Rugoz wrote:The "Chinese model" doesn't highlight any of those things, because China is worse. Why should I take China as a model when Western democracies have less inequality in income and wealth, some of them much less? The "Chinese model" represents a regression for any developed country.
China is still developing, so such gaps are to be expected. Nonetheless, it's not the measure I use when describing what I like about the Chinese model.
Most importantly, in the context of the question, the Chinese state apparatus hasn't been captured by individual oligarchs, and has retained its power. It isn't a regression, but a model that inherently has more
potential for democracy.
In the most simple terms: I, an individual, can vote for the President of a state - I cannot vote for the President of a corporation (without purchasing shares and getting votes relative to my shares, or, in the case of private ownership, at all). States which choose to cede collective power to non-democratic entities are the systemic failure in the Western model because the interests of these non-democratic entities are not usually aligned with the interests of the people, just their owners.
There are alternative models, of course - you could have weak states with democratic workplaces. But those don't exist on a large-scale in any meaningful sense, (yet?).
Rugoz wrote:Based on what? It seems both follow a similar strategy, namely fight the oligarchy if they pose a threat to their rule and otherwise treat them favourably.
The Chinese oligarchy is the Chinese Communist Party, an internally theoretically democratic political organization that is made up by the people and, ostensibly, in service of the people. It is a singular entity with a collective purpose that anybody can join and participate in. It is in their interest to keep state/party power strong, and to reduce the influence of actors that exist outside the state/party system. This is good because the state/party system is inherently more open to participation by the people; has a greater potential for democracy (even if this isn't necessarily manifested in practice at the moment).
The Russian oligarchy is a bunch of individual thieves, business-owners, and other plutocrats that are not a collective entity, do not have a singular purpose or interest, and which is neither open to mass participation or joinable by the public. If they're even answerable to public pressure to begin with, it is through an external political apparatus, and it is in their interest to make that political apparatus weaker (and they act to do precisely that). The West is much closer to this model than the Chinese model.