Crossref Citations
This article has been cited by the following publications. This list is generated based on data provided by Crossref.
Hundt, David
and
Uttam, Jitendra
2017.
Varieties of Capitalism in Asia.
p.
189.
Article contents
Chinese Communism Versus Pragmatism: The Criticism of Hu Shih's Philosophy, 1950–1958
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 March 2011
Extract
The relationship between pragmatism and Chinese Communism is a question important in its consequences but ambiguous in its content. By careful reading of the intellectual history of China during past half-century, certain implications on the intertwined relationships between them can be easily detected. For example, both pragmatism and Marxism were introduced to China during the May Fourth era, a time of unprecedented intellectual ferment. Their common belief in the Western materialist tradition had not only paved the way for a brief united front in the struggle against the dead weight of the Confucian tradition, but their shared emphasis on scientific culture reinforced their common goals and made “science” one of the most worshipped watch-words in contemporary China. Such backgrounds have in fact led many to think that pragmatism represented only a transitional stage on a road that “led naturally and easily to communism as the science of society.” Some claimed that pragmatists not only tended to be tolerant of dialectical materialism and the Communists, but they admired the Communist movement as an integral part of the democratic ideal and helped to prepare the way for the spread of materialism in China in the next few decades. Although the precise relationship between pragmatism and Chinese Communism remains undefined to this day, the pragmatic element in Chinese Communism is a popular theme which has gained wide currency among some recent interpretations.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1968
References
1 Kwok, D. W. Y., Scientism in Chinese Thought 1900–1950 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965), pp. 13–20.Google Scholar
2 de Bary, Wm. Theodore et al. Sources of Chinese Tradition II (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964), 198.Google Scholar
3 Michael, Franz H. and Taylor, George E.. The Far East in the Modern World (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1956), pp. 231–35.Google Scholar
4 In addition to the above-mentioned interpretations, the most recent interpretations along this line are to be found in Holubnychy, Vsevolod “Mao Tse-tung's Materialistic Dialectics,” The China Quarterly, No. 19, July–September, 1964, pp. 18 ffGoogle Scholar. and Cohen, Arthur A., The Communism of Mao Tse-tung (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1964), pp. 27, 188 ff.Google Scholar
5 For example, such criticisms can be found in the following writings. Chi, Li, Hu Shih chung-kuo che-hsüeh-shih ta-kang p'i-p'an (Critique of Hu Shih's “Outlines of Chinese Philosophical History”), (Shanghai: Shen Chou Publication Company, 1931)Google Scholar. Also his Pien-cheng-fa huan-shih shih-yung-chu-i (Dialectics or Pragmatism), (Shanghai: Shen Chou Publication Company, 1932)Google Scholar. Yi Tsing (Yeh Ch'ing) Hu Shih p'i-p'an (Critique of Hu Shih), (Shanghai: The Thinking Bookshop, 1933)Google Scholar. Hu Ch'iu-yuan, “P'in ch'iung ti che-hsüeh” (The Poverty of Philosophy) in Tu-shu tsa-chih I and II. Kuo Mo-jo's criticism of Hu Shih are to be found only in scattered places such as his Shih p'i-p'an shu (A Book of Ten Critiques), (Peking: Science Publishing Company, 1957), pp. 43–49, 119, 463Google Scholar. Mo-jo Wen Chi (Collected Works of Kuo Mo-jo), Peking: People's Publication Company, 1959), XII, 331, XIV, 430Google Scholar and his Ko-min ts'un-ch'iu (Autobiography), II (Shanghai: Hai-yen Book Company, 1947), 148–56Google Scholar. Among the Marxist criticisms, however, Ch'en Tu-hsiu's criticism of Hu Shih can perhaps be singled out as the most representative of their mentality at this time. During the debate between science and metaphysics in the early nineteen twenties, Ch'en, as an admirer of Western progressive civilization, was basically sympathetic to the science-minded group and wrote enthusiastically on its behalf. But as a newly converted Marxist, he believed that “only objective materialistic causes could change society, explain history and control views of life” while Hu Shih and other liberals, with their “dualistic-idealistic emphasis on spiritual forces such as knowledge, speech and education” would inevitably be defeated in front of the metaphysicist assault. Hu Shih answered this materialistic challenge as ridiculous and pointed out that Ch'en's preoccupation with dialectical materialism could easily lead to an unbalanced view of all things. This exchange of opinion is recorded in Hu Shih Wen Ts'un (Collected Works of Hu Shih) III, 40–51.Google Scholar
6 The Communists lost no time after their capture of Peking in launching a general attack against Hu Shih. One of the earliest attacks was made by Chen Yuan, then president of Fu Jen University. In an “open letter” published by the Chin-pu Jih Pao in May 17, 1949Google Scholar, he accused Hu Shih for having misinterpreted Communism and “run away.” See Bodde, Derk, Peking Diary: A Year of Revolution (New York: Henry Schuman Inc., 1950), pp. 183–84Google Scholar. Also Johnson, Chalmers A.Communist Policies Toward the Intellectual Class (Hong Kong: The Union Research Institute, 1959), p. 85Google Scholar. In 1950, another vicious attack against Hu Shih was launched, and his son, Hu Shih-tu, was used as the mouthpiece. In his “open letter,” young Hu accused his father as an “enemy of the people” who “intimately associated with the cultural exploitation of imperialism.” This letter, which was reprinted in newspapers throughout the nation, is reproduced in toto in Hunter, Edward's Brainwashing in Communist China (New York: Vanguard Press, 1951), Appendix I, pp. 331–35Google Scholar. On December 2, 1951, a “symposium on the Criticism of Hu Shih's Thought” was initiated in Shanghai under the auspices of the Ta Kung Pao. Distinguished scholars such as Shen Yin-mo, Ku Chieh-kang and T'ang Yung-t'ung have all participated in the “symposium” by contributing denunciatory articles on Hu Shih. These articles were subsequently published in the Shanghai Ta Kung Pao on December 16, 1951Google Scholar. The gist of these confessions was that Hu Shih was a “cultural compradore imbued with the feudal ideology.” Major articles such as Shen Yin-mo's “This Man, Hu Shih” and Chen Yuan's “What Kind of Man Is Hu Shih,” were translated by the American Consulate General in Hong Kong and published in the Current Background 167, March 25, 1952Google Scholar. See Johnson, Ibid., p. 88. Also see Ta-kai, Kin (Chin Ta-k'ai) Chung-kung p'i-p'an Hu Shih ssu-hsiang yen-chiu (The Chinese Communists' Criticism of Hu Shih's Thought), (Hong Kong: Liberty Publication Company, 1956), pp. 22 ffGoogle Scholar. To this time, however, the attacks were directed against Hu Shih personally. It was not until late 1954, touched off by different interpretation of one of China's most popular novels—The Dream of the Red Chamber—that Hu Shih's thought was for the first time “penetratingly analyzed.” See Johnson, Ibid., p. 89. Also see Current Background 315, March 4, 1955, p. 2Google Scholar, and Chung, Chao, The Communist Program for Literature and Art in China (Hong Kong: The Union Research Institute, July, 1955), p. 53Google Scholar. Starting from late 1954, the campaign was rapidly expanded by the joint effort of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Writers Union so as to embrace not only Hu Shih's literary views but also his philosophical thinking and Weltanschauung as well as his political beliefs and historical interpretations. In due time, institutions of higher learning in various parts of the country also began to respond “enthusiastically” to this undertaking and numerous meetings and forums were organized. The ferocity of the campaign seemed to have rendered only more violent by the passage of time and by the end of 1955, the quantity of the purge literature has well surpassed three million words and the number of participants also registered an unprecedented high over and above all remoulding campaigns previously held in Communist China. See Chen, Theodore H. E., Thought Reform of the Chinese Intellectuals (Hong Kongs Hong Kong University Press, 1960), pp. 43–46, 83–85Google Scholar. Also see Kuo Mo-jo, “Shan tien chien i” (Three Proposals), Hu Shih ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an (Criticism of Hu Shih's Thought: Symposium of Essays), (Peking: San Lien Publications Company, 1955), I, 11Google Scholar. The various critical essays were later published in an eight-volume work under the title of Hu Shih ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an. In addition to these volumes, criticisms made by leading Communist theoreticians such as Ai Ssu-ch'i, Li Ta, Sun Ting-kuo and Yao P'eng-tzu were also subsequently expanded and issued under separate titles. See footnotes 14, 15 and 51. The attack against pragmatism was once again renewed during the anti-rightist campaign. As Lu Ting-yi pointed out, if there were still places where such reactionary ideas (The thoughts of Hu Shih, Hu Feng and Liang Shu-ming) had not been completely eliminated, the campaign against them must continue and “must not stop halfway.” See Chen, Ibid., pp. 118–20. The recent purge in Communist China under the euphemism of “cultural revolution,” despite its political ramifications, however, seemed to have shown once again the salient features of the earlier campaigns. Spearheaded by what was called “the Movement of Outstanding Politics” launched within the armed forces in November, 1965, it went through different twists and turns, and by April of 1966, began to engage not only numerous ranking party officials who seemed to have doubted the Maoist policies in the past through some realistic viewpoints, but also a host of “pragmatic economists, scientists and technicians who failed to pay heed to ideology.” Chieh-jang Chan Pao, the army's newspaper which started the movement, was reported in May of 1966 as “busily leading the criticism of the pragmatists.” The acme of the “revolution,” however, was not reached until July when Mao Tse-tung was reported as having “personally guided” the campaign as his “crowning gift” to the revolution he has led for forty years. By committing himself and his army firmly behind the campaign, Mao seemed to have made the issue quite clear. Instead of regarding the realistic and pragmatic attitude as something worthy of emulation, he took them once more to task and treated them as one of the leading pawns in his favorite game of ideological reform.
7 Hu Shih, “Shih-yung chu-i” (Pragmatism), Hu Shih Wen Ts'un, I, 414–44, 453–58Google Scholar. Genetic Methodology is used to denote the Deweyan five-stage methodology which includes the recognition of problem, the observation of data, the formulation of hypothesis, the verification by experiment, and finally, the making of judgment.
8 Dubs, Homer H., “Recent Chinese Philosophy,” The Journal of Philosophy XXV (1938), 350.Google Scholar
9 Berry, Thomas, C. P., “Dewey's Influence in China,” in Blewett, John, S. J. (ed.), John Dewey: His Thought and Influence (New York: Fordham University Press, 1960), pp. 212–13.Google Scholar
10 Ai Ssu-ch'i was director of the department of philosophical teaching and research of the Marxism-Leninism Institute in Peking. Li Ta, a founding member of the Chinese Communist Party and one-time president of Hunan University, was president of Wuhan University at the time of this criticism. It is recently reported that Mao had written him personally asking him to guide the campaign against Hu Shih in central China. See Chung-yang Jih Pao, August 9, 1966Google Scholar. Hu Sheng is a Marxist popularizer. He is the author of many slim volumes such as Hsin-che-hsüeh ti jen-sheng-kuan (Introduction to Dialectical Materialism), Li-hsing yu-tzu-yu (Reason and Liberty) and Ssu-hsiang fang-fa yu tu-shu fang-fa (How to Think), in which the essentials of Marxism are well stated. Wang Jo-shui and Sun Ting-kuo were members of the Chinese Federation of Literature and Arts. Yao P'eng-tzu and Jen Chi-yü have been Communist essayists and writers for many years.
11 Lifton, Robert J., Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of “Brainwashing” in Communist China (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1963), pp. 369–70.Google Scholar
12 Lin, Ho, “Liang-tien p'i-p'an, i-tien fan-sheng” (Two points of Criticism One Point of Reflection), Jen-min Jih Pao, January 15, 1955.Google Scholar
13 Hu Sheng, “Wei shen-mo yao p'i-p'an Hu Shih, Yu P'ing-po, Hu Feng ti ssu-hsiang” (Why We Have to Criticize the Thought of Hu Shih, Yu P'ing-po and Hu Feng), Hsüeh Ha, April 2, 1955, pp. 9–10.
14 Ssu-ch'i, Ai, P'i-p'an Hu Shift ti fan-tung che-hsüeh ssu-hsiang (Criticism of Hu Shih's Reactionary Philosophical Thinking), (Peking: China Youth Publication, 1955), pp. 2–11Google Scholar. Also Ta, Li, Hu Shih fantung ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an (Criticism of Hu Shih's Reactionary Thought), (Hankow: Hupeh People's Publication Company, 1955), p. 7.Google Scholar
15 Ting-kuo, Sun, Hu Shih che-hsüeh fan-tung shih-tzu ti p'i-p'an (Criticism of the Reactionary Nature of Hu Shih's Philosophical Thinking), (Peking: People's Publication Company, 1955), p. 7.Google Scholar
16 Ibid.
17 Ibid. Also Ai Ssu-ch'i, op. cit. Li Ta, op. cit.
18 Living Philosophies: A Series of Intimate Credos (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1931), p. 21.Google Scholar
19 Ibid.
20 Ibid.
21 Dewey, John, Experience and Nature (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1929), p. iii.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
22 Shih, Hu, “Shih-yung chu-i” Hu Shih Wen Ts'un, I, 445–46.Google Scholar
23 According to Dewey, one of the contracts between the orthodox description of experience and that congenial to present conditions is that “in the orthodox view, experience is regarded primarily as a knowledge-affair. But to eyes not looking through ancient spectacles, it assuredly appears as an affair of the intercourse of a living being with its physical and social environment.” See Dewey, John, Creative Intelligence (New York: Henry Holt & Co. 1917), p. 7.Google Scholar
24 Shih, Hu, op. cit., p. 446.Google Scholar
25 Ibid., 444. Also see Dewey, , Creative Intelligence (New York: Henry Holt & Company, 1917), p. 3.Google Scholar
26 Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., pp. 10–12.Google Scholar
27 Ssu-ch'i, Ai, op. cit., pp. 3–4Google Scholar; Ta, Li, op. cit., pp. 9–13Google Scholar; Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., p. 12Google Scholar. Also see Jo-shui, Wang, “Chin-tsu Hu Shih ti fan-tung che-hsüeh i-tu” (Eradicating the Reactionary Philosophical Poisons of Hu Shih) in Hu Shih ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an, I, 68–70Google Scholar and Yuan-hui, Chen “Hsiao-chin hsueh-shu yen-ch'iu-chung shih-yung-chu-i fang-fa-lun ti tu-hai” (Eradicating the Poisonous Influence of Pragmatist Methodology in Academic Research) in Hu Shih ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an I, 94–96.Google Scholar
28 Chi-yü, Jen, “Hu Shih ti shih-yen chu-i ssu-hsiang fang-fa p'i-p'an” (Critique of Hu Shih's Pragmatic Thinking Method), Hu Shih ssu-hsiang p'i-p'an I, 81–82.Google Scholar
29 Ibid., pp. 80–81, quoted from Hu Shih Wen Ts'un 1, 140.Google Scholar
30 Ssu-ch'i, Ai, op. cit., p. 15Google Scholar; Ta, Li, op. cit., p. 7Google Scholar; Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., p. 14.Google Scholar
31 Lenin, V. I., Materialism and Empirio-Crticism: Critical Notes Concerning a Reactionary Philosophy, Vol. XIII of Collected Worlds of V. I. Lenin (New York: International Publishers, 1927), xiv–xv.Google Scholar
32 Ibid., pp. 119–20.
33 Ibid., p. xix.
34 Ibid., p. 296, note.
35 Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., p. 16.Google Scholar
36 Fischer, Louis, The Life of Lenin (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1964), pp. 64–67Google Scholar. For details, also see Deborin, A. “Foreword to English Translation” in V. I. Lenin's Materialsm and Empirio-Criticism, pp. xi ff.Google Scholar
37 Lenin, , op. cit., p. 87.Google Scholar
38 Ibid., p. 35.
39 Ibid., p. 43.
40 Ibid.
41 Shih, Hu, “Chieh-shao wo tzu-chi-ti ssu-hsiang” (Introducing My Own Thought), Hu Shih lun-hsüeh chin-ts'u (Recent Academic Writings of Hu Shih), (Shanghai: The Commercial Press, 1935), p. 630.Google Scholar
42 For example, immediately after the Bolshevik Revolution, Hu Shih joyfully applauded its success and wrote a poem entitled “Hsin-wo wan-shui” (Long Live the New Russia) to celebrate the event. See Hu Shih, Chang-hui-shih tsa-chi (Diary of Hu Shih), XVI, 1132–33. In his subsequent trip to the Soviet Union, he was so impressed by the Bolshevik policies that he called them “the great and unprecedented political experiments.” He believed that the Bolsheviks “are striving to create a socialistic new age” which “is worthy of our admiration.” He advised his friends Hsu Chih-mo and Chang Wei-tz'u to abondon their “prejudice” against the socialist system. To Hu Shih at this time, “the Soviet system has its universal aspects.” See Hu Shih wen-ts'un, III, 17–18, 74–75, 82–84Google Scholar. Even as late as 1933 in his Haskell lectures delivered at the University of Chicago, he still held the view that the Soviet example was only an early stage of an integrated democratic movement in the West. See, Shih, Hu, The Chinese Renaissance (Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1933), pp. 42–43.Google Scholar
43 Hartz, Louis, “American Political Thought and the American Revolution,” American Political Science Review, XLVI (June, 1952), 337.Google Scholar
44 See footnote 5.
45 Wang, Y. C., Chinese Intellectuals and the West 1872–1549 (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1966), pp. 409 ff.Google Scholar
46 Living Philosophies, p. 255Google Scholar. Also see Shih, Hu, “Tu Wei ti che-hsüeh” (Philosophy of John Dewey), Hu Shih yen-lun-chi (Speeches and Essays of Hu Shih), (Taipei: Hwa Kuo Publication Company, 1953), p. 77Google Scholar, and Shih, Hu, “Shih-yung-chi-i” Hu Shih Wen Ts'un, I, 450.Google Scholar
47 Shih, Hu, Hu Shih lun-hsüeh chin-ts'u, pp. 645–46.Google Scholar
48 Shih, Hu, “The Chinese Tradition and the Future,” Report ana Proceedings, Sino-American Conference on Intellectual Cooperation. Held at the University of Washington, July 10–15, 1960 (Seattle: Department of Publication and Printing, University of Washington, 1962), p. 21.Google Scholar
49 Ssu-ch'i, Ai, op. cit., p. 9.Google Scholar
50 Ibid., pp. 9–12.
51 Ibid., pp. 12–13. Also Li Ta, op. cit.
52 Dewey, John, Reconstruction in Philosophy (New York: Henry Holt & Company, 1920), p. 91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
53 Yao-P'eng-tzu, , P'i-p'an Hu Shih shih-yung-chu-i ti fan-tung-hsing ho fan-ko-hsüeh-hsing (Critique on the Reactionary and Anti-Scientific Nature of Hu Shih's Pragmatism) (Shanghai: Shanghai Publication Company, 1955), p. 52.Google Scholar
54 Ssu-ch'i, Ai, op. cit.Google Scholar Also Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., p. 13.Google Scholar
55 Ai Ssu-ch'i, Ibid., pp. 7, 11, 12, 18–25.
56 Ibid., p. 13.
57 Ibid.
58 P'eng-tzu, Yao, op. cit., p. 50.Google Scholar
59 Ting-kuo, Sun, op. cit., p. 3.Google Scholar
60 For example, Chang Hsin-ju in his P'i-p'an Ha Shih ti shih-yung-chu-i che-hsüeh (Critique of the Pragmatic Philosophy), (Peking: People's Publishing Company, 1955)Google Scholar, provided a typical sample of this kind of criticism. After repeating the general principles of Hu Shih's methodology, he continued: “Let us first of all examine the so-called stage of ‘start with concrete facts and siuations.’ It actually means to start with one's own subjective ideas or, to be more specific, to start with the anti-revolutionary ideology of the American imperialism, to neglect the objective facts and to observe and judge problems from predetermined framework. … Next, there is the so-called stage of ‘hypothesizing method’ or boldness in hypothesizing. This stage means essentially, to fabricate distorted facts by a pair of closed eyes, to neglect and reconcile class contradictions, and to chose among many other facts, the partial, superficial and conforming ones which are capable of being exaggerated for the metaphysical inferences and which will lead to the formulation of the dogmatic conclusions in the name of ‘hypotheses’ … Lastly, there is the stage of testing by experiments or ‘careful verification.’ Actually, this is a stage to create evidence in order to ‘verify’ your own ‘hypotheses’—something which has already been dogmatically asserted in the previous step.… This is the true essence of what the pragmatic philosophers had called ‘laboratory attitude of mind’ and ‘Genetic Method.’ This in effect is a subjective, partial, and superficial metaphysical method. It is also the method of subjective Sophism.” See P'i-p'an Hu Shih ti shih-yung-chu-i che-hsüeh. pp. 40–41.Google Scholar
61 Meyer, Alfred G., Marzism: The Unity of Theory and Practice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954), pp. 94–96.Google Scholar
62 Bauer, Raymond, “Psychological Aspects of Totalitarianism,” in Friedrich, Carl (ed.), Totalitarianism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954), pp. 143–45.Google Scholar
63 Morgenthau, Hans J., Scientific Man Vs. Power Politics (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1946), p. 4.Google Scholar
64 Lenin, , op. cit., p. 83.Google Scholar
65 Elliot, W. Y., The Pragmatic Revolt in Politics (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1928), p. 42.Google Scholar
66 Bauer, Raymond, op. cit., p. 147.Google Scholar
67 de Santillana, George, “Phases of the Conflict between Totalitarianism and Science,”Google Scholar in Friedrich, Ibid., p. 255.
68 Vsevolod Holubnychy, Ibid., pp. 18–20.
69 Ibid., p. 20.
70 Yu, Siao, [Hsiao yu] Mao Tse-tung and I Were Beggars (Syracuse University Press, 1959), p. 246.Google Scholar
71 Chen, Jerome, Mao Tse-tung and the Chinese Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1965), p. 49.Google Scholar
72 Chan, Wing-tsit, A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 777Google Scholar. Also see Cohen, Ibid., p. 13, note.
73 Snow, Edgar, Red Star Over China (New York: Grove Press, Inc., 1961), p. 147.Google Scholar
74 Tse-tung, Mao, Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung (New York: International Publishers, 1954), I, 284–88. III, 154–55.Google Scholar
75 Snow, , op. cit., pp. 77–78.Google Scholar
76 Cohen, , op. cit., p. 27.Google Scholar
77 Schwartz, Benjamin I., “New Trends in Maoism,” Problems of Communism, Vol. VI, No. 4, July–August, 1957, 3.Google Scholar
78 Gould, Sidney H., ed. Sciences in Communist China (Washington: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1961), pp. 44–45.Google Scholar
79 See August, 1965 issue of Hung Ch'i.
80 Gould, , op. cit., pp. 91, 95.Google Scholar
81 Mao, , Selected Work, I, 124.Google Scholar
82 Ibid., p. 244.
83 Snow, , op. cit., p. 178.Google Scholar
84 Orleans, Leo A., Professional Manpower and Education in Communist China (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1961), p. 7.Google Scholar
85 Leites, Nathan, A Study of Bolshevism (Glencoe: The Free Press, 1953), p. 123.Google Scholar
86 Arendt, Hannah, “Discussion of the Psychological Aspects of Totalitarianism,” in Friedrich, op. cit., p. 288.Google Scholar
87 Pye, Lucian W., “Coming Dilemmas for China's Leaders,” Foreign Affairs, April, 1966, Vol. 44, No. 3, 390.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
88 Mao, , Selected Works, 1, 290.Google Scholar
89 To name just a few instances, witness not only the “Great Leap Forward” fiasco in the late nineteen fifties but also the recent extreme doctrinaire tendencies with foreign as well as domestic repercussions.
90 Crick, Bernard, The American Science of Politics (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1959), p. 88.Google Scholar
91 Commager, Henry S., The American Mind (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1950), p. 97.Google Scholar
92 Hutchins, Robert M., Freedom, Education, and the Fund: Essays and Addresses 1946–1956 (New York: Meridian Books, 1956), p. 126.Google Scholar
93 Although Hu Shih's liberal thought has not been adequately studied in the past, he did present his justification for freedom and democracy based on pragmatism. His major theoretical writings in this area were rather late in appearing. See Shih, Hu, “Instrumentalism as a Political Concept,” in University of Pennsylvania Bi-Centennial Conference, Studies in Political Science and Sociology (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1951), pp. 1 ffGoogle Scholar. and his article in The Philosopher of the Common Man: Essays in Honor of John Dewey to Celebrate His Eightieth Birthday (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1940), pp. 215 ffGoogle Scholar. His other political writings, which are voluminous, were written throughout an extended period from the establishment of the Nu-li chou-pao (The Endeavor) in May, 1922Google Scholar, in Peking to February, 1962, when he died in Taipei. Among them, his articles published in Jen-ch'üan lun-chi (Essays on Human Rights), (Shanghai: Hsin Yueh Book Co., 1931)Google Scholar, his writings in Tu-li ping-lun (The Independent Critic) between 1932–1937, and his discussion on liberalism in the small pamphlet entitled Wo-men pi-hsu shuan-tze wo-men-ti fan-hsiang (We Must Choose Our Direction), (Hong Kong: Free China Publication Co., 1949) are particularly noteworthy. For a preliminary study of his liberalism in terms of the Anglo-American liberal traditions, see my work “The Criticism of Hu Shih's Thought in Communist China” (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, The University of Chicago, 1965), pp. 131 ff.
- 1
- Cited by