[bllguo]

> When educated Chinese people were better exposed to ideas about liberal democracy, they were very clear that they wanted it

This falls flat for me. So the implication is that there are no educated Chinese today with exposure to liberal democracy? I think we take for granted the supposed superiority of a system that empirically has delivered many recent failures.

[tablespoon]

> This falls flat for me. So the implication is that there are no educated Chinese today with exposure to liberal democracy? I think we take for granted the supposed superiority of a system that empirically has delivered many recent failures.

I'm not saying "no exposure," I'm saying they were "better exposed" in the past. You can even see changes like that happening in Hong Kong now, under the new crackdown on civil liberties. For instance, the government is now tinkering with the curriculum of a "Liberal Studies" course in Hong Kong to make it more "patriotic."

> I think we take for granted the supposed superiority of a system that empirically has delivered many recent failures.

Would you trade Donald Trump, Joe Biden, the Democrats, and Repubicans for Xi Jinping and the CCP (and everything that entails)?

[refenestrator]

Educated Chinese generally speak some English, they are way more exposed to our system/culture than we are to theirs.

[bllguo]

my experience is obviously anecdotal but interactions with Western-educated Chinese immigrants, many of whom left in the 80s and 90s, suggest that "democracy is the best" is not some universal wisdom that people will naturally converge to

If it were solely between these two choices? I'm not exactly ecstatic about these options, but I would. The fact that someone like Trump could come to power here - a fact that we, amazingly, seem to be trying to sweep under the rug - says this system is a complete failure and is just waiting to be exploited further.

[tablespoon]

> The fact that someone like Trump could come to power here - a fact that we, amazingly, seem to be trying to sweep under the rug - says this system is a complete failure....

That's unhelpful hyperbole. Trump was an idiot with charisma, but by way of comparison, he caused nowhere near the damage to the US that Mao did to China.

[bllguo]

the fact that a conman with ties to organized crime and indebted to foreign governments could ever assume the highest political office in this country is a complete disgrace. he was _voted_ in!

it scares me to think about what a more devious version of him could have accomplished. i think he would have caused untold amounts more damage if he were empowered to do so - credit to the US system neutering him then, I suppose I must concede that

i think it is disingenuous to bring up mao in comparison anyway, china today is vastly different politically

[fighterpilot]

Sure, liberal democracies have had many recent failures, but they're still the most prosperous societies on a per-capita basis by a gigantic margin. If an authoritarian or non-democratic country can achieve over $40,000 GDP per capita, then we can revisit.

[dirtyid]

If you go by PPP, top 5 per capita territories are Luxembourg, Singapore, Ireland, Qatar, Macau. That's 3/5 non democracies. Rank 6-10 is Switzerland, Norawy, US, Brunei, HK. 5/10 non democracies.

Many systems can become prosperous if relatively small and sufficiently aligned to US foreign policy to preserve the hegemony. Democracies that don't will get crushed / contained inspite of "democratic peace". The real disruption of PRC's rise is an alternate system that could create a prosperous or even moderately wealthy society, despite US supremency.

[bllguo]

that's true. but none of this is happening in a vacuum. liberal democracies are also the ones trying to change or destroy non-democratic regimes by force. imo you can sum up everything evil China is accused of, and it would not come close to what we pulled in South America, the Middle East, and Asia

I'm all for a fair comparison. And as someone who currently benefits from Western ideals of personal liberties, I'd be happy to see it proven that they are superior. But let's make it fair

[quickthrowman]

> imo you can sum up everything evil China is accused of, and it would not come close to what we pulled in South America, the Middle East, and Asia

I know you said Asia and that includes China, but Western countries (and Japan) did similar things to China in the 19th and 20th centuries:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_of_humiliation