Perceptions of democracy in China are *higher* than in the US, the UK, and France : socialism

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Something not mentioned in the comments; In my experience Americans do not really understand democracy ; they understand voting. But ignore everything after they leave the voting booth, including how their votes are counted ( which in much of the USA are some private companies who hide their methods and do not allow recounts). Any United Nations method used to detect cheating shows massive amounts of ballot stuffing. This is ignored.

My point mentioning the above is that the United States is not a democracy by any metric, but pretends more than any other country that it is. And because the people of the USA fundamentally do not understand this, any improvement in the USA, improving quality of life, cannot be by democratic methods.

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Some background information on the source. From NATOpedia:

The Alliance of Democracies Foundation (AoD) is a non-profit organisation dedicated to the advancement of democracy and free markets across the globe

It was founded in 2017 by war criminal, former NATO secretary general and likely current CIA asset Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Among the co-founders you find the politically connected oligarch Fritz Schur who provided a significant part of the funding for Anders Fogh Rasmussen's Liberal Party during his tenure as prime minister.

It is an organisation devoted to advance atlanticism, neoliberalism and western imperialism.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 week ago

in other words, it's an org that cannot possibly be accused of having a pro Chinese bias

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 week ago (1 children)

And yet, it still shows China in a more positive light than its masters.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Yes. That's what makes it quite remarkable.

There could be several reasons why such an organisation would publish this. It could have been published with the expectation that it would only be read among the elite who actually needs accurate information. It could also have been published to push for some sort of "renewal of democracy" through tighter control of the media and harsher repression of dissidents. It could also simply be a "look at his brainwashed the Chinese are!" Kind of thing.

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[+] [email protected] -11 points 1 week ago (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago

Unironically correct. What's there to complain about?

90% of families in the country own their home giving China one of the highest home ownership rates in the world. What’s more is that 80% of these homes are owned outright, without mortgages or any other leans. https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2016/03/30/how-people-in-china-afford-their-outrageously-expensive-homes

Chinese household savings hit another record high in 2024 https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-jones-bank-earnings-01-12-2024/card/chinese-household-savings-hit-another-record-high-xqyky00IsIe357rtJb4j

People in China enjoy high levels of social mobility https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/18/world/asia/china-social-mobility.html

The typical Chinese adult is now richer than the typical European adult https://www.businessinsider.com/typical-chinese-adult-now-richer-than-europeans-wealth-report-finds-2022-9

Real wage (i.e. the wage adjusted for the prices you pay) has gone up 4x in the past 25 years, more than any other country. This is staggering considering it's the most populous country on the planet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cw8SvK0E5dI

The real (inflation-adjusted) incomes of the poorest half of the Chinese population increased by more than four hundred percent from 1978 to 2015, while real incomes of the poorest half of the US population actually declined during the same time period. https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w23119/w23119.pdf

From 1978 to 2000, the number of people in China living on under $1/day fell by 300 million, reversing a global trend of rising poverty that had lasted half a century (i.e. if China were excluded, the world’s total poverty population would have risen) https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/China%E2%80%99s-Economic-Growth-and-Poverty-Reduction-Angang-Linlin/c883fc7496aa1b920b05dc2546b880f54b9c77a4

From 2010 to 2019 (the most recent period for which uninterrupted data is available), the income of the poorest 20% in China increased even as a share of total income. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.DST.FRST.20?end=2019&amp%3Blocations=CN&amp%3Bstart=2008

By the end of 2020, extreme poverty, defined as living on under a threshold of around $2 per day, had been eliminated in China. According to the World Bank, the Chinese government had spent $700 billion on poverty alleviation since 2014. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/31/world/asia/china-poverty-xi-jinping.html

Over the past 40 years, the number of people in China with incomes below $1.90 per day – the International Poverty Line as defined by the World Bank to track global extreme poverty– has fallen by close to 800 million. With this, China has contributed close to three-quarters of the global reduction in the number of people living in extreme poverty. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2022/04/01/lifting-800-million-people-out-of-poverty-new-report-looks-at-lessons-from-china-s-experience

None of these things happen in capitalist states, and we can make a direct comparison with India which follows capitalist path of development. In fact, without China there practically would be no poverty reduction happening in the world.

If we take just one country, China, out of the global poverty equation, then even under the $1.90 poverty standard we find that the extreme poverty headcount is the exact same as it was in 1981.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/07/5-myths-about-global-poverty

The $1.90/day (2011 PPP) line is not an adequate or in any way satisfactory level of consumption; it is explicitly an extreme measure. Some analysts suggest that around $7.40/day is the minimum necessary to achieve good nutrition and normal life expectancy, while others propose we use the US poverty line, which is $15.

https://www.cgdev.org/blog/12-things-we-can-agree-about-global-poverty

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

This should be improved with adding more countries, like Russia, then comparing with other important data, like freedom of expression, to be somehow relevant to any discussion

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Freedom of expression only matters when it translates into real-world action. Otherwise, it’s just a jester’s privilege, the freedom to scream into the void. In China, people enjoy genuine freedom to advance their material interests, reflected in their consistently rising standard of living and an economy that serves the majority. Meanwhile, the West claims abstract 'freedoms' while living standards crumble and working people are stripped of political power.

[+] [email protected] -8 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

In my country I could live without working and still be in pretty good health conditions after years, if I would like to.

Is that possible in China?

Because my country is the average "western" country and I consider it still pretty far from a democratic utopia.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 week ago (11 children)

The average "western" country depends on the spoils of Imperialism to subsidize costs, ie social safety nets and lower prices of commodities through expropriating vast amounts of wealth from the Global South. China doesn't do that, its own development and safety nets come from their own labor and production. Very different circumstances.

[+] [email protected] -10 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Lol that must be true for some country somewhere, but China is not it, no matter how much even I would like it to be true.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It is true, though. The PRC's economy is extrenely industrialized and focused on exporting commodities, western countries use financial domination and strategic underdevelopment of the Global South to get cheap commodities. The West doesn't produce as much as it takes, China produces for itself and sells the excess to others.

[+] [email protected] -13 points 1 week ago (1 children)

In my country we produce for ourselves and sell the excess too... Still not even close to a socialist utopia though...

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Every country exports and imports, that's not what I'm talking about. Private monopoly Capital in western countries extends and carves out the value created in the Global South. The PRC is far more industrialized than any Western Country, it doesn't engage in Imperialism. Here's a good article on Imperialism.

Further, nobody said China was a Utopia. It's a developing Socialist country, Socialism isn't some holy status that makes all who live in it live magical lives, it's a mode of production. China has a long way to go, but Socialism is why it has had the success it has so far.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Which other countries does China exploit?

[+] [email protected] -16 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Are you serious? China is an imperialist country like most others that are that big.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Tell me who they’ve exploited. Go on.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Is Brazil imperialist? Is India imperialist? They are "that big", no?

[+] [email protected] -10 points 1 week ago (14 children)

Brazil, yes. India, I'm not informed but my bet would be obviously yes, no way such a country hasn't developed imperialist practices.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 week ago (3 children)

I think you're using "Imperialism" to describe something fubdamentally and entirely different from what Socialists consider Imperialism to be. Would you mind explaining what you think Imperialism is?

[+] [email protected] -7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I consider imperialism putting your hands in someone else's land, basically speaking.

What's YOUR definition?

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Gotcha, so your definition is focused entirely on force. I don't think this definition fits, though, not in prior forms of Imperialism like the Roman Empire or British Empire, and not for modern Imperialism dominated by the US Empire, as it makes no mention of extraction or analysis of why Imperialism exists. For example, the Union defeating the Confederacy, or the Soviets taking Berlin, are both "Imperialism" in your definition.

What Socialists refer to as Imperialism is a form of international extraction. I already linked this Prolewiki article for you, but here's the basics:

The presence of monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life.
The merging of bank capital with industrial capital into finance capital controlled by a financial oligarchy.
The export of capital as distinguished from the simple export of commodities.
The formation of international monopolist capitalist associations (cartels).
The territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers.[3] This expansion to Marx's analysis of capitalist development was one of Lenin's most important theoretical contributions to political economy.

The PRC, India, Brazil, etc do not fit this, but Western countries absolutely do, especially the US Empire.

[+] [email protected] -8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Ahahahah no no, the Soviet invading Berlin isn't imperialism for me. Oppressing neighbors is though, like Tibet to make a classic example.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago (1 children)

By your definition, it was, though. The PLA liberating Tibet from a slave-driven feudalism isn't Imperialism either, especially considering the PRC doesn't underdevelop Tibet and use it as a hub of extraction.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

You couldn’t choose not to work in China, it’s still a pretty poor country and the majority need to work to live.

Those who can’t work are mostly well-supported by a combination of family support networks - far more highly valued in China than in the west - and government welfare systems. It’s part of the reason homeless people are so rare there for example.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 week ago (1 children)

If you're not working to support your life, then someone else is.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

Those poor naive people have been brainwashed into thinking their government helps people. Us enlightened and free Westerners know the system's rigged and that those in power don't give a shit about what we think, which proves the superiority of our system smuglord

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Its incredibly depressing talking to western liberals about politics. They can't even imagine that countries actually exist where the goverment isn't trying to kill them at all times.

What's even worse, is that when looking at any societal problem, the first place they look is the how the US half-tries and fails to solve a problem. How the US does anything, whether it be from health care, to law, to caring for the environment, should be the case study in what not to do. It's a rare person who looks at how any non-western country tackles problems.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 week ago

The liberal worldview rests on a theological conviction that liberalism represents the pinnacle of governance, inherently destined to yield the best possible results. This article of faith, treated as self-evident truth, then dictates that any non-liberal system is, by definition, repressive and inferior. It's a conclusion that requires no further examination.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

This will be unironically what libs and conservatives post if they ever saw this. Of course they won't ever see it because they have a premium media diet of 100% western cope so they can imagine how they're forces for good in the world as they repeatedly ignore every sign that the west is taking all the money and burning down everything it touches.

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