A Tentative Study of Zhang Zhidong’s Political Personality:From the Perspective of Political Culture

As an important minister of the late Qing Dynasty,Zhang Zhidong played a big role in China’s development in its modern history. This paper analyzes Zhang Zhidong’s political personality from the perspective of political culture. Our analysis shows that he had the personality of a typical traditional Junzi and a striking character of adjustability. Zhang Zhidong’s political personality also features eminent subjectivity which brought into full display collective subjective consciousness cultivated by traditional political culture but failed to achieve the sublimation of modern political personality characterized by flaunting individual subjective consciousness. Nonetheless,Zhang Zhidong could size up situations and make due adaptations. Therefore,he made great contributions to the development of modern China and has been rightly regarded as sage of the time.