Issues in social and political thought have been central to Chinesephilosophy from its earliest moments down to the present day. Neither“social” nor “political” have ready correlatesin Chinese prior to the nineteenth century, but Chinese thinkersconsistently have been concerned with understanding how bothindividuals and institutions have broad effects in what we can callboth social and political modes. In some cases, the philosophersnarrowly focus on governance and the state, but in many other cases,no firm distinction is made between the realms of political, social,and even family or individual. The scope of social and politicalthought, and its relation to other concerns like individual ethics,are discussed inSection 1.

The bulk of this entry is arranged chronologically, beginning with themost important texts of the classical (or pre-Imperial) era; thenbriefly attending to developments in the early Imperial era; nextlooking more carefully at some of the key developments in the 800-yearNeo-Confucian era; and ending with Chinese social and politicalthinking over the last 150 years. The organization within each sectiondiffers because of differences in our sources. While theoriesconcerning the composition and dating of classical texts remainintensely controversial, it is at least clear that our default shouldnot be to treat these texts as the products of single authors at asingle time, much less as representing the theories ofwell-established schools of thought. Instead, it makes sense to takeindividual texts, and sometimes individual chapters, as our basicunits of analysis. The nature and authorship of sources are clearer aswe move into later eras, and so a topical organization makes sense forsubsequent sections of the entry.

Several questions are central to the teachings and debates that makeup Chinese social and political thought, among which the issue of howto sustain “order (zhi)”—often understoodmore particularly as “harmony (he)”—is themost basic. To what degree should we rely on institutions (and of whatkinds?), and to what degree is human leadership crucial? What sorts ofroles, relationships, or hierarchies should structure our societies,and how are they justified? Can they be challenged or changed? Insofaras society is divided into rulers and ruled, what are theresponsibilities that each owes to the other, and why? We will seethat social and political topics routinely connect up with otheraspects of Chinese philosophy—for example, answers to some ofthe questions just raised lead to further ethical, epistemic, ormetaphysical questions—but for the most part it is stillpossible to make sense of social and political thought in its ownterms.

• 1. The Scope of the “Political”
• 2. The Classical Era
  • 2.1Guanzi: Carrot and Stick
  • 2.2Mozi: Theological or Utilitarian Justification?
  • 2.3Analects (Lunyu) andMencius
  • 2.4Dao De Jing: Nature and Non-Action (Wuwei)
  • 2.5Zhuangzi: Rejecting Governance
  • 2.6Book of Lord Shang: Benefit Through Order
  • 2.7 Shen Buhai: Bureaucratic “Non-Action”
  • 2.8Xunzi: Transforming the People
  • 2.9Han Feizi: Pragmatic Justification of Practical Policies
• 3. The Early Imperial Era
• 4. The Neo-Confucian Era
  • 4.1 Factions and Political Independence
  • 4.2 Institutional vs. Character-centered Theories of Governance
  • 4.3 Final Thoughts
• 5. The Modern Era
• Bibliography
  • Primary Texts
  • Secondary Texts
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. The Scope of the “Political”

On one common reading, a ruler’s authority is based inindividual moral charisma (or virtue;de). The famous“Mandate of Heaven (tianming)” theory has itsroots in the way that the Zhou people legitimized their conquest ofthe Shang. Passages in theBook of History tell us thatHeaven (tian: the deity of the Zhou people) had transferredits “mandate” from the Shang to the Zhou leaders, as aresult of the depravity and misrule of the Shang kings. The Zhouleadership claimed to know this by employing oracle bone divination:they adopted the Shang practice of divining, but put it to the new useof justifying political authority, and thus the shift ofHeaven’s favor (partly by eliding the difference between theShang chief deity and their own). One aspect of this transformationwas transforming Heaven into a moral figure, a god who made judgmentsbased on the perceived virtue of the leader (Allan 1984). As we willsee below, by the time of the Warring States era and the foundationaltexts of Confucian philosophy, there have been furthertransformations: Heaven is no longer a figure at all, but closer to anabstract sense of the normative order of the universe, and itsintentions are no longer accessible via divination. Still, most modernscholars hold that for the majority of classical thinkers, an ethicalideal continues to serve as the ultimate justification of politicalauthority.

It must be acknowledged, though, that there is attention in Confuciantexts to procedural matters and to the norm of “order”, atleast partly separate from rulers’ virtue. Some interpretershave argued that this means the Confucians recognized a distinctspecies of “political” norms, and that such politicalconcerns were more important to the Confucians than the achievement ofindividual, rarefied ethical states. For example, in his discussion ofunder what circumstances Mencius judges a rebellion to be justified,Justin Tiwald emphasizes that Mencius “puts a great deal ofweight on the essentially procedural requirement that the ruler beproperlydesignated for the task” (Tiwald 2008: 274).Even more explicitly, Loubna El Amine argues at length in herClassical Confucian Political Thought for the importance of adistinct sphere of politics. She says that while “the realm ofpolitics is not completely distinct from the realm of ethics,…political order, not moral edification, is the end”; andfurthermore that “political order is an end in itself, not ameans toward virtue” (El Amine 2015: 15).

All interpreters agree that there is at least a narrow kind ofpolitical legitimacy in play, of the type that tells one who thelegitimate heir to the throne should be. According to theMencius, in the earliest days, political power was passed onvia sagely, particularistic assessment of who was most qualified torule, coupled with the endorsement of Heaven, as viewed through theactions of the people. This is how the throne was passed from Yao toShun, and from Shun to Yu. This practice quickly fell apart, though,and in its (supposed) place arose the mechanisms of hereditarymonarchy (MC 5A:5 and 5A:6). This is an ingenious explanation for theshift that also helps to explain why Confucius was never tapped torule in the way that Shun had been. Mou Zongsan has influentiallyargued that the shift from sagely judgment on who is best fit to rule,to hereditary monarchy, is a shift from a holistic form of ethicalauthority to what is merely an effective technology for theadministration of power instead of genuine political authority (Mou1991: 132). In other words, Mou agrees with El Amine on the existenceof a relatively distinct realm of politics, though—writing as amodern Confucian philosopher—Mou regrets the degree to whichthis shallow form of politics is disconnected from justificationdeeper than “order”, and argues for a re-imagining ofConfucian politics (on which seeSection 5).

While Mou’s argument that Confucian political thought is toonarrow is certainly controversial, all agree that at least someclassical thinkers focus on effective technology for theadministration of power and the maintenance of order, to the exclusionof ethical concerns. Indeed, one of the better arguments thatConfucians really did refuse to separate the ethical and the politicalis simply that so many of the Confucians’ critics interpretedthem in this way. Whatever we decide about early Confucians, it isquite evident that a millennium later, most Neo-Confucians took ethicsand politics to be mutually entailing, as we will see inSection 4.

2. The Classical Era

A small amount of historical context will be useful before we begin.The Zhou people conquer the Shang in approximately 1046 BCE, and forthe next several hundred years, the central plains of what is nowChina were either ruled directly by the Zhou king, or else by elitefamilies loyal to the Zhou, in a kind of feudal system. By the Springand Autumn era (771 BCE–476 BCE), the power of the feudal lordshad eclipsed that of the Zhou king, but a rough peace still prevailedwith different feudal lords acting as “hegemon(ba)”. This system then breaks down and thepre-Imperial period enters its final stage, the Warring States era(often dated 475 BCE–221 BCE), which received its name from theincessant warfare conducted between the realms that establishedthemselves as independent powers after the effective demise of theZhou dynasty. Not only was warfare common in this period; it was alsoincreasingly vast in scope, as the chariot armies of the elite madeway for much larger conscript-based armies. This change was in turnrelated to the increasing abilities of states to raise, organize, andfeed such large armies. Both larger populations and more complexgovernmental structures lay behind these developments. All theseinter-related developments, finally, both drove and were shaped by theera’s social and political philosophies. The texts that weexamine here all date from the Warring States era, a period ofpluralistic debate that establishes key terms and questions addressedby Chinese thinkers for many centuries thereafter. Three general,provocative treatments of this era are El Amine 2015, Bai 2012, andPines 2012, and Hsiao 1979 is a classic account of the subject.

2.1Guanzi: Carrot and Stick

The earliest chapters of theGuanzi, which were composed inthe state of Qi and date from the mid-4^th century BCE, areamong the first theoretical writings on governance. In a famouspassage from “Shepherding the People”, we find that“Success in government lies in following the hearts of thepeople”. Success is not defined as making the peoplehappy—we learn elsewhere that success for the ruler is having astrong state that endures through the ages—but following thepeople’s wishes turns out to be a necessary condition forsuccess. Thus:

When the granaries are full, the people will know propriety andmoderation; when their clothing and food are adequate, they will knowthe distinction between honor and shame.

Similarly,

If the ruler can ensure the people their existence and provide themwith security, they will be willing to endure danger and disaster forhim. (GZ ch. 1, pp. 54 and 52)

This is not to say that the people should be given free reign. If theyare well fed and put to work at tasks well-suited to them, they arelikely to accord with propriety and moderation, but the author addsthat rulers must “Make clear the road to certain death”,by which he means “having severe punishments” for thosewho go astray (GZ ch. 1, p. 55). In another chapter of the text,possibly by the same author, we find:

Those who shepherd the people desire them to be controllable. Sincethey desire them to be controllable, they must pay serious attentionto standards (fa). (GZ ch. 3, p. 98)

These “standards” are then enumerated to include honoringranks and ceremonial dress, giving salaries and rewards to thedeserving, granting offices, and applying punishments. TheGuanzi thus presents us with versions of the two techniquesof governance that will run throughout the texts of the WarringStates: nurturing the people and setting them standards.

2.2Mozi: Theological or Utilitarian Justification?

Roughly contemporary with theGuanzi is theMozi,one chapter of which begins:

In ancient times, when people were first born and before there wereany punishments or government, in their languages each had a differentnotion of rightness (yi). One man had one notion, two men hadtwo…. Thus those with good doctrines would keep them secret andrefuse to teach them. (MZ ch. 11, p. 91, translation significantlymodified by author)

This of course led to chaos and suffering, the cause of which was theabsence of “a leader to govern”. A ruler was thereforeselected, declared the “Son of Heaven”, and provided witha staff of ministers to aid him. The ruler then established the singleidea of rightness that all would heed. The text describes acomprehensive hierarchy according to which each individual would heedhis or her superior’s judgment as to what was “good(shan)”, ultimately leading up to the ruler who wouldbase his judgment on Heaven.

“Heaven (tian)” is a difficult term. It onceclearly referred to a religious entity, but eventually comes to beunderstood in more naturalistic terms. Which it means in this chapteris a matter of scholarly disagreement. For the most part, WarringStates philosophers of governance do not appeal to supernaturalstandards to justify their claims. Even in theMozi, if onetakes evidence from other chapters into account, the interpretivedispute over “tian” may be moot. These otherchapters record that just as carpenters can use a compass to determinewhat is circular, so an understanding of the “will ofHeaven” leads one to reliably judge what is right. The strikingthing about a compass is that no special knowledge is needed to useit: it is a public, objective standard for circles. If the “willof Heaven” is to be analogous, then there must be a public,objective standard for right. Mysterious knowledge of the will of adeity does not sound like a good candidate for such a public,objective standard. The text offers an alternative, though: itregularly speaks of maximally “benefitting (li)”the people as a standard. A neat way of resolving all these looseends, then, is to conclude that the “will of Heaven” is ametaphorical reference to the standard of “benefit”.Proper Mohist governance thus would ultimately be a matter ofutilitarian judgment.

2.3Analects (Lunyu) andMencius

Ostensibly a collection of sayings by Confucius and his students, muchif not all of theAnalects was composed afterConfucius’s death, and its various chapters express theteachings of individuals who identified themselves withConfucius’s legacy. The earliest chapters in the text(mid-5^th to mid-4^th century BCE; chs. 3–9)may well be the earliest written philosophical reflection in China,but show little direct concern with governance. In one of the mostdramatic shifts in the text, governance takes center stage in a set ofchapters (12, 13, 2) which may date from the last quarter of the4^th century BCE (Brooks & Brooks 1998). The theory ofthis segment of theAnalects has much in common with theGuanzi. Asked about government, “Confucius” ismade to say: “Enough food; enough weapons; the people havingconfidence in the ruler” (LY 12:7, p. 91). Of these,“confidence (xin)” is most important.“Confidence” here means that one identifies withone’s ruler, doing so because he manifestly seeks what is goodfor one (see also LY 13:29–30).

The dynamic of people identifying with and modeling themselves on theruler permeates the text’s understanding of governance. Askedwhether a ruler should kill those who fail to follow the way(dao), Confucius responds:

You are there to govern; what use have you for killing? If you desirethe good, the people will be good. The virtue of the gentleman is thewind; the virtue of the little people is the grass. The wind on thegrass will surely bend it. (LY 12:19, p. 94; see also LY 2:1)

Unlike the emphasis put on “punishments” as one kind of“standard (fa)” in theGuanzi, theAnalects here minimizes the importance of killing. This pointis reinforced in perhaps the most famous saying in the text aboutgovernance:

Lead them with government and regulate them by punishments, and thepeople will evade them with no sense of shame. Lead them with virtueand regulate them by ritual, and they will acquire a sense ofshame—and moreover, they will be orderly. (LY 2:3, p. 110)

There are only a few passages in the text that stress the continuedneed for punishments in a good society, and they all come quite latein the text: 13:3 is an obvious interpolation, and like the similar20:2, probably dates to the mid-third century BCE.

In a variety of ways theMencius picks up whereAnalects 12, 13, and 2 left off. One innovation of theMencius is to give a name to its preferred mode ofgovernance: “humane government (renzheng)”. Thismeans that one should rule by loving the people like a parent loveshis children: providing for them, educating them, giving them a rolemodel. The text stresses that while this policy is beneficial to allinvolved, one must pursue it out of humane concern rather than out ofcold calculation. Because of the ruler’s ability to transformothers through his example, if he acts on the basis of “benefit(li)” alone, his subjects will do so as well, and eachfrom his or her own, narrow perspective. The result will be chaos andsuffering, rather than order, harmony, and mutual benefit, all ofwhich would arise from genuinely humane governance (MC 1A:1).

TheMencius emphasizes humane governance as well as thedistinction between rightness (yi) and mere concern withbenefit, rejecting utilitarian calculation without regard torightness. It also opposes coercive authority, recognizing that evenmodeling and role-emulation work indirectly:

You can never win the allegiance of people by trying to dominate themwith goodness; but if you use goodness to nurture them, then you willwin the allegiance of the whole world. (MC 4B:16; see also 7A:14)

From other places in the text we can tell that Mencius (or hisfollowers) knew and disapproved of the Mohists; this passagecriticizes the Mohist practice of directly enforcing a standard ofgoodness through hierarchy. TheMencius contains numeroushierarchical ideas (see esp. MC 3A:4), but it has considerable faithin the people’s ability to do good if they are provided for, andnot otherwise (see MC 1A7, 3A3).

Both theMozi and theGuanzi stress the need forobjective standards (fa), as will many subsequent texts. Inthis contextAnalects 12, 13, and 2 andMenciusstand out as not takingfa seriously. Even when we come uponthe tool metaphor inMencius (MC 4A:1), it is applied to theidea of “humane government” rather than to specific,institutionalizable standards. This is not to say that theAnalects andMencius were devoid of any notion of“standard”. Their standard, though, is resolutelyparticular, rather than objective and general: the model set by theethical ruler. The laterAnalects (e.g., 13:3, a lateinterpolation) and theXunzi (see below) recognize a role forcoercion, but authority in the earlier “Confucian” textsis non-coercive. People follow willingly, initially because the goodruler provides for them, and increasingly because they come to lovehim as a father: they are transformed from individuals into members ofa single, state-wide family.

2.4Dao De Jing: Nature and Non-Action (Wuwei)

The “Guodian” version of theDao De Jing,discovered in a tomb in 1993, begins:

Cut off knowledge, abandon argumentation, and the people will benefita hundredfold. Cut off cleverness, abandon “benefit”, andthere will be no more thieves or bandits. Cut off activity and abandonpurposefulness, and the people will again be filial…. Exhibitthe unadorned and embrace the simple. Have little thought of self andfew desires. (Henricks 2000: 28; cp. ch. 19 of received version[DDJ])

In several respects the attitude here expressed mirrors that of theMencius: explicit discussion of “benefit” isrejected, though the indirect goal of benefitting the people isendorsed; argumentation—whether referring to litigation orlogical disputation—is rejected; a simple life with “fewdesires” (cp. MC 7B:35) is favored. On at least the first twocounts, Mohism seems the specific target (as it is in theMencius as well).

Despite these resonances, though, there are also important differencesbetween theDao De Jing andMencius. Most importantare the differences in their respective positive accounts of whatrulers should do. In theMencius, rulers are enjoined tofollow the way of the ancient kings and establish a humane government.TheDao De Jing is much more reticent about articulating anyspecific human standard; indeed, in the received version of the text,the line which reads “Cut off activity and abandonpurposefulness” in the Guodian version has been updated to“Cut off ‘humaneness’ and abandon‘rightness’”, thus extending to followers ofConfucius the treatment initially reserved only for Mohists.

The best communities, as far as theDao De Jing is concerned,are those that form and flourish naturally, with little guidance fromabove. Later chapters will add that the community is best if small andisolated (DDJ ch. 80), as well as providing theoretical justificationsfor the success of such communities, as for instance:

The way is revered and virtue is honored not because this is decreedby any authority but because it is natural for them to be treated so.(DDJ ch. 51)

Rulers succeed by allowing nature to take its course: by “notacting (wuwei)”. Ironically, some of theDao DeJing’s teachings are appropriated as straight-forwardpolitical advice by certain later thinkers. TheHan Feizi (onwhich see more below), for example, echoes theDao De Jing incalling for rulers to avoid articulating explicit standards ordesires, but it does so in order to make sure that ministers cannotpander to the ruler, rather than out of a deeper objection tostandards as such.

2.5Zhuangzi: Rejecting Governance

Unlike theDao De Jing, with which it is often lumped asfellow “Daoist” texts, it is difficult to read theZhuangzi as concerned with governance or aimed at rulers.This is not to say that the text advocates anarchism; like all textsfrom the Warring States, it seems to take for granted that states willhave rulers. To a greater extent than any other text, though, it isuninterested in the problems rulers faced and even seems disinclinedto grant rulers any special authority. It is certainly at odds withthose thinkers who believe that people must come to identify withtheir states. One gloss for the attitude of the text towardsgovernance issues, in fact, might be: avoid commitment, accept whatcomes.

At the heart of the text is a radical linguistic and epistemologicalargument against accepting any one perspective as ultimately,eternally correct. “Clarity (ming)” comes whenone realizes the perspectival nature of all affirmations and denials.Having attained this kind of clarity, it makes no sense to put oneselfon the line for any one set of evaluations, like “our state musttriumph” or even “it is better for humans to flourish thanplants”. In the context of the harsh realities of the WarringStates, these doctrines may well have appealed to many.

2.6Book of Lord Shang: Benefit Through Order

TheBook of Lord Shang (Shangjun shu) builds on twothemes that we have already encountered. First, it argues that“the greatest benefit to the people is order(zhi)” (SJS ch. 7). This is to implicitly accept that“benefit (li)” is the standard by which theoriesof governance are judged, but it also places particular stress on thecollective character of “benefit”. In a war-torn world, weare told, only when the state is strong can its inhabitants flourish.Those who act for their own interests rather than for the“benefit of the state”, therefore, are to be punished (SJSch. 14). The text is no friend of those who like to debate and pushtheir own agendas; it prefers a people devoted to agriculture who are“simple (pu) and easy to direct” (SJS ch. 3). Wecan see here, in short, that one result of the fuzziness surroundingthe idea of “benefitting the people” is that if clearercriteria can plausibly be seen as necessary conditions for benefittingthe people, they take center stage. A prime example is“order”. Disorder, it is natural to assume, isincompatible with the people’s well-being, so rulers couldconcentrate on order and allow benefit to follow in its wake.Especially when combined with the idea that the people tend to beselfish and not understand what is really good for them, though, afocus on order can rapidly lead to tyranny.

Another idea we have seen already is that governance demands objectivestandards. This is a central theme of theBook of Lord Shang.It repeatedly stresses the importance of public, impartial standards(fa) for application of punishment and reward.“Fa” is often translated “law”, butits uses here and elsewhere are clearly broader than mere penal law.One kind of standard, to be sure, is the penal statute(xian), but standards take many other forms. The fact thatrewards and punishments are regularly attached to standards makes itclear that these are normative expectations, and not just ideals. Inanother way the “fa” are more than ideals: theyare institutionalized. This aspect no doubt explains part of theappeal of translating “fa” as “law”,since we often think of laws as norms that are subject to some kind ofenforcement, unlike ethical ideals.

Finally, the text also insists that there be no debate over what thestandards are nor about when they have been fulfilled: the ruler alonefixes the standard based on his assessment of the needs of the age. Heshould neither imitate antiquity nor follow current standards. What iscrucial is that his standards set out the distinct roles(fen) expected of people, as well as the rewards andpenalties that will enforce these roles. The text adds that theintelligent ruler will not fail to carry out his own role, on pain of“harming the standards”.

2.7 Shen Buhai: Bureaucratic “Non-Action”

Shen became Chancellor of the state of Han in 354 BCE and died 337BCE. Early bibliographies list a text bearing his name, but all thatremains of it are quotations in other works; the original has beenlost. It is thus difficult to date this material.

Shen’s central insight seems to have been that government shouldbe based not on feudal principles, but on a bureaucratic system. Creelobserves that Shen favored “a system of administration by meansof professional functionaries, whose functions are more or lessdefinitely prescribed” (SBH p. 55). Rulers should not find goodmen and give them responsibility, but instead find the right man foreach role in the system. The role of the ruler in such a theory issimple: define the needed functions and select men to perform them,then “do nothing (wuwei)”. Doing nothing does notmean to literally abstain from action, but the ruler does nothing morethan keep the system running smoothly. Shen compares the ruler to ascale:

… which merely establishes equilibrium, itself doing nothing;yet the mere fact that it remains in balance causes lightness andheaviness to discover themselves. (SBH p. 352)

Unlike theDao De Jing, which seems to trust nature more thanman, Shen Buhai trusts man-made institutions more thanindividuals’ decision-making powers.

2.8Xunzi: Transforming the People

Chapter 19 of theXunzi contains one of the Warring Statesera’s most famous origin stories.

From what did ritual (li) arise? I say: Humans are bornhaving desires. When they have desires but do not get the objects oftheir desire, then they cannot but seek some means of satisfaction. Ifthere is no measure or limit to their seeking, then they cannot helpbut struggle with each other. If they struggle with each other thenthere will be chaos, and if there is chaos then they will beimpoverished. The former kings hated such chaos, so they establishedrituals and rightness in order to establish distinctions among thepeople, to nurture their desires, and to satisfy their seeking. (XZch. 19, p. 201, slightly modified by author)

Ritual (li—a different character from that for“benefit”) was important in many chapters of theAnalects, but takes on an even more central role here. Whilepeople (unlike animals) have the ability to notice and pay heed todistinctions (fen), they will not do so naturally. Theirdesires have to be shaped through on-going ritual education in orderfor society to be harmonious and for people to flourish. The textexplicitly links ritual with the idea of “standard(fa)”: “To reject ritual is to be withoutstandards”, and “a man without standards is lost andguideless” (XZ ch. 2, p. 14, modified). Unlike the explicitregulations for when punishments and rewards are deserved of theBook of Lord Shang, that is, theXunzi takesstandards to come through having been taught ritual by an expertteacher—by one’s immediate teacher, by one’s ruler,and by the sage kings, who originally established the proper set ofrituals. Both texts seek to exploit features of peoples’psychologies to establish order, both in the name of benefiting thepeople. The central difference, which hearkens back toAnalects 2:3, is that theBook of Lord Shang reliesdirectly on people’s desire for benefit and hatred of harm,while theXunzi relies on people’s ability to careabout “distinctions” in order to transform them. Oncetransformed, ritual propriety and shame, rather than direct concernwith benefit, will guide them.

Although Xunzi puts considerable emphasis on the role of standards, healso famously argues that “There are people who create order;there are no standards creating order of themselves” (XZ ch. 12,p.117, slightly modified). A major theme in Xunzi’s writings isthat explicit standards are necessarily vague, so that the properimplementation of them is underdetermined. He also holds that properimplementation of standards requires a great deal of skill andtechnique. Furthermore, he notes that standards sometimes appear toconflict with one another, and it requires wisdom and experience toknow how to balance such competing considerations. Finally, there isno fixed way of systematizing the rules. Changes in circumstancerequire that the priority of rules will sometimes need to be revised,and this too requires good judgment. For all these reasons, Xunzicredits good people with order, not the standards themselves.

2.9Han Feizi: Pragmatic Justification of Practical Policies

Like several earlier texts, theHan Feizi puts considerablestress on objective criteria for governance. Rulers are to compare“names (ming)”—that is, explicit statementsof a position’s duties—with results and bestow awards orinflict punishments based on how the two correspond. We also readthat: “A truly enlightened ruler uses standards (fa) toselect men for him; he does not choose them himself” (HFZ ch. 6,p. 24). While the ruler does not choose ministers according to his ownjudgment or whim, he still must establish standards in the firstplace; he cannot simply rely on tradition or precedent:

The sage does not try to practice the ways of antiquity or to abide bya fixed standard, but examines the affairs of the age and takes whatprecautions are necessary. (HFZ ch. 49, pp. 96–7)

This contrasts with strands in several earlier texts which advocatedconforming with past tradition. In some of these texts, the recordedor imagined practices of earlier ages are thought to haveepistemological significance: evidence of the insights of the sages.Others, more skeptical about naturalistic justifications, imply thatobserving tradition is our only means of agreeing on a single set ofstandards, and without such agreement, disorder looms.

More common than a desire to conform to old practices, though, is thenotion that times change and the good ruler must be prepared to changewith them. New standards are needed for a new age. This is evenendorsed by some of the texts which ground ultimate justification onthe natural order: the underlying patterns of nature may not change,but their specific applications can, as human society grows andchanges. Other justifications of change are more pragmatic, though,and theHan Feizi is perhaps the most explicit. Here we readthat rulers are enjoined to measure the gains that come from enactingnew standards against the losses that ensue; “… if onefinds gain will exceed losses, one goes ahead with them” (HFZch. 47).

TheHan Feizi also gives us a clearer idea than any earliertext of why rule via standard was to be preferred to rule by the wiseand virtuous. Chapter 40 puts readers through the following dialectic.We begin with the idea, attributed to Shen Dao, that virtue and wisdomare unnecessary for good governance; everything depends on“political purchase (shi)” and “status(wei)”. To this a critic responds that “talent(cai)” is also necessary: give power to the unworthyand the result will be chaos. The conclusion follows: when rulers areso good or bad that nothing could change them, we will call thatshi-by-nature and set that aside. But such men are rare. Theauthor is interested in the average ruler, for whomshi iscrucial. So in the end we are back to Shen Dao’s position as theonly tenable one for the vast majority of rulers—and for all therulers for whom the author’s advice is going to make anydifference.

Another theme of the text is the conflict between individuals andpublic, state interests. We are shown that even for the virtuous,family loyalties regularly trump state loyalties, and thus:

Since the interests of superior and inferior are as disparate as allthis, it is hopeless for the ruler to praise the actions of theprivate individual and at the same time try to insure blessing on thestate’s altars of the soil and grain. (HFZ ch. 49, p. 107)

The author analyzes this as a conflict between “private(si)” and “public (gong)”perspectives, and argues that the two are mutually irreconcilable.

The ruler, in particular, must heed the distinction betweengong andsi. For instance,

… For his part the ruler must never make selfish (si)use of his wise ministers or able men, so the people are never temptedto go beyond their communities to form friendships. (HFZ, ch. 6, p.25)

The clear suggestion is that ruler can be blamed if people conspireagainst him. In another chapter, we read that

To fail to heed your loyal ministers when you are at fault, insistingon having your own way, which will in time destroy your goodreputation and make you a laughing stock of others. (HFZ ch. 10, p.49)

While there are certainly some sections of the text that paint therelationship between rulers and ministers as conflictive—sincethe latter tend to look only to their personal concerns, at theexpense of the state’s more general well-being—thischapter, at least, urges a more constructive relationship betweenthem.

3. The Early Imperial Era

In 221 BCE the king of the state of Qin vanquishes his final rival anddeclares himself the First Emperor, inaugurating both the Qin dynastyand China’s imperial era. The First Emperor’s success wasfounded in part on his adherence to social and political ideas akin tothose in theBook of Lord Shang, and he endeavors to extendsocio-political standardization and control in unprecedented ways inthe new empire. The Qin dynasty does not long outlive its founder, butit is followed by the four-century-long Han dynasty in which many ofkey characteristics of imperial Chinese state and society are firstestablished. A lengthy period of disunity follows the collapse of theHan in 220 CE; over this period and through the succeeding Sui andTang dynasties, intellectuals focus less on social and politicalphilosophy than on issues of spiritual cultivation and abstractmetaphysics: in particular, this is the era when Chinese Buddhismcomes of age. While there certainly is socio-political thinking to befound (see, for example, Chiu-Duke 2000) it makes sense to focus inthis section on the Han dynasty.

In the area of social and political philosophy, Han dynasty thinkersmake three main contributions. First of all, they seek to betterunderstand and systematize their inheritance from the classical era.In part they do this by editing and establishing standard editions ofearlier texts; many of these now-classic texts take their current format the hands of Han dynasty scholars. Another important aspect of thiswork is establishing categories through which to understand theclassical era authors and debates. Distinctions among “schools(jia)” such as Confucian, Mohist, Standards(fajia, often translated as “Legalist”), andDaoist (daodejia) come from the efforts of Han scholars todivide up earlier thinkers’ approach to governance in particular(Csikszentmihalyi 2006: xvii; Smith 2003). The second importantcontribution during the Han dynasty lies at the intersection ofthought and practice: rulers and the advisers implement a variety ofinstitutions aimed at realizing socio-political goals that rest on asynthesis of classical thinking. That is, notwithstanding the effortsto distinguish various classical schools of thought, much Han thoughtand practice was highly synthetic, seeking to harmonize the insightsof all schools. This meant building a state that rests on laws andother “standards” as well as on rituals and on the ethicalcharacters of the rulers. Han emperors establish central educationalinstitutions and initiate the practice of bringing talented scholarsinto the government via examination (albeit at a much smaller scalethan in the later Neo-Confucian era).

The third contribution of Han thinkers is their individualphilosophizing about the ways that state and society should beorganized and fit into the larger cosmos; we will briefly considerthree examples. Jia Yi (200–168 BCE) was a statesman and thinkerwhose eclectic philosophizing was emblematic of his era. He is bestknown, though, for his “Confucian”-sounding ethical andpolitical writings. For example, he carefully articulates the waysthat a crown prince should be educated, living alongside scrupulouslycorrect people so as to acquire a correct “second nature”,just as one acquires one’s mother tongue. As the prince matures,he must be open to the realities of the world and to his ownfallibility: Jia prescribes that “Wooden boards are erected, onwhich people might censure his actions. He is subject to the drum ofremonstrance” (HCT pp. 12–13). Jia elaborates on theimplied vision of socio-political order in another essay, arguing thatwhile the common people must be punished when they violate standardssuch as laws, high officials are accountable to ritual and ethicsrather than public law. These latter methods enable the cultivation ofa sense of shame, an internal moral compass, which in turn will enableofficials to learn from public remonstration—which is explicitlylegitimate—and to adjudicate wisely in law courts (HCT, pp.36–7).

Another feature of Han socio-political thought is an emphasis on“non-action (wuwei)”. The term is best-known fromtheDao De Jing, although the term and, more broadly, thegeneral ideal of non-purposive, spontaneous action is widespread inWarring States thought (Slingerland 2003). In the Han we see itadapted to many different approaches to governance. The Utopian visionthat lies at the heart of theDao De Jing (on at least onecommon reading) is still present, but more common is a synthesis ofritual or legal standards with the idea of non-action. For example,one official recommends what he takes to have been the approach of theearly sage kings, which was that “In making laws and edicts,they made sure [those laws and edicts] accorded with humandispositions and only then put them into effect” (HCT, p. 60).In this way, people follow the laws naturally, needing no overtintervention on the part of the state. Texts that brought together anemphasis on overt standards and ideas like non-action are widespread;in fact, the earliest extant commentaries on theDao De Jingare included as chapters—likely added to the text in theHan—of theHan Feizi, which as we saw above is theepitome of standards-based governance.

Finally, many thinkers in the Han stress the ways in which humanactivity fits into and is even shaped by cosmological processes andpatterns. Here is an example of such a naturalistic justification ofthe political order:

The five phases each move according to its place in thesequence…. This is the reason that wood rules life, metal rulesdeath, fire rules heat, and water rules cold. Human beings have nochoice but to go by their sequence, and officials have no choice butto go by their abilities. (HCT, p. 178)

In such a context astronomical and other portents take on significantpolitical roles, though the Han also had famous skeptics like WangChong (27 CE–100 CE) who denied their importance. All in all, wecan say that the Han bequeathed to China a normative visionemphasizing socio-political harmony, even including harmony with thecosmos, that has room for various objective standards alongsideimportant roles played by virtuous rulers and ministers.

4. The Neo-Confucian Era

The Neo-Confucian era begins in the early Song dynasty, which itselfis founded in 960 CE. A combination of social and political changescreate fertile ground for new socio-political theorizing. The keymarker of social status in the Tang dynasty (618–907) had beenone’s pedigree, and the society was organized around somethingclose to a state-sponsored aristocracy. Seeking its own legitimacy,the leaders of the new Song dynasty settled on a partnership with atransformed elite class, now based more in education and claims ofmerit than in ancestry. Instead of official families, the elite becomea “community of the educated”; Song society is far moreliterate and published than its Tang predecessor, and scholarsgenerally refer to the new elite as the “literati” (Bol2008: 31–9). In this fertile soil, the idea that literati shouldreflect on the Way and seek to influence their society took root andgrew.

In the mid-twentieth century, a range of scholars argued for two,closely linked theses concerning the relation of Neo-Confucians toimperial power. The first was the Autocracy Thesis, according to whichimperial power began to grow in the Song dynasty, eventually reachingdespotic levels in later dynasties. The second was the Inward-TurnThesis, which held that Neo-Confucians largely abdicated fromengagement in political affairs, especially after the loss of northernChina (Liu 1988). In recent decades, though, new scholarship has shownquite convincingly that ministerial and literati power remainsignificant throughout the Song, and that Neo-Confucians remainpolitically engaged (Bol 2008: 119; Levey 1991: 545f). The nature ofthe political engagement does change, however. Rather than seeingNeo-Confucians as simply advocating an inward turn, it is moreaccurate to see them as often favoring a localist, decentralizedapproach to governance. Among other things, they come to see non-statespaces as extremely important to successful change at wider levels ofthe state. This is not to say that Neo-Confucians abandon efforts toeducate, direct, and serve the emperor, and strong emperors early inthe Ming and Qing dynasties manage to bring the focus back tothemselves for periods of time. Overall, though, the emphasis ofNeo-Confucian theories of governance is nicely captured in the modernslogan “think globally, act locally”.

According to Neo-Confucians, institutions of governance operate on twolevels simultaneously, one socio-political and the other personal. Atthe socio-political level, they are concerned with the practicalitiesof keeping order in a large state filled with imperfect people. At thepersonal level they are concerned with an individual’s moralcharacter. Someone might think that operations on these two levelswork at cross-purposes, because crafting good institutions andpolicies requires that we take human imperfections into account, andyet a full commitment to improving one’s character requires thatwe rise above these imperfections. Neo-Confucians disagree. For them,the continuity of the socio-political with the personal received itscanonical expression in a passage from the classicalGreaterLearning:

Wanting to light up the bright virtue of all in the world, theancients first put their states in order. Those who wanted to puttheir states in order first regulated their families. Those who wantedto regulate their families first cultivated their selves. Those whowanted to cultivate their selves first rectified their heartminds.Those who wanted to rectify their heartminds first made theirintentions sincere. Those who wanted to make their intentions sincerefirst reached understanding. Reaching understanding lies ininvestigating things. (Greater Learning 4)

We could understand the continuity described in this passage as atemporally connected set of steps: first investigate things, thenreach understanding, then make one’s intentions sincere, and soon, eventually putting one’s state in order. But in fact theNeo-Confucians tend to see the steps as mutually constitutive:investigating things just is reaching understanding, families areregulated through the very act of personal cultivation, and havingorderly families is part of what it means for a state to be in order.The implicit relationship between personal cultivation andsocio-political order is captured in the frequently used slogan“inner sage-outer king”: ethics and governance are twosides of the same coin. In other words, socio-political order entailsthe ethical transformation of people in the state, as well as theirleaders; in the language of the text, this is to “light up thebright virtue of all in the world”.

With virtually no exceptions, Neo-Confucians accepted hereditarymonarchy as their form of government. This does not mean that allmonarchs automatically enjoyed full legitimacy, however. Already inthe latter half of the Tang dynasty, Confucian and Buddhist scholarshad begun to claim that the proper moral or spiritual teaching waspassed on in a genealogical fashion (Wilson 1995). Han Yu(768–824) famously asserted that this transmission of theConfucian “Way” had been lost for many centuries; NorthernSong progenitors of Neo-Confucianism argued that it was only in theirgeneration that the Way had been recovered. In other words, legitimatesuccession from one monarch to another did not assure that individualrulers—or even their dynasty as a whole—were following theWay. Zhu Xi (1130–1200) gives this idea its most influentialformulation when he says that the “succession of the Way(daotong)” comes to those who are able to grasp thedeep truths embedded in the classics by the early sages. According tothis view, the earliest sages both grasped the Way and ruled, but overtime rulers lost this tie to the moral Way. A few great teachers likeConfucius and Mencius understood the Way and tried to steer theirsocieties in the right direction, even though they were not rulers,but eventually the succession of the Way was lost until it wasrecovered, says Zhu Xi, by the Cheng brothers (Cheng Hao[1032–1085] and Cheng Yi [1033–1107]).

The idea that the succession of the Way can come apart from the moresuperficial succession of monarchy has a number of importantimplications, especially when combined with the view of governanceoperating at two levels (maintaining social order and achieving moraltransformation). Borrowing a term from classical antiquity,Neo-Confucians argue that a ruler who is successful at keeping orderbut who falls short of achieving broader transformation is a mere“hegemon” rather than a true “king”. It isbetter to be a hegemon than a cruel tyrant, to be sure, but even thesuccessful hegemon still needs to aspire to something greater. Thegatekeepers to these greater achievements, meanwhile, are thosescholars who have attained the succession of the Way. According tothis manner of thinking, therefore, monarchs must accept that leadersof the literati should be their teachers or even co-rulers, or thatthe monarch’s central authority should be reined in so thatmorally cultivated literati can hold sway over local affairs. Over theNeo-Confucian period literati had varying degrees of success inasserting authority derived from the succession of the Way.

4.1 Factions and Political Independence

William de Bary, one of the most influential Western scholars ofNeo-Confucianism, has said an important “trouble withConfucianism” is that it imposed tremendous moral demands on theConfucian superior person (junzi) without providing thepolitical power to fulfill them. The superior person shoulders theresponsibility of cultivating humane monarchs and fashioning socialand political institutions that work for the public weal, butConfucians are also committed to a system that gives superior peoplevery little leverage with which to accomplish these herculean tasks.They deprive themselves of this leverage in various ways, some of themobvious (Confucianism embraces powerful and largely uncheckedmonarchical government) and some of them subtle. One of the ways ofundermining Confucians’ own power is by refusing to pander tospecific constituencies or factions, standing on the side of the rightand the public good rather than with allies or friends of convenience.Their weakness, de Bary argues, is

in their indisposition or inability to establish any power base oftheir own.… [E]xcept on rare, momentary occasions, they facedthe state, and whoever controlled it in the imperial court, asindividual scholars unsupported by an organized party or activeconstituency. (de Bary 1991: 49)

Indeed, there is no question that the role of the Confucian ministeris complex and often vexed. This section highlights one of its keydimensions.

Let us start with some context. From late-classical times down intothe early Song, the term “faction” (pengdang) wasinvariably derogatory, referring to associations of “pettypeople” who aimed to use their roles in government to furthertheir own, selfish ends. There is a certain degree of support for thisunderstanding of “faction” in even earlier texts, but itis significant for our purposes that some passages in early texts likeConfucius’sAnalects also suggest that superior people(junzi) can form associations, so long as they do not act inpartisan ways (Levine 2008: 25–6 and 34–5; LY 12:24). Akey question that emerges in the midst of the political andintellectual wrangling of the Northern Song is whether horizontalaffiliations among equals are in any way appropriate, or whether theonly axis of loyalty is the vertical one, from individuals upward tothe ruler (and beyond, to the Way or to cosmic Patterntianli]).

We can identify three different positions on this question. The mostcommon is the long-held view that factions and factionalism are theexclusive domains of the self-centered; superior people, in contrast,are individually loyal. The radical alternative to this was the claim,made most forcefully by Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072), that genuinefactions—which he understands as long-lasting associationsorganized collectively to pursue the common good—are only formedby superior people. The affiliations of petty people are onlytemporary, for personal gain (Levine 2008: 47–56; Ouyang’sessay is translated in de Bary and Bloom 1999). Crucially, Ouyang addsthat genuinely superior people will unite around a shared Way(tongdao), so disputatiousness at the ruler’s court isinevitably seen as sign of self-centeredness. Finally, a thirdposition agrees with the first in using “faction” as aterm for selfish associations that ignore the common good, but agreeswith the second view that superior people can and should collaboratewith one another for their mutual edification: “When superiorpeople cultivate themselves and regulate their heartminds, their Wayis one of collaboration with others” (Levine 2008: 58). So,according to this third position, while superior people should notengage in factional wrangling at court, they should work together tocultivate themselves and pursue the common good.

What, then, should be done about factions in practice, and aboutministerial disagreement more generally? Again, there are three mainpositions. Those who believe that superior people should beindividually loyal tend to argue that the ruler should try to wipe outall factions. One strong argument for this view maintains that even ifthere is a faction of superior people, they will be outnumbered byfactions of the selfish; factionalism itself is destructive, so shouldbe rooted out (Levine 2008: 46–7). Ouyang Xiu’s radicalview holds that the true faction of superior people can be identifiedas such, and their one voice—which, after all, is unified aroundpursuit of the common good—should be heeded. False factions ofpetty people should be suppressed. The third view, finally,acknowledges that factionalism seems inevitable and calls for a strongand wise ruler who is able to encourage vertical loyalty and to judgeamong the competing ministerial arguments. By relying on the ruler inthis way, this third view is able consistently to maintain thatsuperior people need not themselves form ministerial factions, eventhough they should collaborate to encourage mutual ethicaldevelopment.

In his own day, Ouyang Xiu’s radical view fails to win out, butover time the idea that there is one genuine faction becomeswidespread within Neo-Confucianism. Zhu Xi encourages hiscontemporaries to support the formation of such a “faction ofsuperior people”, to join it themselves, and even to see thatthe emperor himself becomes part of this faction. For Zhu, it is thisfaction of superior people—those who have grasped the“succession of the Way”—who have the ultimatelegitimacy in society, thus even the emperor needs to be properlyeducated so that he can strive to join this group. Zhu is alsoexplicit that it is crucial to maintain the ethical purity of those inthe faction; “if there are those who are wicked and evil, thenyou ought to expel them completely” (WJ vol. 21, p. 1244).Similar views can be found among the leaders ofNeo-Confucianism’s most famous faction, the Donglin. Thislate-Ming dynasty movement is multi-faceted, including a broad ethicalrevitalization movement, a national Confucian “moralfellowship”, and a ministerial faction in Beijing; the wholemovement takes its name from its institutional base in the privatelyfunded Donglin Academy in southern China (Dardess 2002). The Donglinfaction goes to extreme lengths to promote its cause, driven by itsmembers’ conviction that theirs is a battle of the good andpublic-spirited against the evil and self-centered. Donglin partisanscontribute to a toxic political atmosphere in which each sidedemonizes its opponents. The crucial moment in the struggle comes whena Donglin figure issues a public document explicitly accusing aleading palace figure of gross immorality. In a modern scholar’swords, this document is written in the “language of moralterrorism”: language that is uncompromising, “heated tothe highest possible degree of emotional incandescence” (Dardess2002: 71). Not long after this comes a violent backlash in which keyDonglin figures are arrested, tortured, and killed, the academy razed,and the movement crushed.

Reflecting on Neo-Confucian ideas of faction, three observations arein order. First, returning to de Bary’s conception of the“trouble with Confucianism” with which we began thissection, Neo-Confucian principles make it difficult for properConfucian ministers to establish a power-base of their own, in partbecause they are not supposed to have special commitments or loyaltiesto groups. Second, even if the primary axis of loyalty is vertical (tothe emperor, public good, and more abstract notions like the Way),horizontal solidarity fits very well with key aspects of Neo-Confucianviews of self-cultivation, such as the part that one’s communityplays in developing an ethical “commitment”. In thislight, and given the excesses to which the “one truefaction” view can lead, it is tempting to conclude that thethird view of factions described above is most attractive. Finally,recent scholars have disagreed about the significance of Neo-Confucianviews of faction. One opines that

had Confucian gentry been able to transmit their local influence tothe provincial and national levels through legitimized factionalorganizations such as the Donglin academy, it is interesting tospeculate what sorts of political forces would have been released intoConfucian political culture;

he goes on to suggest a parallel to “the trend againstabsolutist monarchy and toward parliamentary rule in the West”(Elman 1989: 389). In contrast, another scholar argues that

the Donglin affair was no harbinger of some possible futureparliamentarian democracy. Donglin Confucian thought was monarchicaland authoritarian to its core. (Dardess 2002: 7)

4.2 Institutional vs. Character-centered Theories of Governance

Most basically, China’s governmental structure in theNeo-Confucian era has four parts: (1) the emperor, imperial family,and inner-court attendants like eunuchs; (2) the outer-courtministers, bureaucracy, and the literati families who staff them; (3)the common people; and (4) the institutions that help to shape theways in which (1)–(3) interact. One of the great debates of theNeo-Confucian era is about the relative importance or priority ofinstitutions. This debate takes on many guises, but at bottom is thesense that there is a tension between two ways of understanding thestructure that undergirds a well-ordered society. One seesinstitutions and their component parts (traditions, rules, andregulations, etc.) as more fundamental. The other sees the people whodirect and belong to the institutions, and particularly the characterof such people (understood as a combination of talents and ethicaldispositions), as more fundamental. Where a philosopher stands on thisissue can help to explain how they align on other critical issues inmatters of governance. Those who tend to see institutions as morefundamental are more inclined to see legal and regulatory reform asthe primary way of addressing large-scale problems. Those who see thecharacter of people as more fundamental often think the solution tosuch problems lies in moral cultivation and transformation (inparticular, of the emperor himself). To a certain extent, the formerthink that institutions should be designed to take human flaws andshortcomings into account, so that the state does not require largenumbers of people to be virtuous in order to create social order,while the latter tend to worry that institutions designed for flawedpeople will, at least at certain levels, inhibit the kind ofself-improvement that makes government truly transformative. For easeof reference, let us use the term “character-centered” and“institutionalist” to refer to these two positions.

On one somewhat simplistic historical account, most Neo-Confuciansadvocate a character-centered theory of politics, holding that ethicalcultivation of people and not institutional reform is the mostplausible means of restoring social order. This is supposedly whatprecipitated the “Inward Turn” described above,encouraging individuals to abandon interest in state governance andfocus instead on their own moral self-improvement. This version ofhistory is not entirely misleading. Neo-Confucians of the SouthernSong frequently blame the fall of the Northern Song on its failedexperiments in institutional reform, especially those of theinstitutionalist thinker and statesman Wang Anshi (1021–1086).And the most famous Neo-Confucian philosophers tended to makepronouncements more consistent with the character-centered theory,including the Cheng brothers, Zhu Xi, and Wang Yangming.

But the truth is quite a bit more complicated, and morephilosophically interesting. From the Song dynasty all the way throughthe Qing, the Neo-Confucians counted among their ranks many thinkersinterested in “statecraft (jingshi)”. By the lateMing dynasty and thereafter, “statecraft” came to describealmost any method or techniques that could be used for the practicaloperations of the state, construed so expansively as to includemathematics and history. But in the narrower sense common amongearlier Neo-Confucians, it refers to a philosophical position thataims to address social problems through institutional reform ratherthan through dramatic transformations of character. Scholars sometimesdescribe these thinkers as belonging to a “StatecraftSchool” which includes Song philosophers like Chen Liang(1143–1194) and Ye Shi (1150–1223), and the MingNeo-Confucian Wang Tingxiang (1474–1544) (Niu 1998; Tillman1982; Ong 2006). It also includes reform-minded Neo-Confucians wholived through the downfall of the Ming and the rise of the Qingdynasty, such as Gu Yanwu (1613–1682) and Huang Zongxi(1610–1695). Even for more character-centered Confucians, whatit meant to say that people’s character is more fundamental thaninstitutions was open to debate.

To understand the nuances of the resulting debates, it helps to beginby recalling the classical Confucian philosopher Xunzi, famous as adefender of the character-centered view; as noted above, he holds that“There are people who create order; there are no standardscreating order of themselves”. Discoursing on Xunzi’sclaim gives Neo-Confucians opportunities to develop new ways ofexplaining how the character of people can be prior to institutions.One crucial elaboration is made by Hu Hong (1106–1161). OnHu’s view, people enter into the explanatory order of governanceat two levels: first, they are the ones who implement the rules andregulations. At this level Hu’s analysis closely followsXunzi’s, stressing the necessary vagueness of law and the needto have skillful magistrates who understand individual laws in asystematic way. But secondly, the people are also the ones who fix therules whenever the rules are not suited to the circumstances. That is,humans govern not just as executives but as originators too:

Xunzi said, “There are people who create order; there are nostandards that create order”. I humbly submit that we illustratethis by drawing an analogy between wanting to restore order after aperiod of chaos, and trying to cross a river or lake [by boat]. Therules are like the boat and the people [i.e. the ruler and hisofficials] are like the steersman. If the boat is damaged and therudder is broken, then even if [the steersman] has seemingly divinetechnique everyone nevertheless understands that the boat cannot getacross. So whenever there is a period of great disorder it isnecessary to reform the rules. There has never been a case where onecould successfully restore order without reforming the rules. (HHJ pp.23–24)

In short, for Hu, people bear credit for successful governance notjust by guiding the institution correctly, but also by creating andmodifying the very rules on which governance is founded. Credit goesnot just to the steersmen but to the shipwrights as well.

Although human discretion may allow people of talent and goodcharacter to update rules or apply them differently in differentcontexts, they also allow people who lack talent and good character tomisuse them. In these cases, it helps to set limits to abuses ofauthority and leadership by requiring that leaders adhere to rules.The philosopher who argues for this view most forcefully is HuangZongxi, who lived in the late Ming and early Qing. In a remarkableessay titled “On Standards (Yuanfa)”, Huangmaintains that we should distinguish between legitimate andillegitimate standards, where the illegitimate ones are distinguishedby the fact that they are created or modified primarily to serve theinterests of rulers. Huang says that what gives rules legitimacy isthe purpose for which they are fashioned, not just tradition or theduty to respect the ancestors who fashioned them. When rules aredesigned with the interests of the people in mind they tend to beloose and open-ended, for their purpose is not just to control humanbehavior but also to cultivate virtues. People are more likely todevelop virtuous character traits if their orderly conduct is donewillingly rather than under threat, and they are more likely to actwillingly if they are brought up under a regime of rules that protectstheir interests. Ironically, it is the rules of self-servingauthorities that require greater and greater stringency. Because theyrely heavily on coercion and work against the welfare of ordinarypeople, the policy makers have to create one layer of rules thatgovern human conduct, then a second layer of rules establishinginstitutions to enforce the first, then a third layer of rules toenforce those in the second, and so on. The result is a regime withconsiderably less flexibility and room for human discretion than theproponents of the Xunzian principle envision (YF p. 317).

4.3 Final Thoughts

According to most Neo-Confucians, revering the emperor meant bothritual respect for the role of the emperor and obedience to thelegitimate authority of the emperor, but not unthinking loyalty to theruler no matter what he might do or say. Ultimate loyalty is owed tono individual but to the Way, which Neo-Confucians also discuss interms of “cosmic Pattern (tianli)”—that is,the ultimate harmony of all things. Neo-Confucians lived in a publicculture in which it was expected, at least in principle, thatministers show their loyalty by courageously pointing out flaws andremonstrating with their rulers. And many Neo-Confucians, includingZhu Xi, quietly or reluctantly acknowledged that there are cases whenone should not obey one’s emperor, presumably after all attemptsto dissuade the misguided ruler had been exhausted (Schirokauer 1978:141–43). We already saw some of this in the Donglin incident,discussed above; there are numerous other cases in which ministers,either individually or as a group, seek to upbraid or reform an errantruler. Often these disputes revolved around ritual matters, since thestability of human relationships as expressed through ritual wascentral to the overall harmony of the society and cosmos. Throughoutmuch of the Neo-Confucian era political actors also find it necessaryto justify their proposals through reference to classical texts, whichone contemporary scholar has therefore argued serve a partly“constitutional” role (Song 2015). Notwithstanding thevarious ways in which literati can partly constrain the choices ofrulers, though, there is little question that the power of rulersremains paramount. And while the deep-seated belief that harmonyrelies on the well-being of the people is no doubt responsible for thepeasantry living better lives than they might have otherwise, in theend Neo-Confucian socio-political thought grants them only onepolitical outlet: revolt (Angle 2009: ch. 10).

5. The Modern Era

The last years of the Qing dynasty, which collapsed in 1911, weremarked by a flourishing of political thought under the twin stimuli ofdomestic challenges and encounters with foreign politicalphilosophies. The Russian Revolution of 1917 added further fuel to thefire, at a time when the nascent Republic of China was struggling withboth internal and external threats. The nature and sources ofpolitical authority once again were topics of debate. Many now took itfor granted that the goal was some sort of “democracy” inwhich the people were (at least in principle) sovereign. But whocounted as “the people”, how they were to be led orrepresented, and how collective versus individual goals were to bebalanced all were up for grabs. At a broader level, there was a debatebetween those who felt the answer lay in one or another“ism”—that is, an all-encompassing ideology likeMarxism—and those who favored working more pragmatically, viainstitution building, on one “problem” at a time. A fewdecades later, after the founding of the People’s Republic,similar issues were addressed in the contrast between“Red” (ideologically and morally pure) and“expert” (possessing technical expertise). In variousways, these twentieth-century debates resonated with classical andNeo-Confucian contention between insitutional and character-centeredtheories of governance. Were morally advanced individuals the key toan ideal society? Or should objective standards of success, coupledwith objective institutions, be society’s political foundation?In cases of conflict, which had priority?

There was certainly no single answer offered to these questions by anyof the groups making up twentieth-century China’s politicallandscape, ranging from “New Confucians” to nationaliststo liberals to Marxists. However, the “isms” approach wonout through much of the century, and Thomas Metzger has shown thatChinese political thinkers of all camps tended toward what he calls“epistemological optimism”, which is a confidence that theone, universally applicable moral and political truth is knowable, andso great authority should be vested in those gifted individuals ableto perceive this truth (Metzger 2005). Another way to put this wouldbe to say that there is a strong Utopian strand in muchtwentieth-century Chinese political thought, which has both pushedtoward radical solutions and led to dissatisfaction with continueddissonance or piecemeal progress. Even Chinese liberals have, in manycases, envisioned harmonious societies in which individualself-realization goes hand-in-hand with the realization the largercollectivity, which they often called the “larger self(dawo)” (Zarrow 2021).

Some philosophers in the twentieth century have been more aware thanothers of the problems with Utopianism. Mou Zongsan (1909–1995),a leader of the new Confucian movement, was not only aware of it, butalso offered a particularly creative way out of the recurrent tensionbetween personal virtue (or morality) and public standards (orpolitics). Mou’s insight is that the relation between moralityand politics is “dialectical”. Rather than seeing aleader’s political virtue as a direct extension of his or herpersonal, moral virtue, Mou argues that there needs to be an indirectrelation between them. Politics and political virtue must develop outof morality, but nonetheless have an independent, objective existence.This means that human rights, for example, must have a basis inmorality, but come to be measured by standards that are separate frommoral standards. The converse is also true: full moral virtue requiresthat which partly “restricts itself (ziwokanxian)”, namely objective structure (Mou 1991: 59).Objective structures (like laws) are fundamentally different from thesubjectively-felt, internalized morality after which we should allindividually strive. The concrete implication of this is that nomatter what one’s level of moral accomplishment,

insofar as one’s virtue is manifested in politics, one cannotoverride the relevant limits (that is, the highest principles of thepolitical world), and in fact must devote one’s august characterto the realization of these limits. (Mou 1991: 128)

In short, sages cannot break the law or violate the constitution.Politics thus has its independence from morality.

Philosophers have differed in their evaluations of Mou’sargument, but it can stand as an instance of the continuing creativityto be found in contemporary Chinese political thinking (Angle 2012).China’s dynamic society offers a crucible within which new ideasand new political forms may be forged and tested in coming years. Tobe sure, genuinely novel and intellectually challenging ideas do notform the majority of contemporary Chinese political discourse, butthey are nonetheless present across the entire political spectrum. Itremains to be seen whether robust political values and institutionswill emerge as alternatives to models with which Western politicaltheorists are familiar, just as we cannot yet foresee what role theMarxist, Confucian, liberal, and other traditions will play in futureChinese political thinking. Concerns with harmony and virtue areunlikely to disappear, but (as Mou’s example shows) this by nomeans limits the future interest of whatever political institutionsand theories emerge in China.

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Acknowledgments

The section of this entry on Neo-Confucian socio-political thought isdrawn in significant part from on-going collaborative work onNeo-Confucianism that I am undertaking with Justin Tiwald, and Igratefully acknowledge both his influence on my understanding of thesematters, and his willingness to allow me to use some of our jointfindings here.