The way I understand it is by distinguishing bween the Chinese *government* and the Chinese *people*.(posted 8731 days ago)The Chinese government is pretty awful--not nearly as awful as it was a generation ago during the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, but still pretty awful. The question is how to change it. And the hope is that free trade and other steps to make economic, cultural, and social contact between China and the rest of the world as close as possible will in the long run--fifty years or more--teach China's people what they are missing, and give them the ideas and the power they need to change their government.
So far no dictatorship (save Singapore) has survived when a country's people have become rich enough that almost everyone is literate, everyone has a radio or TV, and more than half the people have cars. South Korea and Taiwan are the most recent indications that this strategy works: that political democracy follows economic prosperity and close contact with the rest of the world.
Of course, this is a long-run strategy. And in the meantime the government remains awful--and faster economic growth gives the government more power to exert its will over other, neighboring countries.
And, of course, this strategy is not certain to succeed. But, as Laura Tyson puts it, in the long run the attitude of the Chinese people toward Americans will be much better if we try to make them democratic by making them rich than if we try to keep their government from being a threat by keeping them poor...
Brad DeLong