[tictoc]

Perhaps slightly unrelated, but do people believe a dictatorship like China can thrive as a first world economy by suppressing people's basic fundamental human rights?

[AnimalMuppet]

Maybe? It's too early to tell. So far they've survived that way, but they haven't been a first-world economy for very long.

[tempeirn]

Yes. I actually do. People have been saying communist can’t survive, but look what China has achieved and continues to achieve. It’s scary but saying dictatorships can’t survive dismisses any possible understanding that it might.

[staticautomatic]

China is not communist under any political scientific definition.