本书聚焦“秦汉与罗马”时期的政治，作者以极其敏锐的眼光、缜密的分析，从学理上探寻中西文明之源，对中西政治文明进行分析比较。他指出，不同的文明各有高峰低谷，我们不能用别人的高峰来比自己的低谷，也不能用自己的高峰去比别人的低谷；我们应当从高峰中体会到彼此的优点，从低谷中体会到彼此的缺陷，再寻找各自改进之途。本书附录精心选编了多位专家的精彩评论，有助于读者更好地理解、把握本书的深刻内涵。

Contents
Foreword I / i
Foreword II / iii
Preface / vii
Introduction / 1
Chapter I
Two Civilizations / 13
Chapter II
The Western Han Dynasty / 59
Chapter III
The Roman Empire / 137
Conclusion / 205
Appendix: Commentaries / 227

Foreword
I
“A sustainable civilization is one that can
examine itself, tolerate and accommodate others,
coexist in harmony with others, and learn from
others” – this is a common wisdom of both the
Chinese civilization and the Greek civilization.
It is the wisdom very much needed in today’s
world, where challenges we face are global, and
we need more than ever to work together, to learn
from each other, and to focus on common values.
Pan Yue’s book makes an important contribution
to the civilizational dialogue between the East
and the West, and helps to bring us to the common
ground, or “Agora” as I would call it, to
enrich each other via debate, to move forward
together, and to create a shared future for us
all.
H.E. George Papandreou,
182nd Prime Minister of Greece,
President of the Socialist International
Foreword
II
The West has been the primary author of
global history for the last two centuries. As a
result of its dominance, the world sees history
through a Western prism, based on an underlying
assumption that the Western experience is
universally relevant. The classic example is the
nation-state. It has become the pre-condition for
the recognition of polities. When a vast number
of countries won their independence from their
colonial masters after the Second World War, they
were required to become nation-states. It was a
condition of their independence. Yet the
invention of the nation-state was an entirely
European affair dating back to the Peace of
Westphalia in 1648. The global dominance of
Europe, and then the West more generally, imposed
on the world a European-designed international
system at the heart of which was the nation-
state. It was not until the late 19th century
that China was finally forced by its state of
abject weakness to adapt to the European norms of
the international system and begin the process of
becoming, at least in part, a nation-state.
But China had never been a nation-state. It
was a product of an entirely different history
that was rooted in the Chinese civilization.
China was a civilization-state. It is still
primarily a civilization-state, although, being
secondarily a nation-state, it might be described
as a hybrid. And China is not alone. As Pan Yue
points out, there are many other nation-states
that are the product of civilizational histories
such as Iran, Turkey, and Russia. But it is China
that concerns us here. It is impossible to make
sense of China unless its history as a
civilization is recognized and understood. Alas,
the West is in denial. It sees the world, and
China, in narrowly Western terms. As a result, in
a most fundamental way, the West does not
understand China. It requires China to be
Western, but China does not conform to the
Western paradigm, never has and never will.
During China’s long history of weakness, this
did not matter. China could be used, abused, and
ignored. But China’s rise makes this position
unsustainable. The West is now obliged to
understand China as it is not how it thinks it
should be.
Pan Yue’s book is a book for our time. He
shows how profoundly different the histories of
Europe and China have been over more than two
millennia and how this has resulted in the very
different societies we see today. This is not a
reason for regret but embrace and celebration: It
is testimony to the richness of human history and
the diversity of human experience. A knowledge of
history, and a resulting respect for difference,
opens up the possibility of a new kind of
creative dialogue between the West and China
based on mutual respect and understanding.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
The fundamental problem in the West is that it
does not understand China, or even know how to
understand China. The ideas in this book are the
path of enlightenment.
Martin Jacques,
Britis