2020 Annual Meeting of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism Focuses on "Great Historical Changes: Scientific Worldview and Methodology in Unconventional Situations"
From November 6 to 8, 2020, the 2020 Annual Conference of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism was grandly held at the Boya Building of the University Town Campus of Chongqing Normal University. The conference was hosted by the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Chongqing Normal University, and organized by the School of Marxism of Chongqing Normal University, the Chongqing Research Center for the Theoretical System of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics, the Chongqing Research Center for Citizen Morality and Social Construction, and the Chongqing Research Center for Party Building in Higher Education Institutions. It was co-organized by the Research Center for National Cultural Security and Ideology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and the editorial department of Marxist Studies (Makesizhuyi Yanjiu). The theme of this annual conference was "The Great Historical Changes: Scientific Worldview and Methodology in Unconventional Situations." More than 160 participants attended, including Professor Hou Huiqin, President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism; Vice Presidents Professor Wu Fulai, Fellow Feng Yanli, Professor Yang Haifeng, Professor Yan Xiaofeng, Professor Jiang Yingchun, Professor Yuan Yinchuan, and Professor Yang Shengping; Secretary-General Fellow Zhu Jidong; Professor Meng Dongfang, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and President of Chongqing Normal University; as well as executive directors and directors of the Society, representatives of selected paper authors, and faculty and graduate students from the School of Marxism at Chongqing Normal University.
The opening ceremony of the conference was held on the morning of November 7, presided over by Fellow Zhu Jidong, Secretary-General of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Executive Deputy Director and Secretary-General of the Research Center for National Cultural Security and Ideology at CASS. Meng Dongfang and Hou Huiqin delivered speeches on behalf of the host organizations. In his speech, Meng Dongfang extended a warm welcome to experts and scholars from all over the country, expressed heartfelt thanks to the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism for its trust in Chongqing Normal University, and introduced the university's outstanding achievements in recent years regarding its acquisition of doctoral degree conferring status, discipline cluster construction, the National Center for Applied Mathematics, the second prize of the National Natural Science Award, and cultural construction. In his address, Hou Huiqin welcomed and thanked the delegates who had traveled despite great difficulties for the prosperity of the Society and the study of Marxist truth. He expressed gratitude to the faculty and students of the School of Marxism at Chongqing Normal University for their hard work and warm service. He provided an in-depth interpretation of this year's theme, analyzed the causes of the current world's fragmentation, division, and disorder, and criticized the falsity of capitalist ideology. He emphasized the need to use Marxism as a "telescope and microscope" to observe the real world, human history, and the future. He called for maintaining strategic focus, promoting the spirit of revolutionary struggle and criticism, and strengthening self-revolution so as to transform the subjective world while transforming the objective world.
From November 7 to 8, the conference featured one keynote report, two plenary thematic sessions, and three sub-forum presentations and discussions. Professor Chen Hong, Director of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Dean of the School of Marxism at Chongqing Normal University, and Professor Jiang Yingchun, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Secretary of the Party Committee of the School of Information Management at Nanjing University, presided over the keynote report and thematic speeches respectively.
Professor Hou Huiqin, President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Director of the Research Center for National Cultural Security and Ideology at CASS, delivered a keynote report titled "Engels' Contribution to Marxist Philosophy." He pointed out that Engels was the first person to uphold the fundamentals and break new ground in Marxist philosophy. His main contributions lay in: bridging ontology and epistemology, solving Kant’s riddle of the "thing-in-itself," founding the dialectics of nature, establishing the foundation of materialist dialectics, and making unique contributions to the "new materialism" [1]. He bridged the history of ancient and modern philosophical thought, established the fundamental question of philosophy, and set an objective standard for correctly conducting the struggle in philosophical ideas. Furthermore, he bridged German Classical Philosophy with Marxist philosophy, providing a scientific generalization of the latter. Hou then provided a deep and detailed explanation of how these bridges were scientifically constructed, highlighting Engels’ great contributions.
Professor Wu Fulai, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and Secretary of the Discipline Inspection Committee at Renmin University of China, gave a thematic speech titled "Methodological Research on the Formulation of Intra-Party Regulations." He analyzed the attributes, characteristics, and steps of formulating intra-party regulations, noting they possess both legal and practical attributes. He identified their purposeful, practical, procedural, and interdisciplinary characteristics, stating that the legislative path for intra-party regulations involves a problem-solving methodological path followed by the further demonstration of regulatory recommendations from previous stages.
Professor Yang Haifeng, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Dean of the School of Marxism at Peking University, spoke on "Knowledge Map of the Contemporary Development of Marxist Philosophy." He stated that Marx established the concept of historicity, which laid the theoretical premise for political economy and Marxist philosophy. He emphasized that philosophy has its historical determinations and that one must attend to the significant differences in philosophical expressions across different eras, as well as the processes of social change and theoretical development.
Professor Jiang Yingchun, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Secretary of the Party Committee of the School of Information Management at Nanjing University, delivered a speech titled "Analysis and Assessment of the Liberal View of History." He argued that the "great changes unseen in a century" represent a historical contest between capitalism and socialism, and between Marxism and liberalism. This involves the interaction between the strategic overall situation of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and these great changes, as well as the overlapping interaction between China’s period of strategic opportunity and the period of strategic anxiety in Western countries led by the United States. He pointed out that the philosophical basis of liberalism is idealism and metaphysics, manifested in replacing the whole with the part, reality with imagination, and essence with phenomena.
Professor Yan Xiaofeng, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Dean of the School of Marxism at Tianjin University, spoke on "Adhering to Bottom-line Thinking: An Important Methodology Under Unconventional Situations." He emphasized understanding "bottom-line thinking" [2] from six aspects: a "measurement" thinking that accurately determines boundaries; a scientific thinking that accurately grasps the absolute and relative nature of "degree" (du); a value thinking that avoids harm and pursues benefit; a creative thinking that gives full play to subjective initiative; a predictive thinking where cognition originates from practice but precedes it; and a global thinking that masters major events and manages risks.
Fellow Feng Yanli, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Deputy Director of the Institute of Philosophy at CASS, delivered a speech titled "'Justice as Fairness' and 'Fairness as Justice'." He compared the books Justice as Fairness, The Fairness of Justice, and The Two Sides of Justice. He pointed out that Justice as Fairness was Rawls’s response to academic criticism of A Theory of Justice and his revision of the two principles of justice. While later works sought to transcend Rawls and succeeded in some respects, none of the three reached the height of Marx. They failed to see the importance of production determining distribution and did not explain conceptual things based on material practice. Feng argued for deepening research on justice through the dialectics of fairness and justice, and actively constructing a system of disciplines, academic systems, and discourse systems for philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics.
Professor Yuan Yinchuan, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and Professor at the School of Marxism at Wuhan University, spoke on "Engels' Theoretical Contribution to the Basic Principles of Marxism." He discussed three major contributions: co-founding the basic principles with Marx; enriching these principles in terms of philosophy, political economy, and scientific socialism; and defending them against dogmatism and revisionism after Marx’s death.
Professor Yang Shengping, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Historical Materialism and President of the Capital Normal University Press, spoke on "Grasping the General Situation of Historical Development through the Unification of Historical Regularity and Selectivity." He discussed the deepened understanding of historical regularity and selectivity and the interpretation of the "Great Changes," emphasizing the need to correctly grasp the Marxist view of the era and handle the relationship between global and international relations, as well as the domestic and international "two overall situations."
Fellow Zhu Jidong, Secretary-General of the Society and Executive Deputy Director of the Research Center for National Cultural Security and Ideology at CASS, spoke on "From Mao Zedong to Xi Jinping: Continuity and Change in Adhering to the Principle of 'Statesmen Running Newspapers'." [3] He noted that in the New Era, this principle has deeper connotations and higher requirements. He argued that "statesmen running newspapers, journals, and websites" is a fundamental principle, that Party management of ideology is key, and that the "Four Musts" must be followed: maintaining the correct orientation of public opinion, strengthening the professional team, focusing on the "key minority" of leading cadres, and vigorously strengthening ideological capacity building.
Professor Lin Jinping, Executive Director of the Society and Dean of the School of Marxism at Sun Yat-sen University, spoke on "From Communist Morality to the Construction of Marxist Ethics." He reviewed representative figures and theories in the study of communist morality, affirming the contributions of Marxist ethics while questioning the rationality of deriving value demands from necessity in certain historical developments of the field.
Professor Zhang Zhidan, Executive Director of the Society and Dean of the School of Marxism at Shanghai Normal University, spoke on "The Humanity of Revolution." He proposed that revolution itself contains humanity and that the social systems established after a revolution help elevate and guarantee humanity. Evaluating the humanity of revolution must adhere to the Marxist historical materialist view, combining human standards with historical evaluation standards.
Professor Zhang Shihai, Director of the Society and Dean of the School of Marxism at Shandong University, spoke on "Accurately Grasping the Methodological Principles in Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era." He emphasized combining a Chinese standpoint with a global vision, combining realistic needs with historical reflection, and combining partial interpretation with a holistic grasp.
Professor Li Changtai of the School of Marxism at Chongqing Normal University and Vice President of the Chongqing Ethical Society, spoke on "Marxism and the Reconstruction of the Subjectivity of the Chinese Nation." He interpreted this from five dimensions: the ancient strength of Chinese subjectivity; the modern (1840-1949) predicament that called for Marxist consciousness; the modern pursuit as the source of power for accepting the Marxist spirit; the process of the Sinicization of Marxism as the great practice of restoring Chinese subjectivity; and the deepening practice in the New Era as the great reconstruction of that subjectivity.
On the afternoon of November 7, the conference established three sub-forums focusing on "Contemporary Chinese Marxism, 21st Century Marxism, and the World’s Great Changes Unseen in a Century," "Scientific Worldview and Methodology Amidst Great Changes Unseen in a Century," and "The Adherence, Inheritance, Development, and Innovation of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era."
Following the sub-forums, group reports were presented. Professor Tan Qunyu (Sun Yat-sen University), Professor Jiang Guifang (Zhengzhou University), and Fellow Fu Erji (Shanghai Institute for Development and Reform) reported for their respective forums. Professor Yuan Yinchuan presided over the reporting session.
Professor Chen Hong presided over the closing ceremony, and Fellow Zhu Jidong summarized the conference, hailing it as a high-level, high-efficiency, and high-quality event. Professor Hou Huiqin, in his closing remarks, stated that the conference was practical and successful, reflecting a unification of scholarship and politics. He emphasized that the study of Marxist philosophy has no end and urged scholars to focus on the integrity, revolutionary nature, and scientificity of Marxism to create more theoretical achievements.
On the evening of November 6, the Society held the second plenary session of the 8th Member Representative Assembly and the 8th Board of Directors, where they revised the Society’s charter, decided on the venues for 2021, and elected new directors.
Source: China Social Science Network (CSSN) Web Editor: Xinran