China, Eastern Europe and Russia compared

Ivan Szelenyi and Peter Mihalyi
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Ivan Szelenyi: Sociology and Political Science, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

Acta Oeconomica, 2020, vol. 70, issue s, 85-93

Abstract: After the collapse of the Berlin Wall it was conceivable that China would follow the path towards the cessation of communism, as it happened in the successor states of the USSR, Yugoslavia and the East European satellite states of the Soviet Union. But the Communist Party of China (CPC) managed to retain control and avoided the Russian and East European collapse, a full-fledged transition to capitalism and liberal democracy. For a while, China was on its way to market capitalism with the possible outcome to turn eventually into a liberal democracy. This was a rocky road, with backs-and-forth. But the shift to liberal democracy did not happen. The massacre at Tiananmen Square in 1989, approved by Deng Xiaoping, was a more alarming setback than the contemporary Western observers were willing to realize. This paper presents an interpretation of the changes under present Chinese leader, Xi Jinping in a postcommunist comparative perspective.

Keywords: China; liberalism; illiberalism; dictatorship; comparative economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: B14 P11 P14 P21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
Note: Based on a video message prepared (but not presented) for the Conference commemorating the 40th anniversary of launching of Chinese reform and 30th anniversary of the publication of path-breaking paper by Victor Nee “Market transition theory”, Renmin University (Beijing), August 27–28, 2019.
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