Confucian cultural heritage, political ideology, and variable government performance in contemporary China.

This study explores the factors that affect Chinese political identity. Although the Chinese government claims that maintaining the traditional Confucian political heritage represented by the Great Harmony Society (大同社会) and common prosperity is its main source of political legitimacy, this study found that for the majority of Chinese people, their support for the Chinese government is not based on the government’s Confucian political heritage, but rather on the government’s National Accountability system and national-oriented ideology, For individuals, supporting the state is an unconditional moral requirement, even if the state’s performance is not good, so Chinese people have higher political satisfaction. This ideology encourages the state to restrain freedom of the people in the form of omnipotence, and is also responsible for meeting all the needs of the people. This study suggests that China’s thousands of years of centralized political tradition and the inertia of large government have made the people more accustomed to an omnipotent government. The governance of the Chinese government is also a model of external Confucianism and internal law(外儒内法), with Confucian political heritage as the surface propaganda, but the internal system is centralized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]