Comparison between ancient people-oriented and socialist people-oriented

People-oriented thought is an important ideological resource in the treasure house of China's excellent traditional culture. It originated in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, and "people as the foundation, foundation as the foundation and harmony as the foundation" highlighted the original democratic color in the political life of this era.

In the feudal society of China after Qin and Han Dynasties, people-oriented thought was still an important official consciousness, but it was sealed in China for more than two thousand years.

Creating a social political ecology is actually a merciless mockery of people-oriented thought. Although the ruling class is aware of its relationship with the people and hopes that the people can live and work in peace and contentment and realize the political goal of "consolidating the country", under the impact of the feudal economic base and superstructure based on class exploitation, this desire cannot be realized at all, and the people-oriented thought has gradually evolved into political empty talk of "talking too much but not actually doing it" in the long-term feudal social and political life.

People-oriented thought has played an active role in the historical development of China, especially in the traditional ideology and culture of China. It not only trained a large number of thinkers, writers and politicians who cared about people's sufferings, but also played a positive role in the transformation of China society from tradition to modernity. In modern China, it was injected with new theoretical content by progressives. Grafting with western "democracy" has become an important ideological weapon to promote social progress in China. We have reason to believe that the concept of "people-oriented" will really shine in socialist China.

People-oriented thought is a valuable historical heritage with a long history in China traditional culture. Its appearance can be traced back to the beginning of the formation of early countries, and its connotation has been enriched and evolved with the development of history. In modern times, the people-oriented thought has changed from the official ideology of the feudal ruling class to an important ideological weapon of the bourgeois democratic revolution. In particular, the China * * * production party critically inherited the historical heritage and endowed the people-oriented thought with brand-new theoretical content. Today, sorting out the cultural connotation of China's ancient people-oriented thought and its historical context of development and evolution is undoubtedly of great reference significance for building Socialism with Chinese characteristics's political culture. Historical origin of people-oriented thought

"Man" was mentioned many times in pre-Qin literature. Although scholars have different understandings of the early status of "people" so far, they have one thing in common, that is, "people" was the ruled class of the city-state in the pre-Qin era and the main laborer of the society at that time. In the ancient prose of Wuzi Song, it is said that "the people only care about the country and live a better life for themselves".

Jia Yi's "New Book" and Dong Zhongshu's "Spring and Autumn Stories" interpret "man" as "blind" and "ignorant", meaning uneducated and ignorant. This kind of exegesis with contempt cannot be said to be completely unfounded, but it is doubtful whether it is the reason why the word "person" has its meaning. The same book "Taishi" says: "Heaven regards himself and others, and heaven listens to himself and others." Zuo Zhuan has been published for six years: "The husband and the people, the Lord of God, and the holy king are dedicated to God." It can be seen that in the pre-Qin era, in the eyes of the ruling class, "people" were highly respected. Of course, this does not mean that it can be put into practice.

In the primitive society before the country came into being, everyone, including clan and tribal leaders, was a member of clan and tribe and had equal status. After entering a civilized society, there is a country, a class, and the difference between monarch, aristocrat, commoner and slave, but the ancient tradition of clan system has not died out quickly. Although ordinary clan and tribal members have become "people" ruled by monarchs and nobles, the dignity and honor that their ancestors once had still exists.

Another meaning of "people are the foundation of the country" is to admit that "people" are the main creators of material wealth of society and the country; Without them, the national economy and people's livelihood would be impossible. "Mandarin Zhou Yu" said that after Zhou Xuanwang acceded to the throne, he did not take a thousand acres. Guo Wengong said: "The great event of not taking people lies in agriculture, the prosperity of God comes out, the sugar cane of the people comes out, the supply of things comes out, the co-compilation of prosperity comes out, and the financial use starts.

A remarkable embodiment of the concept of "the people are the foundation of the state" in the early state is that the primitive democratic tradition still plays an important role in the political life of the city-state. Shang Shu Hong Fan said that Zhou Wuwang asked politics in Kiko, and Kiko suggested that besides seeking celebrities and divination, he should also seek Shu Ren. Third, beg you. Wang Guowei pointed out in On the System of Yin and Zhou Dynasties: "Those who express the meaning of governance in Shangshu only talk about ordinary people. The following nine articles in Kang Patent show that Zhou's way of doing business is not professional. Guo Yu Zhou Yu said that Li Wang was autocratic and called for a public announcement: "The people are not miserable!" Lee killed everyone who complained. Zhao Gong said: "It is better to defend the people's mouths than to defend Sichuan. If a river collapses, many people will be injured and so will the people. "Li Wang didn't listen, and finally caused people's riots in China and drove Li Wang away. This example shows that when the people can't stand the cruel oppression of the rulers, they will make the rulers suffer like a flood that breaks its banks.

During the Spring and Autumn Period, the royal family declined and the princes competed for hegemony. Struggles for power and wealth often occur between government departments and ministers, as well as among ministers. In these struggles, people's back-to-back has played an important role. In the third year of Zuo Zhuan, it was said that the fields of Qi lent grain to the people, borrowed it in big barrels and collected it in small barrels, and the people were very grateful. On the other hand, women are blessed, and people are exposed to public criticism, such as escaping from bandits. "Therefore, the regime of the State of Jin is also controlled by the nobles of the six countries. Lu was deported by his family. Ask Shi Mo why "Ji's family is a monarch, but the people serve him well, and his ministers follow him, and the monarch dies outside, but he doesn't do it or commit a crime." "Shi Mo said:" Lu Junshi lost his life, and Ji Jia practiced his diligence. The country is impermanent, and the monarch and ministers are impermanent. This has been the case since ancient times. " (Thirty Years of Zuo Zhuan Zhao Gong) When a monarch loses his virtue and ignores the people, it is bound to be abandoned by the people. Therefore, Mencius said wholeheartedly: "The people are the most important, the country is the second, and the monarch is the least." In fact, Mencius said "people", "country" and "people".

After the Qin and Han Dynasties, the people-oriented thought was not excluded from the official consciousness of feudal society for more than two thousand years. Not only some Confucian thinkers and political commentators often preach the people-oriented thought, but many emperors also openly admit the concept of "people are the foundation of the country and the country is the foundation". This is because the slightly wiser feudal rulers know that the people play an important role in the country's economic and political life. So everyone should dress up as the protector of the people. If they openly deny the people-oriented thought, they will abandon their own people and destroy the legal status of the rule. Under the pretext of recording Confucius' words and deeds, The Five Classics of Confucius said, "Shu Ren is also water when my husband is rowing. Water can carry a boat or overturn it. " The same is true of historical practice. Although autocratic imperial power can take anything the people want, it is cruel exploitation and exploitation. Any dynasty in Xuanhe may collapse in an instant. The number and scale of peasant wars in the history of China are enough for many feudal rulers to take warning. This is the most profound experience of Emperor Taizong. He once said to his ministers, "To be a monarch, we must first save the people. Those who harm the people will still break their shares and die full. " He added: "Cute." Honesty is the best. "(Zhenguan Politician, Jundao, Political Power) The feudal rulers regarded the people as the foundation of the country and compared their relationship with the people to the relationship between ships and water, hoping that the people would live and work in peace and contentment and that the ruling class and the ruled class would live in harmony. This is not hypocritical moral preaching, but based on the political needs of expecting long-term stability in feudal countries. However, the feudal economic base and superstructure were all based on class exploitation. There is a natural contradiction between people-oriented thought and this exploitation system, which determines that people-oriented thought will inevitably be restricted by "antinomy" and eventually become a political empty talk that can not be realized at all. The political ecology of China's feudal society for more than 2,000 years is actually a merciless mockery and trampling on people-oriented thought.

Agriculture was the most important production sector in ancient China. The small-scale peasant economy, which takes the family as the production unit and combines agriculture with cottage industry, is the broad foundation of the feudal mode of production. The core of people-oriented thought in feudal society can be said to be the broad foundation for protecting small-scale peasant economy. Before the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the land was owned by the same nation linked by blood or geography, and farmers' families needed to "live in different places" regularly. At that time, there was no problem of farmers losing their land. However, with the growth of private ownership, the same land ownership characterized by "well field system" gradually collapsed. During the Warring States period, the reforms in various countries accelerated the process of land privatization. Although the owner's small land ownership has been widely developed, due to its inherent weakness, it cannot withstand the destruction of natural and man-made disasters. Since the Qin and Han Dynasties, the situation of "the rich have fields and buildings, and the poor have no place to stand" has emerged rapidly. Farmers who have lost their land will either become powerful laborers of landlords or go out to escape from the desert and become refugees. The decrease in the number of yeomen not only exhausted the source of tax corvee in feudal countries, but also caused a serious social crisis, threatening the rule of feudal countries on a large scale. Therefore, all dynasties had to try their best to maintain the small-scale peasant economy and reduce the loss of the national version of farmers' household registration. Therefore, persuading farmers to plant mulberry trees has become an important economic function of feudal countries. Gong Sui, the satrap of Bohai Sea in the Western Han Dynasty, "advised the people to plant mulberry, so as to plant one elm, one hundred onions, one leek, two mothers and five chickens"; In the Eastern Han Dynasty, Guiyang magistrate was kind to "teach Sang Ma? Local officials advised farmers to raise silkworms and weave shoes (Han Shu Hou Han Shu Guan Zhuan) is a typical example. For farmers who have no land and little land, feudal countries also implemented policies and measures such as "granting land", "fake land", "giving land" and redefining the real boundary, and allocated state-owned land for them to cultivate. This created favorable conditions for feudal countries to adjust land relations. During the reign of Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, in order to solve the serious social problems of "the land is left behind, the people have no surplus wealth, or they die fighting for land, or they are willing to stop business because of hunger" (Shuwei Gaozuji), they ordered the implementation of the equal land system. From the Northern Wei Dynasty to the Northern Qi Dynasty, and from the Northern Zhou Dynasty to the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the land equalization system was basically inherited. However, due to the further development of private ownership of land, there was no remaining land in the hands of feudal countries for distribution, and the land equalization system was finally abolished. After decades of war in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, a large number of barren land appeared all over the country. After Emperor Kangxi ordered the Manchu princes and nobles to ban enclosure, he encouraged farmers to reclaim land and "allow labor forever". At the same time, the "renamed field" was implemented, and the scattered land property of Ming prisoners was handed over to the original tenant farmers for farming.

The main reasons for farmers' bankruptcy and exile are frequent natural disasters, heavy feudal taxes and land annexation by the landlord class. After Qin Shihuang unified the six countries, he ignored the war-torn people's urgent desire to recuperate, and "if the family is rich, it will prosper, if it is strong outside, it will die, and if it is blessed by half of Thailand, it will die if it breaks through", resulting in "men are short of wages, women are short of spinning performance" and even "women are short of clothes", which led to the collapse of the bank (Record of Eating Goods in Hanshu). In On Qin Dynasty, Jia Yi once pointed out that "Mu Zhi's Taoism is safe" based on the historical lesson of Qin's death. In the early Han Dynasty, Huang Lao's theory of "inaction" was advocated, and the punishment was reduced, so that the broken social economy was restored and developed. Since the Han Dynasty, the tax corvee of feudal countries was extremely heavy, and farmers were not only hungry and cold, but also had to sell their offspring and leave their homes. Generally speaking, farmers can barely tolerate the tax corvee within the system, but the feudal ruling class will not be satisfied with the exploitation within this system. Some unscrupulous corrupt officials often disregard farmers' lives, arbitrarily increase taxes outside the customization, and the number of farmers' accounts increases. However, after Yang Di acceded to the throne, he was extremely extravagant and sent troops to North Korea many times. As a result, the burden of farmers' tribute increased unprecedentedly, so that the land in many areas was barren, and "the world died in service, and the family was hurt by money" ("Sui Shu Food Records"). In the early Qing Dynasty, the tribute was rectified, and the imperial edict of Kangxi was "never to increase the breeding population". It has played a positive role in the recovery and development of the small-scale peasant economy that has been destroyed since the end of the Ming Dynasty. However, due to the corruption of officials, the burden on farmers is still very heavy. In order to curb the illegal exploitation of farmers by officials, Yongzheng promulgated the "yanglianyin" system to officials. However, under the feudal system, raising wages could not put an end to the corruption of officials. After receiving the "yanglian silver", many officials still "arbitrarily collect" it from farmers to enrich themselves.

It is an important content of people-oriented thought in feudal society to oppose the land annexation of farmers by landlords and tyrants. However, this does not mean that the scholar-officials who hold this view oppose the feudal exploitation system. In fact, it is only a reflection of the contradiction between the overall interests and local interests of the feudal ruling class. Chao Cuo said that merchant landlords "suffered from the death of farmers, and gained thousands of people.". Because of his wealth, the traffic prince, he is too powerful to benefit. " "The reason why this businessman is inclined to benefit." Farmers are also exiles. " Dong Zhongshu advocated "limiting the people's famous fields to make them scarce" and accused the landlords of "taking advantage of Sichuan and Ze, taking care of the mountains, being extravagant, making the people in the city respected by the monarch, and having rich princes in the city, making the people not sleepy?" (History of Eating Goods in Han Dynasty) They all opposed the annexation of farmers by landlords from the overall situation and long-term interests of feudal countries. At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, some scholar-officials advocated the restoration of the well-field system, "limiting the husband's field to break the merger" (Zhong Changtong: Chang Yan's Profit and Loss). But even this idea of "restricted areas" can't be put into practice at all. At the end of the Western Han Dynasty, feudal countries had issued restrictions on princes.

People-oriented thought failed to achieve the goal of maintaining small-scale peasant economy under the condition of "antinomy" in feudal society, but it played a positive role in the development of China history. The ideological proposition of "people-oriented" was injected with new theoretical content in modern China and became an important ideological weapon to promote social progress.

The traditional people-oriented thought is based on the premise of recognizing the supremacy of autocratic monarchy. This internal contradiction is the fundamental crux of the failure to realize his political ideas. However, because "people-oriented" thought has become the political creed of the elite of literati in past dynasties, it has not only bred a group of thinkers, writers and politicians who care about people's sufferings, but also decayed with the decline of feudal system. This will inevitably urge some of them to use the people-oriented thought to oppose the autocratic rule of imperial power. As early as the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Huang Zongxi denounced the feudal monarch for "killing the liver and brain of the world, dispersing the sons of the world and enriching my career", "but it is a great harm to the world, and you are just a gentleman!" He also criticized the officials under the autocratic monarchy "must talk about the art of governing Mu Zhi", because "the toil of the four parties and the emaciation of people's livelihood are enough to endanger our monarch". Huang Zongxi's criticism of feudal autocracy touched the key of traditional people-oriented thought and revealed the breath of modern democratic enlightenment. Liang Qichao once said that The Record of Ming Yi to be Visited had a profound influence on the young people of his generation.

After the Opium War, modern western social and political theories were introduced into China, which promoted the evolution of traditional people-oriented thought to modernization. The bourgeois reformists who advocate constitutional monarchy skillfully cited the traditional people-oriented thought as the theoretical basis of reform when propagating the western bourgeois "civil rights" thought. Kang Youwei cited relevant records of Hong Fan, Mencius and Zhou Li in his memorial to Emperor Guangxu to prove himself. It is the old adage that "the first king rules the world, and the people * * *". Although this analogy is far-fetched, even absurd, it holds that "the monarch and the people are the same" and advocates that "the monarch and the people govern together", which is obviously different from the traditional people-oriented thought, which compares the monarch and the people to the relationship between the boat and the water. Yan Fu and Tan Sitong went further on this issue. Yan Fu in "The Book of Bihan" is the ear of the so-called thief of the country. Tan Sitong said in "Benevolence": "beginning of life, there is no such thing as a monarch and a minister, but everything is equal. People can't govern each other, so * * * chooses a person to be the monarch ... If the husband says * * *, there will be a monarch because of the people, and the people will be at the end. "People-oriented, people can promote the monarch, but also can abolish the monarch. These views have a strong color of modern democracy, which can be said to be a great progress in breaking through the connotation of traditional people-oriented thought.

The bourgeois reformists admit that the people are the "God" of the country, but they also advocate constitutional monarchy and oppose democracy and harmony. This is obviously contradictory in theory. Their explanation is that the quality of China citizens is too poor, and it takes a constitutional stage from autocracy to * * *. Kang Youwei said: "If you want to change the law quickly, you must not be in danger, unless you get help from the winner first." If you want to establish a good law and protect it for a long time, you must change it into a constitutional civil right. "(The Collection of Kang Youwei's Political Comments) Liang Qichao declared:" The national psychology of * * * cannot be achieved by people who have long been accustomed to autocracy ",and" China citizens today are not qualified to be * * * and nationals "(The Collection of Dining Rooms, Volume II). This reveals.

Before and after the Revolution of 1911, the bourgeois revolutionaries and reformists had a heated debate about whether to be democratic or constitutional. Sun Yat-sen clearly pointed out: "China has been an authoritarian regime for thousands of years, which is unacceptable to equal and free citizens"; "We must carry out a civilian revolution and establish a national government, which is not only the purpose of our revolution, but also indispensable in our revolutionary process." He pointed out that the reformists slandered American nationals and were not qualified to practice this fallacy. "They regard themselves as inferior to the natives of Honolulu and slaves in South China" (Volume I of Complete Works of Sun Yat-sen). However, due to the inherent weakness of the bourgeoisie in China, the revolutionary camp is quite confused about how to safeguard civil rights. For example, Zhang Taiyan saw that the representative democracy of the western bourgeoisie was easily dominated by a few politicians, and even put forward: "It is not as good as the kingship, the scale is low, and the people are struggling, and the people still have to be saved." (On Delegate Debate)

Although bourgeois reformists and revolutionaries have different views on how to realize "civil rights", they have one thing in common, that is, they don't understand that the people are the real creators of history and don't believe that the people have the ability to be masters of their own affairs. Only after Marxism was introduced into China, China Party talents solved this problem from the combination of theory and practice. Li Dazhao wrote "Populism" in the early days of the founding of the Party, saying: "Populism is the translation of democracy, some are people-oriented, some are democracy, and … pure populism means treating all privileged classes politically, economically and socially. In this way, all people are people who do useful work for society and the country; There is no need to use political organs to rule the people. Political organs are just tools for all people to manage affairs belonging to all people. " Mao Zedong warmly praised the rise of the peasant revolutionary movement in the Investigation Report of Hunan Peasant Movement. "It's like a storm, and it's extremely rapid and abnormal. No matter how big the power is, it will be unstoppable. They will break through all the traps that bind them. Run fast on the road to liberation. " In a series of works, such as "New Democratic Constitutionalism" and "On Coalition Government", Mao Zedong repeatedly emphasized that "the affairs of China must be decided by the majority of people in China" and that "all the words and deeds of * * * producers must conform to the best interests of the overwhelming majority of the people. Take the support of the overwhelming majority of the people as the highest standard. " Mao Zedong also pointed out: "In the final analysis, the quality and size of the role played by the policies and practices of China's political parties in the people of China depends on whether it contributes to the development and help of the people's productive forces in China, and whether it binds or liberates the productive forces."

The history of ideological and cultural evolution shows that all valuable ideological and cultural heritages created by human society will be sublated in the process of inheritance and will not completely disappear. China Producers' Party represents the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the people in China. To build Socialism with Chinese characteristics culture, we need to be guided by Marxist theory, critically inherit the people-oriented thought at all times and all over the world, and learn from the historical experience and lessons of governing the country and ensuring the country. People-oriented thought will be applied in society.