From my perspective, as someone who’s a fan of the new historiography that’s more sympathetic to Cixi, I’d say the best chance for the Qing is if the improved relationship between the Guangxu Emperor and her hadn’t soured with the arrival of Wild Fox Kang, who ruined the chance of reconciliation that the two were achieving, and tainted all concepts of constitutionalism with his own self serving nature, prospect of Japanese domination and increased her paranoia and made her a worse ruler as she did fear for her life at that point.
I recognise that Jung Chang does tend towards hagiography but, while maintaining a pinch of salt and recognising that she could be incredibly ruthless and irrational, i tend towards accepting that it’s only under extreme duress and when she had people she could trust and was trusted by, she was a bold reformer, who could have maintained the Qing government had she not been shunted out of power when her work was working and only brought back when things were in dire straits.
Also, it’s a bit worrying how, on here at least, Cixi is referred to in worse terms than even Stalin or Hitler- honestly, it does seem like people are willing to use terms like they do for her simply because she’s a woman, and with that I have little trouble believing that people would’ve used her as a convenient scapegoat in the even more sexist atmosphere of early 20th century China. From the number of people who refuse to even speak her name you’d imagine she’s Voldemort