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This archive is an ongoing English translation project of Wang Huning's diaries.
Wang Huning is a Chinese political scientist and politician who has served on the Politburo Standing CCP since 2017. He has been the Chairman of the CPPCC National Committee since 2023. Previously, he served as the First Secretary of the CPC Central Committee's Secretariat and Chairman of the Central Guidance Commission on Building Spiritual Civilization from 2017 to 2022, and headed the Central Policy Research Office as director from 2002 to 2020. Wang was a professor and dean of the law school at Fudan University.
Political Life was written during Wang's years as a political science scholar at Fudan University and published by Shanghai People's Publishing House in 1995. The diary covers his personal life, political theory and research, books and films, and his reflections on Chinese society, the wider world, and contemporary social problems.
Where possible, the translation preserves the tone, register, and structure of the original rather than recasting it into more idiomatic or contemporary English. The translation was produced without the assistance of AI.
January 23, Sunday
At dawn I watched an original-language film called The Past. It seemed to be a film promoting the religious spirit. It tells of a child who likes to sing and, under the guidance of a priest, wants to become a great singer. Later, in a car accident, he loses his voice and can no longer sing. The child devotes himself wholeheartedly to God, and suddenly his voice returns. It has a cultural background to it.
凌晨看一部原版片，叫《往事》，好像是宣传宗教精神的片子。说一个小孩喜欢唱歌，在神父的引导下，想当大歌唱家。后来在一次车祸中嗓子失音，不能再唱。小孩一心敬奉上帝，突然就恢复了声音。有文化背景的。
I wrote an article for Revelations from Debate. I gave it the title “Investigating Things and Extending Knowledge, Cultivating the Self through Debate—The Making of Debating Talent.” This article is not easy to write well. It cannot be too theoretical; it has to have a certain amount of plot. It should write about how to conduct debate and training, the problems of training. I have not written about training before. Training is difficult to write about. Training is an operational question, not a theoretical question; it is a process of responding to changing circumstances, not a process of preaching. One must adjust the training according to the situations discovered from time to time and from place to place, and formulate a training plan according to the circumstances of the students. After each training session and debate, there is no deep impression, no object anymore. There has to be an object for there to be a feeling. This is true training.
写《辩论启示录》的文章。把题目定为“格物致知，修身辩论——辩才的制造”。这篇文章不太好写，不能太理论化，要有一定的情节。写如何来进行辩论和训练，训练的问题，过去没有写，训练很难写，训练是一个操作问题，不是理论问题，是一个应变过程，而不是说教过程。要根据随时随地发现的情况，调整训练，针对学生的情况，制定训练的计划。每次训练和辩论以后，就没有什么深刻的印象，没有对象了。要有对象才能有感觉，这才是真正的训练。
In the evening I watched a videotape called Alien, translated into Chinese as 异形. It was the first film. I had seen the second film in Tokyo in 1992, so I was interested in watching the first. It is a science-fiction film. It says that a commercial spaceship from Earth transported more than twenty million tons of ore back from some star system. On the way, it received a strange radio signal. When they went to investigate, some kind of thing was brought aboard the spaceship: the alien. The alien is a vicious creature of immense strength. In the end it kills all the people, leaving only one woman. Later she finally drives the alien out of the spaceship. The next film continues this story, saying that the alien did not die and remained alive.
晚上看到一部录像，叫《ALIEN》，中文译成《异形》，是第一集。1992在东京看过第二集，所以有兴趣看第一集。科学幻想片，说地球上一艘商业用的飞船，在什么星系运了两千多万吨矿石回来，在途中收到奇怪的电波，去查的时候，有一种东西被带上飞船，就是异形。异形是一种凶恶的生物，力大无比，结果杀死所有的人，只留个女人。后来她终于把异形打出飞船。下集接着这个故事，说异形并没有死，依然在。
Films of this kind have a very large market in Western countries. I do not know whether it is because of people's state of mind or because of society. In developing countries, however, that may not necessarily be the case.
这类片子在西方国家有很大的市场，不知是心态的原因，还是社会的原因。在发展中国家，倒未必。
January 24, Monday
At dawn I read Participation, the journal of the International Political Science Association. It carried this year's international conference theme and reports. The theme is “Democratization,” with many subtopics below it. The question of democratization is becoming increasingly important in today's world, and is also a basic direction of social development. This year's international conference is being held in Berlin. The Chinese Political Science Association has already withdrawn from the International Political Science Association. The theme is a good one; it should also be studied carefully in China.
凌晨看国际政治学会的《PARTICIPATION》，登了今年国际大会的主题和报告，主题是“民主化”，下面分很多分专题。民主化的问题在今天世界越来越重要，也是社会基本的发展方向。今年的国际大会是在柏林开。中国政治学会已经退出国际政治学会。主题不错，在中国也要好好加以研究。
I also read the Chinese Political Science Association's collection of papers, Political Stability. There were not many good articles. Several graduate students from the department had published articles in it.
另外看了中国政治学会的论文集《政治稳定》，好的文章不多。系里有几位研究生在上面发表了文章。
January 25, Tuesday
At dawn I watched Dangerous Liaisons, depicting a kind of life within the aristocracy and interpersonal relationships full of intrigue. There is not much to it. If one understands a certain circle of life and the culture of life at that time, one can probably understand something. But from a broader perspective, one has not understood anything; it is merely the relationships between men and women among several people. There are quite a few revealing scenes in the film, of course, already edited. This is an indispensable aspect of Western culture; without these things, there is no drama. Recently, this kind of coloring in some films has become increasingly strong. I do not know what degree it will eventually reach. I think there is always a limit. Otherwise, there will only be XXX films.
凌晨看《危险的关系》，描写一种贵族内部的生活以及勾心斗角的人际关系。没有多大的意思，如果了解当时一种生活圈子和生活的文化，大概能知道一些。但是从更广泛的角度说，又没有了解什么，只是几个人之间的男女关系。影片有不少暴露镜头，当然已经作了处理。这是西方文化的一个不可缺少的方面，没有这些，就不成戏。最近一些片子，这样的色彩越来越浓厚，不知最后要走到什么样的程度。我想总是有一个极限的，不然的话，就只有XXX电影了。
厦门来的一个女孩子，叫我王爷爷，一副纯真 的样子。
A girl from Xiamen came and called me “Grandpa Wang,” with an utterly innocent look.
January 26, Wednesday
At dawn I read The Legend of the Condor Heroes, a novel by Jin Yong. I saw him in person in Singapore before; he is a very affable person. I had read it before, but my impressions had already become vague. What is inspiring about it is its ingenious conception and bold imagination. Although it is fictional, this kind of imagination is valuable for those engaged in scientific research. How to have a sudden flight of fancy and make what was originally plain and ordinary rise up like an unexpected new force—only then can there be creativity. It is said that some great scientists, when training students, first have them read martial arts novels.
读《射雕英雄传》，金庸的小说，在新加坡见过他本人，是一个很和气的人。原来曾经看过，但已经印象模糊了。给人启发的是它巧妙的构思和大胆的想象力。尽管是虚构，但是这种想象力对从事科学研究的人来说，有价值。如何突发奇想，把本来的平平淡淡，看得异军突起，这样才能有创造性。据说，有的大科学家，在训练学生时，首先要他们看武侠小说。
People from the Graduate School came to the department for a discussion meeting, discussing the development of the key discipline of international relations and how to compete for “Project 211.” Project 211 is a plan put forward by the State Education Commission to establish one hundred world-class universities in the twenty-first century. Every university is competing for it. Fudan University has also established a “Project 211 Office.”
研究生院的人来系开座谈会，讨论国际关系重点学科建设，以及如何争取“211工程”。211工程是国家教委提出的一项计划，在二十一世纪，建立一百所世界一流大学。各个大学均在争取。复旦大学也成立了“211工程“211办公室”,。
We reported our ideas for the department. Their view was that a disciplinary cluster should be established, and that we should form a disciplinary cluster together with world economics and international finance. Such an organization may be a formal arrangement; in the end, however, it will still depend on how people operate it. We discussed competing for international relations as a key discipline in political science, but we do not know whether we can succeed in getting it. Last time they did not let us compete for it; there was probably some reason for that. There are quite a few problems among the various disciplines in the university now, many of them problems with people, which cannot be coordinated all at once. Once a university has been running for a long time, such problems will arise. If these problems cannot be put into order, there is no great prospect for development.
我们汇报了系里的想法。他们的意见是要建立学科群，要我们和世界经济和国际金融一起组成学科群，这样的组织可能是一种形式上的安排，最后还是要看人的操作。我们谈到政治学专业要争取重点学科，不知是否能争取到。上次没有让我们来争取，大概有某种原因。现在学校各个学科中存在着不少的问题，很多是人的问题，不是一下能够协调得了的。一个学校办得长了，就会发生这样的问题。如果这些问题不能理顺的话，没有大的发展前途。
For the graduate program and fields of specialization, fields should be established from new perspectives, and new points of growth should be sought. In the political science program, we want to establish political theory, government economics, political development, administrative development, public policy, and so on. We require international relations and international politics to establish such fields as international relations theory, international integration, global issues, international political economy, and so on. Only in this way can there be a new starting point for development. There are also some new fields that need to be developed.
研究生专业和方向，要从新角度设立方向，寻找新的生长点。在政治学专业想设立政治学理论、政府经济学、政治发展、行政发展、公共政策等，要求国际关系和国际政治设立国际关系理论、国际一体化、全球问题、国际政治经济学等方向，这样才能有发展的新起点。还有一些新的领域要开发。
I asked S to write in Lion City Debate: “From the perspective of the world, life is so great; from the perspective of the individual, life is so small. Therefore, the meaning of life lies in experiencing the life of the individual through the life of the world, and understanding the life of the world through the life of the individual. This is what may be called the life of life.”
给S君在《狮城舌战》上写：“从世界的角度看，生命是那样的伟大；从个人的角度看，生命是那样的微小。所以生命的意义就在于从世界的生命来体验个人的生命，从个人的生命来领会世界的生命，是谓生命之生命。”
January 27, Thursday
I went to the Institute of Higher Education Research to look up the course structure of Harvard University's Department of Government. In terms of course structure, we are preparing to move closer to it, although the content will of course be different. Some of their courses have distinctive features, such as courses on political science research methods and some courses on global affairs and international relations; ours are relatively outdated. We are preparing to reconsider our courses and bring them into line with the world's first-rate universities.
到高教研究所查哈佛大学政府系的课程设置，课程结构上，准备靠拢，当然内容不一样。有些课他们有特色，如政治学研究方法的课、一些全球和国际关系方面的课，我们的比较陈旧。准备把我们的课程再考虑一下，向国际一流大学看齐。
January 28, Friday
At dawn I watched The Bitter Realm, from the Bulaohu series. It is said that the Bulaohu series was the first series in China to have a registered trademark, written in imitation of popular or best-selling novels from abroad. The Bitter Realm is about a Chinese doctor who is kidnapped while returning to China, trained to become a cold-faced killer, and sent to a Beijing office, where he develops feelings for a Chinese girl. Under the call of these feelings, his humanity returns. It is a story that has been fabricated rather well, but it is entirely a fabricated story, and one can feel the traces of fabrication too clearly. But novels of this kind have precisely this kind of style. The main “MSG” is his relationships with several women; there also seems to be rather too much “bedroom action.” But there is a little less of it than in The Abandoned Capital, so there is no need here for the author to cut however many words, and so on. This is the elementary stage of a best-selling book. It has not reached a certain artistic level, and neither the completeness nor the credibility of the story is particularly high.
凌晨看布老虎丛书中的《苦界》。据说布老虎丛书是国内第一套注册商标的丛书，模仿国外流行或者畅销小说来写。《苦界》是说一名中国医生在返国途中被绑架，被训练成冷面杀手，到北京办事处，和一名中国姑娘发生感情，在感情的感召下，人性复归。是编造得不错的故事，但完全是虚构的故事，让人感到虚构的痕迹太明显，不过这样的小说也就是这样的风格。主要的“味精”是几名女性和他的关系，“床上动作”似乎也太多了一些。但比《废都》少一点，因而不需要作者此处删去多少字云云。这是畅销书的初级阶段，没有写到一定的艺术境界，故事的完整和可信性均不那么高。
We discussed the question of setting the fields of specialization for graduate students in international relations and international politics. We must aim at the frontier of scholarship, renew our own fields, and, more importantly, renew our knowledge structure. Without renewing our knowledge, merely renewing the names of the fields will probably still not be enough.
商量国际关系和国际政治的研究生专业方向的设置的问题，要瞄准前沿的科学，更新自己的领域，更为重要的是要更新知识结构。没有知识的更新，单更新方向的名称，恐怕还不行。
