The Chinese State’s media, People’s Daily published an article stressing the importance, now that China is getting stronger, of breaking the Western monopoly on the definition of democracy and establishing a Chinese communist democratic discourse system instead.
The article said, “For a long time, Western developed countries have monopolized the right to define democratic concepts, set democratic standards, interpret democratic theory and judge democratic disputes. Western theorists constantly use their discourse hegemony to package Western democracy, decorating it with a “universal” coating and portraying it as a global political standard so as to mislead the people of the world in their understanding and practice of democracy. Under the new situation, China is steadfastly walking its socialist political development path with Chinese characteristics. Therefore, China needs to deconstruct the Western democratic discourse hegemony, profoundly understand the absurdity of the definition of Western “democracy,” strive to build a socialist system of democratic discourse with Chinese characteristics, and reverse the passive situation of being ‘cursed’ by the West.”
“In recent years, with the development and expansion of China, the West continually creates a variety of public opinions that question, misinterpret, and slander China. In public opinion, the issue of democracy is often being used to create an attack target. In the face of the Western democratic discourse hegemony, we must dare to utter our voice, confidently expose the absurdity of Western democratic discourse, and then build a socialist democratic discourse system with Chinese characteristics. We should make it clear to people that Western democracy is only a local experience and knowledge that is built in the context of the specific historical and cultural background of the West. It is not a universal truth, nor is it a universal way to solve the problem of governing the country. The Western democratic model does not value as a ‘model’; it only has a reference value.”
Source: People’s Daily, June 30, 2017
http://theory.people.com.cn/n1/2017/0630/c40531-29373312.html