Ok, to use American parlance, we expected them to play ball on an even field. Of course pols/biz were blinded by the big $$ in their eyes and could not see beyond that, but the expectation with was that the legacy of Deng and Hu would continue to soften the CCP and eventually become (economic) "partners" of some sort. Maybe not completely an open democracy but also definitely not the more authoritarian swerve it's taken over the last 10 years or so.