Wake up call for Indians? Chinese President Xi Jinping vows to reinforce traditional family values

At a time when traditional family values are fast disappearing from several countries including India, Chinese President Xi Jinping has vowed to reinforce them in his country. At a function on Monday, the President appealed for “efforts to enhance virtue and civility in Chinese families,” Chinese official media Global Times reported quoting Xinhua News Agency.

XI also asked his countrymen to make traditional family values an “important foundation for national development, progress and social harmony.” On the occasion, the President awarded 300 model families for epitomising “family values and virtues”. This was the first of its kind event in China to honour families that displayed “patriotism”, observed “law”, “ethics, harmony, honesty, professional spirit, thrift and commitment to public welfare”.

According to Global Times, experts believe that Chinese government and the Communist Party of China (CPC) want to reshape China’s societal values and spread virtue.

During the event, XI appealed to people to work for “a new trend toward socialist family values.” The new trend, he said, should be inspired by “love for the nation, family and one another, devotion to progress and kindness, and mutual growth and sharing.”

XI said that traditional family values were “engraved on minds melted into the blood of the Chinese people.”

Global Times quoted Zhi Zhenfeng, a legal expert at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, as saying that traditional values in China are facing several challenges from urbanisation, modernisation, nontraditional families, and homosexual families. Zhi said the government is stressing “familial virtues” and awarding “model families” to “reinforce the foundation of virtue” in the modern Chinese society.

Earlier on Friday, Xi had called for “ruling the country based on both law and virtue”.

Traditional values play an important role in keeping nations intact. Sometimes people confuse traditional values which orthodox practices. However, values can’t be classified as orthodox or unorthodox. They remain universal. Values inspire love not just for the family but for the country as well.

China’s stress on reinforcing the traditional values seems to be a timely exercise and wishful thinking by the country’s administration. Herein also lies a lesson for India where a generation of people feel disgusted at the very thought of something traditional– no matter whether it is the nation, nationalism or the family.