The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, we propose a theoretical framework to examine popular democratic conceptions in societies with limited experiences of democratic politics. Second, following this framework, we use new survey instruments to investigate the origins and consequences of popular democratic conceptions in mainland China, with particular emphasis on how the Chinese government indoctrinates its people with a guardianship discourse on democracy to disguise its authoritarian nature. Using national survey data, this paper demonstrates that the Chinese government has effectively taken advantage of its regulated education and media systems, as well as its lingering Confucian and Leninist traditions, to promote and indoctrinate its people with the guardianship discourse. A majority of Chinese citizens indeed understand democracy following this particular discourse and, thus, perceive the Chinese government as more or less a democracy.

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The kinetics and mechanism of ethylene and 5-ethylidene-2-norbornene copolymerization catalyzed by rac-Et(Ind)2ZrCl2 were investigated using 2-thiophenecarbonyl chloride.

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Scholars have been puzzled by the high level of support for democracy, as well as the high level of support for the authoritarian regime, in China, as revealed in numerous surveys. In this paper, Shi and Lu argue that people in different societies may understand democracy in distinct ways. Confucian culture defines democracy in terms of Minben , which is different from the procedural understanding of democracy following the liberal tradition. These two definitions generate different expectations for the government, provide varying standards for assessing political legitimacy, and define distinct functions of participation. Their findings suggest that meaningful comparative studies of support for democracy require scholars to be sensitive to culturally embedded understandings of democracy in different societies.