The May 4th New Culture Movement in 1919 is recognized almost unanimously by Chinese scholars as part of important event in Sino-Western cultural communication and the beginning of the development of contemporary Chinese culture. The development continued in a tortuous process in latter years, with a new starting point about 1979. Some Chinese scholars studying the May 4th movement take it as a samsara of sixty years. I agree with this view generally and see something similar in the studies in China of pragmatism and other Western philosophies. In order to develop a new culture which situates the future development of China in a changing world structure and to avoid a possible new samsara, it is very important to bring to light the samsara and to derive lessons from that experience.

Pragmatism was first introduced in China as early as the be-ginning of this century. Chinese scholars Zhang Don-sen and Lan Gong-wu and others established the Journal, Education, in Tokyo in 1909 in which they published some papers introducing prag-matism. But it was through the "May 4th" New Culture Movement that pragmatism became a main trend of thought with strong in-fluence in China. After returning home from America in 1917 young Hu Shi published a series of articles advocating pragmatism and became a leading figure of pragmatism in China. Tao Xinshi, Jiang Menlin, Fu Sinian and other Chinese scholars who received the theories of John Dewey in America also advocated pragmatism when they returned. John Dewey himself came to China in 1919-1921. He visited almost all the main cities of China and gave a series of lectures on pragmatism. This played a very important role in the spread of pragmatism in China. During this time, a great many Chinese intellectuals, especially the more enlightened and progressive, were favorably impressed by pragmatism to different degrees. Chen Du-xiu, who became the first leader of the Chinese communist party when it was formed in 1921, received some ideas from pragmatism and admired Dewey’s lectures.

Pragmatism was more or less received by many intellectuals involved in the New Culture Movement. Almost at the same time, such Western philosophies as the voluntarism of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, "Lebens philosophie" from Germany and France, as well as mechanism, were imported into China. Besides Dewey, such other famous Western philosophers as Bertrand Russell, Hans Driesch, etc., visited China, but their influence there was far less than that of pragmatism and Dewey.

Why did pragmatism have such a powerful influence upon China in the May 4th period? Before answering this question we must introduce briefly the main characteristics of pragmatism which were understood in broad terms by Chinese scholars at that time.

As to what pragmatism is many distinct, but nonetheless justified, answers can be given because it is a conception with various meanings. As the theories of three leading American pragmatists, i.e. Charles Peirce, William James and John Dewey, differ one from the other it is very difficult to give a simple but exact definition. But it has been understood by Chinese scholars since May 4th to have the following main characteristics.

First, pragmatism rejects traditional metaphysics, both of materialism and idealism, especially the older rationalistic spe-culative idealism. They were all against attempts to find the ab-solute substance of matter or of mind as well as objective or a priori necessity and any absolute principle beyond experience. It does not negate the possibility of the existence of a world beyond ex-perience, but insist that the realm of philosophy should be limited to the world which can be experienced. Philosophy should be con-cerned with the world of experience, i.e. the life world of human beings.

Second, for the pragmatist experience differs from that of the traditional epistemologies of both empiricism and rationalism. It is neither knowledge resulting from a process of cognition, nor sub-jective consciousness separated from the object; rather it is human action, life, practice itself, or the united process of subject and object, or mind and matter. Drawing support from Darwin’s theory of evolution, pragmatists insist that for the human being as an organism, like any other living being, the most important thing is to live. On that basis, the human constantly must adapt to his en-vironment. This process is just the interaction between organism and environment, i.e. the process of life, action and practice. That humans must adapt constantly to their environment implies that humans must constantly struggle and keep forging ahead, that they must unceasingly be in progress and evolution. Applying this to socio-historical problems, history is a process of constant progress and evolution and society must be continually reformed.

Thirdly, pragmatism maintains that human adaptation to the environment, i.e., human action, life and practice, are different from the instinctive behaviour of animals. Human beings are born with intelligence; their action and practice are always in pursuit of some goals and are guided by reflection and thought. Therefore, the question of how human action is guided by intelligence, i.e., the question of methodology, turns out to be a central question with which philosophy should be involved. In this sense pragmatism is nothing but a methodology guided by intelligence, i.e., scientific methodology. Pragmatism does not reject any other method as long as it can bring some satisfactory effects: what pragmatism ad-vocates is only the scientific method.

Fourth, pragmatists hold that every idea, theory and doctrine should serve to adapt human beings to their environment, should be an instrument of human behaviour. Therefore they reject the correspondence theory of truth and maintain that the criterion of the truth of every idea, theory or doctrine lies in its effects upon human action and practice, that is, its practical value. Truth does not have universal or absolute meaning, but only disjunctive or re-lative meaning. For this reason all truth is pluralistic, not monistic.

Fifth, pragmatists believe that each acting person is in-dividual. His or her existence and interaction with the environment is in the end an individual behaviour. In order to live, every in-dividual must struggle by oneself, one cannot depend upon anyone else or be controlled by any other or by some superhuman force or authority. Therefore, pragmatists maintain that the personality of every individual must be liberated and one’s rights to act and to express one’s own will freely must be respected. That is, a system of full democracy and freedom must be practiced in society. Never-theless, they reject excessive self-will and egoism and emphasize that individual freedom must not harm that of other’s and must be regulated by society. Society, for its part, should avoid both tota-litarianism and anarchism.

The above-mentioned characteristics of pragmatism are interconnected and incarnate its cardinal doctrine from different aspects. In summarizing these ideas, pragmatists have given them distinctive expression from different points of view so that they can be described variously as a new empiricism, a scientific metho-dology, a philosophy of practice and behavior, instrumentalism, humanism, etc. While taking pragmatism as a philosophy of so-ciety, they often see it as expressing the traits of democracy and science.

When pragmatism was imported into China at the time of the "May 4th" Movement a great many progressive intellectuals warmly welcomed it because of the above-mentioned characteristics, especially the spirit of science and democracy. Some facts coincide with several aspects of the Chinese traditional culture, while others coincide with the demands for science and democracy by the progressive Chinese intellectuals of that time.

Though the May 4th Cultural Movement was launched against the old cultural tradition of China, it also grew from the soil of that tradition. As both the leaders of the movement and the broad band of intellectuals who took part in it had grown up under that tradition and then separated from it, only in reference to the tra-dition could there be criticism of the old culture or the introduction of anything new. Although some representative figures of the movement proposed radical slogans of totally negating the tra-ditional culture, one of their feet always remained planted in the foundations of the old tradition. Therefore the introduction and reception of Western cultures in the May 4th period had to be limited by the field of vision which was controlled to some extent by the traditional culture. The ideas introduced at that time were first of all those which could coincide with some aspects of tra-ditional Chinese culture and hence easier for the participants of the movement to approve and understand. Among the various Western trends, pragmatism seems to have related best to such ideas.

- First, among other things, Chinese traditional culture, espe-cially philosophy, was imbued with following characteristics. Basically it was an ethically oriented discourse about nature, society, etc. The questions of the development and self-perfection of human beings frequently were the central issues in their discussions, which thus were basically humanistic.

- Second, as for the world as object of knowledge the ancient scholars stressed the real life world faced by people, not the transcendental world or world-in-itself separated form human beings. Hence, they did not develop systematic metaphysical or theological theories.

- Third, Chinese traditional culture emphasized experimental-intuitive knowledge and its practical effects upon human beings. The cardinal principle of knowledge was "study for the purpose of application." It sought truth from facts and checked it through its effects. Compared with their Western counterparts, ancient Chinese scholars did not like to create speculative and abstract theories. Fourth, Chinese culture was pluralistic and all-embracing. Although two thousand years ago Confucianism was officially considered to be the sole learning so that it controlled the whole field of thought and culture, there still were various trends and tendencies which co-existed or were mixed with one another. In fact, Confucianism itself was pluralistic and embraced a variety of trends.

- Fifth, Chinese culture, especially Confucianism, stressed harmony and the mean, avoiding extremes and conflict. The so-called "doctrine of the mean" has always been considered the most important characteristic of Chinese culture.

Generally speaking, Chinese traditional culture long based upon the feudal-patriarchal system, was quite different from modern and contemporary Western culture, including pragmatism. Nevertheless the above mentioned characteristics are to some extent quite similar to some thoughts and ideas of pragmatism. Thus, although the leaders and participants of the May 4th move-ment had a deep background in Chinese traditional culture they objected against tradition and received pragmatism more easily. Note that Hu Shi, the leading figure of pragmatism in China, had already formed a framework for his academic thought which was similar to pragmatism before going to the United States and contacting American pragmatism. What he did after that was only a perfecting and systematizing of his original thought.

The most important and even decisive reason why prag-matism had so powerful an influence in China in the May 4th period is that the ideas of science and democracy it advocated so suited the ideological and political demands of the New Culture Movement.

The "May 4th" New Culture Movement had started from a revolution in literature, but rapidly developed into a political and social revolution which took anti-imperialism and anti-feudalism as its main contents. The banner:"Strive for national rights outside and punish traitors within" which was held high by demonstrating students on "May 4th", and the slogans of "Down with Confu-cianism" and "Welcome Mr De (democracy) and Mr Sci (science)" which were put forward by the leaders of New Culture Movement were just the concentrated expression of this revolution. Although the political position and ideological tendency of the persons in-volved in this movement differed from one another, all had in common the following concerns:

- to re-evaluate the ancient Chinese tradition and culture;

- to reject the feudal autocracy expropriating people’s

freedom;

- to abandon the feudal morals which fettered people’s

thought; and

- to re-establish a new culture with scientific and democratic

traits.

These demands coincided with common attitudes to some degree as they were all against the feudal forces and warlords’ oppressing of the broad masses of the people, and against the privilege of foreign countries in China and the unequal treaties they imposed upon China. So to some degree they were able to establish a broader united front. The culture they talked about during that time went beyond the limits of simple literature or culture in a narrow sense, and was imbued with political and ideological meaning. Both the establishment of a new culture characterized by science and democracy and the re-evaluation of the old culture involved the social system and political and morale ideologies including that of democracy. Those involved in science sought a new world-view and methodology to replace the traditional un-scientific world-view and methodology; this had ideological meaning. Science and democracy represented the ideal of a new society, as well as an attitude and methodology which must be used in order to achieve such an ideal.

Facing the historical mission of "re-evaluation", especially of "re-establishment", many intellectuals imported a successive variety of Western ideas and theories. This made the "May 4th" period the time of the most intense sino-Western cultural com-munication in the modern history of China. Some radical per-sonages began to receive Marxism under the influence of the October revolution in Russia. But for both social and episte-mological reasons the broad masses of intellectuals could not accept Marxism with its theory of class struggle and dictatorship of the proletariat as the keystone of its doctrine. So they tried to find other theories from the West more suitable to their call for demo-cracy and science. To many pragmatism, being characterized by science and democracy, advocating constant progress and inno-vation of society, and promoting the liberation and freedom of per-sonality, seemed the most suitable.

Qu Qiu-bai, one of the early leaders of the communist party of China, said "It was really not accidental that pragmatism had appeared in China around `May 4th’. The patriarchal society of China had been shaken by international capitalism. It needed a new outlook on the world and life so as to adapt to the new environment of China. Pragmatism with its positive sides has satisfied this need." (Qu Qiu-bai, Pragmatism and Revolutionary Philosophy.)

Clearly, the importing of pragmatism gave an active role to the development of the New Culture Movement at the time of "May 4th". Many Chinese intellectuals received pragmatism’s "new out-look on world and life" as their conceptual approach for elimi-nating evils and disadvantage and benefiting politics, destroying the old and establishing the new. Why did the reputation of young Hu Shi rise suddenly, why were the lectures of Dewey welcomed by a broad range of intellectuals, including even many of the left wing. The main reason is that the pragmatism advocated in these lectures was adapted to trends of thought in China at the time of "May 4th".

There were some serious defects in the reception of prag-matism in the "May 4th" period. For example, people did not understand adequately the onesidedness and limitations of prag-matism. They did not give adequate attention to the impact prag-matism would have upon the conditions of the Chinese con-sciousness.

Pragmatism is generally acknowledged as embodying the American national spirit. The particular historical conditions of the formation and development of American society gave the Ame-rican culture and national spirit the following traits: an under-estimation of other worlds, but close attention to the world of experience; a devaluation of speculative and abstract theories, but the promotion of practical and concrete actions; disdain for the beaten path, but great effort at innovation and creativity; disregard of every absolute authority, but admiration of all kinds of individual effort; opposition to autocracy, but the promotion of democracy; rejection of blind obedience and belief, but promotion of intelligence and science, etc. Pragmatism embodies all these traits. Such a philosophy played a very important role for the American people in constructing the world’s most developed country on an almost uncultivated soil, in the prosperity of science and culture, and in the development of America’s democratic system. This strongly impressed Chinese intellectuals striving for social progress and the renewal of their culture. In receiving and propagating pragmatism at the time of the "May 4th" Movement Hu Shi and others idealized pragmatism. They claimed that once the method of pragmatism was employed all kinds of problems regarding the re-evaluation and re-establishment of Chinese cul-ture, even the innovation and progress of Chinese society, would readily be solved.

But pragmatism is not a perfect philosophy; still less is it fully suitable for China. As to the theory of pragmatism, although it contains many positive elements which deserve being affirmed, it has serious limitations. First, under the banner of rejecting meta-physics, pragmatists mention speculative idealism and materialism in the same breath, and negate both of them indiscriminately. Thereby, inevitably they cancel the objective basis of their own theory. Although pragmatism is not a pure idealism and at times it even opposes idealism, still it comes finally to a subjective idea-lism. Second, while stressing the activity of human cognition and practice, often they neglected the objective necessities which must be obeyed; their stand on progress and evolution was imbued with some subjective arbitrariness. Third, while opposing dogmatism, absolutism and varieties of authority, as well as separating theory from practice, they negated the existence of objective and absolute truth. Sometimes they confuse the practical test of truth with its value for humans and make truth dependent upon the individual’s subjective likes and dislikes. Fourth, having rejected the objecti-vity of knowledge and practice, even their so-called scientific method losses objectivity so that they could not break clearly with subjective fabrication and sophistry.

These and like onesidedness and limitations in pragmatism were criticized by many philosophers even in Western countries, and especially in its American birth place. Contemporaries of James and Dewey, such as British philosophers F.H. Bradley and B. Russell, and the American philosophers G. Santayana and A. O. Lovejoy, criticized its contradictions, ambiguity, vagueness and onesidedness. For example, Russell did not agree with a James’ view that a belief is truthful in so far as its effects are good. Inte-llectually, this view has important difficulties because according to it people could not affirm even such a simple matter of fact as that Columbus crossed the Atlantic Ocean in 1492. The effect of the belief does not justify why some must say that is was in 1492 but not in 1491 or 1493. Therefore Russell considered the philosophy of James to be nothing but subjectivist ravings . Of course, Russell and others misunderstood the real implications of pragmatist theories, especially that of James. Nevertheless, it was indeed onesided limited.

Because of this there must have been some reasons why pragmatism played so important a role in America. The principal one was that America had established a capitalist social and political system with the corresponding principles of value. This system and its principles do not simply assume pragmatism as its theoretical basis; the Declaration of Independence is the foun-dation of the country, but its theoretical grounds were Mon-tesqieu’s and Rousseau’s rationalistic enlightenment doctrines of freedom, equality and universal fraternity. Therefore, although pragmatism declared itself against metaphysics and rationalist systems, it worked on the premises of rationalist systems which undergird the capitalist system and its principles.

Apparently one who pursues pragmatism emphasizes only action, but does not pay much attention to ideals; he or she is interested only in concrete reality and does not care about rational principles. In fact, however, pragmatists base their action and interests upon the above mentioned ideals and principles. Prag-matism was developed in America during its formation when American’s universally accepted their senior thinker’s ideals as well as principles, institutions and the value system of capitalism. Without these conditions, pragmatism could not have emerged in America, or if it had emerged, it would not have been accepted widely. Therefore, one cannot reduce the American world-view and outlook on life to pragmatism, nor can we even trace to it the general development of American society and culture.

Nevertheless due to the conditions noted earlier, pragmatism did play an important role in its birthplace in the first half of this century and its one-sidedness and limitations were usually neg-lected. When it spread to China, although it played an active role in promoting the "May 4th" New Culture Movement, its role was greatly limited from the very beginning. The fundamental reason was that Chinese culture, unlike the American, lacked the social and intellectual premises required for pragmatism to play its full role.

China had spent thousands of years in the feudal traditions, which is a serious obstacle to the progress of Chinese society and places heavy spiritual shackles upon Chinese thought. After the Opium War in 1840, with the invasion of foreign capitalism, great changes took place in Chinese society and the country sank into a semi-feudal, semi-colonial state. During the "May 4th" Movement, China was in a turbulent state. The establishment of a new social system and intellectual culture was advocated by many progressive persons who were still in an obscure state. At that time, China had many concrete problems, from rickshas to Presidential jurisdiction, from prostitution to government bribery and the betrayal of the country. China still needed to search for the social causes of these problems and for principles and direction for their solution. With-out the latter, it would be unable to solve the former. The semi-feudal and semi-colonial social system which caused the above-mentioned problems and other types of social malpractice had not been basically overthrown. Hence, the solutions to the above-mentioned concrete problems which were drawn up in accord with the pragmatism advocated by Hu Shi and others could not be put into practice. Actually, before the introduction of pragmatism, in Chinese traditional thought and especially in Chinese modern Enlightenment thought it was emphasized that the secret of learn-ing lay in solving practical problems and getting practical effects. However, these ideas did not help the Chinese before or during the "May 4th" Movement to solve the many problems they en-countered.

Therefore, at the time, China’s urgent need was for a revolu-tionary theory which would shape the future path of development of Chinese society; and for a new culture to replace the old Chinese cultural tradition, sort out its essence, and guide correctly the changes of Chinese society. The spirit of science and democracy advocated by pragmatism and scientific methodology in certain aspects suited the needs of many Chinese intellectuals and inspired their enthusiasm for destroying the old and establishing the new. But pragmatism did not correctly point out the mode of Chinese future development. It could not provide the Chinese with a conscious and definite path. Moreover, at that time, many propa-gators of pragmatism were favoring overall Westernization. They did not deeply investigate the relation of Chinese and Western culture and the problems of how Western culture could be adapted to Chinese soil. So the pragmatism they propagated was not able to meet China’s special needs. When the "May 4th" New Culture Movement developed further and met the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolution of the young students and broad masses of workers and peasants, Hu Shi and other leading pragmatists in China gradually withdrew from the position from which they had launched an attack on the old system and tradition: some even took the opposite position. This indicated that pragmatism in China had lost its active and progressive meaning.

After being introduced into China, pragmatism did not play a long and profound role as it did in America. Being an important instrument in political conflicts of contemporary China, it became the victim of these conflicts. People cannot equate pragmatism as an ideology with a specific political tendency. It is an academic theory which includes scientific methodology, but does not always relate directly to politics. People even used the former to swallow up the latter so that the role of pragmatism was largely limited by China’s special political circumstances.

At the period of May 4th, while introducing and propagating pragmatism as well as other Western trends, Chinese scholars generally did not distinguish their knowledge and value systems. In pragmatism and other Western trends there was a tendency to search for a general plan adapted to current circumstance but usually they did not investigate deeply their academic theories. In other words, the people’s main attention was upon the connection between knowledge and the value systems of pragmatism and others orientations. They even confused the two and neglected their differences regarding, for example, the knowledge system’s re-lative independence from political needs and other values. When they accepted and advocated pragmatism, this was not based mainly upon the recognition of the truth of its theoretical system, but upon the utility it could have for politics and morality.

The pragmatism introduced in the period of May 4th was mainly Dewey’s doctrine, especially his political philosophy and theories of morality and education. Dewey’s own lectures in China and the introductions to pragmatism by his Chinese students (Hu Shi and others) all laid particular stress on concrete, especially political, problems rather than entering deeply into its structure. In the famous polemic on "Problem and Doctrine," Hu Shi promoted pragmatism in terms of its ability to solve the social and political problems of Chinese society. At that time, many people who accepted pragmatism had no correct and deep understanding of its academic content. Their reason for accepting pragmatism was mainly that the spirit of science and democracy it propagated cor-responded to their political and moral choice at that time. However, with the further development of the "May 4th" movement, their political and moral choice changed and some came increasingly to distrust and even complete to negate it.

The tendency to determine choices in philosophy by politics and values developed further after May 4th. China’s old unified tyrannical feudal system had been shaken, while the new unified political pattern had not been formed yet. The pluralist pattern of politics produced by the conflict among warlords and the struggle of political forces provided conditions for a pluralist ideological pattern. At that time, people’s academic choices were slightly influenced by certain unified political structures. Because it was evidently pluralistic and was accepted to different degrees by people with different political inclinations, pragmatism was es-pecially prevalent.

After May 4th, and especially after the forming of Chinese political pattern governed by two opposite forces, the CPC and the KMT, all research into Western philosophy was governed by this pattern. The investigation of pragmatism continued and it had definite influence in the field of history, archaeology, education and especially the natural sciences, which had little direct relation to politics. But generally speaking there was little deep study of pragmatism as an academic theory; it remained usually at the level of its politics and values and its fate in China actually was determined by the attitudes of the two above-mentioned political forces.

The political structure of the early KMT was rather complex. Among its members, there were not only conservative forces, but also progressive personages who struggled for a democratic revo-lution in China. Later, it became increasingly divided interiorly and in 1927, after the breakdown of the cooperation between the KMT and the CPC, the KMT was increasingly governed by the rightist forces. Sometimes they neglected or even abandoned the goal of democratic revolution of the period of May 4th. For example, democracy was replaced by dictatorship of Jiang Jie-Shi and the local warlords. In this case, the study of philosophy, including that of pragmatism, was strongly influenced by dictatorial politics. Around 1935, in the discussion of democracy and dictatorship some persons who advocated democracy in the May 4th period now supported carrying out a new type of dictatorship in the name of strengthening the cohesion of the country and rapidly realizing uni-fication. The propagation and influence of pragmatism still existed, but essentially it had lost its reputation as a progressive theory which advocated science and democracy.

Although at the period of May 4th there were differences in principle between Chinese Marxism and pragmatism, still they formed a united front supporting science and democracy. Even in the famous polemics of problem and doctrine, Li Da-zhao, the representative of Marxism, did not wholly reject Hu Shi’s prag-matism. He even pointed out that some of his own ideas were completely the same as Hu Shi’s while others differed slightly (cf. Li Da-zhao, "On Problem and Doctrine Again").

After the "May 4th" Movement, because of the radical changes in the political situation of China, the political divergence between Chinese Marxism and pragmatism became increasingly pointed. The original united front having been destroyed, they took an increasingly negative attitude toward each other. Such changes reached a tuning-point in the thirties when Stalin’s Leftist Line had formed in the USSR. Dewey openly took a critical and skeptical attitude toward the trial of Trotsky and others in the time of Stalin, he even organized an investigative committee on the Trotsky case which acquitted Trotsky of any crime, and opposed the authorities of the USSR. Thus, Dewey, who at first was praised as a dis-tinguished progressive and democratic scholar, now was criticized as a reactionary philosopher of imperialism and a most vicious enemy of the USSR; the pragmatism linked to his name was de-clared a decadent and reactionary philosophy of imperialism. Such changes in the USSR’s attitude toward pragmatism soon influenced China and its earlier, more objective and practical, realistic judgements which lent some degree of supported for pragmatism were replaced by its overall rejection.

The Leftist inclination to judge theories purely by political criteria was developed further in the criticism of Hu Shi’s prag-matism, led by Mao Tze Dong himself in the early fifties. At that time the many treatises criticizing pragmatism served special political needs, but did not proceed from a deep investigation of pragmatism as an academic theory. Many authors did little research, or did not even study the original works by the prag-matists; their arguments were based on conclusions already deter-mined by persons in authority. The leaders of this critical move-ment sought their goals in politics and ideology, establishing Marx-ism as the absolute authority and eliminating any open influence from other trends. But out of neglect for learning and basing their critiques only on political choices, theoretically they failed to make a clear distinction between right and wrong. Hence, they criticized some active agenda which pragmatism had in common with Marx-ism or could be accepted by Marxism. Hence, this critique essen-tially deviated from real Marxism, neglecting some fundamental practical and realistic Marxist principles. Unfortunately, such leftist orientations were not overcome in time, but increased with the strengthening of the political left. This resulted in a unitary pattern for criticizing the whole of Western non-Marxist thought.

The above-mentioned leftist inclination reached its extreme in the so-called Cultural Revolution. It should be noted that while in the name of Marxism they mounted a punitive expedition against pragmatism and other Western trends, the extreme leftist leaders at that time essentially pursued a pragmatism which excluded the spirit of science and democracy; the result was an absolutism and dogmatism which reflected a feudal autocracy and was criticized by pragmatism. Thus, they acted arbitrarily in politics, deprived the mass of people of their democratic rights, wantonly trampled on science as theoretical and energetically advocated a cult of the individual. All this was not only fundamentally opposite to real Marxism, but differed greatly from pragmatism and other Western doctrines about science and democracy. Thus, they seemed to return people to the situation of feudal autocracy and obscurantism of the old China before the "May 4th" Movement.

In the early summer of 1976, the famous "April 5th" move-ment took place in Tienanmen Square in Beijing. It expressed the people’s extreme hatred of "The Gang of Four" which had played the tyrant in the Cultural Revolution and the people’s desires to cast off the yoke of politics and thought. In the winter of that year "The Gang of Four" was eventually overthrown and the Cultural Revo-lution ended. Since 1979 Chinese society once again took up the path of innovation and development. People began again to inves-tigate Marxism which had been distorted and misrepresented; also they began once again to study pragmatism and other Western trends.

This new beginning is just sixty years after the "May 4th" Movement of 1919. As earth shaking changes had taken place in Chinese society for those sixty years, we cannot think of this return as a simple repetition of the starting point. But surely great simi-larities exist between the two. For example, both faced the same national conditions: poverty and backwardness in economics, defi-ciency of democracy in politics, underdevelopment in science and ossification in thought. Hence, progressive Chinese intellectuals attempted to promote China’s reform by introducing a new aca-demic theory and working out a general plan for restoring China’s prosperity and strength. The "May 4th" Movement took science and democracy as its main slogan; people have been calling again for science and democracy since 1979. People regarded the "May 4th" Movement as an Enlightenment in modern Chinese history, and the renewal of thought and ideas since 1979 as a New Enlight-enment.

Why did the movement striving for science and democracy, which began in 1919, have to return after 60 years to a starting point quite similar to its origins? There were manifold reasons: the powerful influence of China’s old feudal forces in politics and eco-nomics as well as its traditional feudal culture; the interference and destruction by foreign countries, especially the Japanese invasion; the ragged form of the modern Chinese revolution and the many faults committed -- all of these had hindered the smooth develop-ment of modern Chinese society and its corresponding thought-culture in various degrees. In addition to these analyses, another important reason is that people, mainly the authorities, had not correctly handled the relation between knowledge systems and value systems in thought and culture -- in other words, learning was taken as simply instrumental to politics, which itself was always unstable.

Confusing the knowledge system with the value system, taking it only as an ideology for the service of particular social and political groups, and judging its truth or falsity simply by its utility value generated two results. First, it hindered deep research in the knowledge system and impeded real knowledge of what was true and false. Second, it hindered the use of a correct theory for guiding action and achieving success; theory could not develop its own utility (including political) value. The main lesson of the sixty years experience with pragmatism in China seem to be here.

As has just been mentioned, because people who were for and against pragmatism took its utility value as the criterion of judge-ment, they were unable to study fully and deeply its theory. Al-though it has been over sixty years since the introduction of prag-matism to China, there still is no adequate book which introduces it fully and objectively. Deliberate misrepresentation appears every-where when people talk about it. Its theoretical contents are not the most abstruse in contemporary Western philosophy, but because it was closely related to politics and more easily governed by shifting political needs people had only a dim knowledge of its true meaning. Even in philosophical circles, many people from begin-ning to end had no true and definite knowledge of what pragmatism was, especially of its relationship to Marxism. This led to extreme confusion regarding theory. Some leftist Marxist theorists always stressed the contrasts between Marxism and pragmatism. At times they criticized such ideas of pragmatism as: "Any thought and idea that can make people successful is true" as prominent expressions of bourgeois egoism and a philistine approach to doing business; at other times they considered the same ideas to be profoundly Marx-ist if expressed in other terms, especially those borrowed from political leaders.

When revisionism was widely criticized in the fifties and sixties, its thought basis was first reduced to "bourgeois prag-matism" and therefore suppressed wantonly. In the last ten years, people have not been criticizing revisionism and what was ori-ginally criticized is now regarded as tallying with Marxism. As to the line of demarcation between pragmatism and Marxism scarcely any scholars can give a clear answer.

Confusion in theory leads to confusion in action. Some people repeatedly declare themselves most devout advocates and followers of Marxism. However, because Marxist theory was ossified, dogmatized and divorced from practice it was unable to be used as a guide to practice. How then was practice to proceed? This depended only upon observing the effects produced, that is, on experience. "Look before every step" was the watch word, or to use a famous statement of a Chinese leader: to cross the river feel one’s way along the riverbed. Such a way of guiding action merely in terms of daily experience and its effect was not Marxist theory, but it was close to the parochial empiricism of pragmatism. When the problems to be solved by practice were more simple and pure, this empirical method was not without effect, but when the problem was more complex this method was obviously powerless, and persis-tence in using it usually would lead to errors and failure in action.

The purely political utilitarianism of judging thought and theory, or, more broadly, culture, would lead to simplification, coarseness and vulgarization of theoretical research. Further, it would throw knowledge and theory into confusion which subse-quently leads practice and action into new pitfalls or failure. In order to avoid this, people must study theory once again. If, how-ever, people merely take up a short-sighted political utilitarianism as their criterion, another vicious circle surely would follow. From 1919 to 1979 the samsara phenomena of culture unfolded in just this manner -- a big circle of sixty-years consisting of a series of smaller circles.

Since the new Enlightenment began in 1979 the progress and achievements of cultural studies in China have been unmatched by those in the corresponding period after May 4th. But as far as the study of pragmatism and other Western trends is concerned, there were still problems similar to those following the May 4th. Among them, the most striking is that cultural studies were still at times controlled by short-sighted leftist or rightist political utilitarianism.

The left deviation has been predominant. Some people at-tempted to judge the truth or falsity of pragmatism and other West-ern trends in the light of whether or not they corresponded to the political needs of the time. From such a point of view, these trends were non- or anti-Marxist. Such studies would be politically use-less and a harmful dissemination of spiritual pollution advocating bourgeois liberalization and as a result they must be strictly limited. After the events of Tienanmen Square in June 1989, the leftist political forces were more ascendant. The introduction and study of Western trends, being considered one of the main causes of the turmoil, was limited even more. Since the Spring of 1992 the winds of reform and openness have been blowing again more strongly than ever, while the leftist forces have been in decline. This wind has been mainly in the economic field; but the thought-culture field is becoming flexible.

On the other hand, a few overly liberal scholars uncritically accept some theories and ideas of pragmatism and other Western trends, especially those of Western democracy such as a multiple party system, parliamentarianism, etc. At the same time, they neglect traditional Chinese culture and even more the complex Chinese political and social conditions. They believe that if these Western theories and systems were introduced, all kinds of social problems faced by China would be solved naturally. A very few scholars go far beyond academic studies and attempt to force the Chinese government to practice a scheme of political reform which they put forward according to Western patterns. Such political utilitarianism could not be successful in the realities of present day China; on the contrary, it provides a pretext for the leftists to strengthen their ideological control. It is evident then that the short-sighted political utilitarianism of both left and right hinder the development and progress of thought-culture studies, including that of pragmatism in China, and hinder also their possible political function.

Under China’s present conditions the way in which cultural studies should proceed is in need of discussion from different quarters. It will not be discussed here in detail, but from the ex-periences and lessons of such studies since May 4th, especially in recent years, the following elements seem to emerge.

First, studies in thought and culture should not be taken simply as instruments of politics, especially of current policies. To be sure, almost every trend in thought and culture has its political tendency and the purposes of such studies often are connected with politics. But this does not mean that studies of thought and culture should be subordinated fully to politics. On the contrary, in order to study objectively and deeply in order to disclose the secret of every theory and thought pattern, including its political tendencies, people must extricate themselves from short-sighted political pre-conceptions. Otherwise, they would not only easily distort or mis-understand the matters they studied, but cause other disastrous effects such as were mentioned above. The lessons since May 4th must not be forgotten.

Second, studies in thought and culture should be manifold, even pluralistic, in order to prosper. One of the main reasons why the May 4th period produced the most prosperous cultural develop-ments of contemporary China is that various trends and schools of thought and culture co-existed and freely discussed and debated one another. On the contrary, when a leftist political line of thought controlled China, all non-Marxist cultural studies were considered harmful and in fact were prohibited as Marxism was considered to be the only truth. There was a policy: "let a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend," but by over-stressing solely the Marxist school in all decisions the hundred schools were controlled by this one school. Hence, essentially only this school existed. Without discussing, debating and being en-riched by other schools, this school became increasingly ossified and dogmatic.

Third, studies in thought and culture should be open. Whe-ther culture studies should be guided by Marxism is a matter of de-bate among Western and Chinese scholars. According to my view, the most important question is not this, but how to understand Marxism and its guiding influence. If people take it as closed, it would certainly become dogmatic and ossified: such studies certainly will turn into a blind alley. If people take Marxism as an open theory, it will receive every valuable thought and idea from other trends and abandon any thing of itself which becomes anti-quated or is shown to be wrong. Culture studies under the guidance of such Marxism certainly will be fruitful.

What role could the study of pragmatism play in the future development of Chinese culture? From the lessons learned since May 4th, the answer is not difficult. Generally speaking, we should affirm audaciously that a number of theories and ideas of prag-matism are valuable in promoting the innovation and development of Chinese culture. For example, to advocate open inter-disci-plinary study in the field of thought and culture, as mentioned above, is consonant with the emphasis of pragmatism.

Two more points must be noted. First, useful ideas in prag-matism often are shared with Marxism to some extent, or are worth being referred to by Marxism. Second, some ideas in pragmatism are similar to aspects of Chinese traditional culture, as mentioned above. Being based on developments in modern science and society the ideas of pragmatism frequently are more systematized and developed. Hence they are able to provide points of reference for the innovation and development of Chinese traditional culture. In a word, we should overcome the leftist deviation of simply negating pragmatism and other Western trends, strengthen those studies and receive everything valuable therefrom.

On the other hand, we should not forget that pragmatism is not a perfect philosophy, still less a philosophy fully suitable to China. Hence we must also disclose and criticize its onesidedness and limitations. To idealize pragmatism, certainly would be to re-peat the errors which in the past have hindered the smooth develop-ment of Chinese culture and society.