Embracing the concept of democracy in China: citizens’ democratic perceptions and support

ABSTRACT

Citizens in authoritarian regimes understand the concept of democracy under the influence of the state's manipulation and individual agency. This study examines Chinese citizens’ perception of three types of government – people relationships – government (1) of the people; (2) by the people; and (3) for the people – without directly using the term ‘democracy’. Citizens’ perceptions of these three principles of democracy can predict the level of their support for democracy, identifying variations among Chinese ‘democrats’. The principle of government by the people is most popular among the Chinese public. Citizens who understand democracy based on government of the people are dissatisfied with the country's level of democracy and criticize authoritarian politics. Public understanding of democracy based on government for the people has an anti-democratic orientation, and is compatible with support for authoritarian rule. This study unveils variations in the Chinese public's understanding of democracy and its impact on politics.

KEYWORDS:

• Authoritarian survival
• democratic support
• liberal democratic values
• one-party rule
• support for nondemocratic rules

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments and suggestions, which help improve the quality of the current manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 It is impossible to completely dismiss social desirability. In repressive countries, some people may conceal their true evaluations of the authority. Despite existence of possible bias, studies of public opinions in China show that people are not affected by social desirability too much if they are not asked some person-specific questions such as those related to bribery (Lei & Lu, 2017).

2 Overlapping of perceptions of different government-people relations indicate the extent to which people coherently and consistently construct their concepts of democracy. Previous studies have found a mixture of complementary and conflictive conceptual elements of democracy in Chinese people's perception of democracy (Chu & Huang, 2010; Shin, 2012). This reflects the complexity of this concept in China.

3 Data analysed in this article were collected by the Asian Barometer Project (2013–2016), which was co-directed by Professors Fu Hu and Yun-han Chu and received major funding support from Taiwan's Ministry of Education, Academia Sinica and National Taiwan University. The Asian Barometer Project Office (www.asianbarometer.org) is solely responsible for the data distribution. The authors appreciate the assistance in providing data by the institutes and individuals aforementioned. The views expressed herein are the authors own.

4 Bartlett's test of sphericity was significant, χ² (10) = 1892.317, p < .000, and the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin index for the matrix was 0.747. Two empirical indices regarding the sample's correlation matrix revealed that it was suitable for principal component analysis.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 71874109].

Notes on contributors

Yida Zhai

Yida Zhai is an Associate Professor in the School of International and Public Affairs at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. He received his PhD from the University of Tokyo. His research interests include political psychology, public opinion and East Asian comparative politics. His work has been published in Asian Survey, International Political Science Review and other Chinese and Japanese journals.