Social Responsibility of Modern Chinese Intellectuals

Introduction: Perry Link and the Legacy of Intellectual Duty

In Perry Link's essay Responsibility, the author conveys the profound sense of social responsibility felt by modern Chinese intellectuals by demonstrating how this sense of responsibility is a legacy of older notions of loyalty and service. There is a deep sense of pride among modern Chinese intellectuals that China can and should be an exemplary culture and society. Link shows that there are three types of roles intellectuals take on in relation to responsibility in the modern era.

The first role belongs to those who taint themselves by engaging in commercial activity or by compromising with the state through accepting official posts. The second are those who bury their heads in their own scholarly work, usually living in poverty and virtual anonymity. The third are those who dedicate their work to improving society.

Three Roles of Modern Chinese Intellectuals

Most Chinese intellectuals believe that the origins of responsibility lie in the traditional conception of intellectual moral duty — the sense that one is responsible for everything around them and for everything that happens. This can be seen in the political activities of intellectuals throughout the 1980s. Those actions were shaped by state-intellectual relationships over the hundred years following the emergence of modern Chinese intellectuals, and predominantly by the manner in which intellectuals were treated by the state during Mao's era.

Historical Roots: From the Qing Dynasty to Mao's Era

Under imperialist pressure, Chinese intellectuals throughout the late Qing dynasty and the Republican era urgently desired a strong state that could protect the nation — a drive that ultimately contributed to the rise of communism. However, the communist state, the powerful state that intellectuals had envisioned, became a source of disillusionment because it performed far better at implementing political oppression than at achieving economic transformation. The agonizing experiences of intellectuals during Mao's era pressed them to fight for democracy.

Yet the intellectuals themselves also inherited difficult Maoist legacies. These included the following: the unchecked state power under Mao had frightened Chinese intellectuals and led them to view democracy as a precondition for Chinese modernization; the long-standing Marxist style of education had instilled a utopian worldview; Mao's mass mobilization campaigns had fostered a populist conception of democracy; and thirty years of repression and isolation had produced an educated class suffering from significant knowledge gaps and opportunistic tendencies. All of these factors contributed to the prevalence of idealism, opportunism, and radicalism among Chinese intellectuals, shaping a culture that in turn drove intellectual discourse throughout the 1980s and helped fuel the 1989 Movement (Zhao, 2004).

Conclusion

The older generations understood the young people's desires to be free from party control but were very disappointed that they had shunned the basic ideas of social responsibility. They felt that the younger generation was taking a completely opposite view, caring only about themselves and not about what happened to the country or society as a whole. The young people appeared lost — going through life with no real sense of where they were headed or how they would get there. In many respects, they were simply running from the past rather than moving toward the future.