It seems to me like power concentrating into the hands of a small minority is inevitable everywhere. I'd really like to believe otherwise, but I'm hard pressed to see long lasting examples where money and power do not act like gravity
Democracy isn't the only form of governance that can work, and it's _definitely_ not a silver bullet. I just don't see the majority of China's citizens clamoring for democracy so much that they'll revolt. My main point of contention with your original comment is that democracy is inevitable. I'd like for you to be right, but I'm just not seeing it. (I'd also like for the American system to be more effective for all than it is, but I won't betting on that...)
Classic... this is why democracy is a lot less important than some less-obvious factors when it comes to quality of governance - especially things like upholding the rule of law. BTW, there's nothing particularly "westernizing" about that, either - in fact, it's something that Confucianism explicitly calls for (albeit historically with other labels, such as "Rectification of Names") and I believe it's even mentioned in the official PRC Constitution.
Democracy is not a taboo in the mainland, at least in academia. The government has also done a few democratization experiments in small villages and cities, but results were unpromising. Democratization in China is inevitable since the economic miracle won't last forever, the hard part is to figure out how to make sure the process of democratization keeps the country unified and brings prosperity, I remember there are even a few foreign professors working on this issue in Peking or Tsinghua University.