The achievement and dilemma of political education in Chinese universities since 1978: a comparative perspective

Li Yu Wen

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УДК 316.3/.4+321

ДОСТИЖЕНИЕ И ДИЛЕММА ПОЛИТИЧЕСКОГО ОБРАЗОВАНИЯ В КИТАЙСКИХ УНИВЕРСИТЕТАХ С 1978: СРАВНИТЕЛЬНЫЙ АНАЛИЗ

Юй Вень Ли (Пекин, КНР)

В данной статье автор рассматривает развитие политического образования в Китае с 1978 г. Автор отмечает, что политическое образование всегда было противоречивым, так же, как и социально-политическая жизнь в современном Китае. Наряду с радикальными изменениями, внесенными Реформой 1978 г., политическое образование в китайских университетах постепенно переходило, и по содержанию, и по форме, от стереотипной идеологически-политической работы к модернизированной научной дисциплине с сильным теоретическим основанием. Начиная с того же самого 1978 года, китайское правительство приняло ряд документов о политическом образовании, чтобы начать изменение общественной ситуации, характеризовавшейся хаотичностью и политическим экстремизмом, последовавшим за Большой Культурной революцией и продлившейся в течение 10 лет. В 1984 г. идеологическое и политическое образование постепенно устанавливалось как базовая академическая дисциплина, включенная в программу бакалавриата. Далее автор отмечает, что политическая образовательная практика в Китае столкнулась со многими трудностями, являющимися результатом изменяющегося общества и изменяющегося нового мира.

Интересна позиция автора, связанная с подходом к определению политического образования. Политическое образование на Востоке и Западе отличается во многих отношениях. Хотя общие особенности политического образования всегда имеют общие черты в следствие сходств политического, социального и культурного багажа отдельных исследователей. Чтобы получить адекватное понимание о главных особенностях политического образования в Китае, необходимо провести сравнительный анализ политической культуры Запада и Востока.

В то время как западные страны имеют тенденцию следовать правилам конституции, Китай, в силу исторически сложившихся моделей управления, за основу берет интересы этнического государства и партийное управление как базу политической жизни. Конституция на Западе с ее превосходством к пристрастным спорам и государственным учреждениям, поддерживает оправдание всех политических прав любого законопослушного гражданина. Поэтому не удивительно, что там ученые-политологи полагают, что политическое образование является процессом обучения, сосредоточенным на изменяющемся знании, отношении, умении и поведении, продвижении к политической идентичности, участии в политической жизни и политическом шоу. Поэтому, большинство педагогических процедур в университетах на Западе фокусируют внимание на взаимосвязи между людьми и гражданским обществом.

Юй Вень Ли - профессор философии образования, директор центра политического образования Школы Марксизма, проректор Института социальной экономики и культуры, Пекинский университет. Е-таі1 [email protected]

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Чтобы осмыслить новые тенденции в отношении изменения содержания политического образования за прошлые тридцать лет в Китае, автор исследует обширный массив документов, принятых китайским правительством в этой области, и приходит к выводу, что политическое образование постепенно сформировалось как научный предмет.

Рассматривая достижения политического образования за этот период, автор отмечает, что внедрение политического образования в китайских университетах никогда не проходило гладко. Оно столкнулось с проблемами и конфликтами, которые сделали курс политического образования проблематичным. Дилемма все еще существует. После выявления и анализа существующей дилеммы политического образования автор обрисовывает перспективы его реализации в китайских университетах.

Ключевые слова: образование, политическое образование, наука, западная политическая философия, педагогическое обучение.

Introduction

Political education has always been a controversy as much as a top issue of social-political life in modern China. Along with the drastic changes brought by the Reform and Opening up in 1978, political education in Chinese universities has gradually shifted in both contents and forms from stereotyped ideological-political work to a modernized scientific educational disciplinary with strong theoretical supports. Starting from the same year of 1978, Chinese government and its affiliated ministries have promulgated series of documents on political education, so as to normalize the social order from the chaotic state and political extremism resulting from The Great Cultural Revolution lasted for 10 years. In 1984, Ideological and Political Education was gradually established as an institutional academic discipline, firstly including bachelor’s degree then doctor’s degree. Up to 2009, political education in China has made great progress both as scientific research and as educational practice. Yet, facing the varieties of new challenges arising from a changing society and the changing new world, the political education practice in China has also encountered many difficulties. Observing from a historically analytical perspective, people may find that the achievements in political education since 1978 are obvious and encouraging, but the dilemma in which © 2011-2014 Вестник НГПУ

political education entangles is still problematic and troublesome.

Define political education in Chinese context

Due to different cultural tradition, social system, political framework, academic logic and educational practice, Political education differs in the east and the west in many ways. So, it’s necessary to make clear what political education means in Chinese context. Political education is far-reaching in its scope, in general it concerns with the theoretical, empirical, normative and conceptual dimensions of political practices. Up to now, there are no acknowledgements, no required doctrines in western political philosophy to advocate that political educationist do or ought to address an authoritative definition for political education. The meaning of political education resides in its fluctuating uses, not in any essential property. It is nevertheless possible to identify some common features and thus generalize the basic elements in political education. In fact, while taking a stand of scholastic perspectives, one might find that there are so many issues, disputes and arguments involved in defining political education in academia. Because of the interdisciplinary complications and intermingling of social-cultural perspectives, the defining of political education is complicated among Chinese scholar themselves. Yet, the general features

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of political education can always be outlined because of the sameness of political, social and cultural background of individual researchers. In order to gain a better understanding of the main features of political education in China, it would be wise to have a comparative analysis upon the west and east approaches on defining political education. But as it is well known, ‘the concept of political education also is open to disagreement........in many classical Greek or Roman

theorists, the notion of political education is hard to distinguish from that of indoctrination. Both rulers and ruled, it was thought, ought to be trained in whatever knowledge, beliefs and behavior that might be demonstrably necessary to establish and maintain a given regime. Such education would vary, depending on whether the regime were the best form, the best attainable in the circumstances, or simply that which ex-ists.’(Melvin Richter, 1980) But, to list at least one definition, I agree to the explanatory words by Marshall William Conley, that political education ‘refers to the attempt to teach people, in this case school students, about politics and political system of which they are a part, with a view to making them more politically aware and to getting them to participate more effectively and more readily in the political arena.’(Marshall William Conley, 1993) Normally, in the west morphology and academic fields, political education is much more constitution-orientated while in China it is nation-partisan orientated. That is to say, while the west countries tend to pass the message of ‘constitution rules’, China, however, inherited from its cultural legacy, takes nation-state and party ruling as the first priority in political life. With its superiority to partisan disputes and state institutions, constitution in the west maintains the justification of all the political rights of any law-abiding citizen, therefore, it’s not strange at all that scholars in political science and social education academia propose that

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political education is a process of teachings centered on passing knowledge, attitude, value, skill and promoting behavior on political identity, political participation and political representation. Therefore, most of the pedagogical procedures in universities in the west focus on the interrelations between individuals and civil society. Student’s awareness of political education not only include but also categorize as some knowledge of government, individual understanding of the democratic process, political attitudes and activities towards social-political participation, the subscription to the values that operational to broader social and political orientations, such as civil liberty, community service and civic engagement. In general, these attitudes and values both conceptual and practical are rather open. Thus political conscience derived from the educational practice certainly will be bonded to a rather broader national-social perspective. However, different cultures breed different logics and thinking Chinese tend to be good at abstract thinking instead of concrete thinking, plus the deep influence of “authority ruling and power worship” in traditional Chinese political culture, political education is comparatively centered on the “grand narratives” of political life and political practice. Therefore, it is normal that political theories, especially the localized Marxist theory taken as the core content in formal pedagogical practice and theories such as Mao tse-tong Thought, Deng Xiao-ping Theory, etc will be important content for political education because these theories are believed to be the represents of the collective wisdom of Chinese communist party. As to the definition of political education, Chinese scholars tend to focus on the “class” issue and put more assertions on class relations instead of constitution, law and concreted political frameworks. Therefore, in some way, the definition of political education is severely po-

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liticalized in logic and perspective. Since there is a heavy leaning on the reforming and cultivating of individuals on their thoughts, the political education is also defined as a “mind work”, meaning to help to form and change other’s political thinking. With the combination of abstract theory teaching as core and the focus of class relations, political education is also called ideological and political education, even though scholars believe that these two can also be differentiated. What’s more, political education in China can be illustrated in very broad sense, either referring to the political publicity work on general public, or the professional training of pedagogical teaching to students. In this paper, the term of political education will be taken as the theoretical and practical education category in relating to politics, mainly on political theories as a scientific subject.

The achievements of political education since 1978: both quantitative and qualitative perspectives

Along with the dramatic changes happened by the end of 1970s, China started a new track of reform and opening to the outside world. This was the beginning of a great change destined to remodel the fate of Chinese people and the future of China. As Deng Xiao ping has put it, the reform and opening up is ‘the beginning of a new stage in historical development.’(Deng, 1994) In fact, the reform and opening up unveiled a brand-new and changing world that China should have embraced with and joint hands a long time ago. Apparently, this historical change in China’s state framework and domestic policy initiated the overall transformations happening in every corner of this land, in economy and politics as well as in culture and society. Contra to Mao’s administration, the most striking feature of the past 30 years (1978-2008) is that China is liberated from stereotyped political bondages and intense class struggles prevailed in the previous social and

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political life. Deng’s widely-cited saying, Emancipation of the mind, seeking truth from facts became the motto the core guideline in social and political life even though it sounds to be a pet-phrase and cliche now. with this pragmatic philosophy as the ethos of time, soul of life and beacon tower for sailing China in the vast ocean of a new world, changes unavoidably took place in all walks of life.

In ancient Chinese cultural philosophy, ‘ten is the climax of decimal numbers’. This is an adage literally interpreted as to define the regularity of changes in social development. A retrospection of the past 30 year may also reveal the seemingly regular changes with noticeable social events at the bottom of every ten years or so. Taken the end of 1970s as the beginning, then the end of 1980s and beginning of 1990s, together with the millennium of 2000 and even the Olympic 2008 into account, periodical great changes or upheaval, more often along with symbolic events, can always be found which undoubtedly have brought great impacts to Chinese social and political life, no matter it’s happy event or tragic turbulence. The rhythmic economic, political and social events contributed to the changes of the social existences, resulting in the diversity of economic interests, life modes, social organizations and distribution methods, providing educational contextual changes which in turn change the pedagogical psychology and methodology relating to the political education in Chinese universities.

To take a glance over the past 30 years, great achievements can also be found in the fields of political education, especially in the theoretical development and pedagogical teaching as a modern disciplinary. The process of political education can be described as following the process of political socialization of the society and the academic modeling as a scientific discipline. To reveal the specific achievement, both

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quantitative and qualitative analysis will be exemplified through the following aspects of progress. In this article, quantitative analysis will be focused on the more general aspect of policies on political education and academic development of the discipline.

1. the mainstream policy on political education, especially the policies reflecting the

changes of political educational pedagogy. In

the past thirty years, Chinese central government, especially the educational and publicity bureaus have promulgated nearly 50 new documents in regarding of the political educations in institutions of higher learning in China. (see 17 main documents in table®)

® Important Documents Released

Number Year Name of the documents Political Organs

1 1978.4 On enforcing the theoretical education of Marxism and Leninism in institutions of higher learning Ministry of education

2 1980.4.29 On strengthening the ideological and political work to University students Ministry of education, Central Youth League

З 1982.10.9 Notice on gradual establishment of communist ideological and moral course in institutions of higher learning Ministry of education

4 1984.4.13 On establishing ideological and political education major in 12 universities Ministry of education

5 1985.8.1 Notice on reforming the curricula teaching of ideological moral and political theory in universities and colleges Central committee of CPC

6 1986.9.1 Notice on opening Law Fundamentals in institutions of higher learning National education committee

7 1987.З.17 On further reform of pedagogy in Marxism Theory in institutions of higher learning National education committee

8 1987.5.29 Decision of reforming and strengthening ideological and political work in institutions of higher learning Central committee of CPC

9 1987.10.20 On the construction of ideological educational course in institutions of higher learning National education committee

10 1988.5.24 On the implement of Current and Policy education in institutions of higher learning National education committee

11 1991.8.З Suggestions on the strengthening and reforming of Marxism Theory Education in institutions of higher learning National education committee

12 1998.4.28 Notice on opening the course of introduction of Deng xiao-ping Theory in institutions of higher learning Central Publicity Ministry Ministry of Education

1З 2004.8.2б On further strengthening and improving the ideological and political education among university students Central Committee of CPC State Department

14 2004.11.17 Notice on further strengthening education of Current and Policy in institutions of higher learning Central Publicity Ministry Ministry of Education

15 2005.2.7 On further strengthening and improving ideological and political course in institutions of higher learning Central Publicity Ministry Ministry of Education

1б 200б.б.2б Notice on opening Ideological Moral Education and Fundamentals of Law starting from year 2006 in overall institutions of higher learning Ministry of Education

17 200б.12.22 Notice on opening Introduction of China Modern History and Introduction of Mao tse-tong Thought, Deng xiao-ping theory and the important thought of ‘three represents’ to student of Year2006 from the spring of 2007 in institutions of higher learning Ministry of Education

Source: selected literature on ideological and political theory course in institution of higher learning (1949-2006), collected and edited by social science department of Ministry of Education, (China Renmin University, 2006)

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What is quite noticeable is that from the titles of these documents, we can trace down what has been going on in the field of political education, either about the pedagogical systems, such as establishment of new majors and discipline, or about the changes in educational curriculum in institutions of higher learning. As stipulated in the title of these documents, we may as well figure out the new changes in relation of the content of political education. For instance, in the year of 1986, a new course entitled Law Fundamentals was established for university students, this is the first time for the country to open courses on law for non-law majors at university levels, as to enhance the consciousness of law-awareness and spirit of law-abiding in modern society. This is a seemingly drastic change because for many years the knowledge of law and thus the consciousness of law were not taken into account as to build the qualified citizens in political education. The change of the content by adding law education into the pedagogical course frame of political education symbolized the change of the logic in understanding and redefining of political education as China is growing to be more democratic and law-ruling country along with the opening up process. Similarly, the course of Current and Policy opened in 1988, Introduction of Dengxiao-ping Theory opened in 1998 all reflected the changes of political education.

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2. The establishment and development of political education as a discipline

In 1980, two yeas after the opening policy was set forth, the necessity of turning the political education practice into a scientific subject has been awakened and encouraged in this field by a noticeable paper, Ideological and Political Work Should be a Branch of Science, published in Guangming Daily, one of the major newspapers dealing important theoretical topics in Chinese intellectual circles. As stated in the above table, in the year of 1984, ideological and political education was firstly setup in some Chinese universities as a new discipline and a major for bachelor’s degree. This was a decision by the Ministry of education of China, but based on a heated discussion in intellectual circles since past several years. Along with the discussions and researches by intellectuals and managerial personnel in the relevant fields, political education gradually became a scientific subject of social and political science. In 1988, the first group of master degree authorization units was nominated within 10 universities. In 1996, 3 universities started doctor degree program with the authorization of State Degree Office. Up to 2009, the achievement in the discipline of ideological and political education is so great that it may be regarded as leaping and jumping in building up the pedagogical system as an independent subject in the past decade. (see table @ for detailed information of its development).

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@ Development of political education as a discipline, exemplified in institutions increase,

student enrollment, program category and student graduation

Institutions covered Provinces covered Comprehensive universities Program year

620 24 38 4years 3 year minor Second degree

ЗЗ 24 18

Doctor‘s degree units Master’s degree units Post doctor collaboration units Total graduation

66 253 16 З000 1 2000 1 1б00

Source: Wang yingxian, the historical development of ideological and political and its enlightment, Journal of Zhe jiang science and technology university,vol.26, No.3, May,2009.

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The achievement of political education as an independent disciplinary subject can also be seen in what happened in academia as long as they contribute to the improvement of pedagogical developments. In fact, since political educa-

tion is built as one branch of scientific subjects, the scholastic achievement in publication and attention also account a lot in the past decades (see the following tables and diagrams ®~®).

@ Publication of books (1984-1990)

Total theory methodology history 1 psychology moral youth studies enterprises others

350 69 18 б 1 17 30 19 47 126

Source: Wang yingxian,the historical development of ideological and political and its enlightment, Journal of Zhe jiang science and technology university,vol.26, No. 3, May,2009.

Website established (up to 2005)

items Searching sites Total number of websits

www.yahoo.com.cn www.sina.com www.sohu.com

Political education websites 4 2 9 15

University political education websites З б9 1 7З

Source: non-alliance of website in institutions of higher learning, problems and counter-measures of internet construction in universities, Thought, theory and research, by Shi tie jie,No.5,2005,p25-27.

Source: publications on political education, http://trend.cnki.net/trendshow.php

As to the qualitative perspective in viewing the achievements in political education for the past thirty years, many different ways can be followed to make the observation. Among which, the most common one will be in comparative methods. That is, through the comparison between what has changed or has been changing in the political education field ever since the opening up, especially along with the setting up of

ideological and political education as an independent discipline, one might find what has changed and thus improved with the actual process of political education. Due to the gradual process of socialization and democratization of Chinese society since reform and opening up to the outside world, the content and mode of pedagogical conducting has been changing, which might be perceived through the previous tables.

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As to the content of political education, one can easily find out the addition of courses on political knowledge training and legal consciousness cultivation. It is no doubt the a qualified citizen in a modern and open society will have to receive education on these courses, as he will be trained to be law-abiding and armed with common sense of political kingdom. As to the mode of political education, the formation of pedagogical system offered good examples of formal training in colleges and universities, in class or-

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ganization and off-campus social practice of no difference to other major social science courses. In order to exemplify the achievements of political education in Chinese universities, two cardinal educational changes will be examined as to reveal the progress happening in political educational practices: one is the change of educational goal relating to political personality, the other is the educational paradigm relating to political subjectivity.

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Source: scholastic attention on political education, http://trend.cnki.net/trendshow.php

As to the change of educational purpose to political personality, we may easily get hint from the changes of educational goals along with the development of China’s education in general and the establishment of a pedagogical system in ideological and political education field. Before 1978 even shortly after the reform and opening up in early 1980s, the general goal of china’s political education is to train civilized and disciplined socialist talents with ideals and morality. This is the goal of featuring the morality of individuals stipulated in many important documents issued by the central government as the direction for socialist political education. Because there was a prevailing belief among the society that good morals make good politics. Under such circumstance, the political personality was assumed

as the morality of individuals. Accordingly, political education equaled to moral education and took morality as the core issue. Since 1986, two years after the establishing of ideological and political education as an independent discipline, things changed relating to the educational goal in political personality cultivation. In the symbolic document of initiating China’s spiritual civilization movement and ideological purification campaign, Resolution on the guiding principles of socialist spiritual civilization, the educational goal was changed to be “cultivation of socialist citizens with ideals, morality and discipline”. Compare with the former goal of education, the change of “talents” to “citizens” symbolize a big step in educational politics towards a more democratic and open political logic. It’s in fact a

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shadow projected by the change of ruling pattering in china as it is getting fast in the changes from ruling by morality to ruling by law. This change seemed to be a slight change in wording but significant in its connotation. To put it in a simple way, morality ruling was replaced by law ruling both in the managing of the country and in the nature of political education.

As to the change of educational paradigm of political paradigm, we may as well examine what significant changes have taken place in the past 30 years in the actualization of political education. Previously, class teaching and even social practice designed to strengthening the educational efficiency were mainly centered on the indoctrination of the theoretical transformations of partisan documents or decrees of the government. In some way, machine politics of textbook justified the truth and fact in political education. Not only seldom do the pedagogical scheme designers and instructors care about the real interest and enthusiasm of the trainees or students, but seldom do the political educators allow what he teaches challenged and questioned as well. Everything has done in political education was centered on the existing texts and all students had to do were to follow the theoretical correctness of the textbook. The general feature of political education under this situation is the com-

plete control of text ruling. But along with the wakening of self-consciousness and improvement in individual subjectivity, political education is getting to be people-orientated in its directions and development. The rigidness of traditional teaching logic and pedagogical patterns were changed to be more flexible, as to better and improve the political education in effects. Ever since the end of 1980s and the beginning of 1990s, a heated debate over the teaching subjectivity lasted for many years in ideological and political education academia. The result of the debate was more and more people began to believe the ultimate goal of political education is to server people but not to serve politics, even though it may be done so through politics. This change reveals the new feature of democratic education in China. In fact, it symbolized the change of text ruling to people orientation in political education. A specific example of this gradual change is students are not passive listeners but active participants now in political education. They have their say as equal members in political pedagogical structure, with identification of being the participants instead of bystanders, citizens instead of subjects of the whole political educational system. (see changes in student’s role in political education in the following table ©).

©

environment identity status role attitude

authoritative- democratic subject-citizen passive - active bystander - participant rebellious -supportive

Note: edited by the author

Dilemmas existing in political education frameworks

In this global age, politics is a necessary dose for any country and even everyone if he is not living secluded. But what we frequently observed is that politics is not something attractive to the general public, in fact it always receives

reproaches, inviting complaints and curses. Therefore, political education unavoidably falls into the loop of being questioned, facing the challenge of find out what to teach as to meet the demand and interests of opposing parities, general public and ruling blocs. In other words, political education will always find itself in an

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awkward position in the choice of cultural enlightenment, academic liberty and political missions. This may be traced back to the rival of politics and science, but exactly finds root and exists in the present pedagogical systems in political education. In fact, while we try to picture the vividity of the achievements of political education in Chinese universities over the past 30 years, we may as well find that the political education in Chinese Universities can never be said a smooth trip and in no way perfect. It encountered plights and conflicts which made the course of political education a problematic one. The following are where the dilemma came from and still exists.

1. Conflicts between diversifying political beliefs and unified modeling for political educational purpose

The reform and opening up in China has opened the door to outside world not only in economic fields, but also in political and cultural fields. It is no doubt that the political and cultural interchange has brought great impacts to the former communist consciousness and socialist beliefs, if not to the communist party in China, at least to the general public. Therefore, diversifying political beliefs came into being and prevail the ideological world within China. The natural request of existing political belief demands for democratic air of liberty and freedom while political education will have to holdfast to the unified modeling of political personalities, especially loyalty and coherent to one political belief. When the conflicts between the diversity and singularity of political belief can not be solved and thus reach agreement, political education then enters into an educational stalemate or pedagogical falsehood. In transiting China at present, there are basically two aspects of mass confusions which generate the diversifying political beliefs. One is caused by the conflicts between traditional ideological legacy and modern demo-

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cratic thoughts and emerging ideas. The other is caused by the easy public access to news and information in an open society and the seemingly unified political consciousness. Such confusions no doubt bring the political education into dilemma, However, due to the changing of interrelations between individuals and nation-state framework, room still can be found for effective political education on the condition that the rigidity and conservation of stereotyped political logic are broken as well as the hypocrisy of politics are torn down.

2. Discontent with the didactic teaching without well-prepared practices

A brief study may help to find out that, in the political education area there exist strong discontents among university students with the didactic teaching, especially when little or no well-prepared practices involved. The present political education conducting in Chinese classroom is still old fashioned and ineffective in some way. As to the teaching method, indoctrination and lecturing of political knowledge take substantial amount of training hours. In this information age, due to the overflow of information, young university students today are seemly attentive to “hot issue” politics and practical concerns instead of dull theories and well-grind knowledge of less drive for curiosity. (see table®) If they can not find anything catering to their interest, they probably manage to escape from the educational loop because that sort of political education is far away from their intended learning propensities and their lives. As Melvin puts it, ‘political education, if so reduced to indoctrination, is incompatible with most modern theories of democracy and their moral and political vocabularies.’(Melvin Richter, 1980) What now quite true to students in political education, is didactic teaching not only bores them but also ruin the truthfulness and effectiveness of political knowledge. On the other hand, as to eradicate

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political illiteracy, it is also quite obvious that any education without knowledge infusion would be impossible. Therefore, to figure out a better way to combine infusive indoctrination of

necessary knowledge with practical participation in political education is the best outlet to the theory domination and practice inefficiency dilemma.

item cultural Classic Law and policy Current review Moral and political education Party and league life Prose appreciation Psychological consulling Love story Employment guidance others

Ratio (%) 14.95 38.32 65.89 12.15 12.15 45.79 7З.8З 36.45 74.30 28.97

Item: Student’s attention to webpage on political education

Title: on the necessity of internet ideological and political work to university students Author: Li shiwu

Journal: Journal of Hunan Environment and Biology Vocational College

Page:93-96

No. 4, 2004

item Very high Average high Average low low

ratio(%) 1.87 10.75 70.09 17.29

Source: tables and graphs on political education, http://trend.cnki.net/trendshow.php

3. Dilemma in political values and action among university students

We all know that action says more than words and only words without action do not help. Lack of obligatory integrity and coherent personality might be one of the existing drawbacks causing the departure of claiming values and non-actions. In other words, there is the dilemma in political values and actions, normally resulting from duality of belief and practice. We also know that the purpose of political education is to get students interested in politics and to lay down the foundations which will allow them to become responsible citizens by attempting to teach them how to analyze and assess a given political situation independently. In this process, sound and healthy political value is, of course, quite necessary to do this. But it is also quite natural for student fall into the trap that they are unable to do things at all, because their actions may be encouraged by much more than the only values in head. What’s more, values in real life vary a lot among the students today. Bernhard believes

that “politics, education and, indeed, political education are all forms of intentional action; they are guided by objectives and values. In pluralistic societies the question is how and whether it is possible to reach a consensus on values. As far as the free education of youths and adults is concerned, a good way of reaching consensus might be to put one's trust in public debate, but those responsible for political education have to make sure that these values are legitimate.” (Bernhard, 1999) In other words, the real dilemma of political education is the value-action dilemma caused by the incapability of political education to teach consensus value. Still, this challenges the conflict existing in various political beliefs as well.

Future Prospects of political education in Chinese universities

Political education in Chinese universities is presently seeking its way as it struggles in both heading towards a decentralizing democratic politics and anxious to be an independent social political science discipline. The diversity of ideology and interdisciplinary feature of political

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education science vitalize as well as embarrass the further development of political education. Yet, with the sharing of international experience, there is much to be enthusiastic about the future of political education in Chinese universities.

Any open society will encounter almost the same troubles in ideology confusion and value conflicts. The challenges come for both inside and outside of the country itself, when old beliefs and new ideas, liberal thinking and conservative opinions crash. As along with the political socialization and gradual democratization of China, political education will have to keep abreast with new developments of current thoughts, the arising of new concepts and the formation of new ideological schools. But, what is of utmost importance is always try to help the students gaining a basic knowledge in all of the most important political issues with regard to the future such as democracy, it benefits and threats, the relationship between politics, economy and the cultural ecology, the future of the consumer-based society, globalization and the union of the country, etc. Progress still needs to be made in these areas of access and equity, gender, minority, issues of domestic and international politics, both negative and positive, as to disclose the seemly disguise mystery of politics in the young minds and fanatical interpretations.

In the near future, value conflicts will still be a hard nut to crack in Chinese university political education arena. Yet, dealing with value problems is a ball that never should be dropped to political education. Thus, developing and strengthening the fundamental political values and boost value awareness through political education is a necessary step to smooth the development of economy and politics in China. It is quite obvious that if unified values formed, the rejections of directed actions will be in decline.

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However, it is not easy job to follow the old tracks of history as to centralize the agitated minds of present era. Strategically, the harmony of society and unity of politics call for measures of reconciliation as to ease the tension between values existing in all fields. It’s no doubt wise to keep a balanced value system with core value dominates in public political space and personal values tolerated in private political space. It might also be a good way to solve the pedagogical values in politics as well. Furthermore, as Karen Dawson says, “political education is a lifelong process and takes place both within formal institutions of education and within other sectors of the community-such as the home, workplace, religious institutions- and through mechanisms such as parent-child and peer group relationships, voluntary group associations, and media influences.”( Karen Dawson, 1979) It is also wise for university pedagogical and curriculum organizers try to borrow strength from other resources outside of the classroom and textbook.

The dynamism of political democratization allows nothing mistakable as falsehood and discrepancy in formalistic political education causes nothing but only trouble. Therefore, even though the theoretical political education will be largely pushed ahead along with the efforts in building a better scientific discipline in the near future, it is also of the ultimate significance to let the students understand the basic task of politics for solving current problems. Besides, it is predictable that will be not only a cry for political identity but an increasing pressure for more participation and access to political involvement among university students, in line with the political socialization process in China. So, the best policy is to let the players play and never try to refuse anyone because they can teach themselves as well in political education.

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NOTES

1. Melvin Richter, Political Theory and Political Education, New Jersey: Princeton university press,

(1980), p. 4-5.

2. Deng Xiaoping, Analects of Deng xiao-ping, Volume 2, (Beijing: People’s publishing Press, 1994),

p. 159.

3. Bernhard Sutor, Theoretical Fundamentals; Wolfgang W. Mickel (publisher), Handbuch zur

politischen Bildung, (Bonn: Federal Centre for Political Education Band 358, 1999), p. 66-67.

4. Klaus Rothe, Educational Tasks; Wolfgang W. Mickel (publisher), Handbuch zur politischen Bild-

ung, (Bonn: Federal Centre for Political Education Band 358, 1999), p. 97.

5. Marshall William Conley, The Theory and Practice of Political Education in Canada, 1993.

6. Dawson Karen Smith, Political Education - a Challenge, News for Teachers of Political Science,

no. 20, (Winter, 1979), p. 4.

2(18) 2014 www.vestnik.nspu.ru ISSN 2226-3365

UDC 316.3/.4+321

THE ACHIEVEMENT AND DILEMMA OF POLITICAL EDUCATION IN CHINESE UNIVERSITIES SINCE 1978: A COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE

Yu Wen Li (Pekin, P.R. China)

In this paper author considers political education in Chinese universities. Political education has always been a controversy as much as a top issue of social-political life in modern China. Along with the drastic changes brought by the Reform in 1978, political education in Chinese universities has gradually shifted in both contents and forms from stereotyped ideological-political work to a modernized scientific educational disciplinary with strong theoretical supports. It is shown that political education differs in the east and the west in many ways. So, it’s necessary to make clear what political education means in Chinese context. Political education is far-reaching in its scope, in general it concerns with the theoretical, empirical, normative and conceptual dimensions of political practices. Up to now, there are no acknowledgements, no required doctrines in western political philosophy to advocate that political educationist do or ought to address an authoritative definition for political education. Although the general features ofpolitical education can always be outlined because of the sameness ofpolitical, social and cultural background of individual researchers.

Considering the achievements of political education in Chinese universities for the past 30 years, the author notes that there is political education dilemma. Summarizing the author outlines the future prospects of political education in Chinese universities.

Keywords: education, political education, science, Western political philosophy, teacher training, Chinese universities.

NOTES

1. Melvin Richter, Political Theory and Political Education, New Jersey: Princeton university press,

(1980), p. 4-5.

2. Deng Xiaoping, Analects of Deng xiao-ping, Volume 2, (Beijing: People’s publishing Press, 1994),

p. 159.

3. Bernhard Sutor, Theoretical Fundamentals; Wolfgang W. Mickel (publisher), Handbuch zur

politischen Bildung, (Bonn: Federal Centre for Political Education Band 358, 1999), p. 66-67.

4. Klaus Rothe, Educational Tasks; Wolfgang W. Mickel (publisher), Handbuch zur politischen Bild-

ung, (Bonn: Federal Centre for Political Education Band 358, 1999), p. 97.

5. Marshall William Conley, The Theory and Practice of Political Education in Canada, 1993.

6. Dawson Karen Smith, Political Education - a Challenge, News for Teachers of Political Science,

no. 20, (Winter, 1979), p. 4.

Yu Wen Li, the Professor of Educational Philosophy, the Director of Center for political education, School of Marxism, Peking University, the Assistant dean of Institute of Social Economy and Culture, Peking University.

E-mail:[email protected]

The achievement and dilemma of political education in Chinese universities since 1978: a comparative perspective Текст научной статьи по специальности «Политологические науки»

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