Economic analysis has to deal with the major issue of the impact of time on economic activities. Since the birth of economics, the progress on this issue has been quite slow. Modern mainstream economics defines ″economic time″ in terms of natural time or logical time, using highly abstract, formalized, and indifference measurement methodology, and then constructing increasingly sophisticated analytical models on this basis. However, the explanatory and predictive ability of economics has not increased correspondingly. This paper examines this issue from the perspective of history of thought, focusing on the theory of historical ″economic time″ proposed by Mrs. Joan Robinson, an outstanding economist in the 20th century, and trying to explore its important ideological resources which have long been ignored by the academic circles. Using the methodology of comparative study of the history of thought, this article chose Introduction to Modern Economics, Mrs. Joan Robinson’s late representative work, as the main text material. Placing Mrs. Robinson’s theory of ″economic time″ in the historical course of economics since the formation of classical political economy, and comparing it with the American paradigm of economic analysis represented by Samuelson in the same period, this paper tries to accurately grasp its core connotations and characteristics, and clarifies its significance to the development of economics. This article sorts out Robinson’s connotation of historical time method as follows: (1) Unalterable Past. Economic analysis should be carried out in a particular and unchangeable context. Unless it started from a blank state, economic analysis involving time processes will have a certain historical background, even subject to a certain accumulation of experience. (2) Unidirectional Time. Firstly, only through a certain period of time, can most changes, morphological or quantitative in the economy, be realized. Secondly, in the dynamic process, the consequences and their concomitants will have impacts on the subsequent economic movements. These consequences and concomitants will accumulate and even interact with each other with the passage of time. (3) Unpredictable Future. In most instances, the future cannot be entirely known as it is no longer a simple superposition of the past or the present, but a new state. The future mainly involves both uncertainty and expectations in the analysis. Due to the lack of reliable information, uncertainty is not a probability that can be calculated, while expectation is the judgment which the economic subject makes on the basis of the existing information, and which carries its own subjective cognitive color and is not uniform. This article then chose the case of pricing primary products in Introduction to Modern Economics to specify how Mrs. Robinson introduced the paradigm of historical time in her analysis. Comparing it with Samuelson’s related statements in Economics (19th Edition), we find that Mrs. Robinson believed that even in the primary market which is extremely close to a fully competitive one, the price will not be the price at which supply and demand will be balanced, but more likely to be fluctuating. What is more, this fluctuation is not necessarily an equilibrium fluctuation. For Mrs. Robinson, the price is also ″a series of events″, and these events have their own temporal characteristics. It is different from Samuelson’s analysis. According to the analyses in her book and the methodology which she applied, this paper believes that Robinson is more eager to see an economic analysis method combining historical analysis with abstract theory.

As England faced a serious problem of money shortage in the 1690s, the authority used all measures to prevent smuggling out, melting and hoarding of silver coins, but all proved in vain. A main cause was that France had serious financial deficits, and thus devalued French money by 10%. This attracted hot money from foreign countries into France for arbitrage profits. Large quantities of silver were shipped abroad, bringing on heavy losses to England.Despite all kinds of suggestions and heated debates, the government was unable to resolve the issue effectively. In December 1695, after the Parliament voting, the Treasury made a decision thatthe silver content of coins wouldnot be changed. This means that while France devalued 10%, England still maintained the value of silver coins as set by Tudor Queen Elizabeth in 1601. The silver value of English coins was therefore officially set higher than their face values. Consequently, coins were melted and exported, with losses of 12% of total silver in 1685, 15% in 1688, 30% in 1692 and 49% in 1695 respectively. The Treasury (led by William Lowndes) tried to devalue, but an opposing group (led by the philosopher John Locke) argued for returning to the Tudor standard (to appreciate). This paper analyzes why the Treasury lost the battle in the Parliament. The role of Isaac Newton was ambiguous: in public debates he supported Locke’s claim to return to the Tudor standard (appreciate money), while in a written manuscript (1695), he supported Lowndes’s claim for a heavy devaluation (25%). This controversy, when judged by today’s economic mentality and policy orientation, is quite probable that Lowndes’s claim for a heavy devaluation (25%) might win in the Parliament. Most delegates would have agreed to three important measures: (1) completely prohibitingthe export of silver bullion and coins; (2) or prohibitingexport of silver bullion and coins within a certain period; (3) and/or increasing coinage supply (in today’s terms: quantitative easing). These three policies couldreduce England’s silver outflow and avoid domestic money shortage, because money shortage had important consequences, such as deflation, higher interest rates, consumption slump, discouraging investments, increasing unemployment and social instability, etc. Moreover, the devaluation of Pound would help the export of English products and discourage foreign imports. Why did John Locke and his followers tend to appreciate, returning to the silver content of Tudor coins? In terms of mentality, they might thinkthat the State should maintain the intrinsic value of moneyrather than alter the silver contents at discretion,otherwise people wouldlost confidence, impairingbusiness transactions at home and abroad. For these reasons, Locke won the Parliament’s final decision. The attitude of Newton was ambiguous. On the one hand, he was in favor of devaluation (same as the Treasury), as manifested in his 1695 manuscript. On the other hand, he supported Locke’s line of appreciation (returning to the Tudor money standard). This ambiguity was a kind of mental paradox between sense and sensibilityoften observed in Newton’s personality as has been noted by many biographers.

With the development of education and the popularization of culture in the Song Dynasty, the education level of the Buddhist monks and Taoists generally improved. The discussion of their education level and the number of literates among them is conducive to a deeper understanding of the social culture and religious connotation of the Song Dynasty. In this dynasty, there were explicit benchmarks for the education level in both the profession itself and its official management. The law stipulated that anyone who wanted to be a monk or Taoist must pass a rigorous examination conducted by the government and must be able to read 500 pages of Buddhist scriptures. The examination was presided by five officials including the state general judge. After being a monk or Taoist, he needed to study Buddhism and other fields of knowledge all his life, as it was the foundation and an important part of the practice. The government also strengthened the monitoring of the education of monks and Taoists in temples, usually in the form of assessment in the promotion of monks. At least in terms of system, monks and Taoists in the Song Dynasty were all literate, which resulted in a higher overall education level than those of the past and made outstanding historical contributions in the religious and spiritual fields. The most historically significant religious academic achievements in the Song Dynasty such as the numerous Quotations in Buddhism, especially the Lamp Record, were beyond the reach of the Sui and Tang Dynasties. As one of the most important works on alchemy theory and practice, Ziyang Zhenren Wuzhen Pian written by Zhang Boduan had a great influence on Taoism in later generations. In the Song Dynasty, the Linji School started the two influential schools of ″Huanglong″ and ″Yangqi″, giving the Zen and even Buddhism an entirely new look. One of the signs indicating the development of Taoist culture is the creation of new schools. For example, the Zhengyi School had the branch school of Tianxin, the Fuzhuan School had the branch of Shenxiao, the Lingbao School had the branch of Jingming Taoism, and the Neidan School was divided into the Southern School and the Northern School. All these marked the high education level of monks and Taoists in the Song Dynasty. Versatile and erudite, they actively participated in worldly affairs, making many contributions in science and technology, literature and art, etc. Chen Deyi, a Taoist priest, had a good command of calendar. Monk Huaibing was an outstanding expert in architecture. The elderly monk, Fengxiang, was skillful at metallurgy, and many more monks were well-versed in medicine. The monks and Taoists who were excellent in Chinese calligraphy and painting created a lot of rare literary and artistic pieces 8 people were listed in Xuanhe Shupu and Xuanhe Huapu. There were many top musicians among monks and Taoists. Unique in the history of Chinese literature, monks and Taoists were enthusiastically involved in literary endeavors, particularly in the Song Dynasty because of the existence of a large team of writers. In particular, they incorporated Zen and Buddhism into poetry, contributing to the innovation and development of poetry and became a miracle in the history of Chinese literature. These were without dispute marks of their higher education level. Poetry anthologies written by Taoist priests are still read and appreciated now. As a center for book publishing, collection and reading, Buddhist and Taoist temples served as places for storing and disseminating large numbers of documents, and they were open to the public. The temples also set up primary schools and enrolled children for elementary education. Monks and Taoists in the Song Dynasty attracted scholar-bureaucrats with their high education level and versatility. Their extensive contacts were of great significance to the integration and development of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism and the development of literary creation. It is estimated that at the end of the Northern the Song Dynasty, there were about 600,000 literates among all monks and Taoists, constituting a huge part of intellectual class. Therefore, it is no exaggeration to say that Buddhist and Taoist literacy is equal to scholar-bureaucratic literacy, and the two dominated the country, representing the thought quintessence at that time. The history of the Song Dynasty shows that Confucianism was mainly at the political level and Buddhism and Taoism the life level; Confucianism played a major role in the upper class, while Buddhism and Taoism in the lower class. Buddhism and Taoism were no less influential than scholar-bureaucrats in people's life, and penetrated even deeper into people's daily life and the ideas. The philosophical aspect of Buddhism and the scientific aspect of Taoism were not found in Confucianism. The education level and the cultural influence of Buddhism and Taoism, though far from competing with Confucianism, played a role of balance, which was conducive to the diversified development of the dynasty.

The study of factionalism is an important issue in the historical research of the Northern Song Dynasty. So far, emphases have mainly been focused on people like scholars, generals and royals, etc. However, this paper turns the perspective from the upper class to one group of small figures or insignificant people, namely, the stone carving workers. This change in perspective may lead to a preliminary exploration into the public opinions and narrative standpoints of scholars in the Southern Song Dynasty. Stone carving workers were part of the traditional community of manual laborers, a group of people earning their living by carving skills. Therefore, they are rarely mentioned in the existing ancient documents. Occasionally, the workers would leave their names on the stones, which constitute the only historical materials for us to study them. At present, the ongoing studies mainly concentrate on collecting and compiling the name lists of these workers, but systematic and deep-going studies still fall short. Except for comprehensively filtrating the handed-down literatures, this paper attempts to makes full use of the stone carving workers' signatures occasionally left on the stone carvings and study them from the perspective of factionalism, which not only contributes to a better knowledge about the living state of these people, but also makes a better understanding of the political stand of small figures in the grand history. In the Northern Song Dynasty, most of the stone carving workers taking office in the central government came from local stone carving families or succeeded the posts from their fathers who had been technical officials. Compared with civil officials, they were usually humble both in political status and earnings. As a consequence, they were regarded as craftsmen and had difficulty in promotion or direct involvement in the upper class factionalism. That is the reason why they are relatively unknown in the documents about factionalism. Different from many official stone carving workers who have been forgotten, civil stone workers such as An Min and Li Zhongning have enjoyed longstanding reputation for rejecting to carve steles for Yuanyou Partisans in the ″Inhibition of Party in the Reign of Chongning″. Stories about An Min and Li Zhongning are found in personal note novels in the Song Dynasty. The History of Song Dynasty which was compiled and revised in the Yuan Dynasty adopted the story of An Min into Biography of Sima Guang to praise his noble character and outstanding moral principles, which unquestionably expanded the influence. From the stories of An Min and Li Zhongning, it can be concluded that these were brave enough to uphold justice and expressed their political stands when civil officials dared not voice their opinions. For one thing, extolling their stories showed public sympathy to the Old Faction; for another, the descendants of the partisans recorded in the list uniformly backed up the Old Faction and opposed the New Faction when narrating factionalism in the Northern Song Dynasty. To some extent, they launched a counterattack with the purpose of carrying forward ancestral merits and virtues. In actuality, An Min and Li Zhongning's refusal to carve for Yuanyou Partisans were not only due to justice, but also for private reasons. Many poems in the Ming and Qing Dynasties eulogized An Min and Li Zhongning, which reflects later scholars' appreciation for their sticking to justice and virtue in spite of their insignificant status.  Judging from the perspective of factionalism, small figures like stone carving workers, who appeared to be far from or at the edge of politics, couldn't be completely independent of big events. Faced with such circumstances, they would join in the factionalism consciously or get involved in the stream passively, and some of them even took their own stand in the political struggle. The paper surmises about the names of the people who carved for Yuanyou Partisans' Steles in the imperial capital Kaifeng. Our studies show that Zhao Yin and his fellows might be the ones who carved for Yuanyou Partisans' Steles in Chongning. The main research methods used in this paper are dual evidence, document statistics and analysis and so on. It is expected that these research methods may contribute to the future studies of stone carving workers.

An epitaph is a stone inscription buried in a tomb with the biography of the owner of the tomb. It originated in the Eastern Han Dynasty, developed in the Southern and Northern Dynasties and flourished in the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties. It existed in the forms of stone carving, text and calligraphy: The stone carving constitutes its physical form, the literal content its textual form, and the handwriting its calligraphic form. Epitaphs, as they evolved throughout the medieval period from the Wei, Jin to the Five Dynasties, exhibit exquisite textual patterns and developed specific writing rules. Firstly, epitaphs in the medieval period formed a special system constituted by at least three formats: text, calligraphy and material object. General literary forms such as poems and rhapsodies were created by writers and handed down through writing, compilation, carving and printing. In addition to the process that general literary forms went through, epitaphs also had stone inscriptions, the stones buried in the grave with manuscript carved on them. Calligraphers had to write down the words that were to be carved on the stones, and a material object came into being after the carving.  Secondly, the medieval epitaphs demonstrated more evident literary features. The epitaphs and poetic genres were more fully combined, and the genres of Mingwen were increasingly diversified. Epitaphs consisting of Zhiwen and Mingwen became a regular pattern for later generations. Sometimes, Zhiwen and Mingwen were written respectively, with Zhiwen intended for recording events and Mingwen for extolling the virtues. The relatively fixed format of ″Thirteen Events″ also witnessed the stylistic stylization of the epitaphs. The epitaphs matured and flourished in the Tang dynasty. The authors took advantage of various literary styles in the previous generations and integrated their good qualities into the epitaphs, making the epitaph an independent and popular literary style. Thirdly, the writing rules of epitaphs in the Tang Dynasty were manifested in increasingly complete inscriptions, occasional annotations, and the special format of line breaks and blanks. Stone epitaphs are a complex of epitaph texts: their texts were provided by the author of the epitaphs, revised and supplemented by the bereaved, written by the calligrapher, and finally inscribed by the engraver. The information provided by the stone epitaph was much richer than that by the paper-based epitaph collections. For example, the epitaph inscriptions indicating the author's identity were important materials for studying the style and format of the epitaphs. However, they could not be found in the paper-based epitaph collections. Finally, the writing style of epitaph in paper-based collections is different from that in stone carving. The comparison of the two different types of epitaphs is helpful for us to grasp the stylistic characteristics of epitaphs. The newly unearthed stone epitaphs, many of which were included in paper collections, provide us with excellent materials for a comparative study of the style and form of the epitaphs. The forms of stone epitaphs are varied and complex, thus providing much additional information to mere textual forms. Paper-based epitaphs show the instability of the texts resulting from copying and printing, from which we can examine the course of the spread of the texts. A comparison will also bring out the different standpoints of the epitaph authors and the bereaved.

Xi Kui was an important litterateur in the mid-Tang dynasty who excelled in imperial examinations and literary writing. He had close contacts with famous literati such as Han Yu, Bai Juyi, Liu Yuxi and Lu Chang. His bibliographical record in the extant documents, however, is rather sketchy. Fortunately, his newly-discovered epitaph clarifies his biographical information, including the year of his birth and death, family, participation in the imperial examinations，literary creation and social network. It can serve as a source for studying the protogenic environment of the mid-Tang literature. Firstly, the epitaph records the literary pedigree of Xi Kui. His grandfather Xi Yu, a famous poet in the high-Tang, was a member of the most prestigious literary group in the Kai Yuan period together with literati such as Zhang Yue, Zhang Jiuling and Han Xiu. Many famous literati such as Yan Zhenqing brothers and Xiao Yingshi won his recognition. Xi Yu's literary achievements and status also influenced his clansmen and descendants. Li Zhou, one of his grandsons, was an essayist who had contacts with famous poets like Du Fu, Cen Shen, Liu Changqing，Liang Su and Dugu Ji. Xi Kui's literary pedigree profoundly influenced his literary creation. Secondly, the epitaph recorded the literary activities of Xi Kui. From the epitaph and his extant literary work, his literary creation was closely related to his participation in the imperial examinations and his official experiences. Xi Kui was a successful candidate in the highest imperial examinations. His existing poems and odes are representative of his literary talent. After passing the imperial examinations, he served as Guang Wen Guan, a position which many famous literati took in the Tang Dynasty. Xi Kui's literary influence contributed to his appointment to the official post, which, in turn positively impacted his literary creation and elevated his literary status. Later, he served as an official in charge of secretarial matters and was responsible for issuing government decrees, drafting imperial edicts and authoring eulogies on the feats of the emperor. While writing these official documents, Xi Kui was able to follow his own concept of literature and demonstrate his unique personality. Finally, literary communication is an important aspect for studying the relationship between Xi Kui and the literature of Mid-Tang Dynasty. According to the extant documents, well-renowned Tang writers such as Han Yu, Bai Juyi, Yuan Zhen, Liu Yuxi and Lu Chang all had contacts with Xi Kui. In addition, as is shown by the epitaph, the writer of the epitaph, Chen Feng, passed the imperial examination in the same year as Xi Kui and was a close friend of his. The calligrapher of the epitaph, Pei Lin, was adept in literature and calligraphy. Both Chen Feng and Pei Lin were famous literati at that time and this connection significantly helps us understand Xi Kui's activities, social network, and the literary value of epitaphs. In sum, the epitaph of Xi Kui was indicative of the environment wherein literary work was created in the Tang Dynasty. It demonstrates four interconnected aspects of the emergence and development of Tang Dynasty literature: family background, imperial examination, literary network and personal experience.

Based on the theory of global communication, the authors maintain that not only is ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″ an important part of Xi Jinping Thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for the new era and of neo-cosmopolitanism, but also China's network governance ideas and global governance programs which represent China's wisdom are important contributions to the world as well as an advance over traditional cosmopolitanism, community philosophy, and network security in a variety of ways. The research framework of this paper is as follows: Firstly, it expounds the wisdom and experience of China's network governance, discusses how China breaks the discourse hegemony of ″Western Centralism″ in the global governance system, and promotes the universality of local experience of network security governance. Secondly, it explores the origin of the connection between the terms ″global communication″ and ″community″, especially the deep logic behind the concept of ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″. The innovation brought by technologies such as online new media has challenged the existing ″community″ experience of mankind. The development from the ″community″ based on lineage and geographical location to the ″community″ based on the infinite expansion of virtual space has created new possibilities and demands. Thirdly, the above two points lead to a deep analysis of the logical foundation of ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″, and to the idea that digital space and digital culture bring a new vitality to the ″community″ in the eyes of social scientists such as Giddens, and ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″ has become the most practical Chinese proposition in solving the network security problem in the Internet era. Finally, the article examines the meaning of communication of the ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″, i.e., when all human beings are regarded as one single community, communication is vital to maintaining order in the community to cope with shared risks. Although the emerging new communication technologies have contributed to the promotion of civilization and human well-being, global risks such as cybercrime and cyber terrorism still exist. ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″ will be practical only when multi-subjects actively participate in cyberspace governance, and nation-states and new media users become policy co-makers. This paper contributes to existing research in two aspects: (1) Extracting the theoretical value of ″Community of Common Future in Cyberspace″, and discovering the role of different communication subjects in the construction and governance of Internet space order from the perspective of communication; (2) Systematically discussing China's positive behavior in cyberspace governance, and analyzing China's efforts and goals to break the rigid international discourse system and realize self-empowerment.

Based on the dialogue with the traditional theories, this study investigates the development of related theories and explores the issue of the inadequate explanatory power of these traditional theories when applied to social reality. In Cosmopolitan Theory, the tension between cosmopolitanism and nationalism, universalism and pluralism, localism and globalism can never be properly dealt with. Community Theory confronts the contradiction between freedom and certainty and cannot achieve the basic goals of human pursuit of community.  With the significant enhancement of China's overall national strength, new cosmopolitanism is a beneficial approach and practice in the globalization of Chinese discourse. New cosmopolitanism inherits from cosmopolitanism its recognition of ″otherness″ and the pursuit of universalism, and turns from emphasizing consensus to acknowledgment, which embodies the good desire to achieve the greatest common divisor. Meanwhile, it promotes the ideas of ″harmony without uniformity″, ″harmony as fundamentality″, ″the doctrine of the mean″ and ″Great Unity″, and guides the ″harmony″ culture from instrumentality to publicity, which reflects the human-oriented way of thinking. In addition, new cosmopolitanism combines the theoretical development and the practical evolution of the community concept, as well as the recent practice of building a community with a shared future for humankind, and proposes more instructional and operational suggestions. New cosmopolitanism advocates a world of co-construction，which has resolved the issue of the relationship between China and the world. The idea of a community with a shared future for humankind softens the contradiction between freedom and certainty, and aims to establish a community with long-term stable ties on a global scale. At the same time, new cosmopolitanism advocates the construction of cross-cultural norms through communication and dialogue in the process of continuous learning and interaction, in order to coordinate the relationships between locality and globality and between universality and peculiarity. Compared with traditional theories, new cosmopolitanism transcends communicative rationality and ideology and makes the realization of the ultimate goals possible, which makes it applicable to the whole world. More importantly, new cosmopolitanism is operable and sustainable, fundamentally solving the problem of lacking a dynamic mechanism, which cosmopolitanism cannot solve. The practical path of new cosmopolitanism includes shaping the national image of a peaceful rise country, deepening strategic mutual trust among neighboring countries, strengthening economic cooperation with different countries, constructing a multi-dimensional communication system, respecting the existing international cooperation mechanism, innovating the organization mode of regional cooperation, expanding the demonstration effect of the “Belt and Road” initiative, and building a win-win global cooperation network. The study of the new cosmopolitanism theory plays an active role in refining the basic theoretical framework of international communication. Meanwhile, the study of its practical path has important real-world implications for enriching the global communication practice of Chinese discourse. New cosmopolitanism will have a positive impact on global communication, dialogue, cooperation and development. It will help to further enhance China's discourse system and promote the exchanges and interactions between China and the rest of the world.

As a special language phenomenon, metaphor expresses non-literal meaning, which increases the difficulty of exploring its truth condition. In the 1990s, Glucksberg et al. proposed the Category Attribution Theory, interpreting the understanding of metaphorical sentences as a category attribution judgment. According to the theory, metaphor has two potential referential objects: a literal referential, and a category of things or situations represented by this metaphor. Genabith later described this class category based on the standard type theory which uses a high-order logic based on the λ calculus. This was one approach to the semantic truth condition of metaphorical statements. In traditional logical semantics, the generations of grammar and semantics meet the principle of combination, namely, in the form of one-to-one correspondence. But for metaphorical sentences, this syntactic-semantic correspondence in generation raises questions. It is because in the traditional way, we can only get the literal meaning of the statement rather than what we really intend to express. Therefore, we need another combination of categories to achieve the generation of metaphorical meaning, that is, metaphorical sentences are given different categories by their unique tags. As pointed out by truth conditional pragmatics, the truth condition of a statement often goes beyond the semantic level and involves more complicated pragmatic factors. Therefore, meaning is not a simple combination of separate parts while we are taking context into consideration. Rather, meaning is modulated by the context. In the framework of category type theory which connects the three dimensions of syntax, semantics and pragmatics, this paper attempts to extend the analysis of semantic truth conditions to syntactic and pragmatic levels, with the aim of presenting the interweaving and interaction of the three to better replicate the generation and understanding of metaphorical meaning. From the perspective of categorical grammar, in metaphorical sentences, vocabulary is given new categories as well as corresponding semantic types. The type of source domain is transformed from a set of individuals into a set of properties, with an explicit or implicit metaphorical marker whose type is a function mapping a set of properties to a set of individuals. The function extracts context-dependent properties in the source domain. If the object in the target domain satisfies this extracted property, the metaphorical statement is true. Take the metaphorical sentence ″A is B″ as an example. When Source Domain B is promoted from a set of objects to a set of properties, the metaphorical token ″is″ is a function restricted by context mapping a property set to an individual set. Intuitively, its role is to choose a certain property with a high degree of context fusion among the properties of B. Finally, the truth condition for ″A is B″ becomes: A is B=1 iff A, where is a certain property of B. This means that the semantic change can be realized by giving a new category to each component in the sentence and changing the corresponding semantic type. Thereby we get the truth condition of metaphor that is consistent with the classical interpretation. At the same time, the special position of context in metaphorical understanding is considered. Our approach is expected to refine the theory of truth conditional pragmatics and systematically answer the question of ″How does the context-to-semantic adaptation proceed″. It also disassembles the metaphorical understanding process that is instantaneously completed in real communication, and gives an answer to the question of ″How do we understand metaphor″ from the perspective of logical semantics.

The issue of zombie firms is one of the key concerns of China’s supply-side structural reform. To clarify the causes of zombies is of great significance in disposing zombie firms. This paper looks into the causes of zombie firms from the perspectives of government-banks relationship in the context of the local government intervention along with Chinese-style fiscal decentralization and the historical role of state-owned banks as the ″second fiscal department″. The formation of zombie firms is more likely to be institutional. The average probability of a state-owned enterprise becoming a zombie is 3.1% higher than that of a private one, which indicates that the status of ″state-owned enterprise″ increases the probability by around 10.9%. In addition, the coefficient of the ratio of regional state-owned-enterprises’ output to actual GDP is significantly positive, indicating that the more the regional economy relies on the state-owned sector, the more likely local enterprises will become zombies. Furthermore, the stronger the intervention motives of local governments are, the higher the probability that local state-owned firms will become zombies. For every one-standard-deviation change of fiscal decentralization, the probability will change by 4.41% for state-owned enterprises, equivalent to 9.8% of the mean, the economic significance of which should not be ignored. On one hand, the increase of the level of competition in the regional financial market significantly reduces the possibility for enterprises under various types of ownership to become zombies. For one-standard-deviation change of the intenseness of competition, the probability changes by 1.46%, which is 5.14% of the mean. From the regression results of the nonlinear model, the less intense the competition, the stronger the improvement effect of raising the level of competition. The difference in the improvement effect on state-owned and private enterprises narrows along with the increasing intenseness of competition. For state-owned enterprises, the mean marginal effect of competition increases with the level of itself, but the rate of increase drops. On the other hand, the local government’s stronger motive of intervention reduces the effect of financial market competition, and indirectly increases the possibility of turning local companies into zombies For state-owned enterprises, the above-mentioned increasing effect is 60 percent higher than that of private enterprises. Companies with lower total factor productivity and those who are not involved in R&D activities are more likely to become zombies, especially for state-owned ones. Lower productivity, as a competitive disadvantage, is one of the mechanisms to explain why local governments keep interfering with financial markets and supporting zombie firms. These findings are meaningful for the comprehensive understanding of the causes of zombie firms, for the reflection on the orientation of regional competition, for the unhooking of government and financial enterprises, and for the governance of state-owned enterprise. We believe that breaking the symbiotic relationship between government, banks and enterprises, promoting openness within and beyond financial industries, financial disintermediation, the deleveraging and classification of zombie firms, are all essential to getting out of the dilemma of zombies in China. Meanwhile, adopting sustainable-growth assessment indicators such as Inclusive Wealth Index and guiding local governments to abandon the practice of distorting resource allocation will be institutional guarantee for removing the soil which nourishes zombie firms. Research up to now has applied empirical models or game theory models to explore the links between government-enterprise, bank-enterprise relationship and zombie firms, but little research has been done on the interaction between the local government and banks, neither has it provided empirical evidence. In this research, we focus on the impact of government-bank relation, rather than the former two kinds of relation. This complements the discussion on the causes of zombie firms. In addition, we compare the changes in the number of zombie firms with the benchmark interest rate during the same period, which further examines the applicability of the CHK method to China’s firm-level data.

Most countries in the world pursue a private land system, while China alone insists on the public ownership of land with collective ownership and household contract as the core. This paper borrows the concepts and tools of the New Institutional Economics, discards the traditional public-private antagonism of the land system and regards the collective and the family as two separate systems when discussing the rationality of the Land Tenure System in China on the basis of regarding. In terms of the stability of the system, both the collective and the family are the natural selection of history. The provisions of the law only make the original informal system manifest as a formal institutional arrangement. In addition, with the support of the informal system, the land system is more likely to form an efficient institutional structure. As far as the collective is concerned, informal institutional factors like customs, culture, trust, and public opinions affect the decision-making behavior and behavioral performance of farmers in various fields, which is related to the realization of collective action or the management of public affairs. As far as the family is concerned, they share the same goal and communicate more conveniently. Aside from these advantages, they play greater roles in different labor positions and work more effectively, reducing the management cost of the system, including negotiation costs, information costs and supervision costs, etc. In terms of the flexibility of the system, both the collective and the family have good internal adjustment functions, and they are able to adapt to the changes in the land system. As far as the collective is concerned, the collective organization, as the agent of the peasant collective, has always embodied the dual principal-agent relationship, exercising different functions in different periods. This agent has successfully handled the relationships between small farmers and the government, and between small farmers and the market, saving transaction costs at different levels. As far as the family is concerned, the transformation of agricultural operation subjects from contracted farmers to new agricultural operation subjects indicates that the design of ″separation of three rights″ is conducive to improving the efficiency of farmland allocation without breaking the original interest pattern. In addition to helping deepen the understanding of Chinese and foreign scholars on China’s Land Tenure System, this study also has important theoretical values and policy implications. The theoretical values are as follows: (1) Organization is also a system. Different organizational forms embody different institutional arrangements. The analysis of the organization should account for the system’s classic definition and the basic functions of the system. (2) China’s practices indicate that the issue of land system is not only one of ownership, but also one of the principal-agent. In the future, the principal-agent theory may find better application in the field of land system. (3) It is a reasonable option to establish a formal system alongside the informal system. The unreasonable elements in the informal system should also be eliminated through the establishment of a formal system. The policy implications are as follows. First, it is necessary to clarify that the villagers’ group should be the main body of the collective land property ownership and to explore the effective realization of family management under collective ownership. Second, attention must be paid to the functional coordination between the formal system and the informal system, especially the function of the informal system. Third, within the framework of collective ownership, the relative functions of collective organizations may be selectively dormant or alive in order to deepen the reform of the ″separation of three rights″ of agricultural land on the basis of family management.

Adopting the subjective indicator of corruption tolerance, this paper measures the change of moral attitudes towards corruption among civil servants since the18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) to test the effectiveness of the construction of the anti-corruption system on individuals’ moral development. The questionnaire on corruption tolerance conducted among civil servants from 2012 to 2017 reveals that the corruption tolerance after the 18th CPC National Congress is lower than that of before. Moreover, the corruption tolerance has seen a downward trend since 2012, and threenodes can be observed: firstly, the tolerance corruption in 2013 was significantly lower than that in 2012; secondly, corruption tolerance slightly increased in 2014 and 2015 compared with 2013; finally, corruption tolerance showed a downtrend from 2015 to 2017.By exploring the influence of institutional factors on corruption tolerance, this paper finds that the driving factor for the decline of corruption tolerance is that the anti-corruption strategies have been changing from the centralized and power-styled modeto institutionalization and normalization, as well as a combination of the construction of static institutions and a dynamic mechanism for sustainableimplementation. These measures have led to the improvement of both institutional constructionand individual morality. The shift from passive obedience to activerecognition of the moral normsconforms to Kohlberg’s theory of moral development. Correspondingly,civil servants’ attitudes toward corruption went through three phases: The first is the stage of imposed obedience under intensified anti-corruption actions, during which the decline in the corruption tolerance was more out of fear of high-handed punishment than out of identification with anti-corruption. At this stage, the civil servants’ obedience mainly developed from external compulsion. They obeyed authorities and superiors in order to escape punishment, and their capability of moral responsibility was still at the stage of compulsorily passive obedience. The second phase is the moral deviation in the initial stage of system construction, during which the anti-corruption started to transform from being power-driven to system construction. As a result of the prevailing culture of corruption in the past, after a brief shock, civil servants began to slack off and held negative attitudes towardanti-corruption, and along with their increasing expectation of corruptive opportunities after the power transition, thetolerance of corruption increased. The third phase is “conventional morality” in the period of institutional strengthening, during which civil servants’ corruption tolerance declined again. The attitude of civil servants toward corruption began to show certain characteristics of the conventional moral phase, that is, civil servants began to develop a more rational understanding of authority and orders. Their attitudes toward anti-corruption institutions changed from passive obedience to positive identification. This paper shows that the construction of an effective anti-corruption system requires not only static laws and regulations, but also a sustainable long-term enforcement mechanism. The individual morality of civil servants can be developed and perfected in the continuous and stable institutional construction and implementation.

The construction of aesthetic culture, owing to its significance for the development of the human society, is inevitably consistent with the law of the unity of universality and diversity. Basically speaking, the construction of aesthetic culture in a society depends on the contradictory movement of the production mode of material goods, while following the development law of culture and the inevitable logic of aesthetics. Meanwhile, modes of production and life, cultural traditions, daily habits, structures of feelings and values vary widely from nation to nation. Only when aesthetic culture is based on local conditions, will it achieve its effectiveness and sustainable stability. In the contemporary society, cultural policy, especially literature and art policies, is a basic means of aesthetic culture construction. Social investigation is the key foundation on which the Marxist political Party forms its route, guideline and policy. On the basis of plenty of social investigation, Lenin and Mao Zedong obtained an accurate understanding of their respective national conditions and drew a set of blueprints of aesthetic culture, namely literature-and-art policies, suitable for their own countries. Lenin focused on the mode of production, investigated the social structure and cultural conditions of the Soviet Russia and ultimately formulated the literature-and-art policy of ″Inclusive Absorption″. Mao Zedong focused on field work, investigated China's social classes, especially the peasant class, and developed the literature-and-art policy of ″Destroying the Old， Establishing the New″. Faced with similar national conditions, Lenin and Mao Zedong made policies with a huge difference, which shed light on Chinese Socialist Construction. To start with, the construction of aesthetic culture, also called the literature-and-art policy, should follow the universal rule on the one hand, while it should highlight the local characteristics on the other hand. China needed to develop an aesthetic style with its own characteristics. The fact that New China grew out of a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society and the Soviet Russia from an imperialist society is the key factor leading to different policies made by Lenin and Mao Zedong. Furthermore, it is significant to properly handle the dialectical relation between the legitimacy and the proper use of literary ideology when making literature-and-art policies. In the post-colonial context, the core focus of contemporary China is an accurate understanding and appropriate treatment of the nature of literary ideology. In this era featured with culture-economy integration, great importance needs to be attached to the emphasis on the legitimacy of literary ideology and its proper use. Finally, subjective perception has certain influence on objective investigation. Lenin and Mao Zedong, as pure Marxists, shared a similar worldview and methodology. However, there is nuance slight difference: Lenin emphasized the process of natural history while Mao Zedong proposed individual endeavors. The subtle differences in subjective perception led to their different attitudes towards similar findings and the formation of distinctive policies.

In recent years, a large number of studies have emerged in the field of local history. However, the compilation and publication of local history in the real sense is far from systematic and mature, especially of the local contemporary history. For the sake of improving the quality of local history, particularly the compilation of local contemporary history, a basic point should be reconsidered — searching a scientific method under the guidance of Marxist historical materialism. The main research method in this study is literature research, in which Marx’s The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte is the core literature. After summarizing its historical significance, and examining the practical issues in current research and the writing of local contemporary history, the study has drawn the following three conclusions: First, the method of ″realistic historical narrative″. Professor Callinicos, a British political philosopher, summed up the characteristics of this historical narrative method as ″taking some of the most important political events of the time as its object of study, and solving historical problems through the structure of narration″, of which the important foundation is historical materialism. Marx successfully and truthfully pictured the social background of Bonaparte coup, including its occurrence and development, and exposed the real causes of the historical events. This method is enlightening in that researching and writing local contemporary history should be based on historical materialism, focus on a historical critical moment, and reflect the reality in the form of pictures rather than on dogma. What is more, to write a local contemporary history of higher social value, the basic motive force and law of development should be deeply analyzed, and the conclusion should be integrated into historical narration. Second, the method of ″laying current affairs into history″. Applying this method, Marx discerned and recorded significant clues from the news. This makes this work regarded as a general political commentary at that time become an immortal classic of political and event history. This method provides a theoretical basis for resolving the argument of both whether and how current affairs can be part of history. The enlightenment of this method for researching and writing local contemporary history is regarding current events as an important source of historical resources. Furthermore, local contemporary history-writing cannot be restricted to realistic materials, and neither should it be subject to the disturbance of political, personnel or other factors. Instead, historical and social responsibilities should be shouldered and essential researches and objective records should be insisted on. Third, the method of ″materialism historical summary″. can be summarized as two principles: one is objective authenticity and the other is seeing essence through phenomenon. It is by applying this method that Marx discovered the inherent laws and trends of historical development from the appearance of numerous and complicated historical events, and summed up the history of the French class struggle from the period of the February Revolution to the Bonaparte coup. The enlightenment of this method for researching and writing local contemporary history lies in that historical events must be recorded objectively, truthfully and comprehensively, and that historical experiences and lessons should be justly summarized with the approach of historical materialism. Accordingly, the essence and law of the development could be grasped and the purpose of ″learning from history and advancing better″ achieved.

With increasing environmental dynamics and task complexity, the issue of the creativity of knowledge-based teams has attracted extensive academic attention. One important way to address the issue is to investigate the role of the team leader in facilitating team creativity. Previous studies on leadership have focused on either the leader’s personal characteristics, or her/hisbehaviors, or therelationships with their followers. The first of the approaches known as the trait theory of leadership has received renewed attention in recent years. The trait theory is particularly relevant to team creativity, since the process of team creativity is essentially cognitive. It is our assumption that a team leader'slogical reasoning and creative thinking will have an important effect on team creativity. In a knowledge-based team, the leader faces a special managerial situation. Within the team, vertical hierarchies and commands are replaced by horizontal interaction and communication. The leader retains the identity as a knowledge worker, but s/he generally lacks clear managerial responsibilities. This gives rise to certain role ambiguities. The team leader is expected to undertake the responsibilities of allocating tasks, handling conflicts, and dealing with contingencies. To conduct these activities, the leader needs good logical reasoning. Meanwhile, the leader also plays an important role in generating creative ideas and stimulating team members intellectually. For this purpose, the leader needs to be a creative thinker her/himself. The question is, in most real-life situations, where the leader is not equipped with both sets of cognitive skills (i.e. logical reasoning and creative thinking), which one facilitates team creativity more?This study explores the prioritization of the two thinking abilities for a leader in a knowledge-based team. We argue that a high level of logical reasoning is more important than a high level of creative thinking in facilitating team creativity. On one hand, a considerable number of previous researches indicate that in the process of creative teamwork, aneffective leadership role is usually a supportive rather than a dominant one. According to the dominance complementarity theory, a leader with a high level of logical reasoning is more effective than one with a high level of creative thinking ingenerating creative teamwork. This is because the logical leader is committed to establishing external ties, provides members with both resource and structural support, and promotes members’ psychological empowerment, intrinsic motivation and self-efficacy, whichultimately increases the overall creative output of the whole team. On the other hand, drawing on the idea that human attention capacity is limited, we argue that it is a waste of the team's creative resources to appoint an individual with a high level of creative thinking ability as the leader.As this appointed leader would then invest considerable time and attention in managerial responsibilities and fail to use her/his limited cognitive resources to produce creative work,the team’s overall creativity wouldsuffer consequently. Thus, we hypothesize that a leader with a high level of logical reasoning will bringa higher level of team creativity than a leader with a high level of creative thinking. This hypothesis issupported by both a laboratory study and a case study. This study makes a two-fold contribution. First, by highlighting leaders’ cognitive abilities and variances, it adds importantly to the body of literature that explores the effect of leaders’ personal traits on team creativity. Second, by focusing on team leaders rather than high-level executives, the study also sheds further light on the management of knowledge-based teams. At the team level, a high level of logical reasoning ability rather than creative thinking ability will make a good leader.

In China, environmental problems are still serious. In litigation for environmental public interest, the number of lawsuits filed by social organizations has not increased significantly. Firstly, organizations of environmental protection are under heavy work and financial pressure. The litigation for environmental public interest is characterized by high appraisal cost and heavy workload. In litigation for environmental public interest, a lot of work needs to be done from accepting cases to suing. Secondly, the reward system for the plaintiffs is inadequate when they win the lawsuit. Thirdly, the fund system of the litigation for environmental public interest is not perfect. In this regard, we can learn from the experience of other countries according to China’s actual situation. The incentive mechanism of the United States is relatively sound, as it includes transfer of lawyer fee, the compensation system for appraisal fee of experts, the system of bounty hunter and fund from litigation for environmental public interest and other incentive measures. The ″Investigation Committee″ of Germany is an organization appointed by the court to investigate such cases, which greatly reduces the cost of the plaintiff to collect evidence. In addition, if the plaintiff proves that he cannot afford the costs of litigation, he can apply to the court to limit the litigation costs to a very low level. To establish the incentive mechanism of social organizations to file litigation for environmental public interest, we must improve the system of fund and relief measures. The sources of the funds include damages and the support from government, value-added funds and other ways. For example, some scholars suggest using the lottery of environmental protection to raise funds for litigation of public interest. Since sports lottery and welfare lottery can absorb a lot of money, it is also practicable and acceptable that an environmental lottery can do so. The fund will be used mainly to restore the ecological environment, pay costs of litigation and reward successful environmental organizations. Public trust can be authorized to manage the fund. The government that allocates funds and individuals or groups that make donations to the fund can act as trustees. In this way, the transparency of the use for funds can be enhanced. The scope of payment should be specified, and the rules of maximum payment should be limited. In addition, organizations should be set up to supervise interior fund according to the law. Incorporating lawyers’ fees into the system of insurance can not only relieve the economic pressure of social organizations in their litigation for public interest, but also guarantee the payment of the lawyers’ fees, thus encouraging more lawyers to participate in the litigation for environmental public interest. The lawyers of public interest aim to safeguard public interests and provide professional legal services for litigation of environmental public interest. We must improve the system of legal aid. In addition, we must pay attention to the issue of strengthening the safety protection of litigants for environmental public interest. It is vital to increase transparency and let the general public exercise supervision. A necessary concern is that social organizations may worry about what to do if environmental lawsuits fail like other common lawsuits, in which the losing party bears the costs. Therefore, in the litigation for environmental public interest, the rules of payment for litigation costs should be different from the general rules. Another possible solution is to change the acceptance fees of litigation for environmental public interest into payment by pieces, which conforms to the requirements from the rules of litigation, and does not put too much pressure on the plaintiff.

Does the company law have scientific value? The Joseph Needham puzzle and the way he solves problem have guided us to transform the researches on company law in a scientific way. First, the traditional ″science″ focuses on deduction and analogy, while the modern science does induction. Second, the traditional ″science″ emphasizes on experience, while the modern science does experiment. Meanwhile, the ″utilitarian motive″ lies in people’s minds is the most obstructive factor for the scientific researches. Analyzing the nature of the mentioned two researching methods, empirical observation and experimental science, will help the academic community explore the research prospective on company law and research methods, and introspect itself in the current era. On one hand, the era of codification presents three major characteristics. The first is the evolvability, which requires us to check the diverse theoretical opinions on doctrines during the process of editing codification from a ″dynamic″ perspective. The second is the simplicity, which requires us to follow the method of ″extraction of the common cause″ to delete the repeated. The third is the systematicness, which requires us to think about the contradictions, compatibilities and tunings between laws and regulations, articles and theories from the perspective of systematology. The above characteristics require us to turn the research perspective of the company law from rule law to real law. And it prefers the study of typical cases of company law with the guiding cases as the core, which is learned from the American Legal Realism. On the other hand, in the era of big data, a data revolution which shifts ″from quantity to quality″ has been rising up, and it is doing further exploration for the close cooperation with artificial intelligence technology. At the same time, the governance has been changed gradually. The innovation of ″Mathematically Management″ may become another solution to the Joseph Needham puzzle. The above tendency requires us to study the company law from experimental method on the basis of the traditional research method such as normative analysis and comparative analysis. The Popper’s ″four-segment diagram″ falsification method could be used as experimental approach. And the system softening, market competition, social interaction and other processes could be adopted in the experimental mechanism. The method of data mining and that of information map are used comprehensively as the test methods, which are also used as technical approaches for the empirical study of the company law in China. In conclusion, this article is discussing the problems from a strategically advantageous position in terms of academic vision and theoretical system. Analyzing the nature of empirical observation and experimental science has guided us to transform the researches on company law in a scientific way. In terms to the research perspective, we will transfer from rule law to real law, and in terms to the research method, we will transfer from experience to experiment.