Because China is not a democracy and probably it's size and culture all but prevents effective democratic transition (they are wise to not start it, do it and what happened in Russia will look like a joke), it's bound to get stuck rather quickly. Are there any rich non-democratic countries, apart from petrostates, out there anyway? They will have to either reform (and go bust), or resort to becoming a hermit state, before they reach East European level.

And due to the size of their debt, getting stuck means going bust - in their case, just quitting capitalism, calling it a mistake and returning to the good old days.