NC: Do you think that egalitarianism has lost some of its appeal after more than 30 years of reform?
ZW: The situation has changed a lot over the years. A planned economy produces a society entirely based on an official hierarchy. Reform and Opening-up gave legitimacy to the private possession of wealth, and material capital began to gain social power.
The shift of power from the bureaucracy to capital is a form of progress. There is no such thing as a perfect system for a society. In a “capital centered” society, you can enjoy anything you can afford, while in an “official centered” society you have to hold a bureaucratic position to access anything at all. I agree with [economist] Friedrich August Hayek, who argued that a society in which wealth is the way to social status is better than a society in which social status is the way to wealth. Wealth should not be created either in the process of attaining power, or once one has obtained power. But this is what happens in China.