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Juxtaposing Past and Present in China Today

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Extract

Ever since the 10th Party Congress in August 1973, what had been a rather quiet anti-Confucian campaign has been combined with a much fiercer anti-Lin Piao campaign to make a very broad onslaught on all who are backward-looking and opportunistic and who seek to “restore capitalism.” In many respects, there is nothing new in this. China has gone through many campaigns since the 1950s and 1960s, and attacking Confucius is something that dates back almost continuously to 1915. Also, using the past to criticize the present, using historical analogies for current political ends, praising or condemning contemporary figures by likening them to historical heroes and villains – all these the Chinese have been doing for centuries, sometimes crudely, sometimes with sophistication. But there is at least one refinement in the present two campaigns which is new and deserves attention. This is the juxtaposition of two historical processes in the combined campaigns which are not so much Chinese as Marxist. That is to say, apart from the moral judgments and the comparisons between Confucius and his disciples and Lin Piao and his followers, there is a new consciousness about comparing two periods separated from each other by more than 2,000 years but both marked by revolutionary transitions from one kind of society to another. In the case of Confucius, the period is described as one of transition from slave society to feudal society; in the case of Lin Piao, the present is marked by the transition from capitalism to socialism. For both periods, there is the common danger of class “restoration,” that is, from restorationist forces wanting to arrest the changes and turn the clock back. Furthermore, unlike past analogies which applied to China alone, this setting side by side of two dynamic processes discovered or determined through the application of Marxist theory is not confined only to China. The present campaign warns that the same dangers that confront China confront the rest of the world as well and thus seems to serve the additional purpose of stimulating Chinese awareness of the relevance of universal history.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1975

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References

1. The literature of the anti-Lin Piao and anti-Confucius campaigns is already large. Apart from short polemical pieces which appear almost daily in Jen-min jih-pao (Jen-min) and Kuang-ming jih-pao (Kuang-ming), there are the longer and more scholarly articles which appear in Hung-ch'i, the new Shanghai journal, Hsueh-hsi yü P'i-p'an, and the archaeological and historical articles in K'ao-ku and Wen-wu. Some short articles have also appeared in scientific and medical journals. More popular translations have appeared in Peking Review, China Reconstructs, Chinese Literature and China Pictorial. Separate collections of some of these articles have also appeared.

2. More detailed studies of the history-writing in China before 1964 may be found in Feuerwerker, A. (ed.), History in Communist China (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1968), Chapters 3–15.Google Scholar While in this paper I go over some of the same ground, I am not concerned with historiography but look more at the changing ways the past has been used to serve the present. In addition to the main texts, journals and collections examined by the contributors to the Feuerwerker volume, I have paid special attention to works on non-Chinese history and to more recent articles about China's place in world history. The most useful journals have been Li-shih yen-chiu, Li-shih chiao-hsueh, Hung-ch'i, the history section of Kuang-ming, select issues of Jen-min, Chung-kuo ch'ing-nien, Shih-hsueh yueh-k'an and Che-hsueh yueh-k'an. The Ch'uan-kuo tsung-shu-mu for 1950–66 has been checked for publication details; for this I wish to acknowledge the assistance of Miss Nancy Lim.

3. The division is most clearly exposed during various rectification campaigns, especially in debates about Chinese history. Among those strongly criticized before 1962 were well-known non-Marxists like Lei Hai-tsung, Hsiang Ta, Jung Meng-yuan, Ch'en Yin-k'o, Ku Chieh-kang, Liang Sou-ming. After 1962, attacks were not limited to non-Marxists like Liu Chieh and Feng Yu-lan, but extended to those who were more or less Marxists like Chou Ku-ch'eng, Wu Han, Chien Po-tsan and many others. Few of the historians of foreign countries are well known. The five mentioned here are some of those who started as historians of China but who were publishing more on foreign history after 1949. The younger Marxist historians are too numerous to list here.

4. Most of the translated books mentioned have not been available to me. The contents of some of the originals are outlined and discussed in Black, Cyril E. (ed.), Rewriting Russian History (revised 2nd ed., N.Y.: Vintage Press, 1962)Google Scholar and Mazour, A. G., The Writing of History in the Soviet Union (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1971).Google Scholar Shorter articles have been available in journals like Li-shih yen-chiu, Li-shih chiao-hsueh, Shih-hsueh yueh-k'an, Hsin chien-she and various issues of Kuang-ming, history section. Even more important are the many reviews of Chinese translations of various Soviet textbooks published in Li-shih chiao-hsueh and Kuang-ming before 1956. I regret not having seen the various articles in Shih-hsueh i-ts'ung (19541958)Google Scholar; many are quoted in articles by Chinese scholars. Various journals also published news of the activities of the Soviet Institute of Historical Sciences but fewer and fewer items appeared after 1957. The details of the reorganization of the Institute and other centres of historical research following the 20th Congress as seen in Keep, John (ed.), Contemporary History in the Soviet Mirror (N.Y.: Vintage Press, 1964)Google Scholar and Heer, N. W., Politics and History in the Soviet Union (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1971)Google Scholar do not seem to have been reported in China. See also the complaint in Vyatkin, R. V. and Tikhvinsky, S. L., “Some questions of historical science in the Chinese People's Republic,”Google Scholar in Feuerwerker, , History in Communist China, p. 334.Google Scholar

5. Kuang-ming, 29 04 and 2 09 1954Google Scholar; see also the critical essay on the teaching of world history by Tsung-hsü, Liu in Li-shih chiao-hsueh, No. 3 (1959), pp. 4446.Google Scholar

6. The two men translated a new edition of the Outline History of the U.S.S.R. by A. V. Shestakov; Li Shun-wu translated a book on the October revolution. They were both the main editors of world history and Soviet history textbooks for junior and senior-middle schools. Li Keng-hsü was also one of the editors of primary history textbooks. For the attention still paid to Soviet textbooks in 1958, see Li-shih chiao-hsueh wen-t'i, No. 1 (1958), pp. 512Google Scholar; for serious criticisms of these Soviet books, see No. 7 (1958), pp. 1–7.

7. Kuang-ming, 12 12 1953.Google Scholar

8. Lin's books on the English revolution and on the industrial revolution and Liu's on the American War of Independence were reprinted twice between 1954 and 1957. Both were actively writing and editing books and articles on European and American history until the early 1960s. Liu Tso-ch'ang also published a history of the English revolution in 1956. Lin Chu-tai had long been writing on European history. His modern history of Europe (republished at the end of 1949) was probably the last to appear under the title of Hsi-yang (Western Ocean) history. Among several translated works on the French revolution, the most successful and often reprinted was that by Albert Mathiez, translated by Yang Jen-keng and first published in 1947; revised and annotated by Yang in 1958 and this edition reprinted in 1963; and reprinted most recently in 1973. Another translation by Chou Chin-k'ai appeared in 1954. The authoritative textbook, New Modern History, edited by B. F. Porshnev and others (1953) and translated by Wang I-chu as Hsin-pien chin-tai shih was well received, especially Vol. I (1640–1789).

9. T'ung Shu-yeh continued to publish on ancient Chinese history and wrote on comparative history. Wu Yu-chin was the key figure in the study of Greek and Roman history (see notes 24 and 36). T'ung's notable books were ku-tai tung-fang shih kang-yao and Ku Pa-pi-lun she-hui chih-tu shih-t'an. Ch'i Ssu-ho also bridged relations between China and Byzantium in his book Chung-kuo ho Pai-chan-t'ing ti-kuo ti kuan-hsi (1956). His book on medieval history was criticized by history students at Peking University and he published his attack on Robinson, in Kuang-ming, 13 10 1958.Google Scholar

10. Each volume appeared in two parts in Chinese translation. The three volumes (six volumes in Chinese) available to me, edited by lu. P. Frantsev (Vol. I), S. L. Utchenko (Vol. II) and N. A. Sidorov (Vol. III), are excellently produced and elaborately illustrated. Particularly striking is the space devoted to the history of Asia (including China) and the acknowledgment by the Soviet scholars to the help received from Chinese scholars. Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 5 (1963), pp. 728Google Scholar published a translation of a long and very critical review of the Korean sections of the first nine volumes of the series by three well-known Korean historians; the editors offered no comment. As far as I can determine, Volumes V – X were not translated into Chinese.

11. Kuang-ming, 5 02 1959.Google Scholar

12. For example, in various articles on Indian and Iranian history which appeared in Li-shih yen-chiu, Li-shih chiao-hsueh and Wen shih che, there were more references to Soviet writings than to any other source.

13. Chung-Fei chiao-t'ung shih ch'u-t'an. See also his earlier articles, “Chung-Fei chiao-t'ung ti li-shih kuan-hsi ch'u-t'an,” Hsin chien-she, No. 2 (1963), pp. 7074Google Scholar; and “Ts'ung Tung-Fei shih shang k'an Chung-Fei kuan-hsi,” Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 2 (1963), pp. 127–34.Google Scholar

14. Not all historians accepted this dictum, although few were as bold as Lei Hai-tsung who openly questioned the relevance of Marx and Engels not only to the interpretation of Chinese history but also to western history itself. He was in 1957 professor of world history at Nankai University when he suggested at a “Hundred Schools'” forum in Tientsin that Marxist social-science theory did not develop after 1895; Jen-min, 22 and 28 04 1957.Google Scholar This made him one of the prime targets of the anti-rightists campaign which followed soon afterwards. For the best coverage of this campaign, including several articles criticizing Lei, see Hsin-hua pan-yueh k'an for the second half of 1957.

15. The brief discussion between T'ung Shu-yeh and Jih-chih on the Asiatic mode in Wen shih che, 1951 and 1952Google Scholar, is not available to me; neither is Wu Tse's essay in Hua-tung shih-fan ta-hsueh hsueh-pao, No. 1 (1955).Google Scholar From other discussions, it appears likely that these early essays never seriously debated the subject; see the 1954 comments by Chao Wei-pang and Jih-chih in Kuang-ming, 19 August and 25 November respectively, on “ancient Asiatic society.” The scholarly article by I-hsuan, Tai (Chung-shan ta-hsueh hsueh-pao, No. 2 (1955), pp. 114–40)Google Scholar, the theoretical paper by Jih-chih (Li-shih chiao-hsueh, No. 9 (1957), pp. 3035Google Scholar) and the short notes by Sun Tao-t'ien (Li-shih chiao-hsueh wen-t'i, No. 2 (1959), pp. 2426 and No. 5 (1959), p. 42Google Scholar) also duck the implications of the Asiatic mode; similarly, the short comments in 1961 by Yang Chih-chiu and others in Kuang-ming, 10 May, 16 August and 30 August respectively. In 1963 the key passages of Marx and Engels on the subject were put together in Li-shih lun-ts'ung (Peking: Academica Sinica, 1964), Vol. 1, pp. 158.Google Scholar

16. 10 March 1958. Text of speech in Hung-ch'i, No. 13 (07 1959), pp. 4649.Google Scholar

17. See Ch'uan-kuo tsung shu-mu for the years 1959–65; also the contents of the journals Li-shih yen-chiu, Li-shih chiao-hsueh, Che-hsueh yen-chiu, Wen shih che and the history section of Kuang-ming; Peking Historical Society's Lun-wen hsuan-chi, 1961–1962 (Peking, 1964), especially pp. 415–23Google Scholar; and Vyatkin, and Tikh-vinsky, , “Some questions of historical science,” pp. 331–55.Google Scholar Also Goldman, M., “The unique ‘blooming and contending’ of 1961–1962,” The China Quarterly, No. 37 (1969), pp. 5483CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “The Chinese Communist Party's ‘Cultural Revolution’ of 1962–1964,” in Johnson, C. (ed.), Ideology and Politics in Contemporary China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1973), pp. 219–54.Google Scholar And Pusey, J. R., Wu Han: Attacking the Present Through the Past (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18. The debate can most clearly be followed through the history section of Kuang-ming (reprinted, in 2 vols., Washington D.C., 1972), Vol. 2, passim. More learned essays are found in Li-shih yen-chiu, Li-shih chiao-hsueh, Hung-ch'i and Che-hsueh yen-chiu.

19. Kan-ch'uan, Lin's “Li-shih chu-i ho chieh-chi kuan-tien,” Hsin chien-she, No. 5 (1963)Google Scholar, transkted in Selections from China Mainland Press (SCMP), No. 3162, pp. 1517Google Scholar; this was criticized by K'o, NingLun li-shih chu-i ho chieh-chi kuan-tien,” Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 4 (1963), pp. 126.Google Scholar Lin Kan-ch'uan replied, but two others joined in: Kuan Feng and Lin Yu-shih also in Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 6 (1963), pp. 118Google Scholar, followed by another article by Ning K'o in the same journal, No. 3 (1964), pp. 1–38. The controversy continued in Kuang-ming, starting from 12 March and 8 April 1964 through to 5 May 1965.

20. Shih-ning, Chung, “Chieh-chi fen-hsi yen-chiu li-shih ti ken-pen fang-fa,” Cheh-hsueh yen-chiu, No. 3 (1963), pp. 1421Google Scholar, and Yü-lou, Chang, “Ma-k'o-ssu chu-i chieh-chi fen-hsi fang-fa ho li-shih yen-chiu,” Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 3 (1963), pp. 2744Google Scholar, led the new attack on Liu Chieh for his article in Hsueh-shu yen-chiu, No. 2 (1963)Google Scholar, on how to study history in order to serve the current political situation (Liu's article itself has not been made available). This was followed by a forum held in Peking on Liu Chieh on 5 July 1963; reported in Kuang-ming, 31 07 1963.Google Scholar

21. Kuang-ming, 6 10 1965.Google Scholar Several series of such local histories appeared between 1963 and 1965, the most notable being the “Families Histories” of peasants, miners and workers; the “Four/Five Histories” of Peking, the central-south region, the north-east region; and the “Recalling Bitterness” (I-k'u ssu-t'ien) series.

22. Ling-hsiu, Ho, “Ch'ing k'an ‘sheng-jen chia’ ti ‘tao-te,’Kuang-ming, 23 09 1964.Google Scholar

23. The long controversy is discussed in Uhalley, Stephen, “The controversy over Li Hsiu-ch'eng,” Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 25, No. 2 (02 1966), pp. 305–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24. See Ch'uan-kuo tsung shu-mu, 19571965Google Scholar, passim. Since 1971, a new series of “small” histories has appeared. Several of the titles are the same as those in the 1962–65 series and are written by the same authors. Among the books in this new series are those on the 1905 Russian revolution (November 1973) and on the October revolution (March 1974), both compiled by the History Department of the Hua-chung Normal College.

25. Criticisms of Chou Ku-ch'eng had begun as early as 1958; see Kuang-ming, 10 November and 25 December. For the criticism of his aesthetics, see Goldman, M., “The Chinese Communist Party's ‘Cultural Revolution’ of 1962–1964,” in Johnson, Chalmers (ed.), Ideology and Politics in Communist China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1973), pp. 229–32.Google Scholar

26. Chang Chih-lien's and Wei Ch'i-wen's articles in Kuang-ming, 3 12 1964Google Scholar; Yü P'ei-ming's criticism, 30 December 1964; Lu Hsiao-ping's fierce attack, 13 January 1965; and Ch'eng Ch'iu-yuan on Chou's hypocrisy, 10 March 1965. Vyatkin, Compare and Tikhvinsky, , “Some questions of historical science,” pp. 335–38.Google Scholar

27. Speech at the 10th Plenum, 24 September 1962, in Schram, S. (ed.), Mao Tse-tung Unrehearsed (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974), pp. 188–89.Google Scholar

28. Hung-ch'i, Nos. 23–24 (1962), pp. 1527.Google Scholar

29. Tung-hsiang, Shih, “Chieh-chi tou-chen kuei-lü shih pu neng wang-chi te,” Hung-ch'i, No. 22 (1962), pp. 1222Google Scholar; Lenin's thoughts selected by Po, Chu and Ho, Cheng in Hung-ch'i, Nos. 23–24 (1962), pp. 514.Google Scholar

30. Hung-ch'i, Nos. 23–24 (1962), pp. 15, 16 and 2627.Google Scholar

31. Chung-kuo ch'ing-nien, No. 1 (1963), pp. 25 and 9.Google Scholar

32. Chung-kuo ch'ing-nien, Nos. 3–4 (1963), pp. 25.Google Scholar

33. Yü-lou, Chang, Li-shih yen-chiu, No. 3 (1963), p. 31.Google Scholar

34. “Chung-kuo nu-li she-hui hsiang feng-chien she-hui chuan-pien shih-ch'i ti chieh-chi tou-cheng,” Li-shih yen-chiu, Nos. 5–6 (1964), pp. 117–42.Google Scholar

35. Kuang-ming, 25 09 and 23 10 1963Google Scholar for articles by P'an Jun-han and Ch'i Wen-ying; 14 July 1965 for Chao Jui-fang's reply to Lin Chü-tai's article (in Hua-tung shih-fan ta-hseuh hsueh-pao, No. 1 (1964), not available).Google Scholar

36. Chüeh-fei, Wang and Yü-chin, Wu in Li-shih chiao-hsueh, No. 1 (1964), pp. 3342Google Scholar; and No. 3 (1964), pp. 23–32. Other essays by Hua-jung, Kuo in Li-shih chiao-hsueh, No. 2 (1964), pp. 2835Google Scholar; by Tsung-hsü, Liu in Kuang-ming, 16 06 1965Google Scholar; by Chen-kang, Ko in Li-shih chiao-hsueh, No. 12 (1965).Google Scholar

37. Wen-ying, Ch'i, Kuang-ming, 23 10 1963.Google Scholar

38. Both Peking and Futan Universities have published their new textbooks on world history. For Chinese history, there has so far only been the re-issue of Fan Wen-lan's well-known pre-Cultural Revolution textbooks, but recent publications on selected problems and events suggest that revisions of earlier textbooks are being undertaken. It has been announced that the series edited by Kuo Mo-jo will soon be available again. It will be interesting to see if it has been substantially revised.

39. “K'ung chia-tien ti yu-ling yü hsien-shih ti chieh-chi tou-cheng,” reprinted in Hung-ch'i, Nos. 6–7 (1969), pp. 4754.Google Scholar

40. Hung-ch'i, No. 3 (1971), pp. 3546Google Scholar; No. 9 (1971), pp. 40–45. It would appear that both this series and the Wai-kuo (foreign countries) “small” histories' series were discontinued. Some of the books were revised after 1971 and published in two new series, the Chinese history series by Chung-hua Book Co. and the foreign history series by Shang-wu (Commercial) Press; but both are under the same series' title, Li-shih chih-shih tu-wu.

41. Hsueh-lei, TingP'i-p'an Liu Shao-ch'i ti fan-tung jen-hsing lun,” Hung-ch'i, No. 11 (1971), pp. 3342.Google Scholar

42. Hsiao-wen, T'ang, Hung-ch'i, No. 2 (1972) pp. 1014 and No. 8 (1972), pp. 2026Google Scholar; Chün, Shih, Hung-ch'i, No. 4 (1972), pp. 1621Google Scholar; No. 5 (1972), pp. 18–24; No. 6 (1972), pp. 33–40; No. 11 (1972), pp. 68–73; Chih-sung, T'ien, Hung-ch'i, No. 6 (1972), pp. 6067.Google Scholar

43. Shih-t'i, Hung, Ch'in Shih-huang (Shanghai, 1972)Google Scholar; Ch'en Sheng, Wu Kuang (Shanghai, 1972).Google ScholarMo-jo, Kuo's article in Hung-ch'i, No. 7 (1972), pp. 5662.Google ScholarJung-kuo, Yang's article in Hung-ch'i, No. 12 (1972), pp. 4554.Google Scholar Another philosophical pamphlet of some interest is one produced by the Philosophy Department of Peking University on empiricism in the history of philosophy, published in November 1972. This listed Confucius, Mencius, Tung Chung-shu, Chu Hsi and Wang Shou-jen with their western “equivalents,” Plato, Descartes, Kant and Hegel. For an attempt to trace political differences between Kuo Mo-jo and Yang Jung-kuo, see Moody, Peter R. Jr, “The new anti-Confucian campaign in China: the first round,” Asian Survey, Vol. 14, No. 4 (04 1974), pp. 307–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

44. Jung-kuo, Yang, “K'ung-tzu-wan-ku ti wei-hu nu-li chih ti ssu-hsiang chia,” Jen-min, 7 08 1973.Google Scholar Between Yang's December 1972 and August 1973 articles, there appeared a survey of the struggle between materialism and idealism and between Legalists and Confucians from Ch'un-ch'iu Chan-kuo periods to the Ch'ing dynasty. This is P'an Fu-en and Chen Ch'lin, Chung-kuo ku-tai Hang chung jen-shih lun ti tou-cheng (Shanghai, 05 1973).Google Scholar I have discussed one aspect of the campaign in a recent article, “‘Burning books and burying scholars alive’: some recent interpretations concerning Ch'in Shih-huang,” Papers in Far Eastern History, No. 9 (03 1974), pp. 137–86.Google Scholar

45. Most of the newcomers are better known as Marxist theoreticians than as historians, but it would appear that the distinction between the two will continue to blur. Hung Shih-t'i writes fairly straight history and it would appear that Shih Chun, Tien K'ai and a few others are mainly historians, but almost everyone is engaged in using the past to help understand the present.

46. For example, Hsueh-hsi tzu-liao (Shanghai, 02 1972), Vol. 2Google Scholar, reprints from Wen-hui pao (01 1974)Google Scholar; and the collection of sayings in support of Confucius first collected in November 1969, and enlarged and published in October 1973, called Wu-ssu i-lai fan-tung p'ai ti-chu tiu-ch'an chieh-chi hsueh-che tsun-K'ung fu-ku yen-lun ch'i-lu (Shanghai, 01 1974).Google Scholar

47. Frequent reminders are found in Jen-min and Kuang-ming. Not all writing groups deal with all five, or even four, histories. In Chi-lin province, there is a “Three-History” series.

48. While this paper was in press, it was announced in Peking that the prestigious historical journal, Li-shih yen-chiu, has resumed publication after a break of over eight years. I regret it has not been possible to include here a discussion of the first new issue.