In the past period of time, there have been two cultural-related incidents that have attracted attention, one of which is that the director of a certain local station invoked Confucius's "Do not do to others what you do not want to be done to yourself" to express his understanding of cross-provincial supervision, and bluntly said, "We never watch other people's jokes, we never broadcast anything in the gray area, we only ** positive energy." In an instant, this director, who doesn't look at other people's jokes, became a joke on the whole network, and netizens ridiculed "It's terrible to be uneducated" and "Confucius is probably going to be angry when he hears it"; The second is that in order to attract tourists, the bureaus of culture and tourism across the country have worked hard to "stand out from the crowd", and as a result, they have engaged in a bunch of vulgar propaganda that has nothing to do with the local cultural heritage to please the audience. A civilized country with rich historical and cultural resources, how can there only be a bunch of interesting "fast food" with meat and hemp here at the Bureau of Culture and Tourism?
Undoubtedly, we have a long history and a splendid culture, and the proposal of cultural self-confidence, cultural rejuvenation, and even a new form of human civilization also reflects the vision of those in power. However, cultural construction is a systematic project, which is embodied in all aspects of society. Here I would like to share an article about cultural construction by Li Shulei, the current Minister of the Propaganda Department of the CPC Central Committee, in an interview with the 21st Century in 2007. Li Shulei said that a person's life must be meaningful and cultured; If a country or a regime wants to be passed on for a long time, it must also have a culture. Culture endows individuals and social life with richer content and a higher realm, and also endows the country and the nation with higher consciousness, higher civilization standards, and stronger ideological and emotional identity, making them invincible. ** To say that an army without culture is a stupid army, and historically, regimes that have no culture and destroy culture are also small courts that die in a few generations. The interview was originally titled "Cultural Construction in International Competition".
1. What is the use of culture?21st Century: As a cultural scholar and a representative of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, how do you evaluate the cultural part of the report of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China? Li Shulei:I think it should be highly valued. The report of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China highlighted culture, which is itself an important cultural phenomenon. The use of eye-catching and unusual words such as "great development and great prosperity" and "new upsurge" to call for cultural construction expresses the party's urgent desire to develop culture. This includes a clear understanding of the lag of cultural development, a strong perception of fierce international cultural competition, and a deep concern for the people's cultural needs and cultural rights. With such great determination to build culture, it also shows the soundness and maturity of the party's governing philosophy. As the ruling party, the Communist Party of China (CPC) is responsible not only for the economy, politics and society, but also for culture and the cultural prosperity of the Chinese nation. It is our duty to protect culture and continue Sven. "21st Century": Now that society is talking about culture, what is the meaning of culture? Li Shulei:Culture is a spiritual force as opposed to material satisfaction; In contrast to the current issues, culture is a vision and sentiment that appeals to the long-term and the future. A person's life must be meaningful and cultured; If a country or a regime wants to be passed on for a long time, it must also have a culture. Culture endows individuals and social life with richer content and a higher realm, and also endows the country and the nation with higher consciousness, higher civilization standards, and stronger ideological and emotional identity, making them invincible. ** To say that an army without culture is a stupid army, and historically, regimes that have no culture and destroy culture are also small courts that die in a few generations. Without culture, people's behavior will be degraded, malignant, and highly destructive, and it will be difficult for society to maintain. Moreover, in a sense, culture is also the essential attribute of human beings and human beings, and it is also the purpose of human beings. So Lukács says that humanity must not only be economically emancipated, but ultimately liberated from the economy. "Attaining economic emancipation" means getting rid of poverty and moving toward great prosperity, and "emancipating from the economy" means getting rid of the domination of things over people on the basis of continuous material prosperity and attaining a very high cultural realm. 21st Century: It's inspiring, but I still think it's a bit abstract, how does culture work in everyday life? Li Shulei:Culture is not only a spiritual system, but also a social function system, which plays an indispensable role. Its function can be roughly divided into two levels. The first is to provide people with ultimate care and soul home, and at the same time comfort people's feelings in daily situations, especially in pain and predicament, and give people spiritual support and spiritual satisfaction. This can be called "peace of mind". The second is to provide value standards and moral norms for people's behavior, so that people tend to avoid honor and disgrace, good and evil, and make social atmosphere and evaluation stimulate, shape, and restrain people. This can be called "standing". If a society's culture is poor and weak, the proper function of culture will be crippled, not only people's hearts will be empty, life will lose its sense of meaning, but society will also be disordered and chaotic. 21st Century: I convey a question that is a little skeptical. In modern society, everyone regards living a good life as the highest goal, and all countries have maintained stability by developing their economies and continuously improving people's living standards. Li Shulei:It is precisely from the state of modern society that I see the importance of culture. First, life is better, people have gotten rid of the excessive greed for material things in the era of poverty, and they have the spare feelings and energy to enjoy culture, and the desire for cultural consumption will only flourish and will not shrink. Second, the situation of modern society has brought great mental pressure and psychological tension to people, and it needs culture to soothe them. In an agrarian society, people are in nature, and getting along with nature will naturally relax people's spirits and make people mentally healthy, but we now live in an artificial urban environment, and our dependence on culture is stronger, and many spiritual difficulties can only be alleviated by cultural life. The fierce competition, the drastic changes, and the increase in the intensity of work in modern life and urban life will bring psychological problems to people, such as anxiety and depression, and other psychological disorders will increase. In this sense, the development of a culture is also a special kind of humanitarianism. Third, economic development and material satisfaction alone are not enough to maintain social stability. Different from the limited needs of people in the traditional agricultural society, the modern industrial and commercial society evokes and relies on people's infinite desires. In this case, if there is no cultural bond and cultural cohesion of the society, no cultural identity of the public for the first class, and no consistent Taoism to clean up people's hearts, it is difficult to be stable. Moreover, the high-risk nature of the modern economy will bring about some sudden crises, in which it is difficult to imagine the consequences without the public's belief in mainstream values, and without the emotional and moral recognition of society and the country. Is there no cultural system in modern society?
2. Cultural construction should be "with people in mind."21st Century: What is your deepest experience of the cultural discourse of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China? Li Shulei:The cultural discourse of the report is "people in sight". The report proposes that "it is necessary to give full play to the main role of the people in cultural construction and arouse the enthusiasm of the broad masses of cultural workers", to "encourage the philosophical and social science circles to play the role of a think tank for the cause of the party and the people, and to promote China's outstanding achievements in philosophy and social sciences and outstanding talents to the world", and to "train and bring up a group of Marxist theoreticians, especially middle-aged and young theorists". And there is a specific system design: "Establish a national honor system to recognize cultural workers who have made outstanding contributions." This captures the law of cultural growth. The foundation of cultural prosperity is the emergence of a large number of characters, a very large cultural contingent, and a large number of outstanding cultural people, especially large cultural people. "Things" are also important, but more important are "people". This can be regarded as a kind of "people-oriented". 21st Century: Why do you take this issue so seriously? Li Shulei:The creation and dissemination of culture has its own echelon structure, and great cultural heroes like Marx, Confucius, Li Bai, and Lu Xun are the real support of culture. There are also many cultural giants of all ages and nationalities. The wisdom of the people, the vitality of the times, and the essence of tradition will suddenly be endowed to some individuals, and on the basis of integration, they will form personalized brilliant creations. This is the norm in cultural history. Great cultural people and cultural masters have created models for culture, pushed culture to a new height, become a cultural symbol and idol of the era, and become a classic that future generations often read. With such characters, we can say that culture is prosperous, not how many books have been written and how many plays have been acted. 21st Century: Is this too demanding? Li Shulei:As far as our splendid national cultural traditions are concerned, in terms of the rich cultural resources that we have access to today, and in terms of our vigorous and open social atmosphere, I don't think it is too high. Of course, we can't make a plan to say how many people will be produced, like how many Guo Moruo were planned to be produced in 1958. Of course, the emergence of cultural masters has its unpredictable creation, and there is a certain mystery that can be encountered and unavoidable, but we always know what kind of environment and what kind of conditions are more conducive to the growth of cultural people, and at least we can strive to create such an environment and conditions. At the very least, we can encourage and nurture talented cultural people by various means. At that time, Mr. Mei Yiqi said that "a university is not a building, but also a master", he didn't understand that a master is not as simple as building a building, but he also knew how to start, how to recruit a large number of talents to make them grow and grow together, and how to reward and learn to make them stand out. Due to the preciousness and rarity of cultural geniuses, and due to the sensitivity and fragility of cultural creativity, we should especially cherish and care for cultural people, and maintain regular communication and support. This is what the ancients said about cherishing the "seeds of reading". 21st Century: How do you think we can create an environment conducive to the growth of cultural people? Li Shulei:First of all, cultural and academic institutions must overcome the habits of administrativeness and bureaucracy. For example, universities should not have official or bureaucratic atmosphere, but should have more college atmosphere, and should take academic value as the value and the needs of professors as the need. Of course, scholars and intellectuals are also secular professionals, but their professions and identities are of a certain sacred nature in the ancient tradition of sages and monks, and should be respected enough. At that time, students at Tsinghua University listed several major crimes against President Luo Jialun, the first of which was "treating professors as employees". In terms of "personnel relations", professors are of course employees of the president, but the president cannot simply treat professors as employees, which is the logic of the college. According to an old alumnus of Jilin University, Kuang Yaming, the president of Jilin University at the time, saw a professor waiting for the director of academic affairs in front of the academic affairs office, so he took off the sign of the academic affairs office and asked the director to write and check it. Of course, professors should also cultivate self-cultivation and morality, but this is the second issue, and the first is to let professors give full play and play freely. At the same time, today's universities also need to get rid of too much enterprise, not to quantify everything, not to weave too tightly the network of management, and to let professors have a calm heart. 21st Century: The report of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China said that scholars should be encouraged to play the role of think tanks, what do you think is the significance of this? Li Shulei:Significant enough. Not to mention that the participation of scholars is conducive to scientific decision-making and is conducive to getting rid of departmental interests in decision-making, it is also very obvious in terms of the benefits of this matter to scholars. Participating in decision-making consultation helps scholars to obtain problems and strengthen their awareness of problems, and raising and solving problems has always been the greatest driving force for ideological and academic innovation. Participating in decision-making consultation will also give scholars more opportunities to go into the field, understand the actual situation of society, understand the actual operation of the first institution, and obtain first-hand materials, so that the academic has a solid foundation. This is all conducive to the development of scholars. At the same time, cooperation with scholars will also enhance understanding, mutual trust and establish feelings between the two, which is conducive to the peaceful social atmosphere. Many paranoid views are caused by ignorance, and when they do, they often understand and understand. In short, China in development and change is a vast field of academics, and I believe that Chinese schools in various disciplines will emerge from this.
List of high-quality authors Third, the country's "soft power".21st Century: What does the concept of "soft power" mean exactly? Li Shulei:"Soft power" was originally an international political concept, which originated from Harvard University professor Joseph Nye's work on the international power of the United States in the early 1990s, and its meaning is how a country's non-economic and non-military power plays a role in international competition. Culture is defined as one of the most important "soft powers". In fact, similar ideas appeared even earlier, at least as far back as "psychological warfare" during the Cold War. This is an understanding of culture from the perspective of function and function. Of course, our understanding of the meaning of culture is much broader, the meaning of culture is far more than practical, it is first of all the expression of our hearts and emotions, is our spiritual home, we build culture first of all because of the love and respect for culture; But since powerful foreign countries have bluntly stated that they want to use culture as a weapon against other countries, we have no choice but to respond to it and strive to improve the country's "soft power". 21st Century: What are the characteristics of the use of "soft power"? Li Shulei:We still need to recognize the duality of cultures. Culture has a peaceful and pure side, and there is also an impure and fighting side. To say that culture is peaceful and pure means that the excellent culture of all nations is the crystallization of human thoughts and emotions, and they are all appreciated and cherished by us. To say that culture has an impure and fighting side is to say that culture has always been used as a tool in international struggles, from the earliest colonialists who used English and religion to rule the colonial people, and now the United States uses its films, television, and popular science to spread its ideology and expand its national interests. In addition, the American scholar Huntington's "theory of the clash of civilizations" has added fuel to the fire, which has made the smell of cultural gunpowder strong. As a developing country, China must also enhance its own cultural strength and soft power in order to survive and develop. 21st Century: How do you judge the current balance of cultural power? Li Shulei:There is no room for optimism. The dumping of foreign culture on us is very serious, and American blockbusters, TV dramas, and ** movies are everywhere. Even Korean film and television are dumping at us, which would not have been dreamed of twenty years ago. It is worth noting that most of these ** are not excellent works of art, but cultural industrial products produced according to genre film patterns and stylized means. Helplessly, it is precisely this kind of thing that wins the audience. When I met Joseph Nye in 1999, I told him that Chinese intellectuals don't like Hollywood blockbusters, and he said that not only you Chinese intellectuals, but also French and Italian intellectuals don't like Hollywood, but it doesn't matter whether intellectuals like it or not, the key is that the Chinese and European people like it. Unfortunately, what he said was true. These are very complex and intractable cultural phenomena, and their rationality and irrationality coexist, and it is not easy to deal with them culturally. Academically, most of the theories and concepts come from the West, and these foreign theories are beneficial to broadening our horizons and stimulating our thinking, but the lack of our own academic concepts and ideas in China is also a major defect, which is not conducive to foreign countries' understanding of us, nor is it conducive to our academic accurate and profound understanding of China's affairs. 21st Century: What are the ways to deal with culture? Li Shulei:There is no other way but to quickly and forcefully promote cultural construction and increase one's own cultural strength. Foreign cultures can be dumped because we have a cultural vacuum, so we want to make our own culture prosperous and enriched. In the face of extremely severe foreign cultural challenges, I am afraid that we must try some new ideas for the cultural construction of our country, and we must no longer stick to many conventions, and we must take effective measures to stimulate our own cultural production. In terms of culture, the solution to the problem cannot only rely on the struggle at the conceptual level, but more importantly, it must rely on the competition of cultural strength. On the one hand, we must have an open mind and a broad vision, and accept excellent foreign cultures, and any meaningful cultural creation must be realized in an open environment; On the other hand, we must have the heart of cultural self-improvement and bring about a new upsurge in cultural construction. At the same time, cultural development is a long, sometimes bit by bit accumulation process, and we still need to have enough endurance and patience.