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Comment on "Westernization Movement"
Purpose The Westernization School advocates "middle school as the body and western learning as the application", hoping to maintain feudal rule and carry out reforms with advanced technology without touching the feudal system. The Sino-Japanese War proved that the Westernization Movement did not make China rich and strong. However, it introduced some modern scientific production technologies from western capitalist countries, trained a number of scientific and technical personnel and skilled workers, objectively stimulated the development of capitalism in China and resisted the expansion of foreign economic forces. When the Westernization School set up modern industries, it put "calming China" and "opposing foreign countries" together. The former reflects the domestic class contradiction, while the latter reflects the contradiction between the Qing rulers and foreign invaders. However, after the Second Opium War, when the corrupt rulers of the Qing Dynasty had frequent "internal troubles and foreign invasion", the Westernization School could only rely on the western powers to jointly suppress the people and maintain the crumbling regime. Therefore, the result of the practice of Westernization Movement is bound to deny "foreign enemies". If the Westernization Movement is a reform, it can only be a "reform" in a semi-colonial direction. All the great powers are willing to support westernization, which is proof. Li Hongzhang said that the Huai army had the confidence to win when it met "bandits from the mainland", and it was "unclear whether it would win or lose" when it met foreign enemies. Ding Richang, an official of the Westernization School, said that his naval gun "can prevent bandits in the town, but not foreign invasion". The Westernization Movement lasted for 30 years, but it didn't make China prosper. On the contrary, under the slogan of "self-improvement" and "seeking wealth", it enriched the first generation of warlord groups. Subjectively, westerners do not want capitalism to appear in China. Even when the civil industry was founded, it was repeatedly said that similar private enterprises were not allowed, which hindered the emergence of capitalism to some extent. However, under the feudal system in China, the Westernization School introduced a new productive force, advanced western science and technology, which was incompatible with the feudal relations of production, objectively and inevitably accelerated the disintegration of the feudal relations of production, thus stimulating the emergence of Chinese national capitalism, which was independent of the subjective will of the Westernization School. In order to solve the problem of funds, the Westernization School set up civilian industries, and adopted the methods of "official supervision and business operation" and "official-business joint operation" to absorb private capital. This "commercial stock" part is the factor of national capitalism. Since the 1970s, a group of bureaucrats, landlords and businessmen have directly invested in modern civilian industries, which has finally enabled China to have a little advanced production capacity, promoted the emergence of national capitalism, and also promoted the emergence of the bourgeoisie and the growth of the proletariat. In addition, the argument between the Westernization School and the die-hards and their incomplete criticism of the die-hards have shaken the absolute authority of adhering to the tradition of ancestral training and standardizing the famous religion to a certain extent, and opened up a good atmosphere for learning from the West. Westernization School has translated many foreign scientific and technological books, sent overseas students of different ages and qualifications, trained a group of diplomatic and scientific talents, and introduced western social science knowledge, which also played a pioneering role in promoting the spread of democratic ideas. On this basis, in the 1970s and 1980s of 19, a group of early bourgeois reformists in China were differentiated from westernization bureaucrats. Finally, the establishment of Westernization civil industry partially resisted the expansion of foreign economic forces. For example, in 1872, Li Hongzhang founded the Steamship Merchants Bureau, so that "the benefits of Neijiang offshore will not be taken up by foreigners". For more than three years, the loss of foreign ships was13 million, and the American flag company was returned to the well by China merchants because it was unbearable. After the opening-up of the official textile layout in Hubei Province, the import of foreign fabrics in Jianghan Customs decreased by more than 100,000 pieces every year. China's capital can beat foreign businessmen, which was once considered as "original". The function of modern industrial enterprises managed by Westernization School is based on the premise of not changing feudal production relations. The enterprises they run have strong external dependence, feudalism and a certain degree of monopoly. Therefore, the Westernization School had to be controlled and restrained by imperialism in industrial technology, capital and even management, in order to set up modern industrial enterprises and prepare for China's coastal defense. As a result, the imperialist control over China's politics, military affairs and economy was deepened, and the Westernization School accelerated the emergence of its own comprador. Such enterprises can not only avoid their own bankruptcy, but also seriously hinder and inhibit the development of modern national industries in China. In the thirty years of "Westernization", the number of trading ports that China was forced to open increased from 7 before 1860 to 34 before 1894, and the import volume of foreign countries also surged from 5 1864 to 1894. Among the imported commodities, opium occupied the first place before the 1980s, and cotton products jumped to the first place after the 1980s, and opium relegated to the second place, but the absolute quantity still kept rising. Before the 1980s, the main commodities exported were tea and silk, and after the 1980s, cotton and soybeans gradually increased. China was forced to accelerate its involvement in the whirlpool of world capitalism, becoming their commodity sales market and the origin of cheap raw materials. Therefore, the process of Westernization Movement is the further combination of Chinese and foreign reactionaries and the gradual deepening of China's semi-colonization, and it is also the self-help movement of the landlord class. Thus, although China's modern national capitalist industry grew difficultly in the same process of the Westernization Movement, it was mainly the result of the restriction of China's modern economic laws, which was counterproductive for the Westernization School. However, the Westernization Movement acted as an unconscious historical tool after all. With the construction of modern industry, modern production technologies in some capitalist countries have been introduced, and a number of modern industrial workers have emerged in China society. In the new schools founded by the Westernization School, a group of intellectuals and engineers who have mastered natural science have also been created. At the same time, the profits of enterprises also attracted some bureaucrats, landlords and businessmen to invest in modern industry, which objectively stimulated the development of capitalism in China.