No More Learning

Even while he clung to his rationalistic Confucianism, the filial son was likely to feel deeply attracted to the escape into nothingness of Taoist hermits and Buddhist mystics. This attraction is described in the great eighteenth-century novel, The Dream of the Red Chamber, whose youthful hero, Pao Yu, abandons both an official's career and his pregnant bride for a supernatural Buddhist-Taoist destiny. Generations of gentry youth have since vicariously experi- enced Pao Yu's escape from filial obligation, neglecting Confucian volumes for the surreptitious pleasures of The Dream of the Red Chamber. But even Pao Yu squares his filial account before his departure: he applies himself to his Confucian studies and passes his state examinations with distinction, thereby bringing great honor upon his family; he impregnates his bride, thereby insuring his posterity; and as his last act before disappearing, he seeks out his stern father and bows four times before him "in a solemn Ko-t'ou" thereby expressing his symbolic filial submission. 10
Thus the filial son could be both Confucian in his worldly obliga- tions and Buddhist and Taoist during inner moments of flight from them. Or he might express other forms of antagonism toward the filial web--an admiration of outlaw heroes, heavy gambling, or opium smoking--all strongly-developed cultural patterns. One Western authority, C. P. Fitzgerald, was so impressed with these escapist tendencies in Chinese character that he regarded filial piety as an essentially compensatory phenomenon: "The Confucian in- sistence on filial duty and the strict training of the young would seem harsh until it is realized that the Chinese, a people naturally
? 366 THOUGHT REFORM
over-kind and indulgent to children, are also averse to discipline. "u Yet during the traditional period Confucianism prevailed over all rival ideologies, for its stress upon filial piety gave it abiologically- based social ethic of great force, an ethic known in all societies, but brought to its highest development in China.
Did this ethic allow for maximum personal growth? Could the identity of the filial son provide a rewarding sense of existence? Fung Yu-lan answers in the affirmative:
It is by becoming a father or a son, a husband or a wife, that an indi- vidual enlists himself as a member of society and it is by this enlistment that a man differentiates himself from the beasts. In serving his father and sovereign, a man has not given up his personality. On the contrary, it is only in these services that his personality has its fullest development. 12
Hu Shih, another contemporary Chinese scholar, expresses the opposite opinion:
All the much-idealized virtues of filial piety simply could not exist; and in those rare cases where they were consciously cultivated, the price paid for them was nothing short of intense suppression, resulting in mental and physical agony. 13
There is no doubt truth in both views. Filialism offered one a firm and respectable self-image;but many outwardly filial sons must have experienced profound inner hostilities toward their ostensibly revered fathers. And there is no doubt that society feared this hos- tility: in rare cases where parents accused their sons of being "un- filial," the latter were publicly disgraced, sometimes whipped by a magistrate to the point of death. Crimes of parricide were treated as desecrationsof the most dangerous sort: the culprit was not only beheaded and his body mutilated, but his house was razed to the ground, his immediate neighbors and teacher were punished, the district magistrate deprived of his office and disgraced, and higher provincial officials degraded in rank. 14
Clearly then, rebelliousness had to be repressed, which must have resulted in a significant amount of unconscious guilt. The prohibi- tion and repression of rebelliousness also undoubtedly contributed
(at least during the Ch'ing Dynasty) to the stagnation within Chi- nese society, to individual passivity, to rationalization of the exist- ing order, and to impotence rather than action in the face of a
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 367
declining civilization.
How did Confucian proponents of filialism deal with such grave
emotional problems? They returned, in true fundamentalist fashion, to the classical texts, seeking to sanctify their message on the basis of such passages as the following:
The body is that which has been transmitted to us by our parents. Dare any one allow himself to be irreverent in the employment of their legacy? If a man in his own house and privacy be not grave, he is not filial. If in discharging the duties of his office, he be not serious, he is not filial. If with friends he be not sincere, he is not filial. If on the field of battle he be not brave, he is not filial. If he fail in these five things the evil (of disgrace) will reflect on his parents. Dare he be but serious?
The fundamental lesson for all is filial piety. . . . True love is the love of this; true propriety is the doing of this; true righteousness is the Tightness of this; true sincerity is the being sincere in this; true strength is being strong in this. Music springs from conformity to this; punish- ments come from violations of this. . . . Set up filial piety, and it will fill the space from heaven to earth. Spread it out and it will extend over all the ground to the four seas. Hand it down to future ages and it will be forever observed. Push it on the eastern sea, the western sea, the southern sea, and the northern sea, and it will be everywhere the law of men, and their obedience to it will be uniform. 15
Whatever its strains, filialism was the source of the predominant identity of traditional China, a basic ideal against which any other form of self-image had to be judged. To be regarded as "unfilial" was to be placed beyond the pale. The heritage of the filial son was one of the strongest and most enduring national identities ever created.
Transitional Rebellion: The Modern Student
By the second decade of the twentieth century, the world of the young Chinese intellectual had drastically changed, especially in his relationship to the ideology of filial piety. In fact, he had apparently made a complete about face: "The new China must eradicate the Confucian rules of obedience which make slaves of men. " 16 These words, written in 1916, typify the spirit of the "New Tide" or "Renaissance Movement" which was then beginning to flourish among rebellious avant-garde intellectuals, and especially among the young. Rather than being considered "the root of all virtue," filial
? 368 THOUGHT REFORM
piety was being denounced as "the source of all evils. " To be sure, not every young intellectual felt this way; but such was the power of this cultural countertrend17 that all were significantly affected by it. As one Chinese commentator observed,
The inner life of the youth of China was thus completely changed, for the ancient motto of China was: "W alk slowly behind the elders; revere the past/* while the motto of China's youth today is "self-expression. " 18
During the most active years of this movement (1915-1920), matters came to a head for China both in its national history and in the life patterns of its young students. China had long been lag- ging in its cultural creativity, deficient in social progress, woefully behind the West in technology. Although the Ch'ing Dynasty had been overthrown in 1911, the revolutionary movement had foun- dered; political chaos went hand in hand with social deterioration. And young intellectuals were aware of a similar sense of discon- tinuity in their own lives. Although traditional forms had already lost much of their hold, the emotions lingered on. Parents con- tinued to convey to their children in one way or another the filial principles upon which moral behavior should be based, even if (as was true of Hu) the social structure made it impossible to practice these principles. No longer capable of offering a sense of existential harmony, the identity of the filial son now seemed archaic and intolerably passive. Confucianism had become a rigid and nar- row orthodoxy: its voice was still heard, but to young ears it had a hollow ring. To Chinese youth, Western ideas and techniques seemed much more attractive than did the decaying institutions immediately around them. The cohesion and continuity of the traditional period disappeared, to be replaced by intellectual shop- ping and acute ideological hunger.
There had been important attempts at reform before this, be- ginning in the latter part of the nineteenth century. But they had usually followed the characteristic Chinese pattern of "finding in antiquity the sanction for present-day changes. " Faced with over- whelming threats from the West, both ideological and technolog- ical, reformers had maintained the ethnocentric hope of using Western knowledge for practical purposes only, while maintaining the more precious Chinese "essence. "19 They had wished to re- vitalize, rather than replace, the ideology of filial piety. This was
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 369
even to some extent true for those early reformers to whom the modern student looked for inspiration, among them men still in- tellectually active at the time of the New Tide.
K'ang Yu-wei (1858-1937) was one of these early leaders. First at the turn of the century and then again during the New Tide itself, he bitterly criticized both the practices of traditional Chinese families ("They present a harmonious picture from the outside, but inside there is an unescapable and overwhelming atmosphere of hatred"), and the demand for filial piety within them ("Birds and animals care for their young but ask no reward. Real love does not ask for recompense"). Yet in his prescription for Utopia 20 (Ta-tung Shur The Book of Great Unity) he took Confucius himself as his authority, painting the Sage as a misunderstood Messiah. K'ang's famous pupil, Liang Chi-chao? went even further in his condemna- tion of the old order, and in his acceptance of Western ideas; but he returned from a post-World War I trip to Europe disillusioned with the West, and looked again to China's past for spiritual values.
In the New Tide, the modern student found something different from all that had gone before: a movement which advocated a break with tradition that would be both deliberate and decisive, and which made a special plea for young people to assume leadership within it. "It is the youth who must save this great revolution from the powers of the past/' wrote Ch'en Tu-hsiu, one of the leading figures of the New Tide, in the magazine which he edited appropriately entitled The New Youth. The modern student was even given a blueprint for the identity change asked of him: the "old youth"--weak, ef- feminate, devoid of militancy, seeking only wealth and high posi- tion--was to be supplanted by the "new youth"--courageous, strong, free of parental domination, idealistic, and patriotic. 21 In this national and personal transformation, the "two gentlemen" to follow, according to Ch'en, were "Mr. Democracy" and "Mr. Sci-
ence. " Democracy and science were defined specifically in relation- ship to the problem at hand: democracy meant release from the bondage of Confucian filial piety, the attainment of equality be- tween men and women, the opportunity for individual expression; science meant opposition to traditional Chinese thought, and its replacement by modern Western learning. 22 Here was the dichot- omy (relived by Hu and George Chen) between the "irrational past" and the "rational future. " And in the accompanying literary
? 370 THOUGHT REFORM
renaissance, the "new youth" were urged to express themselves in clear, forceful, conversational language--"in the living language of the people"--rather than in the effete and frequently obscure clas- sical style. 23
This was precisely the direction in which the modern student wished to go. His group identity had come into being with modern schools and universities during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The emergence of a Youth Movement gave him sudden prominence. The universities and upper middle schools offered him a forum for his rebellion, and an identity to challenge that of the filial son (as was true for Hu and George Chen). Fre- quently feeling persecuted by his family (and sometimes, like Hu, suffering at the hands of members of older generations made des- perate by the crumbling of the world they had known) the modern student plunged eagerly into the new group life. Thus, a celebrated and widely-read novel of the thirties, The Family, whose story is laid during the time of the New Tide, describes the young hero's isolation and misery when among family members: "He was sud- denly overwhelmed by a strange feeling of solitude. It was as if all the other members of his family were far away, as if they lived in a different world. He felt cold, as though he were oppressed by un- speakable sorrow and anguish," and contrasts this with his joy and trust when working among his friends for the new ideals they shared.
Here he feels that he is not an outsider, not a lonely man. He loves the other young men around him; they love him. He understands them; they understand him. He can trust them; they can trust him. 24
Although these feelings are in many ways very similar to those experienced by generations of Westerners as they emancipate them- selves from family control, this youth identity was in China a vitally important part of the cultural countertrend. The term ch'mg-m'en, "youth," which had little significancein the past, took on a new and revealing meaning; it came to suggest articulate young advocates
(including women, and to some extent peasants and laborers, rather than only male gentry-literati) of political radicalism and social reform: new generations of youth who married later, often resisting their parents' marital arrangements for them, and who demanded independent lives physically and emotionally separate from parental control. 25
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 371
Almost overnight the modern student seemed to step into an identity which allowed him to be active rather than passive, which offered him a sense of logic and purpose rather than meaningless compliance with tradition, and an opportunity for self-realization rather than self-denial. So strong was the reaction against Con- fucianism, and so timely the New Tide's appeal, that the Chinese student movement during the transitional period achieved a power and influence unmatched by any similar movement in the modern world. This power was demonstrated in the celebrated "May 4th Movement" of 1919, in which student demonstrations sparked an effective national protest against the humiliating Versailles Peace Treaty; in the "May joth Movement" of 1925, another mass demon- stration against imperialism; and in the continuous student agita- tion against the Nationalist Government (in which Hu and Grace Wu participated) prior to the Communist takeover. The first of these, the 1919 May 4th Movement, was particularly significant as a turning point: as one authority put it, "Henceforward, agitation by students gave an ever more powerful impetus to the release, slow or violent, of the forces of change in China. "26
In simultaneouslyrebelling against his family and usurping social authority, the modern student was being far from filial, and this was bound to cause him suffering. Even if he went on to become
(like Hu) an extreme rebel, an avenger, or a would-be martyr, the filial son within him was likely to remain very much alive. After thousands of years, it was not to be easily destroyed. In this respect, the modern student's inner life resembled the state of his country: immobile tradition, petrified into traditionalism, existed side-by- side with iconoclastic and totalistic revolutionary urges. Indeed, the psychological strength of the filial tradition was attested to by the immense energies necessary to attack it: that part of the past which resides within oneself is most difficult to sweep away.
No one expressed this inner dilemma more powerfully than Lu Hsun, the greatest of modern Chinese writers and the leading literary spirit of the New Tide Movement. His short story, "The Diary of a Madman/' which appeared in The New Youth in 1918, is one of the most effective condemnations of traditional Chinese society ever written. The author speaks through his hero, a mad- man-sage, who, in his persecutory fears, evokes a twilight world be- tween delusion and reality. The story's theme is the "man-eating"
? 372 THOUGHT REFORM
nature of traditional Chinese society, a theme which is expressed on several simultaneous levels of symbolism. The hero notices the threatening faces of the people around him, and from various bits of evidence concludes that they are going to kill and eat him. Wondering what he has done to cause their enmity, he decides that it must result from his earlier rebellion:
Twenty years ago I trampled the daily account book [a derogatory al- lusion to the Classics] of Mr. Hoary Tradition under my feet. . . . I did not thinlc that I could be considered a wicked man, but . . . I am no longer so sure. They seem to think so . . . they have a way of brand- ing anyone they don't like as a wicked man.
In a further quest for understanding, he studies ancient history. He finds that despite the high moral claims ("over every page was scrawled the words 'Benevolence and Righteousness'"), in reality "the book was nothing but a record of man-eating"; and that "this world in which I had moved about for half a lifetime has been for over four thousand years a man-eating world. " He thinks of can- nibalistic practices which actually occurred in Chinese society and decides, "Everyone wants to eat others but is afraid of being eaten himself, and so everyone looks at everyone else with such profound distrust and suspicion. " The leader of the man-eaters around him, he discovers, is none other than his older brother (the father's representative in the family, and here a symbol of family authority); he decides to begin with his brother, first in "cursing man-eating men," and then in converting them from their evil ways. But his pleas ("y? u must repent . . . change at once . . . you must know that the future has no place for man-eating men") are ignored-- out of wickedness and because of the habit of rationalization. "Some felt that it had always been so and that it was as it should be, while others knew that it was wrong, but wanted to eat just the same. "
Only then does he come to a terrible realization that he too is among the guilty. He recalls his older brother's having taught him an old principle of filial piety: the belief (which really has existed) that if a parent is sick, the child should cut off a piece of his own flesh, boil it, and feed it to the parent as medicine. Since this brother was in charge of the family at the time of his sister's death, he decides (with the logic of a madman-sage) that "they ate my
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 373
younger sister"; and since he also partook of the family meals, "it is not at all impossible that I had myself eaten a few slices of my sister's flesh! " He comes to know "how difficult it is to find a true and innocent man," The only hope lies with the young, and the story ends: "Maybe there are still some infants that have not yet eaten men. Save, save the infants. " 27
Commentators have rightly emphasized this story's assault upon traditional Chinese society, but they have overlooked something else in it which is equally important: the desperate psychological plight--the intolerable anger and overwhelming sense of guilt--of the man who has chosen the path of rebellion. The story's hero is burdened by three great sins: first, having participated in and "tasted" the rewards of the "man-eating" society which he now condemns; second, defying four thousand years of authority in mak- ing this condemnation; and third, harboring within himself such explosive hatred.
Through his imaginative use of his hero's psychosis, Lu Hsun made contact with the emotions of the Chinese modern student as no other creative writer had before or has since. "The Diary of a Madman/' described as "the overture and finale" of his writings, evoked a sensational response. Young intellectuals found "man- eating" an apt description of their own attitudes toward their filial heritage, and the psychotic's suffering an expression of their own pain.
The antitraditional passions of the New Tide Movement--in both its political and literary expressions--set the tone for the en- tire transitional period. Emotions and ideas which had been smol- dering for several previous generations were now forcefully artic- ulated on a mass scale, and they continued to be shared and reinforced by succeeding generations of modern students until the Communist takeover in 1948-49. But the undermining of the gen- eral principle of filial piety (which the New Tide accelerated rather than initiated), far from satisfying the widespread ideological hunger, created an even greater ideological vacuum. Chinese intel- lectuals sought a more comprehensive set of beliefs and a more spe- cific program of action.
What psychological characteristics did they require of a unifying ideology they might embrace? Any such ideology would have to be rebellious in tone to encourage full expression of great hostility,
? 374 THOUGHT REFORM
to offer some relief for feelings of guilt, and to provide a solution to the broad crisis in identity which I have described. It would have to be a "modern" (and therefore Western) movement, and offer a program for economic development as well as some form of popular participation in government. It would inevitably call for a national resurgence achieved by casting off both Confucianism and Western imperialism. Consequently it had to supply some way to attack the past and yet feel pride in it, to condemn the West and yet use Western ideas to find a solution to Chinese problems. This was a big order, and contending ideologies were tortuously examined, experienced, and refashioned in a series of desperate attempts to find answers to problems which seemed always deepened rather than resolved by time.
The modern student (both during and after his student days) was confronted by three ideological alternatives, two of them or- ganized movements: the Chinese versions of Nationalism, liberal democracy, and Communism. Without attempting to trace a full history of any of these, we may ask to what extent each was able to satisfy the psychological requirements just mentioned.
By Nationalism, I mean the revolutionarymovement initiated by Sun Yat-sen, and subsequently embodied in Chiang Kai-chek's leadership of the Kuomintang, or Nationalist Party. Both Sun and Chiang won great personal acclaim; their call for a strong, modern Chinese government was supported fervently by modern students as well as by much of the rest of the Chinese population. Just after Sun's death, which occurred during the period following the May 3oth incident of 1925, Chiang brought the Nationalist movement to its greatest momentum and highest point of popularity. The "Second Revolution" of 1926-27 was successfully carried out in the midst of a wave of popular sentiment, mass demonstrations, and boycotts of Japan and the W est. The atmosphere was violently anti- imperialist, and therefore anti-Western.
Shared angers and shared hopes did at first unite intellectuals and peasants. But Nationalism's effectiveness as an ideology vir- tually stopped here: it was able to gain the allegiance of modern students, but as these students matured into harassed intellectuals they could not find within it a sustained program or a set of ideas to satisfy their emotional urges and their rational standards. Sun's "three people's principles" (Nationalism, People's Rights or De-
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 375
mocracy, and People's Livelihood) were acceptable enough but amorphous, and only the first was convincingly put into action. These principles came to be more a catechism recited by school children than a set of living beliefs. Nationalism took its forms from both Western liberalism and Russian Communism, but in a way which was frequently devoid of the inner meaning. It placed great stress upon modernization, but at the same time it joined forces with the traditionalists in hollow and ritualistic revivals of ancient Confucian values. The modern student usually found this combination of filial piety and Westernization an incompatible ideological admixture, which intensified rather than solved his guilt and identity problems. Increasingly, the intellectual drew a sharp line between himself and the bureaucrats, financiers, and mili- tary men of the Nationalist regime, and looked elsewhere for his ideological nourishment. Nationalism was indispensable to him, but he found in it no more than half an ideology.
The failure of liberal democracy is a much more complex story. By liberal democracy I mean that loose tradition developed in Eu- rope and America which advocated social reform, parliamentary government, and full expression of individual rights. It would be too facile to state categorically, with retrospective wisdom, the reasons why it could not have succeeded, although it did face extraordinary problems in meeting existing emotional demands. Its achievements in China were in fact considerable. It supplied the original inspiration for China's trend toward Westernization dur- ing and before the transitional period, and was the model for indi- vidual expression which lay behind the attack on filial piety.
Ch'en Tu-hsiu's ringing declarations inaugurating the New Tide movement, for instance, were inspired by the Manchester liberalist- like philosophy which he then espoused,28 although he later shifted his position and became one of the founders of the Chinese Com- munist Party (and still later was deposed as one of its first villains). Hu Shih, also a leading spirit in the New Tide, remained one of the most articulate spokesmen for liberal democracy throughout the transitional period. A disciple of John Dewey, he sought in the Chinese past a basis for the pragmatic, scientific approach of his teacher; and he accompanied the American philosopher on his celebrated and highly influential lecture tour of China in 1919-20. And Lu Hsun, although deified by the Communists and certainly
? 376 THOUGHT REFORM
a militant leftist, held fast to the liberal principles of "the right to life, the right to food and shelter, and the right to the unlimited development of the individual. " 29
Spread by missionaries, by Western and Chinese educators, and by Chinese students returning from the West, liberalism had tre- mendous appeal for the Chinese intellectual. But it could never satisfy his need for totalism, and its "drop-by-drop" moderation
(in Dewey's phrase) seemed weak in contrast with the messianic tone of its ideological competitors. Liberalism was least able to make sustained use of feelings of hostility and rebellion, and al- though its stress upon individualism inspired Chinese to challenge family authority, it offered little help for the resulting guilt and identity stress. It offered no lasting group identity to a people who had become dependent upon one, and no substitute for the filial loyalties being cast off. In addition, because of its Western origins, it bore the stigma of Western imperialism, no matter how strongly Chinese and Western liberals opposed to imperialism sought to dis- sociate themselves from this stigma. Liberalism also created a problem about "Chineseness" (as, for example, for Robert Chao and Grace Wu), since the individual Westernization which was likely to accompany any profound acceptance of liberal democratic ideas often led to a sense of being severed from Chinese roots.
Without entering further into the question of potential com- patibility between traditional Confucian humanism and modern liberal democratic ideals (and a case can be made for sucli com- patibility), we can say that no effective political-ideological form was evolved to unite them.
Liberal democratic ideology during the transitional period therefore proved more effective in stimulating opposition to the past than in resolving pressing emotional con- flicts of the present.
Every Chinese intellectual to whom I spoke emphasized just how pressing these conflicts were. Even taking into account the general tendency during any such transitional period to stress only chaos
(some intellectuals must have lived relatively stable lives), there is no doubt that emotional chaos was widespread. Generations of young students had their patriotic emotions aroused but unsatisfied, their rebellious feelings frustrated, their guilt unresolved, their self- definition obscured. Sons and daughters clashed openly with their parents in a society ill-equipped to deal with such strife. While
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 377
great strides were made in youthful self-assertion and in the posi- tion of women, much remained confused. In father-son conflicts, compromises were often achieved at the price of great anguish for both parties. And the breakdown of clear-cut male and female roles often resulted in uncomfortably overt female domination, a recur- rent theme in our case histories. 30
Once initiated into the antitraditional, modern Western world, the Chinese intellectual could never reverse the psychological forces generated within him. The intense conflicts and visions experienced during youthful struggles to attain adult identity often remained throughout life, and the struggles of the modern student in many ways came to characterize the entire transitional period. Sometimes the former student activist, as he got older, seemed to slip back into a traditional pattern, honor his filial duties, then see his own rebel- lions mirrored in those of his son. But no matter how filial or how "modern" the Chinese intellectual appeared on the surface, some conflict between these two emotional tendencies was bound to be taking place underneath. His undigested combination of filialism, Nationalism, and Western liberalism was likely to leave him-- at different times and in different degrees--rebellious, withdrawn, disillusioned, despairing. Continuous war and plunder further sapped energies and hopes--early revolutionary battles, encounters between warlords, Japanese invasions, World War II, and the Communist- Nationalist Civil War. Governed during the latter phase of the transitional period by a group which had become "conservative and antirevolutionary" and out of touch with his own aspirations, the modern student shared in the "general bankruptcy of morale" 31 and turned his gaze toward Communism--if it was not already there.
Thought Reform: The Filled Communist
In Communism, his third ideological alternative, the Chinese intellectual found a no-nonsense solution for his spiritual predica- ment. What role did thought reform play in this solution? Was the cure worse than the disease?
The interplay between Chinese intellectuals and Communism began, not in 1948, but in 1919, immediately following the Russian Revolution. From then on, Communism became linked with
? 378 THOUGHT REFORM
China's own continuous revolution--emotionally, organizationally, and ideologically. Of all Chinese mass movements, Communism was most capable of harnessing the powerful emotions released in the youth-age cultural reversal;32 moreover, its revolutionaryinspira- tion and practical techniques were attractive to Nationalist leaders like Sun and Chiang, and its emphasis upon social reform was much admired by Westernized Chinese liberals.
Communism's greatest ideological weapon was perhaps the "grandiose, starkly melodramatic image of the world"33 provided by the Leninist theory of imperialism, the doctrine which placed on the Western nations and their international finance capital vir- tually the entire onus for China's (or any other "backward" coun- try's) wretched condition. Intellectuals of all shades of political opinion found in this theory a focal point for hostilities, a reassuring interpretation of a humiliating situation, a way to avoid the pain of their own struggles with shame and guilt by centering their ac- cusatory emotions upon an outside enemy, and a rationale for re- jecting that Western enemy even while borrowing his knowledge and methods. This kind of emotional relevance leads to great over- simplifications, and Chinese intellectuals magnified the part-truths of the Leninist theory into a "scientific" gospel.
Liberals, Nationalists, and even traditionalists espoused this theory, but it was really Communist property, an integral part of the broader Communist scheme. As the modern student moved from the Leninist theory to its surrounding Marxist-Leninist prin- ciples, which had great currency even outside the Communist move- ment, he found that this hostile critique reinforced his own Chi- neseness, so that even when he severely criticized China's past, he was able to avoid a sense of being completely alienated from it. And the unwavering boldness of Marxist-Leninist and Communist attacks on both Chinese tradition and the modern West saved him from both the confusing complexities of liberalism, and the fluctuating ethics of Kuomintang Nationalism. The three-fold Com- munist program was clear enough: break filial bonds, expell the harmful Westerner, and follow the Communist Party on the path to total redemption. Thus the modern intellectual could begin to see a possible solution for his long-standing emotional torment; not only could hostility be expressed and guilt atoned for, but there seemed to be the promise of an identity which was both new
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 379
and Chinese.
Yet at first, for most intellectuals, all of this was no more than a
possibility, and here is where thought reform enters the picture. In the ndd-i93o's intellectuals recruited to the Communist-held border area--just a handful from among the great numbers who were em- bracing Communism--were already undergoing a kind of re-educa- tion which closely resembled later thought reform programs. From that time on, thought reform took shape as the Communists' con- veyer of a new Chinese identity. It won adherents, trained cadres, ensured compliance to Communist doctrines, and instilled inner warning signals of anxiety to guard against potential deviation. Yet transcending all of these very important functions was (and is) thought reform's role in directing the human aspect of China's vast culture change--or to put it more accurately, in redirecting on its own terms a culture change which was already well under way.
To influence this change, thought reform had to deal with the problem of filial piety, less with its traditional ideology than with its modern emotional remnants. This involved thought reform in four basic identity tasks.
First and most obvious was the problem of coming to grips with filial emotions which have a way of outlasting even the most ex- treme kind of transitional rebellion. Emotions of loyalty, self- discipline, and respect for authority remained alive side-by-side with their negation, and these were emotional commodities too valuable for the Communists to waste, even if it were possible to dispel them. "Hate your past to win your future," the reformers urged, and they meant it. But they might well have added, "Do not hate it so much that you cannot bring us its sense of filial dedication. " The re- formed intellectual was expected to be, as before, loyal, self-dis- ciplined, and obedient--now a filial son of the Communist regime.
Thought reform placed equal stress on its second task, the un- dermining of lingering effects of Western liberalism. Liberalism was a dangerous rival; it still appealed to many intellectuals as an inner alternative to Communist discipline. In personal terms, this task meant that an intellectual had to be taught to stigmatize as evil and selfish those aspects of himself which desired moderation, wished to live and let live, considered both sides of any question, or favored any form of gradualism. Hu Shih was an obvious choice for the symbolic liberal villain. He has been denounced in almost all
? 380 THOUGHT REFORM
thought reform curricula, and during 1954 and 1955 a special na- tional campaign was conducted during which his personal life and his pplitical, historical, and literary opinions were subjected to a Communist-style dissection. Hu was condemned as an "extreme liberal/' a "pro-American/' and "worshiper of America/' a purveyor of "anti-Marxist pragmatism"; and it was made clear that these pernicious influences still exterted considerable influence upon in- tellectuals. 34 The liberal identity may not have been as deep-rooted as that of the filial son, but its relationship to rival political forces make it, in Communist eyes, a more dangerous one.
The third task was a mopping-up operation directed against transi- tional chaos and against the psychological patterns which accom- panied it. Confusion was to be replaced by certainty, wavering speculation by absolute knowing. Under attack were many rela- tively indefensible identities--those related to cynical detachment, asocial self-seeking, or hollow despair, and those associated with non- ideological personal loyalties to questionable political, military, or financial leaders. In this area the Communists were able to mobilize considerable moral force.
Finally, thought reform has had a synthesizing function, the building of a new identity. Resurrected filial emotions, much of the identity of the modern student, and a sizable chunk of the inter- national Communist were all to be a part of it.
An awareness of these four identity tasks enables us to read be- tween the cliches of thought reform, and construct an analysis based on the principle of imposed identity change. We then discover that its language and its demands, stereotyped as they are, have a special set of emotional meanings for Chinese intellectuals. In both sequence and content, the thought reform process bears down on the historical and cultural conflicts I have enumerated.
The first stage of thought reform (the great togetherness) offers a prelude of promise--the sense of effortlessly merging with a dedicated group which is basic to any Utopian quest. This stage revives the group identity of the modern student, and gives an immediate sense of release from the emotional chaos of the transi- tional period (the third of the four identity tasks). "Thought mobilization" then reminds everyone that inner chaos is not to be so easily cleared up, that the infection is deep-seated. As Mao him- self explains; "The first method is to give the patients a powerful
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 381
stimulus, yell at them, T ou're sick! ', so that the patients will have a fright and break out in an over-all sweat; then, they can be care- fully treated. " 85 The intellectual is reminded that he has inner conflicts (indeed they are made to seem worse than he thought they were); but the accompanying rationale gives him a feeling that Communist "doctors" possess both the knowledge of cause and the means of cure. The treatment will be difficult, but if he will submit himself to it totally and trust in his physicians, he will acquire a new self, and be better than ever. The stress upon promise and need, and the accusations leveled at the distant and recent past indicate the general direction of the treatment. This first stage thus focuses the intellectual's full attention on the identity tasks at hand.
Stage two (the closing in of the milieu) brings on the struggle phase: the pain which the intellectual must experience in order to realize the Utopian promise, the psychological surgery necessary to rid him of the disease. The "logical dishonoring" of this stage of the re-education process can be understood in terms of the specific conflicts of Chinese intellectuals.
For instance, the Chinese intellectual is vulnerable to the ac- cusation of "individualism"--the most basic criticism, since in the eyes of the Communists it "sums up in one term the ideological characteristics of the petty bourgeois class" 36--on all identity fronts. When individualism is defined as "ultra-democratic ideology, tend- ency for independent action, excess emphasis upon individual lib- erty," 37 it is obviously being directed at the Western liberal in him. When it is defined as "individual firstism" to include those who "both adulate and pull strings/' who believe that "what is mine is mine and what is yours is also mine," 38 he can feel its valid applica- tion to highly-personalized acquisitive patterns which became so prominent during the transitional phase. When individualism is described as "placing personal honor, status, and interests above other things," 39 the intellectual feels it directed against traditional patterns still part of himself--especially against the traditional stress on preserving individual dignity and social standing which is in- herent in the Chinese concept of "face. " 40 And the criticism of "individual heroism" applies both to the traditional Chinese ideal of the chien-hsia or "knight errant" and to more modern ideals of "the hero" brought in from the West. Each of these forms of "in- dividualism" is equated with selfishness, hypocrisy, and insincerity;
? 382 THOUGHT REFORM
each is rendered immoral because it allegedly conflicts with the greater group interest.
The Chinese intellectual has similar vulnerabilities to the accusa- tion of "subjectivism. " When this fault is ascribed to those "who simply quote the words of books they have studied as the sole basis for the solution of problems," it is being directed at a long-standing Confucian pattern which persisted in the approach of Chinese intellectuals to Western knowledge as well as to Confucianism itself. 41 When Communist reformers denounce the "subjective idealism and mysticism" of such liberal approaches as those of John Dewey and Hu Shih,42 they are dealing with a more recent set of hopes and visions so consistently shattered that many Chinese intellectuals are now willing to view them as illusory. "Worshipping blindly Western culture"4S is another accusation which makes effective contact with the modern student identity in all Chinese intellectuals (but since the Communists could themselves be ac- cused of doing the same thing, much depended on which aspects of Western culture were chosen as objects of worship).
Just as the "sincere man" (one who submits totally to the Com- munist movement) is offered as the identity alternative to individ- ualism, so the "scientific" practitioner of Marxist-Leninism is the alternative to subjectivism: "Marxism-Leninism, derived from ob- jective reality and tested by objective reality, is the most correct, scientific, and revolutionary truth. " 44 This form of scientism (I use the term to mean both a false claim of precision based upon an alleged natural science model, and a deification of science itself) has a very special appeal for those rebelling against a non-West- ern, nonscientific cultural tradition. Scientism was thus a comfort- able ideological resting place for many Chinese intellectuals after the confusing array of ideas to which they had been so recently exposed.
The Communists equated most additional criticisms either with individualism or with subjectivism, but two of their other epithets --"liberalism" and "sentimentalism"--have special importance for the problems under discussion.
I have already mentioned the accusation of "extreme liberalism" applied to Hu Shih; closely related is the charge of "extreme dem- ocratic tendencies. " Both these accusations have direct application to those Western liberal influences which the Communists seek to
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 383
undermine; but there is also a specifically Chinese connotation for "liberalism. " In an essay devoted to this question, "In Opposition to Liberalism," Mao's first illustrative bad example is "failing to start an argument in principle with a person, even when you know he is in the wrong, letting things slide for the sate of peace and cordiality, all because he is an old friend, a fellow villager, a fellow student, a close friend, someone beloved, an old colleague, or an old subordinate . . . or speaking about [the error] in allusions in order to preserve harmony and unity. " Mao is referring here mainly to the principles of personal loyalty, propriety, and harmony carried over from the filial identity of traditional Chinese culture. All these principles are then viewed in terms of individual char- acter, and "liberalism" is extended to include "refusing to consider correction of your errors even when you recognize them, adopting a liberal attitude toward yourself. "45 Liberalism becomes equated with laxity, softness, and self-indulgence. Here, the traditional Chinese considerations for "human feelings"--that special tolerance for individual frailty which gave balance to an otherwise rigid Confucian system--is under fire; and so is the modern liberal ethic which also urges respect for individual differences.
"Sentimentalism" has essentially the same significance as the personal side of "liberalism/' and refers mainly to a reluctance to sacrifice personal loyalties, and especially those of family, to politi- cal (Communist) considerations. This is primarily an attack upon traditional practices, although a modern liberal can also be guiltyof sentimentalism in connection with his concern for other people as individuals. A deep reluctance to sever his personal ties was often more than offset by the Chinese intellectual's rebellion from these ties, as well as by his conviction that sentimentalism and nepotism had long been barriers to Chinese progress. He was, moreover, offered an identity alternative which was just the opposite of liberal and sentimental softness: that of a "straightforward, loyal, and posi- tive" person who would, "no matter where or when, uphold correct principles and struggle untiringly against all incorrect thoughts and actions"46--in other words, he was to become definite rather than wishy-washy, active and "masculine" rather than passive and "femi- nine. "
The methodical criticisms and self-criticisms of thought reform's second stage are thus aimed at breaking down every emotional iden-
? 384 THOUGHT REFORM
tification which could interfere with the full acceptance of the new Communist identity. Authorities from outside the Communist camp are devalued (as, for instance, the university professors who were publicly humiliated) until they too fall into step with the Communist program. Nothing in one's heritage is to remain worthy of respect unless it contributes to the "new man" being shaped.
The final stage (submission and rebirth) completes the four identity tasks. In this stage the intellectual symbolically acts out his "turning over/' and at the same time commits himself to it by his written analytic statement.
The denunciation of one's father is the symbolic act par excel- lence. Through it the intellectual is to cast off his tie to filialism entirely; after this let no man regard him as a traditional filial son. The act also severs him from his more recent past, and allows him to disown the identities derived from the transitional period. It has this last effect because in China the father has always been especially representative of a man's past, and because the fathers of con- temporary intellectuals were very apt to have been associated with Nationalist, liberal, or other transitional Western influences (as they were for three of my four Chinese subjects). Indeed, the most celebrated denunciations of fathers were cases in which the fathers had distinguished themselves mostly in connection with Western learning: Lu Chih-wei, the former president of Yenching Univer- sity, whose humiliation by his daughter was described by Grace Wu, was an American-trained psychologist; Liang Chi-ch'iao, who was posthumously condemned by his son, himself a university professor, was one of the great early reformers; and a widely-pub- licized attack was made upon Hu Shih (in absentia) by his son. The latter called his father a "public enemy of the people, and an enemy of myself" and went on to state the identity issue in very clear terms: "I feel it is important to draw a line of demarcation between my father and myself. "47 The "line of demarcation" is be- tween father and son, old regime and new, family and Party, past and future.
The final thought reform summary, with its detailed class analy- sis, codifies and conceptualizes the identity shift, and puts it on permanent record. The class analysis is based on Communist psy- chological theory, the crux of which is that "in a class society, man's class character forms the very nature and substance of man . . .
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 585
the class character of man is determined by his class status. "48 The thought reform participant can draw upon this concept for a correlation of class and character: those from "exploiting classes" are extravagant, competitive, cruel, abusive; those of proletarian origin seek solidarity, mutual co-operation, have a "sense of organ- ization and discipline," and are also characterized by "progressive outlook and demand of public ownership of property/' revolt against all exploiters, militancy, tenacity, and so on--in other words, the ideals of the Communist Party as an organic representa- tive of the working classes. Intellectuals, since they have bourgeois and petty bourgeois backgrounds, must inevitably reflect the charac- teristics of these classes: idealism, greed, objectivism, individualism, and stress on personal honor and status. In this sense, all of thought reform is an attempt to emulate Mao Tse-tung's own example and "outgrow" one's class characteristics by changing from one class to another. If an intellectual cannot achieve this ideal of becoming "one with the masses of workers and peasants" 49 he can at least do the next best thing and "accept the direction of the ideology of the working class"--in other words, of Marxism-Leninism and "the thought of Mao Tse-tung. "50 These views on class char- acter, derived from earlier Communist writings, have limitations as psychological theory, but they do serve as a framework for the content of the final thought summary or personal confession. They supply the necessary theoretical basis for commitment.
The third stage ends on a note of togetherness very similar to the one with which the program begins. The pattern of thought reform thus follows the classic Marxist sequence of harmony, struggle, harmony; in psychological terms--group identification, isolation and conflict, and reintegration. At every moment of thought reform, the intellectual has revised, rejected, and modified elements of his past in order to dislodge himself from what he was, and become someone else.
As painful as it is, thought reform would never have a lasting effect if it did not offer a new and appealing sense of identity as its reward. I have so far mentioned only a few of the character traits which thought reform attempts to instill. In general, the reformed identity is based upon principles originally applied to Communist party members, the ? lite of the Communist movement. This identity is therefore not an exact blueprint, but rather an ideal which
? 386 THOUGHT REFORM
neither the dedicated Communist nor the ordinary intellectual can hope to realize fully. But like the identity ideal of the filial son, it is one against which everything else must be weighed,
Partly for this reason I have called the thought reform identity the "filial Communist"--but not for this reason alone. For in be- coming a- filial Communist, the Chinese intellectual becomes part of a new mystique, also vast in its scope and stringent in its de- mands, one which, like the old Chinese family system, envelops almost his entire life space. The filial Communist draws upon traditional sources for its all-important ethic of loyalty, and taps the values of the transitional period for its stress upon progress, science, and change. It is thus a culmination of the historical Chinese identity shifts we have been discussing.
What is the "new man" of thought reform to be like? Many of his characteristics were described by Liu Shao-chi in the famous pamphlet, "How to be a Good Communist/' Liu's criteria, those from other Communist writings, and the attitudes expressed by my subjects allow us to summarize the personal qualities of the ideal filial Communist as follows: he is active, energetic, decisive, un- ambivalent, forceful, masculine, unwavering in his thoughts and actions; he is logical, scientific, materialistic, and disdainful of mysticism, of notions of spiritual values, and of philosophical ideal- ism; he is realistic, down to earth, simple in his tastes, deeply re- spectful toward labor and toward the masses, critical of artistic and intellectual efforts that are not of practical value; he is selfless and totally dedicated, subordinating his own interests to those of the Party and the People in every conceivable manner, ready to make any sacrifices, including that of his life, and to be, in so doing, the happiest of men; he is humble, self-critical, receptive to criticism from others, eager to improve himself in order to be able to do still more for his cause; he is always enthusiastic, confident, high-
spirited, totally sincere in his manner and in his beliefs, well- integrated within himself and in harmony with his society; he is modern, progressive, forward-looking, disdainful of traditional cul- tures and of requirements dictated by past custom; he is conscious of his relationship to a great international movement, of his role in liberating human beings from their bondage, and of having participated in "the remoulding of the substance of mankind"; yet he is proudly Chinese, intensely patriotic, nationalistic, aware of
? THE FATE OF FILIAL PIETY 387
being part of an old and great civilization, of a nation far exceeding any other in population and in potential power.
While no such man could possibly exist, the identity ideal is impressive in its excess of both crassness and nobility. It contains in its totalism the psychological potential for wide-ranging accom- plishment as well as for bitter disillusionment. No more radical change in Chinese character has ever been called for.
Do these identity shifts mean that filial piety, in the original family sense, no longer has any emotional appeal for Chinese in- tellectuals? We can draw no such conclusion. The history of other mass movements teaches us that attacks upon family ties are most characteristic of early phases. We can expect in China, as hap- pened in Russia, a revival of support for the family--that is, for a form of "new Communist family," regarded as an extension of rather than a threat to the regime. It is doubtful whether anything approaching the old ideology of filialism can ever reappear in China, but its central principle of obedience and loyalty of children to their parents is too basic an emotional phenomenon, and one too deeply rooted in Chinese life, to be long negated. Not only does the new Communist man bear the stamp of his filial past; his creators--perhaps more than they realize--are influenced by that same cultural heritage.
? CHAPTER 20
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES: ORIGINS
Where did the Chinese Communists learn their re-
form skills? How did they get to be such master psychologists?
These are questions I have frequently been asked, and as often as not the questioner has in mind a theory of his own: the Chinese have studied Freud on individual psychology, or Kurt Lewin on group dynamics, or Pavlov on conditioned reflexes. The first two of these theories (Freud and Lewin) are products of a cultural and professional ethnocentrism among Western psychiatrists and social scientists; actually, neither Freud nor Lewin has had much in- fluence in China or Russia. The Pavlovian theory is more generally held. It is based on a chain of associations that goes something like this: Pavlov--Russian scientist--supported by Soviet regime-- Soviets use his theory of conditioned reflex for propaganda pur- poses--they taught his techniques to the Chinese--result, thought reform. But there is no convincing evidence that thought reform de- veloped this way. It is true that academic psychology in Communist China does follow the Soviet lead in emphasizing Pavlovian theory, but academic psychologists apparently have had nothing to do with thought reform. And even in the Soviet Union, according to an American authority, there has been nothing to indicate that psy- chiatrists or psychologists have shaped confession or indoctrination techniques, or even that Pavlovian theory has been an important
388
? ORIGINS 389
model for propaganda approaches. 1 In all three of these theories there is the twentieth-century tendency to single out the scientific specialist both as the fountain of all knowledge and the perpe- trator of all evil, Moreover, all of them neglect the two great histori- cal forces which shaped thought reform: Chinese culture and Rus- sian Communism.
The Russian Communist contribution to thought reform is immediately apparent in much of the content and many of the forms of the process; the allegedly scientific Marxist-Leninist doc- trine; the stress upon criticism, self-criticism, and confession as features of "ideological struggle"; the organizational techniques of "democratic centralism"; the combination of Utopian imagery and iron discipline; the demands for purity of belief and absolute obe- dience; and the practice of informing upon others in the service of the Party. Certainly, many of the pressures used to extract confes- sions in penal thought reform closely resemble techniques used by the Russians during the great Soviet purge trials of the late 1930'$: the irresistible demand for an admission of criminal guilt, however distorted or false, and the prolonged interrogations, physical pres- sures, and incriminating suggestions used to obtain it. 2 Eastern European Communist nations have employed similar confession methods, for instance, in the widely publicized cases of Cardinal Mindszenty, William Oatis, and Robert Vogeler.
Russian Communist influences are also responsible for thought reform's immense stress upon sin and evil, and for its continual manipulation of feelings of guilt within all who take part in the program. Such a focus upon sin and guilt has never been prominent in traditional Chinese culture. These Soviet Russian contributions are in turn derived from the many cultural influences which fed modern Communism; the Judeo-Christian religious tradition, the Utopian secular ideologies of the eighteenth century, mystical elements of German romanticism, and the authoritarian excesses of traditional Russian and Byzantine culture, including the heritage of the Russian Orthodox church.
But after acknowledging these Russian and Western debts, we must still ask why it was the Chinese who developed thought reform. Other Communist countries have, to be sure, used elaborate propaganda techniques and various psychological pressures, but never with thought reform's meticulous organization, its depth of
? 3 9 ? THOUGHT REFORM
psychological probing, or its national scale. Nowhere else has there been such a mass output of energy directed toward changing people. In Russia confessions have generally been associated with the purge --the "ritual of liquidation"; in China, confession has been the vehicle for individual re-education. What is the source of this special reform emphasis?
Communist leaders reveal the source in some of their thought re- form writings. Liu Shao-chi, for instance, in "How to be a Good Communist" enjoins Party neophytes to pursue diligently their "self-cultivation. " And he quotes as an example the experience and the words of none other than Confucius himself:
At fifteen, I had my mind bent on learning. At thirty, I stood firm. At forty, I had no doubts. At fifty, I knew the decree of Heaven. At sixty, my ear was an obedient organ for the reception of truth. At sev- enty, I could follow my heart's desire, without transgressing what was right.
Liu also makes reference to the Confucian disciple who said: "I reflect on myself three times a day," and to the Book of Odes which suggests that one cultivate oneself "as a lapidary cuts and files, carves and polishes. " He refers to the Confucian principles expressed in the following quotation from The Great Learning:
The ancients who wished to illustrate illustrious virtue throughout the kingdom first ordered well their own states. Wishing to order well their own states, they first regulated their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they first cultivated their persons. Wishing to cultivate their persons, they first rectified their hearts. Wishing to rectify their hearts, they first sought to be sincere in their thoughts. Wishing to be sincere in their thoughts, they first extended to the utmost, their knowledge. . . . from the Son of Heaven down to the mass of the people, all must consider the cultivation of the person the root of everything besides. 3
These principles echo in the thought reform program, although Liu does of course emphasize the Communists' needs to stress materialism rather than classical "idealism," and to achieve their self-cultivation not through passive meditation but rather by means of active participation in the Communist movement.
Yet the concept of self-cultivation is distinctly Confucian, as is Liu's injunction to Communist cadres that each "watch himself when alone. " Liu and other Communist theorists may refer to these
? ORIGINS 391
traditional principles in order to introduce the alien words of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin in a familiar idiom; but this Confucian idiom does have deep emotional meaning even for anti-Confucian re- formers, and it is this lingering Confucian spirit which has caused the Chinese Communists to make an ideological fetish of moralistic personal re-education.