China is rising—not just in GDP and infrastructure, but in influence. While America dithers and Europe stalls, China acts. To many, this looks like the future. Roads are built. Orders are obeyed. Pandemics are crushed. Political chaos is replaced by seamless authority. For some observers, this is not terrifying—it is inspiring. I wrote an article about what the world would look like if China ruled it. In this piece, I expose how it would look if Europe and other countries adopted the Chinese style.
Increasingly, Western politicians and business elites look at China and ask, “Why not us?” From Hungarian strongmen to French technocrats, the idea of governing like Beijing is no longer taboo. In fact, it is tempting. But this temptation is fatal. Because what looks efficient is actually built on silence, fear, and obedience—not stability. Copying China is not modernization. It is self-erasure.
China: Nothing sacred – just the largest and most visible
China’s apparent success is not the result of some civilizational wisdom. It is the result of state planning, raw population, coerced labor, and Western outsourcing; it rose by manufacturing for the world, not through freedom or transparency. It conquered markets, not morality. And now, as Western democracies fragment, China’s model seems appealing. But the illusion of competence often hides the absence of rights.
What many forget is that China’s rise was not born of free inquiry, innovation, or open discourse. It was built through exported labor, borrowed technology, and a one-party machine willing to crush dissent at every level. From Uighur internment camps to censored professors, the system does not tolerate deviation. And that is why it moves quickly—not because it is better, but because no one is allowed to say no.
Chinese instinctual integration: Humans follow power
Throughout evolution, humans gravitate toward powerful tribes. In times of crisis, we default to authority. Democracy feels chaotic. Authoritarianism, by contrast, promises control. China capitalizes on this instinct. Its system sells the fantasy of efficiency—but only by turning its population into functionaries.
This instinct is deeply rooted. When survival is uncertain, the brain favors hierarchy. In ancient tribes, following the alpha increased your chances of protection and food. In modern politics, it translates into admiration for strong states. China appears strong. So people instinctively admire it. But this is not rational—it is evolutionary inertia.
The marketing machine: A dream engineered
No dictatorship in history has sold itself so well. Chinese leaders speak of harmony. Of discipline. Of shared prosperity. But behind the slogans lies surveillance, imprisonment, and absolute control. What is presented as unity is actually suppression.
Western intellectuals fall for this illusion because China has learned how to speak their language. It builds green cities and hosts global conferences. It launches tech start-ups and funds universities. Meanwhile, it jails activists, censors data, and rewrites history. And it gets away with it—because it markets the repression as “cultural stability.”
Figures like Pitbull and Bill O’Reilly celebrate America’s version of the dream: work hard, rise up. But even they are deluded by structural lies. In China, the myth is even more extreme. There is no space for criticism at all. Even Arnold Schwarzenegger, who praises discipline and meritocracy, misses the point: the system works for a few to pacify the many.
Scale, not genius: Why China seems to win
China appears intelligent. But its dominance comes from numbers. A country with over a billion people will always produce results that look impressive. More scientists, more factories, more soldiers. But this is scale—not brilliance.
And crucially, this model is only sustainable in the short term. Why? Because innovation dies where dissent is punished. Real science needs failure. Real policy needs critique. And real people need freedom. China stifles all three. It does not grow by evolving—it grows by repeating.
Fear as fuel: The alternative is worse
People around the world do not dream of China because they love it. They fear the collapse of their own countries. When police are corrupt, when food is scarce, when elections are fake, Beijing looks better than Baghdad. Or Lagos. Or Caracas. But this is not love. It is desperation.
China does not inspire. It fills a vacuum. In a failing world, even a sterile system looks warm. But it is not a cure. It is a control mechanism. And once adopted, it cannot be undone.
Cultural amnesia: A story without blood
The Chinese government erases its own atrocities. Tiananmen Square? Gone from textbooks. Covid whistleblowers? Silenced and disappeared. Uighur repression? Systematic internment, forced sterilization, and re-education camps. Hong Kong democracy? Crushed by force and censorship.
Like all authoritarian regimes, it rewrites its own story. And because human memory is short—and attention is fragile—this works. Global observers forget quickly. Leaders praise China’s GDP but ignore its human cost. They speak of “lifting millions out of poverty” without mentioning forced labor, mass surveillance, or ideological control.
Winners celebrated, losers erased
In China, only success stories are allowed to exist. Failed businesses, jailed artists, censored scientists—they are all deleted. This creates a myth of constant progress. It is not truth. It is selection bias on a national scale.
Even in Western systems, we see this lie. Pitbull became rich—but most people in his situation did not. Bill O’Reilly lectures the poor—but he inherited connections. These myths keep people compliant. In China, the myth is national policy.
The myth of choice and the evolution of guilt
In evolutionary tribes, failure meant exclusion. That fear still lives in our blood. Modern governments exploit it. China goes further: it replaces agency with obedience. You are not supposed to choose—you are supposed to serve.
This turns politics into submission. And once that becomes normal, rebellion becomes unthinkable. That is not progress. That is engineered extinction of dissent.
Escapism over justice: The Global South’s calculation
Millions flee corruption, poverty, and chaos. China looks clean, fast, and organized. But the trade-off is invisible. You get electricity, yes—but you lose your voice. You get order—but only by agreeing to be monitored, manipulated, and erased if you speak too loudly.
This is not a dream. It is a survival instinct. The Dream works when the world around you dies. And that is what makes it dangerous.
Obedience through aspiration
What makes China powerful is not fear alone—it is aspiration. It promises that if you obey, you will prosper. That your children will succeed. That you will matter.
But this is a lie. Most people do not rise. Most remain underpaid, unseen, and afraid. The system dangles success to silence dissent. It offers hope to delay rebellion. It works—not because it is true, but because the alternative looks worse.
Why imitating China is the most dangerous idea
Many European politicians say, “Let’s govern more efficiently.” What they really mean is: “Let’s govern without resistance.” And that is where China seduces them.
But here is the truth: we could govern efficiently—without authoritarianism—if we got rid of clientelism. The reason democracies fail is not too much freedom. It is too much corruption, nepotism, and tribal self-preservation. China appears to solve these—but it does not. It replaces one elite with another. It removes transparency and calls that efficiency.
Western systems could be just as fast, just as strategic, just as ambitious—if they removed patronage, clientelist politics, and institutional stagnation. The Chinese model is not efficient. It is rigid. It looks smooth only because no one is allowed to disrupt it.
Conclusion: A future not worth copying
China’s model is not the future. It is a shortcut to stagnation. It kills the very things that make a society worth living in—dissent, reflection, debate, and growth.
The most dangerous sentence in modern politics is: Let’s do it the Chinese way. Because it sounds smart. It sounds strategic. But it is a betrayal of everything that made human civilization more than just a machine.
Efficiency without ethics. Order without truth. Growth without soul. That is the Chinese way.
And if we follow it, we will not just lose our freedom. We will lose what it means to be fully human.
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