Hu Tianjiao: From "Civilization Determined by Technology" to "Technology Determined by Civilization"
In the mid-19th century, the West "broke into" the China of the East. This incursion was not merely physical in a spatial sense; it meant that China’s national destiny would be irreversibly intertwined with the modern world. The ancient Middle Kingdom was thus forced into a "great change unseen in several millennia" [1]. Supporting this colonial act of "breaking in" were the powerful technological transformations occurring since the Industrial Revolution. Faced with the suppression of a modern Western world backed by formidable technology, traditional China’s institutions, economy, and even its civilization exhibited a state of total decline. Since 1921, through a century of exploration and struggle, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has led the Chinese people to victory in the New Democratic Revolution and established the New China, marking a new historical starting point for exploring Chinese-path modernization. This "newness" refers not only to the iteration beyond traditional feudal society but also to a breakthrough from the capitalist world system that shaped the global order through colonial bullying. Seen from the long currents of history, the comprehensive transformation required by China in the modern era—namely, achieving decolonization, pursuing modernized development, and reshaping civilization upon this foundation—were all aspirations inherited by the New China. How should we deeply understand the uniqueness of the Chinese-path modernization route and the rich connotations of the new form of human civilization [2] based upon it? Answering these propositions requires a long-term historical perspective and a developmental framework of Sino-Western comparison. Therefore, this article attempts to present, through a long-term historical lens, the impact and influence of the waves of Western modernization on China, as well as the interaction and "counter-shaping" by the New China. The goal is to better recover history, understand the historical practice of the New China’s quest for technological development and holistic modernization, and provide historical reference elements for current technological development paths.
I. The Logic of Western Modernization from "Technology to Civilization" and China's Pursuit Since the Modern Era
In the great transformations of human history, the iterative updates of technology have always played a supporting and driving role. The Neolithic and Bronze Ages used the polishing of primitive tools and the emergence of metal smelting technology to calibrate the degree to which humanity escaped barbarism and evolved toward civilization. Since the Industrial Revolution, as machine production became increasingly integrated with capitalist economic operations, humanity achieved massive progress in technological endeavors, reaching a historical peak. Marx once marveled at the changes technology brought to society: "Subjection of Nature’s forces to man, machinery, application of chemistry to industry and agriculture, steam-navigation, railways, electric telegraphs, clearing of whole continents for cultivation, canalisation of rivers, whole populations conjured out of the ground as if by magic—what earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the lap of social labour?" [3] In terms of human lifestyle and environment, industrial technology changed historical organization and the forms of production and life in one fell swoop; it also initiated the process of transforming the essentially finite human and natural worlds. Marx examined large-scale capitalist industry from a dialectical perspective, believing it could "transform human life and prepare for human liberation, even though it must directly result in the full development of dehumanization." The "marginalized man" laboring repetitively on the assembly line in Modern Times portrays the dehumanizing discipline imposed on workers by modern technology as it merged with the capitalist mode of production at the time.
Regarding international engagement, advanced transportation and communication technologies began to integrate regions and countries across continents into a unified vision with meticulous detail; the globe formally entered "world history." Driven by the thirst for capital accumulation and expansion, Western capitalist industrial nations embarked on the path of global colonization. For the Western world, which was the first to enter industrial civilization and master the "secret key" of advanced technology, it was naturally easy to overpower agricultural civilizations and more backward tribes. They proceeded to seize and manipulate resources such as minerals, crops, populations, and markets. However, to match the rise of bourgeois democratic revolutions at home—which trumpeted "democracy, independence, and freedom"—and to regularize and order the colonial movement, Western industrial nations also needed to resolve the ideological question of their legitimacy. This was the historical background for the conscious emergence of the "Civilization vs. Barbarism" binary discourse. Supported by religious concepts like "Manifest Destiny," and based on modes of production, social organization, and technological development, the early-developing nations categorized the world into three types: civilized humanity, barbarous humanity, and the lowest tier, savage humanity. In civilized nations, "agriculture has become technical and scientific, manufacturing is on a grand scale, and literature, science, and all arts have reached a very high level, with commerce spanning the globe." Simultaneously, "civilized" nations made significant strides in military and public institutions. In contrast, "barbarous" or "semi-civilized" groups appeared coarse and backward in both productive forces and social customs. Clearly, this standard of judgment consciously utilized technology and productive forces as the yardstick for human capability and civilization, forming the logic of "technology leading to civilization."
Furthermore, this logic was not used merely to categorize the attributes of a nation or region; it was portrayed as a value-oriented trend of historical development. That is, among the three categories—civilized, barbarous, and semi-civilized—only civilized nations with advanced productive technology were qualified to join the community maintaining the world order and treat each other as equals. The latter two groups were targets to be conquered and "edified." Only by following the path imposed externally by the civilized subjects could these "objects" potentially attain the status of "civilization." In this sense, the transformation of "barbarous" or "uncivilized" regions into colonies by "civilized nations" to extract natural and human resources was not viewed as exploitation or plunder, but as an act aligned with the global trend of modern civilizational progress to save backward civilizations. As this discourse spread widely in the West and was written into textbooks, the order of "civilization" ruling and conquering "barbarism" was established and promoted. Colonial acts thus gained legitimacy, obscuring the underlying logic of using technological strength to determine the relationship between the ruler and the ruled. Meanwhile, the Eastern and Southern worlds, forced into globalization, remained voiceless and lost their subjectivity in the hierarchy of civilization. To use Lenin’s metaphor, in this capitalist world system, backward nations were destined to become "objects of imperialist international politics," their "existence serving only as fertilizer for capitalist culture and civilization." After World War II, although the old colonial system gradually collapsed, this underlying value system remained unchanged. Whether it was John Foster Dulles claiming when preparing for negotiations with the Soviet Union, "We should negotiate from a position of strength, not from a position of weakness," or the United States claiming in recent years that it intends to deal with China "from a position of strength," we can perceive the consistent connotation of hegemony.
The logic of "technology leading to civilization" has, explicitly or implicitly, continued to shape the landscape of the modern world and profoundly influenced China's historical choices after being forced into the world system. Since the mid-19th century, the far-reaching phrase "strong ships and sharp cannons" (chuanjian paoli) [4] became the most common discourse in China to describe foreign provocation and aggression. This shows that the polar difference between Chinese and foreign technology constituted China’s most direct and vivid perception of the modern world. Due to technological backwardness, China's national defense was weak; modern China suffered repeated humiliations, lost swaths of territory, saw its economic lifelines controlled, and faced foreign incursions in fields ranging from justice to education. Moreover, under the logic of civilization ruling barbarism, the Chinese people were imagined by the West as the inferior, immoral, and unhealthy "Sick Man of East Asia" [5] or "Yellows"—terms that were, from their inception, identity definitions saturated with Orientalism and colonial color. Behind these discourses lay the disintegration and negation of traditional Chinese civilization. Thus, the blow dealt to China by the modern Western world was threaded with technological suppression from beginning to end, concluding with a "civilizational reduction" [6].
In traditional Chinese culture, the relationship between "vessel" (qi) and "the Way" (dao) is a vital pair of concepts: "That which exists before physical form is called the Way; that which exists after physical form is called the vessel" [7]. However, since the onset of the modern era, the function of the "vessel" broke free from the governance of the "Way," gradually acquiring its own independent significance and even turning to determine the survival and form of the "Way." Facing changes unseen in millennia, the Chinese people actively sought a way out and quickly discovered that whether a nation possessed powerful industrial technology—whether it could advance from an "agrarian world" to an "industrial world"—had become a matter of national life and death. Kang Youwei once lamented: "Today is the time when an agrarian world advances to an industrial world. England’s strength and the prosperity of Europe and America, with steamships and motorcars encircling the earth and dominating the globe, are solely due to industry. What our country lacks most is industry. I wonder when a 'Latrobe' [8] will appear in our nation? Then the day of our country's strength and prosperity shall arrive." To achieve self-preservation and follow the great wave of the era, people of high aspiration launched the "Self-Strengthening Movement" (Yangwu Yundong) under the slogan "learn the superior techniques of the barbarians to control the barbarians." Later, the Hundred Days’ Reform of 1898 and the May Fourth Movement demanded comprehensive changes in institutions and the national spirit, respectively. Since the beginning of the modern era, the arduous exploration of national rejuvenation has followed this progressive logic of "technology leading to civilization": from simply rejecting traditional crafts in search of modern technology to pursuing a comprehensive modern civilization based on industrialization.
The socialist revolution and construction led by Chinese Communists are a continuation of the "save the nation from extinction" (jiuwang tucun) movement of the modern era. Therefore, its problem-consciousness necessarily includes how to respond to and neutralize the challenges of the external modern world. Correspondingly, the main theme of its revolution and construction necessarily contains the historical mission of the nation leaping into industrialization and realizing large-scale machine production. In this process, the exploration of technological progress is consistent. On the other hand, the practice of the New China inherited the value orientations of Marxism. As the pursuit of modernization deepened, it gradually overflowed the framework of Western modernization, presenting another developmental logic of the relationship between technology and civilization as the era progressed.
II. Exploration Within the Framework of "Technology Leading to Civilization": Establishing the Nation Through Industry and Striving for Subjectivity
On the eve of the founding of the New China, Mao Zedong delivered a speech at the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. This speech outlined the Chinese people’s struggle since the beginning of the modern era while depicting the vision for the New China's future development. He stated: "Fellow delegates, we have a common feeling: that our work will be written in the history of mankind, and that it will demonstrate that the Chinese people, comprising one quarter of humanity, have now stood up. The Chinese have always been a great, courageous, and industrious nation; it is only in modern times that they have fallen behind... The work of economic construction on a national scale is already before us... With the upsurge in economic construction, there will inevitably appear an upsurge in cultural construction. The era in which the Chinese were regarded as uncivilized is now over; we shall emerge in the world as a nation with a high culture." There are several questions worth deep reflection here: First, why were modern Chinese people defined as "fallen behind"? Second, why could cultural construction based on economic construction end the era in which Chinese people were "regarded as" uncivilized? Behind these questions lies the actual relationship between technology, modernization, and civilization. According to the standards of agricultural civilization, China possessed a magnificent "Rites and Music" civilization, a massive and systematic civil service system, a Confucian culture with vast influence, and exquisite and developed handicrafts. Late Qing China had not completely lost these advantages. This indicates that the root of China "falling behind" in the modern era lay in the fact that, in the world system dominated by powerful states, the reference system for calibrating whether a country was "civilized" had shifted. Within the changing historical trends, the New China needed to pursue a new civilization atop entirely new economic technology.
After the era of large-scale industry, the degree of development in industrial technology and the industrial economy became the core standard for determining whether a country possessed modern civilization. Even socialist states, acting as "rebels" against the capitalist system, have had to participate to a certain extent in the rules of competition established by early-developing nations in order to win the right to develop in the real world. During the Cold War, for example, the arms race, the technological race, and the foreign economic aid programs undertaken by the United States and the Soviet Union were intended to prove that their respective systems could more effectively advance the cause of modernization (whether for their own nations or their allies), thereby justifying their own legitimacy and progressiveness. In 1957, when the Soviet Union launched the world's first artificial satellite, Mao Zedong regarded it as a key sign that "the East Wind prevails over the West Wind." For the United States, technological assistance was likewise of pivotal significance for expanding its sphere of influence and justifying its global leadership: "The key to helping the Third World and preventing its collapse lies in America's technological success. Money alone cannot achieve this; only technology and the diffusion of corresponding expertise can help the Third World rapidly navigate this period of uncertainty threatened by communism. For Third World countries to accept American technology means they accept America's leadership role in the global movement toward modernity." It is evident that the legitimacy of modernization, as defined by the development of technological productive forces, does not become invalid for one side simply because of the distinction between capitalism and socialism. After the process of modernization swept the globe, the logic of attaining modern civilization through the development of technology and productive forces became an ideological and practical law that no country could evade. Within this historical trend, to regain national subjectivity in the modern world, the modernization of New China required at least two characteristics: first, the modernization China achieved must be a modernization mastered by China itself, rather than one manipulated by other nations; second, the modernization China achieved must be a progressive modernization, rather than a backward one. It was precisely along these dual objectives that the Communist Party of China (CPC) conducted profound and steadfast historical explorations within the "from technology to civilization" framework, taking a critical step forward in advancing the journey of rejuvenation.
(1) Establishing an Independent and Complete Industrial System: One Path of New China’s Technological Development
"We Communists are to strive for the industrialization of China." As a group that personally witnessed the humiliating plight of modern China falling into semi-colonial status under "strong ships and sharp cannons" [9], and as those upholding socialist ideals to break out of the imperialist system, Chinese Communists consciously shouldered the mission of the era to facilitate China's transformation from an agrarian country to an industrial one. "The general task of economic construction is to enable China to gradually change from a backward agricultural country into a powerful industrial country... Industrialization—this has been the dream of our people for a hundred years; it is the fundamental guarantee that our people will no longer be bullied by imperialism and no longer live in poverty; therefore, it is the highest interest of the entire nation." Clearly, achieving industrialization is the necessary path for defending the country’s people and a historical choice in line with the common interests of the people and the state. However, merely possessing industrial sectors does not mean a country truly possesses or has mastered a new and powerful industry, nor does it mean it has achieved autonomous industrialization and modernization. This can be viewed through the lens of India's development before independence: "Does India have industry? Undoubtedly, it does. Is India's industry developing? Yes, it is. But... the industry there is entirely subordinate to British industry. This is a special method of imperialism—developing industry in the colony to make it dependent on the metropole and on imperialism." In other words, Indian industry during the colonial period could not produce or be laid out according to the developmental will of its own nation; it could not produce the means of production or tools of production, but had to rely on technological supplies from other countries, acting as a low-end appendage to the global economic expansion of the British Empire. Such industrial development, far from becoming a "great power instrument" [10] to protect sovereignty, became an economic chain deepening India's dependence. In contrast, New China clearly recognized that achieving independence in politics, military affairs, and diplomacy was only the beginning and the premise of breaking through; it also required an independent and autonomous economic system as a solid foundation for breaking colonial shackles and "completing national independence economically." The key step was the establishment of an independent and complete industrial system.
The requirements for being "independent" and "complete" supported one another. Only by shaking off foreign interference, changing the reliance on technological transfers from advanced nations, abandoning the rote copying of other countries' development templates, and engaging in self-reliant [11] path exploration and industrial layout—while conducting exchanges and mutual learning on our own terms—could the nation avoid external manipulation and build a complete industrial chain. Simultaneously, only by maximizing the improvement of the domestic industrial system, especially by mastering autonomy in industrial sectors concerning the national lifeblood, could China truly and lastingly defend its independent and autonomous status and better carry out broader foreign technological exchanges and trade on an equal footing. As General Secretary Xi Jinping summarized: "Practice has repeatedly told us that key core technologies cannot be asked for, bought, or begged for. Only by grasping key core technologies in our own hands can we fundamentally guarantee national economic security, national defense security, and other forms of security."
Through arduous struggle, New China established a relatively comprehensive industrial system, thoroughly changing the tragic fate of modern China as a source of raw materials and cheap labor for central capitalist countries. This provided the most powerful structural support for China's deep integration into the world economy after the Reform and Opening-up and for unswerving advancement of the cause of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation amidst global political and economic fluctuations. Entering the New Era, China has further strengthened supply-side structural reform, improved industrial chains to promote industrial upgrading, and formed and consolidated "the world's most complete and largest-scale industrial system," becoming "the only country in the world to possess all industrial categories in the United Nations industrial classification." As the world enters an accelerated phase of "changes unseen in a century" [12], facing the ebbing of economic globalization, the rise of protectionism and unilateralism in some countries, and a new global landscape of increased instability and uncertainty, possessing an independent, complete, and massive industrial system remains the inexhaustible impetus for ensuring that China has sufficient economic potential and tenacious developmental resilience.
(2) Developing Cutting-Edge Technology and Mobilizing Mass Science: Second Path of New China’s Technological Development
After the founding of New China, the international environment shifted. The weakening of European countries and the impact of national independence movements led to the gradual decline of colonialism. However, the logic of hegemony based on modern technological strength remained prevalent; isolation, blockades, political interference, and military provocations were still the unavoidable historical background for New China. The collective memory of modern "backwardness leading to being bullied" [13], superimposed on the severe geopolitical environment faced by New China, gave China’s pursuit of modernization a characteristic of "forced catching up." Furthermore, as a nation with a massive population and historical civilization, China subjectively harbored a strong desire to realize the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Whether rejuvenation succeeded also involved the question of whether a socialist China could gain initiative and discourse power in the modern world. Therefore, under the dual effect of the "forced catching up" trait and the "subjective catching up" passion, for New China, only progressive rather than backward modernization outcomes could meet historical expectations and satisfy the needs and well-being of the people. To achieve this goal, China adopted a construction orientation in technological development that balanced the development of cutting-edge technology with the mobilization of mass science.
In the first half of the 20th century, new trends emerged in world technological development: inventions of ultra-high temperature, ultra-high pressure, and ultra-high speed machinery brought about the development of materials science with special properties; the use of atomic energy became a new source of power for human production; the application of electronics made production automation, remote control, and the replacement of some mental labor possible. Zhou Enlai once judged: "These latest achievements place humanity on the eve of a new scientific, technological, and industrial revolution." As a new round of technological explosions simmered, New China promptly caught the pulse of the era. In 1956, the State Council’s Science Planning Committee formulated the Outline of the Long-term Plan for the Development of Science and Technology (1956-1967), sketching out key projects for China's technological development from a global and long-term perspective, providing a basic guide for promoting R&D and innovation in cutting-edge technology and catching up with the world’s technological wave. Encouraged by the call to "March toward Science," New China achieved great historical feats. For example, it successfully developed the first large-scale computer, and independently designed and manufactured the first oceanographic research ship, deep-well oil drilling rig, 10,000-ton ocean liner, and artificial satellite, comprehensively expanding the understanding of nature and the breadth and depth of science and technology. In this process, China’s atomic energy undertaking was also quietly "launched" despite blockades, gradually developing from civilian to military use, defending China's overall security and modernization cause with strength. In today’s world, a new round of information technology revolution is in the ascendant. Disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, virtual reality, and quantum computing are constantly updating the boundaries of human knowledge and forms of production organization. To build a global power in science and technology and grasp the strategic high ground in the race for the future, New Era China is persistently advancing exploration in cutting-edge technological fields, striving to develop new quality productive forces, and achieving "major results in manned spaceflight, lunar and Martian exploration, deep-sea and deep-earth exploration, supercomputers, satellite navigation, quantum information, nuclear power technology, new energy technology, large aircraft manufacturing, and biomedicine, entering the ranks of innovative countries."
In addition to deep cultivation in high-precision and cutting-edge technologies, New China also emphasized the full mobilization of the wisdom of the masses, tapping into local and indigenous production technology as a driving force for accelerating modernization. There seems to be a contradiction here: while encouraging the use of local production technology aligns with China's independent and autonomous development route, indigenous technologies are often crude and relatively backward; how then can they match the "progressive" development goal? This contains the dialectical working method of the CPC in leading economic construction. From a horizontal perspective of social development, promoting industrial transformation in a massive country that started "poor and blank" [14] with small-scale peasant operations spanning thousands of years is a long process, but this does not mean the masses must simply wait for advanced technology to arrive to begin modernization. For instance, when industrialization was limited and the popularization of agricultural machinery was low, in order to continuously promote agricultural modernization, encouraging the masses to use indigenous experience and wisdom could maximally stimulate latent local production vitality, effectively improve production efficiency, and boost the "progress" of production results, achieving a transition from quantitative to qualitative change through incremental accumulation. From a vertical perspective of technological development, indigenous technology harbors the possibility of progress: "Many small things will become medium, many medium will become large, just as the backward will become advanced and indigenous methods will become modern [foreign] methods; this is the law of objective development." For example, Artemisinin (Qinghaosu), which relieves disease and pain, left "clues like grass-snakes and grey-lines" [15] in folk anti-malarial recipes, secret formulas, and ancient classic Chinese medicine literature. Its discovery and invention were completed during a large-scale "mass campaign," enabling Artemisinin drugs to meet identification standards. This played a huge foundational role in solving China's food and clothing problems and realizing the cause of a moderately prosperous society (xiaokang); hybrid rice, which still benefits many developing countries today, was also achieved, selected, applied, and promoted on the basis of large-scale collaboration across dozens of provinces and the extensive participation of the masses in tackling key problems. It is evident that respecting the pioneering spirit of the masses and gathering wisdom from the front lines of production helps to nurture the technological buds unearthed from indigenous resources within a cross-section of history, cultivating "progressive" technologies grown from Chinese soil with full confidence.
III. Transcending the Logic of Hegemony: Toward a Modernization of “From Civilization to Technology”
Looking back at history, since the arrival of the Industrial Revolution, the overarching logic of "civilization via technology" has never abated. In the modern era, it was wrapped in the ideology of a hierarchical order of world civilizations, manifesting as a colonizer-colonized relationship. Because technology and productive forces were linked to morality and civilization, the Western world achieved an all-encompassing "dimensionality reduction strike" [16] against late-developing nations, ranging from the military and economic spheres to civilization itself. Following the Second World War, a wave of national liberation emerged, and colonialism receded in form. It was replaced by the confrontation between the two major blocs of the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and the struggle for the "intermediate zone" [17]. During this period, the logic appeared through competition and confrontation between the two alliances. Whether through the direct application of military force in the intermediate zone or the race for the speed of productive forces and space supremacy, the foundation of competition derived from the level of technological development. The goal was to vie for the exclusive right to represent and interpret modern civilization, thereby attaining a global leadership position.
Within the allied blocs, however, the logic of "civilization via technology" presented itself through a leader-led relationship. It employed more sophisticated and gentler methods than the colonialism of the past, exporting technology, capital, and management models to led nations, promising that this was the "one true path" to modern civilization. Following the shifts in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, neoliberalism and the "end of history" thesis became rampant, holding that the forces obstructing the expansion of American universalism had vanished and that Western free markets and liberal democratic systems had become the "final form of human government."
Through several centuries of iteration, although "civilization via technology" has changed in its form of expression, its historical narrative and essential theme have influenced the deep-seated order and realistic laws of the modern world. Transcending geographic barriers, changes in international units, and ideological disputes, it leaped to become a true "universal value." It has always served powerful nations, becoming the basis for their manipulation of international affairs and their judgment of other countries' paths to modernization. At its root, only nations and states possessing technological and material strength can occupy a place in the world system; those outside this circle face the risk of being absorbed and tamed by others or existing in a state of near-voicelessness—that is to say, their existence is equivalent to non-existence.
In the broad view, the aforementioned efforts of New China to promote technological development clearly fit within the framework of acquiring a voice for one's civilization through technological strength: whether constructing complete industrial chains to consolidate the national economy and bolster the foundations of security to stand tall among the forest of nations [18], or actively advancing construction to obtain the fruits of progressive modernization and seize the initiative in the industrial age, China did indeed follow a path of acquiring modern civilization through the development of technology. However, this does not mean that New China ultimately succumbed to or was assimilated by this value system. In the discourse of "civilization via technology" controlled by the Western world, advanced technology dictates the direction of civilization and the developmental trends of backward technologies. This implies that not only are the definitions of "advanced" and "civilized" predetermined, but there is also a prescribed, universal path for moving from backwardness to advancement. In its development, China chose to break through this regulated "universal" path, turning instead to explore a construction program suited to its own national conditions [19], demonstrating a tendency to continually overflow the original framework. As a "New China" that continues the Marxist tradition and upholds socialist ideals, the direction of its technological development is driven not only by a strong desire to join the modern world but also by a grand blueprint for a brand-new modernity that transcends the logic of "civilization via technology." It is precisely in this sense that China is no longer a passive recipient of Western logic since the modern era, but its active reformer and transcender. Starting from the historical point of "making the nations of peasants subordinate to the nations of bourgeois, the East to the West," [20] the emerging Eastern China, in the process of exploring Chinese-path modernization, has continually responded to shocks and counter-shaped the hegemonic logic inherent in "civilization via technology." Through the three steps of "negative recognition," "value deconstruction," and "substantive transcendence," China is moving toward a modernization of "technology via civilization," leading the gestation and birth of a new form of human civilization.
(1) Revealing the existence of the "civilization via technology" logic in a negative sense
After the recession of past forms of colonialism, the power-consciousness that classifies civilizational hierarchy and international status based on technological strength has continued to exert a deep-rooted and realistic influence. However, its blunt and naked expressions have gradually and consciously retreated behind the scenes of history, replaced by more concealed and sophisticated discursive forms. For example, in the early Cold War, the United States still overtly emphasized the need to "build positions of strength" throughout the "Free World" (referring to the capitalist world) and that "Western nations and their Far Eastern allies must participate in the Geneva meetings with the communists from a position of strength." However, under the influence of the socialist camp's "peace offensive" and the global populace's strong yearning for peace, the U.S. was forced to formulate a "Peace Plan" to pivot from its morally inferior position, attempting to downplay the reality of power politics. To facilitate a US-Soviet condominium over the world, the Soviet side also collaborated by asserting that the Cold War and the policy of "positions of strength" had fundamentally ended.
Regarding this issue, China and the Soviet Union held starkly different interpretative perspectives. China also realized that the Western policy of "positions of strength" was temporarily difficult to maintain in name, but argued "that was because the previous Cold War policies became disadvantageous to them, so they made some changes to relax the situation." In other words, whether relaxation or tension, both are means for hegemonic states to maximize their interests; once global relaxation becomes unfavorable to them, the US-led West can once again provoke tension. Therefore, fundamentally, this still belongs to the manifestation of "positions of strength" in a broad sense. To proclaim the end of this policy before power politics has actually exited the stage of history constitutes a cover-up and a whitewashing of reality, which might confuse the people’s understanding of the situation and slacken the demand for national independence and self-reliant production. Pointing out that "positions of strength" will persist for a long time reveals a structural crisis and provides theoretical assistance to national liberation and construction movements. Therefore, similar to the narrative logic that "backwardness leads to being beaten" [21], the emphasis on positions of strength expresses not an "ought" (normative value) but an "is" (historical reality). Meanwhile, establishing an equal international order cannot rely solely on the maneuvering and "alms" of great powers; it requires backward nations to enhance their industrial strength after achieving national independence and to unite to master their own destinies.
It is evident that New China's adherence to the developmental logic of "civilization via technology" is not merely a practical compromise but contains a historical dialectic of struggle. China's pursuit of technology and power is not for the purpose of following this logic to rule or manipulate other countries, but to become a force for safeguarding world peace and development based on securing its own sovereignty and security. China’s recognition of the realistic influence of power politics is not to consolidate the ideological laws of "civilization via technology" dominated by hegemonic powers, but to acknowledge and reveal the existence of this logical system in a negative sense, thereby unsettling and rejecting it. This breaks the historical pattern of "the East being subordinate to the West" in the real world rather than in conceptual illusions.
(2) Peace and development as the keynote: The disembedding of civilization and technology
The impact on and transcendence of the "civilization via technology" framework by New China began with the decoupling of civilization and technology. A civilization predicated on technological strength remains essentially subordinate to the politics of force. The "disembedding" of civilization and technology implies that human civilization should possess connotations independent of technology. Continuing Lenin’s logic of the "advanced Asia and backward Europe," New China overturned the civilizational connotations previously controlled by the Western world. In a conversation with a delegation of youth from Black Africa, Mao Zedong offered a sharp rebuttal to Western civilizational discourse: "The Western imperialists consider themselves civilized and call the oppressed 'barbarians'... for imperialism to occupy our China is very barbaric. We in China have not occupied other countries in the past, do not now, and will not in the future occupy the United States or Britain as colonies. Therefore, we have always been a civilized nation, and so are you... They like to say we are dirty, very unclean, and unhygienic. I don’t think that’s necessarily true; we are actually a bit cleaner. We must have self-confidence."
Defining civilization through the lens of "relationships," civilization is not determined entirely by economic prosperity or the level of technological advancement, but also by whether a country upholds a concept of an equal and just international order and whether it can respect the will of other nations to independently explore modernization paths that suit their national conditions. Therefore, modern civilization in this context is an open concept that continually advances with the times. It will inevitably be enriched as the peoples of the world seek and summarize experiences in their quest for modernization. This also determines that China's modernization is a modernization following the path of peaceful development, encouraging a modernization where people of all countries achieve common development. At present, the world faces complex and interwoven severe challenges: "The deficits in governance, trust, peace, and development are growing... the dregs of Cold War mentality such as containment, suppression, confrontation, and threats are rising again; hegemonism and power politics are rampant; the law of the jungle and zero-sum games have found new soil." At another historical juncture determining where humanity will go, China unswervingly "stands on the right side of history and the side of human civilizational progress," calling upon the vast majority of nations under the banner of peace and unity to pull together in the same boat, seeking win-win development through the "Belt and Road" [22], and joining hands to deal with common human challenges such as global climate change, public health crises, terrorism, and environmental pollution. It aims to build a community with a shared future for humanity and to jointly explore answers to the "Questions of China, the world, the people, and the times." [23]
(3) A developmental path highlighting the people-centered nature: Toward the modernization of "technology via civilization"
While stripping away the decisive role of technological strength in defining civilization, it is necessary to reconstruct a more rational coordinate system between the two. After the Industrial Revolution, the overlay of machine production with the capitalist economic model not only used high productivity to create a massive accumulation of products but also caused global wealth polarization, making the vast majority of laborers slaves to industrial technology—falling into a state of alienation, which became the object of Marx's critique. Currently, as the world enters "changes unseen in a century," a new technological explosion is imminent. In deciding what kind of future humanity will move toward, there is a need to call for a new civilizational guidance to constrain the path of technological development, which is essentially boundless.
The guidance of civilization over technology means that while pursuing technological development, one must also consider the prerequisite questions: In what way should technology be developed, and for what purpose? New China has continued the value orientation of Marxism, forming a new form of civilization that highlights the position of the people within the gestation and generation of Chinese-path modernization. It explicitly proposes that the innovation and development of science and technology should be "led by humans, serve humans, and conform to human values." On the basis of this "New View of Civilization," a historical shift from "civilization via technology" to "technology via civilization" has been achieved, providing a new answer and new practice for the era: developing technology for the people and relying on the people for development.
Developing technology for the people. "Fundamentally speaking, all construction carried out in our country is for the welfare of the masses." [24] Seeking happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation is the original aspiration and founding mission of the Communist Party of China, as well as the fundamental goal of New China's pursuit of modernization. Therefore, all progress in the productive forces and the great power of science and technology should serve to enhance the well-being of the people. In the process of promoting the cause of socialist modernization, China has consistently emphasized the protection and improvement of people's interests across the complex dimensions of space and generations. This demonstrates that Chinese-path modernization is a modernization dedicated to achieving common prosperity for all people, as well as a modernization that follows the harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature.
Spatially, Chinese-path modernization pursues integrated and coordinated regional development, using the tangible results of increased industrialization as a crucial aid to bridge the urban-rural gap and promote rural revitalization [25]. "In the past ten years, rural roads have seen a net increase of more than 900,000 kilometers, the rural power grid has been continuously optimized and upgraded, and the coverage rate of rural tap water has increased to about 84%." Moreover, "all eligible townships and administrative villages have been connected to paved roads and bus services. 100% of administrative villages and villages lifted out of poverty have broadband access. The three-tier logistics distribution system at the county, township, and village levels has been basically established." This has provided vital infrastructural support for China to win the comprehensive battle against poverty [26], enter a moderately prosperous society, and move toward common prosperity. Generationally, China's new path to modernization maintains its focus and emphasis on the people's welfare, with a subject orientation that includes not only the people of the present but also the people in the future dimension of time. This means that China's development path upholds a long-term perspective, balancing current interests with long-term interests and focusing on sustaining and protecting the natural environment upon which human survival and development depend. By promoting high-quality development and environmental governance, controlling total carbon emissions while initiating an energy revolution to address global climate change, China ensures the long-term welfare of future generations across generational time and space. This realizes the vision of a beautiful life where we want "both mountains of gold and silver, and lucid waters and lush mountains." [27]
Relying on the people for development. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out: "The people are the creators of history; they are the creators of the era. Within the magnificent struggle of the people, fiery chapters of history-making leap out everywhere, converging into an epic of the people." The people are the destination of technological development and the fundamental driving force for creating technology; technology as an "object" should not turn around to control or suppress the human beings who are its creators. Currently, a new round of information technology revolution is imminent; frontier technologies such as virtual technology, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology have brought new economic growth points and historical development opportunities to China. On the other hand, however, "the rapid development of informatization and intellectualization has posed non-negligible challenges to the forms of human existence, modes of activity, and ethics." How should we understand the actual consequences of the interaction between humans and technology? How should we envision the boundaries of technological development and application? What kind of technology can more comprehensively serve to enhance the people's well-being? Answering these questions requires tracing the technological development paths adopted by humanity.
Although technological iterations have been occurring for a long time, it remains necessary for us to review the developmental experience of the early period of New China [28], extracting from changing history those principles of development that should not be altered. We must revisit the history of "mass science" [29] and emphasize the path of relying on the people to develop technology. In 1956, during the formulation of the Long-term Program for Science and Technology, the proposal from the strategic weapons department—represented by Qian Xuesen [30] and Nie Rongzhen [31]—was adopted. Consequently, "China's science, technology, and national defense system embarked on an alternative development path of 'sophisticated weaponry + the mass line'." In constructing China's aerospace, nuclear, and electronic information industries, China "discarded the bureaucratic model of traditional manufacturing and adopted the forms of engineering projects and special task forces." On the basis of emphasizing unified management and centralized decision-making, this new production model implemented decentralization, expanded communication channels between technical researchers and decision-making leadership, and achieved flexible cross-departmental and cross-system mobilization and flattened collaborative organization. This embodied the organic unity of centralization and democracy.
Subsequently, this innovative management model with socialist attributes expanded from the sophisticated weaponry sector to various fields of production, generating a unique "mass science" path during the promotion of R&D innovation and practical application. For example, in the three major machinery plants of a large industrial province, a new mode of organizing production emerged, characterized by close collaboration between cadres, experts, and ordinary workers. This management system allowed professional departments to receive timely production feedback and incorporate new innovations from ordinary workers' labor; it also helped workers access necessary theoretical knowledge, breaking down barriers and making the factory floor a composite field for production, design, trial manufacturing, and scientific research. This new form of management and collaboration exerted a broad global influence, inspiring the emergence of the Toyota way in Japan and becoming a practical resource for "Post-Fordism."
Compared to capitalism—which deprives laborers of production skills through the monopoly of knowledge, downgrades them to mechanical physical force, and continuously produces workers "stripped of knowledge"—New China's unique path of technological development has expanded both the connotation and extension of modern science and regulated the purpose of technological development. This ensured that "Mr. Science" [32] was no longer perched aloft but became knowledge and technology closely related to the people's production and daily life. Simultaneously, it urged the masses to continuously move toward re-skilling and intellectualization, becoming the subjects of modern production. This is also the source of confidence for the vast number of laborers to improve their scientific literacy and actively participate in building socialist modernization with a sense of ownership.
In the process of New China seeking a new path toward modernization, it has pointed toward a transcendence of the developmental logic of "civilization through technology." Its main thrust is not the subversion of modern civilization, but the correction of its flaws. In international relations, China rejects a world order that assesses civilization based on technological strength and instead calls for the formation of fair and just relations between nations. At the same time, it adjusts the coordinates of civilization and technology, ensuring that a civilization characterized by its "people-centered nature" guides the path and direction of technological development, reflecting a development lineage of "relying on the people and for the people." China's reflection on modern civilization and its unique path of technological development have had a profound impact on the world, making valuable explorations in combining the relationship between the people and technology.
In summary, the reflections of New China on the relationship between technological development and civilization were influenced by the impact of Western modernization, yet were able to proceed from its own reality, flexibly responding to and shaping the modern world. The spiritual core of these reflections contains both a realist-oriented aspect and a visionary aspect that guides the people and the world with high-level ideals. In the process of arduous exploration, there have been achievements and there has been experience gained; this road is not in the past tense, but remains open to China in the New Era and the future world of humanity.
(The author is a lecturer at the School of Marxism, Central Party School of the CPC (National Academy of Governance)) Source: Socialist Studies, Issue 1, 2025. Web Editor: Ma Jingren.