The Disjunction Of Society And Redemption Of Culture

In his book Cultural Contradiction of Capitalism, Daniel Bell conducts a comprehensive analysis ofthe late capitalist society from the perspective of time and space. Adopting the virtual model researchmethodology of “Axial Principle”, he makes a penetrating far-reaching contrastive study on traditionalculture and modern and post-modern culture.Based on a fragmented view of society, Bell entertains that politics, economics and culture areindependent. This is a view contradictory with the Marx’s theory of social organism, which emphasizes thecoordinating development of politics, economics and culture, thus making the biggest difference betweenthe two views. Originated from Bell’s early work The Coming of the Post-industrial Society and The end ofIdeology, the fragmented view of social fields embodied in Cultural Contradiction of Capitalism is the keyto the analysis of social and cultural contradictions of capitalism. And it is exactly in the light of this viewthat Bell establishes his position as “an economic socialist, a political liberal and a cultural conservative”.Bell views the economy of current capitalist society as instrumental, taking the accumulation of wealth asits purpose. This development model neglects the ultimate guiding role of the culture and value system oneconomy. The essence of Bell’s belief in economic socialism is to strive for the priority decision right toeconomic policy so as to affect social justice. This appeal in the economic field needs to be justified by thepolitical democratic system and the social priority decision right should be determined by democraticconsultation rather than the investment choice of private owners—the holder of means of production.Therefore, it calls for political liberty and democracy to strike a balance between individual and publicinterests. In the culture field, traditional culture plays an important role in maintaining the civilization orderwhile the pursuit for self-satisfaction and self-fulfillment upheld by modern culture blunts the developmentof economic socialism and political liberalism. That is why Bell claims himself as a cultural conservative.Political contradiction, economic contradiction and cultural contradiction constitute the socialcontradictions of late capitalist society and the contradiction in cultural fields with those in other fieldsmake the major social contradiction. Bell’s cultural contradictions of capitalism on the one hand, refers tothe culture and the contradiction between economic interests, political equality, on the other hand refers to the modernist culture and postmodernism culture and the contradiction between the main consciousnessof traditional culture.To reconstruct the cultural atmosphere and establish a new belief is a necessity toresolve cultural contradiction. In Bell’s view, religion and culture share common grounds in the reflectionof human existence. We can’t leave divine power alone in the exploration of culture. Therefore, Belldefines religion as a kind of belief, a belief in god and goddess as well as other divine things that transcendhuman beings. In the light of this view, Bell seeks to overcome the cultural contradiction of late capitalistsociety through establishing public family and restoring religion.However, Bell’s solution dooms to be illusionary due to the paradox of his theory and his classlimitations. The capitalist society has exerted constraints on his theoretical development. What is moreimportant is that the great differences between Bell’s view of society and that of Marxism and Bellmisunderstanding of Marx’s thought have become obstacle of objective understand and realize the latecapitalism. It is lateral proved that Marx’s thought is scientific. Bell’s profound understanding of cultureexercises a huge influence on the world’s view of culture and it has implications and reference significanceon our socialist cultural construction.