I used to hold a kind of naive hope that the ham fisted Party would eventually be replaced with democracy. I remember back in 2011 my friends that were placed in moderately distinguished positions were sending their kids to Canada to collect foreign dual citizenship, fully expecting the collapse of the PRC in their lifetime.
But now I think the Party is too good at maintaining itself. It's augmented by technology like WeChat to know exactly what is going on across the whole country. Access to dissident conversations will make it even easier to tailor the kind of subtle propaganda they're getting very good at.
Will the PRC just continue to exist as it is, forever? My last remaining hope is for massive power grabs by xi jinping (already happening), followed by government ineptitude as he ages and underlings squabble, followed by chaos upon his death. Beyond that I can't see any way out.
Maybe there's a third option aside from continue the state quo or convert fully into a democracy? Maybe the party can evolve into something that's more and more benevolent to the people it governs?
As a Chinese who emigrated because of the many social problems of China, I'm not sure switching to democracy right now will be beneficial for regular Chinese. You've all heard stories about how bad mannered Chinese tourists are, but those are still somehow better than the average Chinese I'd say. Think about people who still eat shark fins today, who have no problem buying rhino horns or pangolin skins. (there are more extreme stuff, one example: https://www.animalsasia.org/intl/media/news/news-archive/fiv...). If you ever visited mainland China you probably noticed many public restrooms have no toilet paper. Some places tried to put toilet paper in but people would steal all of them right after.
I am not sure democracy can work with people like that. I fear it wont. I fear not enough educated/informed people will make democratic decisions that are harmful to themselves. I fear a democratic China will become the next Russia, the next Brazil, the next Turkey. At least the current party has done more poverty fighting than most of the third world democratic countries. (data available on world bank website)
Does China have problems? Absolutely. The question is if you really understand what are the problems, before we even start talking if the proposed solutions will work or not.
>Will the PRC just continue to exist as it is, forever? My last remaining hope is for massive power grabs by xi jinping (already happening), followed by government ineptitude as he ages and underlings squabble, followed by chaos upon his death. Beyond that I can't see any way out.
If that happens, is that a good thing? To you, or some Americans who see China as a foe, maybe. I doubt such a chaos is what the average Chinese wants.
I'm not saying Chinese culture is incompatible with democracy. I'm talking about eduction mainly. If you look into post WWII histories of Taiwan/South Korea, it wont be hard for you to find a few dictators within the democracies[1]. I personally think during those periods the citizens of those democracies were catching up on how democracy works.
Could not fantastic education provide an intelligent enough population to handle democracy within a single generation? I.e.... exactly what happened in Taiwan upon the removal of martial law?
The USA managed it swaths of the country spread across a frontier.
But you have to admit there are risks for the switching, i.e. there are countries that become worse after the switching. Personally, I dont think democracy is the cure to the current problems. Education probably is. And I haven't been presented with enough evidence to think otherwise.
Like, did Taiwan become drastic better after removal of martial laws? Or is Taiwan at a better position today mainly because of the help of U.S.? Is there any other third world democratic countries that have developed as fast or faster than China, who is NOT a U.S. ally?
How would education help under the current regime? Xi jinping isn't going anywhere until he dies, and Party members aren't elected (well some kinda are).
What good does education do if it doesn't drive government changes? What changes would the PRC allow at all?
Which democracy are you thinking of that 'became worse after switching'? I can't think of any, though I can think of a few countries that mostly botched the switch and ended up in a sort of pseudo-democracy.
China is commuting mass genocide against the Uighur people, has a surveillance state beyond that of any other nation, it is clearly intending on annexing Taiwan in 5 years whether Taiwan likes it or not, massacred protestors in Tiananmen Square, has a dictator for life, and it didn’t need a democracy or populism to achieve any of that.
Yes. A democratic China would be better for the world.
We have a competent Chinese Trump today in the form of xi jinping - the difference being instead of being limited to merely separating children the children of Other from their Parents and throwing them in jail, Jinping is directing the wholesale imprisonment and "reeducation" of entire religions, and occasionally just taking their organs from them.
I'll take a democratically elected trump that is gone in at most 8 years over the now irremovable xi jinping.
So yes, democracy is unilaterally the better option for China.
have you talked to any Chinese people and how many of them oppose this reeducation of entire religions? I'm just curious whether that will still happen in your planned democratic China.
Could be argued that anyone who watches propaganda on Chinese TV daily isn't particularly fit to have that discussion.
It's not like in the West where people are critical of this kind of stuff. They've really excelled at developing a "hive mind" mentality with what the state media put out.
In a democratic China the Uighurs will have representatives. If they don't, it's not democratic yet.
Ask other democratic nations if they can get away with voting for systematic oppression of a people via a vote.
Historically, decentralizing power (i.e. via democracy) leads to less shittiness for more people.
In any case, what possible reason would the average Chinese person have to systematically oppress the Uighurs or falun gong? They're only oppressed now because their religion poses a threat to the cultural control the Party exerts over the people. In a democracy, that control vanishes.
>In any case, what possible reason would the average Chinese person have to systematically oppress the Uighurs or falun gong?
This question is crucial to indicate that you have no idea about ordinary Chinese people. You need to sit down with some Chinese to talk about it if you are really interested. So I encourage you to find some first gen immigrant from mainland China currently living in SFBA. It wont be hard to find them. I can even direct you to relevant social media sites if you like.
> Maybe there's a third option aside from continue the state quo or convert fully into a democracy? Maybe the party can evolve into something that's more and more benevolent to the people it governs?
As one raised in a democracy (the UK) and thankful for that, taking a big step back I don't know if democracy is a more stable system than others. Or even better in terms of long-term results. I wonder if our democracy is mainly the result of cheap energy which removed the hardscrabble existence of our ancestors and will go when cheap energy finishes (if we don't pull our socks up).
It's a contentious point, I'm not sure it's right, and I'm not punting for china. Just raising a question.
NB my father was born and raised in a military country with an oppressive government. Hearing some stories from him is why I know how fortunate I am.
Democracy will never be as stable as a regime or dictator, but it can also survive a lot more chaos and instability while still protecting the rights of its people.
A stable system does not mean a robust one. A tea cup on a counter is stable, but easily broken. A spinning top is not very stable but can survive most falls.
> Democracy will never be as stable as a regime or dictator
Why never? While I'm not arguing that democracies are inherently super stable (that's empirically false), I don't think that democracies are inherently less stable than dictatorships.
I would think an system that peacefully transitions power with the consent of the governed on a regular basis would typically be more stable than a system where the transition of power is generally a once in a lifetime event dependent on whomever holds the most power in government during the transition.
I can understand the argument that transitioning power is less stable than maintaining existing power structures, but transitioning power is inevitable even if it's to an heir.
Dictatorships aren't stable, dictatorship is stable. Dictatorships involve bloody power strugges that ruin the country and kill people. Dictatorship usually remains, though, because the replacement government is usually another dictatorship - ensuring that when it in turn falls, even more people will die.
taking a big step back I don't know if democracy is a more stable system than others. Or even better in terms of long-term results
I wonder what sort of education you've had? I can easily and quickly think of dictatorships that killed or enslaved millions of their own citizens - it's practically a requirement to be a really good dictatorship, it seems. It's a struggle to think of any democracies which do that. Perhaps the Israel/Palestine conflict has shades of that, perhaps internment of Japanese in America during WW2 counts a bit, but it ended pretty fast and was due to a war.
I'm gonna take a wild guess that your current lack of faith in democracy is caused by Brexit. Am I right?
But yours a very good point! So what do I mean? It depends on the word 'better' and 'stable'.
'stable' is easily covered - chinese society has existed in a stable form for thousands of years. There's no evidence that any democracy has, because democracy as I know it is a relatively recent thing. Yeah, greeks and democracy, but they also kept slaves so no.
'better'? Well, what do you mean by that. I suppose on reflection I was equating that with stable, so if you accept that then I've already covered it, and feudalism/totalitarianism/authoritarianism is perhaps 'better'. A stable society at the cost of individual happiness.
You define 'better' as equivalent to human rights, which I agree with, however my point is, be clear with your definitions of pivotal words! That's all. And I should have been so as well.
To be clear I'm not advocating nor would wish to live under, such regimes.
(and the brexit shite is a train wreck, and I am losing some faith in people who voted for brexit based on xenophobia and ignorance. I've met both sorts so I know they exist).
> chinese society has existed in a stable form for thousands of years.
This is a patently false myth that the PRC promotes to legitimize its government. Never mind that the PRC is only 70 years old and radically different than the government that came before it, or the one 30 years before that, or 300 before that, or 200 before that...
Chinese language and culture has existed as long as all the others have. And furthermore, it has gone through just as many regime changes. Unless you're pretending each dynasty was a single government?
Well, how do you see that China has been stable? In the 20th century it's been conquered in an invasion, then went through a communist revolution and fought a civil war that split itself in two. The governments have been replaced repeatedly. It has such severe racial and civil unrest in its western regions the PRC built huge concentration camps and 'disappeared' millions of people into them as the only way to keep the peace. That doesn't sound very stable to me!
Compare that to Britain which has had continuous revolution-free government for hundreds of years, has not split, has had no civil wars for centuries and doesn't disappear its own citizens. It looks pretty stable in comparison.
I think maybe your view of China is coloured by PRC propaganda. They love to claim thousands of years of history, that the PRC is the source of all stability and harmony in China, etc. But a cold reading of history makes it look a bit different.
I voted for Brexit, because the best countries are universally the most democratic countries. That's how I guessed your poor view of democracy might be related to it. We can say these views are stereotypes, but I met a lot of Brexit voters who just didn't like the EU institutions or the way they treat the country, and none (so far) that didn't like immigrants. I'm sure such people do exist, they just don't seem to be prevalent in the circles I move in. Unfortunately I have met a lot of Remain voters who seem unfortunately keen on dictatorship - I guess that's why Leave arguments about democracy are only ever met with irrelevant counterarguments like "racism! xenophobia!". The lack of democracy in the EU is one of the things that appeals to them about it!
> Well, how do you see that China has been stable?
Hard to say. China's society has been around since after the unification, 221BC (post-waring-states, the qin dynasty). It may have gone back further, to the shang dynasty (~1500 BC) but that was probably a period of conflict throughout. But does conflict in itself negate continuity of society?
But a) my knowledge of chinese history is minimal, and b) most important, how do you measure a society. The UK of now is different from the UK of 1980, how does one measure the continuation of a society? By culture? The Shang dynasty oracle bones have script that may be the precursor of chinese writing. Han period statuary is very reminiscent of modern chinese stuff.
Britain was likely pre-literate before the romans arrived (50BC IIRC) and the art was very different then, such as it was.
I don't know, how should we measure this? I mention art and writing as a proxy for culture as a proxy for society, but what should it be? We can't debate without agreeing basic terms.
> In the 20th century it's been conquered in an invasion
I think you mean the opium wars. I mention this in another post here. But they survived as a culture (arguably). "went through a communist revolution" - ditto survived (I might argue).
> PRC built huge concentration camps and 'disappeared' millions of people into them as
Yesss, I mention this in another post here. That is one way to have stability albeit an horrific one.
Compared to this, the UK was invaded repeatedly within the last 1000 years, the language was changed, the genetics were changed, the art changed... but what is a culture/society? These things? Other? Tell me.
> I think maybe your view of China is coloured by PRC propaganda
No. Please my other posts here. And stability and harmony are a matter of definition. I am sure my and your vision of it is something far nicer than china's crushing 'pacification' but unless we define things, we're spinning our wheels.
Also this thread is not about brexit and in this context I'm not willing to discuss it. I don't know why you're bringing it up.
China has probably had a somewhat more stable writing system and gene pool compared to Britain, that's true. I suspect with more knowledge there'd turn out to be pretty large differences over time too. For instance medieval Britain used the Latin alphabet/writing system. The language has changed enormously since that time, but still uses that script. Probably Chinese is the same.
Getting back to the original point (and I'll drop Brexit), your original question was whether democratic systems are really more stable than others. With my definition of stability as avoiding civil wars, revolutions, and other violent transfers of governmental power, I feel pretty sure they are more stable. If you define it as absence of change in art or other forms of culture, I'd concede the point - I'd expect a dictatorship to have less change in art and language, simply because culture benefits from free expression and some of the most creative people in society are often rebellious, which doesn't fit well with such societies.
However, I quite enjoy unstable (or dynamic) culture paired with stable (or peaceful) constitutional change. That seems like a good mix, and it also seems to require democracy.
Pinning anything down is a bugger but I'll accept your definition of "without [civil] wars or non-peaceful transfers of governmental power". It's pretty good. (just to be a complete bastard, do 'the troubles' of northern ireland count as civil war?)
My knowledge of chinese history is an illusion. I've always found the culture interesting and the 2D & 3D art/sculpture much more elegant than a lot of western stuff. Can't say the same about the music... I picked up a remaindered book on the oracle bones <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle_bone>. Regarding the art, I was leafing through a book on ancient chinese artefacts. But the more I know, the less I know. And yes, [edit: ancient] chinese script is doubtless as legible to a modern person as anglo-saxon is to us, likely even less so.
I'll read up on your manchuria link, thanks - I wasn't aware it was that it was so extensive. I recall loadsa abominations by the japanese etc etc so it goes.
I understand where you're coming from, thanks again!
The Troubles certainly got pretty close and are the best rebuttal to the idea of British stability, yes. And that unfortunate partition of India thing.
oh so the current presidents of Brazil is not democratically elected you mean[1]?
And how would you assure a democratic China will not have a corrupted election scheme that resemble Russia's?
Without you stating any evidence, I dare to say your sense is wrong. Chinese are more than ready for capitalism if the current system is not already it.
Yes. Two other candidates were illegally prevented from participating. And there were more fake news campaigns in brazil, where whatsapp is the de facto communication medium, than USA during the election.
"Lula’s criminal conviction on corruption charges last year came under highly suspicious circumstances. All year long, polls showed him as the clear front-runner for the 2018 presidential race [...] Ever since, Lula has been held in a makeshift prison cell inside a Federal Police building in Curitiba [...] An electoral court then barred Lula’s candidacy for president. Barring Lula from running as a candidate paved the way for the election of the far-right extremist Jair Bolsonaro"
https://theintercept.com/2019/05/22/lula-brazil-ex-president...
Different question, when we talk about China ( which is mostly incompatible with Western as superpower, because of the differences between society and disruption through state capitalism).
I am always a little bit concerned about how it comes across for a Chinese person, because I do not want to offend them. And most of my points are about Xi's rule ( and actually somewhat cautious about it going globally).
Can you enlight me on "what is happening now", if you are offended in a personal way or is it obvious that there is a difference?
Sorry but I think your first paragraph is not complete? when we talk about China () then?
Generally speaking I wont get offended as long as the discussion is rational and logical. Me personally dont care much about country or patriotism. But Chinese are like any other populations, each individual can be quite different.
I'm not really in the loop of what is happening now but I do think sometimes only (trade?) wars can resolve unbridgeable misunderstandings.
Thank you for being curious. What I found offending on HN is people who are cool-headed within their own domain can be irrational and quick to conclusions when it comes to issues related to China.
We all know the project management tree swing cartoon[1]. We can almost replace the project with China within this cartoon lol.
edit: I read some of your other comments and I dont think you know China as much as you imagined you know. There's news about Belgian police shot a refugee child for example. I wont based on that to say all belgian kills refugee children. So treat news from China as news if you dont mind. More extreme things happen within a population of 1.5 billion.
At least I can read about the Belgium's incident and people in Belgium can protest feeely. That wouldn't happen in China, that's the difference between a first world country and China
India has a big population and doesn't throw thousands of falun gong and Uighurs into reeducation camps, harvesting their organs at whim.
India has a big population and doesn't threaten the sovereignty of democratic nations like Taiwan.
I'm happy to acknowledge the good things happening in China and the advancements its made since the cultural revolution (of which my partner's mother can tell you stories of from her time in labor camps), but not when the objective is to try to sweep under the rug the massive crimes against humanity China is doing, right now.
What you are saying is India has a better human rights record than China. But at the end of the day what exactly is human rights? To you it's the ability to speak freely, to nordic countries it can be free education, free healthcare, and even free internet connections. But to a poor country, what is the most important human right? It's be able to be fed! It's not die!
According to world bank data, China had 755.8 million people living on less than $1.9 a day in 1990. In 2013 it's 25.2 million.
What about India? There are still 268 million people earning less than $1.9 per day in 2011 and data are not collected afterwards[1]. More than doubled the infant mortality rate[2].
Now I believe you live in SFBA. There are ton of mainland Chinese working at AMZ, at FB, at Google, etc. Tons of them in Chinese grocery stores. Go ask them if they think India is better than mainland China to live. Now that they live freely away from mainland China's propaganda, go ask them if they care about the massive crime you are talking about to the degree they would want a government overthrown and have a government similar to India's.
Again my point is there are huge problems about PRC. Still, it would be highly unlikely that the solution is what you, a nonexpert, proposed. I believe there are westerners who understand the problems better than me. But they've spent years of effort studying the issues. Not like you or even me who just read some news articles and think we knew better. Thinking about it it's almost like climate change. Everyone has a say to it no matter what experts think.
It'll be fine as long as people in bulk are reasonably happy, which equates to the economy doing well which allows china's economy to look and feel good. "look and feel" because there seem to be many proper economists (I'm not) that see china's economy as a facade hiding junk.
When we get the big bubble pop which seems to be hastening in, their people may start to feel a lot less comfortable. We'll see then what happens but I don't think it will be remotely nice as their government will start to blame anyone but themselves (well naturally!) and political tensions will rise.
Maybe one day, if China embraces democracy, it might hope to become as prosperous as India. /s
In all seriousness, "democracy" is at this point almost meaningless as a barometer of good governance. There are a lot of spectacularly successful autocracies and a lot of dismally awful democracies. In the broad scheme of things, the CPC has done a damned good job of advancing the interests of the Chinese people. China might one day gradually transition towards democracy in the manner of Singapore, but many Chinese people are rightly fearful of the possibility of the collapse of the CPC. The most common outcome after the overthrow of a dictatorship is chaos and economic collapse, followed by a much worse dictatorship.
> CPC has done a damned good job of advancing the interests of the Chinese people.
Certainly the nation has modernized rapidly. But at what cost? Western media speaks of famines, proxy wars, land grabs, implicit and explicit suppression of anything/anyone different.
(Not saying other forms of governing are guaranteed to do better, but at least with democracies power is supposed to be more distributed.)
I’m not sure where your sample starts but to start from the beginning one has to take into account the Great Leap Forwards, Cultural Revolution, invasion of Tibet, and so on. The ineptitude and corruption of the Nationalists never approached the suffering of the 50s and 60s which were actively difficult to achieve.
The sole mechanism by which the party became a force for stability is slowly being eliminated: collective leadership in China is now something of a joke. That’s where things went wrong under Mao; it’s why the “bad emperor” problem exists as a concept; and it’s where things are beginning to go wrong at the edges (Xinjiang, Tibet…) under Xi.
If you keep doing ideological flamewar on HN we are going to ban you. Breaking the site guidelines will eventually get your main account banned as well.
I think China take will the path to democracy most other democratic nations have taken including my own: As the middle class eventually grows big enough it will demand and get political influence ultimately creating democratic institutions (formal freedom of speech, parliaments, elections, referendums) as we have it in the west.
It is easy to focus on a single news story and forgetting that China is a much freer society today than it was 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago.
As a matter of fact --- what you said used to be a belief shared widely among public intellectuals in China 10-20 years ago. No one believes in it now.
As a Chinese, I'm inclined to agree with you. One thing above all is the education level of the population has gone up quite a bit. I personally think that's a cornerstone for any future social reforms.
China is big, so it ebbs and flows depending on who's in power.
Two steps forward one step back. In the last ten years, more people have travelled, studied, or learned about the world than ever before. The people running the show will die one day, that's not representative of what will happen. It's what the people think that determines what will happen. What the younger generations have experienced in their personal lives will translate to what they want for society, and that's my measure: the younger people are much freer in their personal lives than those 10 years ago. They know what they want, and one day they will get it.
Thanks. I didn't mean to make you a research assistant. In this age of misinformation, I think it's good manner to back up our claims with some evidence. And as a Chinese I was pretty surprised by the claim itself.
Sure.. right now there's a selection process for the National Congress... just make it so anyone can run for that position (and maybe the Central Committee too). Then hold free and fair elections in each province.
But now I think the Party is too good at maintaining itself. It's augmented by technology like WeChat to know exactly what is going on across the whole country. Access to dissident conversations will make it even easier to tailor the kind of subtle propaganda they're getting very good at.
Will the PRC just continue to exist as it is, forever? My last remaining hope is for massive power grabs by xi jinping (already happening), followed by government ineptitude as he ages and underlings squabble, followed by chaos upon his death. Beyond that I can't see any way out.