WI: China was never communist or the kouomingtang won?

kernals12

Banned
How do you know that there would be rapid economic growth? Again, the small scale of Taiwan and the fact that it allowed moderate amounts of US economic aid go a long way make extrapolating from Taiwan's economic growth questionable.
US foreign aid is not nearly as big as you think it is, and a lot of it was swallowed up by defense. Taiwan's economy took off because government policies provided a stable platform for investment. The Taiwanese also had extremely high savings rates which provided a massive amount of capital.
 
US foreign aid is not nearly as big as you think it is, and a lot of it was swallowed up by defense. Taiwan's economy took off because government policies provided a stable platform for investment. The Taiwanese also had extremely high savings rates which provided a massive amount of capital.

Also, countries tend to have fairly rapid economic growth within a few years of a war's ending. After all, the only way is up. Just repairing all the damage the war done is going to provide years of economic growth. It might take a decade or more for it to be all repaired but in the short run, people will be comparing it with the immediate past, not its pre-war condition.
 
One thing to remember is that one reason the KMT undertook economic reforms on Taiwan is that the loss of the Mainland had led it to re-evaluate its policies. If it hadn't lost the mainland, the temptation to continue doing things in the same old way would be considerable..
 
One thing to remember is that one reason the KMT undertook economic reforms on Taiwan is that the loss of the Mainland had led it to re-evaluate its policies. If it hadn't lost the mainland, the temptation to continue doing things in the same old way would be considerable..

Obviously, a KMT-China will depend heavily on how it won the civil war.

OTL, KTM-Taiwan did many reforms that the KMT had envisioned for China, not so much simply because of a re-evaluation of policy, but because the cliques in China effectively blocked things like land reform. A major reason for land reform in Taiwan was simply that the KMT was in control of Taiwan. (of course, this sentence is only true, if one equates the KMT in China with what ended up in Taiwan).

Also, KMT-Taiwan was hardly a model government. Highly militaristic with a wasteful 5+% GDP on the army, a leader whose vision of grandeur literally is to conquer China and a somewhat corrupt system (KMT is known as "the richest party in Asia" controlling numerous companies worth est. USDbn 40). And yet, despite this KMT-Taiwan moved from a Congo/Zaire level of wealth in the 1950s to a Japan/Western EU-level now.

But still, in order for a victorious KMT or another victorious clique for that matter to accelerate atl-China's growth, all they literally need to do is to avoid batshit crazy Mao-stuff, like "hey, let's kill all the birds, that will have no effect on the ecosystem" or "hey, let's empty all the universities and send out graduates to work as field hands, that will improve overall progress and happiness" (知識青年), or "hey, Gulags are a great idea, let's lock up 50 million dissents".
 
But still, in order for a victorious KMT or another victorious clique for that matter to accelerate atl-China's growth, all they literally need to do is to avoid batshit crazy Mao-stuff, like "hey, let's kill all the birds, that will have no effect on the ecosystem" or "hey, let's empty all the universities and send out graduates to work as field hands, that will improve overall progress and happiness" (知識青年), or "hey, Gulags are a great idea, let's lock up 50 million dissents".

Not just that, but I think that the GMD itself would need to undergo some major reform - including, among other things, forcing Jiang into retirement. That way the GMD won't be tempted to return to the old ways - OK, not completely, but then again the Party of Revolutionary Institutions (PRI, Partido Revolucionario Institucional) was no different in their governance of Mexico for a long time during the bad old days. Indeed, once Jiang is taken out of the picture (with all due respect), all the pieces are in place for a similar Mexico parallel in China. It won't be exact and the process will be painful, but it could be useful for comparative analysis.
 
Not just that, but I think that the GMD itself would need to undergo some major reform - including, among other things, forcing Jiang into retirement. That way the GMD won't be tempted to return to the old ways - OK, not completely, but then again the Party of Revolutionary Institutions (PRI, Partido Revolucionario Institucional) was no different in their governance of Mexico for a long time during the bad old days. Indeed, once Jiang is taken out of the picture (with all due respect), all the pieces are in place for a similar Mexico parallel in China. It won't be exact and the process will be painful, but it could be useful for comparative analysis.

Does anyone have a recommendation for a good biography of Jiang, btw? I've read a few Mao biographies, but I'd like to branch out to broaden my understanding.
 
Mao won control over mainland China in 1949. What if he did not?
I think Asia and the world would be a much better place. Chang Kai Shek was willing to "live and let live" as long as he personally was enriched. Mao's mad utopian schemes, like Stalin's, resulted in the death of millions and tore much of the continent apart. Utopian and visionary schemes have that very negative effect.
 
Of course since the question is "What if China was never communist" a good way to avoid that is to avoid the Warlord period entirely. Which in my head has 3 different results.

1.) What if the Xinhai Revolution lead to another Dynasty ousting the Qing but in a constitutional monarchy fashion ala the UK? No idea how unlikely this is.
2.) No chinese revolution, the Qing stay in power.
3.) Yun Shanki decides not to crown himself emperor and avoids fracturing the country. Perhaps Sun Yat Sen is President longer or someone else takes over.

Curious what the effects from these 3 scenarios to the question would be.
 
1.) What if the Xinhai Revolution lead to another Dynasty ousting the Qing but in a constitutional monarchy fashion ala the UK? No idea how unlikely this is.
There is actually a really detailed TL about this which has since been published as a Sealion Press book (With Iron and Fire, or Superpower China).
 
3.) Yun Shanki decides not to crown himself emperor and avoids fracturing the country. Perhaps Sun Yat Sen is President longer or someone else takes over.
I think this would be pretty interesting. I think its pretty rare for China to be a Republic and not be more or less like OTL or even worse.
 
Why would kmt china get more growth than otl?

- It would have access to US recovery aid after WW2
- It would have access to US and European markets after WW2
- It would be unlikely to engage in the economic disaster that was the Great Leap Forward, as well as the economic costs of other instances of mass deaths from economic mismanagement. Even in the case of bad policies by the KMT, the US would be there to at least send food.

So, even if China does’t grow as fast after the 80s, they’ve got such a head start over the historical Red China that they can afford slower growth. Which isn’t a given.
 
and why wouldn't KMT china go hard on the red tape/protectionism/using parastatals like other third world countries of the time?
 
and why wouldn't KMT china go hard on the red tape/protectionism/using parastatals like other third world countries of the time?

They might very well, and it would be a detriment to their economic growth. Of course, red tape and tariffs and state owned enterprises are not mutually exclusive with trade with the US, while relations between 1950-1970 were absolutely mutually exclusive with such trade.
 
Would the nationalists implement a one child policy like the communists did? If not Chinas population would be around 1.8B today instead of 1.4B

It'd be a corrupt technocratic oligarchy. Probably still bans winnie the pooh references online.

THe big differences would be 1) no one-child policy 2) China as a source of immigration for the west/other places from the 50s instead of wha,t the 1980s and 1990s
The one child policy really depends on wether the KMT leaders decide that The Population Bomb is a good book. India also had population control measures IOTL, so it isn’t out of the realm of plausibility that the KMT decides to control population growth.

I think it'd grow as much as OTL, but the difference is it doesn't have to dig out from various communist FAIL. KMT China would be bureaucratic, highly protectionist and deeply corrupt but a crippled market economy works better than trying to centrally plan everything. Probably also taking 10-20 years longer to stop malnutrition being a problem en masse for this reason too, so that'd set things back.

So yeah, same GDP/development per capita as OTL China in 2019, but likely significantly slower growth rates than OTL because of the stuff mentioned above.
This.

Either China becomes dependent on America or it’s just OTL in the modern day with a flag change. Taiwan can’t be used as a model just due to the fact that the Nationalists were able to shed the worst parts of the warlords, infighting and corruption that had plagued them on the mainland as they fled to Taiwan. They’ll probably have to be aligned with the US just due to the fact that they’ll probably continue to have issues with a communist insurgency long after the Chinese Civil War officially ends and they’ll need the aid that would continue to prop up their government.

In regards to the economy, the rapid growth of the Chinese economy is due to the specific attitude that the Americans had towards China at the time of the economic liberalization in the PRC. And earlier growth may be strangled in its crib by a more protectionist US as it did with Japan. As bad as Mao was, he was able to solidify and centralize the control of the nation in a way that the KMT would just have been unable/unwilling to do. As an example, India, despite not having a massively disastrous government policy like the Great Leap Forward or the Cultural Revolution, is in a worse place economically compared to the PRC, despite both of them starting in a comparable situation and India arguably having greater advantages.
 
The one child policy really depends on wether the KMT leaders decide that The Population Bomb is a good book. India also had population control measures IOTL, so it isn’t out of the realm of plausibility that the KMT decides to control population growth.


This.

Either China becomes dependent on America or it’s just OTL in the modern day with a flag change. Taiwan can’t be used as a model just due to the fact that the Nationalists were able to shed the worst parts of the warlords, infighting and corruption that had plagued them on the mainland as they fled to Taiwan. They’ll probably have to be aligned with the US just due to the fact that they’ll probably continue to have issues with a communist insurgency long after the Chinese Civil War officially ends and they’ll need the aid that would continue to prop up their government.

In regards to the economy, the rapid growth of the Chinese economy is due to the specific attitude that the Americans had towards China at the time of the economic liberalization in the PRC. And earlier growth may be strangled in its crib by a more protectionist US as it did with Japan. As bad as Mao was, he was able to solidify and centralize the control of the nation in a way that the KMT would just have been unable/unwilling to do. As an example, India, despite not having a massively disastrous government policy like the Great Leap Forward or the Cultural Revolution, is in a worse place economically compared to the PRC, despite both of them starting in a comparable situation and India arguably having greater advantages.

India reformed later and was almost as over-regulated as China. It's economy was just short of being Socialist itself. China started reforming in 1978 while India started reforming in in 1991. IOW, it had a 13 year lead on India.
 

kernals12

Banned
India reformed later and was almost as over-regulated as China. It's economy was just short of being Socialist itself. China started reforming in 1978 while India started reforming in in 1991. IOW, it had a 13 year lead on India.
I call BS on India having communist levels of economic control.
 
One thing that people must keep in mind about Taiwan is that it was already one of the most developped region of China because it was part of Japan, the Japanese built a strong infrastructure network and an efficient agriculture system. Iirc Taiwan was 70% wealthier than the mainland average in the 30s

In the same way that Manchuria had a strong infrastructure and industrial base thanks to Japanese investment, this industrial base that would help the communist from taking China and would be one of the leading region for mao’s heavy industry program.
 
Never heard of the Licence Raj, Mahalanobis, or the "Hindu rate of growth" trope?

Yep. if it wasn't quite as centrally controlled as China the hoops you had to jump through to start a business was insane, there was also included central planning via five year plans and it practiced autarky. India was pretty socialist before 1991. It was a democracy but it had strong socialist tendencies. Economically it reminds me of Italian Fascism.
 
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