Draft. Please do not quote. Revival of Confucianism and Reconstruction of Chinese Identity Na Chen University of California at San Diego and Fudan University (A paper for the Conference on “The Presence and Future of Humanity in the Cosmos: Why Society Needs Both the Sciences and the humanities,” ICU, Tokyo, March 18-­‐23, 2015) Abstract This paper attempts to understand the ongoing revival of Confucianism in China as a process of reconstruction of Chinese cultural identity. It examines the historical development of the anti-­‐tradition radicalism in the New Culture Movement and that in the communist movement and its negative impact on the Chinese identity building. With a review of the nationwide revival of Confucianism since the post-­‐
Mao reform, this paper concludes that China has started its reconstruction of cultural identity. I. Introduction The revival of Confucianism since the post-­‐Mao reform has become a major social trend in China, which has drawn increasingly more attention in the academia. As for how to understand this phenomenon, there are different perspectives and explanations. In the early 1980s, many scholars followed the Weberian perspective and examined the relationship between Confucianism in the modernization of East Asia. The conclusions from these studies are mostly similar that the Confucian work ethic has positive effect on economic development.1 Although the theorization was first based on other countries in East Asia, the theory was also used to explain the revival of Confucianism and modernization in China.[note??] Meanwhile there are also studies which explicitly or implicitly suggest the political and ideological background of the revival of Confucianism, that is, as the post-­‐Mao China deviates from the Marxist track of development, the party-­‐state turns to Confucianism to promote nationalism and development. This does not seem to be well supported. [note Makeham??] Of particular interest for this paper is to put the revival of Confucianism in a historical framework. Two scholars with much influence in this aspect are Yu Yingshi and Tu Weiming. As a historian, Yu Yingshi has studied the historical development of Confucianism both in ancient and modern China. In his famous essay “The Predicament of New Confucianism” (《现代儒学的困境》), Yu describes the post-­‐Qing Dynasty Confucianism as a “disembodied wandering soul”, which has become a jargon in the study of Confucianism. [note ??] His emphasis on the long-­‐term and comprehensive disintegration of traditional Chinese society that has not 1
It is acknowledged that there is a contradiction in the theorization -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ on the one hand, it follows Weber’s perspective in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, and on the other hand, it goes against Weber’s theory on Confucianism as the hindrance of modernization. 1 yet completed suggests his linear perspective of social development. His negative or pessimistic opinion on the revival of Confucianism in mainland China may be due to both his academic view and his lack of first-­‐hand information about mainland Chinese society over the last sixty years. [note??] On the other hand, Tu Weiming, an acclaimed New Confucian, has been active in the academic circles of Confucian studies both within and without China. According to his theory about the three-­‐phase development of Confucianism, Tu takes the current revival of Confucianism as the third phase development, which would lead to the spread of Confucianism beyond China and East Asia. Tu has published extensively in Confucian studies with a major focus on academic development of Ruxue (儒学). One topic that both Yu and Tu have touched upon here and there in their studies on the revival of Confucianism is Chinese cultural identity.[note??] But neither of them has conducted a deepened analysis on this issue. Taking a macro-­‐perspective, this study proposes to understand the ongoing revival of Confucianism in mainland China as a process of reconstruction of Chinese cultural identity. In the pre-­‐
Opium War China, there was no controversial that Confucianism was the core of Chinese identity. Culturally speaking, what made the Chinese Chinese was Confucianism.2 In history, even those Chinese who claimed to be members of Daoism or Buddhism were first of all Confucians. After the Opium War in 1840, Chinese people faced severe crisis of identity. This crisis reached a climax in the early 20th century, when the Qing Dynasty was overthrown and the New Culture Movement3 gave rise to an anti-­‐tradition radicalism. Under the banner of “science and democracy”, the revolutionary elites of the time put forward the slogan: “Destroy the Confucian Shops!” In time, this anti-­‐Confucianism trend became an important part of the dominant official discourse. [note on Republic??] When the communist came to power in 1949, this anti-­‐tradition radicalism was pushed further to the extremes. Here comes the question -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ when Confucianism had been trashed, what would be the Chinese cultural identity? In retrospect, “science and democracy” or Westernization did not produce a new set of beliefs and values shared by the Chinese in their cultural identity, nor did the communist ideology and the communist-­‐led social movement. Meanwhile, with all the declining of Confucianism in the twentieth century, and in spite of the tremendous structural changes in the modernization process, China’s sociocultural life has very much been in the shadow of Confucianism, be it a dark or light shadow. For almost a century, therefore, the issue of Chinese cultural identity, especially in the mainland China, is in a twisted status, or we may say, there is a consistent crisis or at least uncertainty of identity. To understand this situation, we have to face a basic fact: culturally speaking, even today, what makes the Chinese Chinese remains Confucianism; although today’s Confucianism may differ from the pre-­‐
Opium War Confucianism in some specific aspects, the inherent continuity in the core values and ways of thinking between these two isms is undeniable. While the 1911 Revolution changed the political system as well as the cultural system in Chinese society, the changes in these two aspects happened in different ways. The former died in a matter of weeks or months; the latter was damaged but never dead. 2
Though there are “three teachings”, Confucianism is by far the dominant teaching. Since Song Dynasty, Confucianism has absorbed much of the basic ideas in Daoism and Buddhism. In this paper the term “Confucianism” is used in its broad sense, as synonymous with Chinese culture or Chinese tradition. To a great extent, Confucianism is treated in such a way in both the New Culture Movement and the communist movement. 3
In this paper, the term “the New Culture Movement” refers to the social movement that happened in China th
roughly from the mid-­‐1910s to the mid-­‐1920s; therefore, the May 4 Movement is understood as part of it. 2 It is true that the harsh criticism and rhetoric in the New Culture Movement, and later the violent Cultural Revolution, further damaged traditional Chinese culture, yet the tradition remained alive and continue to develop along its own track. We will come back to this point later. For almost a century, the anti-­‐traditional discourse, as well as the relevant institutions, and the extremely high political pressure based on ideology had severely smothered the normal development and open expression of Chinese cultural identity. When the post-­‐Mao reform adjusted the official discourse and relieved the pressure, the long smothered and twisted issue of cultural identity found its way to straighten out. As Confucianism has been a de facto imbedded part of Chinese sociocultural life, the revival of Confucianism comes in a spontaneous manner and in some cases carried out without being aware of it. The revival of Confucianism is accompanied with the rebuilding of Chinese cultural identity. By its nature, the reconstruction of cultural identity is a long-­‐term process of socialization or re-­‐
socialization among members of society in their molding or remolding of beliefs, values, attitudes, discourse, and personal/group identifications. Although there is never an announced agenda nor any organized campaign to reconstruct cultural identity, and the specific situations differ quite a lot between individuals and from place to place, yet it is not difficult to find that there does exist a nationwide trend of cultural transformation, as well as identity reconstruction, if we look into the gradual and sometimes dramatic sociocultural changes and expressions related to the revival of Confucianism over the last three decades. In the sections that follow, I will first analyze the development of the anti-­‐tradition radicalism, then review the revival of Confucianism over the last thirty years, and finally discuss the implications and significances of the revival of Confucianism and the reconstruction of Chinese cultural identity. II. Development of Anti-­‐Tradition Radicalism Talking about the declining of Confucianism, the New Culture Movement is no doubt a milestone. It is during the Movement that the famous slogan “Destroy the Confucian shops!” was put forward and that full-­‐scale Westernization was proposed as the key agenda of China’s modernization by the intellectual elites such as Chen Duxiu and Hu Shi. It is extremely unusual that the lead intellectuals of a country would denounce their own cultural tradition with a harshly hostile attitude. To better understand the phenomenon we should take historical and contextual consideration. After all, the New Culture Movement did not come from nowhere. The present study wants to emphasize two points. First, the New Culture Movement is the gradual result of the long term development and evolution of Chinese society since the Opium War in 1840. In about eighty years, four generations of intellectual elites4 who had witnessed the ever deteriorating situation in China caused partly by its internal conflicts but much more by the invasions and interferences from the West (later the West plus Japan), and gradually changed their attitude towards Chinese tradition. Among them the first generation of intellectual elites, including such scholar-­‐official as Lin Zexu (林则徐 1785-­‐1850), were still confident about Chinese tradition and strongly identified with Confucianism even though China’s loss in the Opium War signified the historical declining of Confucian 4
Of course this quartering is a rough division. Each quarter has both radicals and conservatives but the “average” in each quarter shows the historical changes in the ethos of each period. 3 tradition. The second generation, with all their efforts to learn from the West in order to strengthen China, had a partially positive attitude towards the Western tradition but on the whole kept their identification with Confucianism. The third generation, represented by the group of reformers in the 1890s, were highly critical of China’s traditional system so that they attempted to change the status quo with political and social reform. The year of 1905 saw a big turn when the thousand-­‐year tradition of imperial examination was abolished, which cut off the umbilical cord between intellectuals and the institutionalized Confucian political system. The 1911 Revolution that overthrew the Qing Dynasty signified the end of the Confucian political system proper. But a real tsunami against tradition did not come until the mid-­‐1910s 5 when the fourth generation of intellectual elites came onto stage and initiated the New Culture Movement which lasted about ten years. The “fake republic politics”6 and the desperate social reality brought about an identity crash. The intellectual elites who were disappointed at the political institution of the new Republic turned to search for solution at the deeper level of culture in order to salvage China from sinking and perish. They waged a full-­‐scale war against traditional culture with a focus on Confucianism, which was considered as the fundamental obstacle for China’s modernization. The second point is that the New Culture Movement is also the direct result of the impact of Western ideology, either directly from the West or by way of Japan. All the intellectual elites engaged in the Movement had experience of overseas studies, either in the United States, or in Japan, or in Europe. They have brought back all kinds of theories but the most influential were scientism and social Darwinism which prevailed at the turn of the century as the major sociopolitical ideologies in the West as well as in Japan. Due to its geographic and cultural proximity, Japan had even more influence on Chinese intellectuals at that time. In the Japanese Westernization movement in the late 19th and early 20th century, an important move based on social Darwinism was to trash Chinese civilization represented by Confucianism as outdated and backward. Japan’s rapid rise since the Meiji Restoration and the war victories over China in 1894 and over Russia in 1905, all became telling materials to support the Japanese theory. When Chen Duxiu first raised the banner of “Mr. Democracy and Mr. Science” as the guide for the New Culture Movement, his target was the “feudalistic Confucianism” and his theoretical justification was scientism and social Darwinism. The total denunciation of Confucianism became a trend among the New Culture intellectuals, which gave birth to a new tradition of radicalism against traditional Chinese culture. Although there were people, individuals or groups of intellectuals, who proposed a more reserved or balanced evaluation of Chinese tradition, they were all refuted and criticized by the overwhelming radical forces. [note ??] In time, the anti-­‐tradition radicalism became the dominant discourse among the intellectuals and in the media. This discourse was further reinforced and developed in the communist movement. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was established in 1921, during the heyday of the New Culture Movement. Among the founders of the CCP, some were leaders of the New Culture Movement and many others were enthusiastic followers of the New Culture trend. [note ??] The CCP carried on the New Culture tradition of radicalism and further theorized it with the communist ideology which claimed 5
The widely accepted time for the beginning of the New Culture Movement is 1915, when Chen Duxiu started to publish the magazine New Youth. 6
Hu Shi, et al. 《争自由的宣言》???. 4 to be based on modern science. According to the theory of historical materialism,7 human society develops in a stage system, from the lowest stage of primitive society to slavery society, to feudalist society, to capitalist society, and finally to the highest stage of communist society. The historical mission of the Communist Party is to promote the progressive development of society from the lower stage to higher stage and finally to communist society. In the specific case of China, which was then defined as a semi-­‐feudalist and semi-­‐colonialist society, the mission of the CCP was to win the power of the country and build a socialist society, which is considered the preliminary stage of communist society. In order to promote social progress, therefore, anti-­‐tradition is a constant task of the communist revolution. There is another dimension of historical materialism, that is, the dialectical relationship between the economic base and the ideological superstructure of society. While the economic base forms the foundation of the ideological superstructure, the latter can also function on the development of the economic base. As Confucianism is considered as the core of the ideological superstructure of the feudal China, the CCP must fight against Confucianism in order to promote social progress. When the CCP came to power in 1949, it became the major concern for the party state headed by Mao Zedong to construct a strong socialist superstructure so as to promote the development of socialist economic base. Believing in “no construction without destruction” (不破不立), Mao Zedong took a series of measures8 with the attempt to both destruct the old and to construct the new superstructure, which culminated in the Cultural Revolution (1966-­‐1976). The famous campaign of “destroy the four Olds and set up four News” (破四旧立四新), which pushed the New Culture anti-­‐tradition radicalism to the extreme, has been generally blamed on the Red Guards. In the final analysis, however, the Red Guards were only to materialize Mao’s vision of continued revolution under the socialist system, that is, to destroy the old superstructure and to replace it with a new one. In 1974, Mao waged the movement of “criticize Lin Biao and criticize Confucius” (批林批孔). Although the origin of this movement was power struggle within the CCP, its harsh criticism of Confucius carried forward the radical tradition of the New Culture Movement, which trashed Confucius and Confucianism further in the negative mire. While “no construction without destruction” may stand as a philosophical proposition, if and how the destruction during the Cultural Revolution has brought about any constructive contribution to the new superstructure remains a question. III. The Revival of Confucianism The answer to the question above is negative. In 1981, the Central Committee of the CCP concluded that the Cultural Revolution was wrong and brought about catastrophic turmoil in Chinese society.9 What was neglected in the Party’s Resolution is how the Cultural Revolution has impacted the issue of cultural identity among the Chinese people. As a matter of fact, during the Cultural Revolution the anti-­‐tradition radicalism and Mao’s personality cult had forced the whole country to identify with the revolution under 7
Here we can only briefly touch on the ideas of historical materialism. A detailed discussion is beyond this paper. Such measures include the Campaign of self-­‐Education and Self-­‐Reform of the Intellectuals (1951-­‐1952), the Anti-­‐
Rightist Movement (1957), the Campaign of Socialist Education (1963-­‐1966, aka the Four Cleans Movement), etc. 9
See “Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People’s Republic of China”, adopted by the Sixth Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on June 27, 1981, ???待核书目 in Resolution on CPC History (1949-­‐81), Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1981. 8
5 the leadership of Mao. However, this “revolutionary identity” that the high political pressure had imposed upon the people proved to be false and shallow. Soon after the Cultural Revolution ended with the death of Mao, the radical “revolutionary identity” vapored away and there left a “spiritual vacuum” among the people.10 Meanwhile, with the unfolding of the post-­‐Mao reform, the once condemned Confucian tradition started to find its way back. In time, the revival of Confucianism turned into a societal trend, which has directly or indirectly affected the reconstruction of cultural identity. Different from socioeconomic development in the reform, which is officially announced and systematically carried out in accordance with the set policies and strategies, the reconstruction of cultural identity is a subtle on-­‐going process based on no explicit agenda.11 By its nature, the reconstruction of cultural identity is a long-­‐term process of socialization (or re-­‐socialization) among members of society in their remolding of beliefs, values, attitudes, way of thinking, and their personal/group identification. The revival of Confucianism has been a general but gradual process since the post-­‐Mao reform started in 1979.12 In the 1980s, Confucianism was a hot but controversial topic. In the general population, people started to resume traditional customs spontaneously. In academia, scholars came to reevaluate Confucian tradition with caution, but the prevailing trend of the time remained anti-­‐Confucianism, under the remaining influence of the New Culture anti-­‐tradition radicalism. 13 The 1990s saw an increasingly more positive attitude toward Confucian tradition in social life and more cases were reported about its revival. Yet the revival of Confucianism did not form a societal trend until the 21st century. On the one hand, the general population had gradually come out of the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution and resumed much of the tradition, and on the other hand, the renaissance of Confucianism was supported by a series of government moves including personal support from the top party-­‐state leaders. Confucianism, understood as Chinese cultural heritage, has gained a solid and positive position in China for the first time over the last one hundred years. The following is detailed discussion about the revival of Confucianism. It is by no means an exhaustive research on all the topics but hopefully it will to provide a sketchy landscape of the ongoing trend. There are five categories: 1) Grassroots level revival of Confucian tradition. 2) From Confucian classics to Confucian ceremonies. 3) Revival of Confucianism in the academic circle. 4) The government and the revival of Confucianism. And 5) Challenges to the revival of Confucianism. Grassroots level revival of Confucian tradition. The end of the Cultural Revolution signified the tapering off of the Maoism ideology. The vacuum left by the removal of the high political pressure paved the road to the revival of China’s tradition. This is more so in the countryside, where tradition has much more influence than in the urban. The dismantlement of 10
Cf. Luo Xu, Searching for Life’s Meaning: Changes and Tensions in the Worldviews of Chinese Youth in the 1980s, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2002. 11
John Makeham (2008, p. 8) notes “… whether there are policy documents and programs that promote the idea of an officially sanctioned ‘Confucianized’ national identity. Of the latter, I have found none.” Also see his discussion on the second key theme of the book on p. 7. 12
This paragraph is based on a similar paragraph in Chen Na and Fan Lizhu, “The Birth of a New Religion: The Development of Confucian Congregation in Southeast China”, (forthcoming). 13
To a great extent, the six-­‐episode documentary movie The River Elegy (《河殇》) released in 1988 signified the ultimate of the anti-­‐tradition trend since the post-­‐Mao reform. 6 the People’s Commune around 1983 returned the collective communities to “natural villages”. Spontaneously villagers would resume their traditional way of life including religious life. It is estimated that well over one million village temples have been rebuilt or restored nationwide, 14 and ritual traditions long thought lost are now being reinvented and celebrated in temples or in the communities. Meanwhile there are tens of thousands of large scale Buddhist monasteries, Daoist temples, Christian churches and Islamic mosques that have been rebuilt or restored over the last three decades.15 Though the village temples are generally featured with syncretism that worships gods and deities of multiple sources, its religious practice on the whole expresses Confucian values and way of life. With the rebuilding of temples, many temple associations (or pilgrim societies, 香会) and traditional festivals were reestablished. People resumed traditional temple fairs, pilgrim trips, ritual ceremonies, drama performances, and all kinds of celebrations.16 In most cases, these traditional activities or re-­‐creation of traditions were spontaneously initiated by local enthusiasts with or without official permissions. In the early years, some of them suffered from interferences by the authorities in the name of against superstitions. But when the central government started the campaign to construct socialist new countryside (建设社会主义新农村运动) in 2005,17 the local enthusiasts found a justification or simply an excuse in the name of enriching local cultural life and developing spiritual civilization.18 In a case in the northeast of Fujjian Province, also in the name of reviving traditional culture, a group of people founded a new religious group, the Confucian Congregation. Like many other folk religions in China, the Congregation is syncretistic. But in the entrance hall of their House of Dao is staged the statue of Confucius, as the major object of worship. The mission of the Congregation is to revive and spread Confucian values. In their gatherings, an important ritual is the Congregation members chanting in chorus some popular Confucian classics, including The Three-­‐Character Classic (《三字经》), The Classic of Brotherhood (《 弟 子 规 》 ), The Classic of Saints (《 圣 人 经 》 ), etc. In about ten years, the Congregation has developed seven franchised branches with hundreds of members.19 In many areas, especially in Southeast China, as people became well-­‐to-­‐do with economic development in the reform, the Confucian tradition of building the ancestral hall, either restoring the old ones or 14
In many places the initial revival of religious tradition may have to take extra steps. For example, in East Village of Jiangsu Province where I did my research, the village earth god temple was pulled down three times by the authorities before it was rebuilt the fourth time, which has lasted. 15
See, Kenneth Dean, “Local Ritual Traditions of Southeast China: A Challenge to Definitions of Religion and Theories of Ritual”, in Fenggang Yang and Graeme Lang, eds., Social Scientific Studies of Religion in China: Methodology, Theories and Findings, Leiden: Brill, 2011. 16
See, for example, Adam Yuet Chau, Miraculous Response -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ Doing Popular Religion in contemporary China, CA: Stanford University Press, 2005; Wang Yongxin, “A True Record of the Festival to Welcome the Gods in Dongtianchi Village of Handan County”, in Overmyer and Fan, eds., Temple Festival and Local Culture in Northern China, Handan Volume, Tianjin: Classic Chinese Press, 2006. 17
th
See “The Proposal by the CCP Central Committee on Making the 11 Five-­‐Year Plan on National Economy and Social Development”, adopted by the Fifth Plenary of the Sixteenth National Congress of the CCP on October 11, 2005. http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2005-­‐10/18/content_3640318.htm accessed January 23, 2015. 18
See, for example, Gao Bingzhong, “One Museum: Ethnography of Temple Construction -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ On Double Name as a Political Art”, in Li Xiaoyun, Zhao Xudong and Ye jingzhong, eds., Rural Culture and Construction of New Countryside, Beijing: Social Science Academic Press, 2008. The fact that the authorities would allow more leeway in “cultural st
development” implied further loosening up in ideological control in the 21 century. 19
For details about the Confucian Congregation, see Chen Na and Fan Lizhu, “The Birth of a New Religion: The Development of Confucian Congregation in Southeast China”. (Forthcoming.) 7 building the new ones, became popular since early 1990s. In Cangnan County, south Zhejiang Province, the Chen family alone had built or restored more than 120 ancestral halls by 2006.20 Even those which claimed to be restored ancestral halls were mostly in totally new buildings. Meanwhile, the recompilation of the lineage books involved an even larger population nationwide.21 Thus the traditional family-­‐clan organizations, which had once been denounced as feudalist residues, resurged again in many places, though with relatively weaker power compared with the pre-­‐communist time. Quite often, such revival of family-­‐clan tradition would take advantage of the government policy to promote local cultural development so as to gain legitimacy and social capital. As found in our fieldwork in Cangnan, almost all ancestral halls have a sign of “The Association of the Elderly” and/or “The Center for Cultural Activities”. In some cases, the family-­‐clan organizations would harvest much social power in the reconstruction of the ancestral halls and in the revival of their tradition.22 While rural communities provide fertile soil and ecology for the revival of traditional culture, in the urban areas relatively more atomized individuals have been undergoing similar process in a somewhat different way. For example, 23 in her study in Shenzhen, the bustling new metropolitan between mainland China and Hong Kong, Fan Lizhu shows that there the dynamics of modernization interact with the search for spiritual meaning. Many Shenzhen residents draw selectively on perennial elements of China’s indigenous cultural tradition to support their personal quest. The spontaneous turning to tradition for solutions to deal with problems in everyday life reveals their inherent cultural orientation. Meanwhile in this new milieu, traditional elements are readily adapted to suit new life circumstances.24 From Confucian classics to Confucian Ceremonies An important change in the post-­‐Mao reform is the re-­‐accessibility of Confucian classics as well as many other traditional literature, which had been criticized and banned during the Cultural Revolution. With the revival of Confucian tradition, there emerged a spontaneous interest in Confucius and Chinese classics started in 1980s.25 The 1990s saw increased interest in traditional Chinese learning (国学). 20
Chen Houqiang, ed., A General Review of the Chen Family in Cangnan County, Hangzhou: Hangzhou Publishing House, 2006. For a detailed discussion about the revival of the family-­‐clan traditions in the south of Zhejiang Province, see Fan Lizhu, Chen Na, and Richard Madsen, “The Lost and Renewal of Cultural Heritage: Ethnographic Studies of Lineage Traditions in Southern Zhejiang”, in Robert P. Weller and Fan Lizhu, eds., Religious and Social Life in Greater Jiangnan, Shanghai: Shanghai People’s Publishing House, 2015. (Forthcoming.) 21
The rebuilding of ancestral hall is always accompanied with the recompilation of the lineage book. Meanwhile many family-­‐clan groups that do not have ancestral halls also recompile their lineage books. We found in our fieldwork that some family-­‐clan groups even publish newsletters or other publications circulating among their members, nationwide or worldwide, in hard copy and/or online. 22
For a case of family-­‐clan tradition revival and social power, see Jing Jun, The Temple of Memories: History, Power, and Morality in a Chinese Village, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996. In our fieldwork we see similar cases in the Kong family and Jin family in Cangnan County, Zhejiang Province. 23
This study stresses the comprehensive societal revival of tradition in China, both rural and urban. Here we raise only one example of Fan’s study in Shenzhen. The discussions below are mainly taking place in the urban. 24
See Fan Lizhu, Religious Transformation in Contemporary China: Field Study in Shenzhen, Taipei: Weber Culture, 2005; Fan Lizhu, James Whitehead and Evelyn Whitehead, “The Spiritual Search in Shenzhen: Adopting and Adapting China’s Common Spiritual Heritage”, Nova Religio, 9, no. 2 (November 2005). 25
At the beginning it was limited to individuals, for example, Kuang Yaming (匡亚明), former President of Nanjing University, published his book A Critique Biography of Confucius in 1985 (a revised edition published by Nanjing 8 Meanwhile, promoted by enthusiasts both from mainland China and from Taiwan and Hong Kong, there formed the popular movement of “reading the classics” ( 读 经 ). Entering the 21st century, this movement gradually spread all over China. 26 There are many different forms, including individual readers and all kinds of classes -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ afterschool classes for kids, classes for adults (including some arranged by the employers for their employees), special classes learning Chinese classics (国学班) at some universities that charge fairly high fees, etc. There have also emerged numerous private schools specialized in classic learning, including such famous ones as Yidan Xuetang (一耽学堂) in Beijing and Mengmu Tang (孟母堂) in Shanghai. There were also summer camps specialized in classic learning for children and teenagers. There are feature programs on the television, e.g., Yu Dan’s lecture series on the Analects, which brought such a “fever” nationwide that the book based on her lectures sold millions of copies. With all the controversies,27 the trend of “reading the classics” has been surging higher. Over the last two years, President Xi Jinping has been personally advocating the revival of Confucianism, which further encouraged the movement of “reading the classics”. For example, in April, 2014, a large-­‐
scale campaign of “reading Confucian classics” as extra-­‐curriculum activities started in Shanghai. More than 70,000 middle school students took part in the campaign. With the local business union providing the fund, all the participating students were given free copies of Analects and other popular Confucian classics.28 The schools nationwide will increase their teaching of Confucian classics and other ancient literature. In Beijing the 2015 edition of Chinese textbooks for primary school pupils will greatly increase its contents of ancient Chinese poems and essays. For example, for Grade One, there will be 22 ancient poems and essays vis-­‐a-­‐vis less than ten in the old edition; the new Grade-­‐One textbook will include such popular Confucian classics as The Three-­‐Character Classic and The Classic of Brotherhood.29 In the course of the revival of Confucianism, people started to re-­‐evaluate certain traditional Confucian custom and rituals. In some places, the traditional rite of passage was resumed, in which young men and young women coming of age went through a solemn Confucian ceremony to turn a new page in their life. There were couples getting married to choose traditional Chinese wedding ceremony, in which the new couple would pay tribute to the heaven, the earth and their parents. To carry forward the Confucian tradition of Xiao (filial piety) and Bao (reciprocity), some schools develop the ritual for students to kneel down and washing their parents’ feet. With the rapid development of education in the post-­‐Mao reform, increasingly more people (both the students and their families) are involved in all kinds of education activities as well as visits to the Confucius temples (孔庙 or 文庙) all over China. As University Press in 2006); started in mid 1980s, Professor Huang Jizhong (黄继忠) of Peking University dedicated his last years to translate new versions of Analects and other Confucian classics into English. 26
For detailed discussions on this topic, see Sébastien Billioud and Joël Thoraval, “Jiaohua: The Confucian Revival in China as an Educative Project”, China Perspectives, 2007 (4). 27
It has been controversial from the very beginning whether kids/students should spend much time “reading the classics”. Because of certain legal issues involving The Compulsive Education Law, some private schools, including the Mengmu Tang in Shanghai, were forced to close. But at the same time many more have mushroomed. See, for example, a report by The Chinese Youth Daily (《中国青年报》), http://zqb.cyol.com/content/2010-­‐
07/10/content_3319216.htm, accessed on January 24, 2015. The Yidan Xuetang claims to be a civil organization of volunteers though promoting “reading the classics” has been the major part of its work. 28
See, Sun Xueying, “The Initiation of the Campaign of Reading and Chanting the Classics of Shanghai Students”, The Shanghai Education News Online, April 29, 2014. http://www.shedunews.com/zixun/shanghai/zonghe/2014/04/29/638099.html, January 23, 2015 accessed. 29
See http://edu.sina.com.cn/zxx/2014-­‐11-­‐25/1027445062.shtml, accessed on January 28, 2015. 9 Anna Sun observes, “ritual worship of Confucius is indeed undergoing a significant and diverse revival in temple settings in contemporary mainland China”.30 But by far the most meaningful ritual in the revival of Confucianism is the ceremony honoring Confucius (祭孔) for his birthday (September 28) in Qufu, the Confucius hometown where the Kong family cemetery and the ancient building group of the Kong family mansion and the Confucius temple are situated.31 The thousand-­‐year tradition of honoring Confucius was banned when the Communists came to power in 1949. In the early years of the post-­‐Mao reform, the Kong family resumed the ritualistic activities in their private celebration. The local government of Qufu started to sponsor the ceremony honoring Confucius in 2004. Then governments of higher levels are also involved and it becomes a national event. On September 24, 2014, President Xi Jinping personally delivered a speech at the Ceremony in Celebration of the 2565th Birthday of Confucius and International Academic Conference.32 For the first time, the top leader of the communist party-­‐state attended such an event. Revival of Confucianism in the academic circle. When Professor Tu Weiming of Harvard University visited China in 1980, some scholars in Hong Kong ridiculed him as being absurd to talk about Confucianism in mainland China.33 In retrospect, Tu made a courageous and valuable move to try the water at that time though with limited reaction in China’s academic circle. The real awakening of academic interest in Confucianism did not start until the mid-­‐
1980s, when the “Culture Fever” was burning up all over China. One of the major forces in the movement, the Academy of Chinese Culture (中国文化书院),34 led the trend in reviving the study of Confucianism and traditional Chinese learning. Major lecturers at the Academy are from Peking University and other institutions in Beijing, as well as those from Hong Kong, Taiwan and the United States.35 Within four to five years, the Academy organized a series of workshops, reprinted books on Confucian studies by the older generation of scholars and published new books and magazines. In 1987, the “Research on Modern New Confucianism” headed by Fang Keli was initiated as a key research project of national level, which lasted for ten years.36 But the general atmosphere in the academic circle 30
Anna Sun, “The Revival of Confucian Rites in Contemporary China”, in Fenggang Yang and Joseph Tamney, eds., Confucianism and Spiritual Traditions in Modern China and Beyond, Leiden: Brill, 2012, p. 309. 31
For a historical review of this ceremony tradition and a report on its recent development, see Sébastien Billioud and Joël Thoraval, “Lijiao: The Return of Ceremonies Honoring Confucius in Mainland China”, China Perspectives, 2009(4). 32
For the complete speech of Xi Jinping, see http://news.xinhuanet.com/2014-­‐09/24/c_1112612018.htm accessed on January 23, 2015. 33
Xiao Sanza, “Interview with Tu Weiming”, see http://xiaosanza.blog.21ccom.net/?p=30 accessed on January 26, 2015. Tu refers to those scholars in Hong Kong as his former teachers. 34
The Chinese Academy of Culture was established in 1984 with the Peking University professor Tang Yiji as its first president. 35
John Makeham suggests that the interaction “between scholars in China and overseas Chinese scholars (particularly those based in Taiwan) has served as a key impetus sustaining academic interest in discourse on ruxue.” See Makeham, 2008, pp. 6-­‐7. 36
Cf. Fang Keli, “On Some Issues in the New Confucianism Research”, in Tianjin Social Sciences, 1988 (4). Fang’s is a th
th
key research project in both the 7 and the 8 five-­‐year national plan. 10 of the 1980s was still under the influence of the New Culture radicalism and the idea of Westernization was still popular especially among young students. The June 4th Tiananmen Event in 1989, followed by the collapse of the former Soviet bloc, shook Chinese society. The 1990s signified the further decline of anti-­‐traditional radicalism and also the rapid development of academic studies of Confucianism and other traditional Chinese learning. More graduate programs related to Confucian studies have been set up in various disciplines including philosophy, religion, history, sociology, anthropology, literature, etc. The International Confucian Association (国际儒学联合会) was registered in Beijing in 1995. As a national research institute, Chinese Institute of Confucius (中国孔子研究院) was set up in the hometown of Confucius, Qufu, in 1996. Meanwhile a range of academic journals were regularly published in the area of Confucian studies and traditional Chinese learning.37 Entering the 21st century, more research institutions of Confucian studies have been established in top universities, including China Renmin University Institute of Confucius (中国人民大学孔子研究院，
2002), Peking University Institute of Confucian Studies (北京大学儒学研究院，2010), and Shangdong University Advanced Institute of Confucian Studies (山东大学儒学高级研究院，2010). Local and national professional associations of Confucian studies have been set up. All kinds of academic meetings, international, national, or on special themes, etc. are being held every year. There have emerged different academic opinions as well as various schools of scholars on the revival of Confucianism.38 In 2002, Peking University started the Confucian Canon project (《儒藏》工程) to compile all known classical works on Confucianism in Chinese, including historical works written in Chinese by scholars in Korea, Japan and Viet Nam. As planned, the Confucian Canon will be completed in 2022 with a total of over one billion Chinese characters.39 The government and the revival of Confucianism. The post-­‐Mao reform started with a basic ideological guideline that remained anti-­‐Confucianism, very much in the historical shadow of the New Culture Movement and that of the theories of Marxism and social Darwinism, though the party-­‐state authorities was trying to deviate from the radicalism of the Cultural Revolution. Its gradual changes have taken place under the influence of various factors: deeper reflections on the anti-­‐tradition radicalism in the history of the communist revolution and that of modern China; theories about the impact of Confucian tradition on the East Asian development; interactions between the mainland China and Hong Kong, Taiwan, and other overseas Chinese; the collapse of the former Soviet Bloc and the end of the Cold War; increased involvement of China on the world stage and more self-­‐consciousness on the issue of identity in the globalizing world; personal understanding of the major policy makers, especially the top leaders of the party-­‐state. At different 37
For a list, see John Makeham, Lost Soul: “Confucianism” in Contemporary Chinese Academic Discourse, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008, Note 7 on p. 61. 38
For example, the criticism both positive and negative on the “2004 Culture Declaration” (《甲申文化宣言》) initiated by a five scholars and intellectuals and cosigned by dozens; the pros and cons over the theory of political Confucianism advocated by the “Mainland Cultural Conservatives” represented by Jiang Qing, Kang Xiaoguang and Chen Ming. 39
For more information about the Confucian Canon, see http://www.ruzang.com/gcgkdisplaynews.asp?id=282. 11 time, certain factors may be more prominent in the changing trend, which has been, on the whole, increasingly more positive in the reevaluation and appreciation of Confucian tradition. So far there has never been an announced government plan or agenda for the revival of Confucianism. But from relevant happenings, including the government-­‐controlled media, major national events, and official speeches by the leaders, it can be observed how the party state has changed its attitude or stance. Some of these happenings convey explicit expression, and some indirect or symbolic. In 1983, China Central Television staged a live performance in the Chinese New Year’s Eve. It has since become an annual national television gala to celebrate the Chinese New Year. From the very first time on, the annual national TV gala would include traditional drama and other performances, such as pieces of traditional Peking opera, which had been criticized and banned during the Cultural Revolution. This is highly symbolic as a gesture of re-­‐appreciation of the tradition, which provides both entertainment and political and ideological relief. More formal endorsement of Confucian tradition by the government started in the mid-­‐1990s at official occasions in commemoration of the anniversary of Confucius’ birthday.40 Entering the 21st century, there have been increasingly more formal or symbolic endorsements of Confucian tradition by the government and many of them exert influence both at home and internationally. For example, at the 2001 Conference of the Asia-­‐Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) held in Shanghai, when the then Chinese President Jiang Zemin and other state leaders attending the Conference posed for a collective photo, all dressed up in traditional Chinese costume called “Tang Zhuang”, its symbolic meaning went far beyond the APEC. “Tang Zhuang” has since been a fashion in China, a constant reminder of traditional culture. In 2004, Hu Jingtong, President of China, initiated the proposition to build China into a “harmonious socialist society”, which was based on the Confucian value of Harmony and went directly against the Maoism ideology of class struggle.41 In the same year, China started to promote Confucius as a cultural figure to the world by setting up Confucius Institute and Confucius Classrooms to teach Chinese language and culture in foreign countries. By the end of 2014, there are 476 Confucius Institutes and 851 Confucius Classrooms in 127 countries worldwide. 42 This was soon followed by two major international events held in China, the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and the Shanghai 2010 Expo, which displayed many elements of traditional Chinese culture and thus turned them into important windows to show the world about the changing attitude of Chinese government and the revival of tradition in China. Another government decision that makes history in the revival of Confucianism is about the festival. Traditionally China is a culture rich with rituals and festivals. But for the second half of the 21st century and more, only one traditional festival was officially observed in China, that is, the Chinese New Year, 40
Cf. John Makeham, Lost Soul: “Confucianism” in Contemporary Chinese Academic Discourse, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008, pp. 316-­‐9. 41
Hu Jingtao personally promoted the idea of “harmonious society” in his speeches and articles. In fact, Hu took it as his major contribution to the ideological development as the leader of the party state. Cf. Hu Jingtao, On the Construction of Socialist Harmonious Society (《论构建社会主义和谐社会》), Beijing: The Central Literature Publishing House, 2013. 42
The Confucius Institute is set at college/university level institutions while the Confucius Classroom is at the primary or secondary school level. For the numbers, see http://www.hanban.edu.cn/article/2015-­‐
01/13/content_570643.htm, accessed on January 28, 2015. 12 also known as the Spring Festival. A change happened in December 2007, when the government declared to add three traditional festivals -­‐-­‐-­‐ Qingming Festival (清明节), Duanwu Festival (端午节) and the Mid-­‐Autumn Festival (中秋节) -­‐-­‐-­‐ on the list of paid national holidays. 43 All these festivals are important parts of the Confucian tradition. The Qingming Festival in particular is the traditional time in the spring to sweep family tombs and pay tribute to the ancestors. Even without the government regulation of Qingming as a paid holiday, many people had been observing this tradition in their own ways. Now the official re-­‐recognition of the festival has given a big push to the revival of the tradition and much more people make trips to their family tombs. This also helps promote the revival of many other traditions, which, in some areas in south China, include the custom to sweep family tombs a second time in the year during the winter solstice.44 Xi Jinping succeeded Hu Jiangtao as the paramount leader of China in 2013 and proved to be an even more enthusiastic advocate in the revival of Confucian tradition. He frequently quotes Confucius and other ancient Chinese figures in his speeches both at home and abroad.45 In November 2013, Xi visited Qufu, Confucius’s hometown, and promoted the development of Confucian studies.46 As mentioned above, in September, 2014, President Xi Jinping personally delivered a speech at the Ceremony in Celebration of the 2565th Birthday of Confucius and International Academic Conference. Challenges to the revival of Confucianism. As the revival of Confucianism develops into a general trend in Chinese society, there are also some sociocultural factors that form countertrends or whirlpools, which create challenges to the revival. The first is the modernization process. With the rapid industrialization and urbanization going on in China today, the rapid social structure changes have brought about a status of anomie both in the rural and urban areas, which is a strong subversive force for any traditional cultural and value system. This is particularly true for Confucianism, which after all is a pre-­‐modern cultural system. The second is the population structure change. The one-­‐child policy adopted in 1980 has given birth to more than a generation of “single-­‐child” Chinese. This has been changing the Chinese family structure, both in terms of parents-­‐child relationship and the brotherhood tradition. 47 For the single-­‐child generation, of whom many tend to be self-­‐centered and over-­‐spoilt, the traditional Confucian values of self-­‐discipline and self-­‐cultivation may sound very foreign. Meanwhile the one-­‐child policy is also reshaping the traditional extended family structure from the pyramid shape to a reversed pyramid shape, that is, instead of a houseful of children and grandchildren (儿孙满堂) there is a houseful of 43
For the title of the State Council decree, see http://www.gov.cn/zwgk/2007-­‐12/16/content_835226.htm, accessed on December 23, 2014. 44
This paragraph is adapted from Lizhu Fan and Na Chen, “Revival and Development of Popular Religion in China over the Past 30 Years”. (Forthcoming.) 45
th
See, for example, Xi Jinping’s speech in Paris at the Meeting Commemorating the 50 Anniversary of the Establishment of China-­‐France Diplomatic Relations, at http://www.en84.com/nonfiction/remarks/201404/00014696.html, accessed on January 27, 2015. 46
Xi Jinping visited Qufu and personally picked books on Confucian studies. “I will carefully read them,” he said to the people around him. See http://news.qq.com/a/20131126/012935.htm, accessed January 25, 2015. 47
The “brotherhood” is one of the Five Cardinal Virtues (五伦) of Confucianism. 13 parents and grandparents. Therefore the fundamental Confucian value of Xiao (filial piety) will be challenged and the social relationship based on the Five Cardinal Virtues need to be redefined. The third is globalization. To a great extent, the on-­‐going globalization means the expansion of the Western culture or Westernization, including the value system and ideology. For example, the rapid increase of materialism and consumerism in China today, and the changing attitudes towards sex and family among the younger generation, are partly due to the changing social structure and partly due to the impact of Westernization. Historically the decline of Confucianism was the direct result of the interaction between the East and West. Now the revival of Confucianism is facing the challenge of the new East-­‐West interaction. And the fourth is the impact of the radicalism tradition. Since the New Culture Movement of one hundred years before, the anti-­‐tradition radicalism has been the dominant ideology in China until recently. Though it has been declining over the last thirty years or so, yet radicalism as a tradition, both that from the New Culture Movement elites and that from Maoism, remains an important sociocultural force in China and from time to time functions as a countertrend in the revival of Confucianism. Here is an example. In January 2011 a Confucius statue was place in front of the newly renovated National Museum of China next to the Tiananmen Square. But after 100 days, the statue was quietly removed from this politically sensitive spot without any explanation. Some say, “After a whole century, there is still anxiety or complex over Confucius, Confucianism, and traditional Chinese culture.”48 IV. Discussions and implications With all the complexities, it is obvious that, in today’s China, the revival of Confucianism and the rediscovery of tradition are no longer particular social events but a nationwide societal trend. It was initiated by individuals at grassroots level and was gradually participated and promoted by people of all walks of life. The spontaneousness in these events and movements implies that the cultural genes deep-­‐
rooted in the tradition should not and cannot be long suppressed and it is destined to re-­‐germinate once there are appropriate circumstances. Facing the acclaimed renaissance of Confucian tradition, here comes a question -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ will it necessarily bring about the reconstruction of Chinese cultural identity? The answer is Yes. The so-­‐called “cultural identity” is the identity shared by individual members of that culture. How then does an “ideal-­‐type” individual form his/her sense of identity? Identity … is at once concept and reality, high theory and lived experience. For a person to have a sense of “identity” necessarily requires all sorts of thoughts, assumptions, beliefs and affects about who they are and what their relationship is to others as well as the wider world. These will not necessarily be consciously known thoughts; rather, semi-­‐conscious thoughts about the self are likely to be key. There might be other feelings or affects too which are buried from consciousness, stored in the unconscious. But it is clear that identity, in order to be lived, requires immersion in received thoughts, language, family inheritance and social relationships.49 48
See http://news.163.com/11/0425/03/72F4GP6J00014AED.html, accessed January 22, 2015. This removal of Confucius statue happened four years ago. Had it been today the statue could be more likely to stay. 49
Anthony Elliott, “Editor’s Introduction”, in Anthony Elliott, ed., Routledge Handbook of Identity Studies, London: Routledge, 2011, p. xxi. 14 Essentially one’s sense of “self” or “identity” is shaped by the relevant sociocultural environment. In the traditional Chinese society, as agreed upon by both critics and defenders of ruxue (儒学), Confucianism “penetrated every aspect of social life, to the extent that its value concepts and modes of behavior affected popular custom”, and Confucianism “entered every aspect of the daily lives of Chinese people, by means of the establishment of political, social, economic and educational institutions”, ….50 That is why Chinese people of that time would have Confucianism as the core of their cultural identity because Confucianism played the fundamental role of society and life. People lived in a cultural ocean of Confucianism where they built their identity, lived their identity, and expressed their identity in a “natural” way. The Opium War triggered a “fundamentally changed situation never seen in the history of thousands of years” (Li Hongzhang). The Chinese tried hard to understand and cope with the situation. But practically in vain. When the ever deteriorating situation finally reached the point of life or death for the Chinese nation, the New Culture intellectual elites took the position of anti-­‐tradition radicalism. The seemingly well-­‐justified New Culture discourse turned the traditional Chinese cultural system upsidedown. Meanwhile the Chinese people lost their justification to identify with their cultural tradition. In fact, this “New Culture” brought several generations of Chinese the dilemma of identity -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ who are we? Of course, identity means much more than who we are. History will tell that the current revival of Confucianism is also a grand project of social engineering -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ the reconstruction of cultural identity, which, as we said before, is a long-­‐term process of socialization or re-­‐socialization at the societal level. When the revival of Confucianism first started as occasional incidents at the beginning of the reform, its impact on the reconstruction of cultural identity was of limited significance. But when the increasingly more events have gradually surged up as a societal trend permeating in all aspects of China’s sociocultural life, the reconstruction of cultural identity is already underway. Take the example of education. In today’s China, more than 98% children receive at least nine-­‐year compulsory education.51 Within a few decades, when these children who started their literacy with popular Confucian classics become the majority of the Chinese population, there will be a sharp contrast in terms of identity between them and their grandparent generation whose literacy started with “Long live Chinaman Mao!”52 and whose total schooling had little or no access to Confucian classics. As shown in our discussion in the last section, the revival of Confucian tradition is by no means limited to literacy or schooling, but also in literature, art, philosophy, religion, family, community, rituals, festivals, media, public discourse, government policies, etc., which are forming a huge pool of Confucianism that makes it possible for members of society to gain the necessary “thoughts, assumptions, beliefs and affects” and also to have the necessary “immersion in received thoughts, language, family inheritance and social relationships”. At the time when children’s literacy at school began with “Long live Chinaman Mao!” the dominant feature of China’s official ideology was along the track of the anti-­‐Confucian radicalism. Ironically 50
See Makeham’s (2008) discussion on the shared conviction of the critics and defenders of ruxue or rujiao. P. 38. See the 2013 data from China’s Ministry of Education, accessed on January 2, 2015, http://www.moe.gov.cn/publicfiles/business/htmlfiles/moe/s8493/201412/181725.html and http://www.moe.gov.cn/publicfiles/business/htmlfiles/moe/s7567/201309/156875.html. 52
In the 1950s, the 1960s and the early 1970s, the school children usually started their literacy with “Long live Chairman Mao!” Confucian classics, considered as backward and negative, would not be used as literacy material and rarely used in the secondary school textbooks. The change of textbooks since the reform has been gradual. Putting Confucian classics into the primary school textbook is very recent. 51
15 however the slogan itself is very Confucian -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ Confucianism in its broad sense. This is a meaningful phenomenon. On the one hand, it supports the point that, with all the anti-­‐Confucian criticism and denunciation and the accompanied institutionalized measures in the early 20th century, Confucianism as a tradition was damaged but never dead. In fact, even during the heyday of Cultural Revolution, many happenings, such as the deification of Mao Zedong, were also very Confucian though in a highly twisted and negative way.53 On the other hand, it shows that the living tradition of China, as any other living sociocultural tradition does, has been undergoing a continuous process of reinvention and reconstruction, in which Confucianism would always play an indispensable role, whatever that role may be. Now the ongoing movement of rebuilding Chinese cultural identity is undergoing a similar process only that the current phase in question is exploring a generally positive role in Confucianism. This leads to another question or concern -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ are we going back to the old days of Confucianism? The answer is No. Because there is neither the necessity nor the possibility for a simple restoration of Confucianism. Like the Renaissance in Europe around the 16th century, the current revival of Confucianism is to rediscover and reevaluate the classic tradition in a social backdrop quite different from the old days. But on the other hand, this concern is not without reason. After all, Confucianism is a tradition of thousands of years with a mixture of all kinds of elements, positive or negative. There is no doubt that the sharp and passionate rhetoric of criticism was not uttered for nothing when the New Culture elites campaigned against Confucianism. Under any circumstances, the ideal expression of “to inherit critically” or “to carry forward [tradition] critically” (批判性继承) is easily said than done. Both the New Culture Movement and the Cultural Revolution are historical lessons that fail this ideal and the Chinese people have paid dear tuitions for them.54 However in today’s situation, it is more likely that people fail the ideal the other way round, that is, to bring back certain historical trash in the name of carrying forward the tradition. We have already seen many negative cases reported. 55 It can be anticipated that more such cases will appear but it can also be predicted that, in today’s China, such cases cannot appear in large areas nor exist for long time. Meanwhile, the main force in the current revival trend is trying to bring out more positive aspects of the Confucian tradition, including such values as Ren (仁 Benevolence), Yi (义 Righteousness), Shu (恕 Forgiveness), Hexie (和谐 Peace and Harmony), and Heerbutong (和而不同 Harmony without Conformity), which will nourish the Chinese people in their reconstruction of cultural identity while leaving the Maoism philosophy of “class struggle” and “continued revolution” to the passing history. By its nature, the current revival of Confucianism is a direct reaction to the Cultural Revolution, as well as a remote echo to the century-­‐old New Culture Movement. In the Renaissance, the Europeans resorted to the Greco-­‐Roman tradition and reconstructed their identity by integrating the ancient treasures into their sociocultural life. The Chinese today are in a similar procession only that the domestic transformation mixed with the globalization will necessarily 53
Further development of this topic is beyond the limit this paper. Both the New Culture Movement and the Cultural Revolution are very complicated sociocultural phenomena. It is not my intension to give a simple negative judgment. 55
In a recent case, for example, a city in Anhui Province made a public-­‐good advertisement of the old filial-­‐piety story Guo Ju Buried His Son (《郭巨埋儿》) to promote moral development. It was a really bad choice as the story, once harshly criticized by Lu Xun (鲁迅), pushes the value of filial piety to the unacceptable extreme. The advertisement was removed from the street within hours and the online news was followed by literally thousands of critical comments. See http://news.ifeng.com/a/20141025/42295251_0.shtml, accessed on January 31, 2015. 54
16 churn out more varied elements into the reconstruction although Confucianism will remain the key element. The European Renaissance lasted a time span of centuries, because all those rediscovered treasures took time to digest, absorb, internalize, integrate, and finally burst into blossoms and fruits. One should not expect the Chinese renaissance much shorter. Even in the modern age, it is a project that takes generations to accomplish. In the long run, it is the Chinese who know who they are that would enliven the ethos of Chinese society, and it is the Chinese who identify with the Confucian tradition of harmony without conformity that would contribute more to our global village. Five Questions proposed for discussion: 1, Compare “humanism” in the East and West traditions. 2, Impact of Enlightenment mentality on East Asian development. 3, What are the major possible contributions of oriental tradition toward global ethics? 4, Understanding modernization -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ the cases of East Asia and more. 5, Exclusiveness and inclusiveness -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐ on the Confucian value of “harmony without conformity”. 17