Research project

The period between the two world wars witnessed radical redirection in Chiese intellectuals' search for social and political programmes for China. Before the First World War, the dominant tendency in progressive minded intellectuals was to advocate the model of liberal democracy as the remedy for China's problem. This liberal thinking found theoretical justification in the evolutionary social philosophy of the West in the 19th century. By the 1920s, the dominant intellectual tendency began to change. The 1920s-30s debate was accompanied by a flood of translation of Western social and political theories, and rapid development of sociology and political science as disciplines in the newly emerged higher education in China. During this period, some German social theorists were introduced into China. Among them, Werner Sombart , Max Weber, and Karl Wittfogel. This research project hopes to further investigate the transfer of ideas from Germany to China in the 1920s and 1930s by focusing on Sombart, Weber and Wittfogel. It will examine the translations of their works, Chinese books and articles during this debate, academic books and journals, university curriculum, to assess the scope and depth of their influences in China during China's critical period of political development.