Arnaud Dephalese

Les avis émis par l’auteur ne sauraient avoir de valeur que provisoirement fictive, simply giving the reader the right to future dividends from my thoughts.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@RodolpheCart Quel intérêt d'être protectionniste si illibéral ? Quel intérêt d'être illibéral si protectionniste ?

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@NicolasQuiPaie Je n'y ai pas cru non plus : une initiative se prétendant apolitique ne peut avoir aucun impact sur l'économie politique.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@VincLapierre C'est l'incapacité à se construire socialement, c'est-à-dire en groupe qui permet d'écraser si facilement les Français (ça commence avec la famille et puis ça se prolonge). Autrement dit, c'est le fait d'être trop méchant qui oblige à ramper auprès du monde entier.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@NicolasQuiPaie Et arrêter de subventionner les entreprises. Si elles sont trop mauvaises pour exister sans subventions, qu'elles coulent.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@NicolasQuiPaie Est-il réellement "parfaitement intégré à la société" si "il ne bénéficie plus du contrat social" ?

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@bloquonstout "Ni de gauche ni de droite" = parfait. Cependant, j'attire l'attention sur le fait qu'i il ne faut pas confondre avec "apolitique" (erreur commise par les GJ). C'est un mouvement qui n'est affilié à aucun parti politique et qui est, pour cette raison même, profondément politique.

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

Many people dismiss China as a one-party state but the reality is actually much more nuanced than this.

As I've often argued you cannot possibly understand something - let alone criticize it - if you don't also understand it from the standpoint of those who defend it. Meaning, in this instance, that if you only ever hear about China's system from the standpoint of its detractors, you cannot possibly have an intellectually honest understanding of it. The honest thing to do is hear about the system from both "sides" and make up your own mind about it.

Anyone with common sense can agree to this. And this is actually normally supposed to be the standard scholastic method of disputatio (structured debate) in the classical West: first you present your opponent's position in its strongest form and demonstrate that you truly understand it, then and only then can you proceed to critique it. Otherwise you risk simply attacking a straw man version of their position.

In this spirit, let's look at a recent Qiushi article (https://t.co/mRfKwerI8k) - Qiushi is the official theoretical journal of the Central Committee of the CPC - that explains how China views its "Political Party System".

First of all, people might be surprised that China doesn't have one party but 9 official parties: the CPC and 8 other parties.

The article makes an interesting historical case for why this system emerged. After the 1911 revolution that ended imperial rule (which the article calls a "autocratic monarchic" system that was "semi-feudal"), China experimented with Western-style parliamentary democracy. The result, according to the article, was chaos - in just 16 years, China went through 10 different heads of state, 45 cabinets, and 59 prime ministers. The longest-serving prime minister held office for less than a year, while the shortest served for less than a day. Then they tried one-party rule under the Kuomintang (KMT), which ended in "economic collapse, political isolation, and military defeat."

This historical experience led China to seek a different path - what the article calls a "new type of political party system." Rather than having parties compete for power as in the West, or having a single party monopolize power, China developed a system where multiple parties exist but in a cooperative rather than competitive relationship.

To be fair, the CPC does have a monopoly on power in a big way, and the Qiushi article admits this. It explicitly states that "leadership by the CPC is the defining feature of China's new type of political party system" and that working with the CPC is "the fundamental political basis for multiparty cooperation."

But this gets to a crucial point: we're enormously confused when we try to understand the Chinese system through our vision of the CPC as a political party like the Democrats or Republicans. In China's system, the CPC isn't really equivalent to a Western political party but rather to the constitutional order itself. It functions not as a competitor for power but as what the article calls the "highest force for political leadership."

This helps us understand the role of the eight other parties. They're not meant to be opposition parties or potential alternatives to CPC rule. Instead, they serve as channels for different sectors of society to participate in governance through consultation and cooperation. The article describes them as "participating parties" who act as "effective advisers, helpers, and partners to the CPC."

This might sound like mere window dressing to Western ears - indeed, many critics like Aaron Friedberg argue these parties exist solely to "create the illusion of inclusiveness and representation." But I think this misses something important about how these parties actually function.

First, many of these parties have genuine historical roots predating the PRC. The China Democratic League, for instance, - which is the biggest of these "minor parties" with about 350,000 members - was founded in 1941 as a "third force" seeking a middle path between the KMT and CPC. The Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang, another party with about 160,000 members, emerged from the left wing of the KMT that opposed Chiang Kai-shek. These weren't artificial creations of the CPC but political movements with their own historical trajectories that eventually found their place in China's current system.

Secondly, these parties play a specialized role in China's governance. They have seats in the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee, and participate in the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. The Qiushi article describes how they conduct research and offer policy suggestions on major initiatives like the Belt and Road Initiative and rural revitalization strategy.

Each party tends to represent specific constituencies - the China Democratic League focuses on intellectuals in education and culture, the Jiusan Society (211,000 members) represents scientists and technologists, while the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang works on cross-strait relations with Taiwan. They serve as channels for these professional and social groups to have input into governance.

This ties back to what I explained in my previous post about China's "whole-process people's democracy" (https://t.co/2nU3D05pjI). Rather than seeing democracy as periodic competition between parties, China's system emphasizes continuous consultation and input from different sectors of society. These minor parties are one of the institutional mechanisms for this consultation.

In effect, they are a bit like a mix between professional associations, think tanks, and government advisory bodies - but with a formal political role that includes seats in the legislature. They're more institutionalized than Western lobbies or interest groups, but less powerful than opposition parties in liberal democracies. And they are expected to think about the national interest rather than just advocate for their sector's interests. As the article puts it, the aim of the system is "to pursue common goals" rather than pursuing narrow sectoral interests.

The Qiushi article frames this as avoiding both the "inadequate oversight in one-party rule" and the "destructive competition" seen in Western systems. Whether you agree with this framing or not, it represents a distinctly Chinese approach to political representation - one focused on consultation and consensus-building rather than competition and alternation of power.

It's all to easy - and wrong - to dismiss these parties as purely decorative. They provide specialized expertise, represent specific constituencies, and offer channels for different sectors of society to have input into governance, albeit in a consultative rather than competitive way.

In my post on China's "whole-process people's democracy" (https://t.co/2nU3D05pjI) I explained that the best way for a Westerner to think of China's system isn't as a one-party state, nor frankly as a system that has multiple parties because I think it's confusing, but rather as a zero-party state.

What I mean by this is that in Western democracies, political parties compete to temporarily control the state apparatus through elections, but in China, the CPC effectively is the state apparatus - it functions not as a political party in the Western sense but as the permanent embodiment of the state and constitutional order itself. Through this lens, the other eight parties aren't really "parties" in the Western sense either, but rather function more like formalized consultative bodies representing different sectors of society within this constitutional framework.

These "parties" are just one of many mechanisms that China uses for consultation and feedback in what it calls its 'whole-process people's democracy.' There's also things like residents' committees and village committees at the grassroots level, various channels for citizens to report issues or provide policy suggestions, and of course the 100 million CPC members themselves who live among the population and are meant to understand and relay people's needs. All forming an extremely complex and intricate mechanism for constant policy adjustment based on societal feedback and needs.

To conclude, the point here isn't to say that this system is better or worse than Western liberal democracy. My personal opinion is that the Chinese system is so deeply rooted in Chinese culture, history and traditions that it can only fit China - which is precisely why we should try to understand this system on its own terms.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@SebGouspillou @nayibbukele La prison de Bukele est juste un vaste hangar "open-space" sans cellule...

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

I'm about to start to tweet.

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@Francois_Ruffin Il faut arrêter avec la propreté, c'est juste une invention du patriarcat capitaliste pour rendre les individus productifs. Inciter vos enfants à relâcher leurs sphincters en permanence, ils éviteront les cancers du cul !

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@tyraanik @supervisual87 @Morolian Est-ce que tu sais à quel volume du manga ça correspond ?

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

@BornLik23266 Hello, Can I ask if you take profit on Kanye West merch?

[Arnaud Dephalese @fendkowsky]

Tout ce que vous dites sera retenu contre vous