It's easier to keep your citizens content while your GDP is growing 5-7% per year, and standards of living are improving rapidly. Even so, China appears to require a lot of internal security resources to keep their society "harmonious"... Taiwan offers a glimpse of what China could be, with a slightly less stifling government. I'll also add that the culture in Japan feels much more alien to me than China/Taiwan, but I've only visited these countries briefly, never lived there.
It's easier to keep your citizens content while your GDP is growing 5-7% per year, and standards of living are improving rapidly. Even so, China appears to require a lot of internal security resources to keep their society "harmonious"... Taiwan offers a glimpse of what China could be, with a slightly less stifling government. I'll also add that the culture in Japan feels much more alien to me than China/Taiwan, but I've only visited these countries briefly, never lived there.