Why is China a top-down Confucian society and the West a bottom-up democratic society?<p>Jared Diamond attributes it to geography: 
<a href="http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/diamond_rich/rich_p6.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/diamond_rich/rich_p6.html</a><p>Just look at the map: 
<a href="http://www.map-of-china.org/china-relief-map.gif" rel="nofollow">http://www.map-of-china.org/china-relief-map.gif</a>