Comment: China’s Long March to Freedom

Yang highlights several factors that augur well for freedom in China. These factors include growing elite discourse on human rights and democracy as well as a massive expansion of tertiary education that will make a new generation more capable of articulating its interests. International factors include the expansion of democracy in Asia and China's aspirations to be a responsible global power in a world in which the leading powers are democracies. Ultimately China's political transformation will not be determined by the top elite alone but will be subject to negotiation and contestation among diverse interests.