A review of China’s Trapped Transition: The Limits of Developmental Autocracy by Minxin Pei.
About the Author
Bruce Gilley is professor of political science at Portland State University. His works include The Right to Rule: How States Win and Lose Legitimacy (2009) and The Nature of Asian Politics (2014).
Like all contemporary nondemocratic systems, the Chinese system suffers from weak legitimacy at the level of regime type. The most likely form of transition for China remains the model of…
Through greater savvy engagement with international law, authoritarians are seeking not only to shield themselves from criticism, but to reshape global norms in their favor.