An Interesting Background Story:

Most people might find it interesting or would otherwise agree that modern-day China runs or operates more as a socialist state rather than based strictly on communist ideologies like the ones from the Soviet Union under its first leader Vladimir Lenin because the idea of social classes does exist in Chinese society. That particular social class could very well determine what type of medical care you get and the type of occupation or education you can get ahold of despite what the present-day Chinese government would still claim to be a communist state based on Marxist-Leninist ideas, which tries to promote absolute equality, but in practice, is nothing more than a fairytale or a utopia than its practically feasible. However, what people usually do not realize is that China is actually more capitalist than we originally thought it was, and it is more so, to an extent, that it is a society based on capitalism with certain socialist, communist, or autocratic characteristics. In fact, the Chinese economy has been growing so rapidly since Deng’s Open Door Policy in 1979.

Nevertheless, however, do you know in ancient China, there was also a time when the Chinese economy skyrocketed, and that dynasty’s average income per citizen was higher, even more so than in modern-day China? That’s right, and that is the Song Dynasty. But the reason why they were able to surpass even modern-day China was that the Song Dynasty’s emperors truly believed in the idea of “藏富于民,” which means embodying the country’s wealth within its citizenry and not with the political establishments or societal elites. It was a time period in which its average citizenry was encouraged to study hard and test their way up the ladder into the societal elites. People were encouraged to study because the governing officials were paid very generously. Also, it was a time in which free speech actually existed in China. There was a time in which a “chancellor” in the palace openly defied the emperor’s idea, and instead of prosecuting him and throwing him in prison or sentencing him to death, he allowed him to speak his mind and was humble enough to accept that advice that was good, and took the word of criticisms as a way to encourage himself to be a better emperor. All of these happened while the society and the governing institutions embraced the market economy and encouraged free trading between cities, other countries, and even foreign adversaries, such as Jin and the Liao Dynasties.

Question of the Day:

Now, which system (Caste or Class) do you believe that the Song Dynasty embraced based on our readings in Chapter 9 and from this story? Why or why not

Responses to the professor or other students:

From what I have read and learned, to put it simply, a closed system is a hierarchical social structure in which one assumes a societal status at birth where the person does not have any possible means to move up or down the society. Whereas an open system is a social structure in which, although one also assumes an advantageous status at birth, it promotes opportunistic equality in which, through merit and self-accomplishments, they are able to change their fate and move up or down the ladder of the class of societal elites. A good example of this is, quite frankly, the Soviet Union during Lenin’s rule. He tries to promote absolute equality, but in turn, creates more societal problems because no matter how hard you try in society, you reap the same reward as your neighbor or friend that does absolutely nothing. In this case, it does not incentivize people to strive to advance themselves. This is also one of the reasons why Soviet Unions collapsed in 1991 because the Soviet Republic’s satellite states relied heavily on Soviet Russia’s funding which created a strain on their overall economy. These satellite states only did as their motherland directed them to and did not strive to do better or feed their citizenry. When General Secretary Gorbachev took office in 1985, he tried to change that by granting more freedom of will for these satellite Soviet states, which created a massive socio-political crisis for the continued existence of the Soviet Union. And with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and Gorbachev’s intent not to intervene in the reunion of the East and the West German state further diminished the Soviet’s influence in Western Europe, eventually leading to its demise in the fateful winter in December 1991.