28 May, 22:13
Giovanni Arrighi’s legacy and the limits of Beijing’s authoritarian capitalism
“The terminal crisis of a world-system is not a crisis of capitalism, but a crisis of the system of accumulation that sustained it.”
— Giovanni Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century
A World in Transition
In the twilight of the U.S.-led liberal order, the People’s Republic of China presents itself not just as an economic powerhouse but as a civilizational alternative. Amid growing inequality, infrastructural decay, and ideological fatigue in Western metropoles, Beijing builds — railways, cities, digital platforms, and global corridors. It exports steel instead of slogans. It offers loans instead of lectures.
To some, this suggests a new hegemonic cycle is in motion — a transition from the Anglo-American system to a Sino-centric world-economy, reminiscent of the patterns Giovanni Arrighi outlined in The Long Twentieth Century. But this perception, while seductive, misreads both China's structural contradictions and the historical logic of hegemonic succession.
The Chinese ascent is real. But it is not hegemonic — at least not yet, and possibly not at all.
Arrighi’s Framework: Systemic Cycles and Their Crises
In his magnum opus, Giovanni Arrighi extended Fernand Braudel’s world-systems theory to argue that capitalism has passed through successive systemic cycles of accumulation, each led by a hegemonic power:
Genoese cycle (15th–17th centuries): Merchant capital rooted in finance.
Dutch cycle (17th century): Trade capital coupled with maritime power.
British cycle (19th century): Industrial capital and colonial empire.
American cycle (20th century): Mass production, mass consumption, and military–financial dominance.
Each cycle ended in overaccumulation, financialization, and hegemonic decline — leading to wars and eventually to a transition. Arrighi argued in the 1990s that China might represent the next epicenter of accumulation, but he left the question open, noting the crucial role of political structure and global legitimacy.
The Mirage of Infrastructure Hegemony
What differentiates hegemonic powers from regional powers, according to Arrighi, is not merely economic capacity, but the ability to universalize a logic of order. The U.S. projected a global system through the IMF, UN, Bretton Woods institutions, and the ideology of liberalism. Britain exported not only coal but also constitutionalism.
China, in contrast, exports highways and surveillance systems.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is a monumental effort to extend Chinese infrastructural logic across Eurasia and Africa. But unlike the Marshall Plan or the Washington Consensus, BRI lacks an ideological or institutional narrative that others aspire to join. It creates dependency, not leadership.
Wallerstein’s analysis supports this view: a core’s dominance is not merely economic, but also cultural and ideological. China’s authoritarianism — while effective domestically — is not an aspirational model globally.
Brenner’s Dilemma: Capitalist Stagnation and the China Trap
Robert Brenner's theory of overproduction crisis adds another lens. According to Brenner, global capitalism is caught in a long downturn due to chronic overcapacity, falling profit rates, and excessive competition — particularly in manufacturing.
China’s economy exemplifies this dilemma:
Industrial overcapacity has led to white-elephant infrastructure and debt-ridden municipalities.
Export dependency is constrained by the decline of Western demand and rising protectionism.
Domestic consumption, while growing, is stunted by inequality, household debt, and the aging population.
The real estate implosions (e.g., Evergrande) expose the fragility beneath the concrete. The myth of eternal growth is unraveling — and with it, the hope of a seamless transition to global dominance.
The Authoritarian Cost of Stability
Many point to China’s improving living standards as evidence of a successful alternative. Yet this socioeconomic progress is embedded in a deeply coercive digital architecture. The "social credit system", censorship algorithms, and AI-powered surveillance form a techno-authoritarian scaffold that suppresses dissent and enforces behavioral compliance.
This is not a post-capitalist society, but a hyper-disciplined capitalist order. Labor discipline is ensured not by market mechanisms, but by omnipresent state surveillance. The working class has no independent unions. Rural migrants remain second-class citizens under the hukou system. Protest is met with swift suppression.
In Arrighi’s logic, China has not transcended capitalism — it has merely perfected its administrative control. This is not the moral leadership he envisioned for a new hegemon.
Hegemony Without Mission?
Unlike past hegemonic cores, China lacks what Antonio Gramsci called a “hegemonic project” — a vision that subordinates consent rather than compels obedience. Beijing has no equivalents of the U.S. Bill of Rights or British common law. Its institutions are insular. Its propaganda, clumsy.
Even in Africa and Southeast Asia, Chinese influence is often perceived as transactional rather than transformational. Its allies are clients, not partners.
For a nation to lead the world, it must offer not just infrastructure, but ideals. Not just power, but meaning.
Conclusion: The Iron Cage of Growth
China’s model is not the end of capitalism — it is its mirror image in authoritarian form. It is capitalism without democracy, progress without emancipation, and growth without legitimacy. As Arrighi himself warned, the next hegemon may not be a hegemon at all — but rather a node in a fragmented, unstable global system.
If the U.S. cycle ends without a successor, we may be entering not a Chinese century — but a post-hegemonic age, marked by regional blocs, digital sovereignties, and contested orders.
In that world, China will remain central — but not hegemonic.
References:
Arrighi, Giovanni. The Long Twentieth Century (1994)
Arrighi, Giovanni. Adam Smith in Beijing (2007)
Brenner, Robert. The Economics of Global Turbulence (1998)
Wallerstein, Immanuel. The Modern World-System (1974–2011)
Gramsci, Antonio. Prison Notebooks
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