It was easy then, as now, for Chinese strongmen to find Western academics happy to confirm that Asian values ‘required’ authoritarian leadership.4 But throughout decades of turmoil China’s transition from monarchy to republic was to prove remarkably durable.5 The first Chinese general election of 1913 was held under a franchise restricted to men over the age of 21 with elementary education. But by the standards of the day that was hardly ungenerous. Even allowing for the failure of the majority of the Chinese electorate to turn out, the 20 million votes cast made this one of the largest
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