For decades, Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has been striving for international recognition, both to advance its own development and to enhance national pride.
However, this mission is challenging. First, gaining recognition in Western Medicine (WM)-dominated world is difficult, as TCM and WM are fundamentally different in their epistemological frameworks. TCM emphasizes holism, while WM prioritizes material localization; TCM focuses on individualization, whereas WM relies on protocol-driven treatment.
The complexity of this endeavor is further exacerbated by internal disagreements within the TCM community regarding whether and how researchers should engage in boundary-spanning work with WM.
| Boundary Work | Description of Boundary Work | Example | Position within the TCM Field |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boundary | |||
| Reinforcers | Boycott: Boundary between TCM and WM should be strengthened, and actors should not transgress the boundary | ||
| Research in TCM theory relying on classical texts, published in Chinese language, lower impact factor journals | Low | ||
| (Low biomedical capital, high TCM capital) | |||
| Boundary | |||
| Crossers | Disentanglement: Boundary should be preserved, but actors can only cross selectively from TCM to WM | ||
| Screening medicinal materials for single active ingredients to be used for pharmaceutical drug development | |||
| High | |||
| (High biomedical capital, moderate TCM capital) | |||
| Boundary | |||
| Blurrers | Hybridization: Boundary should be relaxed, and actors should cross back and forth to improve both TCM and WM | ||
| Clinical trials that incorporate aspects of TCM diagnosis and syndrome differentiation | Middle | ||
| (Moderate biomedical capital, moderate TCM capital) | |||
| Boundary | |||
| Rejecters | Casting: Boundary between TCM and WM will eventually will disappear as WM technology advances | ||
| Use of genomics and big data for individualization and to identify inner workings of TCM | Low | ||
| (Moderate biomedical capital, low TCM capital) | |||
The development of precision medicine provide opportunities for this challenge. Boundary rejecters and some blurrers seeks to merge TCM’s holistic philosophy with PM’s data-driven approach and create a new approach, PCM. While PCM aligns with PM’s focus on individualization and systemic complexity, it still advocate for holism, which is distinct from the American version of PM.
However, this effort has made limited progress. Most PCM research is still published in Chinese journals with low impact factors, and it remains largely illegible to most scientific audiences beyond China. Facing these challenges, some researchers are retreating to China’s academic landscape, where their ideas receive more recognition. The future of PCM depends on its ability to gain credibility beyond China and establish itself within the global scientific discourse.
I was wondering…
Why are professionals in Precision Chinese Medicine (PCM) denied scientific authority by the international academic community? Could you elaborate more on the reasons behind this denial? What is the underlying mismatch? In other words, why is PCM considered illegible to the international audience?
Building on Yanze’s question… you mentioned that the hybridity of the resulting scientific research has rendered it largely illegible to most scientific audiences beyond China. And no matter how hard the boundary rejectors and blurrers are trying, the moment they bring up “yin/yang”, and the moment they were found out that they are from Chinese instuitions, they becomes unrecognized by WM society. Hence, this is not a scientific problem, but also a political one. Given this situation, I was wondering how could TCM gain legitimacy? Trying to incorporate WM’s logic does not seem to work… Does this require other event/opportunities, such as WM’s inefficacy and TCM’s relative efficacy in treating Long-Covid? Or does this require the recruitment of more “in-between” parties, such as American TCM practitioners?
Also, I am curious whether this hybridity is related to the high degree of disagreement within TCM