this post was submitted on 13 May 2025
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China is authoritarian, but if you look only at the material conditions for democracy like prosperity, peace, education they are better than the US. People fundamentally want to exist and raise families in peace without constant terror, confusion and economic hardship. That is because even they are authoritarian, they can still "afford" to have pro-human or pro-national ideology. In the neoliberal countries choosing that over profit gets you fired or sidelined.
if I'm from, say, Ghana, I'm judging China based on how China affects Ghanaian people, not on how China affects Chinese people
That's important too, but that isn't just moving the goalpost, it's a completely different metric. But even if you're a staunch nationalist you might look at how Chinese people feel about the system and if you could replicate that system in Ghana.