Right, but the CCP seems likely to be seen as breaking the deal with the people soon, because they likely aren't going to be delivering rapid growth. The crack

Right, but the CCP seems likely to be seen as breaking the deal with the people soon, because they likely aren't going to be delivering rapid growth. The cracks in that are already showing. Worse, the people are getting to the point where rapid growth isn't enough. It was what they wanted when China was a poor country. Now that they aren't in poverty any more, growth is nice, but they want other things more. As you say, they want choice and a say in how they are governed. (What they really wanted was a better life, not growth for growth's sake. Growth was just the form that a better life looked like when they were poor. Now it's not.) I also see a parallel between China and Russia here. Russia attacked Ukraine because Putin couldn't tolerate a prosperous, democratic, ethnically similar neighbor - it might give his own people ideas. China's in the same boat, except that they have the Taiwan Strait to deal with, and the US at least appears to be willing to back Taiwan more forcefully than it backed Ukraine.