ラベル 歴史 の投稿を表示しています。 すべての投稿を表示
ラベル 歴史 の投稿を表示しています。 すべての投稿を表示

2013年6月12日水曜日

【メモ】 The American Pragmatists (Cheryl Misak)

Cheryl Misak (2013) The American Pragmatists, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

【第一章 初期アメリカ思想におけるプラグマティズム的諸テーマ】

The fact that we can be surprised suggests that experience is not illusory and the world is not constructed entirely by us. Although we may color the universe, there is something that we are coloring. (p.12) cf. Ralph Waldo Emerson, Collected Works 3: 48

【第二章 Chauncey Wright】

But whatever be the origin of the theories of science, Whether from a systematic examination of empirical facts by conscious induction, or from the natural biases of the mind, the so-called intuitions of reason, what seems probable without a distinct survey of our experiences—whatever the origin, real or ideal, the value of these theories can only be tested ... by an appeal to sensible experience, by deductions from them of consequences which we can confirm by the undoubted testimony of the senses. (Chauncey Wright, Philosophical Discussions p.46)

This is a signal difference between pragmatism and British empiricism. Pramatism is not primarily a view about the sources or origins of belief, but a view of what tests a belief must pass once we have it. It is a view about what it is for a belief to count as non-spurious, genuine, or legitimate. (pp.17-18)

A belief can have consequences for the believer—it can make me feel better, it can influence my train of thought, I can desire it to be true, etc. But that is not the kind of consequence Wright thinks salient. A belief must have consequences not only for the believer, but for the world. The importance of this distinction will amplify as we march through the history of pragmatism. (pp.24-25)

【第三章 Charles Sanders Peirce】

[W]hen Paul Carus associated him [Peirce] with Hume in an article published in The Monist titled "Mr. Charles S. Peirce's Onslaught on the Doctrine of Necessity," Peirce resisted the comparison (Collected Papers 6.605). It is interesting, though, that it was not the empiricism he objected to. It was the nominalist metaphysical underpinnings of it. (p.28)

He [Peirce] did not want to define truth as that which satisfies our aims in inquiry. A dispute about definition, he says, is usually a "profitless discussion" (CP 8. 100). ... The pragmatist is merely getting one fix on the idea of truth. (p.36)

[For Peirce,] a true belief is such that it would withstand doubt, were we to inquire as far as we fruitfully could into the matter. A true belief is such that, no matter how much further we were to investigate and  debate, that belief would not be overturned by recalcitrant experience and argument. Peirce says: "if Truth consists in satisfaction, it cannot be any actual satisfaction, but must be the satisfaction that would ultimately be found if the inquiry were pushed to its ultimate and indefeasible issue" (Collected Papers 5.569; 6.485). (p.37)

We have in our various inquiries and deliberations a multiplicity of aims—empirical adequacy, coherence with other beliefs, simplicity, explanatory power, getting a reliable guide to action, fruitfulness for other research, greater understanding of others, living peacefully with others, increased maturity, and the like. When we say that we aim at the truth, what we mean is that, were a belief really to satisfy all of our local aims in inquiry, then that belief would be true. There is nothing over and above the fulfillment of those aims, nothing metaphysical, to which we aspire. Truth is not some transcendental, mystical thing and we do not aim at it for its own sake. (p.37)

The emotion of surprise is "merely the instinctive indication of the logical situation. It is evolution (φύσις) that has provided us with the emotion" (CP 7.190) (p.39)
→ パースの言う「経験の強制力」は単なる心理的、情緒的な衝動ではない。後者はあくまで進化の産物。(では一体何か?)

What we can say, he [Peirce] thinks, is that the fact that we have only our interpretations of what we experience does not throw us into a sea of arbitrary interpretations, where there is no connection to what is real. Our perceptual judgments, Peirce argues, are indices of our percepts—of the actual clash between us and the world. (p.40)

Peirce ... thinks that we can know something of the world as it exists independently of us—we can know that it is there and that it constrains us. Peirce turns to the idea that we can be mistaken in order to show that there is an objective truth and that reality that [sic] goes beyond what you or I or any collection of people happen to think: "The experience of ignorance, or of error, which we have, and which we gain by means of correcting our errors, or enlarging our knowledge, does enable us to experience and conceive something which is independent of our own limited views" (CP 7.345). (p.40)

This forceful element [of experiential judgements] is our link with a reality, something that goes beyond us: "Now the 'hardness' of fact lies in the insistency of the percept, its entirely irrational insistency, —the element of Secondness in it. That is a very important factor of reality" (CP 7.659). (p.41)

Peirce thinks that the theory of evolution tells us, indeed, that our capacities have been selected for survival, but that, nonetheless, we aim at getting beliefs not merely with survival benefits, but beliefs that are independent of human capacities and contexts of inquiry. (p.41n)

The seemingly unsolvable problem of induction disintegrates once we acknowledge that regularities abound, but only some of them want explanations. Only unexpected or surprising regularities make a demand on us to make an inference to the best explanation. (p.49)
→ 驚きを伴わない規則性は習慣の領域に沈滞している。

"The sole immediate purpose of thinking is to render things intelligible; and to think and yet in that very act to think a thing unintelligible is a self-stultification. It is as though a man furnished with a pistol to defend himself against an enemy were, on finding that enemy very redoubtable, to use his pistol to blow his own brains out to escape being killed by his enemy. Despair is insanity. ... We must therefore be guided by the rule of hope" (CP 1.405)

【第四章 William James】

He [James] notes with approval that Jonathan Edwards thought that it was by the fruits not the roots that we must test our beliefs (The Varieties of Religious Experience p.25). (p.70)

【第五章 Holmes、Royce、Schiller】

[For Holmes, law] is an enterprise of inquiry, or "successive approximation," that starts from precedent and then is driven by experience, conflict, and unanticipated problems. (p.78)

Peirce is adamant, with Royce, that we have to preserve a gap in which error can live. (p.84)
→ パースにおいては、outward clashがこの間隙を保証する。

【第七章 John Dewey】

[For Dewey] A belief has to satisfy the inquirer's needs and it has to satisfy the situation. It is bound to the personal or the psychological but it also has to meet what the situation demands of it. (p.112)

"The way in which men do 'think' denotes ... simply the ways in which men at a given time carry on their inquiries. So far as it is used to register a difference from the ways in which they ought to think, it denotes a difference like that between good and bad farming or good and bad medical practice. Men think in ways they should not when they follow methods of inquiry that experience of past inquiries shows are not competent to reach the intended end of the inquiries in question" (The Later Works 12.107)
 → パースが規範性を未来の探求に求めるのに対して、デューイは過去にそれを見出す。

It is certainly the case that those pragmatists who want to talk about the world and its constraints need to work hard to show how there is some space between their view and that of their realist opponents. We have seen that Peirce opens us that gap by arguing that we have no cognitive access to the world of independent objects—it is only by abstracting the forceful element from experience that we can get an inkling that the world is there. Dewey, on the other hand, needs to work to say why his view remains suflficiently far away from his idealist opponents who have a hard time making sense of the ideas of improvement, mistakes, and standards. (p.119)

"It is the situation that has these traits [vagueness and confusion]. We are doubtful because the situation is inherently doubtful" (The Later Works 12.109)

"The question naturally arises how Professor Dewey comes to have a metaphysics. How does he know that specificity, interaction, change, characterize all existence, and that these distinctions are not merely logical, made for purposes of getting along in this world, but characters of an independent existence? Why does he impute the features presented in human experience to a nature embracing, but containing more than, that experience?" (Ernest Nagel, "Can Logic be Divorced From Ontology?" p.707)

Nagel thinks that we need to distinguish "symbols from the subject-matter to which they point." We have seen that Peirce agrees, although his way of distinguishing these two things is as minimal as possible—all we can do is point or gesture at the subject matter. (p.121)

"Mr. Russell proceeds first by converting a doubtful situation into a personal doubt, although the difference between the two things is repeatedly pointed out by me. I have even repeatedly stated that a personal doubt is pathological unless it is a reflection of a situation which is problematic. Then by changing doubt into private discomfort, truth is identified with removal of this discomfort. The only desire that enters, according to my view, is desire to resolve as honestly and impartially as possible the problem involved in the situation. 'Satisfaction' is satisfaction of the conditions prescribed by the problem. Personal satisfaction may enter in as it arises when any job is well done according to the requirements of the job itself; but it does not enter in any way into the determination of validity, because, on the contrary, it is determined by that validity" (The Later Works 14.156)

Dewey is set against the "intellectualist" account of truth, on which truth is "antecedent to any process of verification" (The Middle Works 4.76).

Another way of putting this disagreement between Peirce and Dewey is to ask whether truth is a static phenomenon. Both reject the idea that truth is static in the sense that our beliefs either mirror the world of the Absolute (and are hence true) or fail to do so (and are hence false). But Peirce thinks that truth is static in the sense that a belief either would or would not survive the rigors of inquiry. Again, Dewey usually stays away from this thought. His interest ends with beliefs that show themselves to resolve a particular, local problem. (p.127)

 【第八章 Mead、Santayana】

He [Santayana] thinks that "in their hearts and lives," Americans are all pragmatists: "Their real philosophy is the philosophy of enterprise." They are optimists who "turn their scorn of useless thought into a glad denial of its existence" ("Apologia Pro Mente Sua" p.248-249 in Paul Schilpp, The Philosophy of George Santayana). He did not want to be associated with the American "business intellect" way of thinking. He preferred the intellectual company of Spinoza and the ancient Greeks. (p.144)

He alludes to the two shortcomings in Dewey's philosophy—the awkward metaphysics and the inability to adjudicate—in one harsh sentence. Dewey remains an idealist with Emerson, Schelling, and Hegel: "romantic, transcendental, piously receiving as absolute the inspiration dominating moral life in their day and country" ("Dewey's Naturalist Metaphysics" p.680). (pp.144-145)

"Living when human faith is again in a state of dissolution, I have imitated the Greek sceptics in calling doubtful everything that, in spite of common sense, any one can possibly doubt. But since life and even discussion forces me to break away from a complete scepticism, I have determined not to do so surreptitiously nor at random, ignominiously taking cover now behind one prejudice and now behind another. Instead I have frankly taken nature by the hand, accepting as a rule in my farthest speculations the animal faith I live by from day to day." (Scepticism and Animal Faith p.308)

Philosophy must begin in the middle of things. We assume that many of our beliefs are true and we need not be pushed into trying to prove those beliefs or show that they are certainly or infallibly true. We do not need Cartesian requirements for certainty. (p.147)

"I stand in philosophy exactly where I stand in daily life ; I should not be honest otherwise." (Scepticism and Animal Faith p.vi)

"You cannot prove realism to a complete sceptic or idealist; but you can show an honest man that he is not a complete sceptic or idealist, but a realist at heart" ("Three Proofs of Realism" in Essays in Critical Realism p.184)

Santayana and Peirce struggle mightily to articulate the good side of this thought [James's idea of the Will to Believe]. They both argue that we must accept the bulk of our beliefs, but always keep them open to recalcitrant experience and never believe them on grounds extraneous to facts and reasons. This last point is important. Like Peirce, when Santayana uses the word "faith," he does not mean to mark something that is unbacked by reasons. He says that instead of using "so brutal a term as animal faith," he might have used "cognitive instinct, empirical confidence, even practical reason" ("Apologia Pro Mente Sua" p.586). Each of these alternatives makes it clear that there is something normative or non-arbitrary in what we need to assume. (p.148)

"Why does belief that you can jump a ditch help you to jump it? Because it is a symptom of the fact that you could jump it, that your legs were fit and that the ditch was two yards wide and not twenty. A rapid and just appreciation of these facts has iven you your confidence, or at least has made it reasonable, manly, and prophetic; otherwise you would have been a fool and got a ducking for it." ("The Genteel Tradition in American Philosophy" in The Genteel Tradition in American Philosophy and Character and Opinion in the United States p.61)

The encountering of "brute fact" is the "ground" for Santayana's realism ("Apologia Pro Mente Sua"p.504-505). The "experience of shock" "establishes realism"—it establishes "a world of independent existences" (Scepticism and Animal Faith p.142). Santayana does not want to be associated with the pragmatists because he thinks that a pragmatist such as Dewey is "a philosopher of the foreground" ("Dewey's Naturalistic Metaphysics" p.680), too content with the surface of things. (p.148)

【第十章 Clarence Irving Lewis】

With Peirce (and Kant), Lewis takes the given to be that which is not under our control—that which is independent of the mind's constructive activities. (p.183)

[For Lewis] the given is that which impinges upon us or resists our attempts to change it and thus constrains our opinions (this is the set of thoughts he shares with Peirce). There is no need to add that the given is something that has a certain structure or quality. (p.183n)

What Lewis argues is that there must be something constraining the truth and falsity of our statements and beliefs. (p.184)

For Lewis, it is experience—not logic, not conceptual truth—that is brute and compelling. (p.192)
→ ア・プリオリな真理は確かに必然的だが、それのみを受け容れるよう我々を強制するという意味で必然的ではない。そのような意味でbruteなのは経験の抗力。

"What is a priori is necessary truth not because it compels the mind's acceptance, but precisely because it does not. It is given experience, brute fact, the a posteriori element in knowledge which the mind must accept willy-nilly. The a priori represents an attitude in some sense freely taken, a stipulation of the mind itself, and a stipulation which might be made in some other way if it suited our bent or need. Such truth is necessary as opposed to contingent, not as opposed to voluntary. "("A Pragmatic Conception of Truth" p.231)

"we cannot capture the truth of experience if we have no net to catch it in" (The Mind and the World Order p.271) → この網がア・プリオリな概念やカテゴリー。それは経験のあり方を規定するから経験から独立なのではなく、経験を規定しない(経験のbrtueな抗力に任せる)からこそ独立。また、この網は一つとは限らず、プラグマティックに選択され得る。Lewisの言葉を使えば、それは"uncompelled initiative of human thought"である。

Lewis rejects the idea, again sometimes found in James, that "new truth" replaces "old truth." When a new belief replaces an overturned belief, that should suggest that the old belief was false, not an old truth. ... An assertion always "outruns" our current evidence and best thinking. It reaches into the future and makes a prediction that the evidence and best thinking will continue to support the assertion. This, of course, is the Peircean conception of truth. (p.194)

【第十一章 Willard van Orman Quine】

[T]he insight of disquotationalism is precisely the insight of pragmatism. Both hold that when we assert that p is true, what we are doing is asserting p. The Peircean pragmatist modifies this shared thought slightly, not wanting to limp around with warranted belief. When we assert that p is true, what we are doing is asserting p and asserting that p would remain assertible. ... Both pragmatism and disquotationalism, that is, keep us focused on first-order inquiry. (p.206)

【第十三章 Richard Rorty】

Calling for a dissolution of a dualism, such as that between relativism and absolutism, does not guarantee that one succeeds in escaping the pitfalls of one or the other of the two positions. And it does not guarantee that one will not end up shuttling between the two disliked positions, depending on the particular critique to which one is responding. That is, after the call for the abandonment of a way of looking at things, one must replace the problematic mode of thinking with a new way that really does undercut the problems endemic in the old way of seeing the issue. One must replace the old dichotomy of "objective standards or no standards at all" with low-profile, non-absolutist conceptions of truth and objectivity which can guide us in our inquiries and deliberations. The pragmatist must replace the old dichotomy with distinctly pragmatist accounts of truth, objectivity, and normativity. (p.231)

Frank Ramsey also held that the pragmatist need not take "p is true" to be identified with "p is useful." For the belief p will be useful only if p. See his "Facts and Propositions." (p.232n)

As [Huw] Price puts it, pragmatists start not by asking what the analytic definition of truth is, but rather, why speakers have the notion of truth they have. They should see, he thinks, that our notion of truth does not line up neatly with warrant asertiblity, nor with disquotation. We need a stronger notion of truth than is provided by either of those notions (Naturalism Without Mirrors p.16). (p.233)

To do without truth is to silence our conversations—both our conversations with others and our internal conversations. For the very essence of the norm of truth is to give disagreement its immediate normative character. It is to make disagreement matter. Without the grit provided by the concept of truth, the wheels of argument do not engage; disagreements slide past one another. (p.234)

【第十四章 Hilary Putnam】

[For Putnam] One cannot dodge the problem of saying what truth is by replacing truth with assertibility and then not saying what assertibility is. And once one says what assertibility is, one is taken to a substantial view of truth. (p.242)

2011年7月2日土曜日

A Summary of Max Weber's Protestantism-Capitalism Thesis

Max Weber’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism is a study on the origin of modern capitalism. In this book, Weber identifies the Protestant (particularly Calvinist) ethic as the driving force that led to the development of capitalism. This famous thesis, known as the “Weber thesis”, is in a sense paradoxical, in stating that the spirit of capitalism is rooted not in greediness or the mere pursuit of profit, but rather in the asceticism characteristic in Protestantism.
According to the doctrine of predestination in Calvinism, those individuals who are promised salvation and those individuals who will suffer eternal damnation are already decided at birth by God’s will. Regardless of one’s moral deeds or effort, this fate cannot be changed. According to Max Weber, the fear towards this uncertainty spurred people to ascetic labor. By devoting themselves to labor and achieving worldly success, the followers of Calvinism were able to gain self-confidence that they were the ones chosen for salvation. It was this longing for a sense of assurance that drove them to follow a vocation with zeal.
However, this “driving force” of economic activity does not connect directly to the development of modern capitalism alone. There is another important factor which plays as a catalyst for economic success: the concept of “rationalization”. A characteristic feature of Protestantism that separates it from Catholicism is that it banishes all forms of magical practices and rites, such as the sacrament. Weber called this “disenchantment”, and argued that this rational aspect of Protestantism formed the soil from which capitalism arose. This rationalism led followers to organize their conduct of life based on a certain methodology. They would make daily schedules, keep records of their income and expenditures, and the money they earned would not be spent on expensive luxuries (asceticism) but would instead be invested for further profit-making. It is this rational pursuit of economic gain for its own sake which Weber called "the spirit of capitalism".
What is interesting about Weber’s thesis is that it implies an anti-Marxist worldview, that ideas and religious movement shape the economic structure, and not the other way around. I believe this is a convincing argument, although it cannot be denied that Weber may have put too much emphasis on the Protestant work ethic alone as the driving force behind the rise of modern capitalism. Other aspects, such as the power structure of society and the promotion of literacy through Bible-reading should have been taken into consideration. Needless to say however, Weber’s investigation is a remarkable contribution not only to economic sociology but sociology in general, in that it has helped deepen our understanding of the cultural origins of capitalism.

2011年1月30日日曜日

「百花斉放・百家争鳴」および「反右派闘争」に見る中国の知識人

1956年から1957年にかけての中華人民共和国において、「国の政策に対する意見や批判を歓迎する」というキャンペーンが中国共産党によって実施された。「百花斉放・百家争鳴(様々な花を開花させ、様々な思想を戦わせよう)」という詩がスローガンとして利用されたことから、このキャンペーンは中国では「百花運動(百花运动)」と呼ばれているが、日本では元の詩「百花斉放・百家争鳴」の名で知られている。結論から言うと、このキャンペーンは「反右派闘争」の引き金となり、悲惨な結果に終わった。中国共産党を批判した「知識人」たちは「右派」のレッテルを貼られ、徹底的に排除された。中には公判の手続きなしに拷問されたり、斬首刑に処せられる者もいた。この事件を通して、それ以後の中華人民共和国における「知識人」、とりわけ人権活動家や自由主義者の弾圧と抑圧の歴史が見えてくるように思う。
「知識人」という語は非常に曖昧で文脈依存的なので、ここにてはっきりと定義しておきたい。ここで言う「知識人」とは、「社会の問題や政治の問題について発言する人々」を指すことにする。一般的なイメージでは、「高等教育を受けている人々」、あるいは「高度な専門的知識を要する職業に従事する人々」というニュアンスも強いが、ここでは必要条件とは見なさない。
さて、「百花斉放・百家争鳴」を説明する前に、まず当時の時代背景を紹介しておきたい。1956年2月、ソビエト連邦共産党第一書記ニキータ・フルチョフによって、(3年前に亡くなっていた)最高指導者ヨシフ・スターリンの強権的な政治手法や個人崇拝を批判する報告書が発表された。スターリン執政期に行われた粛清の一部も暴露され、中国や東ヨーロッパ諸国に動揺をもたらした。特にスターリンの協力を得て建設された中華人民共和国にとっては、このような動きはソ連との対立の可能性を示唆したと同時に、スターリンの強権的な政治手法や個人崇拝が批判されたことが、当時中国において絶対的な権威を掌握していた毛沢東に対する不満や疑念を招くように思われた。このような不満が鬱積することの危険性を察知してか、当時の国務院総理であった周恩来が、後に「百花斉放・百家争鳴」運動となる小規模なキャンペーンを開始し、共産党内での活発な議論を呼びかけた。
このキャンペーンの対象者は、政府の役人と共産党の党員に限定されていた。周恩来は、社会主義化に賛同的でない役人や党員に対して、中央当局の政策や運営に対する意見や批判を呼び掛けた。しかし、周恩来による努力もむなしく、発言する役人も党員も一向に現れず、計画は頓挫した。1956年4月の中国共産党中央政治局の会合にて、周恩来は「より大きなキャンペーン」の必要性を強調し、対象者を役人や党員に限定せず、全国の知識人に拡大する意向を表明した。そして毛沢東もこのアイディアを気に入り、賛同の意を表した。
1956年5月2日、実質的に周恩来に代わってキャンペーンの指導者の地位を得た毛沢東は、最高国務会議で全国の知識人に向けて「共産党への批判を歓迎する」と宣言し、「百花斉放・百家争鳴」のスローガンを提唱した。これが運動の正式な始まりである。このときの毛沢東にどのような狙いがあったのかを推し量ることは難しいが、おそらく毛沢東はこのキャンペーンを、社会主義イデオロギーを普及させるチャンスと見なした、というのが一つの見方である。のちの1957年2月に行われた『人民内部の矛盾を正しく処理する問題について』と題された演説にて、毛沢東は「我々の社会は後退できない、あるのは進歩のみ。当局に対する批判は政府をさらに良い方向へ推し進めている。」と語っている。このことが示唆する毛沢東の狙いは、全国の知識人たちによる活発な議論の末、資本主義に対する社会主義の優位性が自明のものとして人民に認識され、その必然的帰結として、完全な社会主義体制へ向けた改革が促進される、というものである。ちなみに「百花斉放・百家争鳴」というスローガンは、春秋戦国時代の諸子百家を示している。儒家、道家、墨家、名家、法家などの諸学派が、イデオロギーや思想を巡る論争を繰り広げ、歴史的には儒教と道教が強い影響力を掌握することになった。毛沢東はこの歴史にちなみ、社会主義イデオロギーの「勝利」を「百花斉放・百家争鳴」というスローガンに託したのかもしれない。
一方で、「百花斉放・百家争鳴」は最初から「反共産党勢力」を炙り出すための罠だったのではないか、という説もある。ユン・チアン(中国出身でイギリス在住の作家)などは、「百花斉放・百家争鳴」は最初から毛沢東による「おとり作戦」だったと断定しているが、このような見方を完全に否定することは難しい。
このような状況の中、1956年9月に、中国共産党第8回全国代表大会が11年ぶりに開催された。この代表大会について特筆すべきは、中国共産党の党規約の、党員の義務規定が改定されたという事実だろう。従来は「マルクス・レーニン主義と毛沢東思想を基礎として」とあった規定が、「マルクス・レーニン主義を学習するよう努力し」と改められ、「毛沢東思想」の部分が削除された。この改定には、スターリン批判の流れを受け、毛沢東の個人崇拝を薄める狙いがあったと思われる。
翌月、中国共産党第8回代表大会終了直後、ハンガリーのブダペストで、ソ連の権威と支配に反対する大規模な民衆蜂起が発生した。いわゆるハンガリー動乱である。ブダペスト市民はハンガリーからのソ連軍徹底や、ハンガリーのワルシャワ条約からの脱退を求めたが、この動きに対してソ連は、官軍を投入して蜂起を直ちに武力鎮圧し、当時のハンガリーの首相を追放して新ソ連派の新政権を樹立させた。この動乱で数千人の市民が殺害され、およそ20万人が国外逃亡して難民となっている。
スターリン批判の影響を受け、民衆が強権的な政治運営を否定することによって起きたこのハンガリー動乱は、「自由な批判を歓迎する」ことの危険性を毛沢東に印象付けたのではないだろうか。それでも毛沢東はこの時期も、(少なくとも表面上は)「百花斉放・百家争鳴」のスローガンに基づいて活発な議論を奨励し続けた。
しかし1957年に入っても「百花斉放・百家争鳴」の呼び掛けに知識人たちはあまり応じず、運動は盛り上がらなかった。保守的な意見は数多く中央当局に届いていたが、批判的な意見はほとんど一切出なかった。過去にも「整風運動」や「反革命鎮圧運動」によって中国共産党内の「異端派」が排除されていたり、「三反五反運動」によって全国の資本階級が、「ブルジョワジーであること」だけで厳しい審問を受けさせられ、中には拷問に処せられる者もいて、中国の知識人たちもその事実を知っていた。「自由な議論」に応じても本当にお咎めがないのか、と多くの知識人が疑心暗鬼になっていたのだと思われる。
一向に盛り上がらない運動を盛り上げるため、毛沢東は民主党派や各層の知識人を集め、1957年2月(先述した)『人民内部の矛盾を正しく処理する問題について』と題された演説を行った。この演説の中で毛沢東は、「破壊的な批判」ではなく「建設的な批判」を奨励し、各民主党派と共産党との間の自由な討論の必要性を説いた。さらに1957年4月、中央当局は学校、科学研究機関、文化芸術機関などの党組織において座談会や討論会を開催し、広く大衆の意見を聞こう、という運動を展開した。ここにきてようやく、意見を出すことに慎重だった知識人たちは、自由に意見や批判を出すようになった。1957年5月から7月にかけて、何百万通もの手紙が中央当局に雪崩れ込み、また中国共産党の強権的な政治運営を批判するデモが北京大学の学生などによって行われた。「百花斉放・百家争鳴」は盛り上がりを見せ、中国共産党に対する批判が相次いだ。
しかし、これに対し毛沢東は、これらの意見は「建設的」なレベルをすでに超越しており、「破壊的」なレベルに達していると断定した。それもその通りで、「この国では知識人は拷問を強いられている」という意見や、「中国共産党が支配する限りこの国には自由がない」といった意見まで、極めつけには中国共産党の退陣を求める声までが噴出していた。これら「度の過ぎた」批判に対し、中国共産党は方針を急転換させ、「力を組織化して右派分子の侵攻に対して反撃する準備をせよ」との指示を出し、「右派」に対する批判を呼びかけた。かくして「反右派闘争」が開始した。「百花斉放・百家争鳴」に応じて批判を行った知識人は「右派」のレッテルを貼られ、徹底的に排除された。1958年の時点で550万人あまりの「右派分子」が辺境へ追放されたり、失職したり、あるいは公判の手続きなしに拷問、処刑される者までいた。
この「百花斉放・百家争鳴」から「反右派闘争」への急転換について、ハンガリー動乱のような事態になる前に民衆の間で鬱積していた不満を解消するために始めたものの、想定以上に過激な批判が噴出したため仕方なく弾圧の方向に転換したのか、あるいは最初から「反共産党勢力」を炙り出すための罠だったのかは、今となっては断定するだけの材料はない。しかし、この出来事が、それ以降の中国の知識人層に深い傷を負わせたことは確かだろう。自由な発言を呼びかけられ、素直に応じたところ排除されたことで、それ以後中国では「中国共産党を批判すると痛い目に遭う」という風潮が定着したのである。その後、3000万人以上の死者(餓死者除く)を出すことになる文化大革命を経て、1980年代まで、中国において政策や政治運営についての自由な論議は公になさられることはなかった。
1980年代に入ると、鄧小平による改革開放路線が始まり、中国共産党自身が「反右派闘争」は方向性こそ正しかったものの、範囲を拡大し過ぎたことにより不幸な結果をもたらしたと率直に認め、知識人層のトラウマはある程度解消されたかのように思われた。1986年には、当時中国共産党中央委員会総書記であった胡耀邦が「百花斉放・百家争鳴」を再提唱し、「第二次百花斉放・百家争鳴」を実現しようとしたが、鄧小平を中心とする長老グループに妨害され、頓挫した。1989年、抗議者からの異議に寛大だった胡耀邦が心筋梗塞で倒れ、死去したのをきっかけに、民主化を求める学生や一般市民のデモ隊が天安門広場に結集したが、中国人民解放軍による無差別発砲や、装甲車での轢殺によってデモは武力鎮圧された。「百花斉放・百家争鳴」以来の、知識人たちの淡い期待は「第二次天安門事件」で重ねて裏切られたのである。以後、中国で自由な言論が許されたことはない。
2010年には、人権活動や民主化活動に参加し、中国当局に繰り返し投獄されてきた劉暁波がノーベル平和賞を受賞したことにより、情勢は大きく変わりつつあるように思う。「百花斉放・百家争鳴」と「反右派闘争」以来繰り返されてきた知識人の言論弾圧の歴史に終止符は打たれるのであろうか。今後の展開にも注目していきたい。