Democracy is a system where the government implements the will of the majority and it is held accountable by the majority.

Western countries implement parliamentary democracy, and we now have ample evidence that this model of democracy does not work in practice. Western governments primarily represent the interests of the elites at the expense of the public as this study of US policy illustrates. US may be an extreme case, but similar situation is observed in most western nations.

Western chauvinists do not get to define whether other countries are democratic or not because western model itself is a failure.

People actually living in those countries get to define what their system is. Vast majority of Chinese citizens approve of their government, and think that it is in fact democratic.

  • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆OP
    2•3 years ago

    Representative democracy is precisely what perpetuates capitalism. Lenin provides a great analysis of this relationship in The State and Revolution.

    Meanwhile, this is clearly not the case in China. Quality of life in China continues to steadily improve with every decade. Poverty has been effectively eliminated. In fact, China is the only place in a world where any meaningful poverty reduction is happening. If we take China out of the equation poverty actually increased in real terms:

    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.

    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.

    China also massively invests in public infrastructure, they built 27,000km of high speed rail in a decade. 90% of families own their home with 80% of these homes being owned outright, without mortgages or any other leans. Wage adjusted for the prices you pay has gone up 4x in the past 25 years, more than any other country, and people enjoy a high level of social mobility. China also chose to prioritize public health over business interests when handling the pandemic, something that didn’t happen in any major capitalist state.

    Chinese government has recently passed massive regulation on big business and released a a five-year blueprint calling for greater regulation of vast parts of the economy. The government has also openly stated that the era of capital expansion is over and the interests of the majority outweigh the interests of shareholders.

    Also worth noting that Finland, Denmark, Switzerland, Iceland, Netherlands accounts for a tiny portion of the overall western population. So, even if we accept those results at face value, many bigger capitalist countries like France, UK, Canada, and US are having very turbulent times. You don’t have country wide protests happening when people are happy.

    • @ericbuijs@lemmy.ml
      0•3 years ago

      Capitalism first occurred in the 19the century UK which had a representative democracy leading to the assumption that these two were forever connected. However Capitalism can be found (or has been found) in a wide variety of political systems including fascist regimes, absolute monarchies and single-party states. Surely China itself has been able to manage economic growth using some of capitalism’s competitive principles.

      I’m not disagreeing with the major advancements that have been made in China and it’s definitely a consequence of the successful policy implemented by the Chinese government. But we shouldn’t be blind to the fact that China is no 94 in the list of worlds happiest countries in the world. So economic growth doesn’t guarantee that people are content.

      So let’s extend the list of countries with the top 15 of the worlds happiest countries and we can conclude that this contradict your conclusion that parliamentary democracy does not work in practice. Like I said it is a flawed method of reasoning to take a few examples to draw general conclusions about one political system or the other. Certainly when other examples that support the opposite conclusion are left out.

      I’m not saying that China is a bad country (on contrary) but it’s not very productive to declare on country or political system superior. It only leads to nationalism which in turn can only lead to bad things. And with that I’m going to leave this exchange. One has to sleep sometime.

      • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆OP
        1•3 years ago

        Capitalism is obviously compatible with different political systems. However, my original point was that parliamentary democracy is very good at keeping capitalism alive in western countries, not that it’s the only system compatible with capitalism.

        As I’ve already pointed out, the happiness index clearly seems to be at odds with reality because happy people don’t organize country wide protests. Here’s a discussion of why such metrics can be very misleading:

        Savolainen even theorizes that this inclination toward moderation shapes residents’ responses to the happiness ranking’s central question. “The Nordic countries are united in their embrace of curbed aspirations for the best possible life,” he writes. “In these societies, the imaginary 10-step ladder is not so tall.”

        It’s much better to look at metrics around material conditions in the county that have tangible impact on the quality of life for the people living in the country.

        And I completely disagree with you that political systems shouldn’t be compared. Instead of looking at it as a nationalistic competition, try to instead view it as a a way to learn from others. If one country manages to continue improving life for their citizens and another doesn’t, then perhaps the one that doesn’t should reexamine what it’s doing.