In order to enrich residents’ cultural life and to broaden their cultural horizons, the Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) organizes the “Lectures by Masters of Culture” programme. This year’s lecture “The System of Values and World Vision of Chinese Culture – The Globalization Perspective” was held on Sunday, 4 November, at 3pm, at the Auditorium of the Macao Polytechnic Institute, hosted by renowned philosopher Chen Lai, attracting a large number of residents to attend.
The President of the Cultural Affairs Bureau, Mok Ian Ian, said in her speech that Chinese culture has a long history and covers profound knowledge. The Chinese thought and culture represented by Confucianism had a worldwide impact in history and formed a grand occasion of the “Confucian cultural circle”. The Chinese values and worldviews that combine Confucianism, Taoism and buddism also cultivate the common values pursued by the Chinese nation, common emotions and morals, common ideals and spirits. The IC has sought to develop its projects in an orderly manner in accordance with the “Five-Year Development Plan” launched by the Macao SAR Government, striving to establish Cultural Macao while seeking to conform with the governmental policies of “One Belt, One Road” and the “Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Great Bay Area”, facilitating the establishment of “One Centre, One Platform, One Base”. According to the “Framework Agreement on Deepening Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Cooperation in the Development of the Bay Area”, one of Macao’s roles in the Great Bay Area is to explore and create a basis for cooperation and exchange based on “Chinese culture as the main key to promote the coexistence between different cultures”, which is the new orientation granted by the State to Macao for planning and construction. In the future, IC will continue to hold large-scale exhibitions, performances and lectures, among others, striving to promote cultural exchanges between Macao and Mainland China as well as to promote Chinese culture.
Professor Chen Lai is one of China’s most influential contemporary philosophers and thinkers, currently the Director of the Tsinghua Academy of Chinese Learning and Professor of the Department of Philosophy, also a member of the Central Research Institute of Culture and History. Mentored by the masters in Chinese studies Zhang Dainian and Feng Youlan, Professor Chen is the first Doctor of Philosophy in China, specializing in history of Chinese philosophy, mainly on philosophy of Confucius, Neo-Confucianism in the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties and modern Confucianism. Winner of numerous awards, his achievements are leading the world in the fields. He is one of the two selected winners around the world of the “Confucius Award” in 2016; winner of the “Global Chinese Ceremony Achievement Award for Chinese Studies” in 2014 and 2016; the “Zhang Shiying Aesthetics Philosophy Academic Award” in 2017, which is the highest honour in the field; and the “Huilin Prize for Culture” in 2018 for the international dissemination of Chinese culture.
In this lecture, Professor Chen will introduce the principles of benevolence, Confucius code of conduct, sense of responsibility and community standards that stand out as core values of Chinese culture, as well as the imagination and practice of a virtuous world, explaining that its values were not only widely accepted in East Asia’s pre-modern era but are also complementary to today’s Western contemporary values and have also real universal meaning to the establishment of a community related on an international level, of political cooperation and a world of harmony.
IC started to launch the “Lectures by Masters of Culture” programme in 2013, inviting world famous scholars, artists and individuals from cultural circles to host lectures and talks in Macao and, through the exchange of experiences and sharing of knowledge, stimulate thoughts with an international perspective and enrich Macao’s culture, in order to inject creativity and vitality in the development of Macao’s culture and arts. The event venue was supported by the Macao Polytechnic Institute.
