Source: Shanghai Observer

Today's China and the rest of the world are faced with unprecedented transformations. These transformations, uncertain and inextricably linked with one another, may have an important impact on the identification bond and operation mechanisms that China and the whole world are accustomed to. In the context of a "two-way interlocking" between China's development and global change, any one-dimensional perspective or static view cannot clearly show the new momentum contained in the transformation of contemporary Chinese society. Some scholars in China’s sociology circle have felt the pressure and challenge resulting from a lack of academic discourse, lack of academic professinoals, and lack of academic confidence, as well as the lack of an overall plan to solve these problems. This is a feeling they have never felt before. For now, our insight and ability of comprehension, deduction and generalization is not good enough to respond to the new problems brought about by the transformation of Chinese society and the world at large. Under this backdrop, it is all the more pressing to build a transformation sociology discourse system in the process of Chinese social transformation.

The transformation of China endows sociology with dual academic missions

The transformation of contemporary China endows sociology with dual academic missions. On the one hand, it is necessary to answer from the level of law the question of how to ensure that all social groups in the same social system are in their own place, have their own role to play, can bring out the best in them, and coexist and benefit from each other; on the other, we need to clarify from the logic level the specific rationality of socialism with Chinese characteristics in the complex world pattern.

Nowadays, interaction between China and the rest of the world is becoming more and more frequent. When we try to explain it, we need to not only identify the empirical mechanism derived from different cultural and civilized backgrounds and the social basis of these experience mechanisms, but also to seek appropriate understanding of the nature of different institutional arrangements, value systems, and operational logic. This understanding is extraordinary because the social transformation we are experiencing is closely linked to the constantly emerging challenges resulting from the crisis of modernity, global governance deficit, setbacks we’ve suffered in the process of globalization, and value diversification. At the same time, it is influenced by different perceptions of and response to the new development of globalization.

As we know, globalization of modern history began with the "trade globalization" of the United Kingdom, and it was followed and later replaced by American neo-liberal "financial globalization". This implies that globalization is not a changeless single process from the past to the present. On the contrary, there has been no lack of globalization in the process of the rising of great powers. China's initiative to co-construct and share the “Belt and Road” is based on the "community of common destiny for all human beings". It is not designed to be in line with the path of globalization the West takes, nor is it a continuation of the modernization mode the West pursues. By amplifying the benefits of globalization, it is aimed to connect Europe, Asia, and Africa, and thus achieve common development and a mutually beneficial, win-win result. It is another development path the Eastern wisdom provides, which is different from the “law of jungle” accepted by the West. Therefore, if we attempt to interpret the global development path of China, we must construct a corresponding discourse system that matches. We cannot apply mechanically the concept of globalization prevailing in the West to this discourse system. As a researcher of the sociology of transition, we must also be deeply aware of the true reason why this cannot be applied.

As the complex globalization process is advancing, China's modernization process has entered a new stage. A new round of scientific, technological, and industrial revolution with the Internet and new technology as the core has resulted in revolutionary change to people's production methods, lifestyles, and social interaction pattern. The "rural feet" society (referring to the daily social life of rural people at the grassroots) almost simultaneously entered the era of big data e-commerce. At the same time, we also sensed some new problems emerging in the fields of technology & employment, industrial upgrading and knowledge & skills, including fairness and efficiency and many other non-adaptable new problems. What’s more, these new problems are changing with artificial intelligence, big data, and information technology development. Whether we can capture the core mechanism will be a new test of the efficiency of the research on the source power and pulling power of China's economic and social transformation. It is hard for us to discuss China's transformation from an agricultural civilization to an industrial civilization from a traditional perspective, nor can we discuss China’s social form changes from tradition to modernity in a simple way. Those methods that rely solely on one-way and static causality have long been unsuitable for understanding contemporary China in transformation, and China’s sociology urgently needs research theories and methods that can reflect such a complexity.

Jump out of the mire of “path dependence” and create new research modes and discourse systems

Due to the influence of new factors, such as technology and economic development of established societies, sociology for researching changes and transformations need to respond to the new changes that may be triggered by the influence of new factors with an open mind. We should always think about how, from a strategic perspective, to establish a methodology that is more suitable to reveal the deep-rooted social problems. However, the technology, economy, and society in reality is an interactive complex whole; its degree of integration is always dependent on a series of empirical mechanisms, and is always potentially unstable. How to identify and use these empirical mechanisms to understand the basic laws of social operation? How to build quality theoretical methods and academic discourse so that it can be updated according to the actual situation and demand? That is an important task all transformation sociology researchers are faced with.

In an era of growing complexity and uncertainties, and in the face of the increasingly deepening relationship between China and the rest of the world, the previous study on China's social transformation and its theoretical basis is likely to encounter great challenges. How can we create more appropriate theories and methods on the basis of which we can make a reliable and forward-looking judgment of China's social changes? How can we create academic discourse that can better explain the practical laws of China's modernization to the world and provide the world with a more acceptable path of understanding about the dynamic source of China’s social progress? These are the special tasks that the current era has assigned to us. Chinese sociologists have made a lot of positive efforts in building and developing disciplinary systems, academic systems and discourse systems. However, we still feel that the main problem we are confronted with is a lack of clear understanding of the distance between the existing thoughts & theory, analysis methods and the actual requirements. We lack the "shared problem consciousness", "the pattern of research to be co-built" and the "common discourse system". Not only that, we did not go far enough in reflecting the deep-rooted problems causing the lack of understanding, especially on the "path dependence" that exists in our study.

A researcher needs to clarify the occurrence, development and evolution process of ideas, concepts, and theories. Otherwise, it is easy to establish inferences on the basis of erroneous judgment. At present, we are aware that our research on the rapid transformation of Chinese society is deeply influenced by the market transformation theory of the West and the Budapest School for interpreting the social transformation of the Soviet Union. We also saw the Western theoretical paradigm "non-acclimatization” and the wide gap between the increasingly western theories and the real situation in China. However, without considering the original setting of these imported theoretical principles and their limitations, we will be caught in the mire of "path dependence", continuing to allow the preexisting thinking framework to shape the research process and the thinking trajectory. In terms of empirical research, it is even more serious that the identification of the thinking set of “path dependence” is deeply rooted in the thinking of institutional arrangements. Thus, the relationship between East and West created by the capitalist world system, that is, the relationship between "tradition" and "modernization" has been long applied to our sociological research mode. Some scholars even try to understand the transformation of oriental civilization based on Western civilization process, while ignoring the latter's unique value system and institutional arrangements. This is perhaps the point where we can hardly really reveal the way and logic of our own social life. Therefore, to reveal the unique rationality of China's social transformation, we need to re-understand the origin of Western classical theory and its limitations, and on this basis to create our own research paradigm and discourse system.

Push forward the construction of a transformation sociology discourse system from multiple dimensions

To have a profound understanding of China’s transformation against the background of multiple globalizations, the requirement on the comprehensive ability in analyzing and solving of a diversity of issues is higher. Therefore, we need to open up the boundaries between the disciplines of social sciences, breaking the narrow mindset to form a new force to bear the responsibility of the times. In real life, we urgently need to examine our own ability of response, as well as how to "make up missed lessons" in the effort to build the transformation sociology discourse system. The transformation sociology discourse system is still in an initial stage. The most urgent task is how to plan retrospection and construction at a high starting point, as well as to obtain the innovation capability we need to make a prompt response to the problems emerged in the process of the transformation of China and the world at large, via accumulating knowledge and skills.

At present, China has put forward the proposal of building "a community of shared destiny for all mankind", which is a new path of globalization. This requires on our part not only the ability to form an effective interpretation of the new era of globalization, but also an academic ability to conduct in-depth comparative study of different globalization mechanisms. In addition, it is necessary to construct a knowledge system that can deal with intertwining complexity, and a "multidimensional dialogue" based on that. We need to go constantly from the "concrete" to the "abstract" through practices, and then from "abstract" to "concrete". In this process, we must be able to have dialogues with stock knowledge based on different experience mechanisms, hence improving the quality of innovation ability in cross-context, cross-situation, and other extremely complex "multi-dimensional dialogues".

The construction of an academic discourse system and academic discipline team takes a long process of constantly improving, innovating, and reproduction. This process particularly depends on a well functioning academic system that supports high-quality academic production. When establishing an academic evaluation system and evaluation criteria, we should take into account the limitations of academic research itself, and realize that academic development relies on good quality rather than a sheer big number. Chinese sociology, as an academic community featuring multi-disciplinary integration, needs to have a comprehensive and systematic understanding of how to "make up the missed lessons". In coordinating the relationship between comprehensive academic pursuit and simplex academic pursuit, on one hand open the border in line with the principle of coexistence of a variety of academic traditions, schools, positions, and methods, mutually exchanging needed things and enhancing communication and cooperation in a bid to achieve the “greatest common divisor”; and on the other hand, guided by the core issues of how to respond to the transformation of China and the world at large, we should build a research pattern corresponding to the thinking space activated by the great changes of the times. Currently, we are in an urgent need to deepen and expand the research field of transformation sociology. Special efforts should be put in expanding interdisciplinary and cross-boundary academic exchanges and cooperation in how to cope with a series of global issues, including globalization conflict, immigration, capital expansion, and information technological revolution. Promote dialogues in the "common" discourse system so that our theoretical thinking based on the practice of social life in China, can continue to mature, and so that our academic discourse can go into the mainstream discourse system of the international academic circles and play a major role in them.

China's transformation sociological discourse system construction is a continuous process. So is the process of understanding the important conditions for the construction task. We are deeply aware of the importance of the historical mission and responsibility. Therefore, we are eager to re-sort and re-understand our own theoretical basis and academic clues, and examine whether our methodological reflection and construction is appropriate or not. It is a test on whether we are more determined in the face of new changes, the comprehensive strength of the academic discourse with Chinese characteristics we are building and whether we can develop Chinese-style transformation sociology in the torrential wave of global transformation.

The author is the First Vice President of Shanghai Academy, President of the Chinese Sociological Association and Professor of Shanghai University. The former title of this thesis is “An Undertaking of Times to Construct China's Transformation Sociology Discourse System"