China Perspective Issues

 ABSTRACT: The aim of this article is to propose a typology of the different issues that the transmission of traditional Chinese medicine encounters today in the world, by successively highlighting ideological, epistemological, political, and educational difficulties. After showing how much the polarised aspect of the debates on Chinese medicine is already entrenched among specialists in this discipline, we explore the question of the epistemological status of this Chinese tradition by confronting it with the dominant biomedicine of Western origin. The originality of Chinese structures that were set up to protect and promote this national tradition is then highlighted as a possible source of inspiration at the international level, before describing the different economic factors likely to play a positive or negative role in the development of this medical and cultural heritage at the local level. Finally, the specific didactic questions that the transmission of this heritage and the teaching of this discipline raise are analysed before presenting a conclusion.

KEYWORDS: Chinese medicine, epistemology, health policy, pedagogy, social sciences

 ABSTRACT: Korea’s exchanges with the West only effectively began after World War II. This makes the situation in Korea very different from that of China or Japan, where various exchanges with Western countries were already being carried out in the sixteenth century. The introduction of modernised research methods was also delayed. Nevertheless, Korean medicine (KM) has been well modernised, while at the same time traditional medicine, less tainted by the wave of modernisation, has been preserved. Moreover, KM is now attracting young and capable talent of a kind never before seen in this field. Often reduced in Chinese official discourse to a mere variant of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), KM in fact constitutes a tradition of its own. This paper tracks the history of KM using time classification in order to better inform Western society regarding KM.

The history of KM can be divided into the following five time periods:

The time of local medicine (for which all medical records have been lost);

the time of Hyangyak medicine (i.e., medicine made solely from medicinal herbs grown in Korea);

the time of compilation of East Asian Medicines;

the time of independent formation of KM; and

the time of exchange with modern medicine.

KEYWORDS: Korean Medicine (KM), Oriental Medicine, Hyangyak medicine (local drugs medicine), history of KM, time classification, TCM.

 ABSTRACT: This article is based on the results of comparative research into the appearance and integration of Chinese medicine (often limited to acupuncture in Europe) into French and Italian medical contexts during the twentieth century. The relationship between Chinese and conventional medicine and attempts at complementarity are studied, using as a starting-point a vast number of interviews with medical practitioners, observations of training sessions in the field, the study of the archives of the major French and Italian associations and schools of acupuncture and Chinese medicine, and a qualitative analysis of questionnaires distributed in training institutions. The motivations of French and Italian acupuncturists are also analysed, as are their representations of Chinese medicine. Particular attention is paid to a comparison between the French and Italian situations.

KEYWORDS: Acupuncture, moxibustion, Chinese medicine.

 ABSTRACT: China’s arrival on the African economic scene is overturning the balance of forces in place since the independence of African countries. Africa is regarded by some as a “new hunting ground” or “promised land” for China, making it part of its global strategy. This article sets out to examine one of China’s so-called “soft power” strategies, represented by the widespread practice of Traditional Chinese Medicine overseas. It focuses on Cameroon, which is a mainstay for Central Africa on account of its harbour and its regional economic dominance.

KEYWORDS: Cameroon, China, Traditional Chinese Medicine, migration, transnationalism.

ABSTRACT: Chinese medicine is a medical system that was developed in China over a long period of time and has subsequently spread over the rest of the world, especially over recent decades. This study aims first to identify this medicine and to examine the changes that accompanied its institutionalisation in the People’s Republic of China starting in the 1950's, then to set out the continuities and breaking points that have characterised the ways in which it is transmitted, from traditional apprenticeship training to the development of national university syllabuses. It then looks into the way in which Chinese medicine has faced up to biomedicine and sets out a comparative analysis of the paradigms of these two systems, before describing the way in which this exotic medicine has been received and adapted in the West. This makes it possible to grasp the difficulties and issues involved in its globalisation and the increasingly pressing need, from the perspective of university teaching and research, for a more complete, objective and pragmatic approach to studying it. 

KEYWORDS: Chinese medicine, history of medicine, transmission, university, medical systems comparison.