Jonathan London (2013) Welfare and inequalities

'Nor should the progressiveness of Vietnamese or Chinese market-Leninism be over-stated. States in both countries combine Leninist tactics of political organisation with market-based strategies of accumulation and social policies that exhibit both redistributive and neo-liberal elements. Unequal forms of citizenship imposed under state-socialism are reproduced and transformed in a manner that preserves the political supremacy of the Communist Party, while creating new market-based opportunities and inequalities. Terms such as “market socialism” or “capitalism with Chinese/Vietnamese characteristics” are inadequate as descriptors of the welfare regimes in these countries. By contrast, the term “market-Leninism” rejects the widely held but false notion that planned or market economies have any inherent political character. The market-Leninist welfare regimes in Vietnam and China demonstrate that as a class-based determinant of distributive out-comes, Leninist political organisation is ultimately much more important than socialism per se, at least for now.'

Jonathan London (2013) Welfare regimes in China and Vietnam Link