The paper seeks to use “civil society” as a model in order to analyze Chinese history and society conceptually. One of the very first questions being raised, when the term “civil society”, a Western born concept since modernity, is applied upon the Chinese socio-history is that of epistemological one: that is, if Western social theory is universalizable？The author discards both the stances of “total Westernization”, which claims optimistically the universal validity of Western knowledge, as well as the exceptionality of China, being used as a shield of depending most of the critics against China’s situation, arguing that most of the Western theories cannot explain essentially the matters in China. Instead, the author adopts a third and mid-way path in order to refine the theory of civil society for the sake of gaining more insightful understanding of Chinese socio-history and endowing “civil society” with a more explaining power. Secondly, since the term “civil society” carries a rich meaning, when it is translated into Chinese language, it can be represented in more than one kind of phrase of words. Thus different translated versions presuppose different accentuations from the interpreters. The author introduces three kinds of literal translation: i.e. “civilized society”, “city people’s society” and “public people’s society”, arguing that they encompass most of the understanding originated from “civil society”. The paper concludes by stressing each society is embedded with its particular cultural values and ideals. When the Western concepts were brought into China and expressed themselves in Chinese language, they have succeeded in revitalization of the proper Chinese values, previously latent in its tradition, to order to meet its contemporary needs of the society.