Since ancient times, Guangdong has been an important window for China's opening up to the outside world, and since the reform and opening up, it has become a test field and a top soldier for China's reform. A good port environment, a thick business environment, and an inclusive humanistic atmosphere have been formed, which has not only created a batch of merchants and huge riches, but also the birthplace of New Ideas in China. Just like the TV series "The Sea of Stars" tells the inspirational story of the protagonist Jane Ai who came to Guangzhou, worked hard from the pantry, and with her unremitting struggle, rode on the booming trend of China's foreign trade, and finally became the chairman of a multinational group. Jane Ai is a silhouette in the tide of reform and opening up, through which she reflects the spirit of "Cantonese people" who have endured many tribulations, still dare to be the first, and constantly improve themselves. It is this spirit that inspires groups of workers to change their destiny and inspires entrepreneurs to change China.
I think that the spirit of Guangdong people has changed with the times, but the spiritual core of daring to be the first in the world, pragmatic and truth-seeking, open and compatible, independent and self-reliant, seeking wealth and daring to get rich, and scientific rationality has never changed.
The first is the spirit of daring to be the first in the world. This is a spirit of courage to fight, but also a spirit of courage to innovate, and a fearless spirit of daring to take the road that no one before has walked. This spirit is one of the most distinctive differences between Cantonese and mainlanders. As early as the 1920s and 1930s, the famous literary scholar Mr. Lin Yutang wrote in his famous book "Chinese": "In Guangdong, just south of China, we have encountered another Chinese. They are full of racial vitality, everyone is a man, eating and working are all manly styles. They are enterprising, carefree, profligate, aggressive, adventurous, enterprising, short-tempered, and beneath the superficial Chinese culture is the tradition of the snake-eating indigenous people, which is clearly a strong mixture of Cantonese ancestry in ancient southern China. Guangdong people have a heroic spirit of "the sky is not enough to be afraid, the ancestors are not enough to the law, and the words of the people are not enough to be sympathetic." Modern Guangdong people have inherited and carried forward the spirit of traditional Guangdong people who dare to take risks and dare to fight. Rong Hong, China's first student studying in the United States, Feng Jingru, the first Chinese to cut off his braids, Zou Boqi, China's first optical expert and photographer, Chen Qiyuan, the founder of China's modern machine reeling industry, Feng Ru, China's first aircraft designer and aviator, Zhan Tianyou, chief engineer of China's first self-designed and built railway, the Beijing-Zhang Railway, and Zheng Zhengqiu, China's first film director, these Guangdong people are constantly exploring the development of modern China. Since the beginning of reform and development, modern Guangdong people have dared to be the first in the world, acted as the vanguard of China's reform and opening up, and bravely rushed out of a bloody road. On this "experimental field" of Guangdong's reform, one exciting "first" and "first" have been written one after another, such as the establishment of the "first" special economic zone, the "first" opening up a new way of "raising funds and attracting funds to build roads and bridges," "taking the lead" in abolishing the "tickets" for the supply of various daily necessities, "taking the lead" in establishing the basic framework of the socialist market economy, "taking the lead" in exploring various forms of the joint-stock system, forming the first newspaper group in the country, establishing the "first" provincial-level spiritual civilization society, and "first" exploring and establishing The political system of "three points of administration" and so on, has also enabled Guangdong Province to achieve a series of brilliant achievements in "taking the lead" in breaking through the two "trillion" marks.
The second is the spirit of pragmatism and truth-seeking. In essence, this spirit is the spirit of seeking truth from facts, the spirit of hard work, the spirit of stressing practical results, and the spirit of doing practical things. The spirit of pragmatism and truth-seeking is undoubtedly the universal spirit of Chinese. The traditional Chinese survives on the basis of the natural economy for thousands of years, and the farming economy has cultivated the traditional Chinese simple and unpretentious, and the spirit of dethronement and pragmatism. Therefore, Mr. Lin Yutang also said, "In China, a person does not have to learn how to be a realist, because he was born that way. However, modern Cantonese people have highlighted this spirit even more and made it more modern. Before the reform and opening up, Guangdong was a relatively backward place, and its industrial base was relatively weak. However, to engage in commodity economy and market economy, we must take the road of modern industrialization and the road of urbanization. In order to rush out of a bloody road, in addition to relying on the guidance of the party's correct line, principles, and policies, the Guangdong people must rely on a pragmatic and truth-seeking spirit and carry out socialist modernization in a down-to-earth manner. Because the Guangdong people are facing a road that no one has ever walked, they can neither find ready-made answers from the books, nor can they find the inherent patterns from the experience of predecessors, let alone rely on fantasies and arguments to solve the way out, but can only rely on themselves to "cross the river by feeling the stones" and rely on their own practice and exploration. In fact, it is precisely with this precious spirit of pragmatism and truth-seeking that modern Guangdong people have explored a series of successful experiences in the forefront of reform and opening up, which not only changed the original backward appearance of Guangdong, but also made their due major contributions to promoting the socialist modernization of the whole of China.
The third is the spirit of openness and compatibility. Guangdong is the birthplace of the Maritime Silk Road, early contact with the outside world, contact with new things and new ideas around the world, and has always had a tradition of being compatible with multiple cultures. This is also a spirit of consciously learning from the outside, being inclusive, tolerant and generous, drawing on the strengths of the family, and striving to improve oneself, rather than being closed to the outside, arrogant, blindly exclusive, and self-contained. Lingnan culture itself is developed in the process of continuous integration of Chinese and Western cultures, from a historical point of view, Guangdong faces the sea, has always been an important port for Sino-foreign trade, with the tradition of outward expansion, the spirit of seeking truth and pragmatism and the humanistic character of compatibility and tolerance. Lingnan culture has rich marine culture genes, it can be said that Lingnan culture is a farming culture and marine culture "mixed" culture. From ancient times to modern times, the number of Guangdong people who have emigrated overseas is large, and according to statistics from relevant parties, more than half of the tens of millions of overseas Chinese and ethnic Chinese in China around the world have their ancestral home in Guangdong. The immigrant culture has also created an open concept and open-mindedness of Cantonese people. As Mr. Li Quanshi said in his editor-in-chief Lingnan Culture, "Lingnan is located on the edge of the East Asian continent and on the coast of the South China Sea. The unique geographical environment and natural environment of Lingnan culture are bound to be 'under the window ledge, susceptible to wind and frost', which inevitably collides and intersects with other foreign cultures, forming an open cultural mentality, showing obvious different properties from the more closed inland culture. "And a culture with openness must have compatibility. Therefore, The Cantonese people living on this cultural soil must have this spirit of openness and compatibility. Undoubtedly, in the new period of reform and opening up, this spirit of modern Cantonese people has been further strengthened due to the more superior natural and social conditions. It is precisely this spirit of modern Guangdong people, under the guidance of the principle of "pollution is not exclusive," that criticizes, transforms, and absorbs the essence of other foreign cultures, and in combination with the great practice of Guangdong's reform and opening up, has formed and developed a series of new ideological concepts that meet the inherent requirements of the socialist market economy, and has effectively promoted the development of Guangdong's material, political, and spiritual civilization.
The fourth is the spirit of independence and self-determination. This is a spirit of independent development of personality and self-improvement. Because Guangdong has developed commerce and trade on the one hand in history, based on the requirements of the development of the commodity economy, the existence of independent subjects has become inevitable, and the concept of individuals and the consciousness of autonomy have always been relatively strong; on the other hand, as Mr. Liang Qichao said, traditional Chinese culture is divided into the north and the south, the north school is Confucius, the south school is Laozi, and Confucius's views are ranked in the south, just as Laozi's views are ranked in the north. The Central Plains culture and Lingnan culture, with Confucian culture as the core, belong to the core culture and marginal culture in the same cultural general system. In this kind of genus relationship and the constraint of mother-child relationship, Lingnan culture, by virtue of its geographical location, with the developed handicrafts and foreign trade in Lingnan since the Ming and Qing dynasties, and with its eclecticism of foreign culture, the influence of the traditional culture of the Central Plains on it has been continuously diluted, making it have greater freedom and tolerance, thus making the core spirit of the traditional culture of the Central Plains - holism failing to form a strong influence on the Guangdong people, and also providing important conditions for the growth of the independent and free spirit in Lingnan culture. With the formation of the socialist market economy in Guangdong, a solid foundation has been laid for the promotion of the spirit of independence and self-determination of modern Cantonese people. At the same time, the promotion of this spirit of independence and self-determination of modern Guangdong people has also become an important cultural condition indispensable for Guangdong to establish a socialist market economy, thus radiating the great initiative, enthusiasm, and creativity of Guangdong people in building socialist modernization, and becoming an important spiritual force for Guangdong to take the lead in realizing socialist modernization.
Fifth, the spirit of seeking prosperity and daring to become rich. This is a spirit of courage to pursue prosperity and dare to work hard to get rich. Guangdong has a long history of commercial and trade economic development, and the fundamental difference between the commodity economy and the natural economy lies in the self-sufficient nature of the natural economy and the unlimited profit-seeking nature of the commodity economy. In business and trade economic activities, the starting point and endpoint of economic agents are aimed at obtaining maximum exchange value. In layman's terms, people hope to achieve their goal of getting rich through commercial and economic activities. Therefore, the mentality of seeking wealth is a general mentality that inevitably arises in the development of the commodity economy. This mentality, due to the marginalization of Lingnan culture, has not been seriously inhibited by the spirit of poverty and happiness in the traditional culture of the Central Plains, which is based on natural economy, but has been preserved for a long time. Although in the decades after liberation, when the Ideology of the Left dominated, this mentality of seeking prosperity, although greatly suppressed, was not extinguished, so under the mighty spring breeze of the socialist market economy, it grew rapidly again, and under the guidance of the party's ideology and policy of enriching the people, a new spirit of seeking prosperity and daring to get rich in the unity of righteousness and profit was formed. Under the excitement of this spirit, the social productive forces that had been suppressed for a long time in the past erupted like a volcano, forming a huge force of hard work and prosperity, pushing the Guangdong people, especially the pearl river delta people, to get rid of poverty, bid farewell to backwardness, and run to a well-off and a prosperous one. Of course, the modern Cantonese people's spirit of seeking wealth and daring to get rich is also a spirit of common prosperity. Therefore, the Guangdong people who became rich first have been making unremitting efforts to support and help people in underdeveloped areas with their own unremitting efforts; whether it is poverty alleviation work or charity activities, Guangdong people have always been at the forefront.
Sixth, the spirit of scientific rationality. It is a scientific spirit, a rational spirit. Although, as far as our traditional culture is concerned, due to the constraints of its economic base, the natural economy with farming as the mainstay, this spirit of scientific rationality has always been the most lacking. The Lingnan culture, which belongs to traditional Chinese culture, has inevitably been affected to a certain extent, which has also caused its scientific and rational spirit to be relatively weak. However, due to the particularity of Guangdong's geographical environment and natural environment, due to Guangdong's long-standing commercial and economic traditions, due to the long-term exchanges between Lingnan culture and other foreign cultures, and due to the openness and compatibility characteristics of Lingnan culture, Lingnan culture is more advanced and more scientific and rational than the traditional culture of the Central Plains. In particular, Guangdong is adjacent to Hong Kong and Macao, and has taken the lead in the wave of reform and opening up, and has earlier and more practical experience in developing the socialist market economy, all of which have laid a more superior condition and environment for Guangdong people to form a modern scientific and rational spirit. Therefore, relatively speaking, modern Guangdong people have more and more distinct scientific and rational spirit, which makes Guangdong people more pragmatic and truth-seeking, more respectful of the objective economic laws of the market economy, and more easily accept and form a series of new ideas and concepts such as respecting knowledge, respecting talents, and respecting science. It is precisely these new spirits, new ideas, and new concepts that adapt to the development trend of the contemporary world that have effectively promoted the smooth development of Guangdong's socialist modernization drive.