China Is a democracy

Direct v Representative Democracy "Democracy" is commonly understood to include both direct democracy where the people make laws directly and representative democracy where people rule through their elected representatives. Con is trying to define democracy in a way that excludes representative democracy in spite of the widespread use of the term that way. This is not consistent with the way the word is generally understood and used among either lay people or among politicians, lawyers, or scholars. A clear line may not be distinguishable, but as "democracy" means "people rule" then it makes sense that "democracy" should be defined primarily on whether or not the people control the government. The people may do this either directly or through elected representatives who are accountable to the people. In the case of China the government is accountable to the people, and I will demonstrate that in my arguments. A Selection of the Preamble of the Chinese Constitution [1] I would've posted the preamble but I ran out of space. So here's a few passages, The Chinese people waged wave upon wave of heroic struggles for national independence and liberation and for democracy and freedom. After waging hard, protracted and tortuous struggles, [...] won the great victory of the new-democratic revolution and founded the People's Republic of China. Thereupon the Chinese people took state power into their own hands and became masters of the country. The Chinese Constitution itself clearly refers to China as a democracy. This does not automatically make it a democracy, but if a nation claims to be a democracy then the burden of proof should fall upon those saying it is not a democracy, especially if the people debating it are from a foreign society. It's hardly democratic for Americans or Westerners to decide what form of government China should have. More evidence can be found in the Constitution... In Article 2 it states that "All power in the People's Republic of China belongs to the people." laying out the National People's Congress and various lower level Congresses as the representative bodies for exercising this power. In Article 3 it states "The National People's Congress and the local people's congresses at different levels are instituted through democratic election. They are responsible to the people and subject to their supervision." And indeed the National People's Congress is democratically elected. Members serve for 5-year terms. They are elected by the provincial people's assembly. In turn the provincial people's assembly is elected by a lower level assembly, and so on (the exact number of assemblies depends on the jurisdiction in question) until you get to the local people's assembly which is directly elected by its constituents. The presidency is also elected for 5-year terms by the National People's Congress. Advantages of multi-tiered representative democracy This system has the advantage of people voting for their representatives close to home. Since each directly elected representative is representing a smaller number of people they will care more about the needs of their constituents. And when the representatives get together and elect people at higher levels their constituents' needs determines how they vote. In this way it is better than the people voting directly for national representatives. A national representative representing millions of people won't be able to connect as directly with his constituents, and would be more beholden to special interests. In a multi-tiered representative democracy those at higher levels have to be mostly concerned with the opinions of which ever lower-level assembly voted them into office, and since each assembly is elected by either a lower assembly until you get to the voters themselves this promotes a balanced consideration of the needs of various groups of voters. The Ability to recall Article 63 of the Chinese Constitution states that the National People's Congress may recall the president as well as various other national government officials. Article 77 states that those electoral units which elect members of the National People's Congress may in turn recall them. Local People's Congresses also have the power to recall national officials such as governors and mayors under Article 101. Article 102 ensures that a people's congress at any level may be recalled by the people's congress below it or by their constituents if it is the people's congress at the lowest level. The United States Constitution affords no such right of recall. In this way China is more democratic than the United States. The Role of the Communist Party China's Constitution does recognize a special role for the Chinese Communist Party. Nevertheless, the Constitution also protects multi-party democracy. In the Chinese Constitution's 2nd amendment: "The system of multi-party cooperation and political consultation led by the Communist Party of China will exist and develop in China for a long time to come.'" Whereas Con claims that the other parties can't win because of opposition from the government they do win. 830 people in the National People's Congress are members of other political parties. The second-largest of these parties is the continuation of the left-wing of the Kuomintang, the nationalist party which lost to the CCP in the revolution. That they were allowed to speak freely, and run in elections after the revolution suggests there is a wide latitude when it comes to which parties are allowed to contest elections in China. The 3rd largest party is the China Democratic League, which was started as a pro-democracy party in China as an alternative to the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. The government lead by the Kuomintang had actually banned the China Democratic League before the end of the Chinese Civil War. The government lead by the CCP allowed them to exist. [2], [3] While not all parties are allowed, the limitations on which political parties are allowed has been decided within a system of democratic representation. In fact it could be said that it would be undemocratic not to allow the people through their elected representatives to impose restrictions on which organizations may and may not field candidates for public office. Freedom of Speech "Democracy" in and of itself means "people rule" not "people can say what ever they want". That being said it's easy to understand how restraints on freedom of speech can weaken or even destroy democracy. If not even democratically elected public servants can't even speak freely how can they represent the needs of their constituents? However, China's Constitution has this covered. Article 75. Deputies to the National People's Congress may not be called to legal account for their speeches or votes at its meetings. The representatives in the National People's Congress can discuss what they wish, so by representing their constituents the people are essentially consenting to the privileged position of the Communist Party. Even if you or I disagree that they should consent to the rule of the CCP who are we to tell them to do otherwise? In addition China does afford some protection for freedom of speech. Article 35. Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration. There are limitations on these rights just as there are in the United States and other countries. All countries have some limitations on freedom of speech to protect public order and competing rights. Arguably not having limitations on freedom of speech when the people either directly or through a system of representatives decides that is how they want to exercise their power is undemocratic. Besides this the Chinese citizens can and do express grievances publicly. [4] There was a strike at a newspaper in Guangzhou which ended in the Guangzhou Propaganda Ministry deciding to change its policy and not intervene directly in editorial decisions. Chinese citizens have also legally protested concerning environmental issues. [5] Public Support of the CCP Con would have a stronger claim that China is not a democracy if the dominant party, the CCP were reviled by the public and yet remained in control. But this is not the case. Public opinion polls suggest strong support for the government among the Chinese citizens. The average person's support for the government was found to be at 8.0 on a 10-point scale. [6] Democracy Index Lastly I question the wisdom of relying on the so-called "Democracy Index". It is run by the UK-based Economic Intelligence Unit[7]. According to its wikipedia page its purpose is "providing forecasting and advisory services through research and analysis, such as monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts, country risk service reports, and industry reports". In short its main purpose is to advise investors. That biases it heavily towards the demands of Western capitalist democracies, which throws its "Democracy Index" into doubt. 1. http://en.people.cn... Constitution of China 2. wikipedia, National People's Congress https://en.wikipedia.org...'s_Congress 3. wikipedia, List of political parties in the People's Republic of China https://en.wikipedia.org...'s_Republic_of_China 4. Guangzhou newspaper strike https://mic.com... 5. Environmentalist Protests in China https://www.chinadialogue.net... 6. Public Support for the government in China http://thediplomat.com... 7. Economic Intelligence Unit https://en.wikipedia.org...