[randallsquared]

That's the standard line, but I'm not sure that it's as inevitable as that. It might well be that an efficient and well-run dictatorship or monarchy can compete with Western-style democracy (though I'm not sure China is "well-run" enough in this sense to be a good test case).

[bilbo0s]

Singapore . . . is the example you were looking for I think.

[randallsquared]

Yeah, I did think about Singapore, but I don't know much about how it's set up politically, so I decided to stick with the case already on topic. :)