14 Public Sphere and Open Society from the Perspective of Axial Age China

2016 ◽  
Vol 2016 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Heiner Roetz
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Political System ◽  
Chinese Culture ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
Open Society ◽  
Textual Evidence ◽  
Negative Factor ◽  
Confucian Values ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

AbstractThe open society together with a pluralistic public sphere is a cornerstone of modernity and a necessary element of democracy. However, it has been maintained that the possibility of such a society depends on liberal convictions that are not applicable to non-Western cultures and also contradict the Confucian value orientation.The article argues that such an assumption is based on a number of problematic premises. There is no one-sided dependence of the socio-political system on culture, and the contemporary Chinese society is much too diverse to be dominated by Confucian values. Moreover, China’s cultural history and also Confucianism can be brought into the debate in yet another way than as a negative factor inhibiting and restricting an open society. There is textual evidence that forms of open society existed already in ancient China. Though they were not always supported by the elite, China’s intellectual heritage offers enough points of reference in order to refute the claim that the open society is an alien element in Chinese culture.

Three-fold Thinking on the Sinicization of Christianity

2015 ◽  
Vol 75 (5) ◽  
pp. 385-394
Author(s):  
Zhang Zhigang
Keyword(s):  
Social Practice ◽  
Chinese Culture ◽  
Religious Faith ◽  
Interreligious Dialogue ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
New Developments ◽  
Christianity In China ◽  
Reform And Opening Up ◽  
Contemporary Chinese ◽  
Opening Up

Abstract This essay investigates the concept of »Sinicization of Christianity« from an »academic« standpoint, the goal being to discuss more objectively and rationally how Christianity may be able to meld into Chinese culture, the Chinese nation, and in particular, contemporary Chinese society. The investigation is presented in three parts: a comparison between the histories of Christianity in China and Korea, a study of the ecological situation of religions in contemporary China, and new developments in international research on interreligious dialogue. The article concludes that social practice should be the main criterion for testing religious faith, and that, based on China’s current conditions, the best course for the Sinicization of Christianity is to make positive and important contributions to continued reform and opening-up of Chinese society and to its development and progress.

scholarly journals “A Real China” on User-Generated Videos? Audio-Visual Narratives of Confucianism

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 342-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jianxiu Hao
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
Visual Narrative ◽  
Visual Narratives ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Cultural Displacement ◽  
Social Interests ◽  
Confucian Values ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

Beneath the “Chinese successful story”, social stratification, class polarization, and cultural displacement have been accelerated. The Chinese Communist Party has not found a coherent solution to the challenges of reconciling social interests, since Communism has been more and more becoming mere “lip service”. However, it has been claimed that Confucian values can provide sources to dissolve the downsides of modernization in contemporary Chinese society. This study intends to investigate the revival of Confucianism, as a source for criticism and construction in Chinese socio-culture, as portrayed in user-generated videos which are produced/consumed by the largest Internet using population in the world, under the Chinese authoritarian regime which controls over communication. By means of a thematic audio-visual narrative analysis, this study has investigated 20 hours of Youku Paike videos published between 2007 and 2013. It has been detected:  (1) about one third of the user-generated videos can be interpreted as Confucian thematic narratives; and there is a slightly increasing trend portraying Confucian values; (2) Confucianism can become a source for the formation of a new online socio-culture, in the circumstances of China’s modernization and cyberization, to advocate social actors’ cultivation and humanity’s flourishing.

scholarly journals The Transnational Order of qing 情 (Feelings) Corruption Cases in Qiu Xiaolong’s A Case of Two Cities

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melinda Pirazzoli
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Culture ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
World Population ◽  
National Narrative ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Negative Pole ◽  
Traditional Chinese Culture ◽  
Two Cities ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

This study will discuss Qiu Xiaolong’s ambivalent, yet powerful response to what Shu-Mei Shih defines as “suturing calls of Chineseness from China” (Shih 2011, 710). The first section of the study will concentrate on what one may define as Qiu’s ‘aesthetics of crime’ as well as his scathing critique to the contemporary Chinese society, “corrupt throughout” (Qiu 2006, 15). The second part will focus instead on Qiu’s homage to traditional Chinese culture. In particular, it will underscore his attempts to create what one may define a ‘trans-national narrative of qing’. Such an analysis will lead us to conclude that Qiu Xiaolong’s narratives are built in order to convey that “globalization straddles the negative pole of alien and the positive pole of English, reshuffling world population, concepts, and goods and services like iron filings” (Ma 2014, xi).

scholarly journals “Confucianism”, an Alternative Source of Belief in Contemporary Chinese Society: An Empirical Study of the Founding of Xin 信 in a “Confucian” Company

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 819
Author(s):  
Lan Jiang-Fu
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Society ◽  
Spiritual Guidance ◽  
Traditional Values ◽  
Private Company ◽  
Alternative Source ◽  
Personal Experiences ◽  
Confucian Values ◽  
The World ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

Open claims to Confucian values, often associated with cultural traditionalism and a larger revival of Confucianism among the Chinese population from the 2000s onwards, have gained momentum in the world of entrepreneurs. The intensity of this phenomenon can be explained by a wide variety of motivations, among which a desire to establish a belief, a sort of xin 信 towards traditional values, has emerged from within the “Confucian” company. Based on fieldwork carried out between 2017 and 2018 at TW, a private company located in Dongguan (Guangdong), this paper aims to analyze the efforts undertaken by “Confucian” managers to use the spiritual guidance role of Confucianism. Our work is organized into three sections. First, we analyze the main modalities of proselytizing within TW. Then, based on the personal experiences of three employees of this company, we try to understand how they live the jiaohua and to what extent this “educational” experience inspired by Confucianism has allowed them to reorient themselves towards a new way of perceiving the world. Finally, by placing it in a broader context, that of contemporary Chinese society’s crisis of values, we question the role Confucianism can play in the foundation of a population’s beliefs.

scholarly journals “A Real China” on User-Generated Videos? Audio-Visual Narratives of Confucianism

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 342-355
Author(s):  
Jianxiu Hao
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Social Stratification ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
Visual Narrative ◽  
Visual Narratives ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Cultural Displacement ◽  
Social Interests ◽  
Confucian Values ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

Beneath the “Chinese successful story”, social stratification, class polarization, and cultural displacement have been accelerated. The Chinese Communist Party has not found a coherent solution to the challenges of reconciling social interests, since Communism has been more and more becoming mere “lip service”. However, it has been claimed that Confucian values can provide sources to dissolve the downsides of modernization in contemporary Chinese society. This study intends to investigate the revival of Confucianism, as a source for criticism and construction in Chinese socio-culture, as portrayed in user-generated videos which are produced/consumed by the largest Internet using population in the world, under the Chinese authoritarian regime which controls over communication. By means of a thematic audio-visual narrative analysis, this study has investigated 20 hours of Youku Paike videos published between 2007 and 2013. It has been detected:  (1) about one third of the user-generated videos can be interpreted as Confucian thematic narratives; and there is a slightly increasing trend portraying Confucian values; (2) Confucianism can become a source for the formation of a new online socio-culture, in the circumstances of China’s modernization and cyberization, to advocate social actors’ cultivation and humanity’s flourishing.

scholarly journals A Behavioural Study on the Influences of Confucianism in Chinese Society

2019 ◽  
pp. 109-132
Author(s):  
Helal Uddin Ahmed ◽  
Zhang Jielin
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Population ◽  
Chinese Culture ◽  
World History ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Chinese Society ◽  
Chinese People ◽  
Social Lives ◽  
The Social ◽  
Traditional Chinese Culture ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

Confucius (551-479 BC) is considered to be a great philosopher and educator in Chinese society and one of the greatest scholars ever in world history. He was the founder of Confucianism, which constitutes a major part of traditional Chinese culture and made tremendous contribution to the unfolding of Chinese civilization over the centuries. In this study, the authors have presented a comprehensive outline of Confucianism and have attempted to gauge the attitude of contemporary Chinese people towards Confucian concepts, values and attributes as well as their influences on the social lives of present-day Chinese population. The Likert Scale was applied in the study to assess the attitude of the Chinese educated class belonging to the educational institutions like the universities in Beijing towards Confucianism. It was found from the survey that the Confucian concepts still wield substantial influence on the social outlook of the modern-day Chinese people and these attributes are still relevant in the day to day lives of the Chinese society. Philosophy and Progress, Vol#61-62; No#1-2; Jan-Dec 2017 P 109-132

The Dynamics of Egypt’s “Semi-opposition,” 2004–11

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 83-103
Author(s):  
Mai Mogib Mosad
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Political System ◽  
Muslim Brotherhood ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Muslim Brotherhood ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
The Relationship

This paper maps the basic opposition groups that influenced the Egyptian political system in the last years of Hosni Mubarak’s rule. It approaches the nature of the relationship between the system and the opposition through use of the concept of “semi-opposition.” An examination and evaluation of the opposition groups shows the extent to which the regime—in order to appear that it was opening the public sphere to the opposition—had channels of communication with the Muslim Brotherhood. The paper also shows the system’s relations with other groups, such as “Kifaya” and “April 6”; it then explains the reasons behind the success of the Muslim Brotherhood at seizing power after the ousting of President Mubarak.

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