A Study On Mao Zedong's Cultural Thought

Mao Tse-dong is both a great proletarian revolutionist and a cultural scientist with very profound knowledge of the culture. During his lifelong revolution career and his leadership of the Chinese revolution and construction process, Mao extremely concerned about the study of culture and attached great importance to the significance of cultural construction. Under the guidance of Marxism, Mao combined the concrete reality of Chinese revolution and construction, timely submitted a series of guidelines to the cultural construction, formed a set of cultural theory with Chinese characteristics and greatly enriched and developed the treasure house of Marxist cultural theory, which is still the guiding principle of our cultural construction.The definition of culture must be clarified before studying on Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. Most scholars of China tend to divide culture into broad sense and narrow sense. Broad sense of culture is defined from the perspective of the distinction between society and nature, which refers to the sum of both material wealth and spiritual wealth created in the process of human history. This kind of cultural understanding is also called the Great Culture. The narrow sense of culture refers to the ideology of the community as well as the systems and organizations compatible with it, specifically to the outcome of the human spirit and human's spiritual understanding of the world, including philosophy, religion, science, technology, literature, art, education, ethics, customs, and so on. The narrow sense of culture is an integral part of human's social activities along with the politics, economy, and military affairs.The"culture"mentioned in Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought mainly refers to the narrow sense of culture. According to a basic Marxist principle that"It is not that social consciousness determines social beings but that social consciousness is determined by social beings,"Mao profoundly revealed the nature of culture and the relationship between economy, politics, and culture. In his On New Democracy, Mao points out that"certain culture reflects and affects certain politics and economy; economy is the base, while politics is the concentrated expression of economy."Apparently, the concept of culture used by Mao Tse-dong is the narrow sense of culture.Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought contributes a great deal to the development and enrichment of Chinese new culture as well as Marxist theory. Summing Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought scientifically, understanding and evaluating Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought correctly, is not a simple historic look-back but an instruction to contemporary China's advanced culture by heckling and interpreting Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought, by exploring its cultural meanings, characteristics and by summarizing the inherent law of its development.On the basis of massive materials as well as Marxist methodology and epistemology, this thesis heckles the development process of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought, analyses the main content and basic characteristics of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought, demonstrates the historical and cultural value and practical significance of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought, and makes meaningful thinking on how to inherit, develop and use Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought in order to promote the construction of an advanced socialist culture with Chinese characteristics in the new historical stage.This thesis is divided into five parts:Part One focuses on the formation and development of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. The era background of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought include Modern China's national crisis, government corruption, and the new features of Chinese cultural revolution around"May 4th"Movement. The practical foundation is new-democratic revolution. The theory sources are the May 4th new culture, Marxism, the Three People's Principles by Sun Yat-sen, and traditional Chinese culture. From the stage of historical development, the initial exploratory phase of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought is from May Fourth Movement in 1919 to the end of the First Internal Revolution War in 1927; the formation phase of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought is from the beginning of the Second Internal Revolution War in 1927 to 1937, before the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War ; the maturity phase of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought is from the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War in 1937 to the eve of the founding of New China in 1949.Part Two focuses on the main content of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. By using the historical materialism principle that"being determines consciousness", Mao defined the nature of the new democratic culture, summarized the content of the new democratic culture, demonstrated the revolutionary program of the new democratic culture revolution, specified the role of the new democratic culture, and proposed to construct"a national, scientific and mass culture", a new national culture.Part Three focuses on the basic characteristics of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. It embodies the unity of class character and service to the people, the time and the nation, the revolution and the strategies, as well as the science and the practice.Part Four focuses on the historical analysis of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. It is the important part of Mao Tse-dong's ideology and the crystallization of the Marxism in China; it has strong functions of fighting, organizing and mobilizing; it is indispensable weapon for the victory of democratic revolution; it promotes the social revolution in China because of its dual role of both salvation and enlightenment.Part Five focuses on the contemporary value of Mao Tse-dong's Cultural Thought. The construction of advanced culture must adhere to the national, scientific and mass culture direction, using Marxism as guiding ideology, correctly handling the relationships between economy, politics and culture, critically inheriting historical and cultural heritage, as well as absorbing advanced culture of foreign countries.