The paople of China have had essentially a totalitarian system from as far back as there are records. The present regime is truly no more and no less than the Mal Dynasty. I have read a lot of Chinese history over the last year and it all confirms that government in China has not changed other than periods of totalitarianism interspersed with periods of warlordism which amounted to totalitarianism in smaller units. The Chinese are not going to change the system now after 2or 3 thousand years. Conceivably there could be a change at the top with a new iteration of the Mao Dynasty or even a transition to anew dynasty but the system will remain the same.
All of those past dynasties didn’t have social media or a population that wants the finer things in life that they have seen on the internet and make in their factories everyday for the rest of the world.