Critical Lessons in Paternalism
The renowned American philosopher and scholar John Dewey completed a two-year sojourn to China a century ago, a critical turning point in his life at a time when China, too, stood at a crossroads. Dewey entered China in 1919, the year of the transformative May Fourth Movement, and left in 1921, coincidentally the year the Communist Party of China was founded.
The May Fourth Movement started with student protests against the government’s weak response to the Treaty of Versailles that undermined China’s sovereignty following World War I. It evolved into a national campaign for new ideas, including science, democracy and Marxism.
We have now encountered yet another critical turning point over the past two years. As the U.S. has arguably pursued a
