Zhang Dong Sun’s Democratic Political Thought

Zhang Dong sun is not only a philosopher, but also a political thinker who isactive in the first half of the20th century."His life interest is philosophy but hecan’t give up politics". Zhang Dong sun is the first man who attempts toestablish his own system of philosophy in the modem history of Chinesephilosophy. He followed Kant ‘s road which start from the theory ofknowledge,then formed its cosmology theory, and at last formed its ownoutlook on life, and formed their own political philosophy system.Zhang Dong sun starts from the research of philosophy, and always observepolitics on the sidelines. By combining the western political thought and someconcepts of democracy in the Chinese traditional culture, he formed thedemocratic socialism. Zhang Dong sun has been trying to mediate the conflictsbetween Chinese and western culture, hoping to find the correspondences ofChinese and western culture to build a cultural foundation for the democracy ofsocialism.In Zhang Dong sun’s point, in order to realize the democratic politics,freedom and equality is a must to form the democratic socialism.Because Zhang Dong sun involved in the treason case which shocked thecountry. He was "dead" as a thinker and philosopher around1949. But we canobserve his changes in the democratic political thought through his political shiftin thinking before and after the founding of The People’s Republic of China.Today, Zhang Dong sun’s democratic political thought research significancelies in the fact that we absorb the beneficial part of his thought, and give up theidea of the actual part, further promote the development of today’s democraticpolitical thought.