Many people say that "China lacks public intellectuals", but in fact, China does not have this tradition, but lacks an arena.
"Professionals" are not considered intellectuals
In China's great transformation over the past century, there have been two major periods in which intellectuals have truly played a guiding role. The first is the end of the Qing Dynasty, that is, when the imperial system, which lasted for more than 2,000 years, came to an end, although the number of intellectuals at that time was small, but it played a very large role. In another period, they are usually circled today under the sign "May Fourth", but in reality, the role played by these intellectuals is far from being encapsulated by this concept. After the 1930s, China's path of transformation was greatly affected by war. This shock lasted until the end of the 40s of the last century, and then entered a period of relative peace.
After 1949, there were two periods in which intellectuals played a role, but due to the general environment, it was difficult for intellectuals to play the independent role of the first two times. The first is the period before the Anti-Rightist Movement in 1957, but this period is very short. Second, in the late 70s and early 80s of the last century, we all thought that it was a period of emancipation of the mind, but looking back at the remarks at that time, whether it was sharpness and depth, or the political, social, economic and cultural atmosphere around us, they were all much worse than the previous two times. Since then, there have been some deep changes in Chinese society, both visible and invisible. The so-called invisible does not mean that you can't feel it, but something that cannot be discussed in the media. What can be seen is that commercialization has become more and more important in the past 30 years, and the impact on intellectuals is the same all over the world - in the era of commercialization, people have become secular and utilitarian, and the role played by intellectuals can no longer be as earth-shattering as before. Closely related to this is the increasing specialization of the social division of labor, which has also led to a serious differentiation of intellectuals. The main source of intellectuals is highly educated people, but as they become more specialized, many highly educated people become "professionals", such as accountants, doctors, teachers, etc. The number of professionals has grown the fastest in the past 30 years, which is also a sign that Chinese society has moved from low to medium development. But strictly speaking, professionals are not considered intellectuals. Therefore, after entering the era of high differentiation, people usually add the word "public" in front of "intellectuals", that is, those who go beyond their own professional fields and make speeches in the public sphere can be called intellectuals. It turns out that it is not right to call all highly educated people intellectuals.
If the momentum of reform that has been in place since the late '70s had continued, China today might be very different. Later, the number of people who were highly educated and willing and daring to be intellectuals was greatly reduced.
"Spiritual reconstruction" is crucial
To this day, we are still faced with the problem of "spiritual reconstruction". In the English context, spiritual reconstruction is concerned with morality rather than knowledge. Knowledge refers to something that is relatively deep, which can be converted into science and technology, and even into a specific means of livelihood, while spirit is mainly a moral quality, moral care and moral consensus. In developed countries, as society enters full commercialization and specialization, the spiritual aspect is mainly driven by two major parts, one is religious and the other is secular intellectuals. Significant people who are active in the field of religion can be regarded as intellectuals in terms of quality, and it is difficult for the illiterate to carry out that kind of work, they are non-secular. Intellectuals in the secular field mainly realize value inheritance, value rebirth, value reconstruction and value innovation through non-religious means, they may be teachers, lawyers, media veterans, and even small groups that have emerged in the past decade or two that are concerned about public affairs, such as organizations related to environmental and ecological issues, groups of doctors who are concerned about a certain disease, groups that have been excluded from the mainstream in traditional society, and so on.
The vast majority of societies in the world have these two parts, and they are constantly interacting. However, China is small, weak, and unsustainable, and does not have a stable environment for them to operate, and it is difficult for them to become strong. This has led to what we often say about "today's intellectuals are not playing their due role".
Without these two pieces, it will eventually cause harm to society. In today's society, people always complain that there are so many problems: the society lacks credit, and some industries can do anything that hurts nature and reason; Families are broken and broken, there is a generation gap, and some very small things can also intensify into large-scale mass incidents; Indifference between people, lack of care, lack of salvation when they see death, lack of warmth; Some very important cultures and values belonging to this country and this nation (this nation is plural) have been neglected or even destroyed, and the relationship between man and nature has been seriously damaged...... Many of these problems have to be solved by law, and some have to be solved by improving material conditions, but there is also a very important one, which is to be alleviated by spiritual values. If economic development is a pillar and the legal system is a pillar, then another pillar is cultural and spiritual activities. In order to create an atmosphere in which people can live in a more dignified and harmonious way, moral, spiritual and cultural values alone are not enough, but they are also not possible without this part. Many of today's social problems are related to the lack of prosperity, inheritance and innovation of spiritual values.
Shopping malls and officialdom: two huge magnetic fields
Many people say that "China lacks public intellectuals", but in fact, China does not lack this tradition, but lacks a platform (arena, that is, the ancient Roman Colosseum, equivalent to a place where everyone fights in the ring). No platform, no matter how great a person is, except for a few family members or friends around you, no one knows you, can't hear your voice, can't get inspiration or encouragement from you, can't seek direction from where you are. Public intellectuals have two platforms, speech and association, so that they can be known, become more and more influential, and attract more and more people to play a role. These two items are the most basic, but we all know that it is very difficult to register a group or organization in reality. When you set up a group to help vulnerable people, such as people living with HIV/AIDS, including their rights issues, you enter the realm of public intellectuals, but this is likely to be restricted.
In addition, after the commercialization of society, there are more temptations, and some people feel that talking does not play a role, and it is better to write for real estate companies. People are like this, they can't do what they want to do, so what should they do, they have to find something to do. Only a very small number of people can really insist that "the rich and the rich cannot be lewd, the poor and the lowly cannot be moved, and the mighty cannot be bent". China has admired this kind of morality for thousands of years, but there are still too few such people. If you publish a few bit-in-the-point articles, and someone calls you in and says if you do it again, your job is gone, your job is gone, you think about it for two weeks. Two weeks later, we will say which bureau or which department we have now, and we think that your quality is the best, so you can do this thing, and don't do anything else. Most people probably won't be able to resist. I resisted, and that's why I'm still so poor that I can't afford a house or a car. One is officialdom and the other is shopping malls, these two huge magnetic fields are too attractive, and there are too few people who can resist them.
The "Spectrum of Intellectual Thought" Abroad
It is possible to look at the state of existence of intellectuals in other countries, but for the sake of space, I will only introduce it in a limited sense. For example, United States is a very commercial society, with all kinds of temptations, in this sense, it should be difficult to produce big intellectuals, or intellectuals to play an important role. But what I see in United States is the opposite, there are quite a lot of intellectuals in the United States, writing articles and columns in the mainstream media, giving speeches in public lecture halls and forums, and preaching in the most important churches and religious groups. The United States has shown breadth and diversity in this regard. These intellectuals do not have complete freedom of speech on any matter of public concern that you can imagine, but there are only a few issues, such as those that endanger race relations. And Chinese intellectuals have problems in terms of quantity, the depth of speech, and the creativity of constructing new values and value systems.
Some countries in Europe are much smaller than those in United States, but intellectuals have a great influence on society, especially United Kingdom and France. In France, intellectuals come out and talk about any problem, such as religion, abortion, gay marriage, single motherhood, immigration, the environment, not to mention political issues, economic policy issues, and social welfare issues. All important issues are advocated and advocated by intellectuals, and at the same time, intellectuals are opposing and criticizing, forming a spectrum of intellectuals' thoughts, and their ideological concepts are as rich and brilliant as a seven-colored rainbow. This is the pluralism of ideas, and the pluralistic need for constant dialogue and competition – peaceful competition – in order for a master-like figure to emerge. In a society, if people look back many years later, oh, 20, 30, or even 50 years ago, he warned us at that time what kind of difficulties our descendants would face if we didn't do something, and now I look back and think about it, his warning was too far-sighted. This is the existence of intellectuals in society - out of ideas, out of values, out of stimulating academics (non-professional), this is the most important thing.
Text/Ding Xueliang