YU XINTIAN

In recent years, concerns about culture have been rising, yet the focus of discussions over culture seems to remain on the relationship between foreign and native cultures. As a matter of fact, after Western powers broke open the door of China with gunboats, the Chinese have been thinking hard on this issue and discuss it fiercely. Culture has always borne the destiny of the Chinese and directed China’s path forward. One of the shortcomings in previous explorations is that they failed to examine closely the relationship between foreign and Chinese cultures against the world background and thereby lacked a broader field of vision. This article wishes to make some attempt at this. Ascending the heights to enjoy a distant view may make it possible to relax our long pent-up cultural complexes and approach China’s development with a tranquil and adaptive mind.

THE COMMON PROBLEM OF CULTURAL DUALITY

Tradition was the highest value for pre-modern societies, for the more scientific and technological means were lacking, the greater the value of experiential results. Only by strictly following customs from the ancestors could social order and civilization be maintained. However, culture has been constantly innovating and changing. To the long-term accumulation have been added discovery, invention and contacts with other nations as new conditions for cultural change. Contacts between nations have often exerted influences on both sides. Generally speaking, more backward nations may learn more from the cultures of the technically more advanced societies. In an environment of peace or conquest, cultural dissemination is a long and slow process. Nations absorbing cultures may make new applications of cultural forms, function and meaning, integrating them into their own cultural traditions as new cultural factors.

When the Western powers, taking the lead in modernization, began to colonize the rest of the world and conquered backward countries with gunboats, commodities and missionaries, some countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America were faced with unprecedented cultural assaults. As Marxism earlier brought to light, the impact of capitalist expansion on oppressed nations was dual and the invasion of Western culture also dual effects. On the one hand, Westerners destroyed most of the original civilizations and societies in the world, denied or changed local ethical standards, and arbitrarily determined the destiny of other nations according to Western standards and on the premise of this being beneficial.

This revealed the power of culture. Bring advanced industrial civilization, and disseminating modern theories, ideologies and values gave the oppressed weapons to criticize the shackles of pre-modern societies. In this sense Western colonialists served as “unconscious historical tools”. The entry of Western forces enabled backward nations to gain from the outside world the driving force of modernization. Colonialists disseminated some advanced technologies and trained suitable managerial personnel, but they were unwilling really to develop their colonies. This resulted in a striking contrast, summarized by Arthur Lewis as a dual economy, which produces the phenomenon of a dual culture. Any national culture has the contradiction of refined and popular tastes, as well as of superiority and inferiority; but both were still within the one system. Local customs and modes entered the larger tradition and spread far and wide through the process of universalization, while the larger tradition was revised through localization and competes with and integrates the original local modes.

However, too wide a gap exists between Western culture and native cultures. With independence the newly emerging countries have more room for self-determined cultural choice. But political changes have not been a panacea for all problems and the tension between Western and native cultures has not been eliminated. The phenomenon of dual culture cannot be fundamentally eliminated due to the slow progress of modernization and the antagonisms generated the dual economy. Without the push of industrialization, freedom of immigration and incentives to urbanization, it is almost impossible to reform traditional social structures, ideologies and concepts.

After repeated setbacks of modernization for over a century, the intervention of the ultra-“Left” line and the ten-year great calamity after the founding of the Republic, China did not set its mind on modernization until the beginning of the reform and opening-policy. Though its achievements are outstanding, the time has been too short. The majority of the Chinese people are peasants and the gap between town and country, intellectual and peasant remains wide, with each sticking to its extreme. This forms the huge hotbed of the dual culture. Extrication from the difficult position of dual culture depends not only on in-depth research and improved ways of thinking, but also and more importantly on the progress of modernization.

THE BREAKTHROUGH TO SELF-DETERMINED CULTURAL CHOICE AND CREATION

It is a matter for rejoicing that some developing countries and regions have caught-up and established newly emerging industrial economies in their modernization drive, while at the same time making breakthroughs in resolving historical problems in cultural building, offering us fresh experiences. Progress in modernization has promoted resolution of cultural problems, while success in cultural building has helped the process of modernization. The academy has split over the relationship between culture and modernization. In sum, there are only two schools: “system theory” and “culture theory”. The former considers the cultural role to be very small and sees economic development as depending on special economic policies and conditions. The latter holds that each social culture and system is extremely unique and plays a great role in economic development.

Actually, the two are not absolutely antagonistic. Firstly, the cultural factor cannot play a role on its own without the support of other political and economic conditions. East Asian countries have similar cultural conditions, but some go ahead of the rest and others lag behind. We absolutely cannot seek “causes” of economic development simply in culture, but we can expect to find there the “juncture” of economic development. That is to say, we can identify the cultural factor which does not act by itself, but which can vitalize the economy. Secondly, the role of this cultural factor cannot be ignored. The correct policy and rational system will, of course, encourage the people to struggle. But how to work out the correct policy, how to make a system rational to a particular nation, and how to create entrepreneurs and the people willing to follow the government’s policy cannot avoid the cultural background. For example, that the ratio of saving of some East Asian people is high, while that of Westerners is low, cannot be attributed to the difference in the wage system and banking policy. Thirdly, we recognize the impact of culture in a very broad field of vision, turning culture into one of variables. Culture not only determines the scope of policy and system, but also casts the special style and features of development. Almost anything will be filtered through culture. The same economic policies may produce different results in different countries. In short, system and culture move forward in interaction and coordination.

The fresh experiences of newly emerging industrial countries and regions in culture building can be summarized as the nativization of Western culture or inculturation, and the transformation of native culture or aculutralization. We see this process in China. Since the beginning of the reform and opening, Deng Xiaoping repeatedly reiterated that keeping the door closed is equal to maintaining backwardness. All the civilizational achievements in the world must be learned. Thus began an unprecedented tide of large-scale learning from foreign cultures started. This has greatly assaulted the traditional thought left over by the feudal society as well as many concepts of traditional socialism, leading to drastic changes in the views and concepts of the Chinese people. However, China has been highly vigilant against the Western democratic system, individualism and liberalism, which it cannot accept completely. On the other hand, Deng Xiaoping attached importance to progress in Chinese culture and ideology. Especially in recent years, social consensus on progress in culture and ideology has been increasingly enhanced, proving that people will pay more attention to the exploration, transformation and development of Chinese ideology, ethics and culture. Understanding the significance of culture building in newly emerging industrial countries and regions will encourage the Chinese to deal more consciously with the relationship between foreign cultures and native culture in the process of modernization and enable China to develop more smoothly.

THE NATIVIZATION OF WESTERN CULTURE

To achieve modernization and become developed, any country must boldly open to the outside world. It should also take the initiative in opening to foreign cultures while introducing large numbers of investors, making great efforts to push forward foreign trade, learning from advanced science and technology, and imitating effective management systems. Latecomers in modernization can use the experiences of forerunners for reference and shorten the process of catching-up. This is to their advantage but has created perplexity over whether to accept wholesale foreign modes or totally to reject them, and whether to believe absolutely in the universality of foreign systems or selectively to adapt native system to modern functions. Facts have proved that copying foreign models often leads to social turmoil and sometimes ends in failure. Furthermore, backward countries are generally in an unfavorable position in the world system and can easily be pessimistic or radical. This hinders them from considering the adaptation to modern functions in terms of the national reality. To open to the outside world, one should learn from Western culture. This is an issue of attitude and method.

In the process of industrialization, newly emerging industrial countries and regions have not only learned Western instrumental culture (technology) and the (management) systems of that culture, but also have introduced its key concepts. To realize individual aspirations and national rejuvenation, the modern fatalism of attempting nothing is questioned and replaced by awareness of competition, of actively forging ahead and changing destiny. In the process of establishing and perfecting market mechanisms, traditional concepts such as the idea of prerogatives -- of honorable men and humble women, of noble officials and humble people -- are replaced by the concept of equality before opportunity. In the transition from a small-scale and self-sufficient peasant economy to large-scale industrialized production such new concepts as national and ethnic identity, submission to law and the observance of disciplines grow strong. However, the absorption of Western culture by newly emerging industrial countries and regions should be self-determined and selective.

The nativization of Western culture implies not only learning and absorbing Western culture but also its screening. There are two basic reasons for this. One is the difference in time between Western and native cultures. Western countries have entered the post-modern stage and face very different challenges than industrializing societies. The other is the difference in their traditions. One of the main origins of Western culture is ancient Greece. Scattered city-states generated special democratic thinking and systems. This is widely divergent from the train of thought of centralized Oriental countries. The natural environment of the East and its mode of production and life have generated a mentality of greater respect for authority and submission to government. Of course, developing countries can transform their systems and change their concepts in the process of modernization, but the force of cultural traditions cannot be ignored.

THE TRANSFORMATION OR UNIVERSALIZATION OF NATIVE CULTURE AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE

To some extent, it can be said that the transformation of native culture is more important than the nativization of Western culture. The reason is that the learning and absorption of the quintessence of Western culture is, in the final analysis, not to change native cultures into offshoots of Western culture, but to transform and develop native cultures. Only on the stock of native cultures can the transplanted Western culture find its point of growth. The direction of the transformation of native cultures also determines the choice of the points of Western culture to be introduced. However, scientific rationality, the spirit of change and norms of the legal system of Western culture exercise a huge incentive on native cultures to change, which of themselves would stick to convention, tend to conservatism and rely on rule by men.

In the process of transformation of native cultures we should differentiate traditional culture from cultural traditions. Traditional culture refers basically to the cultural heritages of traditional societies, while cultural traditions are cultures retained in the present social environment by means of the cultural style accumulated from the ancient times. In the process of modernization, cultural traditions are more important than traditional culture. Sticking to the letter to ancient ways may ossify traditional culture and make it unable to take advantage of an opportunity to change into cultural tradition. This shows that we must meticulously transform traditional culture, abandon dross not adaptable to the needs of modern societies and explore and carry forward factors useful to future development on the basis of which new creations can occur. Without efforts to process and create, it is difficult for people to inherit and feel proud of their own culture.

To facilitate analysis, this article will separately recount the nativization of Western culture and transformation of native cultures. In fact the two processes are simultaneous and intertwined; the two promote, supplement and complement each other.

Success in the modernization of developing countries and regions has enabled people’s recognition of universalization of native culture to take a great leap. The question of whether the development of non-Western nations has been hindered because of culture has been lurking in people’s minds. At various international seminars in the 1960s, most held a negative attitude toward East Asian modernization. One of the reasons was that Confucian culture as it lays stress on harmony and coordination, the collective and social stability was seen as incompatible with modernization. Moreover, as it attaches importance to humanism and ignores science and technology, it cannot be counted on to guide modernization. But after the 1970s, there have been dramatic changes. The rise of the Asian “four dragons” has been looked at with new eyes. Their unique development modes were traced to their cultural source and the Confucian values which had been criticized in the 1960s came to be regarded as the driving force of economic growth.

We should not follow the track of Westerners and take a “man or mouse” attitude towards culture. If it can be said that native cultures originate from a special social formations, that is its historical layer, this does not mean that it has no potential for universalization. All great traditions have similar potentials. The key lies in how people choose and transform culture. Though nations may enter the road of modernization earlier or later, faster or slower, this cannot be the reason for being overweening or excessively humble with regard to some cultures.

From the perspective of history, the foreign-born-type of modernized cultural process of developing countries and regions is a last, very painful resort. However, it has also brought along unexpected results: compatibility of learning from, and integrating with, foreign cultures and a sober rationale for reviewing and assessing native culture at any time. This is of inestimable significance in this “global village” era of ever greater interdependence between nations. Western culture has not undergone threats of foreign cultures -- which is its good fortune in modern times. But as a result, it is difficult to understand the greatness of other cultures. Hence, it recognizes less the need to learn from others -- which is its misfortune for the future. Western countries have given full play to the humankind’s ability to conquer nature and have enhanced individual freedom to an unprecedented level. But they are faced with many problems before which they feel quite helpless. For example, cultural and moral degeneration, the gap between the rich and the poor, a lax society, the break-up of the family, school dropouts, pampered youth, alienation of human nature, and environmental damage. Such modern social “diseases” are hard to cure only by Western culture; “consultation” with various cultures in the world are needed.

Modernization in the world has provided many fresh experiences and China’s progress since the beginning of its reform and opening has also broadened our thinking, so that China possesses better conditions for dealing with the relationship between foreign and native cultures. However, the thinking of our nationals has not kept up with these drastic changes of the situation and they lack adequate understanding of these conditions. Undoubtedly, we should continue to implement Deng Xiaoping’s policy of all-round opening and absorb all of humankind’s excellent civilizational achievements, whether Eastern or Western.

But, when the economy fell in line with the world market, we also heard of the culture falling in line with the world and integrating into mainstream world civilization. This seems open to question. If these arguments mean the transformation of Chinese culture to adapt to modern needs and the change of China from an agricultural into an industrial civilization this has its truth. However, it may easily produce misunderstanding, as if Chinese culture overall would be integrated into the Western culture dominant in the world and only by emulating Western civilization could one enter the world mainstream. As is known to all, cultures in different social stages have different features. One of the results of industrialization is to narrow the gap in the stages between different cultures, while narrowing the gap in technology. However, special national cultural features will not disappear with modernization and “Western centralism” should be avoided.

The interest in Chinese traditional culture has greatly increased, which is great progress compared with national nihilism. But in the view of some people, national rejuvenation lies in a Confucian revival. This also seems one-sided. Confucianism as academic thinking contains the wisdom of the Chinese nation, but it also has many dregs since it was long combined with feudal political rule. If we hope to revive it and use it to push forward modernization regardless of conditions and without any analysis, things may turn out contrary to our wishes. We should indeed make in-depth research and analysis of the Confucianism dominant in the history of Chinese culture and carry it forward on the basis of developing what is useful and discarding what is not. Vague and general affirmations or negations will be of no help.

Further, to understand native culture only as Confucian is biased. Chinese culture should include Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, the Legalists and various schools of thought and their exponents. It should include 56 splendid national cultures and folk cultures. Such rich and profound cultural resources are awaiting development, transformation and utilization. To enable China’s modernization to develop more smoothly, we must cherish the huge role traditional resources can play and shape the characteristics of Chinese cultural construction.

We cannot lump together China’s ongoing modernization drive and the post-modernization phenomena of developed countries. But the problems facing post-modernization of developed countries may be a warning to China, which must make efforts to avoid or at least reduce the negative impacts of some post-modern phenomena in its modernization drive. Therefore, we must pay more attention to the exploration of traditions and their creativity. The reason is fundamentally that only from its own experience can humankind find the weapons to overcome future crises. In this regard, Chinese culture has notable advantages in counteracting the weaknesses of Western culture. It stresses on “Heaven and man combining into one” in the relationship between man and nature, on the harmony between individuals and the masses in interpersonal relations, and on ethical integrity in the moulding human reason. With the stimulation of the times these features are bound to prove more beneficial to the progress of mankind.

We must not forget that Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong’s thought and Deng Xiaoping’s theory of building socialism with Chinese characteristics have entered Chinese cultural tradition as new factors of thought and culture and determined the direction of cultural development. If the pioneers of the Chinese ideological circle had to grope their way in the dark, we can explore the way of cultural building in developing the Republic at its apex. With the destiny of Chinese culture in the hands of the Chinese, the river of Chinese culture from ancient times will bring all creeks to the plain to water the world of the 21^st century.