In the short term this might be true. But any view that holds non-democratic authoritarianism up as a superior long-term approach has to grapple with the fact that open societies have systematically outperformed authoritarian ones over the past century. This is in the face of world war, revolutions, and developments in communications technology that destabilized entire political movements.
Protests and electoral chaos are bad things, and new communications technologies can make them more destabilizing. But the ability to peacefully avoid something like 25 years of Maoism is worth an immeasurable amount of short-term chaos. We should be a little bit careful before we copy the Chinese approach.
Perhaps they don't care about performance, but rather control. The Qing dynasty of Imperial Chine ruled from 1644-1912:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qing_dynasty
They got their asses handed to them starting in the 1800s of course:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_of_humiliation
But the current leadership may be happy with performing at 75% of open societies if they still get to run things: enough development to keep the outsiders at bay, not enough openness to cause trouble.
As long as their general rising prosperity, it may be good enough for most folks in China as well:
> It must be understood that liberalism and nationalism developed in China in lockstep, with one, in a sense, serving as means to the other. That is, liberalism was a means to serve national ends — the wealth and power of the country. And so when means and end came into conflict, as they inevitably did, the end won out. Nationalism trumped liberalism. Unity, sovereignty, and the means to preserve both were ultimately more important even to those who espoused republicanism and the franchise.
> China’s betrayal at Versailles did not help the cause of liberalism in China. After all, it was the standard bearers of liberalism — the U.K., France, and the United States — that had negotiated secret treaties to give Shandong to the Japanese.
> Former liberals gravitated toward two main camps, both overtly Leninist in organization, both unapologetically authoritarian: the Nationalists and the Communists. By the mid-1920s, the overwhelming majority of Chinese intellectuals believed that an authoritarian solution was China’s only recourse.
* https://supchina.com/2019/07/22/why-do-chinese-people-like-t...
I do, however, think the view that "open societies have systematically outperformed authoritarian ones over the past century" is potentially naive, dangerous even. Did the 18th and 19th century "prove" that expansionist imperialism is superior to nationalism, democratic liberalism, etc?
We have a tendency to narrate history with cause-effect dynamics that compliment our ideals. If you believe in open society (I do), you tend to make this an anchor in your historical worldview.
In any case... the west, especially the US, is what "outperformed." If Roosevelt had been Russian & Lenin American, I don't think the 20th century would have played out the same but backwards. There are too many factors at play. History is not determined by ideological positions.
Post WWII, western european states certainly did outperform warsaw pact states. I think that's the strongest evidence of "superiority," but again there are many factors. Not least among them, Western germany traded within a much wealthier trade block. A similar dynamic affected China in the 80s. They suddenly had access to wealthy western markets. This creates wealth regardless of governing economic systems.
In my view, the political imperative is backwards. Open society must succeed for open society ideals to prevail. This as opposed to "success is important, therefore open societies ideas must be adopted." There is no ideological position that guarantees success. That is itself a communist perspective... messianic rationalism.
I don't believe history to be deterministic. Open societies are valuable for their own sake. How they perform is, IMO, attributable to "execution" above all else.
A lot of other discussions use “selective” facts to support their “superficial” points.
Deng Xiaping's famous line during the chinese market reform era was "If you open the window, both fresh air and flies will be blown in."
The "fresh air" was a market economy, trade with western economies, even cultural liberalisation... as long as they weren't dangerous to the regime. They were still dubious of ideological capitalism, at its height in the 80s & 90s... but willing to compromise. They weren't willing to compromise on free press, speech, association, etc.. Those are the flies. They were not about to let them in.
The ccp felt entirely vindicated when the USSR collapsed, and doubly so by the 90s, when China's economy was obviously booming. Communist economics could be binned while maintaining chinese communism in all other realms. Liberal ideologists were wrong.
Anyway... by the time the www got big, this new version of chinese communism was mature, successful and confident. Google, wikipedia, later facebook... these are politically potent, and dangerous. The internet would influence political opinions. It would be exploited by foreign intelligence. It would harbour dissent, and dissent would grow into revolt... the ccp had no control of it. Besides politics, there were other issues. Economics, of course. Why not reserve these markets for chinese companies? Information security, espionage and other intelligence adjacent issues.
The ccp were correct on all points and the last decades proved it. The arab spring. Many elections worldwide, notably the 2016 US presidential. Prism. Flat earthers. $trn market caps. The ticktok backlash. All proof that Deng was right. Political potency. Intelligence potency. Economic potency. All too potent to stay hands off.
Back to the US... The US has basically come around to all these positions. Regardless of why Zuck is called to testify in congress, congressmen are most interested in political potency. Are you favouring my opponent's party more than mine? Is foreign intelligence operating on your platform?
US intelligence treats domestic internet companies as an asset, and foreign ones as adversaries. There isn't even much veneer anymore.
The economics also play, of course. It gets danced around for narrative/ideological reasons... but it's foolish to think the US would be neutral about Amazon's success vis a vis Alibaba.
In essence, the Dengist position has been adopted in the US. The internet americans access must be american controlled. Political reasons first. Intelligence reasons second. Economic reasons quitely.