Cultural China in the Context of Globalization

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Introduction

During the 19th and 20th century, Chinese scholars were confronted with the problem of modernization of China given that China is widely known for its cultural practices. They wondered how China would catch up with the western civilization without giving up part of its cultural practices, which it had known and lived with for a period of more than two thousand years.

From early 20th century (1920s to be precise), Confucian thought was slowly replaced by Marxist ideology and, was later established as the new order of discourse in 1949, when the People’s Republic began. However, many scholars observed that, despite the changes in ideologies that were established in China after the 1919 movement, the Confucianism was not demoted to the museum of History of philosophy in China. Instead, the Confucian ideology (which forms an integral part of the Chinese culture) was not swept away completely but remained influential in shaping the modern china.

It may look suburb that, cultural teachings are still going on in China consideration the rapid changes that are taking place in the global world. Many radicals have tried to give China new ideologies although they have not succeeded because many Chinese strongly hold to their cultural tradition to a point that it has become almost impossible for them to shake it off completely.

However, China has not been left behind in terms of globalization and it is actually among the countries in the world that have managed to keep pace with the changes in the global world. This shows how significant the Chinese culture is to the Chinese people. It has managed to persist in the world of western civilization and seems to persist until the end of time. However, the significant of culture and cultural identity in the age of globalization remains a question that is yet to be answered.

This paper will give an in-depth analysis of Chinese culture that has withstood the western thought. It will explore on some of the work of arts that constitute a big percentage of Chinese culture including aesthetics, poems, pottery, just to name but a few. This paper will put more focus on the aesthetics because they form an integral part of Chinese cultural identity. It will look at the main characteristics of the aesthetics, and they have been able to persist in the world of western civilization. It will also look at the concept of globalization in relation to China and explain how cultural China has been able to consolidate globalization into its institution by looking at its current economic performance in comparison to other countries.

Chinese Cultural Identity

Presently, many scholars have been conducting debates aimed at solving the controversies between cultural identity in china and globalization. These debates reflect upon the issue of universalism and cultural relativism. Some radicals hold that, culture will soon become a museum piece to which they are only ironic references possible, while others claim that, it looks absurd to talk about national cultures in this age of globalization. Michael Walzer, observes that,

Societies are necessarily particular because they have members and memories, members with memories not only of their own but also of their common life. Humanity, by contrast, has members, but no memory, and so it has no history and no culture, no customary practices, no familiar life-ways, no festivals, no shared understanding of social good p25.

Then, another question raises, does culture, and cultural identity apply to other parts of the world for instance, Africa, India, Arab, or it is only practiced in China? Do people in other communities share the modern or post-modern Western perspective and anxieties about culture? Walzer only address the issue of shared understanding of the social good but does not address the shared understanding of art and or aesthetics (Witzell & Lee, 1990). Aesthetic understanding forms part of the humanities and sciences which was set up by the Western civilization and has now become systems with global significance and also forms significant parts of cultures. Cultural identity if formed by language, images, myths, art, religion, references to literature, just to name but a few.

Chinese Aesthetics

Chinese hold some traditional aesthetics, which have been modified to suit the modern perspective. These include poetry, painting, calligraphy, music, martial arts, pottery, and the list is endless. However, it is hard to find common traits among these disciplines, although poetry, calligraphy, and painting share some common traits, which have an impact on the Chinese cultural identity.

The Chinese traditional aesthetics have some specific characteristics that help in impacting the cultural identity. One such characteristic is suggestiveness; this is a quality found in the poetic work. Suggestiveness refers to the ability of the poetic work to highlight the Chinese culture in a metaphoric language (Gao, 2004). This is determined by images of nature and the meaning behind the language and the images used. This is where some words will contain meanings beyond what a layman can find in the word itself or images used may be communicating something that is far beyond the image itself.

Characteristics of Aesthetics

The suggestive characteristic can also be found in the work of painting. This is whereby, a painting is used to convey poetic image and meaning that goes beyond the painting itself; meaning that, the quality of the painting is beyond the painting. Hence, traditionally, Chinese paintings may not be able to mirror the world (that is, it does not give a realistic representation of a given scene because it uses metaphoric language) and thus cannot be relied on because it does not have linear perspective which is a dominant feature in the Europeans painting.

There is another peculiar characteristic in Chinese aesthetics; vital quality also denoted as qi. All aesthetic work is supposed to convey a sense of liveliness; this mostly applies to calligraphy and painting and in some poetry. This characteristic also touches on notions of natural creativity; this is to mean that, a work of art should clearly represent a work of nature. Intrinsic to this idea is the significance of the calligraphic line, for instance the contract between black and white and the preference for painting in black and not white to emphasize the dynamic liveliness of the brushstroke. Black and white is preferred because, they are assumed to produce more interesting movement and dynamics than other colors.

Another unique characteristic with Chinese aesthetic is its ability to portray cosmological ideas, which support the balance between dual opposites in a world of art. For instance, a piece of painting is supposed to harmonize and not oppose the pervading influence of yin-yang thought. For example, the landscape painting called shanshui kwa- meaning “mountain and water painting” unites the two forces (yin and yang); mountain (manifesting the yang quality) and water (manifesting the yin quality). Hence this painting of the landscape catches the harmonious cosmological order between the world and the forces surrounding it.

Chinese aesthetic work has been known to give weight to two notions that seem to contradict with one another; these are regularity and naturalness. This character can be observed clearly in regular poems. This is because; these poems have to follow certain rules in regard to number and length of lines, tone patterns, among other rules. The naturalness of these poems is obvious when one is reading them since they even have an easy style. This characteristic can also be observed in Chinese paintings, which are also defined by set rules.

The Chinese aesthetic work with its characteristics of liveliness, suggestiveness, cosmological forces, naturalness and regularity, and cultivated clumsiness constitutes an completely different world of art in comparison to the western tradition. These aesthetics are unique in every aspect as compared to the western work of art and they still hold some of these characteristics up until now making them more competitive in the global world. These characteristics are only understandable to the Chinese people since they form an integral feature of their culture. They have been able to persist in the changing global world and still form fundamental elements of the cultural identity of the Chinese (Hutrerd, 2004).

Encounters of the Chinese Aesthetics with the Western Culture

Presently, the Chinese aesthetics have been able to maintain some of their important characteristics in the face of western perspective. One of the reasons that Chinese still hold to the quality of the aesthetics is that, they form a realm that is relatively free from politics. This encourages Chinese to explore freely and come up with new ideas and thought because they do not face the restrictions from the political realm. Another reason is that, the Chinese traditional aesthetics forms a basis for intellectuals to link their modern perspective with the traditional ideas.

This is important not only because of the preservation of culture, but also because the Chinese traditional aesthetic was not influenced by western thoughts thereby making it more suitable for the study of the Chinese culture. For instance, at the beginning of the 20th century, the Chinese began to define themselves in relationship to the West, contrary to want would be expected, they held unto their culture and did not allow the western civilization to sweep any of their beliefs. This encounter was actually to the benefit of the Chinese because, they used the western thought to create new ideas, and way of doing things for example they could come up with concepts that would be used inline with their own tradition. We cannot say that, the Chinese discarded the western thought completely but they used it to their advantage. Unlike the westerns who are believed to be shaped by religion, Chinese are shaped by their traditional aesthetics.

Gao (1997) observed that modern Chinese aesthetics have largely been influenced by German idealism. This is to mean that, the discourse of the Chinese aesthetics during the beginning of the 20th century had been influenced by German perspective of the 19th century, which was later received about 100 years later due to the interferences caused by war and translation problems. It is clear that, some of the Chinese aesthetics contains some aspects of beauty and strategy borrowed from the European history.

Hence, the encounter between the Chinese scholars and the western aesthetics resulted in a situation with few creative misunderstandings of the European ideas in the Chinese aesthetics. During the Cultural Revolution period that occurred between 1966 to 1976, Chinese aesthetics ceased to be a topic of debate and more focus was put on European traditional culture. However, the interest towards Chinese culture was later triggered by new perspective about the westerns. This resulted in peculiar tensions, ambivalences, and ironies for aesthetics in china today.

Culture in China Today

At the begging of 1990s there was an assertive flood of studies related to Chinese culture including arts, aesthetics, and ethics. These new trend was triggered by the changes in western thoughts and postmodernism. Scholars were determined to know the truth from the western perspective in order to save china and its cultural beliefs. Gsene (2002) notes that, “The main stream of Chinese modernity discourse has always been enchanted by the magical spell of the Western colonial discourse” P72. He was one of the earliest Chinese postcolonial critics, who worked with the western postcolonial thought to analyze Chinese modernity, which has been influenced by the western enlightenment paradigm to recovering a Chinese subjectivity. This subjectivity as is now believed had been buried by a politically correct western modernity discourse and was almost becoming forgotten.

After the Cultural Revolution period, there was a change in intellectual fashions in many parts of the world. Towards the new millennium, discussion on Chinese culture, aesthetics and art changed to include the notion of globalization. Many scholars wonder if Chinese culture would be able to bring on board particular experience to the discussions taking place in the western world. There is a common saying in china that “Art knows no borders”.

This saying seems to be appropriate for understanding the new age of global modern art (Sassen, 1996). Modern artist in china seems to retain their traditional perspectives even in the modern world. They strongly hold that, a work of art should retain the original concept, expression, socio-political criticism, and purpose even in the context of globalization. Most of Wei Dong’s paintings more so those painted before 2003, show images of half-naked Chinese women in the background of a Chinese landscape. This contrasts with the western tradition where paintings showing human beings have never been accepted as prominent works of art according to Chinese traditional aesthetics.

China and Globalization

Since 1980s (that is after the Cultural Revolution period), China can be grouped among the counties that have been able to reap the benefits of globalization. For instance, in the past two decades or so, China’s economic growth rate has been increasing as the economy tries to move from the command economy to a market-based economy. This growth rate has been made possible by trade liberalization that has been ongoing across the globe (Stiglitz, 2006). However, globalization is a concept and a phenomenon that has gone beyond economies boundaries to encompass socio-cultural and political aspects.

Globalization has varying meanings when it comes to its application in different social and political grounds. For instance, in china, the notion of globalization has positive and negatives impacts depending on geographical locations of individuals, cultural beliefs and area of operation (private or public sector). According to Fiss and Hirsch (2005), globalization in Chinese context means, “the emergence of capitalism, democratization, or globalization is marked by discursive struggles over their social and cultural impacts, and the outcome of these struggles may facilitate or impede the transformation’s widespread acceptance” p29.

Globalization is a concept that is in the process of gaining momentum in china and it is yet to be consolidated in the Chinese institutions. However, the degree of consolidation will highly be influenced by individuals’ perspective, and the meaning of globalization as attached by different members of the society. Many researchers have observed that, the consolidation of globalization into Chinese institutions would rather be a difficult task given that; it is based on western values, which the Chinese are strongly, opposed to and tend to be inclined to their cultural beliefs (Stighitz, 2003).

Many studies have been carried out to understand the Chinese perspectives concerning globalization. One such study was conducted by the world commission on the social dimension of Globalization, which found out that, the process of globalization taking place presently is generating unbalanced outcomes not only in China but also in many countries. The wealth created through the process of globalization is shared among very few countries and there seems to be no effort of shaping this process. China has benefited through trade liberalization although some of these benefits are yet to reach most of the Chinese located in the diverse geographical areas (ILO, 2004).

It would be true to say that; China has benefited the most from economic globalization out of all the developing countries. Fishman (2006), in his book ‘The relentless rise of the next great superpower” noted that, China is among the countries in the world that is having positive influence on the lives of employees, customers, and citizens distributed in many parts of the world. This has only been possible because of economic globalization.

Chinese Economic Performance

China is slowly portraying itself as the world economic driver; this means that each country, individuals and the companies are considering China as a trade partner, a thing that has boosted the economy of the country. The fact that each country is willing to trade with it has set the country in the pace, now heading to be a political neutral country (Nierop, 1994). As nations get more confident in the country, the more they are willing to trade with China and thus the market stands to gain China has highly modern developed infrastructures; both of transport and communication.

The systems are advanced so well that asses to the country from any corner of the world is highly enhanced, the airports, the sea port, and internal transport are well managed and assessable. The communication network within and without is of high-tech. The sectors have seen the private and public participation, this boosts the efficiency of the systems and thus one can trade with approximate assumptions. There is what the government refers to as private public partnership that is aimed at maintaining the infrastructures. This means that the continuity of the countries good systems have been taken care of.

China has well developed financial sector with the privatized and government participation in the sector. The banks are stable enough to sustain the growing economy on the one hand, although this may not have a direct impact on many businesses. There is the emergence of micro finance institutions in the country; the institutions are giving a lot of support to the small scale trader evident in the country.

The insurance companies are stable enough and can handle big losses without going under. At the same time, there are reinvestment insurance companies that help in maintaining stability even further (Reuvid & Li, 2005). The banking sector has enabled firms to get loans at favorable rates. The insurance and the banking sectors thus have a direct and indirect effect. From a direct point it means many investors stand to benefit the efficiency of this institutions and from an indirect point is that as the other sectors get empowered the benefit trickle down to my business. There is good government intervention in the economy and Randall notes that,

the government has taken care to adapt basic economic principles to China’s current circumstances”, for “contrary to neoliberal prescriptions, the state has actively intervened in the Chinese economy and played a key role in setting economic policy, establishing government institutions, regulating foreign investment, and mitigating the adverse effects of globalization on domestic constituencies. (p.5)

The growth rate of the economy of china has always for the last three decades remained on a positive note. There have even been some rates recorded as high as 12%. This is an element to show the strength of the economy as well as it gives us the hope of continuity in the market (Fan and Chan-Kang 2005 P.23). This growth has enabled China to be seen as the emerging world economy. The rate of growth is another indicator of a stable political environment that encourages local and international investors to invest. With such a rate of economic growth it leads to the easy options of diversity of the business.

During the world crisis as stated earlier, China survived the depression and still recorded an economic growth; these are all symbols of a good investing environment. Zheng (2009) says that “Despite its recent rapid economic growth, China’s political system has remained resolutely authoritarian. However, an increasingly open economy is creating the infrastructure for an open society, with the rise of a non-state sector in which a private economy, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and different forms of social forces are playing an increasingly powerful role in facilitating political change and promoting good governance” (P.123).

The above statement aims at giving the coloration between good governance and the economic growth. Due to the high population, there are social evils in the country that can influence the decision negatively. However, the government has continued to assure that security will be boosted. It has invested in modern security systems to boost the security systems. China has been able to transform itself from the greatest opponents of globalization and is now a country being ruled by the rule of law. It is committed to competition and has a widespread command in the use of foreign education, English language and other foreign laws that are working in its favor as it transforms into Chinese civilization (Wu, 2006.

Chinese economic performance is associated with the use of liberalization in the context of globalization. Part of the economic success is improved standards of living among the workers, which has been rapid. Chinese economy has actually grown more rapidly than Japan although this has resulted into stressful adjustments. For instance, enterprise employment has reduced by 44 million, while 25 million jobs have been lost in the manufacturing sector.

China’s success is one of the most significant developments of contemporary history, but prognostic from current growth to Chinese global supremacy or threats to the way of life is just incorrect. Contrasting to the old Soviet Union, reformist China does not try to change any other country’s way of life. Its financial system faces world history’s most rigorous amalgamation of banking, urbanization and employment disputes and by 2020 an expected demographic constrict that will have few workers caring for a big number of dependents. The best upshot would be a China that is sooner or later be like Japan, affluent, winning in some sectors, and losing in others. Signs that China is making rapid progress is quite evident and should be embraced warmly (Appadurai, 1996).

For over two centuries, Chinese had tried a variety of ways including socialism, entrepreneurship, republic, religious fundamentalism, among others, which did not seem to work. Hostility was so relentless that, along with scholars, much of the country accepted that the world economic and political order, and the Chinese economic and political order, were so hoarded against them that any path to success had to start with obliteration of the existing order.

Significant Adjustments Made In China

Today, china is the only nation with the ability to send missions throughout the world seeking best practice. It has been able to adapt not just foreign technology and foreign communal management procedures, but also a range of foreign institutions and practices including but not limited to international accounting standards; British, U.S. and Hong Kong securities laws a central bank structure, and Taiwan-style regulations for foreign portfolio investment. Among the most significant changes is the decision to accept the Western notion of rule of law; acceptance of competition as a most important economic practice; and adoption of English language.

China has come to believe in globalization more than any other country in the world. China’s successes have all corresponded to the reformation of an open economy that accepts globalization. In disparity, the success achieved by Japan and South Korea was a result of use of stricter controls on trade that what China is using. They also used tighter foreign investment policies and domestic activities than Today’s china. However, China has been required to make extreme adjustment given that Chinese people hold strongly to their cultural beliefs.

China is now going through painful social adjustments but it has already shown its willingness to accept these adjustments which have resulted in an improvement in its economic performance it has experienced many rapid improvements in the standard of living and working conditions than have ever been witnessed in any large country. For instance, before the transformation, workers in Shanghai wore the same types of clothing, seemed exhausted and languid, and rarely possessed essential appliances like television sets or even radios. As that was not enough, malnutrition was prevalent in the countryside (Peng & Guo, 2000). Today Shanghai workers have a variety of smart and colorful clothes and look self-assured and lively and the average Chinese family owns somewhat more than one television. Malnutrition is gone and Chinese awesomely support more globalization.

Conclusion

China is one of the countries that still observe some cultural practices even in the modern times thus the name cultural china. Some of these cultures include but not limited to the use of poems, calligraphy, aesthetics, paintings, and pottery in their teachings. Aesthetics became popular in the 19th and 20th century although they were to some degree influenced by German, which became evident after one hundred years. With the entry of Europeans, western civilization began in the 19th century but this did not deter the Chinese from observing their cultural beliefs.

They belief that, their culture is strongly rooted in their origin and thus are not planning to leave in the near future. it seems contrasting that, china being a cultural country can still be considered as the country which has reaped most benefits from globalization. It has been able to globalize while still holding unto its culture. Instead of fully discarding the western civilization, China used it to its advantage. For instance, it used the western thought to modify their artwork in order to suit the modern times. This is did not only receive national acceptance, but was also accepted in many parts of the world.

Many researchers have observed that, the consolidation of globalization into Chinese institutions would rather be a difficult task given that; it is based on western values, which the Chinese are strongly, opposed to and tend to be inclined to their cultural beliefs. However, China has to some extent being able to consolidate globalization through trade liberalization although it has been forced to make some painful adjustments. Among the most significant changes is the decision to accept the Western notion of rule of law; acceptance of competition as a most important economic practice; and adoption of English language. It has come to believe in globalization more than any other country in the world.

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