ABSTRACT
In the context of the contemporary West, liberals are generally regarded as a rightwing political and intellectual force prioritising efficiency over equality and promoting market mechanisms at the expense of the welfare state. Liberals in contemporary China are fundamentally different. They understand liberalism in the classical sense as a political philosophy that considers individual liberty as the most important political goal and upholds principles such as legal protection of individual rights, the rule of law, and limitations on government power. For them, liberalism takes the form of political liberalism for the support of liberal democracy over dictatorship, economic liberalism for the support of private property over government control, and social liberalism for the support of equality over privilege. China’s liberals not only strive for individual freedom and seek to replace the despotism of the Leninist party-state with liberal democracy, but also stand at the front line in the fight against social inequality, and champion the cause of the working class in the quest for a better life. The June 4th massacre was a major setback for the democratisation project in
China, but the discourse on democracy has continued to flourish in defiance of the party-state. The massacre not only hurt Chinese intellectuals deeply, but also compelled some of them to reconsider the trajectory of China’s political development and strategies for achieving the goal of democracy. It is in the process of this intense reflection that a number of Chinese intellectuals have achieved an intellectual breakthrough to fully embrace liberalism since the 1990s. This paper is an assessment of the thoughts and activities of Chinese liberals in the two decades since June 4th. It will provide an analysis on the emergence of the Chinese liberal camp, the latest intellectual developments among Chinese liberals, and their contributions to the quest for constitutional democracy in China.2
