Modernization: Common Properties and Chinese Characteristics

Abstract

ABSTRACT Modernization is the process of transformation and development from traditional agricultural society to modern industrial society and information society. A necessary path and inevitable choice for human society in its development to an advanced stage, modernization represents the direction of progress and driving force of development for human civilization. At once a reflection and critique, a dialectical sublation, and an overall transcendence of traditional society, modernization is led by an advanced class that embodies the contemporary spirit. For its promotion, modernization relies principally on the three levers of science and technology, capital, and the market, and as its goal, it posits the realization of industrialization, urbanization, and informatization. Led by the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Chinese path to modernization is socialist in its essence, and possesses not only the common properties of modernization, but also Chinese characteristics based on China’s particular national conditions. Specifically, this path embodies the people-centered concept of modernization, is committed to achieving all-round human development and social progress, surpasses the object-centered model of Western modernization guided by the logic of capital, and provides a new choice and development direction for humanity in achieving modernization.