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The New Sociology in China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

G. William Skinner
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Extract

The success of the Chinese Communists in defeating their adversaries and consolidating their power is in large measure attributable to their capture of the sympathy and support of students and intelligentsia. This was the culmination of a long historical development. Repeated Kuomintang failures, social, economic, and political, drove more and more of the literate class into the Communist camp. This group now comprises some of the most enthusiastic supporters of the new regime, and they have been given the task of consolidating the Communist position among workers, peasants, and businessmen. There are dissenters, but few will risk open criticism of Marxist theory, Russian orientation, or party policy. This paper deals with the pronouncements and actions of a group of scholars and educators in the field of sociology who have been particularly prominent in their support and implementation of the policies of the new regime.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 10 , Issue 4 , August 1951 , pp. 365 - 371
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1951

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References

1 Those relied on particularly for this article are Shen Chih-yüan, Hsin she-hui-hsüeh ti chi-pen wen-t'i (Fundamental Problems of the New Sociology), no. 2 in the series She-hui k'o-hsüeh chi-ch'u tu-pen (Readers in the Foundations of Social Science) (Peking: Sanlien shu-tien, October, 1949)Google Scholar; and Shen Chih-yüan, She-hui wen-t'i (Social Problems), no. 6 in the same series, same date.

2 Fei, Hsiao-t'ung, “She-hui-hsueh hsi tsen-yang kai-tsao” (How to Reform Sociology Departments), Hsin chien-she (New Reconstruction), 2 (March 3, 1950), 20–23Google Scholar.

3 The source of these recommendations was an officially mimeographed copy used at West China Union University in Chengtu, Szechwan.

4 The summary thus far closely follows Fei, 20. The remainder of this section relies mainly on Shen, Hsin she-hui-hsüeh, 1–9.

5 Shen, Hsin she-hui-hsüeh, 7.

6 This section is summarized largely from Fei, 20–21.

7 According to an oral report on the conference given by the president of West China Union University.

8 Fei, 21–22.

9 Professors of the three Peking universities mentioned above resolved: “We unanimously consider that from now on the basis of social science is Marxist-Leninism” (Fei, 21). Shen, a master of the new literary style, gives the following definition: “By social science is meant the social theory of dialectical materialism, the theory of historical materialism, or material historical sociology” (Hsin she-hui-hsüeh, 3).

10 Though not explicitly stated, the new sociologists obviously except Russian materials; several courses in the approved curriculum deal entirely with Russian society, and translations of Russian works on social as well as other problems are extensively used in universities.

11 This and all other quotations in section 5 are from the conference's recommendations as mimeographed for use at West China Union University.

12 See Ch'uan-hsi jih-pao (West Szechwan Daily), July 14, 1950, 1.