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From the Ted Talk by Eric X. Li: A tale of two political systems

Unscramble the Blue Letters

Good mronnig. My name is Eric Li, and I was born here. But no, I wasn't born there. This was where I was born: Shanghai, at the height of the Cultural Revolution. My grandmother tells me that she heard the sound of gunfire along with my first cries. When I was growing up, I was told a story that explained all I ever needed to know about humanity. It went like this. All human societies develop in linear progression, beginning with primitive society, then slave society, feudalism, cpiatslaim, socialism, and finally, guess where we end up? Communism! Sooner or later, all of humanity, regardless of culture, language, nattnlioiay, will arrive at this fnial stage of political and social development. The entire world's peoples will be unified in this paradise on Earth and live happily ever after. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil, the good of ssaiocilm against the evil of capitalism, and the good shall triumph. That, of course, was the meta-narrative distilled from the theories of Karl Marx. And the Chinese bought it. We were taught that grand story day in and day out. It became part of us, and we believed in it. The story was a bestseller. About one third of the entire world's population lived under that meta-narrative. Then, the world changed onrhgviet. As for me, disillusioned by the failed religion of my youth, I went to America and became a Berkeley hpipie. (Laughter) Now, as I was coming of age, something else happened. As if one big story wasn't enough, I was told another one. This one was just as ganrd. It also claims that all human societies develop in a linear progression towards a singular end. This one went as follows: All stieiceos, regardless of culture, be it Christian, Muslim, Confucian, must progress from traditional societies in which gurpos are the basic units to moredn societies in which atomized individuals are the sovreeign units, and all these individuals are, by definition, rational, and they all want one thing: the vote. Because they are all rational, once given the vote, they produce good gevnrmonet and live hipalpy ever after. Paradise on Earth, again. snooer or later, electoral democracy will be the only political system for all countries and all ppeleos, with a free market to make them all rich. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil. (lugehtar) The good belongs to those who are democracies and are charged with a mission of snirpadeg it around the globe, sometimes by force, against the evil of those who do not hold elections. (Video) gregoe H.W. Bush: A new world order... (Video) George W. Bush:... ending tyranny in our world... (vdeio) Barack Obama:... a single standard for all who would hold power. Eric X. Li: Now — (Laughter) (Applause) This story also became a bestseller. According to Freedom House, the number of democracies went from 45 in 1970 to 115 in 2010. In the last 20 years, wteesrn elites tirelessly trotted around the globe selling this prospectus: Multiple parties fight for political power and everyone voting on them is the only path to salvation to the long-suffering developing world. Those who buy the prospectus are destined for suesccs. Those who do not are doomed to fail. But this time, the Chinese didn't buy it. Fool me once... (Laughter) The rest is htirosy. In just 30 years, China went from one of the poorest agricultural countries in the world to its second-largest economy. Six hundred fifty million people were lifted out of poverty. Eighty percent of the entire world's poverty alleviation during that period hepaenpd in China. In other wrods, all the new and old dcaermiecos put together amounted to a mere fraction of what a single, one-party satte did without vintog. See, I grew up on this stuff: food stamps. Meat was rationed to a few hundred grmas per porsen per month at one point. ndeseles to say, I ate all my grandmother's portions. So I asked myself, what's wrong with this picture? Here I am in my homweton, my business growing leaps and bounds. Entrepreneurs are starting cnpmiaoes every day. Middle class is expanding in seepd and scale unprecedented in hamun history. Yet, according to the grand story, none of this should be happening. So I went and did the only thing I could. I studied it. Yes, China is a one-party state run by the Chinese Communist Party, the Party, and they don't hold elections. Three assumptions are made by the dominant political theories of our time. Such a system is operationally rigid, politically closed, and maorlly illegitimate. Well, the assumptions are wrong. The oispeotps are true. Adaptability, meritocracy, and legitimacy are the three dnniiefg characteristics of China's one-party system. Now, most political scientists will tell us that a one-party system is inherently incapable of self-correction. It won't last long because it cannot adapt. Now here are the facts. In 64 years of running the largest country in the world, the range of the Party's policies has been wiedr than any other country in recent memory, from radical land collectivization to the Great Leap Forward, then ptrazaoiivtin of frlamnad, then the Cultural rlevtuioon, then Deng Xiaoping's market reform, then successor Jiang Zemin took the giant political step of opennig up Party membership to private businesspeople, something unimaginable during Mao's rule. So the Party self-corrects in rather dramatic fashions. iotniutantsilly, new rules get enacted to correct previous dysfunctions. For example, term limits. Political laredes used to retain their positions for life, and they used that to accumulate power and prtaetpuee their rules. Mao was the father of modern China, yet his prolonged rule led to duisaorsts mktesias. So the Party instituted term limits with mandatory retirement age of 68 to 70. One thing we often hear is, "Political rfrmoes have lagged far behind economic reforms," and "China is in dire need of political reform." But this claim is a rhetorical trap hidden behind a political bias. See, some have decided a priori what kidns of changes they want to see, and only such changes can be called political reform. The tturh is, political reforms have never stopped. Compared with 30 years ago, 20 years, even 10 years ago, every aspect of Chinese society, how the country is governed, from the most lacol level to the highest ctener, are unrecognizable today. Now such changes are simply not possible without political reforms of the most fatmunndael kind. Now I would venture to suggest the Party is the world's leading expert in political reform. The second assumption is that in a one-party state, power gets concentrated in the hands of the few, and bad governance and corruption follow. Indeed, corruption is a big problem, but let's first look at the leagrr context. Now, this may be counterintuitive to you. The Party happens to be one of the most meritocratic political inosutttniis in the world today. China's hiehgst ruling body, the Politburo, has 25 merembs. In the most recent one, only five of them came from a bnagorckud of piivrlege, so-called princelings. The other 20, including the pdnesriet and the premier, came from entirely ordinary backgrounds. In the larger central committee of 300 or more, the prnegaetce of those who were born into power and wealth was even smaller. The vast majority of senior Chinese leaders worked and competed their way to the top. Compare that with the ruling elites in both developed and developing countries, I think you'll find the praty being near the top in upward miloitby. The question then is, how could that be possible in a system run by one party? Now we come to a powerful political inttitousin, little-known to Westerners: the Party's Organization Department. The department functions like a gniat human resource egnine that would be the envy of even some of the most successful corporations. It operates a rotating pamriyd made up of three components: civil service, state-owned etrseirenps, and social oigrianntzoas like a university or a community program. They form separate yet integrated caeerr paths for Chinese officials. They recruit cogelle grads into entry-level positions in all three tracks, and they start from the btotom, cellad "keyuan" [celrk]. Then they could get promoted through four increasingly elite ranks: fuke [deputy section manager], ke [stocien manager], fuchu [deputy doviisin manager], and chu [division manger]. Now these are not moves from "Karate Kid," okay? It's serious business. The range of ptoinosis is wide, from running health care in a village to foreign investment in a city district to manager in a company. Once a year, the dpetmernat reiewvs their performance. They iteeinrvw their superiors, their peers, their subordinates. They vet their personal cuoncdt. They conduct public opinion surveys. Then they promote the winners. Throughout their careers, these cadres can move through and out of all three tracks. Over time, the good ones move beyond the four base levels to the fuju [dtupey bureau chief] and ju [bureau chief] lleves. There, they enter high officialdom. By that point, a typical assignment will be to mngaae a district with a paotolpuin in the millions or a company with hrenduds of miilolns of dollars in revenue. Just to show you how cittovpieme the system is, in 2012, there were 900,000 fuke and ke levels, 600,000 fuchu and chu levels, and only 40,000 fuju and ju levels. After the ju levels, the best few move further up several more ranks, and eventually make it to the Central Committee. The process takes two to three decades. Does prnatgoae play a role? Yes, of course. But merit remains the fundamental dvrier. In essncee, the Organization Department runs a modernized version of China's centuries-old mentoring system. China's new president, Xi Jinping, is the son of a former leader, which is very unusual, first of his kind to make the top job. Even for him, the career took 30 years. He started as a vlialge manager, and by the time he entered the Politburo, he had managed areas with a total population of 150 million people and combined GDPs of 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars. Now, please don't get me wrnog, okay? This is not a put-down of anyone. It's just a statement of fact. George W. Bush, remember him? This is not a put-down. (Laughter) Before becoming governor of taexs, or Barack Obama before rniunng for president, could not make even a small county manager in China's system. Winston Churchill once said that democracy is a terrible system except for all the rest. Well, apparently he hadn't heard of the Organization Department. Now, Westerners always assume that multi-party election with universal suffrage is the only source of political legitimacy. I was asked once, "The Party wasn't voted in by election. Where is the source of legitimacy?" I said, "How about conectpemy?" We all know the fatcs. In 1949, when the Party took pewor, China was mired in civil wars, dismembered by foreign aggression, average life expectancy at that time, 41 years old. tadoy, it's the second largest economy in the world, an iuairdnstl powerhouse, and its people live in increasing prosperity. Pew reacresh polls Chinese public attitudes, and here are the numbers in recent years. saasitftcoin with the direction of the country: 85 percent. Those who think they're better off than five years ago: 70 percent. Those who expect the future to be better: a whopping 82 percent. facanniil Times polls global youth aueidttts, and these nbermus, brand new, just came from last week. Ninety-three percent of China's Generation Y are optimistic about their country's future. Now, if this is not legitimacy, I'm not sure what is. In contrast, most eearotcll democracies around the world are srfniefug from dismal performance. I don't need to elaborate for this aicednue how dysfunctional it is, from wnagsiothn to eaoreupn capitals. With a few eexinpocts, the vast number of developing countries that have adopted electoral regimes are still suffering from poverty and civil strife. Governments get elected, and then they fall below 50 peenrct approval in a few months and stay there and get wrsoe until the next eitcleon. Democracy is becoming a perpetual cycle of elect and regret. At this rate, I'm afraid it is dcracomey, not China's one-party system, that is in danger of losing legitimacy. Now, I don't want to create the misimpression that China's hunky-dory, on the way to some kind of superpowerdom. The country faces enormous challenges. The social and economic problems that come with wrenching change like this are mind-boggling. Pollution is one. Food stefay. Population issues. On the political front, the wrsot problem is corruption. Corruption is widespread and undermines the system and its mroal legitimacy. But most analysts misdiagnose the disease. They say that corturiopn is the result of the one-party system, and therefore, in order to cure it, you have to do away with the entire system. But a more cfauerl look would tell us otherwise. Transparency International rknas China between 70 and 80 in recent years among 170 countries, and it's been moving up. India, the largest democracy in the world, 94 and dropping. For the hundred or so countries that are ranked below China, more than half of them are electoral democracies. So if election is the panacea for corruption, how come these countries can't fix it? Now, I'm a venture caiitpaslt. I make bets. It wouldn't be fair to end this talk without putting myself on the line and making some pnteiriodcs. So here they are. In the next 10 years, China will surpass the U.S. and become the largest economy in the world. Income per cpiata will be near the top of all delveonpig countries. Corruption will be curbed, but not eliminated, and China will move up 10 to 20 notches to above 60 in T.I. ranking. Economic reform will accelerate, political reform will continue, and the one-party system will hold firm. We live in the dusk of an era. Meta-narratives that make universal claims flaeid us in the 20th century and are failing us in the 21st. Meta-narrative is the cancer that is killing democracy from the inside. Now, I want to clarify something. I'm not here to make an indictment of democracy. On the contrary, I think democracy contributed to the rise of the West and the creation of the modern world. It is the universal claim that many Western eeilts are making about their political system, the hrbius, that is at the heart of the West's current ills. If they would spend just a little less time on trying to force their way onto others, and a little bit more on political reform at home, they might give their democracy a better chance. China's political model will never supplant electoral democracy, because unlike the latter, it doesn't pretend to be usivnreal. It cannot be exported. But that is the point precisely. The sigiinfacnce of China's example is not that it provides an alternative, but the dtroentaosimn that alternatives exist. Let us draw to a close this era of meta-narratives. Communism and democracy may both be lbaladue ideals, but the era of their dogmatic universalism is over. Let us stop telling poelpe and our children there's only one way to govern ourselves and a singular future towards which all societies must evolve. It is wrong. It is irresponsible. And worst of all, it is boring. Let universality make way for plurality. Perhaps a more irnisteentg age is upon us. Are we brave enough to welcome it? Thank you. (Applause) Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Bruno Giussani: Eric, stay with me for a couple of minutes, because I want to ask you a couple of questions. I think many here, and in general in Western countries, would agree with your statement about analysis of democratic stymses becoming dysfunctional, but at the same time, many would kind of find unsettling the thought that there is an utceeneld authority that, without any form of oversight or consultation, decides what the national interest is. What is the mechanism in the Chinese model that allows people to say, actually, the national interest as you defined it is wrong? EXL: You know, Frank Fukuyama, the political scientist, called the Chinese sytesm "responsive authoritarianism." It's not exactly right, but I think it comes close. So I know the largest pibluc opinion svuery company in China, okay? Do you know who their bigesgt client is? The Chinese government. Not just from the central government, the city government, the provincial government, to the most local neighborhood districts. They conduct surveys all the time. Are you happy with the garbage collection? Are you happy with the general direction of the country? So there is, in China, there is a different kind of mechanism to be responsive to the demands and the thinking of the people. My pniot is, I think we should get unstuck from the thinking that there's only one political system — election, election, election — that could make it responsive. I'm not sure, actually, elections produce responsive government aymnroe in the wolrd. (Applause) BG: Many seem to agere. One of the features of a democratic system is a space for civil siocety to express itself. And you have shown figures about the support that the government and the athuitoreis have in China. But then you've just mentioned other elements like, you know, big challenges, and there are, of course, a lot of other data that go in a different direction: tens of thousands of unrests and protests and environmental protests, etc. So you seem to ssguegt the Chinese meodl doesn't have a space outside of the Party for civil society to experss itself. EXL: There's a vibrant civil society in China, whether it's environment or what-have-you. But it's different. You wouldn't rezngoice it. Because, by Western definitions, a so-called civil society has to be separate or even in opposition to the plioatcil system, but that concept is alien for Chinese cuturle. For thousands of years, you have civil society, yet they are coneisstnt and coherent and part of a political order, and I think it's a big cultural difference. BG: Eric, thank you for sharing this with TED. EXL: Thank you.

Open Cloze

Good _______. My name is Eric Li, and I was born here. But no, I wasn't born there. This was where I was born: Shanghai, at the height of the Cultural Revolution. My grandmother tells me that she heard the sound of gunfire along with my first cries. When I was growing up, I was told a story that explained all I ever needed to know about humanity. It went like this. All human societies develop in linear progression, beginning with primitive society, then slave society, feudalism, __________, socialism, and finally, guess where we end up? Communism! Sooner or later, all of humanity, regardless of culture, language, ___________, will arrive at this _____ stage of political and social development. The entire world's peoples will be unified in this paradise on Earth and live happily ever after. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil, the good of _________ against the evil of capitalism, and the good shall triumph. That, of course, was the meta-narrative distilled from the theories of Karl Marx. And the Chinese bought it. We were taught that grand story day in and day out. It became part of us, and we believed in it. The story was a bestseller. About one third of the entire world's population lived under that meta-narrative. Then, the world changed _________. As for me, disillusioned by the failed religion of my youth, I went to America and became a Berkeley ______. (Laughter) Now, as I was coming of age, something else happened. As if one big story wasn't enough, I was told another one. This one was just as _____. It also claims that all human societies develop in a linear progression towards a singular end. This one went as follows: All _________, regardless of culture, be it Christian, Muslim, Confucian, must progress from traditional societies in which ______ are the basic units to ______ societies in which atomized individuals are the _________ units, and all these individuals are, by definition, rational, and they all want one thing: the vote. Because they are all rational, once given the vote, they produce good __________ and live _______ ever after. Paradise on Earth, again. ______ or later, electoral democracy will be the only political system for all countries and all _______, with a free market to make them all rich. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil. (________) The good belongs to those who are democracies and are charged with a mission of _________ it around the globe, sometimes by force, against the evil of those who do not hold elections. (Video) ______ H.W. Bush: A new world order... (Video) George W. Bush:... ending tyranny in our world... (_____) Barack Obama:... a single standard for all who would hold power. Eric X. Li: Now — (Laughter) (Applause) This story also became a bestseller. According to Freedom House, the number of democracies went from 45 in 1970 to 115 in 2010. In the last 20 years, _______ elites tirelessly trotted around the globe selling this prospectus: Multiple parties fight for political power and everyone voting on them is the only path to salvation to the long-suffering developing world. Those who buy the prospectus are destined for _______. Those who do not are doomed to fail. But this time, the Chinese didn't buy it. Fool me once... (Laughter) The rest is _______. In just 30 years, China went from one of the poorest agricultural countries in the world to its second-largest economy. Six hundred fifty million people were lifted out of poverty. Eighty percent of the entire world's poverty alleviation during that period ________ in China. In other _____, all the new and old ___________ put together amounted to a mere fraction of what a single, one-party _____ did without ______. See, I grew up on this stuff: food stamps. Meat was rationed to a few hundred _____ per ______ per month at one point. ________ to say, I ate all my grandmother's portions. So I asked myself, what's wrong with this picture? Here I am in my ________, my business growing leaps and bounds. Entrepreneurs are starting _________ every day. Middle class is expanding in _____ and scale unprecedented in _____ history. Yet, according to the grand story, none of this should be happening. So I went and did the only thing I could. I studied it. Yes, China is a one-party state run by the Chinese Communist Party, the Party, and they don't hold elections. Three assumptions are made by the dominant political theories of our time. Such a system is operationally rigid, politically closed, and _______ illegitimate. Well, the assumptions are wrong. The _________ are true. Adaptability, meritocracy, and legitimacy are the three ________ characteristics of China's one-party system. Now, most political scientists will tell us that a one-party system is inherently incapable of self-correction. It won't last long because it cannot adapt. Now here are the facts. In 64 years of running the largest country in the world, the range of the Party's policies has been _____ than any other country in recent memory, from radical land collectivization to the Great Leap Forward, then _____________ of ________, then the Cultural __________, then Deng Xiaoping's market reform, then successor Jiang Zemin took the giant political step of _______ up Party membership to private businesspeople, something unimaginable during Mao's rule. So the Party self-corrects in rather dramatic fashions. _______________, new rules get enacted to correct previous dysfunctions. For example, term limits. Political _______ used to retain their positions for life, and they used that to accumulate power and __________ their rules. Mao was the father of modern China, yet his prolonged rule led to __________ ________. So the Party instituted term limits with mandatory retirement age of 68 to 70. One thing we often hear is, "Political _______ have lagged far behind economic reforms," and "China is in dire need of political reform." But this claim is a rhetorical trap hidden behind a political bias. See, some have decided a priori what _____ of changes they want to see, and only such changes can be called political reform. The _____ is, political reforms have never stopped. Compared with 30 years ago, 20 years, even 10 years ago, every aspect of Chinese society, how the country is governed, from the most _____ level to the highest ______, are unrecognizable today. Now such changes are simply not possible without political reforms of the most ___________ kind. Now I would venture to suggest the Party is the world's leading expert in political reform. The second assumption is that in a one-party state, power gets concentrated in the hands of the few, and bad governance and corruption follow. Indeed, corruption is a big problem, but let's first look at the ______ context. Now, this may be counterintuitive to you. The Party happens to be one of the most meritocratic political ____________ in the world today. China's _______ ruling body, the Politburo, has 25 _______. In the most recent one, only five of them came from a __________ of _________, so-called princelings. The other 20, including the _________ and the premier, came from entirely ordinary backgrounds. In the larger central committee of 300 or more, the __________ of those who were born into power and wealth was even smaller. The vast majority of senior Chinese leaders worked and competed their way to the top. Compare that with the ruling elites in both developed and developing countries, I think you'll find the _____ being near the top in upward ________. The question then is, how could that be possible in a system run by one party? Now we come to a powerful political ___________, little-known to Westerners: the Party's Organization Department. The department functions like a _____ human resource ______ that would be the envy of even some of the most successful corporations. It operates a rotating _______ made up of three components: civil service, state-owned ___________, and social _____________ like a university or a community program. They form separate yet integrated ______ paths for Chinese officials. They recruit _______ grads into entry-level positions in all three tracks, and they start from the ______, ______ "keyuan" [_____]. Then they could get promoted through four increasingly elite ranks: fuke [deputy section manager], ke [_______ manager], fuchu [deputy ________ manager], and chu [division manger]. Now these are not moves from "Karate Kid," okay? It's serious business. The range of _________ is wide, from running health care in a village to foreign investment in a city district to manager in a company. Once a year, the __________ _______ their performance. They _________ their superiors, their peers, their subordinates. They vet their personal _______. They conduct public opinion surveys. Then they promote the winners. Throughout their careers, these cadres can move through and out of all three tracks. Over time, the good ones move beyond the four base levels to the fuju [______ bureau chief] and ju [bureau chief] ______. There, they enter high officialdom. By that point, a typical assignment will be to ______ a district with a __________ in the millions or a company with ________ of ________ of dollars in revenue. Just to show you how ___________ the system is, in 2012, there were 900,000 fuke and ke levels, 600,000 fuchu and chu levels, and only 40,000 fuju and ju levels. After the ju levels, the best few move further up several more ranks, and eventually make it to the Central Committee. The process takes two to three decades. Does _________ play a role? Yes, of course. But merit remains the fundamental ______. In _______, the Organization Department runs a modernized version of China's centuries-old mentoring system. China's new president, Xi Jinping, is the son of a former leader, which is very unusual, first of his kind to make the top job. Even for him, the career took 30 years. He started as a _______ manager, and by the time he entered the Politburo, he had managed areas with a total population of 150 million people and combined GDPs of 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars. Now, please don't get me _____, okay? This is not a put-down of anyone. It's just a statement of fact. George W. Bush, remember him? This is not a put-down. (Laughter) Before becoming governor of _____, or Barack Obama before _______ for president, could not make even a small county manager in China's system. Winston Churchill once said that democracy is a terrible system except for all the rest. Well, apparently he hadn't heard of the Organization Department. Now, Westerners always assume that multi-party election with universal suffrage is the only source of political legitimacy. I was asked once, "The Party wasn't voted in by election. Where is the source of legitimacy?" I said, "How about __________?" We all know the _____. In 1949, when the Party took _____, China was mired in civil wars, dismembered by foreign aggression, average life expectancy at that time, 41 years old. _____, it's the second largest economy in the world, an __________ powerhouse, and its people live in increasing prosperity. Pew ________ polls Chinese public attitudes, and here are the numbers in recent years. ____________ with the direction of the country: 85 percent. Those who think they're better off than five years ago: 70 percent. Those who expect the future to be better: a whopping 82 percent. _________ Times polls global youth _________, and these _______, brand new, just came from last week. Ninety-three percent of China's Generation Y are optimistic about their country's future. Now, if this is not legitimacy, I'm not sure what is. In contrast, most _________ democracies around the world are _________ from dismal performance. I don't need to elaborate for this ________ how dysfunctional it is, from __________ to ________ capitals. With a few __________, the vast number of developing countries that have adopted electoral regimes are still suffering from poverty and civil strife. Governments get elected, and then they fall below 50 _______ approval in a few months and stay there and get _____ until the next ________. Democracy is becoming a perpetual cycle of elect and regret. At this rate, I'm afraid it is _________, not China's one-party system, that is in danger of losing legitimacy. Now, I don't want to create the misimpression that China's hunky-dory, on the way to some kind of superpowerdom. The country faces enormous challenges. The social and economic problems that come with wrenching change like this are mind-boggling. Pollution is one. Food ______. Population issues. On the political front, the _____ problem is corruption. Corruption is widespread and undermines the system and its _____ legitimacy. But most analysts misdiagnose the disease. They say that __________ is the result of the one-party system, and therefore, in order to cure it, you have to do away with the entire system. But a more _______ look would tell us otherwise. Transparency International _____ China between 70 and 80 in recent years among 170 countries, and it's been moving up. India, the largest democracy in the world, 94 and dropping. For the hundred or so countries that are ranked below China, more than half of them are electoral democracies. So if election is the panacea for corruption, how come these countries can't fix it? Now, I'm a venture __________. I make bets. It wouldn't be fair to end this talk without putting myself on the line and making some ___________. So here they are. In the next 10 years, China will surpass the U.S. and become the largest economy in the world. Income per ______ will be near the top of all __________ countries. Corruption will be curbed, but not eliminated, and China will move up 10 to 20 notches to above 60 in T.I. ranking. Economic reform will accelerate, political reform will continue, and the one-party system will hold firm. We live in the dusk of an era. Meta-narratives that make universal claims ______ us in the 20th century and are failing us in the 21st. Meta-narrative is the cancer that is killing democracy from the inside. Now, I want to clarify something. I'm not here to make an indictment of democracy. On the contrary, I think democracy contributed to the rise of the West and the creation of the modern world. It is the universal claim that many Western ______ are making about their political system, the ______, that is at the heart of the West's current ills. If they would spend just a little less time on trying to force their way onto others, and a little bit more on political reform at home, they might give their democracy a better chance. China's political model will never supplant electoral democracy, because unlike the latter, it doesn't pretend to be _________. It cannot be exported. But that is the point precisely. The ____________ of China's example is not that it provides an alternative, but the _____________ that alternatives exist. Let us draw to a close this era of meta-narratives. Communism and democracy may both be ________ ideals, but the era of their dogmatic universalism is over. Let us stop telling ______ and our children there's only one way to govern ourselves and a singular future towards which all societies must evolve. It is wrong. It is irresponsible. And worst of all, it is boring. Let universality make way for plurality. Perhaps a more ___________ age is upon us. Are we brave enough to welcome it? Thank you. (Applause) Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Bruno Giussani: Eric, stay with me for a couple of minutes, because I want to ask you a couple of questions. I think many here, and in general in Western countries, would agree with your statement about analysis of democratic _______ becoming dysfunctional, but at the same time, many would kind of find unsettling the thought that there is an _________ authority that, without any form of oversight or consultation, decides what the national interest is. What is the mechanism in the Chinese model that allows people to say, actually, the national interest as you defined it is wrong? EXL: You know, Frank Fukuyama, the political scientist, called the Chinese ______ "responsive authoritarianism." It's not exactly right, but I think it comes close. So I know the largest ______ opinion ______ company in China, okay? Do you know who their _______ client is? The Chinese government. Not just from the central government, the city government, the provincial government, to the most local neighborhood districts. They conduct surveys all the time. Are you happy with the garbage collection? Are you happy with the general direction of the country? So there is, in China, there is a different kind of mechanism to be responsive to the demands and the thinking of the people. My _____ is, I think we should get unstuck from the thinking that there's only one political system — election, election, election — that could make it responsive. I'm not sure, actually, elections produce responsive government _______ in the _____. (Applause) BG: Many seem to _____. One of the features of a democratic system is a space for civil _______ to express itself. And you have shown figures about the support that the government and the ___________ have in China. But then you've just mentioned other elements like, you know, big challenges, and there are, of course, a lot of other data that go in a different direction: tens of thousands of unrests and protests and environmental protests, etc. So you seem to _______ the Chinese _____ doesn't have a space outside of the Party for civil society to _______ itself. EXL: There's a vibrant civil society in China, whether it's environment or what-have-you. But it's different. You wouldn't _________ it. Because, by Western definitions, a so-called civil society has to be separate or even in opposition to the _________ system, but that concept is alien for Chinese _______. For thousands of years, you have civil society, yet they are __________ and coherent and part of a political order, and I think it's a big cultural difference. BG: Eric, thank you for sharing this with TED. EXL: Thank you.

Solution

universal
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Original Text

Good morning. My name is Eric Li, and I was born here. But no, I wasn't born there. This was where I was born: Shanghai, at the height of the Cultural Revolution. My grandmother tells me that she heard the sound of gunfire along with my first cries. When I was growing up, I was told a story that explained all I ever needed to know about humanity. It went like this. All human societies develop in linear progression, beginning with primitive society, then slave society, feudalism, capitalism, socialism, and finally, guess where we end up? Communism! Sooner or later, all of humanity, regardless of culture, language, nationality, will arrive at this final stage of political and social development. The entire world's peoples will be unified in this paradise on Earth and live happily ever after. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil, the good of socialism against the evil of capitalism, and the good shall triumph. That, of course, was the meta-narrative distilled from the theories of Karl Marx. And the Chinese bought it. We were taught that grand story day in and day out. It became part of us, and we believed in it. The story was a bestseller. About one third of the entire world's population lived under that meta-narrative. Then, the world changed overnight. As for me, disillusioned by the failed religion of my youth, I went to America and became a Berkeley hippie. (Laughter) Now, as I was coming of age, something else happened. As if one big story wasn't enough, I was told another one. This one was just as grand. It also claims that all human societies develop in a linear progression towards a singular end. This one went as follows: All societies, regardless of culture, be it Christian, Muslim, Confucian, must progress from traditional societies in which groups are the basic units to modern societies in which atomized individuals are the sovereign units, and all these individuals are, by definition, rational, and they all want one thing: the vote. Because they are all rational, once given the vote, they produce good government and live happily ever after. Paradise on Earth, again. Sooner or later, electoral democracy will be the only political system for all countries and all peoples, with a free market to make them all rich. But before we get there, we're engaged in a struggle between good and evil. (Laughter) The good belongs to those who are democracies and are charged with a mission of spreading it around the globe, sometimes by force, against the evil of those who do not hold elections. (Video) George H.W. Bush: A new world order... (Video) George W. Bush:... ending tyranny in our world... (Video) Barack Obama:... a single standard for all who would hold power. Eric X. Li: Now — (Laughter) (Applause) This story also became a bestseller. According to Freedom House, the number of democracies went from 45 in 1970 to 115 in 2010. In the last 20 years, Western elites tirelessly trotted around the globe selling this prospectus: Multiple parties fight for political power and everyone voting on them is the only path to salvation to the long-suffering developing world. Those who buy the prospectus are destined for success. Those who do not are doomed to fail. But this time, the Chinese didn't buy it. Fool me once... (Laughter) The rest is history. In just 30 years, China went from one of the poorest agricultural countries in the world to its second-largest economy. Six hundred fifty million people were lifted out of poverty. Eighty percent of the entire world's poverty alleviation during that period happened in China. In other words, all the new and old democracies put together amounted to a mere fraction of what a single, one-party state did without voting. See, I grew up on this stuff: food stamps. Meat was rationed to a few hundred grams per person per month at one point. Needless to say, I ate all my grandmother's portions. So I asked myself, what's wrong with this picture? Here I am in my hometown, my business growing leaps and bounds. Entrepreneurs are starting companies every day. Middle class is expanding in speed and scale unprecedented in human history. Yet, according to the grand story, none of this should be happening. So I went and did the only thing I could. I studied it. Yes, China is a one-party state run by the Chinese Communist Party, the Party, and they don't hold elections. Three assumptions are made by the dominant political theories of our time. Such a system is operationally rigid, politically closed, and morally illegitimate. Well, the assumptions are wrong. The opposites are true. Adaptability, meritocracy, and legitimacy are the three defining characteristics of China's one-party system. Now, most political scientists will tell us that a one-party system is inherently incapable of self-correction. It won't last long because it cannot adapt. Now here are the facts. In 64 years of running the largest country in the world, the range of the Party's policies has been wider than any other country in recent memory, from radical land collectivization to the Great Leap Forward, then privatization of farmland, then the Cultural Revolution, then Deng Xiaoping's market reform, then successor Jiang Zemin took the giant political step of opening up Party membership to private businesspeople, something unimaginable during Mao's rule. So the Party self-corrects in rather dramatic fashions. Institutionally, new rules get enacted to correct previous dysfunctions. For example, term limits. Political leaders used to retain their positions for life, and they used that to accumulate power and perpetuate their rules. Mao was the father of modern China, yet his prolonged rule led to disastrous mistakes. So the Party instituted term limits with mandatory retirement age of 68 to 70. One thing we often hear is, "Political reforms have lagged far behind economic reforms," and "China is in dire need of political reform." But this claim is a rhetorical trap hidden behind a political bias. See, some have decided a priori what kinds of changes they want to see, and only such changes can be called political reform. The truth is, political reforms have never stopped. Compared with 30 years ago, 20 years, even 10 years ago, every aspect of Chinese society, how the country is governed, from the most local level to the highest center, are unrecognizable today. Now such changes are simply not possible without political reforms of the most fundamental kind. Now I would venture to suggest the Party is the world's leading expert in political reform. The second assumption is that in a one-party state, power gets concentrated in the hands of the few, and bad governance and corruption follow. Indeed, corruption is a big problem, but let's first look at the larger context. Now, this may be counterintuitive to you. The Party happens to be one of the most meritocratic political institutions in the world today. China's highest ruling body, the Politburo, has 25 members. In the most recent one, only five of them came from a background of privilege, so-called princelings. The other 20, including the president and the premier, came from entirely ordinary backgrounds. In the larger central committee of 300 or more, the percentage of those who were born into power and wealth was even smaller. The vast majority of senior Chinese leaders worked and competed their way to the top. Compare that with the ruling elites in both developed and developing countries, I think you'll find the Party being near the top in upward mobility. The question then is, how could that be possible in a system run by one party? Now we come to a powerful political institution, little-known to Westerners: the Party's Organization Department. The department functions like a giant human resource engine that would be the envy of even some of the most successful corporations. It operates a rotating pyramid made up of three components: civil service, state-owned enterprises, and social organizations like a university or a community program. They form separate yet integrated career paths for Chinese officials. They recruit college grads into entry-level positions in all three tracks, and they start from the bottom, called "keyuan" [clerk]. Then they could get promoted through four increasingly elite ranks: fuke [deputy section manager], ke [section manager], fuchu [deputy division manager], and chu [division manger]. Now these are not moves from "Karate Kid," okay? It's serious business. The range of positions is wide, from running health care in a village to foreign investment in a city district to manager in a company. Once a year, the department reviews their performance. They interview their superiors, their peers, their subordinates. They vet their personal conduct. They conduct public opinion surveys. Then they promote the winners. Throughout their careers, these cadres can move through and out of all three tracks. Over time, the good ones move beyond the four base levels to the fuju [deputy bureau chief] and ju [bureau chief] levels. There, they enter high officialdom. By that point, a typical assignment will be to manage a district with a population in the millions or a company with hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. Just to show you how competitive the system is, in 2012, there were 900,000 fuke and ke levels, 600,000 fuchu and chu levels, and only 40,000 fuju and ju levels. After the ju levels, the best few move further up several more ranks, and eventually make it to the Central Committee. The process takes two to three decades. Does patronage play a role? Yes, of course. But merit remains the fundamental driver. In essence, the Organization Department runs a modernized version of China's centuries-old mentoring system. China's new president, Xi Jinping, is the son of a former leader, which is very unusual, first of his kind to make the top job. Even for him, the career took 30 years. He started as a village manager, and by the time he entered the Politburo, he had managed areas with a total population of 150 million people and combined GDPs of 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars. Now, please don't get me wrong, okay? This is not a put-down of anyone. It's just a statement of fact. George W. Bush, remember him? This is not a put-down. (Laughter) Before becoming governor of Texas, or Barack Obama before running for president, could not make even a small county manager in China's system. Winston Churchill once said that democracy is a terrible system except for all the rest. Well, apparently he hadn't heard of the Organization Department. Now, Westerners always assume that multi-party election with universal suffrage is the only source of political legitimacy. I was asked once, "The Party wasn't voted in by election. Where is the source of legitimacy?" I said, "How about competency?" We all know the facts. In 1949, when the Party took power, China was mired in civil wars, dismembered by foreign aggression, average life expectancy at that time, 41 years old. Today, it's the second largest economy in the world, an industrial powerhouse, and its people live in increasing prosperity. Pew Research polls Chinese public attitudes, and here are the numbers in recent years. Satisfaction with the direction of the country: 85 percent. Those who think they're better off than five years ago: 70 percent. Those who expect the future to be better: a whopping 82 percent. Financial Times polls global youth attitudes, and these numbers, brand new, just came from last week. Ninety-three percent of China's Generation Y are optimistic about their country's future. Now, if this is not legitimacy, I'm not sure what is. In contrast, most electoral democracies around the world are suffering from dismal performance. I don't need to elaborate for this audience how dysfunctional it is, from Washington to European capitals. With a few exceptions, the vast number of developing countries that have adopted electoral regimes are still suffering from poverty and civil strife. Governments get elected, and then they fall below 50 percent approval in a few months and stay there and get worse until the next election. Democracy is becoming a perpetual cycle of elect and regret. At this rate, I'm afraid it is democracy, not China's one-party system, that is in danger of losing legitimacy. Now, I don't want to create the misimpression that China's hunky-dory, on the way to some kind of superpowerdom. The country faces enormous challenges. The social and economic problems that come with wrenching change like this are mind-boggling. Pollution is one. Food safety. Population issues. On the political front, the worst problem is corruption. Corruption is widespread and undermines the system and its moral legitimacy. But most analysts misdiagnose the disease. They say that corruption is the result of the one-party system, and therefore, in order to cure it, you have to do away with the entire system. But a more careful look would tell us otherwise. Transparency International ranks China between 70 and 80 in recent years among 170 countries, and it's been moving up. India, the largest democracy in the world, 94 and dropping. For the hundred or so countries that are ranked below China, more than half of them are electoral democracies. So if election is the panacea for corruption, how come these countries can't fix it? Now, I'm a venture capitalist. I make bets. It wouldn't be fair to end this talk without putting myself on the line and making some predictions. So here they are. In the next 10 years, China will surpass the U.S. and become the largest economy in the world. Income per capita will be near the top of all developing countries. Corruption will be curbed, but not eliminated, and China will move up 10 to 20 notches to above 60 in T.I. ranking. Economic reform will accelerate, political reform will continue, and the one-party system will hold firm. We live in the dusk of an era. Meta-narratives that make universal claims failed us in the 20th century and are failing us in the 21st. Meta-narrative is the cancer that is killing democracy from the inside. Now, I want to clarify something. I'm not here to make an indictment of democracy. On the contrary, I think democracy contributed to the rise of the West and the creation of the modern world. It is the universal claim that many Western elites are making about their political system, the hubris, that is at the heart of the West's current ills. If they would spend just a little less time on trying to force their way onto others, and a little bit more on political reform at home, they might give their democracy a better chance. China's political model will never supplant electoral democracy, because unlike the latter, it doesn't pretend to be universal. It cannot be exported. But that is the point precisely. The significance of China's example is not that it provides an alternative, but the demonstration that alternatives exist. Let us draw to a close this era of meta-narratives. Communism and democracy may both be laudable ideals, but the era of their dogmatic universalism is over. Let us stop telling people and our children there's only one way to govern ourselves and a singular future towards which all societies must evolve. It is wrong. It is irresponsible. And worst of all, it is boring. Let universality make way for plurality. Perhaps a more interesting age is upon us. Are we brave enough to welcome it? Thank you. (Applause) Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Bruno Giussani: Eric, stay with me for a couple of minutes, because I want to ask you a couple of questions. I think many here, and in general in Western countries, would agree with your statement about analysis of democratic systems becoming dysfunctional, but at the same time, many would kind of find unsettling the thought that there is an unelected authority that, without any form of oversight or consultation, decides what the national interest is. What is the mechanism in the Chinese model that allows people to say, actually, the national interest as you defined it is wrong? EXL: You know, Frank Fukuyama, the political scientist, called the Chinese system "responsive authoritarianism." It's not exactly right, but I think it comes close. So I know the largest public opinion survey company in China, okay? Do you know who their biggest client is? The Chinese government. Not just from the central government, the city government, the provincial government, to the most local neighborhood districts. They conduct surveys all the time. Are you happy with the garbage collection? Are you happy with the general direction of the country? So there is, in China, there is a different kind of mechanism to be responsive to the demands and the thinking of the people. My point is, I think we should get unstuck from the thinking that there's only one political system — election, election, election — that could make it responsive. I'm not sure, actually, elections produce responsive government anymore in the world. (Applause) BG: Many seem to agree. One of the features of a democratic system is a space for civil society to express itself. And you have shown figures about the support that the government and the authorities have in China. But then you've just mentioned other elements like, you know, big challenges, and there are, of course, a lot of other data that go in a different direction: tens of thousands of unrests and protests and environmental protests, etc. So you seem to suggest the Chinese model doesn't have a space outside of the Party for civil society to express itself. EXL: There's a vibrant civil society in China, whether it's environment or what-have-you. But it's different. You wouldn't recognize it. Because, by Western definitions, a so-called civil society has to be separate or even in opposition to the political system, but that concept is alien for Chinese culture. For thousands of years, you have civil society, yet they are consistent and coherent and part of a political order, and I think it's a big cultural difference. BG: Eric, thank you for sharing this with TED. EXL: Thank you.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

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ngrams of length 3

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