Legacy of the "Democratic Centralist Model"

I came across something interesting while doing research. One of my favourite academics, Chris Berry, a scholar in Chinese films drew inspiration from the book, "The Chinese Reassessment of Socialism" by Yan Shun and said this in the introduction chapter in one of his books:

"This book assumes that a variety of different opinions and ideas exist in China, including ideas that differ from those of the government and the Party. However, such difference is only conceivable there as counter-revolutionary practice that must be externalised and expunged, inhibiting any academic work from addressing such a possibility directly and explictly. This can be explained as the legacy of the democratic centralist model, whereby democracy is combined with the dictatorship of the proletariat by designating the Communist Party as the representatives of the proletariat exercising leadership after consulting the representatives of the masses. In other words, the Party apparatus is expected to listen, but once its decisions are announced, everyone is expected to follow". (emphasis mine)

--Chris Berry, "Postsocialist Cinema in Post-Mao China: The Cultural Revolution after the Cultural Revolution"

Rings a bell, doesn't it? :-)