After the reform and opening up of the past 40 years, China has risen at an unprecedented speed and scale, which has shocked the world and won a lot of admiration, which has also caused quite common fear, suspicion and suppression.(AFP)
China Focus
Chinese officials often worry about speaking on the international stage and no one believes.Since the founding of the Communist Party of China, the country has achieved national independence and overcomes the poverty and weakness of the country. After reform and opening up in the past 40 years, China has risen at an unprecedented speed and scale, which has shocked the world.And suppress.In the words of the CCP, it is to solve the problem of starving and beating, but they are still scolding.
As far as the overall effect is concerned, China's turnaround not only benefits the people of the country, but also brings a lot of opportunities to the world. So why do you still be scolded?There are many reasons for China to scold, including as a emerging country, letting the world understand that it takes time, and it is inevitable to be misjudged by misunderstandings.The rise of China will inevitably impact the status of guarding the great power, and it is inevitable that dissatisfaction and hateness are also inevitable. It also includes that China is still a novice on the world stage, insufficient experience and confidence, and the lack of flexibility in the system.There are many restrictions, inadequate speeches, restrained behavior, lack of affinity and identity, and often excessive response to sensitive issues.
In addition, there is another reason: the mainstream discourse system, it is impossible to explain and it is difficult to appreciate China's achievements, and China has not been able to integrate and change the mainstream discourse, so it is trying to build another new discourse system.
Fighting the right to speaking and building another discourse system under the same system is two different natures of challenges.The former becomes more realistic as China's national strength rises, and the latter is not a goal that can be achieved by hard power.It depends on China's values, behaviors, words concepts and policy goals to be recognized and accepted by the world, thereby greatly increased soft power.This is a long -term and twisting process.
China's recent goal is to try to eliminate the doubts and fear of other countries, thereby reducing the resistance to its rise; this requires patience and rationality, in international exchanges in similar languages, and obtain understanding and trust.And this communication language can only be derived from the mainstream discourse system.
Discourse System Liberal Value
The core of the discourse system is values, and there is no common language without common values.The mainstream discourse system originated from Western civilization is a mixture based on liberal values.The reason why it can obtain hegemony is not only because of the prosperity of Western civilization and the dominant position of Western media, but also because it can express the demands of ordinary people, the desire to pursue modernization by all nations and countries.
This set of values originated from the oppression, fate, and ignorance of previous capitalist society and politics, which is a strong progressive force in human history.As synonymous with modernization, its appeal is still existing. Any new discourse system that can be replaced must surpass it in its advantage.
The discourse system of liberalism is not no problem, but a lot of problems; as a policy term, it is even a lot of sores, which is completely unable to adapt to the new era of new technological revolution and globalization.It first appeared as a revolutionary ideological weapon. It was born of instrumental, one -sided, and greeting.It is not only unable to provide answers to many questions facing human development today, but also often prescribes wrong prescriptions. It has caused many disasters in the Third World countries and has suffered setbacks in Western countries.
However, this is not the problem of its values, but this set of values that are inherently incomplete and carelessly; it is a problem of mechanically and paranoid implementation in terms of policy and system construction;When to achieve other purposes, hypocrisy and dual standards.
Western countries implement liberalism to cause many catastrophic consequences, including colonialism, selling black slaves, civil war, racial and religious conflicts, and economic backward or decline caused by long -term political turmoil, social division and extremismFamine, plague and refugee issues.However, the values contained in liberalism are still the mainstream of the world. In recent years, the political and economic crisis around the world has not been able to shake it fundamentally.Instead, it is required to truly realize it.
Similarly, the country (including China) with a smooth economic development, the values of the younger generation are generally more modern than the previous generation. In countries with economic backwardness and political darkness, the weapons used by the young generation for resistance are still the value and concept of liberalism.When people criticize liberalism, they focus on one -sidedness and dogma (that is, politics correctly), rather than denial of its basic value.Its values still occupy a moral high ground, and the attractiveness is far beyond the scope of Western civilization, becoming a universal thing.
Opposing universal values, such as denying human rights, democracy, rule of law, equality, freedom of speech, freedom of belief, personal and property security, etc., must be scolded, but not only scolding in the West.The reason why it becomes universal value is because its attractiveness is common and personalized.So far, no one can come up with a set of values that compete with it, and China is no exception.
The CCP's criticism of universal values is mainly aimed at the color revolution of Western politicians, not these values itself, but ignored the impact of anti -universal values on the general public of the West and many developing countries, which caused the image of the Communist Party to be damaged.In the mainstream discourse system, the speech was lost, scolded, and was regarded as a symbol of evil.This is why the voice of anti -China will be very arrogant every election in Western countries.This can also be seen in the process of the recent large -scale protests in Hong Kong and the demonization of China.
Participate and use the mainstream discourse system
For this mainstream discourse system, if you cannot surpass it, you must accept and use it.This is not contradictory with the interests of the Communist Party of China: since the reform and opening up, China has made great progress in the value of most liberalism;, Justice, the rule of law, patriotism, dedication, integrity, friendliness mdash; mdash; obviously also inherited many liberal concepts.
Therefore, what China has to do is to participate in the mainstream discourse system more effectively, find its own position and advantages in the innovation in this system, and promote this system to eventually develop into transcendence of liberalism, which can accommodate liberal values, but alsoA more complete and practical value and discourse system that can make up for its defects.In this way, China can avoid being scolded and can finally win the right to speak.
Of course, to achieve this, we must improve the level of governance in China.In Chinese history, it has always enjoyed the discourse system under unification of civilization, and has repeatedly tried it on the foreign barbarians.However, the modern worldwide discourse system requires both common basic values, can attract people to accept and use voluntarily, and can also be used by different civilizations, culture, nations, religions, class classes and individuals.
It is impossible to promote Yanshen to extend the big country.The great strategy of Chinese diplomacy is to build a community of human destiny. The discourse system pursued should also be compatible and stored to build a common world civilization.This cannot avoid the mainstream discourse system.In addition, the stove must be high and widow, and the chickens and ducks are talked lightly, and the severe cold war is triggered.And in the New Cold War, common language and values make it easier for most countries to join the opposite camp, which greatly increases the difficulty of China's rise.
Recent ChinaThe diplomatic language suddenly became tough, sharp, and fierce. There was a lot of style of Mao Zedong's era. It was described as a wolf -style diplomatic language by foreign media.Is this the art of trading, or is it determined to break up with the West and take your own way?Or lack of patience and sense of direction?Such a language can be happy by itself, and can also win the applause of the people in the country.
For an ordinary country, it may be able to add some majesty in diplomacy and win a little bit, but it may be counterproductive for a superpower that is rising, fearing it, and add oil to the hype of Chinese threat theory.
The United States has collapsed five seconds.The lesson of history is that only by calmness, patience, and constant adjustment can the rising great powers avoid urgent and disruptive errors. This is also the wisdom of Deng Xiaoping.The United States in history still pursues isolationism for decades after growing into the first power, which is also great wisdom.
The author is a senior researcher at the East Asia Institute of the National University of Singapore
