« Construction of a Harmonious Socialist Society » from the Perspective of Sociology - 中欧社会论坛 - China Europa Forum

« Construction of a Harmonious Socialist Society » from the Perspective of Sociology

Authors: Li Qiang

Date: 2005

Published by The paper of the Annual Meeting of China’s Sociology

Through analyzing a harmonious society from the perspective of sociology, this article thinks that any society in the hope of maintaining a good operation without serious problem must be provided with ten basic conditions and puts forward that both opportunities and risks exist in the development of our country so that construction of a harmonious society should be specially emphasized at present. In addition, this article states that the core of construction of a harmonious society is to coordinate and harmonize relations between social stratums and between interest groups and learn to solve new social contradictions and social problems and also points out the long-term task of social structure adjustment.

Section One is mainly to state what is a harmonious society, in other words, what are the basic conditions of a harmonious society. The author thinks that a harmonious society must be provided with the following basic conditions: First, the society should be adapted to its physical environment. Secondly, it should have appropriate reproduction of social population. Third, it should have proper arrangement of basic social groups and social roles. Fourth, it should have communication of information etc. between social members. Fifth, it should have uniform cognition on meanings of basic things. Sixth, the objectives of social groups are the same basically. Seventh, it should have the established social criteria to limit the means adopted to pursue the above objectives. Eighth, it should have limitation on expression mode of emotion. Ninth, Socialization of new member should be realized. Tenth, disruptive social behaviors should be controlled effectively.

After having analyzed the reasons why construction of a “socialist harmonious society” must be specially emphasized at present, the author points out that the key to construction of a harmonious society is to well coordinate and harmonize relations between social groups. The author thinks that the stress must be put on the following four problems: First, the problem of income allocation and polarization of poverty and wealth; secondly, the problem of relations between social interest groups; third, solution of new social contradictions and social problems; and fourth, the long-term task of social structure adjustment.

The author has put emphasis on the third point and points out that recently the unharmonious problems that have led to strained social relations and sharpened social contradictions are prominently reflected on three aspects. First, social contradiction arisen from land expropriation in rural areas for urban development; secondly, social contradiction arisen from migration for construction of projects; and third, contradiction caused by house removal for urban construction.

In the end, the author points out that, in a comprehensive view, the direction of social structure transformation in the past 26 years is accurate and the current progress is relatively smooth, but the only problem is that its speed cannot be very fast. China’s society is a society with huge population and with heavy burden of the countryside, so the social transformation has to be patient. Although the social structure transformation is underway, the time is very long, and according to the calculation by the author, the time required is 40 years starting from the year of 2000. From the above, we can see that construction of a harmonious society is a long-term process, which need long-lasting endeavor of our whole nation.

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