Part One　Civilization and Modernization：Facts and Theories

Chapter 1　What's Modernization in the 21st Century：A Chinese Version

Modernization, as a global trend, initiated in about 18th century, diffused in 19th century, and has become popular in the 20th and 21st century. The contents and characteristics of modernization have changed in all aspects from the 18th to 21st century.Almost all countries in the world are undergoing some kind of modern-ization consciously or unconsciously at present, and the modernization drive can also be set as a development goal directly or indirectly（Martinelli, He，2015）.China will enter the stage which the modernization be-comes the direct national goal in 2020，for example.

As we know that the modernization study emerged in 1950s. And then three waves of modernization re-searches took place i.e.，modernization study, post modern study and new modernization study（Figure 1-1）.This paper will discuss the three explanations of the modernization from the perspective of new moderni-zation study and a Chinese version.

Source.He，2010，2012.

Modernization Is a Worldwide Phenomenon

First of all, there is the phenomenon of modernization first and the word of modernization later from a historic perspective. As a historical phenomenon, modernization can be viewed as the world frontier of human devel-opment since the Industrial Revolution in the 18th century, and the practice and process to chase, reach, and maintain a position in the world frontier.Developed countries strive to maintain their positions in theforefront, while developing countries try to catch up with advanced level.Modernization is like an interna-tional marathon campaign of human development；countries in the lead are developed ones, while those lag-ging behind are developing ones；developed countries may fall behind, and developing countries may catch up and overtake.The switch between these two groups of countries shows a somewhat set pattern（Figure 1-2）.For example, China Modernization Report has discovered that 10%probability of developed countries will get down to developing, while 5%probability of developing countries will rise up to developed in about 50 years（Figure 1-3）.

Source.He，2010，2012.

Source.He，2010，2012.

Some scholars believe that the modernization phenomenon could be dated back at least to the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the French Revolution in the 18th century（Bendix，1967）or before. As early as the 16th century when the Renaissance was near the end, the European society underwent profound changes and the great maritime discoveries made some Europeans believe that a new era—the modern—was approac-hing.The more revolutions that followed, including the Science Revolution, the Enlightenment, the Indus-trial Revolution, etc.，reinforced this belief.By the mid-18th century, the overwhelming changes in Europe made people believe that“to become modern and to meet the modern needs”represented the trend of the time.Thus a new word modernization was invented（1748～1770），which was used to describe this new phenomenon（Table 1-1）.

Table 1-1　From“Modern”to“Modernization”

Source.Webster's online dictionary.

Today, modernization is a polysemant with the basic meanings derived from“modern”.

·As a noun, modernization has two meanings.（a）It refers to the practice of modernizing.（b）It re-fers to the status after being modernized. The later is the status of having modern characteristics or having met modern needs, usually the world advanced level；e.g.，modernization of nations, etc.

·As a verb, modernize stands for the process and act to realize modernization, i. e.，the process and act to become modern or meet modern needs, usually the process and practice to chase, reach or maintain the world advanced level；e.g.，to modernize agriculture, etc.

·Being used as an adjective, modernized refers to the state after realized the modernization, i. e.，the state of having modern characteristics or having met modern needs；or simply put, the modernized is the lat-est, best, and most advanced；e.g.，a modernized school, etc.

Modernization Is a Progress of Civilization

Besides being a worldwide phenomenon, modernization is also a progressive change of human civilization from an academic perspective（Figure 1-4）. The former is the surface, while the latter is the essence.As a civilization progress, modernization is a great transformation from traditional to modern civilization as well as the all-round development of human-being and the appropriate protection of the natural environment.It oc-curs in all fields of human civilization including politics, economy, society and culture etc.Yet in the mean-time, cultural diversity will remain in existence and play its role for a long time to come.Modernization first occurs in a few early starting countries and then spread all over the world（Bendix，1967），with some ex-ceptions though in regions or communities.

Modernization occurs in all fields of the human civilization, with different characteristics in different fields. Scholars from various disciplines have studied the phenomenon of modernization and formed a variety of modernization theories.Ten of them attractive relatively more attention：the classic modernization theory, the dependency theory, the world system theory, the post-modernization theory, the ecological modernization theory, the reflexive modernization theory, the globalization theory, the multiple modernities theory, the sec-ond modernization theory, and the integrated modernization theory.They explain the characteristics and principles of modernization from different perspectives.Here I would like to briefly introduce three of them.

·The classic modernization theory was formed in the 1950s and 1960s. It is not a single theory but a collection of thoughts on the phenomenon of modernization.It roughly covers six branches and six schools.Scholars of politics, economics, sociology, and history took different approaches in their studies of moderni-zation and the resulted theoretical explanations are also different.For example, sociologists generally believe that modernization is a kind of social change and is the transformation form traditional to modern society（Bendix，1967；Martinelli，2005）.Luo（1993），as a historian in Peking University, believes that in the broad sense, modernization is a worldwide historical process, a global change from traditional agricultural so-ciety to modern industrial society；while in the narrow sense, modernization refers to the process where less developed countries catch up rapidly with advanced industrial countries.Western scholars believe that mo-dernity is an abstract term that describes the results of modernization, such as political democratization, eco-nomic industrialization, social urbanization, cultural rationalization, modern science and technology, univer-sal compulsory education, etc.

Note.The transformation from agricultural to industrial society is the first modernization while that from industrial to knowl-edge society is the second modernization.Stoneware represents the primitive society, a wood plough represents the agricul-tural society, Steam engine represents the industrial society, and a computer represents the knowledge society.

Source.He，2010，2012.

·During the 1970s and 1980s, the post modernization theory stepped up onto the academic arena. In-stead of a complete theoretical system, the post modernization theory is an assembly of thoughts on post-in-dustrial society, post modernism and post modernization study.For example, the American scholar DanielBell（1973）divides the development of human society into three stages：pre-industrial society, industrial society, and post-industrial society.French scholar Jean Francois Lyotard（1984）published Postmodern Condition：A Report on Knowledge, and held that knowledge has become a business good and the most im-portant productivity.The American scholar Ronald Inglehart（1997）believes that the human history is non-linear, and the transformation from traditional to modern society is modernization, while that from modern to post modern society is post modernization.The German scholar Wolfgang Zapf（1999）believes that modern society needs continuing modernization, while the American scholar Edward Tiryakian refers to it as“new modernization”and so on.

·In the 1990s, the second modernization theory came into being in close relation to the information revolution, knowledge economy, knowledge society, cyber culture, and innovation systems. It was proposed by the author of this paper（He，1998，1999，2013）.According to this theory, modernization is not only the situation of the world frontier of human development since the 18th century, and the process to reach or stay at this situation, but also the transformation from traditional to modern paradigm of human civilization, with the mutualism between Human-being and Nature and cultural diversity.From the 18th century to the end of the 21st century, the process of world modernization can be divided into two stages, the first moderni-zation or classic modernization, which is the transformation from agricultural economy&society to industrial economy&society, featuring industrialization, urbanization, democratization, rationalization, social welfare and emphasis on economic growth etc；and the second modernization or a new type of modernization, which is the transformation from industrial economy&society to knowledge-based economy&society, featuring knowledge-intensive, informatization, greenization, globalization, being innovation-driven, and the impro-ving of the quality of life etc.Countries and regions that have not completed the first modernization may ad-vance the first and second modernizations in a coordinate way and gather the essence of the two and to reduce errors in the modernization process and reach to the future world frontier of the second modernization.This is the integrated modernization, which is the transformation from semi-industrial economy&society to knowl-edge-based economy&society, featuring coordinated industrialization, urbanization, democratization, ra-tionalization, knowledge-intensive, informatization, greenization, globalization etc.It starts the transforma-tion towards knowledge economy&society when it is halfway from agricultural towards industrial economy&society.

If the traditional society could be divided into two stages of the primitive and agricultural society, and the modern society could be divided into two stages of the industrial and knowledge society, and then the classical（or first）modernization is the transformation from the agricultural to industrial society, post mod-ernization is a transition stage from the industrial to knowledge society（or from the first to second moderniza-tion），and the second modernization is the transformation from the industrial to knowledge society（Figure 1-5）. The classical modernization theory, post modernization theory and second modernization theory have presented the explanation of these three transitions.

The modernization is more complex in the 21st century than that of the 18th，19th and 20th centuries. There are three roads of national modernization in the 21st century in general, they are the first moderniza-tion, the second modernization, and the integrated modernization（Figure 1-6）.There are about 100 nations stayed in the first modernization while more than 20 nations enter into the second modernization in 2012，and the percent of countries stayed in the first modernization will get down, the percent of countries entered thesecond modernization will rise up, and the countries who have not completed the first modernization will push the integrated modernization in the 90 years of the future.

Note.The post modern society is a transition stage from the industrial to knowledge society, and the post modernization is a transition stage from the first to second modernization.The classical modernization theory, post modernization theory and second modernization theory are relative to each other.

Note.The central axis of human civilization had transferred three times, and four ages of the process of human civilization would be set, and so the different structure of civilization appeared in different age.The structure of productivity is taken as the abscissa and the level of productivity is taken as the ordinate.The unit of abscissa scale is the ratio of the non-hun-ting-gathering to hunting-gathering labor in primitive culture, the ratio of the non-agricultural to agricultural labor in agri-cultural civilization, the ratio of the industrial to non-industrial labor in industrial civilization, and the ratio of the non-knowledge to knowledge labor in knowledge civilization.

Source.He，2012.

Modernization Is a Development Goal

Modernization has been set-up as a development goal in many countries and fields from the policy perspec-tive. Among them, the goal of modernized countries is to keep the modernized level, and that of modernizing（or un-modernized）countries is to catch-up and become a modernized country.The national modernization includes the modernization of all fields such as politics, economy, society, culture, environment and human behavior etc.

There are three goals for the national modernization, and second and third are dynamic in the field of new modernization study：

·First goal：To finish the first modernization, and complete the transformation from the agricultural to industrial society. All countries may realize this goal with different time.The all developed countries and parts of developing countries have realized this goal.

·Second goal：To accomplish the second modernization, and fulfill the transformation from the indus-trial to knowledge society. All countries could achieve this goal with great different time.No one has realizes this goal at present, and developed countries will achieve it at the second half of the 21st century.

·Third goal：To catch-up, reach and maintain the world advanced level of human development. The countries reached and kept the world advanced level are the minority at any time, while others are the major-ity.Only parts of countries will realize this goal.

Based on their modernization level, countries may be divided into two groups：developed and develo-ping countries, and the developing countries can be further divided into three categories：moderately devel-oped countries, preliminarily developed countries, and under-developed countries（He，2010，2012）. A-mong the four groups, the developed countries have the highest modernization level and enjoy the world ad-vance level, moderately developed countries have a modernization level higher than the world average but lower than that of developed countries, preliminarily developed countries have a modernization level below the world average but higher than that of under-developed countries, and under-developed countries are of the lowest modernization level, the level of an under-developed country is usually less than 30%of the aver-age of developed countries（Table 1-2）.

According to China Modernization Report（He，2015），in the past 300 years, developed countries ac-counted for less than 20%of all countries in the world, while developing countries accounted for more than 80%. For example, in 2012，among all 131 countries with a population of over 1 million，16%were devel-oped countries, while 84%were developing ones.The US and 20 other countries were developed countries, Russia Federation and 19 others were moderately developed countries, Thailand and 42 others were prelimi-narily developed countries, and Kenya and 46 others were under-developed countries.

Table 1-2　Criteria of Classification of National Modernization Level

Note.The recommended rankings are based on the level of 2005 and are subject to change annually.

Source.He，2010，2012.

In the field of new modernization study, for the convenience of discussion, the developed countries can be viewed as the“modernized countries”，while the developing countries can be viewed as the“modernizing countries”or“un-modernized countries”. Although the modernization is a dynamic and uneven process, and both developed and developing countries are undergoing some kind of modernization consciously or un-consciously（Martinelli, He，2015），while some aspects of some developed countries maybe not reach the world advanced level, and some aspects of some developing countries may reach or maintain the world ad-vanced level conversely.

The modernization's goals of the developed and developing courtiers are different as follows：

·The goal of developed or modernized countries：To remain the world advanced level or modernized level, or to realize the modernization in the aspects that he does not reach the world advanced level.

·The goal of developing or un-modernized countries：To reach the world advanced level and realize the modernization, and become developed or modernized country in a short time. Among all developing countries, moderately developed ones aim at directly becoming developed countries；preliminarily developed countries aim at becoming moderately developed first and then, developed；under-developed countries need to take three steps：first becoming a preliminarily developed country, then a moderately developed one, and finally, a developed one.

For the realization of the Third goal, different countries can do it by steps.

·Realized modernization with high quality：The level of national modernization surpasses the average level of high income countries, and enters the forefront or top-class of world modernization.

·Realized modernization averagely：The level of national modernization surpasses the 80%of the aver-age level of high income countries, and become a developed country or modernized country.

·Realized modernization basically：The level of national modernization surpasses the 50%of the aver-age level of high income countries and world average, and become a moderately developed country.

In 2012，China is a preliminarily developed country and is in the middle range among all developing countries. The first modernization index of China is 96%and ranks 58th among 131 countries, and the sec-ond modernization index and the integrated modernization index are 42 and 44，rank 56th and 62nd sepa-rately（He，2015）.

Based on the average annual growth of the modernization index of various countries, China Moderniza-tion Report predicted that China may complete its first modernization by 2020；surpass the world average by around 2040，becoming a moderately developed country and basically realizing modernization；become a de-veloped country by around 2080，fully realizing modernization；and march into the world frontier by the sec-ond half of the 21st century, realizing its great rejuvenation.

Over the past more than 300 years, more than 20 countries with a total population of 1 billion have reached the modernized level（world advanced level），and in the 100 years of the 21st century, China will bring 1. 4 billion people into modernization.The modernization of China will be an unprecedented project and it will make huge contribution to the human civilization.

Conclusion

Modernization has been a polysemous word in the field of new modernization study.

Firstly, modernization refers to a worldwide phenomenon concerning the world frontiers of human devel-opment since about 18th century and the practice and process to pursue, reach and maintain world frontier's levels（or world advanced level）.

Secondly, modernization has been a progressive change of human civilization with the transformation from traditional to modern paradigm which took place in all fields of human civilization such as politics, e-conomy, society and culture etc.

Thirdly, modernization can be used as a development goal directly or indirectly, and the modernized or developed countries are willing to keep the modernized level, while un-modernized or developing countries are working hard to catch-up and reach the modernized level in more short time. For example, the national objective of China is to become a moderately developed country in the middle of the 21st century and a mod-ernized country in the second half of the 21st century.

Chuanqi He（China Center for Modernization Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences）

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