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This response to Asger S?rensen?s paper From Ontology to Epistemology: Tong,
Mao and Hegel is made on the basis of a reflection on the author?s
intellectual development with special reference to the idea of ?dialectics?.
This development is mainly composed of three periods, in which the author
formed his strong antipathy toward dialectics as a mere tool of power (in
the 1970s), learnt to understand the importance of ?dialogical logic? in
providing conceptual tools for human knowledge of a type of reality which is
both objective and subjective - human practices (in the 1980s) - and
attempted to understand the ?dialectics of rationalization? by integrating
?dialectics? in the Western tradition of Critical Theory with the Chinese
tradition of ?dialectics? systematically interpreted by Feng Qi (1915-1995)
since the 1990s.

Universalism can be religious or secular; within the category of secular universalism, a distinction can be made (especially in China) between universalism focused on 'universality' or the universal validity of certain ideas and universalism focused on 'generality' or the general extension of certain ideas. Within the category of universality-based universalism, 'value universalism' holds one or some values to be universally valid and 'culture universalism' holds a certain culture or a certain way of ranking various values to be universally valid. Within the category of 'value universalism', a distinction can be made between 'dialogue-oriented universalism', which argues for the priority of the right to communication over other rights and 'monologueoriented universalism', according to which one subject can unilaterally decide what is of universal validity for all. Not only 'monologue-oriented universalism', but also 'dialogue-oriented universalism' can be understood in a Euro-centrist way; there is thus a distinction between West-centrist and non-West-centrist varieties of universalism. The key to avoiding West-centrist universalism while upholding universalism is to make a distinction between essentialist universalism and constructivist universalism, and to see what is universally shared by all relevant parties as something to be constructed through the process of ' Verkehr' in Marx's sense that is informed by the process of ' Kommunikation' in Habermas's sense.