China is an interesting case of thousands of years of relatively modern social order with high coercion in many ways.<p>However, it&#x27;s also a society that maintained high levels of family and clan based organization which counterbalance the atomization and individuality that you see in modern &quot;Washington Consensus&quot; societies.<p>I highly recommend &quot;The Search for Modern China&quot; if you are truly interested in thinking about these things in context. It&#x27;s very pleasing and readable.<p>Modern China isn&#x27;t as straightforwardly authoritarian as you might want to compare against.<p>North Korea might be a better choice.