Not surprising at all. In fact, many of the Chinese expats (visitors of mitbbs.com) are pro-china in general. They become less agreeing to western values after spending years in US. (I am one of those examples myself)
There is no people or culture on Earth that stands to gain from oligarchy.
Though it's probably also true that tons of people are shocked by the news
Our cultures are incredibly different. At the same time our cultures are both unusually strong. And for some reason, part of American culture seems to be assuming everyone in the world is just like us, just in different circumstances. This is extremely foolish.
It took me quite a while to be able to understand some things about my Chinese friends that really confused and sometimes frustrated me. A big part of it is the American concept of freedom and personal independence is practically part of our DNA, while it is not valued very highly by many Chinese. Stability, peace and order are highly valued. Of course it would be nice to be able to do whatever you want, but it is much more important that the government is strong. Period. And you get away with what you can as an individual (I've noticed much less respect for the rule of law, much greater respect for personal relationships). And of course many (not all) are highly patriotic, as a great culture with a great history that has been under great pressure for generations, and feels that the rest of the world doesn't respect them like they should or wants to see them fail.
I guess I'd sum it up, that it seems to me an unusual amount of mainland Chinese would choose strength over freedom, and almost all mainland Chinese see themselves as part of a bigger society and a somewhat oppressive government is inevitable and it is futile to resist.
In America, we would prefer to free 10 guilty people than unjustly imprison 1 innocent person. In China, the concept is reversed, it is better to imprison 10 innocent people than let 1 guilty person go free. I actually heard someone say that. Think about it.
Xi is the last vestige of Maoism, the last president who grew up under Mao’s shadow. The next generation of leadership is surely going to be much more modern than any before it. That they are delaying it for something in china’s past is a travesty.
No, he did not "participate" as a Red Guard, he and his family were persecuted by them.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/26/world/asia/xi-jinping-car...
It's interesting that to note that Xi Jinping is from that exact same generation, and both he and his family were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution:
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/world/asia/xi-jinping-chi...:
> When the pandemonium of the Cultural Revolution erupted, he was a slight, softly spoken 13-year-old who loved classical Chinese poetry. Two years later, adrift in a city torn apart by warring Red Guards, Xi Jinping had hardened into a combative street survivor.
> His father, a senior Communist Party official who had been purged a few years earlier, was seized and repeatedly beaten. Student militants ransacked his family’s home, forcing the family to flee, and one of his sisters died in the mayhem. Paraded before a crowd as an enemy of the revolution and denounced by his own mother, the future president of China was on the edge of being thrown into a prison for delinquent children of the party elite.
> ...
> Unlike some youths from elite backgrounds, Mr. Xi did not turn against the party or Mao, but learned to revere strict order and abhor challenges to hierarchy, said Yongyi Song, a historian and librarian in Los Angeles who has long studied the Cultural Revolution.
> “He suffered much under Mao,” Mr. Song said, “but I think that actually increased his belief that those who are ‘born red,’ those children of the party elite, earned the right to inherit Mao’s place at the center.”
Here's a short biography of Xi by the NYT:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/26/world/asia/xi-jinping-car...
> Xi is the last vestige of Maoism, the last president who grew up under Mao’s shadow. The next generation of leadership is surely going to be much more modern than any before it.
Experts were saying that China was slowly but steadily marching on the path to liberalization, but now we have Xi and that that doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I fear those predictions, like yours, are fallacious and overoptimistic.
People immigrated out before 90s tends to be more pro-democracy. (At least from my impression)
"I don't know" is the real answer, but here is my guess.
My Chinese friends are incredibly social, incredibly loyal (to each other), trustworthy (to each other) to a fault. They may be ready to submit to an irresistible power, but if they feel they could resist, and somehow benefit their group, they might resist. They love China, they know a strong government is a necessity, they might not particularly care who that government is run by, and might be happy to help replace one dictator with another.
I think the social nature of the culture is the key here. Americans often try to stand out and be independent. Chinese seem to see themselves as part of a group, and they are very good at self-organizing even large groups of people. While the government is in power, that is their government. If it seems like the tide of the opinion of your group is we need a new government, maybe they'll take the streets en masse (like tiananmen square). So maybe the culture means that 99% of the time everyone is peaceful and cooperative, and then that 1% of the time everyone is in the streets burning down the governors house. I don't think anyone would enjoy mob rule, so maybe even the mob would tend to replace a strong ruler with another strong ruler.
These are just my thoughts based on the people I know.
But I think the Chinese government has always lived in fear of the mob. Their biggest threat has never been an outside power, but their own people. There are an incredible number of people living in a small area. This explains the one-child policy in my mind, too many people == not enough food == mobs in the street. So, perhaps as simply self-preservation, the government has 1) limited their population 2) ensured constant economic growth 3) limited the ability for a mob to form at all by controlling communication 4) tried to instill national pride and patriotism whenever possible.
Can you explain which values you're referring to and why you don't agree with them?
I can imagine that personal property rights and freedom of speech are not included in that list of disagreeable values.
Sure, a revolution that ends in democracy would be extremely dangerous right now (the aftermath of Arab Spring comes to mind).
But if Xi's CCP keeps repeating that the Chinese should feel deeply humiliated by the West, and that conquering Taiwan (and the South China Sea, etc...) is the only way out, then the situation will become increasingly dangerous no matter the form of government.
It's fine if Chinese culture values stability, the problem is that ignoring politics leads to anything but.
NPC has thousands of members, and I'd expect them to be much more educated and rational than general public overall (again, if the system actually works). They could be elected for various reasons and do not need majority vote of the entire population to become a member of NPC. Their opinions would be a lot more diverse.
However, if that actually work as designed, it's not entirely non-democratic, and it's a form I think would be a better fit for China at least in foreseeable future.
The vulnerability of a democracy to a demagogue who would do things like run on a platform of "elect me and we'll take Taiwan back by force", has been known since the Ancient Greeks. At least in the American system, the solution has been to "separate" those powers so no one individual or small group can exercise them, forcing a consensus. You see this still working even today, with Trump, whose the most demagogue-like president in memory. He's mostly foolish talk, since most of his actions have been held in check by the courts or his inability to get legislation passed.
A tendency towards deadlock has been the major failing and problem of American democracy (at least in recent memory), as I see it. I don't really see a good democratic solution to it either, besides reversing course back towards a more decentralized republic with a weaker central government.
We also don't want anything like the deadlocks in American government for sure.
I think the real problem in America is too much centralization. If more policy was made locally, it could be adapted to match diverse local conditions and attitudes, and the preferences of other regions wouldn't be as threatening. Unfortunately the winner-take-all aspect of centralized politics makes the sides more entrenched.
Do you think the current Chinese government is helping or hurting with the attitudes that lead to the appeal of "elect me and we'll take Taiwan back by force"? Seems to me there's some danger of things going badly if they don't prep the ground for democracy and lose control somehow.
This is definitely the way things are moving towards in the US. We had gotten accustomed to a strong federal government during the 20th century as it had necessarily become extremely built up from world wars, massive infrastructure works, the cold war, etc. But as that whole world has faded away in the 21st century, we are seeing states assert their rights again. I'm talking specifically of California, where elected officials are openly defying federal authorities on certain issues like immigration and drug enforcement. The feds seem powerless to do anything since their is such overwhelming local support for these policies, and California is an economic powerhouse.