London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Aug 05, 2025

The false dichotomy of Chinese autocracy and American democracy

The false dichotomy of Chinese autocracy and American democracy

The success of Beijing’s pandemic response and and the failure of Washington’s seem to suggest authoritarian rule is superior to liberal democracy. But such a verdict is based on selective facts, and does not fully reflect the complexities of any political system.

Unlike the old superpower contest between the United States and the Soviet Union, the incipient cold war between China and the US does not reflect a fundamental conflict of unalterably opposed ideologies. Instead, today’s Sino-American rivalry is popularly portrayed as an epic battle between autocracy and democracy.

Moreover, the facts seem to suggest that autocracy has won while democracy has fallen flat on its face. Whereas the US under President Donald Trump has fumbled disastrously during the Covid-19 pandemic, China has brought the coronavirus under control. In the US, even wearing face masks
has been politicised.

But in Wuhan, China – the pandemic’s original epicentre – the authorities tested the city’s 11 million residents for the virus within 10 days, in an astounding display of capacity and order. For many, the verdict seems clear: authoritarianism is superior to liberal democracy.

But such a conclusion is simplistic and even dangerously misleading, for three reasons. First, just as the US under Trump is not representative of all democracies, China under President Xi Jinping should not be held up as a paragon of autocracy. Other democratic societies, such as South Korea and New Zealand, have handled the pandemic ably, and political freedom did not hobble their governments’ ability to implement virus containment measures.

As for examples of autocracies that brought catastrophe upon themselves, look no further than China’s recent history. No modern Chinese leader held more personal power than Mao Zedong, yet his absolute authority led to a massive famine followed by a de facto civil war during the Cultural Revolution.

Chaos is by no means unique to democracy; under Mao, it was insidiously deployed to maintain his power.

Second, there are democracies with illiberal features and autocracies with liberal ones. America’s current troubles do not reflect a universal failure of democracy, but rather the failure of a democracy with the illiberal traits that Trump has brought to the presidency. As commander-in-chief, Trump has ignored democratic norms such as bureaucratic autonomy, the separation of private interests and public office, and respect for peaceful protest.

If democracies can take an authoritarian turn, the reverse can be true in autocracies. Contrary to popular belief, China’s economic ascent after its market opening in 1978 was not the result of dictatorship as usual; if it had been, Mao would have succeeded long before.

Instead, the economy grew rapidly because Mao’s successor, Deng Xiaoping, insisted on tempering the perils of dictatorship by injecting the bureaucracy with “democratic characteristics”, including accountability, competition, and limits on power. He set an example by rejecting personality cults. (Ironically, Chinese banknotes feature Mao, who despised capitalism, rather than Deng, the father of Chinese capitalist prosperity.)

This recent history of “autocracy with democratic characteristics” under Deng is widely overlooked today, even within China. As Carl Minzner points out, Xi, who became the paramount leader in 2012, has ushered in an “authoritarian revival”.

Since then, the official narrative is that because China has succeeded under centralised political control, this system should be maintained. In fact, under Deng, it was a hybrid political system married to a firm commitment to markets that moved China from poverty to middle-income status.

Taken together, this means that both the US and China have grown illiberal in recent years. The lesson from America’s upheavals today is that even a mature democracy must be constantly maintained in order to function; there is no “end of history”. As for China, we learn that liberalising tendencies can be reversed when power changes hands.

Third, the supposed institutional advantages of China’s top-down rule are both a strength and a weakness. Owing to its revolutionary origins, concentration of power, and penetrating organisational reach, the Communist Party of China typically implements policies in the manner of “campaigns” – meaning that the entire bureaucracy and society are mobilised to achieve a given goal at all costs.

Such campaigns have taken many forms. Under Xi, they include his signature policies to eradicate rural poverty, root out corruption, and extend China’s global reach through the Belt and Road Initiative.

Chinese policy campaigns deliver impressive results because they must. Xi’s poverty-fighting campaign lifted 93 million rural residents out of poverty in seven years, a feat that global development agencies can only dream of accomplishing.

The Chinese authorities also went into campaign mode during the Covid-19 outbreak, mobilising all personnel, attention, and resources to contain the virus. These results lend support to the official Chinese media’s oft-trumpeted claim that centralised power “concentrates our strength to accomplish great things”.

But, pressured to do whatever it takes to achieve campaign targets, officials may falsify results or take extreme measures that trigger new problems down the road. In the drive to eliminate poverty, the Chinese authorities are abruptly relocating millions of people from remote areas to towns, regardless of whether they want to move or are able to find sustainable livelihoods.

The fight against corruption has led to the disciplining of more than 1.5 million officials since 2012, inadvertently resulting in bureaucratic paralysis. And in their desperation to meet pollution reduction targets, some local officials tampered with devices that measure air quality. Big and quick results rarely come without costs.

The idea that we can choose only between freedom in an American-style democracy and order in a Chinese-style autocracy is false. The real aim of governance is to ensure pluralism with stability – and countries everywhere must find their own path to this goal.

We must also avoid the fallacy of rushing to emulate whichever national “model” is fashionable, whether that of Japan in the 1980s, post-Cold War America, or China today.

When you are considering whether to buy a car, you want to know not only its pros, but also its cons. This is the kind of common sense that we should apply in assessing any political system. It is also an essential intellectual skill for navigating today’s new cold war climate.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Elon Musk Receives $23.7 Billion Tesla Stock Award
Texas House Paralyzed After Democrats Walk Out Over Redistricting
Mexican Cartels Complicate Sheinbaum’s U.S. Security Talks
Mark Zuckerberg Declares War on the iPhone
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
China Tightens Mineral Controls, Curtailing Critical Inputs for Western Defence Contractors
OpenAI’s Bold Bet: Teaching AI to Think, Not Just Chat
Tesla Seeks Shareholder Approval for $29 Billion Compensation Package for Elon Musk
Nvidia is cutting prices on its RTX 50-series graphics cards after sales slowed and inventories piled up
Ghislaine Maxwell Transferred to Minimum-Security Prison Amid Ongoing DOJ Discussions
U.S. Tariffs Surge to Highest Levels in Nearly a Century Under Second Trump Term
Matt Taibbi Slams Media for Role in Russiagate Narrative
Pilots Call for Mental Health Support Without Stigma
All Five Trapped Miners Found Dead After El Teniente Mine Collapse
Ong Beng Seng Pleads Guilty in Corruption Case Linked to Former Singapore Transport Minister
BP’s Largest Oil and Gas Find in 25 Years Uncovered Offshore Brazil
Italy Fines Shein One Million Euros for Misleading Sustainability Claims
JPMorgan and Coinbase Unveil Partnership to Let Chase Cardholders Buy Crypto Directly
Declassified Annex Links Soros‑Affiliated Officials and Clinton Campaign to ‘Russiagate’ Narrative
UK's Online Safety Law: A Front for Censorship
Nationwide Protests Erupt in Brazil Demanding Presidential Resignation
Parents Abandon Child at Barcelona Airport Over Passport Issue
Mystery Surrounds Death of Brazilian Woman with iPhones Glued to Her Body
Bus Driver Discovers Toddler Hidden in Suitcase in New Zealand
Switzerland Celebrates 734 Years of Independence Amid Global Changes
U.S. Opens Official Investigation into Former Trump Prosecutor Jack Smith
Leaked audio of Canada's new PM Mark Carney admitting the truth about the Net Zero agenda: "We're gonna make a lot of money off of this."
China Enforces Comprehensive Ban on Cryptocurrency Activities
Absolutely 100% Realistic EVO Series Doll by EXDOLL (Chinese Company) used mainly for carnal purposes
World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab: "In this new world, we must accept... total transparency. You have to get used to it. You have to behave accordingly. But if you have nothing to hide, you shouldn't be afraid."
Meet Mufti Hamid Patel, head of Office for Standards in Education in Pakistan
George Soros tells the World Economic Forum: "President Trump is a con man and the ultimate narcissist, who wants the world to revolve around him."
Hamas are STARVING the hostages.
Decline in Tourism in Majorca Amidst Ongoing Anti-Tourism Protests
British Tourist Dies Following Hair Transplant in Turkey, Police Investigate
Poland Begins Excavation at Dziemiany After New Clue to World War II‑Era Nazi Treasure
WhatsApp Users Targeted in New Scam Involving Account Takeovers
Trump Threatens Canada with Tariffs Over Palestinian State Recognition
Trump Deploys Nuclear Submarines After Threats from Former Russian President Medvedev
Trump Sues Murdoch in “Heavyweight Bout”: Lawsuit Over Alleged Epstein Letter Sets Stage for Courtroom Showdown
Germany Enters Fiscal Crisis as Cabinet Approves €174 Billion in New Debt
Trump Administration Finalizes Broad Tariff Increases on Global Trade Partners
J.K. Rowling Limits Public Engagements Citing Safety Fears
JD.com Launches €2.2 Billion Bid for German Electronics Retailer Ceconomy
Azerbaijan Proceeds with Plan to Legalise Casinos on Artificial Islands
Former Judge Charged After Drunk Driving Crash Kills Comedian in Brazil
Jeff Bezos hasn’t paid a dollar in taxes for decades. He makes billions and pays $0 in taxes, LEGALLY
China Increases Use of Exit Bans Amid Rising U.S. Tensions
×