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In a word, that it is a civilization without society, or perhaps a society without culture, which (by this lack) is engineering its own decay.

alephnerd 2y ago
Not exactly. It's hard to translate but I'd recommend taking a read.
- walleeee 2y ago
  You wouldn't say "civilization without society" is pretty close to your first two paragraphs in your comment? Maybe I need a refresher.
  - alephnerd 2y ago
    "Society" and "Civilization" are very loaded terms, and by "Society" Wang specifically meant the community aspect of society. For example, he is very positive about the kind of direct democracy he saw in Belmont, MA (the classic New England Town Meeting), and viewed that as a cornerstone of American society, along with a shared vision of innovation and development. Fundamentally, the core pieces of America that Wang looked up to were the same pieces of policy and legislation that were pushed in the Progressive Era [0] as well as by FDR as part of his New Deal [1] and LBJ as part of his Great Society [2]. In essence, the vision that Wang and Xi are pushing within China today is basically an Authoritarian but also decentralized version of the Great Society and New Deal. [0] - https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-world-power/age-of-empire/a/the-progressive-era https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-wo... [1] - https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-world-power/great-depression/a/the-new-deal https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-wo... [2] - https://library.fiveable.me/apush/unit-8/great-society/study-guide/5lE2fsg4BsckTqmDNJqx https://library.fiveable.me/apush/unit-8/great-society/study...
    - walleeee 2y ago
      Thanks. I still think civilization without society works pretty well as a (necessarily lossy) compression. The US as a civilization without a sense of communitarian civics. The presence of such in rare cases (e.g. Belmont) puts its broader absence into sharper relief.
      - alephnerd 2y ago
        > The presence of such in rare cases (e.g. Belmont) I thought it's fairly common to live in a town with a town hall meetings or PTA meetings? Or visit city hall or met your city council in elementary school? It's the norm in most suburban towns (use the local PTA meeting as the Town Meeting instead depending on the suburb). If you live within a big city, then it's a different story of course (city government is absolutely not community driven), but only 12% of Americans live in Urban areas/cities [0] and 69% live in suburbs. [0] - https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/cusrancvs.pdf https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/cusrancvs.pdf

alephnerd 2y ago

Not exactly. It's hard to translate but I'd recommend taking a read.

walleeee 2y ago
You wouldn't say "civilization without society" is pretty close to your first two paragraphs in your comment? Maybe I need a refresher.
- alephnerd 2y ago
  "Society" and "Civilization" are very loaded terms, and by "Society" Wang specifically meant the community aspect of society. For example, he is very positive about the kind of direct democracy he saw in Belmont, MA (the classic New England Town Meeting), and viewed that as a cornerstone of American society, along with a shared vision of innovation and development. Fundamentally, the core pieces of America that Wang looked up to were the same pieces of policy and legislation that were pushed in the Progressive Era [0] as well as by FDR as part of his New Deal [1] and LBJ as part of his Great Society [2]. In essence, the vision that Wang and Xi are pushing within China today is basically an Authoritarian but also decentralized version of the Great Society and New Deal. [0] - https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-world-power/age-of-empire/a/the-progressive-era https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-wo... [1] - https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-world-power/great-depression/a/the-new-deal https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/rise-to-wo... [2] - https://library.fiveable.me/apush/unit-8/great-society/study-guide/5lE2fsg4BsckTqmDNJqx https://library.fiveable.me/apush/unit-8/great-society/study...
  - walleeee 2y ago
    Thanks. I still think civilization without society works pretty well as a (necessarily lossy) compression. The US as a civilization without a sense of communitarian civics. The presence of such in rare cases (e.g. Belmont) puts its broader absence into sharper relief.
    - alephnerd 2y ago
      > The presence of such in rare cases (e.g. Belmont) I thought it's fairly common to live in a town with a town hall meetings or PTA meetings? Or visit city hall or met your city council in elementary school? It's the norm in most suburban towns (use the local PTA meeting as the Town Meeting instead depending on the suburb). If you live within a big city, then it's a different story of course (city government is absolutely not community driven), but only 12% of Americans live in Urban areas/cities [0] and 69% live in suburbs. [0] - https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/cusrancvs.pdf https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/cusrancvs.pdf