French Enlightenment Ideology And Chinese New Cultural Movement

The French Enlightenment Ideology had an undoubted impact on the New Cultural Movement in China. And this essay aims at the understanding of why there was such an impact, how much it was, and how it faded out of history. By our research, it is found out that the influence of French Enlightenment Ideology can be discovered in the following aspects of Chinese New Cultural Movement: from the theme of Democracy and Science, to the various movements such as, the Ethic Revolution, Literature Revolution and National Renovation of Citizens, from the leaders of the revolution to the majority of young people. Among the factors leading to the impact, there are: firstly, the great concern and efforts, prior to the Chinese New Cultural Movement, in the publicity of French Enlightenment ideas by the bourgeois reformists and revolutionists; secondly, the leaders of Movement in China had been more or less influenced by the French Enlightenment thoughts and was trying to lead the social evolution in China with these thoughts; thirdly, an ideological weapon was needed to call up the citizens and put up a fight against tyranny and ignorance when China was on the verge of getting lost in the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. But during the May 4 Movement Period, the outdated ideological weapon from France could not help China out of the crises, chiefly the national crisis, therefore it failed to meet the demand in then China. Thus leader of the Chinese New Cultural Movement started looking for another ideological weapon, which resulted in its fading out of Chinese history.