Dialectic of the Chinese Revolution

In a comparative philosophical perspective, Jiwei Ci provides an thought-provoking philosophical and psychological interpretation of the history of Chinese revolution from Maoist utopianism to reform-era hedonism. Ci argues against the common conception of the Maoist project as ascetic utopianism. Instead, he sees sublimated hedonism as an integral part of utopianism, and through ideological bankruptcy caused by the irreconcilable separation between reality and meaning creates nihilism, in turn leading to full-scale hedonism. Under this universalizing framework, Ci presents the materialist roots of Maoism his detour on the road to capitalism, reframes the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution as struggles against the routinization or depersonalization of charisma,and even reinterprets the Democracy movement and recent anti-corruption agitation as inherently hedonistic.