ABSTRACT
The Chinese term for politics, zheng zhi, consists of two characters. The first character zheng in ancient times was a synonym for zheng, which had a very broad range of moral connotations and could be used as a noun, a verb and an adjective: the obverse side, to rectify, to correct, to mete out punishment to a criminal, straightforward, unbending, honest, virtuous, original, just, unbiased, and formal. The second character zhi is mainly a verb, and occasionally a noun. The basic meaning of this character is to administer, to control, to rule, to regulate, to harness, and to treat. One of the world's oldest texts expressly created for children is a Chinese exposition: An Essay of a Thousand Characters. A modern literature for children and youth in a newly promoted vernacular emerged in the May Fourth New Culture Movement. The success of Russian Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 seemed to provide a blueprint to Chinese intellectuals for solving China's problems quickly.
