Zhang Guanzi: Grasping the Epochal Value of Chinese Modernization from the Depth of World History
Realizing modernization is a historical trend in world development and the shared aspiration of people in all countries. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out: "Realizing modernization is an inalienable right of all countries in the world," and "in its pursuit of modernization, a country needs to follow the general laws governing the process, but more importantly, it must proceed from its own realities and develop its own features." Today, as changes unseen in a century accelerate across the globe, the international balance of power is undergoing profound adjustments. The limitations and drawbacks of the Western model of modernization are becoming increasingly prominent, and the world urgently calls for a new path toward modernization. As a brand-new model, Chinese-path modernization shatters the myth that "modernization equals Westernization" and provides a new blueprint for global modernization. Deeply understanding the historical process of global modernization and the international significance of Chinese-path modernization helps us grasp its epochal value from the depths of world history, allowing us to advance and expand Chinese-path modernization with greater consciousness and confidence.
The process of world modernization is a collective exploration and undertaking by all of humanity
General Secretary Xi Jinping noted: "The various civilizations created by human society all shine with brilliance, accumulating a profound heritage and imparting distinctive characteristics to the modernization of various countries; they transcend time and space and cross national borders to jointly contribute to the process of human society's modernization." The process of world modernization began in Western capitalist countries, and the developed countries of today are primarily European and American nations or capitalist states deeply influenced by Western civilization. However, it must be deeply recognized that numerous civilizations across the globe have made important contributions to nurturing and driving the world's modernization process.
Marx offered profound insights into the universal laws of human social development, pointing out that Eastern societies "could appropriate the positive fruits of the capitalist system without passing through its Caudine Forks [1]," thereby accelerating the historical process. At the same time, he resolutely opposed the rigid view that "all nations, whatever their historical circumstances, are destined to tread this path," emphasizing that "correct theory must be elucidated and developed in combination with specific circumstances and based on existing conditions." This indicates that the path to modernization is not confined to a single model. A diversity of development paths is what the world ought to look like. To date, most countries that have achieved modernization are Western capitalist nations; consequently, some have developed the illusion that "modernization equals Westernization," ignoring the fact that world modernization is a process explored and driven by all of humanity.
On the one hand, Western modernization was not an endogenous evolution completed in a vacuum; rather, it was deeply rooted in a global network of cultural exchange. Throughout long historical periods, many intellectual achievements from other civilizational systems were continuously introduced to Europe and widely applied. For instance, China's papermaking and printing technologies broke the Church's monopoly on knowledge and culture; the compass facilitated the Great Age of Discovery; and gunpowder shook the foundations of European feudal rule. As Marx pointed out: "Gunpowder, the compass, and printing—these are the three great inventions which ushered in bourgeois society." These achievements were not merely technical progress; they became effective catalysts for ideological liberation and the development of productive forces, serving as indispensable socio-historical conditions for the launch and advancement of the Western modernization process.
On the other hand, the process of world modernization is not a unidirectional expansion characterized by "Eurocentrism." Long before Western capitalist forces expanded outward, people in different regions had already participated in and profoundly shaped the early "reservoir" of world modernization in their own ways through ancient trade networks. The outbreak of the Industrial Revolution quickly linked the world market together, greatly promoting the global flow and reconfiguration of factors of production such as capital, technology, labor, and raw materials. Marx and Engels were unstinting in their praise for the leap in capitalist productive forces and its role in promoting the formation of the world market. Simultaneously, it must be seen that in this process, the non-Western world in Asia, Africa, and Latin America were not mere passive recipients. With their vast markets and abundant resources, they became vital links in the global division of labor, irreversibly drawn into and integrated into the magnificent tide of world modernization.
Viewed historically, Western modernization is only one mode of world modernization, rooted in specific conditions. Institutionally, Western modernization is modernization under the capitalist system, with the infinite accumulation and expansion of capital as its core driving force. Although this mode released immense productive forces during certain historical stages, it inevitably brought about human alienation and social fracture. The logic of capital treats human beings as tools and means for capital accumulation rather than as the purpose of social development. This makes labor no longer a creative activity but a forced drudgery for survival, leading to widespread spiritual emptiness, a loss of meaning, and ballooning materialism—outcomes that run counter to the modernization goal of the free and well-rounded development of the individual. The instinct of capital to pursue maximum profit, if not effectively regulated and constrained, inevitably leads to severe wealth polarization and erodes social equity and justice, further triggering consequences such as the solidification of social strata and the spread of populism. Ethically, the history of Western modernization is filled with bloody crimes such as war, slave trading, colonization, and plunder. This determines the unjust and non-inclusive nature of its path, plunging the people of colonial and semi-colonial countries into misery. As the American scholar Wallerstein pointed out, the core, semi-periphery, and periphery of the capitalist world-economy are assigned different economic roles; ruling groups in the core and semi-periphery maintain their own levels of production and employment at the expense of the periphery. It can be said that Western modernization was advanced largely at the cost of the long-term underdevelopment of countries and regions outside the West, bringing profound suffering to many developing nations.
Chinese-path modernization achieves a major transcendence of Western modernization theory and practice
General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out: "Chinese-path modernization has features that are common to the modernization processes of all countries, but it is more characterized by features that are unique to the Chinese context." Modernization is not a "patent" held by a few countries, nor is it a "single-choice question" of one or the other; one cannot simply engage in "copying and pasting" a uniform model. History fully demonstrates that there is no template for achieving modernization. When a country moves toward modernization, it must follow the general laws of modernization while basing itself on its own national conditions and possessing its own unique characteristics.
The successful promotion and expansion of Chinese-path modernization has its own inherent prescriptions and is rooted in deep historical soil. After the Opium War, China attempted to transplant Western technology, institutions, and even culture, but all failed. Instead, the country fell into a state of fragmentation and extreme misery. The heavy responsibility of exploring the path to modernization fell historically upon the Communist Party of China. With Marxism as our guiding ideology and supported by a spirit of independent exploration and the confidence and determination to follow our own path, our Party has continuously pushed China's modernization forward. Since the founding of the People's Republic, our Party has led the people in completing—in just a few decades—the industrialization process that took Western developed countries several centuries to achieve, successfully advancing and expanding Chinese-path modernization and creating a new form of human civilization. The grand historical depth and civilizational height displayed by Chinese-path modernization benefit from the nourishment of the fine traditional culture of the Chinese nation over more than 5,000 years. For example, the value pursuit of "the world belongs to the public" [2] drives Chinese-path modernization to evade the traps of extreme polarization and the gap between rich and poor. Furthermore, the worldview of "harmony between humanity and nature" [3] and the ecological concept of "following the laws of nature" [4] promote a modernization that respects, adapts to, and protects nature, highlighting the distinct characteristic of harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature.
At present, more and more countries are no longer blindly following the Western model of modernization but are actively exploring development paths that suit their own national conditions and the laws of human social development. Chinese-path modernization contains a unique worldview and unique perspectives on values, history, civilization, democracy, and ecology. Having already achieved remarkable success, it is regarded as a model for a late-developing country striving to catch up and successfully opening a new path to modernization. It has achieved a major transcendence of Western modernization theory and practice in several aspects:
Surpassing the supremacy of capital with the supremacy of the people. Western modernization is capital-centered. Dominated by the logic of capital, Western modernization promotes instrumental rationality, where human subjective value is constantly dissolved or even hollowed out. This inevitably leads Western modernization into multiple dilemmas, such as social fracture and governance failure. Chinese-path modernization respects human subjectivity and highlights human value, viewing people as the fundamental purpose of development. It adheres to the people-centered development philosophy, focusing on ensuring and improving people's livelihoods during development, resolving the pressing concerns of the masses, and guiding capital to serve socialist modernization and well-rounded human development, ensuring that the fruits of modernization benefit all people more equitably.
Surpassing harm to others for self-benefit with harmonious coexistence. Western modernization is embedded with dualistic thinking and a penchant for zero-sum games. From plunder based on violent conquest to "harvesting" based on hegemonic systems, and from the unrestrained extraction of natural resources to the destructive exploitation of the environment, Western modernization is shot through with various forms of visible and invisible predation. This has resulted in the interests of a few countries overriding those of the majority, widening the global wealth gap, while also triggering an imbalance between the material and the spiritual, opposition between humanity and nature, and widespread social disorder. Chinese-path modernization promotes pulling together in times of trouble and harmonious coexistence. It emphasizes sustainable development and adheres to a path of civilized development featuring increased production, affluent living, and a sound ecosystem, continuously expanding the breadth and depth of peaceful development and win-win cooperation.
Surpassing systemic monopoly with openness and inclusiveness. To maintain a pattern of monopolizing its own interests, Western modernization has, in practice, shaped and promoted a dependent and closed monopoly system, attempting to fix or even eternalize this structure of interest monopoly. In contrast, Chinese-path modernization gazes upon the world with a sense of "All-Under-Heaven" [5] characterized by openness, inclusiveness, and a shared future, working with all countries — including the vast number of developing nations — to realize modernization. For instance, China uses the high-quality development of the Belt and Road Initiative as an important platform, focusing on promoting an equal and orderly multipolar world and a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, fostering mutually beneficial cooperation and common development for all nations.
Chinese-path modernization has a far-reaching impact on the process of world modernization
The great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is unfolding within the tide of world modernization. What is pursued is not only the country’s own prosperity and strength but also the development and progress of human civilization. The new form of human civilization created by Chinese-path modernization not only realizes the continuation, iteration, and innovation of its own civilizational form but also explores—across multiple dimensions—the universal laws of civilizational revival for human civilization, especially for developing countries and late-developing modernized nations. It possesses broad and far-reaching global significance.
It shatters the myth of the Western modernization model and proves the diversity of paths to modernization. For a long time, the Western world, by continuously imposing its so-called "civilizing mission" on the non-Western world, firmly controlled the right to define, judge, and speak for "civilization." Western modernization theories were often based on Eurocentric assumptions, leading to systemic cognitive biases and practical errors. How different regions, ethnic groups, nations, and civilizations achieve development and evolution under their specific conditions is a non-linear, non-equilibrium, and concrete historical process. The successful practice of Chinese-path modernization announces the bankruptcy of the unilinear view of history that assumes all countries will eventually converge toward the Western institutional model. In this sense, Chinese-path modernization has not only profoundly changed China itself but has also rewritten the modernization narrative long dominated by the West. It proves that true modernization is not a "holier-than-thou" myth but a manifestation of development diversity; it is not the forced export of a single model but the independent choice of pluralistic paths; it is not the so-called "end of history" but the common progress of human civilization toward the future.
It provides a development philosophy and governance approach different from Western modernization. For many nations, attempting to obtain a reasonable position in the world system by mimicking Western modernization faces numerous pressures and obstacles in the current international environment. The new path forged by Chinese-path modernization provides a beneficial solution. Chinese-path modernization adheres to an independent path of development. Relying on a strong political core, it ensures the long-term stability and consistent execution of national development strategies, keeping the initiative of development firmly in its own hands. Chinese-path modernization has achieved the continuous calibration of development goals—from winning the battle against extreme poverty to solidly promoting common prosperity through high-quality development—reflecting the adherence to a people-centered development philosophy. Chinese-path modernization offers richer governance ideas. For example, the socialist market economy system promotes a better combination of an efficient market and a capable government, breaking the dualistic opposition between "market fundamentalism" and "government intervention theory" and the "either-or" mindset regarding the market and the state.
It reshapes the landscape of world modernization and advances the process of human modernization. On the one hand, Chinese-path modernization will greatly alter the global map of modernization. The entry of more than 1.4 billion people into modernization will profoundly change the balance of power and the landscape of world modernization, effectively dismantling the modernization map that some Western countries attempt to frame with a Eurocentric worldview. This is of great significance for solving the development dilemmas of human society and advancing the process of human modernization. On the other hand, the continuous advancement of Chinese-path modernization expands the space for world modernization by contributing momentum and opportunities to global development. China deepens exchange and cooperation with countries worldwide and promotes the building of a community with a shared future for humanity. This creates conditions for all countries to board the "express train" of China's development and share in its opportunities. It provides a vital chance for Global South countries to break through development bottlenecks and increase their voice in global affairs, driving all nations to advance hand-in-hand in the process of world modernization and reach a new height of human civilization.