The absolute confidence that China's political structure is permanent and forever is reminiscent of the absolute confidence in the 1980s that the USSR's political structure was permanent and forever. But the social contract that undergirds the Communist Party's absolute power in China is fast-eroding, and those who understand Chinese history sense the winds of change have shifted and the next revolution in China is already darkening the horizon.

The story starts in the Song Dynasty, which reached its zenith in the mid-1200s.

I've been pondering the excellent 1964 history of the Southern Song Dynasty's capital of Hangzhou, Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion, 1250-1276 by Jacques Gernet, in light of the Chinese government's unprecedented "Social Credit Score" system, which I wrote about in May 2018: Kafka's Nightmare Emerges: China's "Social Credit Score".

The scope of this surveillance is so broad and pervasive that it borders on science fiction: Inside China's Dystopian Dreams (NY Times)