Do you think democracy can actually work in China?
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  Do you think democracy can actually work in China?
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Poll
Question: Democracy in China?
#1
Yes, it will eventually work out
 
#2
Yes, but not as well as one-party rule
 
#3
No, it will destroy the country
 
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Partisan results

Total Voters: 49

Author Topic: Do you think democracy can actually work in China?  (Read 4983 times)
Boston Bread
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« Reply #25 on: January 25, 2015, 04:15:46 PM »
« edited: January 25, 2015, 04:40:21 PM by New Canadaland »

That scenario would eventually lead to a more liberal democracy; I can imagine gradual change in China easier than I can imagine a revolution.

Monarchism is dead in China, my impression is that the last dynasty is considered too foreign and they did a rather poor job in their last century in power. In a multi-party system there would be a KMT analogue, but they would not call or associate themselves with the KMT because their most powerful members will come from former CPC operatives.
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Famous Mortimer
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« Reply #26 on: January 25, 2015, 05:14:32 PM »

I assume it would work because probably 70% of the population would keep voting for the CCP.
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andrew_c
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« Reply #27 on: January 25, 2015, 07:22:16 PM »

Yes, it would work, but the Communists would have enough electoral strength to stay in power for a long time.
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politicus
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« Reply #28 on: January 26, 2015, 04:51:27 AM »
« Edited: January 26, 2015, 04:55:29 AM by Charlotte Hebdo »

Yes, it would work, but the Communists would have enough electoral strength to stay in power for a long time.

I assume it would work because probably 70% of the population would keep voting for the CCP.

Again, the chance of the something as heterogeneous and internally divided as CPC staying together for decades past the establishment of multiparty democracy is not realistic.

It is not INC, LDP or PRI we are talking about, there are a very wide ideological gap from left to right and combined with different regional interests that will cause a breakup of the behemoth.

In a multi-party system there would be a KMT analogue, but they would not call or associate themselves with the KMT because their most powerful members will come from former CPC operatives.

The strongest wing of CPC would function as a KMT style conservative, pro-capitalist, dirigist, nationalist party.
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politicus
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« Reply #29 on: January 26, 2015, 05:05:50 AM »

A couple of the eight institutionalized "supplementary parties" may  be a able to develop on their own in a multiparty system:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_political_parties_in_the_People%27s_Republic_of_China
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Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese
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« Reply #30 on: January 26, 2015, 05:27:28 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #31 on: January 26, 2015, 01:51:47 PM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Indeed. The circumstances of the establishment of democracy and then (often) how the first democratic rulers act in power are more important (often) than any 'democratic tradition'. Post-Soviet democracy didn't fail in Russia because Russia lacks a democratic tradition (even though it does), for instance...
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politicus
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« Reply #32 on: January 27, 2015, 12:28:45 AM »

I imagine a democratic China would look like a lot of countries - a sprawling dirigiste conservative party that runs things and a liberal opposition who occasionally try to run things

There are three main tendencies ideologically in CPC.

Maoists, Centrists ("Social Democrats") and Conservative Nationalists. A democratic China would have a viable Maoist party and its main opposition party would be more leftist (=statist) than the ones in South Korea and Japan.

Sure, there are Maoists in the communist party, but I don't know if anything beyond ceremonial Maoism will have any resonance in an increasingly urbanized, middle-class-oriented society that the Chinese are building

China is a very divided society with enormous inequality.

So is the US, but you don't see any Maoists

Large parts of China still has a third world living standard and even in the more developed parts there are pockets of rural poverty. There are also more than a hundred million floating workers with no rights and massive poverty problems in the cities. China is not on its way to become a nation of affluent middle class urbanites any time soon.

Add to that a Communist tradition and there would be a potential for a neo-Maoist party based on parts of the CPC doing quite well. I could see them polling something like 20%.
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« Reply #33 on: January 27, 2015, 01:24:44 AM »

Btw- Of course, I voted option 1, but it's not clear that anything "will" happen. Democracy could work well in China but it never will because the CPC will never allow it wasn't an option. This is what all the analysis misses. Over the past decade they have become steadily more repressive. The current president, Xi Jinping, seems to have no policy agenda at all except for consolidating his own power and picking fights with as many neighbors as possible over the most tiny and inconsequential disputes one can imagine. (He has allowed Li Keqiang to tinker around the edges in his shadow, but not do anything truly significant, and even that only at a snail's pace). The Chinese people are in a catch-22 situation. If the economy does well, then the CPC becomes more confident in its own indispensability and repression. If the economy doesn't do well, then they (of whom many millions are still in poverty a politicus points out) suffer. Either way, it's a lose.
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« Reply #34 on: January 27, 2015, 01:26:11 AM »

Eventually.
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Ashbringer
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« Reply #35 on: January 27, 2015, 10:03:40 AM »

China will follow Taïwan: a dictatorship becoming a democracy
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ag
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« Reply #36 on: January 27, 2015, 09:07:26 PM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.
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TheDeadFlagBlues
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« Reply #37 on: January 27, 2015, 09:10:02 PM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.
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Famous Mortimer
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« Reply #38 on: January 27, 2015, 10:31:04 PM »

Does China have universal elementary and secondary education? That's basically the same question.
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ag
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« Reply #39 on: January 27, 2015, 11:05:52 PM »

Does China have universal elementary and secondary education? That's basically the same question.

India does not.

So, it is not the same question.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #40 on: January 27, 2015, 11:33:41 PM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).

Anyway the question is absurd. Of course it would 'work', the question is whether there is a significant number of Chinese who don't want to do so for whatever reason.
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politicus
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« Reply #41 on: January 28, 2015, 01:21:44 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).


To most non-historians/historically interested "100 years ago" is just a way of saying "long time ago", but it still hurts the eyes to read it.
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ag
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« Reply #42 on: January 28, 2015, 01:25:34 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).



To most non-historians/historically interested "100 years ago" is just a way of saying "long time ago", but it still hurts the eyes to read it.

Well, you could argue that even in 1915 the "democracy" in Spain, Austria-Hungary, or even Germany, etc., etc., was, at best, very imperfectly established.
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politicus
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« Reply #43 on: January 28, 2015, 01:41:46 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).



To most non-historians/historically interested "100 years ago" is just a way of saying "long time ago", but it still hurts the eyes to read it.

Well, you could argue that even in 1915 the "democracy" in Spain, Austria-Hungary, or even Germany, etc., etc., was, at best, very imperfectly established.


Austria-Hungary was not Western Europe.

I admit that how you define Western and Eastern Europe and whether you consider Central Europe (Mitteleuropa) to be a separate region (I do) influences the answer quite a bit.
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MaxQue
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« Reply #44 on: January 28, 2015, 02:22:47 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).



To most non-historians/historically interested "100 years ago" is just a way of saying "long time ago", but it still hurts the eyes to read it.

Well, you could argue that even in 1915 the "democracy" in Spain, Austria-Hungary, or even Germany, etc., etc., was, at best, very imperfectly established.


Austria-Hungary was not Western Europe.

I admit that how you define Western and Eastern Europe and whether you consider Central Europe (Mitteleuropa) to be a separate region (I do) influences the answer quite a bit.


The mainstream view in North America is to split Europe in two: West and East, corresponding on which side they were during Cold War.
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politicus
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« Reply #45 on: January 28, 2015, 02:34:44 AM »

The idea that China would not work as a democracy simply because they have no "democratic tradition" is one of the most ridiculous things I've read on this forum... guess what neither did most of Western Europe 100 years ago.

Actually that's not true (but would be true of a lot of other places which are now democratic).



To most non-historians/historically interested "100 years ago" is just a way of saying "long time ago", but it still hurts the eyes to read it.

Well, you could argue that even in 1915 the "democracy" in Spain, Austria-Hungary, or even Germany, etc., etc., was, at best, very imperfectly established.


Austria-Hungary was not Western Europe.

I admit that how you define Western and Eastern Europe and whether you consider Central Europe (Mitteleuropa) to be a separate region (I do) influences the answer quite a bit.


The mainstream view in North America is to split Europe in two: West and East, corresponding on which side they were during Cold War.

Yeah, but the claim was made by a Swede and quoted by a Russian, so that is hardly relevant.
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #46 on: January 28, 2015, 11:50:15 AM »

Well there were (at least nominally) representative assemblies in most of Europe (East as well as West; even the Russian Empire had the Duma) a century ago... but most countries fell well short of what we would call 'democracy' today (but not always for the same reasons).
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angus
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« Reply #47 on: January 28, 2015, 12:04:55 PM »

The mainstream view in North America is to split Europe in two: West and East, corresponding on which side they were during Cold War.

In the long run, that was only a short-lived phenomenon.  American articles written prior to about 1948 and after about 1992 referenced a "Central" Europe.  I would assume that a similar trend holds for Swedes and Russians.  Also, Poland has long had a democratic tradition.

Anyway, I voted for the second option, but that's not quite it either.  I think democracy might work there, but why in the hell would they want it?  Most Chinese I talk to don't seem to value it, and they certainly have gotten on very well for 40 centuries without it.  China is usually the richest nation in the world.  It was sixteen hundred years ago, it was six hundred years ago, and it is likely to be again within my lifetime the nation with the largest aggregate gdp.  At the height of the Roman Empire, under Marcus Aurelius circa AD180, then Han and Roman empires had roughly the same number of square miles and the same number of peoples.  Rome fell apart; the Han kept it together.  The largest city in the world is in China.  The most populous nation is China.  The language which has more native speakers than any other is China.  They are about as successful a nation as I can imagine.  The country that invented democracy, on the other hand, can't seem to get its head out of its ass.  It still boggles the mind that we have so many threads encouraging Western democracy in such a nation as China.
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politicus
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« Reply #48 on: January 28, 2015, 01:17:27 PM »
« Edited: January 28, 2015, 01:29:17 PM by Charlotte Hebdo »

The mainstream view in North America is to split Europe in two: West and East, corresponding on which side they were during Cold War.

In the long run, that was only a short-lived phenomenon.  American articles written prior to about 1948 and after about 1992 referenced a "Central" Europe.  I would assume that a similar trend holds for Swedes and Russians.  Also, Poland has long had a democratic tradition.

Anyway, I voted for the second option, but that's not quite it either.  I think democracy might work there, but why in the hell would they want it?  Most Chinese I talk to don't seem to value it, and they certainly have gotten on very well for 40 centuries without it.  China is usually the richest nation in the world.  It was sixteen hundred years ago, it was six hundred years ago, and it is likely to be again within my lifetime the nation with the largest aggregate gdp.  At the height of the Roman Empire, under Marcus Aurelius circa AD180, then Han and Roman empires had roughly the same number of square miles and the same number of peoples.  Rome fell apart; the Han kept it together.  The largest city in the world is in China.  The most populous nation is China.  The language which has more native speakers than any other is China.  They are about as successful a nation as I can imagine.  The country that invented democracy, on the other hand, can't seem to get its head out of its ass.  It still boggles the mind that we have so many threads encouraging Western democracy in such a nation as China.


1) China's older history is not relevant in this context since democracy is a modern phenomenon. Germany did allright economically without democracy as well. Multiple other countries did, but it is irrelevant in an assessment of whether they need democracy since the purpose of democracy is not to be successful or efficient, but to achieve justice and fairness.

2) The idea that the Chinese do not want freedom and self determination for cultural reasons is hard to sustain since they haven't experienced it - generally when you taste freedom you want more. The general individualisation will affect China as well. When the broad masses reach a certain level of education and enlightenment people want a say in how their government is run. That is not a Western phenomenon, but a modern one. There is a tendency to say certain things are "Westen values" when in reality they are products of modernity and only more prevalent in Western societies because we are more thoroughly modernized than other cultures.

3) Being economically successful is not all that matters. The amount of abuse of power is enormous in China, the lack of any rule of law, the pollution problems and corruption are all things that can to a certain degree be kept in check by democracy. Redistribution of resources also necessitates a way for the poor to force the rich and powerful to share, which democracy provides. Democracy is not important as a tool for growth, but as a vehicle for justice and fairness.

4) You are the one saying Western democracy. The OP does not talk about Western or liberal democracy. Just democracy.
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politicus
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« Reply #49 on: January 28, 2015, 01:19:00 PM »
« Edited: January 28, 2015, 01:23:10 PM by Charlotte Hebdo »

Well there were (at least nominally) representative assemblies in most of Europe (East as well as West; even the Russian Empire had the Duma) a century ago... but most countries fell well short of what we would call 'democracy' today (but not always for the same reasons).

A democratic tradition does not necessarily mean that there is a fully fledged democracy, just that the idea and ideal of democracy is widespread.
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