ABSTRACT
The collapse of the Soviet bloc nations was taken by many as vindication of capitalism’s success, proof of socialism’s inevitable failure, and evidence for the desirability of a transition to capitalist institutions and practices as quickly as possible. For this view, China poses a problem, since the fastest growing economy in the 1990s is located in a Marxist fossil. This awkward situation can be explained away, though, by appealing to China’s reforms, and the vitality of markets and capitalist relations of production within the shell of the planned economy. Thus, it is still capitalism that accounts for dynamism and efficiency.
