically that viruses appear for a variety of reasons, and none of them have to do with race or civilization. Chinese intellectuals and others need to offer clear accounts of Chinese developments, including the abolishment of extreme poverty and the rather quick defeat of COVID-19. Such accounts will help people in other parts of the world understand the relationship between public action and state action in China. This is widely misunderstood, largely because of the information war pursued by the US and its allies. On July 23, the institute I direct - Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research - will publish a key text called Serve the People: The Eradication of Extreme Poverty in China; it is based on field studies of the abolition of extreme poverty. I hope it will be widely read.

GT: The West's narrative on the CPC in recent years has always avoided mentioning the positive effects of the CPC on China's social progress and global economy development. Why can't the West objectively evaluate the CPC?

Prashad: The West cannot be objective because the West fears the rise of Chinese science and technology. For the past 50 years, Western firms have monopolized the areas of high-tech, using intellectual property laws to lengthen their copyright advantages. Developments in China are an existential threat to the dominance of these Western firms, which are in areas such as telecommunications, robotics, high-speed rail, and new energy technology. It is the fear of losing supremacy in these key tech sectors that drives the 'new cold war' against China and prevents sober assessment of Chinese developments.

Rather than develop a sensible attitude, the West has gone in four directions: first, to prosecute a trade and economic war against China to maintain US economic and technological supremacy; second, to pressure developing countries and US allies to break with Chinese firms and isolate China; third, to smear China's reputation by using the framework of "human rights", and by supporting anti-government and separatist forces within China; fourth, by military provocation, particularly through the Quad alliance (Australia, India, Japan, and the US). These mechanisms blind the Western public to the reality of China.

GT: During China's reform and opening up period, the country has been open to learn from Western societies. This has greatly boosted China's development. Do you think there can be such an ideological emancipation in the West to take China's political system seriously? 

Prashad: One hopes that clarity will come upon the Western public, who are - as yet - guided by a political class that is doing the work for sectors of the economy that are threatened by Chinese scientific and technological developments. In the short run, no such positive evaluation is possible. It is more likely for such an evaluation to come in the countries of Africa, Latin America, and southern Asia, where people will understand the immense power of the abolition of extreme poverty and the immense power of the creation of an indigenous high-tech industry. These are developments that are inconceivable in many parts of the developing world. Brazil - under Lula - abolished hunger through the Fome Zero programme, while Kerala - under the Left Democratic Front - has now embarked on a poverty eradication programme. These areas of the world would better appreciate the strides taken by the Chinese people than those who live in the West.

GT: After Biden took office, his administration has spared no effort to rope in like-minded democracies to contain China, attempting to replicate the rivalry between the two blocs leading by the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Do you think the democratic card is an effective way for the US to rally an anti-China camp?

Prashad: The idea of a community of democracies has a farcical edge to it because this new group is being put together to use all manner of force (diplomatic, economic, military) to pressure China and Russia to reverse their advances. A truly democratic group should abide by the UN Charter, which is exactly what the kind of sanctions policies enacted by the Western countries defies. That is why 18 countries have created the Group of Friends in Defence of the UN Charter. This is an important development, since it suggests that the point is to stand by the Charter and not to speak in the name of an abstract democracy that often means that a country must be subordinate to Western interests. The world does not wish to be divided into camps. The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) will be 60 years old this September. The appetite in the developing world remains with the NAM culture. Countries do not want to pick sides in a "new cold war" that no-one apart from the US wants. The divide is not between China and the US, a division that the US is trying to impose on the world. The divide is between humanity and imperialism.

GT: You work "Washington Bullets" listed the assassinations and infiltrations of the US' CIA in various places. US imperialism has been resisted on a global scale. How do you see the fate of American imperialism?

Prashad: The US remains a very powerful country, with the largest military force that is capable of action anywhere on the planet and with forms of soft power (cultural and diplomatic) that are enviable. Despite the terrible record of US interference in the developing world - which I document in Washington Bullets (which will soon appear in Chinese from CTPH, or China Translation and Publishing House) - the US retains a powerful hold on the world's imagination. There remains a view - however wrong it is - that the US operates its power in a benevolent manner and that it acts for the universal, and not nationalist, interest. This cultural power of the US is considerable, which is why the US is so easily able to wield the weapons of information against any adversary. About 30 years ago, Cuba's Fidel Castro urged countries around the world not to neglect the battle of ideas. The information war and the growth of a soft power strategy is essential. US imperialism is not eternal. It is being confronted now by the growth of multipolarity and regionalism. These are the key developments that cannot be stopped by US military or cultural power. Multipolarity and regionalism are the real movement of history. They will eventually prevail.