this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2026
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Russia's approval rates are largely self-reported, unlike China's which are reported by tons of western organizations. These are not equal situations. Further, China doesn't merely call itself democratic, it is democratic.
The Chinese political system is based on whole-process people's democracy, a form of consultative democracy. The local government is directly elected, and then these governments elect people to higher rungs, meaning any candidate at the top level must have worked their way up from the bottom and directly proved themselves. Moreover, the economy in the PRC is socialist, with public ownership as the principle aspect of the economy. Combining this consultative, ground-up democracy with top-down economic planning is the key to China's success.
I highly recommend Roland Boer's Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance. Socialist democracy has been imperfect, but has gone through a number of changes and adaptations over the years as we've learned more from testing theory to practice. Boer goes over the history behind socialist democracy in this textbook.
The working classes in socialist countries are the ones dictating the state and its direction.
It passes in terms of what democracies are in practice but the political suppression, surveillance, and censorship that China is known for its anything but democratic.
Why should capitalists be allowed in the democratic processes of a socialist state? True democracy means rule by the people, not a privledged class.
That's not what I said. Under the veneer of censoring capitalism, you allow broader censorship.
Censorship is not a blanket thing, it's specifically targetting misinformation, pro-capitalist speech, and that which undermines socialism. The working classes use it to silence capitalists.
You're saying that, why should I believe that's actually the case?
Censorship is always done with some sort of "positive" narrative tied to it.
Because it's the reason censorship is used. People don't censor for fun, but to protect the system. China is socialist and run by the working classes, it would not have the support it does if it was brutally oppressing them.