China BriefingIs capital evil? China’s widening crackdown has the ring of a bygone era defined by Mao and Marx

Beijing’s warning against ‘colluding with capital’ sounds vague but is likely significant – and a sign its campaign targeting the private sector is about to widen

China has good reasons to scale back excesses but its methods have fuelled leftist hype, prompting concerns it is abandoning the principles behind its economic success

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Since Xi Jinping became China’s top leader in late 2012, he has strengthened ideological controls at all levels of society. Photo: AP

Published: 9:30am, 29 Jan 2022

Is capital evil?

That question is at the heart of a debate that has been simmering ever since late 2020 when the Chinese leadership first warned against the “disorderly expansion of capital”, heralding waves of intense regulatory actions targeting sectors from tech to property to gaming to private education.

Now the debate is set to ratchet up a notch. On Wednesday, the Chinese government introduced even more ominous lingo into the public discourse by accusing a former high-ranking official of “colluding with capital and backing disorderly expansion of capital”.

That is the most eye-catching of a slew of corruption allegations China’s top anti-graft agency, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), has made against Zhou Jiangyong, once a political rising star and former party secretary of Hangzhou, capital city of Zhejiang province. Other charges include the more standard fare of trading power for a large amount of money and gifts, benefiting not only him but his relatives.