As Taiwan attempts to transcend May Fourth, the mainland is eager to return to it. With the passage of time, there has been a gradual divergence in attitudes on opposite sides of the Taiwan Strait towards the political and cultural movement which changed modern Chinese people's lives more than any other. But whether the mainland and Taiwan continue in the May Fourth tradition, or transcend May Fourth, scholars believe that for China the 20th century will be summed up in the name "the May Fourth century." For what Chinese today can escape the May Fourth Movement's influence?
On 1 June 1999 the PRC Ministry of Public Security started a week-long law-and-order crackdown. Apart from combating crime, the move was even more intended to prevent the 4 June anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre being used as a pretext for "troublemaking" anywhere on the Chinese mainland. Earlier, in April, the People's Liberation Army had moved into Peking University, the "epicenter" of the student movement. In central Beijing, renovations in preparation for the PRC's 50th National Day celebrations on 1 October filled the air around Tiananmen Square with flying dust and the thunder of heavy vehicles. Nothing remained of the student fervor of ten years before.
Raising the May Fourth banner
Ten years ago, as so often before, Tiananmen was the starting point of a movement which swept China. The square has rung to the feet and voices of generation after generation of students, all with the same burning passion, all willing to shed their blood. But of all these crusades, none has been as far-reaching in its effects as the May Fourth Movement which erupted here 80 years ago.
And was not the Tiananmen democracy movement of 1989 an echo of the soul of May Fourth?
We still recall the lecture before Tiananmen by Li Tieying, then vice president of Beijing University, in which he stressed nationalism and patriotism. His words caused an uproar among the student audience, who booed and stamped their feet in protest until they had read out their own declaration of "science as the spirit and democracy as the goal"-at which point they erupted into thunderous, enthusiastic applause.
Past and present are so close. The slogans which most inspired people during the May Fourth Movement-"Mr. Democracy" and "Mr. Science"-are what many people throughout China still long for 80 years on. Yang Tianshi, a research professor in modern history at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, says frankly that the mainland still needs to work hard at many of the reasonable aims of the May Fourth period, such as freedom, democracy, science and individuality. In particular, the issue of democracy in China has still not been resolved, and the aims of the May Fourth Movement are still needed as the goals of this struggle. "As far as democracy is concerned, we still need to raise the May Fourth banner high," says Yang.
At the tenth anniversary of Tiananmen, preventive measures by the mainland authorities made substantive attacks against the government impossible. But participants in a symposium on "The May Fourth Movement and 20th-Century China" at Peking University in early May could scarcely fail to expand on the stated theme, to touch on the currently most sensitive topics of democracy, human rights and freedom which were the issues behind Tiananmen. Hence the symposium was full of the sense that "all history is contemporary history."
When speakers representing the official ideology stressed the patriotic spirit of May Fourth, many scholars retorted that "loving one's country doesn't mean loving the Party and government." Apart from this undercurrent of conflict between academia and officialdom, mainland scholars at the symposium felt a deeper sense of identification with May Fourth Movement figures because of their projection of their own feelings. Hence when overseas scholars voiced the opinion that mainstream May Fourth activists' vehement attacks on tradition and attempts to introduce Western thought were to a large degree motivated by pragmatic goals, and that they had only a shallow understanding of the concepts of democracy and science, mainland scholars responded: "We should be sympathetic to May Fourth figures' passionate words and actions at a time of national crisis," and "Intense opposition to tradition was not the May Fourth activists' only feature."
Women's fashions
Under the shadow of Tiananmen, mainland intellectuals speak much of the spirit of May Fourth. In late April Taiwan too looked back at May Fourth, but in a much less emotional atmosphere. At a symposium held by Academia Sinica's Institute of Modern History to mark May Fourth's 80th anniversary, it was apparent that scholars had largely lost interest in the movement's aims of democracy, science and freedom. Papers with titles such as "Changing Women's Fashions Before and After May Fourth," "Modern Women's Struggle for Inheritance Rights," and "The May Fourth Movement and Changes in Social Customs" reflect the fact that the focus of interest today is no longer strictly on finding solutions to China's problems. "It is natural that scholars in Taiwan, which is suffering the aftereffects of modernization, should have different concerns and interests than scholars in mainland China, which is actively seeking modernization," said Academia Sinica member Chang Yu-fa at Taiwan's May Fourth symposium.
In fact, it is not only the orientation of academic research into the May Fourth Movement which is different on the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. Levels of public and media interest in May Fourth are clearly also dissimilar.
Taking a broader look at history, "May Fourth" was not purely a student movement.
The search for salvation
After the end of World War I, the victor countries acceded at Versailles to Japan's 21 demands for rights over the Shandong peninsula. This sparked off the student demonstrations of 4 May 1919 in Beijing, along with a nationwide patriotic movement aimed at "resisting foreign aggression and excising the traitors within." But behind the May Fourth Movement there was a pressure which had been building among China's intellectual elite ever since the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95, when the crisis of national survival forced them to a deeply critical self-examination which gave rise to several self-awareness campaigns over the following decades.
Under the Qing, the Westernization Movement of the 1860s to 1890s called for "studying barbarian technology in order to stop the barbarians' inroads," in the hope that modern armaments and industry would make China prosperous and powerful. Then Sun Yat-sen led the 1911 revolution which overthrew the old dynastic order, and did his best to reform China through the political system. But he too was unable to rescue the country from its plight. Intellectuals gradually came to the view that the only way forward was a thoroughgoing reform of traditional ideology and culture. There was also a great increase in the number of people going to study abroad, resulting in the large-scale introduction of foreign ideas. In 1915 Chen Duxiu returned from Japan and established New Youth magazine, which advocated "equal importance for science and human rights," and stressed the Western concepts of science and democracy.
In 1917 Hu Shih returned from the USA; he and others such as Li Dazhao and Zhou Zuoren were extremely influential in the debates of the time. With their encouragement, young Peking University students Fu Ssu-nien, Gu Jiegang, Lo Chia-lun and some 30 others organized the "New Tide Society."
Mainstream figures of the May Fourth Movement, of whom New Youth and New Tide were representative, actively promoted a "New Culture." As well as stressing the concepts of science and democracy, they also attacked China's traditional ethics, customs, historiography and literature. They opposed cliched formalism in writing, and advocated the use of the modern vernacular instead of the previously dominant classical Chinese. They decried China's "cannibalistic" feudal ethical code and Confucianism, and demanded women's rights, the liberation of the individual from the family and so on. As well as attacking the old ideology, they brought in all kinds of foreign theories to replace it, such as liberalism, pragmatism, utilitarianism, anarchism and socialism.
On 4 May 1919 the members of the New Tide Society answered the call to arms en masse, and became the pioneers of the May Fourth student movement. This student movement combined with the New Culture Movement to become the May Fourth Movement which Chinese inside and outside China still talk about today. In particular, the New Culture Movement's pursuit of "Mr. Democracy" and "Mr. Science" is synonymous with the May Fourth spirit.
Attacked under its own banner
The New Culture Movement changed the course of modern Chinese cultural history, but was powerless to prevent China's division into warlord fiefdoms or the warlord-dominated Beijing government's abdication of authority and national dignity. The New Youth also debated endlessly on the direction China should take, and splits arose between the leading figures of the May Fourth Movement. Hu Shih, in one camp, hoped students would stay out of politics and avoid extremism, while in another camp Chen Duxiu, encouraged by Russia's October Revolution, strongly promoted the idea that only Marxism could save China. After the Communist Party of China (CPC) was established, it attracted countless fervent intellectuals who hoped that still more intense social movements could fundamentally reform China and find a way out of the country's woes.
As for democracy and science, no progress was evident even up to the 1949 split across the Taiwan Strait. On the mainland, the May Fourth Movement was misleadingly presented as a communist movement. Even today, Geng Yunzhi of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of Modern History has to set the historical record straight: "A Beijing TV reporter actually asked me: 'Wasn't the May Fourth Movement guided by Marxism?'" he recounts.
After 1949, the communist regime on the mainland made May Fourth a CPC icon, but with its antiscientific backyard steel smelting, its antidemocratic, dictatorial concentration of power and its anti-intellectual persecution of the intelligentsia and eradication of dissent, it abandoned the movement's real meaning.
For many years, mainland discussion of May Fourth figures concentrated on Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao and Lu Xun, to the neglect of those such as Hu Shih who did not believe communism could help China. In the 1950s campaign to criticize Hu Shih and Hu Feng, Hu Shih was labeled a "running dog of US imperialism," and even villains in dramas were given the surname Hu. "Criticizing Hu Shih was described as expounding the May Fourth spirit," said one mainland scholar at the Peking University symposium, giving short shrift to the authorities' habit of coopting the May Fourth spirit for all sorts of campaigns.
In mainland China 4 May is officially designated Youth Day, and is celebrated each year with great emphasis on youth revolution and patriotism. In the media, which is seen as the last great no-go area for reform and liberalization, a youthful Mao Zedong's efforts to assist his country and people still furnished front-page headlines on this year's 4 May.
May Fourth figures in Taiwan
While the CPC was pressing the passions of May Fourth into service for successive ideological campaigns, in Taiwan Messrs. Democracy and Science, so sought after by the May Fourth Movement, still had a rocky road in front of them after the ROC government retreated to the island.
Academia Sinica member Li Yi-yuan recalls how when Hu Shih became president of Academia Sinica in 1958, then-ROC president Chiang Kai-shek said in a speech there: "The May Fourth Movement was an important incident in the chain of events which forced us to flee the mainland." Hu Shih immediately replied: "Mr. President, you are wrong." After that Chiang never came to Academia Sinica again during Hu's tenure.
In his Modern History of China, Chang Yu-fa writes that some people trace the mainland's fall to the communists back to the birth of the CPC during the May Fourth/New Culture Movement era, and on this basis castigate the entire May Fourth Movement mercilessly. But in fact this is a merely a case of anger being vented on an innocent bystander. In Taiwan, the May Fourth Movement was long treated merely as a modern-era patriotic movement, and public debate was limited to discussion of the vernacular literature movement and literary development. It was not until the 60th anniversary of May Fourth in 1979, when Taiwan gave vocal support to the China Spring democracy movement on the mainland, that students at National Chengchi University observed the May Fourth anniversary of their own accord. Associate Professor Ning Te-chen of National Chengkung University's history department laments the fact that prior to the 1970s the May Fourth Movement was played down and glossed over in Taiwan's modern history textbooks: "Just like the February 28th Incident, the May Fourth Movement was missing from past textbooks," he says.
But however much the ROC government minimized the May Fourth Movement's political importance, following the arrival in Taiwan of figures such as Hu Shih and Fu Ssu-nien, May Fourth activists in fact became the architects of post-civil-war government policy in areas such as education and agriculture. Chiang Meng-lin was chairman of the Joint Commission on Rural Reconstruction, Hu Shih headed Academia Sinica, and Fu Ssu-nien was president of National Taiwan University (NTU) and director of Academia Sinica's Institute of History and Philology. These scholars' advocacy of the scientific spirit and academic freedom is still well remembered today. They clearly understood that what it takes to promote science is an education system, not a revolution. Hu Shih once suggested to Chiang Kai-shek that however difficult the situation he should never abandon long-term scientific development, and this is why the Science Development Council, the forerunner to today's National Science Council, came into being. It cannot be denied that no matter how dire the economic situation or how restrictive the political atmosphere, over the past 50 years Taiwan has always attached importance to scientific education and training.
A long time coming
Associate Professor Ko Ching-ming of NTU's Chinese department, who grew up under the protective wing of May Fourth Movement figures, says that to some degree it is Taiwan which has been the real heir to the May Fourth spirit. Quoting the inscription "Ethics, Democracy, Science" on the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, he says it is true the two presidents Chiang delayed the advent of democracy on the pretexts of Martial Law and the National Mobilization for the Suppression of Communist Rebellion; but based on the belief in democracy inherent in Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People-Nationalism, Democracy and Social Well-Being-and Sun's plan of development from military and authoritarian rule to an era of constitutional government, everyone understood that ultimately the state would return power to the people. People in Taiwan who are now in middle age gained their understanding of democracy from their formal education.
The civics textbook read by children in Taiwan was written by none other than Mao Tsu-shui, a member of the New Tide Society who was in the forefront of events during the May Fourth period. Ko Ching-ming recalls how 40 years ago, in his fourth year at rural elementary school, he was elected deputy mayor of the school's "self-governing township," and presented his own political program. He says: "The central government was very slow in returning power to the people, but democratic consciousness had long existed at the local level, and even under Japanese rule there were elected representatives in name at least. Among people who are in middle age today, the concept of elections and participation in politics was already familiar even then."
The ideas of May Fourth Movement activists also influenced younger generations. Author Lung Ying-tai says that in her youth she read Chiang Meng-lin's Western Tide, Chiang Ting-fu's The Power of Youth and Hu Shih's Ding Zaijun. All her accumulation of knowledge and all her character training at university was in preparation for the day when she could do her bit for her people and country. Whether or not many young people understood Hu Shih's words "When a foot soldier has crossed the river, the only way he can go is forward," they were branded deeply into their minds.
The right to interpret May Fourth
In the 1980s, while Taiwan was unconsciously realizing the May Fourth Movement's goals and attempting to find its own way forward, mainland China had emerged from its succession of campaigns large and small from the Anti-Rightist Campaign to the Cultural Revolution, and the fall of the Gang of Four had been followed in 1978 by the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, which launched the reform and liberalization program. All kinds of intellectual currents were again flowing into the mainland, and people were eagerly seeking enlightenment. As well as advocating the "Four Modernizations" for the economy, on the political front academia also strove to return to the ideals of the May Fourth Movement and press for freedom and democracy.
Thus May Fourth became an effective tool for intellectuals to censure the government. On the eve of 4 June 1989, Professor Yu Ying-shih of Princeton University said that by their spontaneous demands for democracy, mainland students were "taking back" the right to interpret May Fourth.
But the Tiananmen democracy movement, which had reawakened the soul of May Fourth, was swept aside in line with the CPC's old maxim that "political power comes from the barrel of a gun." Democracy movement activists fled the country or were imprisoned. As if startled awake from a dream, mainland academics reexamined the revolutionary fervor of the 1980s. They also found new foci in their analyses of the May Fourth Movement.
In the era of reform and liberalization, mainland affirmation of the May Fourth Movement "has generally been based more on an overall judgement of its value than on an academic analysis," comments Professor Ge Zhaoguang of the Chinese department at Beijing's Qinghua University. Ge says that many issues in Chinese modern history are still unclear, and are interlinked. Researchers are very prone to look at things from the standpoint of the present, and in the 1980s many mainland scholars took a "pragmatic" view of the May Fourth Movement.
Associate Professor Wang Shouchang of Peking University's philosophy department also observes that each generation of scholars has thought of May Fourth in a different way. If the movement is not studied objectively, most people will bring a consciousness of current issues to their examination of it, and express viewpoints and expectations based on their own present-day needs. But excessive praise or excessive denigration are both harmful to the May Fourth spirit. In the words of Chow Tse-tsung, now aged 82, who was the first person to write a doctoral thesis on May Fourth: "The May Fourth Movement was complex. In the past, people have tried to explain or criticize it without having first got all the details clear. Today we should reevaluate May Fourth." This was a point Chow emphasized repeatedly during the mainland's three-day symposium.
Reevaluating May Fourth
Just as it was not until the 1980s that young people in Taiwan got the chance to read the novels of Ba Jin and Lu Xun, the May Fourth Movement is a hot topic among mainland academics today because "its real face has yet to be revealed." For instance, after the Gang of Four fell from power in 1976, Geng Yunzhi, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Science's Institute of Modern History, began reading the institute's large holdings of letters, manuscripts and diaries left behind on the mainland by Hu Shih. Past CPC propaganda had accused Hu of slavishly idolizing the West and hating communism, but Geng discovered: "Although from a theoretical standpoint he did not advocate communism, he still had many communist friends."
In the 1990s, mainland commentaries on the May Fourth Movement have grown more diverse, and have begun to point out the movement's limitations. Researchers Wang Zhongjiang and Zhang Baoming of the Henan Academy of Social Sciences excerpted six million Chinese characters of text from New Youth magazine, which they arranged according to philosophical viewpoint, language, and intellectual trends in society. Reading these many articles, Wang found that they mainly contained slogans and attacks on other points of view. "May Fourth has been simplified into a token symbol of democracy, science, freedom and so on, but the movement included little real explanation and discussion of what was actually meant by democracy and science."
"From the May Fourth Movement to the War of Resistance against Japan and the founding of the PRC, in fact it was a victory of nationalism," says Ge Zhaoguang, who describes the "democratic state" which has been sought after ever since the May Fourth Movement as a "product of the collective imagination." In the early 1950s, many intellectuals' acceptance of Western culture was driven by their dream of making China powerful. Their mood was extremely nationalistic, and whatever looked effective was seen as good.
"The fact that the leading lights of the May Fourth Movement embraced Western culture does not mean that Western culture was their ultimate concern," says Professor Wang Shouchang of Peking University. For instance, says Wang, when leftist writer Mao Dun spoke of taking "one step forward, two steps back," he meant that we should first westernize, then step back to look at tradition.
The myth of destroying in order to build
Mainland realization that in the area of cultural development May Fourth figures hastily pursued shortsighted goals, echoes issues which scholars overseas and in Taiwan have long been considering.
Professor Wu Chan-liang of NTU's history department takes the view that what was created in the closing years of the Qing and the early years of the Republic by the intelligentsia's complete reappraisal of the past and their yearning for something new, was a loathing for tradition combined with a very superficial understanding of the West. "It would be more accurate to say that they rejected tradition than that they were seekers after new knowledge, truth and genuine understanding." For example, says Wu, who has researched Fu Ssu-nien, "Fu's purpose in studying Chinese scholarship was to destroy tradition."
Wu Chan-liang says that China's process of facing up to outside cultures and studying the West did not start with the May Fourth Movement. But after the 1894-95 Sino-Japanese War, there was a difference in the way Chinese intellectuals "looked westward." Before that there had not been an urgent need to use outside cultures to reform China's governmental system and save the country from impending disaster, nor had there been the passionate rejection of tradition.
Looking at China's modern history, ever since the short-lived Reform Movement of 1898, when Tan Sitong called on his compatriots to "break through the web" of tradition, and said, "Reform and revolution require blood to be spilt-let China start with mine," most modern leaders have had the resolve to die for their cause from the outset, and have been ready to use the most extreme tactics.
The New Youth of the May Fourth era also quickly went to extremes on the question of what attitude to take towards Chinese and Western culture. Chen Duxiu, who was dean of Peking University's school of humanities, went the whole hog. When he rejected Confucianism, he parodied Confucian teachings by saying: "Of all sins, filial piety is the worst; of all virtues, licentiousness is the greatest." When he was converted to Marxism, he took it on board completely and promoted it without reservation.
Professor Hsin Yi-yun of the National Institute of the Arts, who has been teaching literary history for many years, says that the people involved in the "self-awareness" campaigns of the May Fourth era were too young-Hu Shih was 26 and Chen Duxiu 31-to tell whether China's weakness in the closing years of the Qing dynasty was due to tradition or to the age they were living in, so in their passion they sought to break with traditional culture at one stroke. Furthermore, the links between the May Fourth student protest marches of 1919 and the Self-Awareness and New Culture Movements caused people to mistakenly believe that only revolution could transform China.
Hence the Cultural Revolution can also be described as an aftershock of the May Fourth Movement, because it sought to build by destroying, and placed the new and the old in opposition in the belief that modernity and tradition were incompatible. Ever since the May Fourth Movement, anyone who has taken a more tolerant attitude towards culture than the radical figures has been disparaged as a "cultural conservative." It is generally believed today that at the end of the Qing social lethargy was so great, and the country and people had been in a state of decline for so long, that one can sympathize with the New Youth giving vent to the anger in their hearts. But it cannot be denied that the New Culture Movement and its subsequent influence were costly to Chinese society in many ways.
Complete rejection of tradition
In the 1990s, mainland academics' views of the May Fourth Movement have come ever closer to those of overseas researchers. In the 1980s, in a China undergoing reform and liberalization and stressing intellectual liberation and the May Fourth spirit of enlightenment, eminent mainland scholar Wang Yuanhua responded to an overseas scholars' assertion that the radical thinking of May Fourth Movement figures was expressed in "all-round rejection of tradition" with the following words: "What the May Fourth Movement was up against was a feudalism which had been the ruling ideology for thousands of years. . . . Hence to rebel against it required a much greater effort." Ten years later, Wang has a different view: "In historical terms, radicalism is always bad. Every radical movement in the 30 years following Liberation was a failure." At a private meeting of scholars in May of this year, Wang Yuanhua said that it was time for the ideological fervor and passion since May Fourth to be laid to rest.
Wang Shouchang also feels that ever since the May Fourth Movement, academic debates about culture have generally been initiated under political pressure, and have betrayed a lack of serious scholarly research. Thus when scholars today look at the May Fourth Movement they should put it in the intellectual context of the time, and pay more attention to the influence of the historical background. Only by returning to the historical background and gaining a thorough understanding of all the theories and hypotheses put forward at the time, and interpreting the May Fourth Movement on this basis, can we talk about drawing lessons from history, or know how to judge it.
Particularly with the trend towards globalization, China faces the problem of how not to be left behind by the West, while at the same time the Western culture with which China identifies is in crisis. These factors tend to reinforce the nationalistic element of the May Fourth tradition. The PRC authorities have long been adept at taking advantage of May Fourth patriotism to maintain public antagonism towards the West and thereby strengthen their own power base and China's position on the world stage. May Fourth is particularly useful for the authorities, so "academics have to be all the more cautious in their interpretation of the May Fourth Movement," says Ge Zhaoguang.
Leaving behind the May Fourth myth
At the end of the 20th century, mainland China is reassessing the May Fourth Movement; meanwhile in Taiwan, where democracy and science have already surpassed what May Fourth figures conceived of, the younger generation is consciously or unconsciously forgetting May Fourth. At a May Fourth colloquium held on 30 April at Taiwan's National Chengchi University, one student asked Chang Yu-fa whether past research on the May Fourth Movement treated it as national history or foreign history.
Reasons for Taiwanese forgetfulness of May Fourth are that modern Taiwan does not face the general national malaise which once afflicted China, Messrs. Democracy and Science have already been realized to some degree, cultural life is highly westernized, and the nativist movement of recent years has tended to increase estrangement from the mainland. "In Taiwan there is little interest in pursuing fundamental issues of China's recent and modern development," says Wu Chan-liang. Furthermore, indifference to May Fourth in Taiwan also reveals a more basic issue of self-identity.
Unlike China in the May Fourth era, Taiwan today does not face a military threat from Japan or the West. On the contrary, the greatest threat to its survival comes from the mainland communist regime, with which the people of Taiwan share a common Chinese ancestry. But May Fourth patriotism has always been directed outwards, so talking about May Fourth in this very different situation jars badly.
"The CPC's official affirmation of its May Fourth roots goes back to Mao Zedong's nostalgia for his youth," says Ko Ching-ming, who even says that the outcome of the May Fourth student movement's attempts to "resist foreign aggression and excise the traitors within" was merely that they vented their anger on their own diplomatic representatives. Thus, he queries, how can their actions be regarded as exemplary? What makes May Fourth worthy of legend? And what need is there to commemorate it?
At Taiwan's May Fourth symposium, scholars also observed that after 50 years of separation-or for the older generation who lived under Japanese colonial rule, a century-the societies on the two sides of the Taiwan Strait have diverged greatly. As well as recognizing that China and Taiwan are separate political entities, Taiwanese are gradually also "drawing a line" on the cultural front. But the real cultural and ethnic links are undeniable, and this leaves Taiwanese intellectuals in something of a quandary. "Under such circumstances, how much meaning can May Fourth still have for Taiwan?"
Ko Ching-ming compares the status of the May Fourth Movement for people in Taiwan with that of a 286 computer. One may look at it with nostalgia, but who still has a use for it? Thus it is not surprising if voices were raised at the symposium stating that Taiwan had "transcended May Fourth."
"Post-May-4th" issues
"It would be more accurate to say that Taiwan today is facing post-May-4th issues," says Professor Chou Yang-shan of NTU. Chou does not subscribe to the view that Taiwan has transcended May Fourth, but feels that issues Taiwan is facing today, such as how to improve the quality of its democracy and how to solve the negative effects of scientism, spring from the realization in Taiwan of the May Fourth ideals of democracy and science. For instance, people in Taiwan give too much credence to the idea that science is truth, and lack the ability to critically examine Western ideas.
In particular, says Chou, the view which is still prevalent in society today that old and new, modernity and tradition are mutually antagonistic is a myth inherited from the May Fourth Movement. Yu Ying-shih once said that one of the barriers to China's modernization is a confused value system, and a major source of that confusion is the notion that traditional culture and modern life are opposite, mutually incompatible entities. "If the problems in our value system are not cleared up in the long run, this will have catastrophic consequences for Chinese culture, and never mind any nonsense about modernization!" wrote Yu.
Whether we are heirs to May Fourth or have transcended May Fourth, just as the May Fourth activists critically examined China's traditions, the May Fourth Movement itself has left much food for thought for people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait as they pursue modernization.
p.76
Do you recognize the leading lights of the May Fourth Movzement? The student movement which erupted on 4 May 1919 was fueled by a desire for reform which had been building among Chinese intellectuals since the closing years of the Qing dynasty. The individual portraits, from left to right, are of Li Dazhao, Hu Shih, Cai Yuanpei, Chen Duxiu and Lu Xun. (courtesy of the Chinese Museum of History/Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing)
p.79
Interest in the May Fourth Movement among academics and the media is markedly greater in mainland China than in Taiwan. Our picture shows the closing ceremony of a mainland symposium to mark the movement's 80th anniversary.
p.80
In mainland China, 4 May is Youth Day. Official celebrations play up the patriotic spirit of youth.
p.81
Since the mainland's reform and liberalization process got under way, the public has yearned for the reappearance of the May Fourth era spirit of "enlightenment." Wansheng Bookshop, hidden in a quiet back street close to Peking University, is comprehensively stocked with books ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign.
p.82
May Fourth has been extolled but also distorted by the mainland authorities. After the disastrous Cultural Revolution, scholars were eager to gain a new understanding of the May Fourth spirit. In the 1970s, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences researcher Geng Yunzhi reviewed the academy's substantial holdings of letters and manuscripts left behind on the mainland by Hu Shih.
p.83
After the Cultural Revolution, "All we had left at home was a few old photographs of Father which hadn't been burnt, hidden underneath a bookcase." Gu Jiegang's daughter Gu Chao has compiled a collection of her father's manuscripts, letters and diaries which is soon to be published in Taiwan.
p.84
A mature society with a capacity for self-determination doesn't need to rely only on students and scholars to play the role of social reformers. Chou Yang-shan, a Taiwan-based scholar who researches the May Fourth Movement, says that in Taiwan today the middle classes are the main mobilizing force in society, while students also express their opinions through such media as the Internet. In fact, this is a more normal way for society to operate. Shown here are students demonstrating at Taipei's Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall ten years ago in support of the Tiananmen democracy movement in mainland China.
p.85
On the 80th anniversary of the May Fourth Movement a large symposium was also staged in Taiwan, but it attracted little public response.
p.86
The late NTU president Fu Ssu-nien was one of the main leaders of the May Fourth student movement. He set scholars in Taiwan an example of academic independence and freedom. His tomb on the NTU campus is a favorite haunt of students.
Interest in the May Fourth Movement among academics and the media is markedly greater in mainland China than in Taiwan. Our picture shows the closing ceremony of a mainland symposium to mark the movement's 80th anniversary.
In mainland China, 4 May is Youth Day. Official celebrations play up the patriotic spirit of youth.
Since the mainland's reform and liberalization process got under way, the public has yearned for the reappearance of the May Fourth era spirit of "enlightenment." Wansheng Bookshop, hidden in a quiet back street close to Peking University, is comprehensively stocked with books ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign.
May Fourth has been extolled but also distorted by the mainland authorities. After the disastrous Cultural Revolution, scholars were eager to gain a new understanding of the May Fourth spirit. In the 1970s, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences researcher Geng Yunzhi reviewed the academy's substantial holdings of letters and manuscripts left behind on the mainland by Hu Shih.
After the Cultural Revolution, "All we had left at home was a few old photographs of Father which hadn't been burnt, hidden underneath a bookcase." Gu Jiegang's daughter Gu Chao has compiled a collection of her father's manuscripts, letters and diaries which is soon to be published in Taiwan.
A mature society with a capacity for self determination doesn't need to rely only on students and scholars to play the role of social reformers. Chou Yang-shan, a Taiwan-based scholar who researches the May Fourth Movement, says that in Taiwan today the middle classes are the main mobilizing force in society, while students also express their opinions through such media as the Internet. In fact, this is a more normal way for society to operate. Shown here are students demonstrating at Taipei's Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall ten years ago in support of the Tiananmen democracy movement in mainland China.
On the 80th anniversary of the May Fourth Movement a large symposium was also staged in Taiwan, but it attracted little public response.
The late NTU president Fu Ssunien was one of the main leaders of the May Fourth student movement. He set scholars in Taiwan an example of academic independence and freedom. His tomb on the NTU campus is a favorite haunt of students.
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