[lenerdenator]

Well, the powers-that-be saw how a society that doesn't allow a lot of open criticism works in the form of China. The massive returns on investment, the near-permanent ruling class in the form of party cadres, etc. Then they decided they want that for themselves.

If you do business with totalitarian societies that aren't made to liberalize, you too will become a totalitarian society.

[janalsncm]

It’s funny, 30 years ago the argument was the exact opposite: China opening up and doing business with the rest of the world would force them to liberalize.

[lenerdenator]

That was the argument, yes, but let's be real: the reason that capital loved China wasn't because they were going to have to deal with trade unions and citizen initiatives to constrain their ability to unlock value. If that were the case, the then-newly-democratized Eastern Europe, or maybe India, would have gotten a lot more attention from business than China.

No, they liked China because the standard of living meant that it was easy to improve people's lives while also keeping them in line via a government that wasn't above grinding protestors into hamburger with tank tracks. The bar to clear wasn't "maintain the American standard of living", it was "provide more calories than Mao did during the Great Leap Forward", and so long as they could do that, they'd get to do whatever else they wanted with the workforce. Anyone who wanted more would get to deal with the CCP.