Value Changes and Democratic Prospects in China

Abstract

As China has made enormous progress in liberalizing markets and integrating itself into the world economy and consequentially experienced rapid economic growth, most citizens have gained considerable economic freedom and civil liberties and raised their living standard. Such profound changes that have taken place during the last two decades have been studied and analyzed by Sinologists around the world. While economic and social achievements attract a lot of attention and are appreciated, political developments have been ignored or underestimated. It is believed that there are only economic reforms without political ones in China since Chinese political system has been left untouched by the third wave of global democratization and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) maintains a monopoly of power until today. While the studies of Chinese politics almost focus on political elite and formal institutions and processes, there are few systematic empirical studies of mass political culture.