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 reflection about the reality of society, and who proposes solutions for the normative problems of society. Coming from the world of culture, either as a creator or ...

, and a proponent of Chinese liberalism.

Biography

Xu was a teenage

Red Guard Red Guards () were a mass student-led paramilitary social movement mobilized and guided by Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966 through 1967, during the first phase of the Cultural Revolution, which he had instituted.Teiwes According to a Red Guard le ...

at the time of the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...

, He was a researcher at the

Chinese Academy of Social Sciences The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) is a Chinese research institute and think tank. The institution is the premier comprehensive national academic research organization in the People's Republic of China for the study in the fields of ...

at the time of the

Tiananmen massacre The Tiananmen Square protests, known in Chinese as the June Fourth Incident (), were student-led demonstrations held in Tiananmen Square, Beijing during 1989. In what is known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, or in Chinese the June Fourth ...

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 Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...

and the

Frankfurt School The Frankfurt School (german: Frankfurter Schule) is a school of social theory and critical philosophy associated with the Institute for Social Research, at Goethe University Frankfurt in 1929. Founded in the Weimar Republic (1918–1933), dur ...

, and a noted historian of the Cultural Revolution. He is one of the signatories of the ''

Charter 08 Charter 08 is a manifesto initially signed by 303 Chinese dissident intellectuals and human rights activists. It was published on 10 December 2008, the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopting its name and style from ...

'', a manifesto to promote political reform and democratization in China. In 2014, Xu was awarded Sweden's Human rights

Olof Palme Prize The Olof Palme Prize is an annual Swedish prize awarded for an outstanding achievement in the spirit of Olof Palme. The Prize consists of a diploma and 100,000 US dollars. The prize was established in February 1987 and is awarded by the Olof Palm ...

."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 People's Republic of China essayists People's Republic of China philosophers People's Republic of China historians Philosophers from Sichuan Historians from Sichuan Historians of the Cultural Revolution {{China-academic-bio-stub