A review of Stein Ringen’s ‘The Perfect Dictatorship: China in the 21st Century’
Back in late 2012, when Xi Jinping (習近平) first came to power, there was a flurry of opinion that said he was China’s long-awaited liberal reformer. As time passed, everyone could see that Xi was clearly heading in a more dictatorial rather than democratic direction — purging critics, consolidating power within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), squeezing civil society, arresting rights lawyers, and in the economic arena, unable to boast of anything little better than a lackluster record on meaningful reform. Continue reading