Zhou Ding, Zhang Xiaomeng: Young Marx’s Theoretical Exploration on the Transformation of Modernization in Western Europe
Release time: 2025-05-15
As the conceptual foundation of the modernization movement in Western Europe, the modernization thought since the Enlightenment involves concerns about universal issues such as reason, freedom, rights, progress and emancipation, which expresses the pursuit of and reflection on the transformation of modern civilization, Through the confrontation with various thoughts of modernization, young Marx’s attitude towards the conceptual principles of modernity shifted from following to critical scrutinizing. Based on the historical and theoretical investigation of the modernization process in Germany, France, and Britain, he initially revealed the internal contradictions and evolution trends of the modern bourgeois society, From the period of the Rheinische Zeitung to the eve of the philosophical revolution of 1845, Marx identified the positive effects and limitations of modernization through the bourgeois revolution, grasped the logical clues of modernization development through the private property system, revealed the alienation of modern people through the rule of things over human beings brought about by industrialization, and pointed out the practical tendency of self-negation and sublation of modernization through the communist movement, By exploring and responding to the “the German form of modern problems”, Marx gradually realized the temporal and spatial intersection of modernization concepts and social reality, as well as the dialectical connection between historical trends and subject choices, From solving the specific problems of German style modernization to criticizing the universal principles and historical limits of the modern world, he opened up a new revolutionary path for transcending bourgeois political emancipation and achieving universal human emancipation.
Editor: Zhong Yao LiuTingting
From: Teaching and Research. 2025.No.2.
ACADEMY OF MARXISM CHINESE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES