We Wouldn't Be Caught Dead, Red

China's gone capitalist! Shit!

Why this isn't front page news worldwide I don't know.

The creation of private property ownership laws is, as I see it, the last step away from a centralized, "egalitarian" communist society towards a fully competitive, market-driven economy.

So what this really means is that, rather than being Capitalist, Socialist or Communist, China will become a market-based oligarchy. Arguably, every country in the modern world falls into this category.

The BBC News quotes the proposed legislation as saying:

"The property of the state, the collective, the individual and other obligees is protected by law, and no units or individuals may infringe upon it."

But it adds that: "The nation is in the first stage of socialism and should stick to the basic economic system in which public ownership predominates, co-existing with other kinds of ownership.""

If you look at the structure of any nation-state, there is some balance between the ownership of the government and private ownership. The government has the prerogative to override private ownership rights if they compensate the owner (fairness in this regard is in the eye of the property-holder).

It's interesting that the farmers are the ones driving this particular legislation, because you see similar dynamics in other Socialist countries - namely, France, Peru - that often undermine overall economic growth to maintain a traditional, slow-moving, and often stubbornly archaic system of production.

That being said, the production of food is obviously the most important human function, and if farmers wish to have things a certain way, well I'd vote to let them have it.

However, especially with regards to food production and distribution, access is key. Not only do farmers need access to adequate land to produce adequate crops, but the consuming population needs access (affordable access) to their produce.

There's an interesting factoid in my favorite food-related documentary, The Future of Food, about the unfortunate dynamics of the food economy. What they say is that there is more than enough food produced to feed everyone on the planet quite well. The problem, they claim, is not quantity, but access.

The Chinese have the opportunity to develop an economic model here that is immensely compelling. With their collective, centralized ideology they may be motivated to develop a system of production, distribution and compensation that creates a balance for all involved - a system for regulating production so that an adequate amount of each type of produce (grain, meat, etc.) is grown to feed everyone in the accessible region, at an affordable (perhaps even income-graded) price, and at a minimal supply level so that the farmers who have invested in the production are not overwhelmed by competition.

With a creative and dynamic system in place, the Chinese could, theoretically, feed everyone in China and create a worldwide model of production and distribution that, if adopted by the rest of the organized countries, could expand to include the overwhelming majority of humans.

If we all believed that feeding people was more important than making profits, we could feed the world. An interesting challenge.

Talk about a moral question.