China

China is a one-party state with a non-democratic political system. The Premier leads the State Council through confidence of the 2,980-seat National People's Congress, but the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is the ruling party by design. No-confidence votes are blocked at runtime. The President is a ceremonial head of state, auto-populated as whoever currently holds the CCP chair. China is the world's second-largest economy.

Government structure#

The Premier is China's head of government, the executive office that drives the State Council.

The President is a ceremonial head of state: not elected and not appointed through the Premier flow. The office is auto-populated as whoever currently holds the CCP chair, and updates automatically whenever the chair changes. The President carries +0 actions per turn and 0 party strength weight, so the office has no mechanical weight beyond its ceremonial label.

National People's Congress#

The National People's Congress is the national legislature. Despite a bicameral name, it is mechanically unicameral: only the NPC participates in the player legislative loop.

• National People's Congress (NPC): 2,980 delegates representing provinces, municipalities, autonomous regions, the armed forces, and special administrative regions. 5-year terms. All seats contested each cycle. This is the sole legislative body where player-contestable bills originate.
• CPPCC (Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference): 2,169 members representing diverse social and economic constituencies. The CPPCC is an advisory body and is not part of the player legislative loop. It cannot block or amend bills.

The coalition threshold is 1,491 seats (a bare majority of 2,980: 2980 / 2 + 1). Since the CCP is the ruling party by design and no other party competes, this threshold is a formality: the ruling party always holds the NPC majority.

One-party constraints#

China is one-party by design. Several runtime constraints enforce this:

• No-confidence votes blocked. The vote-of-no-confidence path is skipped entirely for China, not fired and rejected. The Premier cannot be removed by a legislative vote mid-term.
• Single ruling party. The CCP is marked as the ruling party at seed time. Only one party competes in elections.
• No snap elections. The Premier cannot dissolve the NPC. Election terms are fixed at 5 years.
• Internal party confidence model. Leader transitions are tracked separately from other countries, and the turn pipeline drives confidence drift each turn. This is the CN-specific substitute for the parliamentary confidence vote.

Internal party confidence#

China is the only country with a ruling-party confidence model. Instead of a legislative confidence vote, the CCP's internal dynamics drive leadership transitions:

• 9-axis priority profile: ideological weights that shift based on enacted policy.
• Per-turn confidence drift: ruling-party confidence is recomputed each turn based on policy-axis effects, popular mood, and economic signals.
• Popular mood profile: public-mood axis weights driving legitimacy drift.
• Faction split: when Stage 3 (internal challenge) fires, an auto-faction-split spawns the "Democratic Faction of the CCP" as a spinoff party. This is the only path by which a second party can emerge.

The President is auto-synced to the CCP chair: when the party chair changes, the President updates to match automatically.

Constitutional convention (regime conversion)#

CN is the only country with a regime-conversion / constitutional convention system. If ruling-party confidence collapses to a critical threshold, a Stage-4 forced conversion fires:

• Collapse target system: a parliamentary republic by default.
• Convention allowlist: parliamentary republic or presidential. The player can negotiate either target. One-party state is excluded from the list, since conversion only ever runs one way.
• Legacy seat reservation: 20% of post-conversion legislature seats granted to the former ruling party by default. The Stage-4 forced path always uses 5% (and halves it to 3% if a "resist" decision was taken).
• Election delay: 24 turns by default before the first post-conversion election.

This is the only path by which China can transition out of one-party rule. Once converted, there is no path back.

Provincial government#

China is organized around Provinces. Each province has:

• A Provincial People's Congress: the sub-national elected legislature, totaling 4,000 delegates across all provinces. 5-year terms. Members vote on provincial legislation.
• A Governor: the provincial executive, directly elected. +2 actions/turn, 5-year term.

The provincial tier is mechanically analogous to US State Senates or UK Regional Councils, but with a CN-specific fiscal model.

One-party regional budget#

CN has a unique two-source regional-budget model: local tax retention plus central transfer grants:

The Business Tax (营业税) was the dominant 1991-era Chinese local tax, replaced by VAT modernization over time. The Enterprise Income Tax (EIT) is the modern primary regional revenue stream, with 40% retained locally and 60% remitted to the central government.

How Chinese elections work#

NPC and Provincial People's Congress elections use FPTP with a CN-specific primary override:

• Up to 7 CCP candidates may advance from each region's primary: the multi-seat PR general phase distributes seats across a 7-NPP-per-region caucus instead of collapsing to a single delegate per region.
• All seats contested in each cycle (no staggered classes).
• 5-year terms for both NPC and Provincial People's Congress.
• No snap elections. Terms are fixed.

The 7-candidate primary override is the key CN electoral mechanic: it ensures the NPC reflects regional CCP caucus diversity rather than a single winner-take-all delegate per province.

Key Chinese mechanics#

One-party by design. The CCP is the ruling party by seed. No other party competes in elections. No-confidence votes are blocked at runtime. The Premier cannot be removed mid-term by a legislative vote.

Internal confidence, not legislative confidence. Leadership transitions run through the internal-party confidence model, not a Dáil/Commons-style confidence vote. The 9-axis priority profile and popular mood profile drive drift each turn.

Ceremonial President auto-sync. The President is not elected: the office auto-populates as whoever holds the CCP chair. When the chair changes, the President updates automatically.

Regime conversion is one-way. If ruling-party confidence collapses, a constitutional convention can convert China to a parliamentary republic or presidential system. There is no path back to one-party rule. The former ruling party retains a legacy seat reservation (5 to 20% depending on path).

Party role labels. CN uses localized party-role labels: chair → "General Secretary", vice chair → "Deputy General Secretary", committee → "Secretariat". These override the default English labels.

Party creation routes through a charter. Founding a new party requires drafting a Party Charter co-signed by 3 human founders. CN requires 2 provinces (no locked home) × 1 NPP = 2 NPPs spawned on creation. In practice, party creation is constrained by the one-party regime.

Social axis baseline +3.5. China starts significantly authoritarian (+3.5 on a −5…+5 scale), the most authoritarian baseline of any country in the game. Drifts toward the social stance of enacted national laws over time.

Career path for Chinese players#

The Premier is the top of the ladder, but it requires internal-party confidence, not a legislative vote. The ceremonial President carries no mechanical weight (+0 actions, 0 party strength).

Currency and economy#

Economic model#

China has four seeded start years: 1953, 1979, 1991, and 2019 (the default), each with its own authored national baseline and regional tilts:

A 2019-start China begins as an industrial powerhouse economy, the same model as Germany and Japan. A 1991-start China begins as agrarian and industrializes over time through play. Earlier starts (1953, 1979) begin further back in China's development arc, well before the reform-era opening. Sector-supported identities (e.g. State-Capitalist) emerge via the 67%+ state-ownership lever once the government actually nationalizes: sectors start unowned.

Key China links#

• Cabinet Guide: every cabinet post, its metrics, and its actions
• Election Mechanics: Primary and general election rules
• Multi-Country Play: One-party vs parliamentary vs presidential
• Core Systems: Turn structure, action economy
• Player Progression: Career ladder details
• International Trade: CNY exchange, tariffs, FTAs

Living history#

The timeline below is written by the turn processor whenever a Premier transition or national-scope bill enactment happens in-game. Each entry is a real event from this save.

CN