The Curriculum Ideological-Political Function of Marxist Classical Works

Marxist classical works are brilliant documents and important carriers that elucidate and express Marxist-Leninist theory. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out, “The most effective way to study theory is to read the original works, study the original texts, and comprehend the original principles.” [1]1 Xi The original works referred to here include a large number of Marxist classical works. Marxist classical works contain rich nourishment that guides students to pursue truth, strengthen their faith, temper their will, and grow healthily; they are vivid teaching materials for carrying out curriculum ideological-political education. The curriculum ideological-political function of Marxist classical works should be deeply explored and brought into play, achieving a perfect combination of professional courses and curriculum ideological-political education.

马克思主义经典著作是阐释和表达马克思列宁主义理论的光辉文献和重要载体。习近平总书记指出，“学习理论最有效的办法是读原著、学原文、悟原理”。这里所说的原著，包含大量的马克思主义经典著作。马克思主义经典著作中蕴含着引领学生追求真理、坚定信仰，磨炼意志、健康成长的丰富养料，是开展课程思政的生动教材。应深度挖掘和发挥马克思主义经典著作的课程思政功能，实现专业课程与课程思政的珠联璧合。

The function of edification. Marxist classical works do not conceal their political stance and Party spirit of representing the fundamental interests of the people; they integrate scientificity with political nature, truth with value, and professionalism with orientation. Ideological education, value guidance, and behavioral orientation are the soul and direction of Marxist classical works, reflecting their educational function. For example, in *The Civil War in France*, Marx recorded in detail the heroic deeds of the Paris Commune Council leading the Paris workers in a brave and tenacious struggle against the Thiers provisional government, and eulogized the noble character of the Paris Commune Council in sacrificing blood and life to defend the first working-class political power in the world. These heroic deeds and noble character, worthy of song and praise, have not diminished with the passage of time; they remain vivid teaching materials for curriculum ideological-political education to this day, possessing the edifying function of guiding students to struggle for the magnificent cause of communism for life.

教化功能。马克思主义经典著作毫不掩饰自己代表人民根本利益的政治立场和党性原则，将科学性与政治性、真理性与价值性、专业性与导向性融为一体。思想教育、价值引领、行为导向是马克思主义经典著作的灵魂和方向，体现了其教育功能。比如，马克思在《法兰西内战》中详细记载了巴黎公社委员会领导巴黎工人同梯也尔临时政府进行英勇顽强斗争的英雄事迹，讴歌了巴黎公社委员会为捍卫世界上第一个工人阶级政权而不惜流血牺牲的高尚品德，这些可歌可泣、可圈可点的英雄事迹和高尚品德不因时过境迁而逊色，至今仍然是开展课程思政的生动教材，具有指引学生为共产主义壮丽事业而奋斗终身的教化功能。

The function of cognition. The standpoint, viewpoint, and method used to understand the world are crucial to whether contemporary college students can establish a correct worldview. The worldview is the “master switch” and “main gate.” College students are in a stage of rapid physical and psychological development, with strong plasticity; guiding them to establish a correct worldview is very critical. Marxist classical works provide us with the worldview and methodology of dialectical materialism and historical materialism. They can guide students to cognize the world with the ontology of the primacy of matter, the methodology of development and universal connection, and the epistemology of practice as primary; and to gain insight into the objective laws of human social development through the basic principles of the interrelationship between social existence and social consciousness, productive forces and relations of production, and economic base and superstructure. This enables students to understand profound truths such as that the world is material, matter is in motion, motion has laws, and laws can be utilized. This is also highly consistent with the requirements of curriculum ideological-political education.

认知功能。以什么样的立场、观点和方法认识世界，关系到当代大学生能否树立正确的世界观。世界观是“总开关”“总闸门”，大学生正处于生理和心理快速发展的阶段，可塑性很强，引导大学生树立正确的世界观非常关键。马克思主义经典著作为我们提供了辩证唯物主义和历史唯物主义的世界观方法论，能够引导学生以物质第一性的本体论、以发展和普遍联系的方法论、以实践第一的认识论来认知世界，以社会存在和社会意识、生产力和生产关系、经济基础和上层建筑相互关系的基本原理洞察人类社会发展的客观规律，从而让学生懂得世界是物质的、物质是运动的、运动是有规律的、规律是可以利用的等深刻道理。这也与课程思政的要求高度吻合。

The function of discrimination. In a certain sense, the history of the international communist movement is a history of the struggle of Marxism-Leninism against various anti-Marxist and non-Marxist trends of thought. Marxism-Leninism has been continuously developed and perfected precisely in the struggle against various social trends of thought. What requires our high attention is that many so-called “theories” put forward by representatives of anti-Marxism are difficult to recognize in their true colors without professional discrimination. For example, the “theoretical system” constructed by Dühring, a lecturer at the University of Berlin, in the 1870s was both complex and relatively “concealed”; Martynov, a representative of the Russian Economists, even quoted Marx’s classic saying that “one step of actual movement is more important than a dozen programs” as his “sword” for worshiping the spontaneity of the working class while despising theory and doing his utmost to belittle it. [2] For these trends of thought, Marxist classical works provide us with the standards and yardsticks for distinguishing the false from the true. Marx’s *Critique of the Gotha Programme*, Engels’s *Anti-Dühring*, Lenin’s *What Is to Be Done?* and *Materialism and Empirio-Criticism*, and other polemical works, respectively thoroughly exposed and criticized the reactionary theories of Lassalle, Dühring, Martynov, and Mach. [3] Studying the relevant classical works also helps students distinguish between true and false Marxism.

辨析功能。在一定意义上说，一部国际共产主义运动史就是马克思列宁主义同形形色色的反马克思主义和非马克思主义思潮斗争的历史。马克思列宁主义正是在与各种社会思潮的斗争中不断发展和完善的。需要引起我们高度关注的是，很多反马克思主义的代表人物所抛出的所谓“理论”，如果不作专业的辨析，很难认清其本来面目。比如，德国柏林大学的讲师杜林在19世纪70年代所构建的“理论体系”既庞杂又比较“隐蔽”；俄国经济派代表人物马尔丁诺夫更是引用马克思“一步实际运动比一打纲领更重要”的经典名言，作为自己崇拜工人阶级的自发性而轻视理论、竭力贬低理论的“尚方宝剑”。对于这些思潮，马克思主义经典著作为我们提供了辨伪的标准和尺度。马克思的《哥达纲领批判》、恩格斯的《反杜林论》、列宁的《怎么办》和《唯物主义和经验批判主义》等论战性著作，分别对拉萨尔、杜林、马尔丁诺夫、马赫的反动理论进行了彻底揭露和批判，通过学习相关经典著作，也有利于学生们区分真假马克思主义。

The function of identification. Identification is a psychological response arising from consistency between individuals in behavior and values; it is a psychological development process from the perceptual to the rational, from the low-level to the high-level, and once formed, it possesses relative stability. Identification is directly related not only to an individual’s life experience, life accumulation, knowledge structure, and theoretical cultivation, but also inseparable from external guidance and education. The most fundamental purpose of curriculum ideological-political education is to guide students to strengthen their political, ideological, and emotional identification with Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the important thought of Three Represents, the Scientific Outlook on Development, and Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. Objectively speaking, during the period of social transformation, with the rapid development of the socialist market economy and the continuous deepening of reform and opening up, ideas, ways of thinking, and value orientations are also becoming increasingly diversified and complex. The difficulty for students to identify with behaviors and values has increased, and scientific guidance is urgently needed. The rich lives of the classic writers displayed in Marxist classical works, the worldview and methodology that run through them, the objective laws of nature, society, and thinking that they elucidate, the systematic and logical scientific theoretical system they construct, the humanistic concern and global vision they present, the value concepts and people’s standpoint they uphold, and the power of truth and moral height they manifest all have an invisible guiding force for enhancing college students’ identification.

认同功能。认同是个体与他人因行为和价值观上的一致而产生的心理反应，是从感性到理性、从低级到高级的心理发展过程，一经形成便具有相对的稳定性。认同既与个体的人生经历、生活积累、知识结构和理论修养直接相关，也同外界的引导和教育密不可分。课程思政最根本的目的就是要引导学生增强对马克思列宁主义、毛泽东思想、邓小平理论、“三个代表”重要思想、科学发展观和习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想的政治认同、思想认同和情感认同。客观地说，在社会转型时期，社会主义市场经济快速发展，改革开放不断深化，思想理念、思维方式、价值取向也日益多样化和复杂化，学生对行为和价值观的认同难度增大，迫切需要科学引导。马克思主义经典著作所展现的经典作家的丰富人生，所贯穿的世界观方法论，所阐释的自然、社会和思维发展的客观规律，所构建的系统化逻辑化的科学理论体系，所呈现的人类关怀和世界视野，所坚守的价值理念和人民立场，所彰显的真理力量和道义高度，都对增强大学生的认同有着无形的引领力。

The function of cohesion. How to guide college students to consciously integrate into society, so that personal ideals and social ideals, personal values and social values, personal interests and social interests, and personal strength and social strength resonate at the same frequency, thereby cultivating new generations capable of shouldering the mission of national rejuvenation, is the fundamental task of curriculum ideological-political education. In the view of Marxist classic writers, people are concrete people, real people, not abstract people or illusory people; the essence of a person is the sum total of all social relations. Therefore, the individual is a social individual, and society is a society organically composed of individuals. When Marxist classical works expound on the relationship between the individual and society, they criticize the values of individual standard and individual supremacy, uphold the values of social standard, emphasize that individual interests must be subordinated to the interests of the state, the collective, and society, that individuals realize their value within the state, the collective, and society, and that the free development of each individual is the condition for the free development of all. This is conducive to integrating and coordinating the relationship between the individual and society, and possesses the cohesive function of curriculum ideological-political education.

凝聚功能。如何引领大学生自觉融入社会，使个人理想与社会理想、个人价值与社会价值、个人利益与社会利益、个人力量与社会力量同频共振，从而培养担当民族复兴大任的时代新人，是课程思政的根本任务。在马克思主义经典作家看来，人是具体的人、现实的人，而不是抽象的人、虚幻的人，人的本质是一切社会关系的总和。因此，个人是社会的个人，社会是由个人有机构成的社会。马克思主义经典著作在阐述个人与社会关系时，批判个人本位、个人至上的价值观，坚持社会本位的价值观，强调个人利益服从国家、集体和社会利益，个人在国家、集体和社会之中实现自己的价值，强调个人的自由发展是一切人自由发展的条件，有利于整合和协调个人与社会的关系，具有课程思政的凝聚功能。

(Author: Zhou Xiaomao, Researcher at the Hunan Provincial Research Center for Contemporary Chinese Marxism, Professor at the School of Public Administration, Hunan Normal University)

（作者：周小毛，系湖南省当代中国马克思主义研究中心研究员、湖南师范大学公共管理学院教授）

Online Editor: Huihui

网络编辑：慧慧