The Internal Logic Of Social Structure, Social Relations And Cultural Types

Since modern times,being forced into "the world history" by the external heterogeneous power,China has been subjected to unprecedented challenges concerning traditional politics,economy,society and culture.So China began its great transformation which lasting for more than one century.With the disintegration of old outline and absence of new linkages,problems,being Chinese and western,ancient and modern interweaved with each other.Many kinds of forces rose and went on stage one after another.China's social transformation and modernization process went forward against the storms.In the 1980s,the reform and opening-up accelerated China's modernization process.At this time,the academic circle summarized and reflected systematically China's social transformation.With the change of time,the transition from local area reform to comprehensive transformation and upgrading raised such realistic questions:Where does China come from?What has China experienced?Where will China go forward?These three questions,related to China's social "prototype","transformational type",and "settled type" respectively.The "proto-type" refers to China's traditional society,"transformational type" directs at the changes since China's modern times,and the "settled type" means that all social elements and relations came into being and stabilized gradually based on the nearly two-hundred-year transformation since China's modern times.The established modern theories and social transformation analytical framework can hardly answer these questions effectively.China's questions call for Chinese theories.We need to study the specific history and reality of China's transformation from the perspective of "Long-term and Macro-history".Based on the historical and realistic logic of China's social development,this dissertation,guided by Marxist Historical Materialism,tries to put forward a three dimensional analytical framework of social structure,social relations,and cultural type to study China's social transformation.Sticking to the principle of the unification of history and logic,using the research methods of structual analysis,comparative analysis and so on,adopting the analytical line of "prototype","transformational type",and "settled type",this dissertation studies its research object from three stages and four historical periods.Besides the Introducton,the dissertation includes five chapters.Chapter One mainly concerns the theory,concepts,and analytical framework of this dissertation.Section One introduces the three basic theories:structuaral ontology,relational essentialism,and cultural typology.Secton Two explains and defines the three core concepts:social structure,social relations and cultural types.Section Three tries to raise a three dimensional analytical framework of'social structure,social relations and cultural types"to analyze social and historical development.The "Three Dimensional Analytical Framework" emphasizes the structural existence of society,social relational essence of human beings and cultural typological characteristics.Chapter Two analynzes China's propotype society from the three perspectives of social structure,social relations and cultural type.It points out that China has developed a hierarchical social structure characteristic of patriarchal politics power domination,the unification of state and clan and power hierarchy.This kind of hierarchical social structure was a result of traditional closed geographical conditions,natural economy,the small-scale farming production,unified rule of autocratic monarchy and patriarchal organization.With the patriarchal kinship outmatching all the other social relations,the social structure of powerful personal bondage,orderly rank priorities and differential mode of association came into being.Under this hierarchical social structure and personage bondage,China's society developed the values of emphasizing loyalty and filial piety,upholding benevolence,admiring the sages and men of virtue,advocating harmony and unification,the thinking mode of pragmatism,wholeness perspective,dialectical logic and perceptual intuitions,the social psychology of seeking security and stability,valuing etiquette,human relations,equalitarianism and the Great Harmony.Chapter Three studies the social structural chaos,social relational disorder and cultural instabilities since modern times from the perspectives of social structure,social relations and cultural types.Part one studies the influx of capitalist economic,political and cultural elements in the semi-colonial and semi-feudal society during the late Qing Dynasty,the disintegration of China's traditional small-scale farming production,the collapse of unified autocratic monarchy system,the weakening of patriarchal organizations and the breakdown of institutionalized Confucianism.During this process,the traditional patriarchal relations loosened,the interest relation started to rise.At the same time,modern capitalist culture entered into China.With the interaction between Western and Chinese culture,Chinese culture began its modern times transformation.Part two studies the social structural disorder,social relational tension,and intense cultural conflicts caused by the changes and conflicts between patriarchal landlord economy and its conservative political power,democratism economy and its political power,as well as colonial economy and its political power in the Republican Period.Part three studies the new hierarchial social structure based on Soviet Union Mode since the founding of the People's Republic of China.The highly centralized politics,planned economic system and revolutionary ideology discourse brought about highly politicization of social relations,culture,view of value and social psycology,as well as the loss of cultural cause.Chapter Four analyzes the social structural transformation,social relational adjustment and cultural reform during the reform and opening-up from the perspectives of social struture,social relations and cultural types.This chapter generalizes the governmental power return led by the Party's unitary authority,the rise of market domain,the growth of social domain,and the increase of human autonomy,as well as the remarkable social structural transformation caused by the change from the Unification of Domains to the relative Seperation of Domais since the reform and opening-up.During this process,the power,interest and class sturcture differentiated,the force of social development and governance integration transformed.In the structural transformation,the strangers'society came into being,the general social relations transformed from "Human-dependence" to "Substance-dependence".At the same time,culture changes greatly,Chinese people witnessed the diversification of value,the increase of the idea of rule of law,and thinking of contract,as well as the differentiation trend of social psychology.Chapter Five puts forward the prospective conclusions that China's society has entered into a stage of overall transformation and upgrading.It means that China's society gets into a mature and settled period.So we should improve,institutionalize and settle the achievements of reform and opening-up.Being settled means reshaping hierarchical social structure,and building a new social structure of "Led by the Party and Government and Ternary Collaboration" which led by the party and government force,based on market force,and with people as its subject.We should bring into full play of socialism system and the party and government,blance interest relations,standadize political relations,coordinate the thinking and cultural relations,harmonize human relations,surpass the limits of "Human-dependence" and"Substance-dependence",and construct new type of social relations.The new type of social sturcture and social relations determines the new culture orientation and way of civilization.As an "Arche Nation",China should emphasize its historical and cultural resourses,increase cultural self-consciousness and confidence,uphold the mutural communication and learning with heterogeneous culture with the mentality of reason,openness and inclusiveness.All these aim to continue China's culture in the period of cultural globalization,to realize cultural self-improvement,and to promote the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.