Like all contemporary nondemocratic systems, the Chinese system suffers from weak legitimacy at the level of regime type. The most likely form of transition for China remains the model of Tiananmen, when three elements came together: a robust plurality of disaffected citizens, a catalytic event, and a split in the leadership. Had China chosen the path of dialogue in 1989, it might be more stable today.
About the Author
Andrew J. Nathan is Class of 1919 Professor of Political Science at Columbia University and a member of the steering committee of the Asian Barometer Survey. His books include China’s Search for Security (with Andrew Scobell, 2012).
As China’s power grows, will it seek to remake the world in its authoritarian image? For now, China shows no such missionary impulse, but the ways in which it pursues its…
The Chinese Communist Party is deadly serious about its authoritarian designs, and it is bent on promoting them. It is time for the world’s democracies to get serious, too.