Xu Youyu (, born 1947 in Chengdu) is a Chinese scholar in philosophy, a

public intellectual An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking, research, and Human self-reflection, reflection about the nature of reality, especially the nature of society and proposed solutions for its normative problems. Coming from the wor ...

, and a proponent of Chinese liberalism.

Biography

Xu was a teenage Red Guard at the time of the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...

. He was a researcher at the

Chinese Academy of Social Sciences The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) is a Chinese state research institute and think tank. It is a ministry-level institution under the State Council of the People's Republic of China. The CASS is the highest academic institution and c ...

at the time of the Tiananmen massacre in 1989, and he tried in vain to persuade students to leave Tiananmen Square before the army suppression, as they refused to believe the soldiers would open fire on peaceful student protesters. Investigated after the protests as a student sympathiser, he refused to admit guilt. His career suffered as he was demoted as director of his research centre and remained so until his retirement, having been denied research funding and unable to supervise postgraduate student projects. Xu is an expert on Western social theories, including

Marxism Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, ...

and the

Frankfurt School The Frankfurt School is a school of thought in sociology and critical theory. It is associated with the University of Frankfurt Institute for Social Research, Institute for Social Research founded in 1923 at the University of Frankfurt am Main ...

, and a noted historian of the Cultural Revolution. He is one of the signatories of the '' Charter 08'', a manifesto to promote political reform and democratization in China. In 2014, Xu was awarded Sweden's Human rights Olof Palme Prize."China pro-democracy activist Xu Youyu awarded Swedish rights prize"
"Yahoo! News", 19 December 2014.

References

Bibliography

* Xu Youyu (1999). ''Xingxing sese de zaofan 形形色色的造反：Hongweibing jingshen suzhi de xingcheng ji yanbian 紅衛兵精神素質的形成及演變'' (''Rebels of All Stripes: A Study of Red Guard Mentalities''). Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Red Guards 1947 births Living people Writers from Chengdu Charter 08 signatories 20th-century Chinese essayists 20th-century Chinese philosophers 20th-century Chinese historians Philosophers from Sichuan Historians from Sichuan Historians of the Cultural Revolution {{China-academic-bio-stub