We should know that the so-called democratic revolution in the West in modern times was caused by the failure of the political regime to open up.
China, on the other hand, has been guilty of the poison of opening up its political power since the Tang Dynasty.
Saving water with water and fighting fire with fire is not only the wrong medicine, but also the symptoms will be worse.
If we want to solve the ills of Chinese society, we should encourage industry and commerce to turn intellectuals to this way, so that intellectuals can no longer concentrate on politics.
However, it turns out that it is easy to become capitalist.
In the West, there was a middle-class society first, and then there was a new industrial and commercial capital, and then it came to open up the career and foresee politics.
Excerpted from the second lecture of Qian Mu's "Political Gains and Losses in China's Past Dynasties" "Tang Dynasty and Tang Dynasty Examination System".
When I read this passage, I kept thinking, does Mr. Qian Mu support capitalism, or does he not support capitalism, just using the West as an example?
Frankly, I don't get a clear answer to this question from his text.
Since I didn't get an answer from him, I had to follow my train of thought.
Mr. Qian said, "We should know that the so-called democratic revolution in the West in modern times was caused by the lack of openness of the political regime. China, on the other hand, has been guilty of the poison of opening up its political power since the Tang Dynasty. ”
The so-called non-release of political power, as I understand it, is that in the feudal era of China, power was concentrated in the hands of a few private individuals, that is, the aristocracy. It is also understandable that before the bourgeois revolution in the West, Europe was a semi-feudal and semi-agrarian society, with a pirate society in the periphery of the coastal areas.
Of course, the social formations of the central and coastal periphes of Europe are indeed different. The central part was semi-feudal and semi-agrarian, while the coastal edge accepted the city-state system of early ancient Greece and Rome on the one hand, and on the other hand, the later rise of Portugal, Spain, Sweden and other countries was a combination of piratery, feudalism and city-state.
In addition, there are dozens of countries and hundreds of ethnic groups in Europe, and it is difficult to form a great unification. As a result, they are more likely to centralize private power and less likely to unleash political power downward. The rise of the bourgeoisie has formed a tremendous force for social change.
So, the capitalist revolution broke out in Europe.
Mr. Qian said, "Saving water with water and fighting fire with fire is not only the wrong medicine, but also the symptoms will be worse." ”
This sentence really made me think about it a lot. In the end, I thought that Mr. Qian's semantics meant that the medicine of capitalism could not cure China's disease, and the medicine was not the right one.
In Mr. Chin's view, the capitalist revolution succeeded in Europe because Europe did not open its political doors. The new bourgeoisie, on the other hand, took de facto control of the country's economy and became a class far more powerful than the old aristocracy.
Social development has its own special laws, and both the East and the West will develop along the same laws.
For example, human beings have understood the role of fire, so they all regard fire as a god, and have learned how to cook food, make pottery, and also learn smelting, and later learn to farm.
The difference is only in the level of technology and development.
As for the social system, as early as 4,000 to 5,000 years ago, China entered a feudal society, while Europe also entered a feudal society about 3,000 years later.
In the late feudal period of China, a new social class emerged, that is, the scholars. After nearly a thousand years of development, the scholars became the backbone of society, replacing the previous aristocracy and becoming the new aristocracy, which was the big bureaucratic family of the Han Dynasty and beyond.
In the West, the larger part of the non-eldest sons, who had aristocratic blood but no inheritance, became knights. These knights began to diverge, and some of them became capitalists. Others, on the other hand, have become destitute.
There is no imperial examination in Europe, and it is impossible for these knights and their descendants to enter the official career through the imperial examination. However, there is another difference between European aristocracy and China. China's primogeniture system is the inheritance of all. In the European primogeniture system, the aristocracy inherited all the power, but the father's property could only inherit one-half. The other half is divided equally among the remaining children.
Therefore, those knights in Europe spent all their time drinking with these possessions, and some of them did business. Even those knights who spend all their time drinking have some of them, waking up at the end and knowing that they must make money.
What to make money with? Land, they don't have, only through **. Therefore, the commercial society first sprouted in Europe.
The descendants of these knights, after a thousand years of hard work, became a newly emerging class of European society, the so-called new bourgeoisie.
Unlike the Chinese scholars, who entered the society through entering the ranks, they achieved the concentration of wealth through industry and commerce.
This is what Mr. Qian said, "In the West, there is a middle-class society first, and then there is a new industrial and commercial capital, and then it comes to open up the career and foresee politics." ”
The road of life is forced out, fate is forced, the social system is forced, and the natural environment is also forced.
After the feudalism in the middle of the European continent, those who were unwilling to be bullied by the feudal aristocracy or criminals fled in all directions, and finally fled to the sea, where there was no escape. The living environment on the seaside is extremely harsh, and in order to survive, you have to engage in piracy. To do piracy, it is necessary to greatly increase the combat effectiveness of the sea.
So, European pirates began with ancient Greece, then ancient Rome, and then to the northwestern coastal region, which is known as the Viking pirates in history. And then, Portugal and Spain. Christopher Columbus is known as the great navigator, but in fact he was the most successful pirate.
These pirates plundered by sea, and the goods they captured could not be consumed locally, so they sold them to central Europe. This move has greatly contributed to the development of Europe. At the same time, those things that came from foreign races, including material and cultural, contributed to the development of science in Europe.
All this has led to the rise of European capitalism.
Spain, for example, once studied inland and established a feudal system. And under the aristocracy, a pirate society was formed, and these pirates formed the middle class. In addition to the rise of other neighboring countries, there is a more internal reason for Spain's fall from the throne of the world leader, that is, after the rise of the bourgeoisie, it demanded political power from the aristocracy.
The emerging bourgeois forces in Spain did not complete their revolution. Eventually, they were suppressed by the feudal aristocracy. But because of this, the Spanish aristocracy declined.
The rise of the new bourgeoisie is inexorable, but the path and manner of its rise is different from that of the continents such as France and Germany, and from the United Kingdom, which is also a coastal region.
Society is composed of different strata, and when a certain stratum becomes a trend, it will become the mainstream of this society and the core driving force of this society.
For example, the mainstream core in India is the Brahmins, and the mainstream core in the West is the bourgeoisie. In ancient China, under the imperial examination system, the elite of the imperial examination was a great integration of the elites of the imperial examination, and the whole society was their stage.
This may be what Mr. Qian said, that intellectuals are concentrated in China's political bloc.