Chen Shuguang: Theoretical Contributions of the Common Values of All Mankind to Marxist Value Theory

Values constitute the core of any system of thought or culture and are a vital component of social ideology. Different nations and cultural spheres across the globe possess their own core values. A core value system serves as the spiritual bond upon which a nation relies for its cohesion and forms the common ideological and moral foundation of a country. Across different nations or cultural spheres, diverse social systems and ideologies, and various historical stages, core values manifest through distinct forms, connotations, and characteristics; they possess salient regional, national, and historical features. A universalist value model that transcends time and space simply does not exist. As a set of commensurable value norms within a synchronic dimension, the common values of all humanity are fundamentally heterogeneous from "value-in-general" that claims to transcend time and space. Instead, they belong to a value consensus that transcends geographical boundaries and institutional differences. Through pioneering and shared substantive content, these values represent a profound innovation of value concepts in the history of human thought. They serve as the basic guidance for leading the progress of human civilization and constitute a principled contribution to the development of Marxist value theory. I have previously discussed the principled contribution of the common values of all humanity in a theoretical propaganda article published in the People’s Daily. However, due to space constraints and the specific orientation of that newspaper, I was unable to fully reveal the falsity of so-called "universal values" or the transcendence of the common values of all humanity at a theoretical level. This article is written in the hope of providing a more comprehensive and systematic answer as to the sense in which the common values of all humanity transcend so-called "universal values" and how they develop Marxist value theory.

I. Various nations and cultural spheres in the world have hoped that the light of their own values could shine upon all humanity to become universal values, yet most have ultimately seen their wishes go unfulfilled.

Different nations and cultural spheres throughout the world have hoped that the light of their own values could transcend regional, national, and cultural boundaries as well as institutional differences to shine upon all humanity and become universal values. Those most keen on peddling their values to the entire world are certain Western countries.

Upholding a universalist religious sentiment, a philosophical tradition of idealism ^[1], and a "center-based" way of thinking, Western countries emphasize the rule of "abstract universality" over reality. They pursue the dominance of Western thought and values, using the monopoly of ideas as a primary means of seeking world hegemony. They propagate the supremacy, universality, and dominance of "value-in-general," advocating for so-called "universal values" that transcend regions, nations, classes, and time. They attempt to "create a world after [their] own image," elevating special Western value models into the only choices and standard answers that hold true everywhere. They advocate for following a single value principle, selecting a single value model, and applying a single value norm regardless of country, nation, or region. The West has not only made "production and consumption in every country cosmopolitan" but has also caused political ideas and value concepts originating from the bourgeoisie to become "cosmopolitan." Arguments such as Western-centrism, the "end of history," and the theory of civilizational superiority are essentially consistent with the "theory of universal values." In the West, the Renaissance held high the banner of "humanism," using human nature to oppose divinity and replacing divine right with human rights to critique the Catholic theological worldview; its core value pursuit was expressed as "liberty, equality, and fraternity." The Enlightenment held high the banner of "rationalism," critiquing absolutism, clericalism, and the estate system to pave the way for capitalism and modern industrial society; its core value propositions were elevated from "liberty, equality, and fraternity" to "liberty, democracy, and human rights." Today, so-called "universal values" primarily refer to these value concepts and the forms of their realization in the West.

The so-called "universal values" of Western countries are not truly universal values. Superficially, they represent a universality that has stripped away particularity, dressing up their own value pursuits as the "universal values" of all humanity. In essence, they represent a particularity devoid of universality, seeking the global hegemony of Western values. True universality is not a singular universality, an abstract universality, or an absolute identity; rather, it is a universality that encompasses particularity and difference within itself. Why are Western countries so keen on weaving the myth of "false universality"? Marx and Engels revealed the secret behind this: as a new class replacing the old ruling class, the bourgeoisie "is compelled, merely in order to carry through its aim, to represent its interest as the common interest of all the members of society, that is, expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the form of universality, and represent them as the only rational, universally valid ones." Similarly, to achieve their ends, Western countries are compelled to describe their values as the "universal values" of all humanity, giving Western values the form of universality and depicting them as the only rational and universally significant value pursuits. However, the "universal values" pursued by Western countries are essentially not true universality, but a universality disguised by Western particularity—namely, a "false universalism." So-called "universal values" are, in essence, nothing more than the specific values of the West, core values produced from the West's unique cultural soil. Common values that truly conform to the interests of all humanity are by no means a false ideology; once they appear, they can attain a world-historical status. Once the universal values of humanity truly become a reality, the falsity of ideology will cease to exist. "As soon as the rule of classes in general ceases to be the form in which society is organized, that is to say, as soon as it is no longer necessary to represent a particular interest as general or the 'general interest' as ruling, the whole illusion that the rule of a certain class is only the rule of certain ideas will, of course, vanish of itself."

Traditional China likewise hoped that its value pursuits could illuminate the world, and there similarly existed grand value ideals such as "Great Harmony Under Heaven" (Tianxia Datong) ^[2] and "Harmony Among All Nations" (Xiehe Wanbang) ^[3]. Although these value ideals possess a certain degree of trans-temporal significance for all humanity, as a cultural tradition they are "merely things handed down from generation to generation, that is, anything transmitted or passed down from the past to the present." In terms of their fundamental nature, they remain local knowledge and Eastern values, necessarily possessing a unique historical context and unavoidable spatial and temporal limitations. Without a modern transformation, they cannot automatically rise to the level of universal values for all humanity. Ancient China established the political and social ethics of the "Three Bonds and Five Constant Virtues" ^[4], the "Way of the Mean" (Zhongyong) of "holding both ends and using the middle" ^[5], the value goals of "benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and trustworthiness," the value orientation of "cultivating the self, regulating the family, governing the state, and bringing peace to the world," the value norms of the "Four Anchors of the State: propriety, righteousness, integrity, and honor," the value choice of "prioritizing righteousness over profit," and the world ideal of "Great Harmony Under Heaven." These core value concepts do not possess unconditional universality and cannot be unconditionally elevated to become the value pursuits of modern China, nor can they be unconditionally transplanted as the value norms of other countries; much less do they unconditionally possess a trans-temporal, world-historical significance. Looking at past history, whether it was the cultural imagination of the "All-under-Heaven" (Tianxia) concept in pre-modern China or the universalist value ideals of the modern West, both eventually lacked the power to transform the real world because they were detached from specific times, places, and conditions.

II. The classical Marxist authors focused their critique on the hypocrisy of the so-called "universal values" of the bourgeoisie, but they did not systematically discuss common values or value consensus that transcend social formations.

Historically, it has always appeared as though ideas hold dominance. When people examine the historical process, they are accustomed to separating the ideas of the ruling class from the ruling class itself, thereby rendering those ideas and concepts independent. The ruling class immerses itself in such fantasies concocted for its own benefit and is "ready to accept these ideas and illusions"; historians, too, seem to do the same. They believe in the "supreme rule of the Spirit in history" and make a living by concocting that class's "illusions about itself," fabricating "chronicles of the years" ^[6] to maintain class sanctity and historical continuity. As a result, "the ideas held to be dominant will be more and more abstract, i.e., they will take on more and more the form of universality." For example, during the period of aristocratic rule, the dominant concepts were honor and loyalty, whereas during the period of bourgeois rule, the dominant concepts are liberty, equality, and so on. However, once abstract universal value concepts like "liberty and equality" return to the reality of Western social life, they reveal their hypocritical face. They descend into "idealistic phrases, conscious illusions, and deliberate hypocrisies," serving as a fig leaf for capital privilege and the class hierarchy of Western society. At best, they are "summaries of the most general results, abstractions which arise from the observation of the historical development of mankind. These abstractions in themselves, detached from real history, have no value whatsoever."

The classical Marxist authors profoundly exposed and criticized the hypocrisy of core bourgeois values (i.e., "universal values"). Marx and Engels believed that capitalist society constructed great principles such as liberty, democracy, human rights, equality, and fraternity, and invented soul-stirring phrases like "all men are born free and equal." However, aside from carefully packaging these to gloss over reality and wantonly exporting and peddling these principles for value infiltration, the bourgeoisie never realizes these principles in practice. Principles are one thing; practice is another. The classical authors profoundly exposed the false essence of these principles.

The so-called "liberty" is the liberty of "capital" and of those who possess capital. "In free competition, it is not the individuals who are set free, but capital." It is the freedom of the bourgeois to exploit wage labor and plunder colonies; the freedom of the bourgeois to appropriate the surplus value created by the proletarians; the freedom of the proletarians to sell their labor power to the bourgeois; the freedom of colonial peoples to be plundered; the freedom of buying and selling labor power; and it is "the most complete abolition of all individual liberty" and being "free to have nothing." The hypocrisy of liberty is also reflected in bourgeois constitutions: "each paragraph of the Constitution contains its own antithesis, its own Upper and Lower House, namely, liberty in the general phrase, abrogation of liberty in the marginal note... so long as the name of liberty was respected and only its actual realization prevented... the constitutional existence of liberty remained intact and inviolate, however much its factual existence was struck dead." In the West, "liberty is a great word, but it was under the banner of industrial liberty that the most predatory wars were waged; it was under the banner of labor liberty that the working people were robbed." Religious wars were launched under the banner of religious liberty, indigenous peoples were slaughtered under the banner of personal liberty, colonies were plundered under the banner of free trade, and the Opium War was launched under the banner of the freedom to buy and sell. Even today in the 21st century, certain Western countries still launch "color revolutions" under the banner of democracy and liberty, wiretap multiple world leaders under the banner of press freedom, illegally detain foreign entrepreneurs under the banner of free flow, and engage in anti-Chinese student policies under the banner of academic freedom. Where is there any liberty?

The so-called "democracy" is democracy within the bourgeoisie, democracy among capitalists—a game for the wealthy. Marx criticized: "The bourgeoisie proclaims itself the democratic class in words, but it is not so in reality; it recognizes the correctness of the principle, but never realizes this principle in practice." Western so-called universal suffrage is merely a way to maintain the legitimacy of the established ruling order, granting the people so-called "false power" and political illusions of participating in state governance through elections, and creating ideological phantasms through formal democracy. Whether at the central or local level, a country's superstructure is determined not by the citizens' votes, but by the country's economic base. In any era, the class that holds the dominant material force in society necessarily holds the dominant political force. "The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life," and this has nothing to do with votes. Universal suffrage theoretically grants citizens equal voting rights, but in reality, it is merely about "deciding once every few years which member of the ruling class is to misrepresent the people in parliament." It is nothing more than a game played by a few wealthy elites who control the economic base and material forces. "The nature of the election does not depend on this name, but on the economic basis, the economic ties of the voters," on the social balance of power, the distribution of authority, and the economic structure. Universal suffrage itself "cannot and never will provide anything more." True democracy is the "work of the people themselves" rather than a "puppet show" manipulated by capital; it is "the rule of the majority" rather than the game of the few; it is whole-process democracy rather than "dormant democracy" or a "one-off deal"; it is "the principle of the proletariat, the principle of the masses," rather than the principle of the bourgeoisie or the principle of financial moguls.

The so-called...

“Human rights” are, in fact, bourgeois rights: “the equal exploitation of labor-power is the first human right of capital,” and “one of the most essential human rights to be proclaimed was bourgeois property.” The bourgeoisie recognizes only one kind of innate, eternal, standard, and abstract human right common to all humanity—that is, the emphasis that all people, including capitalists and wage laborers, are “human.” This uses the natural attributes of the person to erase the class antagonism between people; it replaces the inequality of status, identity, and class with legally stipulated equal human rights; and it substitutes a historical and class-based understanding of rights with an unchanging, supra-social, and supra-historical concept. Human rights are a product of history: “Right can never be higher than the economic structure of society and its cultural development conditioned thereby,” and “the rights of citizens... were graded according to their means.” The core of bourgeois human rights is individualism: “None of the so-called rights of man, therefore, go beyond egoistic man, beyond man as a member of civil society.” The Western advocacy that individual human rights are superior to collective human rights is nothing more than a defense of the unbridled exercise of individual rights; the advocacy that human rights are superior to sovereignty is merely a service to interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, clearing the path for great capital to expand across the world.

The so-called “equality” is the “equal exploitation of labor-power”; it is “bourgeois equality before the law”; it is equality for everyone before the law of value; it is the principle of commodity exchange of equivalents, namely “the exchange of equivalent for equivalent”; it is the principle of equivalent exchange whereby the bourgeois buys the labor-power of the proletarian; it is the equality of exchanging the things created by my labor with me; it is equality in buying and selling—it is, quite simply, “calling inequality equality.” The concept of equality itself is a historical product; its formation, like its “form of social existence,” required the entirety of preceding history. “Such a conception of equality... can be anything you like, but it cannot be an eternal truth.” The concept that all men are born equal and the right to equality remain “confined within a bourgeois framework.” Once they leave the sphere of commodity exchange, the characters in the historical drama undergo a change: “He who was previously the money-owner now strides out in front as a capitalist; the possessor of labor-power follows as his laborer. The one with an air of importance, smirking, intent on business; the other, timid and holding back, like one who is bringing his own hide to market and has nothing to expect but—a tanning.”

The so-called “fraternity” (or philanthropy) ^[7] is the demand that the exploited and the exploiter love and cooperate with one another; it requires the proletarian and the bourgeois to respect and love each other; it requires the proletariat to be deeply grateful to the bourgeoisie. “Fraternity” is a means used by the bourgeoisie to safeguard its own interests; it is a "magic potion" used to expand domestic and international markets, and a sedative or narcotic used to dissolve the revolutionary will of the proletariat. True, universal human love can only be realized in a future society; it can only be completed through the pursuit of communism that is “actual and directly seeking practical effects.” Marx and Engels profoundly exposed the true face of bourgeois “fraternity”: The February Revolution of 1848 in France was carried out jointly by the workers and the bourgeoisie. When the proletariat fought side-by-side with the bourgeoisie for universal suffrage, the words “The French Republic! Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” appeared strikingly on walls throughout Paris. The Paris proletariat was “drunk with this atmosphere of broad-minded and benevolent fraternity.” However, the fruits of the revolution were swallowed by the bourgeoisie alone. When the proletariat launched the June Revolution to fight for its own interests, it was met with “unheard-of cruel revenge” by the bourgeoisie in power. This “was civil class war, the most terrible form of civil war—the war between labor and capital.” Once the fundamental interests of the bourgeoisie are threatened by the proletariat, they will “replace the slogan of the Republic, ‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,’ with the unambiguous words: ‘Infantry, Cavalry, Artillery’!”

While criticizing the hypocrisy of the values of the old society, Marx and Engels revealed the core value pursuits of the new society: the free and well-rounded development of every individual, the liberation of all humanity, the reconciliation of man with nature, and the reconciliation of man with himself. All of these belong to the category of socialist value ideals. Although Marx and Engels envisioned a landscape of common values for the ideal future society, as they emphasized when elaborating on their distinction from utopian socialism: “We do not anticipate the world dogmatically, but rather wish to find the new world through criticism of the old.” They did not explore the issue of common values or a consensus on values under the conditions of the coexistence of “one globe, two systems” ^[8]. This became a mandatory question left by the classical Marxist writers for future generations to answer.

III. The Common Values of All Humanity Transcend Geographic Boundaries and Social Systems, Forming a Principle of Common Values

For a long time, Chinese Communists have emphasized the particularity, historicity, and class nature of values. Although there were some discussions on the consensus of values for all humanity—that is, the issue of common values—they were limited. For instance, as early as 1943, Mao Zedong pointed out: “National freedom and political democracy have become the established principles of the new world; we, the Chinese people, welcome the arrival of this New Era.” However, generally speaking, there was a lack of systematic thinking and structured discourse. Entering the 21st century, as economic globalization deepened, the fields and spaces of international interaction have extended daily. The global peace deficit, development deficit, security deficit, and governance deficit have become increasingly prominent. The global common market urgently needs to establish universally recognized value benchmarks; universal global interaction urgently needs to lay down common value norms; and global governance urgently requires finding the intersection of interests that transcends ideology and political systems. Otherwise, a common market and universal interaction that cross national borders, religions, civilizations, social systems, and ideologies will become impossible. Whether there exists a value consensus in the world market that transcends geographic boundaries, whether universal global interaction can reach commonly followed value standards, and whether different human civilizations can find a "greatest common denominator" ^[9] of values—these are subjects we must answer amidst the "great changes" ^[10].

Since the New Era, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has focused on "value in general" ^[11] and the intersecting points of common human interests that transcend social formations. Against the grand backdrop of universal global interaction and the coexistence of “one globe, two systems,” they have profoundly grasped the value consensus and greatest common denominator of different nations and civilizations. They have refined the common values of all humanity that transcend geographic boundaries, systemic differences, and ideological divides, thereby forming the principle of common values. The core connotations of this principle include the following:

First, common values are the value-based guidance for universal global interaction. As history transforms into world history, interaction also transforms into universal global interaction. For cross-cultural universal interaction to be possible, it must necessarily take commonly followed rules and concepts of interaction as a prerequisite. A value concept that truly assists universal global interaction must possess a normative function, effectively guiding and correcting behaviors in world interaction and providing basic value standards. Common values do not seek to replace one system with another, or one civilization with another; rather, they are committed to reaching a value consensus that transcends social systems, ideologies, history, and culture. Common values are a consensus formed based on the common practical activities of all humanity to satisfy the common needs and interests of all humanity. This consensus is committed to “expanding the points of converging interests and drawing the largest possible concentric circles,” and to condensing the greatest common denominator of values for “people of different nations, faiths, cultures, and regions.” They provide value guidance for the world market and universal interaction and lay the value foundation for building a better world.

Second, peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy, and freedom are the common values of all humanity. Different nations and cultural circles have their own specific value pursuits; what resides within these specific pursuits are the common values of all humanity. Xi Jinping pointed out: We must shoulder the responsibility of condensing value consensus. “Countries vary in history, culture, system, and level of development, but the people of all countries pursue the common values of all humanity: peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy, and freedom.” Peace and development are the common cause of humanity; fairness and justice are the common ideals of humanity; democracy and freedom are the common pursuits of humanity. We should understand the perceptions of value connotations held by different civilizations with a broad mind, not impose our own values and models on others, and not engage in ideological confrontation.

Third, the common values of all humanity lay the value foundation for building a community with a shared future for humanity. A community with a shared future for humanity is a community of interests and also a community of values. “Humanity has only one Earth, and humanity has only one common future”—this fully expresses the common interest relationships and value pursuits of all humanity. “Common values” represent a value consensus with universal significance, providing the value bedrock for a community with a shared future for humanity. Xi Jinping pointed out: “We should vigorously promote the common values of all humanity—peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy, and freedom—and jointly provide correct conceptual guidance for building a better world.”

The common values of all humanity represent a profound innovation in the history of human thought. They are the highest abstraction and summation of the universal value pursuits of all progressive forces in the world. They lay a common value foundation for the joint development of countries and nations across different regions, social systems, ideologies, and religions. They establish basic value norms for universal human interaction and provide a common value bond for achieving the broadest unity in a turbulent international community. For the "new form of human civilization" ^[12] created by China to occupy an important position in the landscape of world civilizations and truly become a world culture, it must reflect the common values of all humanity while highlighting Socialist Core Values. On the premise of upholding cultural subjectivity, it must merge into the tide of human civilizational development. While preserving its own value ideals, it must contribute universal value concepts and intellectual achievements to the “sum of human knowledge.”

Socialist Core Values and the common values of all humanity constitute the two pillars of values in the New Era; they constitute the latest achievements of the Marxist theory of value, and the two complement each other. Socialist Core Values emphasize particularity, while the common values of all humanity highlight the commonality inherent within that particularity. Core values manifest the value characteristics and individuality of different social formations, while common values manifest the value consensus and greatest common denominator of different countries. Core values aim to establish value norms for the state, society, and citizens, while common values aim to condense value consensus for all humanity. Core values provide the fundamental value guidance for building a common spiritual home for the Chinese nation, while common values lay a solid value foundation for building a community with a shared future for humanity. Socialist Core Values and the common values of all humanity both uphold, at the level of principle, the value conception of Marx and Engels that “all value is, in the final analysis, value for man; man is the starting point of all value activities and the destination of all value movements.” Furthermore, they expand the value content of the command to “strive to ensure that the simple laws of morals and justice, which ought to govern the relations of private individuals, should become the paramount rules of the intercourse of nations,” greatly enriching and developing the Marxist theory of value.

IV. The Principle of Common Values is a Value Benchmark Guiding the Progress of Human Civilization, Making a Foundational Contribution to Developing the Marxist Theory of Value

The principle of common values is the latest achievement in the development of Marxist values in contemporary China and the modern world. Through a series of landmark major concepts and original ideological viewpoints, it has profoundly restructured the core categories and important propositions of the Marxist theory of value, making a foundational contribution to the development of Marxism.

First, the principle of common values accounts for the dual connotations of "value in general" and "value in particular," making up for the previous one-sidedness that focused on one point to the exclusion of others. In the past, both China and the West proceeded from the particularity of values, engaging in dialogue based on the core value pursuits of different societies and systems; thus, they were like two parallel lines that never met. The “universal values” peddled by Western countries are nothing but the core values of capitalist society. The value ideals constructed by Marx are, in essence, the core values of a future society. The Socialist Core Values refined by contemporary Chinese Communists belong to the core values of contemporary China. The core values of the Western world and those of contemporary China are parallel lines, each speaking its own language. However, the common values of all humanity are oriented toward the goals of “transcending civilizational barriers through exchange, transcending civilizational conflict through mutual learning, and transcending civilizational superiority through coexistence, promoting mutual understanding and affinity among peoples to co-build a garden of civilizations where all beauties are shared.” On the premise of acknowledging the diverse practices of different countries, nations, social systems, and ideologies, they have drawn a value “concentric circle” for different human civilizations, focusing on highlighting value commonality and value in general.

The so-called "universal values" peddled by Western countries...

"Universal values" represent a false universality; they are an absolute universality that erodes difference and constitutes an abstract identity. They advocate for the construction of a homogenous value order that transcends time and space, denying the particularity of values and pursuing an unprincipled, undifferentiated, conflict-free, and frozen absolute identity. The result is "uniformity without harmony" (tong er bu he) ^[13] and "stagnation through uniformity" (tong ze bu ji) ^[14]. In contrast, the common values of all humanity advocated by China represent a true universality; they are a universality that embraces contradiction and difference and constitutes a concrete identity. They emphasize the commonality behind diversity and pursue a principled, differentiated harmonious coexistence. The result is "harmony without uniformity" (he er bu tong) ^[15] and "harmony generating all things" (he shi sheng wu) ^[16].

There is an essential difference between common values and "universal values" regarding their public nature. First, concerning the demarcation of value publicity, common values emphasize the finitude of temporal, spatial, and subjective conditions; they do not attempt to "cover" all countries, regions, nations, and subjects with a specific set of values. "Universal values," however, emphasize the infinitude of value publicity, setting no temporal, spatial, or subjective boundaries for their own applicability. Second, regarding the functional orientation of value publicity, common values "represent values with public characteristics that can be shared by the people of the world." They reflect the basic value pursuits of all humanity, possess intrinsic resonance and identification, and serve as value norms to guide action. "Universal values" are essentially an ideology used by Western culture to combat non-Western cultures, arrogantly claiming that "at present, there is no ideology claiming universal validity that can compete with liberal democracy." This is a form of value-based discipline characterized by conquest, expansion, and enslavement. Third, regarding the practical logic of value publicity, common values follow the peaceful logic of "one world under heaven" and "humanity as one body." They emphasize a value inclusivity of "helping each other in the same boat" (he zhong gong ji) ^[17] and "harmonious coexistence" (he he gong sheng) ^[18], aiming to "fundamentally change hegemonism itself and move toward a 'new cosmopolitanism' of peaceful development and win-win cooperation." "Universal values," meanwhile, are "products of bourgeois relations of production and property relations," following the capital logic and hegemonic logic of zero-sum games, plotting to shape the value hegemony of capitalism.

Furthermore, the principle of common values relatively distinguishes value concepts from their forms of realization (paths), transcending the Western cognitive error of conflating the two. Value concepts are one thing; the practical forms of those concepts (i.e., value models) are another. The two cannot be discussed as if they were identical. Generally speaking, differing value concepts lead to differing value models. However, it must also be recognized that the same value concept can absolutely be expressed through different value models. For instance, in Western countries, the realization of capitalist democracy can take the form of a two-party or multi-party system; a presidential or parliamentary system; a constitutional monarchy or a democratic republic; and direct or indirect democracy. In essence, these all manifest the value concept of capital being the master of the house. In our country, the realization of socialist democracy includes the system of people's congresses, the system of multi-party cooperation and political consultation under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, the system of regional ethnic autonomy, and the system of primary-level self-governance. In essence, these all manifest the value concept of the people being the masters of the house. conversely, the same value model may embody different value concepts. For example, regarding democratic elections, China embodies the concept of whole-process people's democracy, the essence of which is the people being masters of the house; the West embodies bourgeois democratic values, the essence of which is capital being the master of the house.

We advocate for the common values of all humanity, but we do not seek identical forms of realization or paths of practice. China has always been an advocate for the common values of all humanity, "understanding the understanding of value connotations held by different civilizations with a broad mind, and respecting the exploration of value realization paths by the people of different countries." We respect the localized and individualized paths chosen by different countries. That is to say, we advocate for peace, development, equity, justice, democracy, and freedom, but we will not export China’s social system, development path, or democratic model, nor will we seek a standardized form of value realization. Our opposition to the West's so-called "universal values" is not an opposition to value concepts such as "freedom, democracy, and human rights," but rather an opposition to the West ignoring the distinction between value concepts and their forms of realization. It is an opposition to the West equating the specific realization of "freedom, democracy, and human rights" with the values themselves, unconditionally and undifferentiatedly promoting them to the non-Western world, and forcing the Western path of realization upon the globe. This is an error. Xi Jinping has pointed out: "Does adopting Western sets of things make one freer, more democratic, and more stable? Look at the results for some developing countries that copied Western political and party systems. Many fell into political turmoil and social chaos, with people displaced. Vivid examples are right before our eyes." We must never follow in the tracks of these countries.

Finally, the principle of common values relatively distinguishes ideological attributes from human attributes, avoiding the past limitations of focusing solely on ideological perspectives. Values themselves are inherently ideological; there is no such thing as a "value" that is purely objective, neutral, and detached from ideology. On the question of values, so-called "value neutrality" does not exist. Values adapted to different temporal and spatial scopes have different stances and subjective presuppositions, and their ideological intensity varies. Generally speaking, "universal values" highlight the standpoint of capital, have clear subjective presuppositions, represent the fundamental interests of the bourgeoisie, and belong to bourgeois ideology; thus, they possess strong capitalist ideological attributes. The core socialist values highlight the standpoint of the people, likewise have clear subjective orientations, and represent the fundamental interests of the vast majority of the people; thus, they possess distinct socialist ideological attributes.

Differing from these, the common values of all humanity—at the current stage—highlight the standpoint of humanity, represent the common interests of all humanity, and belong to an inter-subjective value consensus. They do not belong to a single fixed political ideological system nor do they serve specific political ideological purposes; thus, they possess weak ideological attributes. Therefore, our advocacy for the common values of all humanity by no means implies the export of ideology or values to the world. When meeting with foreign guests attending the commemorations for the 70th anniversary of the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, Xi Jinping pointed out: "Promote the common values of all humanity—peace, development, equity, justice, democracy, and freedom—and build consensus among people of different nations, faiths, cultures, and regions." Xi Jinping also noted: "Promoting the building of a community with a shared future for humanity is not about replacing one system with another, or one civilization with another. Rather, it is about countries with different social systems, ideologies, histories, cultures, and development levels sharing symbiotic interests, rights, and responsibilities in international affairs, forming the greatest common denominator for building a better world." The value foundation behind building a community with a shared future for humanity is precisely the common values of all humanity, and the best practical platform for practicing these values is the building of a community with a shared future for humanity. The two share a common value orientation: opposing Cold War mentality and "ideological leadership" (yishi xingtai gua shuai) ^[19]. Clearly, "the common values of all humanity condense the value consensus of different civilizations, reflect the greatest common denominator of value concepts universally recognized by the people of all countries, and transcend differences in ideology, social system, and development level." It is in this sense that the common values of all humanity transcend the chasm of social systems and ideologies; their ideological and systemic attributes are naturally weaker and more muted.

The principle of common values is a system of value concepts guiding the development of contemporary world civilization. It is the basic guideline leading the spiritual growth of the world and the progress of human civilization. It provides a code of conduct for universal global interaction and the interaction between countries of "two systems" (socialism and capitalism), laying the value foundation for promoting a new type of international relations and building a community with a shared future for humanity. The principle of common values is rooted in the temporal and spatial context of universal global interaction in the New Era. It points toward a visionary value of a "garden of civilizations where all beauties are shared" (mei mei yu gong) ^[20] and follows the value position that "all value is, in the final analysis, value for people." It rejects the value hegemony of the capitalist "singular value" and forms a value principle that fundamentally transcends "universal values." With its landmark concepts, original ideas, and foundational theoretical achievements, it has enriched and developed Marxist value theory.