China Channel

Yan Xuetong’s qualified acknowledgement of liberalism – Sam Crane

For many years the Chinese Communist Party has identified “Western values,” including various manifestations of liberalism, as a threat to political and social stability in the People’s Republic.  From the 1983 movement to “eradicate spiritual pollution,” through repeated jeremiads against “bourgeois liberalization” and “peaceful evolution,” to more recent efforts to promote “socialist core values,” Party leaders have consistently attacked liberalism as a “hostile foreign force.” All the while, they attempt to appropriate and redefine certain liberal values – freedom, democracy – to support the illiberal authoritarianism that sustains their power.

It was somewhat surprising, then, to read Tsinghua University Professor Yan Xuetong’s recent article: ‘Chinese Values v. Liberalism: What Ideology Will Shape the International Normative Order?’ The “v.” in the title suggested a reiteration – perhaps a more sophisticated one, given Yan’s academic pedigree – of the usual anti-liberal diatribe. But instead of uncompromising condemnation or distorted appropriation, Yan recognizes the power of liberalism at the level of international relations, and advances tentative ideas for a reasonable accommodation between traditional Chinese values and liberal ideals.

Lessons from history for Xi Jinping – Yuhua Wang

In 1912, at the age of 19, Mao Zedong’s high school teacher gave him a book that became his lifelong favorite. He read it during the Long March, in his cave house in Yanan, and during his train rides across China. A copy of the book could always be found on his bedside table so he could read it before sleep. He told people that he had read it seventeen times, and he frequently referred to the book during conversations with Party officials.

The book is Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance, which was edited by Sima Guang, an intellectual and politician in the Northern Song dynasty, and published in 1084. It is a 294-volume, three-million-word chronological narrative of China’s history from 403 BCE to 959 CE. The emperor asked Sima to write this book to examine the lessons learned from previous emperors, so that future emperors could learn from them, avoid their mistakes, and become better rulers.