Twenty-one years ago, thousands of Chinese students gathered at Tiananmen Square demanding more democracy. The world still remembers the stunning image of a lone student standing in front of armed tanks in an attempt to block the tanks from entering into the Square.

At the time, I had just arrived in the United States as a student and watched the entire demonstration on TV. Like other Chinese students in the U. S., I protested with them on the streets and wept with them when the crackeddown came.

Twenty-one years later, China has changed to a very different country. Today’s new middle class Chinese have little in common with the idealistic students. They are the beneficiaries of China’s economic reform. Most of them approve what the government has done. They are all busy trying to keep up with the swirling changes. Continue reading 21 years after Tiananmen Square, will the Chinese middle class push for democracy?