(Essential Questions·View on China) Zhang Zhiqiang: Why can't China become another Western country?
China News Service, Beijing, October 20th. Title: Zhang Zhiqiang: Why does China not become another Western country?
China News Agency reporter Gao Kai and Li Jingze
China's growth has been accompanied by the attention of the world.
Since the founding of New China, some Western political observers have predicted and even asserted that if China wants to grow and develop, it will have to implement the Western system model.
However, with China's development, especially since the reform and opening up, has made overall progress, the facts show that although China has been learning from the West, China has not followed the United States and Europe.
Regardless of system or culture, China insists on its own characteristics and has not embarked on the path of "another Western country" as predicted by some.
Why is it said that China will not become another Western country?
The answer may be rooted in the "deep" of Chinese civilization.
Zhang Zhiqiang, director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, recently accepted an exclusive interview with China News Agency "Question of East and West" and pointed out that the differences in civilization genes make it impossible for China to become another West, but the genes of civilization also prevent us from treating the West in a Western way.
Data map: Liangzhu Ancient City Ruins Park.
Photo by Zhang Yuhuan
The summary of the interview record is as follows:
China News Agency reporter: In recent years, more and more scholars have begun to discuss the influence of civilization on a country's development path, and the concept of civilization gene has been discussed more and more. How should we understand the genes of civilization within the framework of national development?
Zhang Zhiqiang:
Gene is a biological concept, and civilization gene is a metaphor.
Specific to the genes of Chinese civilization, it should refer to the most basic prototype force that promotes the formation of Chinese civilization.
These prototype forces have continued to play a role in the 5000-year history of Chinese civilization, maintaining the stability and continuity of Chinese civilization.
Therefore, exploring the nature of these prototype forces and the way they function is the key to understanding the continuous development and endless vitality of Chinese civilization.
Why do we say that the genes of civilization are "powers" rather than "factors"?
Because factors tend to be static, while power focuses on dynamics.
Using genes to compare the prototype power of this civilization is actually trying to show that civilization is like a living body. It has a kind of vitality to overcome internal and external challenges and strive to realize its own vitality. This vitality not only creates life, but also sustains and promotes it continuously. The development of life.
Therefore, to use genes as a metaphor for civilization is to focus on the nature of civilization's living organisms.
Any kind of civilization needs to overcome various internal and external challenges in the development process in order to realize its internal purpose.
Therefore, the survival of civilization is actually a process in which civilization itself continuously exerts its historical initiative.
The survival of civilization depends on whether it can creatively adapt to conditions and actively change the environment to promote its own growth.
The mystery of the long-term survival of Chinese civilization must be found in the genes that have nurtured this historical initiative.
Data map: Beijing Palace Museum.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Du Yang
Reporter from China News Service: Can you talk about how the genes of civilization affect China's road choice in light of history? What are the distinctive genetic characteristics of Chinese civilization?
Zhang Zhiqiang: When
we compare Chinese and European civilizations, we often overlook a factor, that is, Chinese civilization is a civilization that condenses into a country, while European civilization has not rebuilt a unified political body since the collapse of the Roman Empire, although In history, Rome’s ideals have disappeared from time to time and never disappeared.
In the end, European civilization did not condense into a unified country, but formed a series of nation-states in modern times.
Strictly speaking, only China is a civilization condensed into a country, although in history, this civilization has condensed into a world system with central power.
Compared with the modern European nation-state system, China's political system has a broader scale.
The biggest difference between Chinese civilization and Western civilization is the different motives for power formation.
The reason why Chinese civilization can condense a broader-scale political system is because it gives legitimacy to politics with the symbol of heaven, which represents all the living people of the world, and the wholeness of the living peoples of the world, symbolized by heaven, becomes a unified politics. According to the foundation, the righteous values and the methodological balance of the righteousness contained in the wholeness of heaven have become the fundamental follow of political power.
What is important is that the great unification is not only a description of the concentration of political power, but also a description of the unity of the world community.
The political community shaped by the symbolic authority of heaven is above the power demands based on parts, groups, and classes.
This ensures the political stability of the world community, and thus makes "unification" the basic political concern of the world community.
In European civilization, due to the dichotomy of the power of Caesar and God, religion has continuously become the driving force of political revolution, which makes it difficult to truly maintain the unity of political authority, making divisions become the norm.
It should be said that this is the fundamental difference between Chinese and Western civilization genes.
Based on the symbolic authority of heaven, Chinese civilization derived the value of "people first" from the wholeness of heaven, and derived from the characteristic of heaven’s grasping and balance, the methodology of “seeking truth from facts” based on the overall situation and humbly reflected. The political pursuit of the unification of the world is derived from the unity of the world community. These all influence the path choice of Chinese civilization in a certain way of civilization genes, and constitute the basic trend of China's road.
Data map: "Flag" sculpture.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Han Haidan
Reporter from China News Service: In modern times, various ideological trends in China have been declining, and the Chinese have finally chosen Marxism in their active exploration. In your opinion, in the process of integrating with Marxism, what are the characteristics of the era in the genes of Chinese civilization?
Zhang Zhiqiang:
Chinese civilization has indeed encountered some problems in modern times. These problems are caused by the challenges of the West on the one hand, and on the other hand, they are related to problems with the metabolic mechanism of the civilized organism.
In a certain sense, these problems have revealed some bottlenecks restricting the development of Chinese civilization.
The founding of the Communist Party of China and its hundred years of struggle have fundamentally broken through these bottlenecks that have restricted the development of Chinese civilization, thus bringing Chinese civilization back to life.
In a certain sense, the appearance of the Communist Party of China actually fully demonstrated the strength of the internal renewal power of Chinese civilization.
And this rejuvenation of power is the result of the creative use of Marxism by the Chinese Communist Party to fully activate the inner power of Chinese civilization.
The Communist Party of China fully embodies the civilization gene of the Chinese civilization to actively play its historical initiative in the historical dilemma.
This gene is a kind of ability to continuously bear the disadvantages and change, it is a kind of ability to continuously open up new realms from historical dilemmas, and it is also a kind of ability to continuously bring ancient civilizations into new realms and new states.
It is this kind of ability that has allowed Chinese civilization to be new, long and large.
In the long history of history, it is impossible for any civilized organism to maintain a state of youth, but only the Chinese civilization can develop continuously due to the principle of self-reliance.
The process of the Chinese people's choice of Marxism is actually the process of combining Marxism with China's specific realities and with the excellent traditional Chinese culture, and it is also the process of combining Marxism with Chinese civilization.
The prerequisite for the combination of the two is that Marxism itself is a product of a thorough philosophical revolution to the Western metaphysical tradition, and Marxism itself has a philosophical spirit based on reality.
At the same time, the Marxist social organism view also gives it a view of the people based on the whole.
These spiritual and ideological characteristics are inherently consistent with Chinese civilization.
The condition for the combination of the two lies in the creative practice of the Chinese Communists. It should be said that the process of Sinicization of Marxism is the process of the Chinese Communist Party creatively combining Marxism with Chinese reality and Chinese civilization.
In this process, the outstanding genes embedded in Chinese civilization, such as the unifying political tradition, the people-oriented values, and the methodology of seeking truth from facts, have acquired new forms and won new consciousness.
In this process, the Communist Party of China broke through many bottlenecks that restricted the development of Chinese civilization. Through its metabolism and decay, the Chinese civilization was modernized, and it embarked on a path of Chinese-style modernization and created a human civilization. New form.
In this process, the Chinese Communist Party firmly grasped the historical initiative, completely changed the destiny of all Chinese people being enslaved and oppressed, and created a new situation for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
Data map: Cultural relics in the Confucius Museum.
Photo by Hao Xuejuan
Reporter from China News Service: Over the years, China has experienced a process of learning from Western developed countries, including civilization exchanges and mutual learning. What do you think the Chinese and Western civilizations have in common? What other civilization genes determine that China cannot become "another Western country"?
Zhang Zhiqiang:
If we go back to the reality of civilization, we will find that all civilizations have commonalities. They are all living and civilized worlds created by people in the process of adapting to their own environment and meeting external challenges.
If we can proceed from reality, rather than from the prejudices of any civilization or ideology, then civilizations can fully understand and learn from each other.
Judging from the reality of civilization history, it is not that different civilizations are unique and indifferent, but horizontal interactions occur continuously at multiple levels. In the cross-section of the history of each civilization, multiple civilizations can be seen. Layers of traces of fusion and interaction.
For example, the Western civil service system was learned from the Chinese imperial examination system, and China's continuous learning of Western scientific and technological civilization in modern times has been the key to China's escape from poverty and backwardness.
If we maintain a civilizational reality view of civilizational communication and integration, we will not accept the view of the clash of civilizations.
In fact, the theory of clash of civilizations is a hypothesis derived from Western historical experience.
The essence of the clash of civilizations theory is a dualistic outlook derived from monotheism, a kind of dogmatic universalism.
This dualistic view of monotheism is completely different from the actual view of civilization in which Chinese civilization is based on the whole.
The so-called actual view of civilization based on the whole always requires understanding the world from the world and understanding the self from others, emphasizing the epistemology of "doing the best to the benefit of others", and emphasizing "do not do to others what you do not want to do" Morality emphasizes the concept of order of "harmony but difference, unevenness and harmony", and the comprehension ability of "sense and continuity".
It is these civilization genes that make China never become "another West", another "West" that "saves others by oneself", "self-centered" and "uneven".
The differences in civilization genes make it impossible for China to become another West, but the genes of civilization also prevent us from treating the West in a Western way.
In today's world, there is an urgent need for a civilization that can proceed from the whole world, stand on the destiny of mankind, and tolerate different civilizations.
This kind of civilization takes a community of shared future for mankind as its ideal and aims to build a world shared by all mankind. This kind of civilization will enable everyone and all civilizations to obtain the conditions for their survival and development.
Chinese civilization is a kind of civilization with this kind of great civilization potential. Only Chinese civilization can tolerate different civilizations, unite all mankind, and jointly create a new form of human civilization.
China News Agency reporter: In 1973, British historian Toynbee asserted that the hope of the world lies in the East, and the hope of the East lies in China. Chinese civilization will provide endless cultural treasures and ideological resources for the future world transformation and human society in the 21st century. How do you think we should creatively promote the contemporary transformation and future development of Chinese civilization?
Zhang Zhiqiang: It
should be said that Toynbee's statement is far-sighted.
However, Toynbee’s statement is still a speculation based on the comparison of his civilization types, and the achievements of Chinese civilization today give us more confidence to clarify Toynbee’s truth.
In my opinion, the centuries of struggle of the Communist Party of China is a course of contemporary transformation of Chinese civilization. We need to deeply understand the inner rationale of centuries of party history, comprehensively summarize the historical experience of centuries of party history, and put the centuries of party history into 5000 years of civilization. We should thoroughly grasp the different historical dimensions of history, 500-year history of the world, and 200-year history of world socialism, and fully understand the inner truth of the combination of Marxism and Chinese civilization.
With a full understanding of the historical experience of a century of party history, we will more consciously grasp the historical initiative to promote the contemporary transformation of Chinese civilization in the future. Only when we fully understand the internal rationale of the century of party history can we understand the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Be more conscious and confident, so that all Chinese people will have more confidence in Chinese civilization, more aspirations of the Chinese nation, and more socialist backbone.
(over)
About the interviewee:
Zhang Zhiqiang, director of the Institute of Philosophy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, researcher, professor at the University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and doctoral supervisor.
Editor-in-chief of "Philosophical Studies".
National-level candidate for the Hundred-Ten Thousand Talents Project, won the title of "National-level Young and Middle-aged Experts with Outstanding Contributions", and an expert who enjoys special allowances from the State Council.
Vice President of the Chinese Society for the History of Philosophy, Member of the Academic Committee of the International Confucian Federation, Member of the China Committee, Standing Director of the Chinese Confucius Institute, Standing Director of the National Classical Research Association.
The research fields are Chinese Buddhism, the history of academic thought from Ming and Qing to modern times, and the research expertise is modern Buddhism, the history of classics from Qing Dynasty to modern times, Yangming school, the relationship between the three religions since the late Ming, etc.