How China's Communists are different from Soviet Communists that are still ruling us

"In fact, China owes its success to the reforms that came after, instituted by Deng Xiaoping, who opened up the system to private ownership, public feedback and decisions based on results, not ideology. If the U.S. system swings between Democrats and Republicans, China’s system swings between those who want to tighten control over the people and the economy and those who want to loosen it. Mr. Deng was a loosener who sought to learn from the best practices around the world.
Mr. Xi is a tightener who has clamped down on dissent, rolled back reforms and returned to one-man rule. Members of his wing of the party have mainly looked to other countries to figure out what not to do. They studied the “color revolutions” in former Soviet republics and the Arab Spring to figure out how to avoid similar fates. When they discovered that entrepreneurs tend to be on the side of revolution, they recruited the emerging capitalist class in China into the party. When they learned that the Soviet Union’s economic isolation had been a weakness, they integrated into the global economy, becoming indispensable to the West."