III) Harmony, China’s ancient cultural essence and soft power

III) Harmony, China’s ancient cultural essence and soft power
From the perspective of harmony, human civilization is the progress in resolving relationship conflicts between:1) Human and nature (birth of religions, etc.)2) Human and human (philosophic, religious, and moral teachings)3) Members of a group (family, tribes’ and nomads’ morals, and codes and standards)4) Citizens and society at large (philosophy, values teaching, and imposition of laws)5) Rulers and the ruled (hierarchical social structure, elite values and government propaganda, democracy development, freedom and responsibility)6) Clashes between religions (such as the current clash between Muslim and western religious beliefs)7) Ideology contests (socialism vs. capitalism, democracy vs. broader harmony)8) Dependence and Independence development between national blocks (developed, underdeveloped, developing, poor and rich)Above is a list indicating, by way of illustration, only some of the major outstanding issues in conflict resolution and achieving harmony. In the interest of leading toward a current universal harmony exposition in the following, only major world harmony development movements will be summarized. These are also past global harmony movements that have by far the major repercussions on human civilization.The three major harmony movements of human civilization as listed in above conflict resolutions are religion, democracy, and harmony. Today’s world is in great disharmony, with religion conflicts, international inequity, and the disparity between North and South. To lead us out of this convulsion, we must look beyond religion and democracy to harmony as the basis of equality, mutual respect, tolerance, and acceptance. Harmony as the universal value envelops democracy; but, as a basic human longing, it is not institutionalized. The spread of harmony has been uniquely peaceful compared to religion and democracy. Will harmony bring a more moderate future world? American democracy faces the challenge of Chinese harmony as the leading global philosophy in the 21st century. Teaching harmony in the U.S. is paramount. For more details, please see China’s Harmony Renaissance: What the world must know by Francis C W Fung, published by World Harmony Organization.