My personal views? No problem. I am a hard-core Castroist. I don't have objections to NEP-type measures in themselves. Only a purist would object. What I do object to is the virtual lack of socialist ideology among the Chinese Communist leaders. When Cuba permitted foreign investment, Castro explained why it was necessary. During the entire time foreign capital has been operating in Cuba, there has been no ideological concession to capitalism itself. Nobody in the Cuban Communist leadership thinks that some sort of Hayekian principle invalidates central planning. They are committed to central planning and state ownership, but are too militarily and economically isolated to maintain the hard-line of the 1960s.
They used to call Guevara a Maoist, which was not really true. What seems to have happened in China is that ultraleft policies exemplified by the Cultural Revolution backfired disastrously. In the brutal aftermath, reformism became seductive. There is a precedence for this. Stalin lurched this way and that way during his decades-long rule in the USSR, except in his case you had a mirror image of China's evolution. Bukharin and Stalin told the peasants to enrich themselves (a mistake) and when things got out of hand, Stalin liquidated the kulaks in a Cultural Revolution type paroxysm.
For Marxism to be effective, there are two things that are necessary. Thought must not be impeded by preexisting ideological guidelines. This was never true in China. The ranks and the leaders of the Communist Party vied with each other as to how slavishly they could follow Mao's thoughts. The Bolshevik Party never functioned this way. When Bukharin disagreed with Lenin, he said so publicly and vociferously.
There is leftist discontent in China today, but it has no formal and legal expression. An old friend Bob Weil has written an interesting book for Monthly Review called "White Cat, Red Cat." Although Bob shares a fondness for Mao with the old-timers at MR--including Bill Hinton--that is not quite my cup of tea, I can still recommend the book strongly. From the conclusion:
....there can be no generalized democratic control by the masses under "market socialism" in its present form, and popular efforts to realize it will most likely be suppressed. To reclaim their role of active participation in running the society, the Chinese people will thus have to rethink the policies of the recent era, and come to terms with the realization that marketization and mass power are ultimately incompatible. Participatory democracy can only be realized if the Chinese once again find a way to engage in class struggle and the "right to rebel" against their oppressors and exploiters at all social levels, with the goal of constantly renewing the socialism won by their revolution. This will require new ideas and methods, fitting the present situation in China and the world, not a simple return to the past.
It is precisely such contradictions and choices which Deng Xiaoping tried to avoid with his assertion that "white cat, black cat, if it catches mice it is a good cat." By this he meant that the means are irrelevant, if they serve positive ends, and that China should concentrate on developing without questioning how. For a while, this ideological program "worked," as the Chinese pursued new possibilities for wealth, and no one can begrudge them their desire for a better and more comfortable life. But it does make a difference which "color cat" catches the "mouse" of development. "Red cats" often "play with their prey," puffing other values before that of pure "material consumption." In the process, sometimes the mouse even gets away, leaving the cat hungry. "White cats" are known to forego any such "foolishness." They pounce quickly, and gobble down their dinner, with thoughts only of "getting fat before others." But in their haste and greed, they are left with a severe case of indigestion, and they may even throw up their meal half-eaten. Such "internal contradictions" leave white cats looking better fed, but in the long run, they are more sickly than their red fellows. Fifteen years ago many Chinese grew impatient with "playing with the mouse," which had left them exhausted, and at times even hungry. With growing fervor, they embraced the goals of "white catism," and with the ideological reassurance that "to get fat is glorious," they have eagerly gobbled up all the mice in their reach ever since. But today they are starting to feel an aching in their guts, and the memory of their sleek youth now haunts them when they look in the mirror. "Older" and wiser, and still hurting from the battles of the past, they neither can nor will return to the foolishness in which they once engaged.
Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)