Chinese Socialism Research Articles

Oil cities, industrial policy and sustainable development: a new historical approach

The notion of “oil cities” is typically considered antithetical to industrialization, growth and development. This paper frames a symposium on Hou Li’s (2021) latest book, Building for Oil, which questions this imbroglio. The book’s central argument is that the oil city of Daqing drove industrialization in China from the 1960s to the 1970s. The industrialization and the self-sufficiency that Daqing symbolized in Chinese socialist economic planning became the template for that particular period of history. While that model was subsequently modified, its developmentalist ideology, its industrial policy and its urban experience – collectively called “the Daqing model” – cannot be overlooked in the analysis of oil cities. In this sense, the book is not simply about Daqing but also about a consequential city that provides lessons – distilled by the six authors in this book symposium.

Revisiting Building for Oil: Daqing and the Formation of the Chinese Socialist State

This review provides a brief introduction and examination of Hou Li’s book Building for Oil: Daqing and the Formation of the Chinese Socialist State. It highlights the historical background of the book, identifies its research questions and summarizes its key themes. The review concludes with a discussion of the book’s distinctive contributions and critiques that may further enrich the analysis or inspire future book projects on the subject.

An Overview of Foreign Literature Studies in China from 1949 to 2019

In retrospect of foreign literature studies in China from 1949 to 2019, we have to acknowledge two fundamental facts. Firstly, although in the initial 30 years of this period foreign literature studies in China largely followed the Soviet model, neglecting Western literary and cultural traditions to some extent—with over a decade under the influence of extreme “leftist” trends—it was during this time that the groundwork for the academic framework of foreign literature studies was painstakingly laid. Secondly, with the influx of Western ideas, foreign literature studies during the subsequent 40 years underwent a complete paradigm shift, providing the spiritual nourishment for and playing a pioneering role in liberating thought and rectifying disorders. However, this period saw a conspicuous adoption of Western paradigms in foreign literature studies, thereby somewhat abandoning certain valuable traditions and academic stances that ought to have been upheld. Meanwhile, foreign literature studies in this period also experienced an undiscriminating acceptance and hasty integration of ideas, leading to a mixture of the good and the bad. This essay provides an important overview of 70 years of foreign literature studies in China, though the specific situations are much more complex. In recent years, as the ideas of cultural confidence and a community of shared future for mankind deeply resonate with the public, the principles of serving the Chinese people and Chinese socialist cause are increasingly becoming significant recognitions within China’s foreign literature scholarly community.

The External Construction of the Socialist Cultural Discourse System with Chinese Characteristics under the Threshold of Harmonizing Heterogenesis Translatology—Take the Cultural View of Harmonizing Heterogenesis Translatology as an Example

This paper, based on the theory of Harmonizing Heterogenesis Translatology, explores the expression of the Chinese socialist cultural discourse system in external construction. By analyzing the practice of Harmonizing Heterogenesis Translatology in international cultural exchanges and its contribution to the enhancement of cultural soft power, it reveals the external perspective of the Chinese socialist cultural discourse system. The study found that the application of Harmonizing Heterogenesis Translatology in international communication can effectively disseminate China's cultural values, enhance China's cultural soft power, and contribute to the construction of a community with a shared future for mankind. Therefore, this research is of great theoretical and practical significance for strengthening the external dissemination of the Chinese socialist cultural discourse system and promoting the enhancement of cultural soft power.

The Bildungsroman of an Artist for New China: Fu Lei's Family Letters, 1954–1966

Abstract This essay explores Fu Lei's Family Letters, 1954–1966 (1981) as an accidental then aborted künstlerroman for the newly established People's Republic of China. It suggests that Fu's private epistolary transformation of the bildungsroman is an important undercurrent of Chinese socialist literature and a telling participation in the utopian historical-aesthetic project of socialist subject formation. Reading the Family Letters as a coincidental socialist bildungsroman allows us to see Fu's “heart and mind's journey” in the early decades of the People's Republic, challenging the dichotomous framework with which the relationship between the Chinese state and its intellectuals is often understood. More importantly, it allows insights into Fu's vision of the artistic bildung and its implication for a New China. Through Fu's narrative preoccupation with Jean-Christophe, and in contrast to the officially orchestrated New Folk Songs movement (1958), this understanding of the correspondence as a Romantic bildungsroman with two protagonists probes the question of the possibilities of a socialist developmental narrative, of agency and participation in the emergence of new subjectivity, and of the role of the artist in New China.

Affective Chinese Socialist Realism: A Reading of Zhao Shuli’s Sanliwan Village

Affective Chinese Socialist Realism: A Reading of Zhao Shuli’s Sanliwan Village

Discussion on the Origin of Chinese Modernization from the Perspective of Classical Marxist Theory

Chinese modernization is socialist modernization with Chinese characteristics under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and it is the contemporary form of Chinese socialist modernization under the grand historical vision, which has considerable research value. This paper mainly combines the theoretical vision with the historical vision, studies and discusses the origin of Chinese modernization, from China’s “Oriental society,” a modern prehistoric social form, to modern China stepping on the socialist road under the basic circumstances of world history, and takes the initiative to master the relevant logic of the historical trend. This paper also presents the research and discussion on why it is possible for modern China to realize Chinese modernization, and to solve the problem of the origin of Chinese modernization in theory and historical logic.

Connecting the Countryside

Abstract In the 1950s and 1960s, rural radio networks were erected all across China, operated and maintained by local residents who worked as technicians, correspondents, and broadcasters. This article introduces the radio network as a complex and diverse technological infrastructure for the socialist masses. The content of broadcasting was never uniform; rather, each county, town, village, and even the individual broadcaster had a say in what sounds came out of their loudspeakers. Accordingly, the Chinese socialist soundscape was not only peppered with quotation songs and political slogans but also contained music and traditional opera, useful information, and occasionally the relay of foreign radio stations. Radio networks brought people together as members and active builders of the new society. While the extant historiography understands the socialist masses as a political and social category, this article argues that it was also constructed as a technological one. The socialist citizenry was often defined by its involvement in state-led infrastructure projects such as the radio network; in turn, as people strove to build and run their own radio networks, they spontaneously took part in assembling and buttressing the infrastructure that underpinned the socialist state.

When Religious Folk Practice Meet Karl Marx: Courts’ Response to Ghost Marriage in Modern China

As religious folk practice is regarded as a radical departure from Marxist atheism, the abnormal existence of ghost marriages under the Chinese socialist regime has attracted wide scholarly attention in anthropology and sociology. However, few scholars have focused on how Chinese courts treat religious folk practices, such as ghost marriages, despite the official socialist ideology. Based on the typological analysis and case study involving 260 ghost marriage cases, the authors argue about the judicial activism of Chinese courts towards atheist ideology in religious folk practices. The findings of this study are twofold. First, the Chinese courts’ attitudes toward ghost marriage cases are pluralistic, reflecting the Chinese legal system’s selective obedience to the socialist ideology. Through the application of different legal interpretations of relevant laws, Chinese courts have shown three attitudes towards ghost marriages: encouragement, tolerance, and suppression. The first two attitudes can be regarded as supportive supervision of religious folk practice. Three factors tended to affect the courts’ attitudes towards ghost marriages: courts’ hierarchical level, parties’ claims, and whether ghost marriage rituals are performed. Second, further analysis suggests that RPC’s guerrilla-style governance strategy in the Chinese legal system allows it to deal with ghost marriage with more flexibility, even overriding its fundamentalist ideology. The guerrilla-style tactic is often used by the Chinese courts to handle matters of religious folk practices in a pluralistic manner. Overall, the courts’ pluralistic attitudes towards ghost marriage is that of modest tolerance and cooperation of religious folk practices based on the RPC’s model of governance.

Analysis of factors influencing the development of Civic Education for senior students of Chinese party culture based on ISO model

Abstract Higher vocational schools are responsible for training socialist builders and later generations, and they must always take moral education as their development purpose, penetrate ideological and political education into the whole stage of education and teaching, implement the three comprehensive education guidelines, and try their best to cultivate generations of talents who support the leadership of the Communist Party and the Chinese socialist system, and firmly contribute to socialism with Chinese characteristics. In this paper, we analyze the situation of the implementation of Civic Science and Politics in higher education institutions by investigating the implementation of the Civic Science and Politics curriculum in higher education institutions and using a more scientific questionnaire and ISO analysis to analyze the situation of Civic Science and Politics practice in higher education institutions and study the root causes of the slow development of Civic Science and Politics education. There are four main factors influencing the construction process of the development of the college’s curriculum thinking politics: 69.9% believe that there is a siloed model of the college’s thinking politics theory course, 56.7% of the college’s teachers’ ability to educate people in the curriculum is not strong, 73.2% of the professional courses’ thinking politics education resources cannot be fully explored, and 51.3% of the college does not have a mechanism for judging the effectiveness of the curriculum thinking politics. The experimental results of this paper show that the ISO analysis method can be used to know the influencing factors to promote the development of thinking and political education scientifically and to propose strategies based on the problems, which can help to propose the promotion for the reform of the thinking and politics work in Chinese universities and has certain significance to continuously improve the actual effectiveness and validity of the thinking and political education work in higher education institutions, etc.

Rethinking Chinese Socialist Theaters of Reform: Performance Practice and Debate in the Mao Era ed. by Xiaomei Chen, Tarryn Li-Min Chun and Siyuan Liu (review)

Rethinking Chinese Socialist Theaters of Reform: Performance Practice and Debate in the Mao Era ed. by Xiaomei Chen, Tarryn Li-Min Chun and Siyuan Liu (review)

Preparing for an alliance: China’s socialist model and Albania’s economic path in the Early Cold War

ABSTRACT Based mainly on Albanian primary sources, this article explores the implications of Albania’s economic cooperation with China during the late 1950s and early 1960s. It shows that in Albania’s shifting alliances, the role of economic calculations has been as important as that of political convenience. The article argues that China’s emphasis on industrialization, mass mobilization and the principle of self-reliance was appealing to Albanian leaders’ long-term economic plans. This was even more so after the Comecon division of labour left Albania at the margin of the economic integration of the European Soviet bloc, relegating it to an agriculture-based development. The article also argues that although there was no substantial technological transfer between China and Albania during the 1950s, those years served for Albania as a period of study of the Chinese socialist system, which ultimately suited Albanian leaders’ political and economic aims more than the Soviet one. Economic relations with China opened new trade routes for Albania, potentially linking Albania’s economy with new markets and the international flows of goods. These opportunities, however, remained fully unexploited due to Albania’s own economic shortcomings, limited industrial capacity and poor infrastructure.

Review of Li Hou 2020: Building for oil: Daqing and the formation of the Chinese socialist state. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Review of Li Hou 2020: Building for oil: Daqing and the formation of the Chinese socialist state. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

China’s Long War on Poverty

This article provides a detailed analysis of China’s ongoing struggle against poverty. In addition to discussing the recently concluded targeted poverty alleviation program, in which the CPC-led government achieved its goal of ending extreme poverty, the author discusses the anti-poverty measures taken during the various phases of the Chinese Revolution, including land reform in the liberated areas in the 1930s and 1940s; the period of initial socialist construction from 1949; reform and opening up from 1978; and the more recent measures aimed at building common prosperity. He concludes that poverty alleviation, and more broadly the improvement of people’s living standards, has been foundational to the entire Chinese socialist project and constitutes a key theme of each of its stages.

Chinese Maker Culture – co-opting digitally mediated making for nation building

ABSTRACT The converging agendas in supporting cultural creativity and digital innovation became evident in the development of creative economy in China. Maker culture has become a key concern for public policy in China, driven by a demand for individualised creativity and the need to co-opt such creativity for nation building. Critics of maker culture have argued that it re-enforces a new global hegemony, one that prioritizes the values of the developed West over Chinese socialist and Confucius values. Applying the concept of ideoscapes, I explore the interpretation and the mediation of the Western creative discourse by Chinese makers and their unique social practices. This article shows the local adaptation of liberal democracy. In the push for a national maker culture strategy, amateur makers as well as professional technology activists work with the state to re-define ‘keywords’ for the operationalisation of Western creative discourse in very different context.

On The Chinese Socialist Market Economy And The “New Projectment Economy”

This article aims to show that the Chinese development process over the past four decades is not a self-explanatory fact. It is a process that may have revealed the ultimate limitation of the current capacities for interpretation represented by both orthodox and heterodox approaches. This limitation is due to two objective facts: 1) the transformation of the “socialist market economy” into a new socioeconomic formation (NSEF), a process that has accelerated since the financial crisis of 2008—the emergence of this NSEF results from a series of institutional innovations designed to accommodate a myriad of modes of production, all of them under the leadership of the public (socialist) sector; and 2) the continuous technical progress achieved by the state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Following the successful implementation of proactive industrial policies, the above-mentioned developments led to the appearance in China of new and superior forms of economic planning. This process can be understood as the re-emergence of Ignacio Rangel’s “project economy,” now under the title of the “new projectment economy.” In our view, perceiving and understanding this change in the mode of production in China, and the theoretical resources involved in it, represents the greatest challenge before today’s social science.

In search of the intrinsic value of one country two systems: from selective adaptation to normative consensus

PurposeThis article examines the effects and implications of the 2019 social movement in Hong Kong and those of the enactment of the National Security Law (NSL) for Hong Kong for one country two systems (OCTS). It further explores how these factors potentially promote or threaten the intrinsic value of OCTS a normative consensus. It also discusses the factors underpinning the rationale of OCTS as a normative consensus and whether this consensus is inviolable and sustainable.Design/methodology/approachThis article uses the concept of selective adaptation, especially the element of complementarity to explainthe legal behaviour of the Peopleʼs Republic of China (PRC) in relation to Hong Kong and to examine the effects and implications of the 2019 social movement in Hong Kong and those of the enactment of the NSL for Hong Kong for OCTS. It further explores how these factors potentially promote or threaten the intrinsic value of OCTS a normative consensus. It also discusses the factors underpinning the rationale of OCTS as a normative consensus and whether this consensus is inviolable and sustainable.FindingsIt is still possible and feasible for China and the West to work out a normative consensus to sustain and/or restore the core values of Hong Kong – the rule of law, freedom of expression, and political participation – while accommodating the PRC's political concerns about national sovereignty and security. This intrinsic value of OCTS in terms of seeking complementarity and coexistence between the Western liberal norms of governance and Chinese socialist ideology, should be acknowledged and that the OCTS policy should remain in full force to serve as a normative consensus between China and the West, and the feasibility of this proposed normative consensus rests on the PRC's self-interest.Originality/valueThis is one of the very few original research that applies the paradigm of selective adaptation to explain and understand the legal behaviour and phenomenon in relation to PRC's policy towards Hong Kong.

The Spread of New Chinese Socialist Martial Arts Films in Africa

ABSTRACT In the 1970s, Hong Kong kung fu films were distributed across Africa and reached large audiences. Although the spread of Hong Kong films in Africa has received some scholarly attention worldwide, the African reception of Chinese films in the post-Mao era has rarely been analysed. Based on archival research and the collation of historical data and materials, this article discusses the background and advancement of the new Chinese socialist martial arts films across Africa and uses the acclaimed film Wudang as a case study to explore the spread of Chinese socialist martial arts films. This article argues that Mainland Chinese films’ imitation of Hong Kong films was a strategic choice made in the context of the Economic Reform and Opening Up policies, in response to Africans’ changing attitudes toward socialist ideology. The research contributes to the understanding of the historical exchanges between China and Africa in the post-Mao era, as well as to the topic of cooperation in the Global South today.

Rethinking Chinese Socialist Theaters of Reform: Performance Practice and Debate in the Mao Era Edited by Xiaomei Chen, Tarryn Li-Min Chun, and Siyuan Liu. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2021; pp. x + 309, 15 illustrations, 4 tables. $80 cloth, $64.95 e-book. - Transforming Tradition: The Reform of Chinese Theater in the 1950s and Early 1960s By Siyuan Liu.

Rethinking Chinese Socialist Theaters of Reform: Performance Practice and Debate in the Mao Era Edited by Xiaomei Chen, Tarryn Li-Min Chun, and Siyuan Liu. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2021; pp. x + 309, 15 illustrations, 4 tables. 69.95 e-book. - Volume 63 Issue 3

Influence of deep learning-based journal reading guidance system on students' national cognition and cultural acceptance.

The purpose is to explore new cultivation modes of college students’ national cognition and cultural acceptance. Deep learning (DL) technology and Educational Psychology theory are introduced, and the influence of art journal reading on college students’ national cognition and cultural acceptance is analyzed under Educational Psychology. Firstly, the background of Educational Psychology, national cognition and cultural acceptance, and learning system are discussed following a literature review. The DL technology is introduced to construct the journal reading guidance system. The system can provide users with art journals and record the user habits like reading duration and preferences. Secondly, hypotheses are proposed, and a questionnaire survey is designed, with 12 specific indicators to investigate and collect research data. Finally, the collected data are analyzed. The results show that women’s cognition of Chinese traditional culture, Chinese excellent revolutionary culture, and Chinese national identity is higher than that of men. By comparison, men’s cognition of Chinese advanced socialist culture is higher than women’s. After using the journal reading guidance system, the cognition of female college students on traditional Chinese culture is improved by 16.3%. Before and after reading art journals, the overall national cognition and cultural acceptance of Minority students are higher than that of Han students. The overall cognition of Literature and History students is higher than that of Science and Engineering students in traditional Chinese culture and China’s excellent revolutionary culture and lower in advanced Chinese socialist culture and Chinese national identity. The overall cognition of college students’ party members to the advanced socialist culture is higher than league members. As students read more art journals through the guidance system, their overall national cognition and cultural acceptance have increased. Therefore, reading art journals can promote college students’ national cognition and cultural acceptance. A national cognition and cultural acceptance promotion system that conforms to the current situation of college students is constructed. The finding provides a reference for developing complex emotion recognition technology in human-computer interaction.