Confucianism scholar calls for return to Confucius values
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Du Weiming, dean of Advanced Humanity Research Center at Peking University and an expert on Confucianism, called for the return of Chinese spirituality in a culture increasingly concerned with material wealth.
He noted the importance and loss of culture in China's rise and said intellectuals and elites in government, media, business and religion need to lead the rebuilding of Chinese culture. But most of these institutions have been thoroughly commercialized.
"It's a tragedy of a nation," Du said.
He said the Chinese are paying overwhelming attention to economic capital, scientific development and material abundance – concepts transported from the West, according to Du – and neglecting society, culture and spirituality.
"The market economy is destroying our traditional spiritual world," Du said. "Honesty, the most important value in Confucianism, has become a rare thing today."
He noted the lack of trust consumers have in the government and corporations, citing recent claims that milk powder was leading premature sexual development in infant girls. The Ministry of Health said studies found no evidence the two were linked, but customers still doubt the finding, Du said.
The challenge for China now is to fuse its traditional culture – paying more attention to the social responsibility, justice and harmony found in it – with the modern world and build a cultural identity within it.
"The intrinsic value of exploring traditional cultural resources is that it can support us when we communicate with others," Du said.
The first step to establishing a cultural identity is to keep the five traditional standards of morality – humanity, propriety, wisdom and credit – in mind, Du said. He also said that people need to think globally to interact with society and nature and learn from non-Western cultures.
He said that the Chinese need to further develop their literature, art, and folk religious traditions to increase their cultural resources, which are "not as abundant as it seems."
Du also said that China needs to build a "memory" for future generations. "It means to figure out what we want our future generation to learn," Du said. "Our history has been distorted for various reasons. It's a great challenge for us to restore historical truth in today's world."
(This post was first published in Chinese and translated by Ren Zhongxi.)
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