ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to link the issues of democracy with the values of stability and development, and the ideals of justice and equality. It traces the evolution of Chinese visions of democracy during the period of reform since the 1980s, with the primary focus on contemporary debates. Deng Xiaoping insisted that the West had no right to argue about human rights, because prior Western interventions in China had led to severe loss of life and injury. An English-language magazine Human Rights was launched in China under the umbrella of the China Society for Human Rights Studies to demonstrate that the state cared about the rights of its citizens. The liberals of the 1980s directed their criticism against both the feudal tradition and socialism, but at the same time they supported official reformers in their efforts to incorporate China into the global economic and political system.
