Interests·Institution·Morality

Guided by historical materialism as the basic theory and the methodological principle, starting from the relationship between Interests, institution and morality, with benefits as the basis, and from the perspective of the developmental laws of morality, the paper intends to explore the inner effects of institution on the moral construction to analyze the essential causes of the present moral problems and to put forward the effective approach to the moral construction.Interests are the basis of morality; moral issues originate from the interests relations among people in their life. Interests are the vehicle to control the world by moral means, and the driving force for the appearance and evolution of morality, and the agency for the transformation from heteronomy to autonomy. Therefore, to resolve the moral issues, the interest issues shall be resolved first to ensure the balance of them.Institution, in nature, is the interest relations among different groups, stratums, and classes in division of labor in the society. The basis of the isomorphism of institution and morality is interest, through which the interaction between institution and morality is effected. The establishment of institutions sets up the social interest environment for the formulation of morality, helps to objectify the inward moral values of subjects, and helps to enhance the moral standard of individuals in the society. The innovation of institutions produces new ethical effects. Therefore, institution is a very important part as well as an important means of moral education. The present moral problems are caused by the interpersonal benefits brought about by deficiency, flaws and obstacles in law. As a result, the realization of the moral construction and the optimization of the moral environment depends on the constraints and standardization of institution.Hence, the basic approach to the moral construction of our socialist economymarket bases "Three Representatives" as the guidance to focus on efficiency, maintain equality and conduct the Interests -constrained, Interests-oriented and Interests-compensated institutional construction. Putting emphasis on efficiency and maintaining fairness is the intrinsic nature of Marxist system, and the requirement of the nature of socialist system, and important objectives of socialist moral construction. The establishment of institutions shall put efficiency in the first place with fairness as the principle. Institutions shall represent the requirement of the development of advanced production so as to fully represent the interests of the masses and resolve and coordinate the interest conflict and lay a foundation for the all-round development of individuals; institutions shall be oriented by advanced culture so as to help people resolve conflict of interest, and exert the orienting and cohesive function of advanced culture on people's values; only with people's fundamental interests as the starting point, can the institutions be valid, legal, and scientific. The arrangement of the institutions shall reflect the theory of "Three Represents". The key for the designing of institution is: to formulate a fair social structure to adjust the distribution of profits through proper awards and penalty meting mechanism, that is, the interest-constrained system, interest-compensated system, and interest-oriented system.