This book examines the ways in which Confucian political culture operates in contemporary Chinese politics and influences its development. The author argues that the authoritarian political culture performs functions similar to the democratic political culture, drawing on a wide range of data--surveys, interviews, archives, Public Hearing Meeting records, and the Party Congress Reports of the Chinese Communist Party--to substantiate and illustrate these arguments. In an authoritarian political system, the "legitimating values" of the authoritarian political culture persuade the public of...