Spór o etnocentryzm w filozofii historii a sprawa chińska

Abstract

Debate on Ethnocentrism in the Philosophy of History and Chinese Issue


The aim of this article is an attempt to reconstruct the reflection on the phenomenon of ethnocentrism in the philosophy of history and historical research. Taking into account the scope of the subject-matter, I narrow the study of ethnocentrism to the Chinese history and historical thinking. Firstly, I try to elucidate the different meanings of the term ‘ethnocentrism’, showing its material and formal, essential and existential variants in the philosophy of history and historical research. Then, I analyze the Hegelian formula of ethnocentrism concerning his view of the Chinese history and culture. After that, I pass on to the critique of his approach, within the German philosophy of history (Jaspers, Plessner) itself, as well as in the postcolonial theory of history. Finally, I analyze Rüsen’s theory of history and his program of the intercultural comparative historiography, which had led him and his proponents to the detailed comparison of the Western and Chinese historical thinking. In conclusion, I present not only some main weak points of such conceptions, but also the main currents of development of the reflection on ethnocentrism in the philosophy of history I predict to arise on the basis of the foregoing debates.

Keywords: philosophy of history, ethnocentrism, China, postcolonialism, Hegel, Rüsen.