Han Qingxiang: Beneficial Results in Exploring the Cultural Dimension of a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind
The history of human society is an evolutionary process in which "real individuals" [1], nature, and society mutually achieve and constrain one another. In the process of forming and transcending the self, humanity drives social development. Under the influence of concrete conditions, human society gradually evolves from "natural communities" to "illusory communities" [2] and ultimately toward the "true community." Culture, accordingly, undergoes a metamorphic process—moving from communication barriers and ethnic conflicts toward the crossing of borders and the attainment of mutual recognition. Since the 18th Party Congress, facing the major questions of what kind of world should be built and how to build it, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed the concept of building a community with a shared future for humanity, offering a series of important expositions and deeply advancing its concrete practice. Professor Liu Tongfang’s recent monograph, Research on the Cultural Construction and International Recognition of a Community with a Shared Future for Humanity (published by People’s Publishing House), is a fruitful scholarly achievement centered on this vital concept.
Demonstrating a realistic perspective characterized by problem-orientation and practical construction. This book is problem-oriented, grounded in a long-term (longue durée), multi-ethnic historical investigation that explores at a macro level how culture shapes international recognition of a community with a shared future for humanity. The author accurately grasps the totalizing positioning of today's global cultural environment and the landscape of world civilizations. He clarifies the realistic direction and contemporary tasks of culturally constructing a community with a shared future for humanity, manifesting a historical consciousness that unfolds theoretical research guided by specific problems. The work is divided into two volumes, covering: preliminary clarifications, the innovation of "matrix" resources, realistic directions and contemporary tasks, historical evolution and the validation of principles, and realistic possibilities and construction strategies. These sections are closely linked and advance progressively. From reviewing various "community" categories and their status in Marx’s era to reflecting on the existential forms of social ideals in traditional Chinese thought, the book proceeds to grasp the community with a shared future for humanity as a product of the "Two Combinations" [3]. It explores the historical connections between this concept, Marx’s "true community," and the "Great Unity" (Datong) [4] society of traditional culture, revealing the relationship between practical construction and the theory of historical philosophy. By explaining the core issue of "cultural construction as a historical mode of human existence and practice," the book elucidates the universal historicity of human practice in constructing communities, showcasing the author's historical consciousness in using philosophical and social science methods to examine practical problems.
Developing a scholarly ethos deeply imbued with contemporary concerns and realistic reflection. The book combines the history of social development with the history of philosophy, conducting deep reflections on realistic problems based on the requirements of the era. It explores the temporal background facing the cultural construction of a community with a shared future for humanity. This exploration is rooted both in the grand background of "changes unseen in a century" [5]—analyzing the overall developmental status of world history—and in the developmental stage of Chinese socialism entering a New Era. By dissecting the realistic situations at the economic, political, and cultural levels, it reflects a scholarly care and responsibility that stays close to the themes of the times, examines modern society, and looks forward to the future of humanity. The book opens with a "Preliminary Clarification of the Community with a Shared Future for Humanity," tracing and analyzing the concept and related views on social forms within the perspective of historical materialism. From the perspective of the overall process of world history, researchers in different periods have had vastly different understandings of "community." The book treats the cultural discourse of the community with a shared future for humanity as a task of "the era captured in thought." It analyzes realistic problems and contemporary missions from the three dimensions of ontological foundations, epistemological support, and axiological stance. It reveals the inherent contradictions and root causes of the expansion of the logic of capital and the imbalance of global development. It emphasizes that the focus of research should lie in creating the conditions for the reproduction of global community forms, confirming the basic principles for handling community conflicts, and striking the spiritual core of world civilizations, thereby demonstrating a scholarly commitment to providing constructive interpretations of realistic problems in China and the world.
Exhibiting an open vision of comparative thinking and the mutual learning among civilizations. Guided by the Marxist theory of world history and its view of civilization, the community with a shared future for humanity is a concept for the development of human society proposed through a profound grasp of the laws of contemporary global development. At the same time, it is built upon the dialectical sublation [6] of traditional Chinese thought and Western theory. Comparative thinking naturally becomes an important method for exploring the cultural construction and international recognition of a community with a shared future for humanity. The book examines this cultural construction within a comparison of various global cultural forms, exploring the continuous characteristics of Chinese civilization, the reasons for the discontinuity of other civilizations, and the future direction of human social existence and cultural creation. The first volume reveals the trend toward a transition from "cultural encounters" to "mutual learning among civilizations" in the process of human history by discussing the state of the world civilizational order and the generation of cultural construction and community legitimacy. This signifies a state where different national cultures gradually form a co-existence and equal interaction. The second volume explores the internal laws of the continuous generation of meaning in the process of mutual learning by explaining the dialectical movement between "Self" and "Other." This reflects the author’s global vision in summarizing universal laws through multi-dimensional comparisons. In explaining the international community’s recognition of a community with a shared future for humanity, the author deeply researches the internal links between common values, cultural construction, and international recognition. He confirms the inevitable process by which different countries recognize common values in concrete practice, actively participate in cultural construction, and reach a global consensus, thereby validating the general trend of promoting mutual learning among civilizations and achieving the symbiosis of cultural meaning.
In short, by clarifying the historical positioning of a community with a shared future for humanity and explaining the dialectical relationship between cultural construction and international recognition, this book advances its discourse layer by layer with an orderly logical sequence. From the perspective of human social development and civilizational progress, it deeply researches the theoretical construction and realistic paths of a community with a shared future for humanity. It is an excellent work that integrates history and reality, facts and values, and the era and its trends of thought into an organic whole through a multi-dimensional approach.