Podcast Episode
Tom Carothers, a top democracy scholar with deep ties in Hungary, joins Jon Bateman on a special episode of The World Unpacked.
Jon Bateman, Thomas Carothers
Podcast Episode
Party-State Capitalism: China’s Communist Party and Rule by Market
Isaac Kardon sits down with Dr. Meg Rithmire to explore the Chinese Communist Party’s complex relationship with capitalism. Rithmire explains how markets have become useful tools of governance, and meanwhile have generated instability that party-state leadership abhors, seeking political control over private entrepreneurs.
Published on Jun 19, 2025
How should we understand China’s unique variety of party-state capitalism? In this episode of The World Unpacked, Isaac Kardon sits down with Dr. Meg Rithmire, a renowned scholar of political economy in China and the James E. Robison Professor at Harvard Business School, to discuss how capitalism functions in a party-state that tries to maintain “rule by market” without ceding too much control to private capital. Their discussion is based on Dr. Rithmire’s chapter in a new volume released from Carnegie called The Life of the Party: Past and Present Constraints on the Future of the Chinese Communist Party. They explore how private capitalists have been important to China’s economy since the 1950s, and how China attempts to exert control over companies to ensure that their activities serve party-state objectives, like Made in China 2025.
Notes:
- Yvonne Chiu, Isaac B. Kardon, Jason M. Kelly, “The Life of the Party: Past and Present Constraints on the Future of the Chinese Communist Party,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 9, 2025.
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
More Work from The World Unpacked
- Why Orbán Lost and What Happens Next
- Inside the Hidden World of Think TanksPodcast Episode
Tino Cuellar is president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a premiere foreign policy think tank. He joins host Jon Bateman on The World Unpacked to pull back the curtain on this hidden world.
Jon Bateman, Mariano-Florentino (Tino) Cuéllar
- What Trump Really Wants From ChinaPodcast Episode
Ali Wyne joins Jon Bateman on The World Unpacked to explain why Beijing hasn’t saved Iran; what Washington’s bipartisan “consensus” on China still misses; and how Trump should negotiate when he finally sits down with Xi Jinping.
Jon Bateman, Ali Wyne
- Inside the Pentagon’s AI War MachinePodcast Episode
In this episode of The World Unpacked, Katrina tells host Jon Bateman about the creation of America’s AI war machine, the rise of Palantir, and the fully autonomous weapons already being tested.
Jon Bateman, Katrina Manson
- Did Trump Kill International Law – Or Was It Already Dead?Podcast Episode
The Iran War marks the second time in two months that Donald Trump decapitated a country without real legal justification. But is this any different from the many times that past U.S. presidents—and other great powers—have violated international law?
Jon Bateman, Oona A. Hathaway
