主题：美国精英对美国选票制度的批判。 -- dolong

http://www.economist.com/node/17150224

The Economist covers how China is trying to determine the meaning of “

universal values”:

The term “universal values”, or pushi jiazhi, is a new one in Chinese

political debate—surprising given that concepts commonly associated with it

, such as freedom, democracy and human rights, have been bickered over

incessantly for 30 years. Many Chinese scholars think the debate really took

off in 2008 after an earthquake in Sichuan province that killed around 80,

000 people. Ten days after the disaster, a liberal newspaper in the southern

province of Guangdong, Southern Weekend, published an editorial that

praised the government’s swift response. It said it had “honoured its

commitments to its own people and to the whole world with respect to

universal values”.

That single mention of the term was enough to enrage hardliners. A

flurry of commentary appeared in Beijing newspapers and on conservative

websites attacking the idea of universal values as a Western plot to

undermine party rule. China was preparing to host the Olympics in August

2008 with the slogan, “one world, one dream”. But conservatives feared

that embracing universal values would mean acknowledging the superiority of

the West’s political systems. In September, after the games, the party’s

own mouthpiece, the People’s Daily, weighed in. A signed article accused

supporters of universal values of trying to westernise China and turn it

into a laissez-faire economy that would no longer uphold “socialism with

Chinese characteristics”.