I've watched the book launch on Gabriel Rockhill's Critical Theory Workshop channel and I do remember him making some offhand remark about "stalinist bureaucracy" but I let it slide. Didn't expect it to be so bad.
I also noticed some other concerning matters in that interview:
- Torkil was very insistent on not calling China socialist, because he considers it a "transitional state" instead (as if that's not what a socialist state is).
- When pressed about his designation of China by an audience member, he asserts that "the basic difference between capitalism and socialism is the market" and "my definition of socialism is a system without market forces".
He reduces capitalism to the employer-emoloee relationship and therefore arrives at the conclusion that the way to go beyond capitalism is to just convert workplaces to worker co-ops.