What is civilization?

The concept of civilization is used in various meanings in scientific works and everyday language. The word "civilization" first appeared in Yi Gan Classical Chinese and Shang Shu Shun Dian in China ancient literature, which means that literary talent is bright and literary morality is brilliant. In the middle and late 17th century, Li Yu, a drama theorist in Qing Dynasty, said in "Casual Love": "Civilization comes from savagery." The "civilization" here is to put it in opposition to "barbarism" and show the degree of social progress. After entering the capitalist society, some western countries and regions used the concept of "civilization" more often, not earlier than the 18th century. This concept is mainly aimed at the backward mode of production, material culture and spiritual culture in colonies and semi-colonies. Its standard, boundary and starting point are to regard colonial and semi-colonial people as "barbarism". Morgan, an American anthropologist, divided the development of human history into three periods: ignorance, barbarism and civilization in Ancient Society. Civilization era includes three historical development stages: slave society, feudal society and capitalist society. Marxism has made a scientific exposition of civilization. In their works, Marx and Engels talked a lot about civilization. One of the main viewpoints is that civilization is the result of human practical activities to transform the world, which includes both material and spiritual aspects. The "achievement" here is not the end, but an organism, which is a process of producing interest by which the past development has achieved and the future development has started. To fully and accurately understand the meaning of "civilization", we must grasp the following relations:

First, the relationship between culture and civilization.

culture is the sum of material wealth and spiritual wealth created by human beings in the process of social development, and sometimes it also refers to social ideology and its corresponding institutions and organizations. Culture is a social phenomenon, which is based on matter. Every society has its own culture, which develops with the development of social material production, changes with the change of new social system, has its own objective laws, and is independent of human will. Cultural development has historical continuity and is based on the development of social material production. The new culture can't be produced without the old culture. As an ideological culture, it is a reflection of the politics and economy of a certain society, which in turn gives a great role and influence to the politics and economy of a certain society. In a class society, culture has a class nature. With the emergence and development of the nation, culture has its own national characteristics and language. National character, national tradition and lifestyle are all the formation of national culture, and all ethnic groups have their own uniqueness. The words "culture" and "civilization" can sometimes be used in general. For example, material culture and spiritual culture can also be called material civilization and spiritual civilization.

civilization refers to the progressive state of human society, including material civilization and spiritual civilization. It is produced on the basis of a certain mode of social production and develops with the progress of society. In the history of human civilization, slave society, feudal society and capitalist society have all produced corresponding civilizations. In socialist society, public ownership of the means of production is implemented, and the people are the masters of the country, so it can create the highest type of civilization in history. Second, it specifically refers to civilized behavior, such as observing public order, observing various disciplines, being polite and paying attention to hygiene, which is the performance of spiritual civilization. This book focuses on civilized behavior.

In a word, "culture" and "civilization" are two concepts with different connotations and different extensions. The meaning of "civilization" is much broader than "culture". On the one hand, "civilization" has the same connotation as "culture", that is, it refers to spirit or ideology. On the other hand, more importantly, the extension of "civilization" is different from that of "culture" and larger than that of "culture".

Secondly, the relationship between material civilization and spiritual civilization.

material civilization is the material achievement of human beings' transformation of nature. It is manifested in the progress of people's material production and the improvement of material life, which is the material basis of spiritual civilization and plays a decisive role in spiritual civilization, especially in cultural construction. The nature of material civilization is determined by the mode of production. The concept of "socialist material civilization" is only said in the sense that the fruits of material civilization are enjoyed by the people under the socialist system, serve the people and serve socialism, and does not mean that the content of material civilization itself is different from capitalism or socialism. Socialist material civilization should inherit and absorb all the valuable material achievements of human civilization on the basis of socialist relations of production, and create and develop them.

spiritual civilization is the result of the transformation of people's subjective world and the development of social spiritual production and life, which is manifested in the development of education, science and cultural knowledge and the improvement of people's ideological, political and moral level, including two major aspects of knowledge, culture and ideological morality, as well as two areas of individuals and society. From personal cultural accomplishment, scientific accomplishment, political accomplishment, moral accomplishment, aesthetic accomplishment and spiritual realm to social spiritual production, spiritual life and customs, they all belong to the field of spiritual civilization.

according to the basic principle of Marxist historical materialism, material civilization is the foundation of the development of spiritual civilization, which plays an important role in promoting the development of material civilization.

In human history, material civilization and spiritual civilization have always interacted. Material civilization provides people with material living conditions for spiritual production and the necessary material means for the development of spiritual civilization. The continuous development of material civilization has gradually liberated people from heavy manual labor, giving people more time to engage in spiritual production and enjoy the fruits of spiritual civilization. The development of material civilization also puts forward tasks and requirements for the development of spiritual civilization and promotes the development of spiritual civilization. Spiritual civilization has a great reaction to material civilization. Spiritual civilization determines the direction of material civilization construction, provides theoretical guidance for material civilization construction, and is the ideological motive force of material civilization construction. Scientific and cultural education in spiritual civilization can be directly transformed into productive forces through certain channels. The development of spiritual civilization can recognize, adjust and solve various contradictions in social life and promote the development of social production.

as a social process, China's socialist modernization is not only the development of material civilization, but also provides spiritual power and intellectual support for this development with socialist spiritual civilization, and ensures the socialist direction of this development. Socialist spiritual civilization provides spiritual power for the construction of material civilization, which is mainly manifested in the following aspects: scientific and cultural knowledge is a potential productive force, which can be transformed into direct and realistic productive force and become an integral part of material civilization by innovating production tools, expanding labor objects and improving the production technology level of workers; Revolutionary ideals and beliefs can stimulate people's enthusiasm for labor and production, which can be transformed into great material strength; Socialist morality can adjust the relationship between people and society, form and consolidate a stable and United social environment, and promote the development of material civilization construction. The construction of socialist spiritual civilization provides intellectual support for the construction of material civilization, which is mainly manifested in the following aspects: education shoulders the task of improving the scientific and cultural knowledge level and labor skills and skills of workers. People have improved their quality in this field. As the most active factor in productivity, it will directly promote the development of social productivity. Science and technology are revolutionary forces to promote social and historical progress, as well as economic development. When people improve their scientific and technological level, they will play a greater role in the modernization drive. Cultural literacy is an important ability factor of workers. By strengthening cultural construction and improving people's cultural literacy, artistic appreciation and aesthetic ability, good spiritual products will be produced or learned from these spiritual products, which will be transformed into material strength.

Socialist spiritual civilization is the guarantee for the development of material civilization along the socialist direction, which is mainly reflected in the guidance of Marxism on material civilization construction.

Marxism, as the ideology of the working class, is the dominant ideology of socialist society, which inevitably requires the modernization to adhere to the socialist road and develop in the interests of the broad masses of the people. The socialist society is advancing towards the goal of the advanced stage of socialism in the future. In this process, we must not only rely on the continuous growth of material wealth, but also rely on the continuous improvement of people's ideological consciousness and the continuous development of revolutionary spirit. If we ignore the guiding role of Marxism, people will lose their revolutionary ideals and goals, and will only be confined to the pursuit of material interests and lose their revolutionary will. Then, modernization will deviate from the socialist direction. Only by constantly strengthening Marxist ideological education and helping people consciously resist the influence of bourgeois ideas and other exploiting class ideas can we ensure the healthy development of China's modernization drive along the socialist direction.

In short, we must follow this objective law in socialist modernization. On the one hand, we should vigorously develop the socialist economy, speed up the pace of "four modernizations" and lay a material foundation for building a high level of socialist spiritual civilization; On the other hand, we must attach importance to the suggestions of socialist spiritual civilization, promote and promote the rapid development of socialist economy, and ensure the correct direction of socialist modernization. In dealing with the relationship between material civilization and spiritual civilization, it is necessary to prevent the neglect of both material civilization and spiritual civilization, and we must persist in grasping the two civilizations together.

the third is the relationship between ideological civilization and behavioral civilization.

all human actions are dominated by their thoughts. Civilized thought is the basis of civilized behavior, and civilized behavior is the external expression of civilized thought. If you want to have civilized behavior, you must first have civilized thoughts. In the construction of spiritual civilization, we must give priority to ideological education, strive to improve people's ideological civilization and promote behavioral civilization.

the fourth is the relationship between civilization declaration and civilization practice.

to put it simply, it is the relationship between saying and doing. Civilization declaration refers to document requirements, conference calls, slogan hanging, and regulations promulgation. The construction of spiritual civilization must have standards for people to follow, and corresponding norms, conventions, codes, etc. must be formulated to declare what can and cannot be done to people. However, our work cannot stop at the formulation and declaration of standards. We must put these standards into practice and turn them into the conscious actions of the broad masses of the people. It is useless to write the standard on the wall and publish it in the newspaper.