No that’s some kind of internalized orientalism. When you say you’re Chinese do you perhaps mean an ethnically Chinese person from Taiwan?
When I say China is Democratic I am referring to
- their elections are not corrupt and reflect the votes of the communities
- their elected officials have a high rate of turnover when compared to the west demonstrating the people are choosing and importantly changing their minds about who they want in power. Compare to the US where 90% of elections are not competitive and so it’s the political patronage network of the Dems or GOP that decide 90% of elections, before we even discuss how meaningful a choice the 2-party system offers
- fully a third of elected officials are independents, and the faction system within the CPC plays the same function as party politics within the west
- the faction system within the CPC is actually more diverse than the party system in the west with factions ranging from die hard Maoists to neoliberals, so to say it’s a one-party state is superficial since factions play the same function within the CPC and to say the 2-party system of almost all of the west presents political diversity is laughable since in the west the political spectrum is one neoliberal party that is homophobic and another neoliberal party that isn’t homophobic; this accurately paints the picture of political diversity in the west which is fucking nothing compared to the diversity of political voices in China
- their elected officials are mostly not lifelong politicians such as in the west meaning in the west we really have a permanent oligarchy (such as Biden who has been part of the ruling oligarchy long enough that he voted against desegregation) whereas in China they elect people who are from the people
- that is to say, Chinese democracy is mostly of the people with some who then climb higher whereas western democracy is a set of lifelong permanent appointments and a remarkably high proportion of them are the children of lifelong politicians
- Chinese democracy is mostly devolved and local, eg city and provincial politics are what matters most, whereas western democracy is mostly centralized
- Chinese people report in poll after poll they see that their government is responsive to their will whereas westerners report the opposite
- Chinese people report a very high level of confidence in the integrity of their democratic processes and representatives when westerners report the opposite
When I say China is a democracy I mean it in the full sense of it, not some orientalized “China is very very mysterious and sinister” sense of it.
It’s not a perfect democracy at all and I won’t make that claim but it’s a very good one and it far outstrips the west in terms of being actually representative of the people in terms of voting patterns resulting in changes of public policy and in terms of diversity of political voices and in terms of actual integrity.
Not some orientalized “benevolent dictator” bullshit but that the people ELECT their leaders for the local politics that matter most and then those local politics elect the national body leading to a system of politics that represents the will of the people based on their right to vote.
Democracy.
Your anecdote is noted but what your anecdote claims is flatly contradicted by data.
I agree it is not a liberal democracy but I don’t think we mean the same thing by that.
Western liberal democracy is to serve the interests of capital and evidently that’s what it does.
Socialist democracy is to serve the interests of the people and according to poll after poll of Chinese people that’s what it is doing.
In terms of the machinery of democracy the data also is in high accordance with the claim that it features a high degree of integrity, data points I outlined above.
It’s true the CPC controls it’s membership but
(1) fully a third of elected officials are independent and many from the other parties for special interests
and (2) within the CPC faction system we see voices in the CPC ranging from Maoists to neoliberals so it’s not performing this function of limiting political voice as you claim but are you saying the 2-party system of the west doesn’t feature the same ideological limits? And in fact we see a much narrower political discourse in the west so clearly the limits imposed by the western liberal democracy 2-party system is actually performing that filter function aggressively than the CPC does,
and (3) a very large fraction of the population are members whereas in the west such a tiny fraction of the population are direct participants in democracy so even on the topic of membership of the CPC the Chinese model features far more inclusion than you see in the west.
The role of decentralizing power to the local and provincial levels is also very important in this discussion since it’s such a large and populous country. Like I’d agree at the national level the Will of the people is somewhat indirect since there is a hierarchical system where you vote at level A and level A elects level B so at the top of this pyramid Democratic voice is indirect but the politics that matters are mostly at level A and the consensus model of politics means that the indirect influence upon the top of the hierarchy is still much more meaningful than the pretense of the 2-party system where Teo neoliberal parties fight culture wars in lieu of politics.
It’s not a perfect democracy but it’s actually a very good one.
I think (2) is an important point by the way, when you wring your hands about the potential for CPC membership to limit political diversity you need to square that with the reality that you see much more political diversity within their system than the western liberal model even just within the CPC and ignoring the important role of elected independents.