Do you think democracy can actually work in China?

[politicus]

An important difference between China and India is that China is 92% Han Chinese and not very religious, which means ethnic and religious parties are unlikely to be important at the national level. There is no inherent reason mainland China shouldn't be able to become as democratic as Taiwan or South Korea (neither perfect democracies, but free societies). None of which had any democratic tradition prior to the democratization process in recent decades.

[politicus]

Yes, eventually, as well as it can work anywhere. The idea that there are Certain Cultures where folks Just Can't Rule Themselves, as something that renders democracy somehow permanently unworkable always and forever rather than just making it difficult to get off the ground, strikes me as inherently racist.

Liberal Democracy likely can not work in very ethnically divided countries without some common cultural denominators creating an overarching loyalty. You need to get past the tribal/clan based loyalties and that is next to impossible in some societies. But democracy can be established in other forms than the Western liberal version. A federation of clans or tribes could also be a democracy.

I would have made the exact same point, except in a more hyperbolic and dismissive tone.

Tempted to put this in the Simple Truths mine

[politicus]

Yes, I think it will. It will also be 'interesting' to see how a democratic China acts in the world.

It has a very nationalist middle class, so probably at least as aggressive and selfish as now at first, but it would likely moderate more in the long run as the political culture matured in China.

[politicus]

Yes, I think it will. It will also be 'interesting' to see how a democratic China acts in the world.

It has a very nationalist middle class, so probably at least as aggressive and selfish as now at first, but it will likely moderate more in the long run as the political culture matures in China.

"Will" rather than "would"?  Do you actually see China transitioning to democracy any time soon?  I'm certainly in the camp that says that China could "handle" democracy as well as anyone, and that there's nothing particular about the culture that stands in the way, but how exactly would the current regime be deposed?

I am not an Anglophone, do not read too much into what tense I use.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

Liberal Democracy likely can not work in very ethnically divided countries without some common cultural denominators creating an overarching loyalty. You need to get past the tribal/clan based loyalties and that is next to impossible in some societies. But democracy can be established in other forms than the Western liberal version. A federation of clans or tribes could also be a democracy.

Well, I assume a democratic China would have strong ethnic separatist parties in regions like Xinjiang and Tibet.

I wonder what a Chinese election map would look like?

Yes, but that would be rather inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. 92% Han Chinese is the important thing.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

Only a handful countries have had a long democratic tradition, that's not a problem. And fracturing hasn't destroyed India which has never been unified for long until now while China has been unified for most of its history so that isn't a problem either. However if the CPC remains unified after a democracy is established I could see them becoming a catch-all party which keeps China a single-party state, and it wouldn't be a liberal democracy. What would be interesting would be how a CPC split what look like if it happened.

A party as heterogenous as CPC would split up if they lost power. It ranges from Conservative Nationalists to genuine Maoists. There is no way to keep that together for long in a multiparty scenario.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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

[politicus]

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%.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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.

[politicus]

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.

Well, as a North European yourself, you do not seem to view your own position as very relevant either

BTW, I am Mexican

Though, when I lived in Spain, I remember people their saying "in Europe" when they meant "north of the Pirinees. I guess, you should have excluded Spain from "Western Europe" as well. Then, again, hard to be further "West".

Many Northern Europeans use Central Europe as a category, so I am not sure what you mean.

The Western/Central/Eastern division of Europe is logical, not some local idiosyncrasy as some Spanish, British and Scandinavians talking about "Europe" as something outside their own region.

Your view of Europe is clearly determined by having grown up in Russia and not by your current status as a Mexican.

Anyway, if you use the cold war division line Austria-Hungary would be an overwhelmingly Eastern European country, despite its capital being in the West (which shows how artificial that division is from a cultural POV).