Excerpt from The Chinese Family System

China is changing. In a metamorphosis that bids fair to be universal, the family, that ancient and hitherto unalterable basis of Chinese society, is undergoing marked transformation. Part of the change is the more or less mechanical resultant of the combined action of a great number of impersonal and unperceived forces; a greater part is the result of conscious readjustments and rational social control.

For many hundreds of years the Chinese family system worked satisfactorily among millions of people. Now the machinery does not seem to run as smoothly as it did a century ago, and in recent years there has been considerable agitation in China for reform.

The transformation of a basic social institution is fraught with far-reaching and often dangerous consequences. Never before has there been greater need of a clear-sighted view of the Chinese family system. The object of this study is to describe with scientific accuracy, clearness, and simplicity the nature and functioning of the Chinese family system, past and present. It is not an exhaustive study. It aims to embody only enough of the more important facts to constitute a comprehensive view of the Chinese family system as a whole. Throughout the thesis, precedence is given to facts and processes rather than to theories and hypotheses. Equal emphasis is placed upon the bad and the good features of the Chinese family system, for both its successes and failures are of value, either as examples to be copied or as mistakes to be avoided. Above all else the author seeks to furnish reliable data which will help solve the problem of family reform in China and serve as a scientific background for practical policies of control.

The present is clearly discernible only in the light of the past. Any worth-while judgment of an existing social institution presupposes knowledge of its origin and evolution.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. Это и многое другое вы найдете в книге The Chinese Family System (Classic Reprint) (Sing Ging Su)