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MOBILITY AND CHANGE

Mary Phillips

submitted to the

Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences

of American University

in Partial Fulfillment of

the Requirements for the Degree

of Doctor of Philosophy

Sociology

Chair: ^ f . Jura,Si6genthale

Russell Stone - i. c&]tuk- /~u* — Michael Puett Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Tu Wei-mingW Date

2001

American University Washington, D.C. 20016 AMERICAN UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

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Mary Phillips

2001

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MOBILITY AND CHANGE

Mary Phillips

ABSTRACT

Confucianism can be thought of as a Chinese model of rational thought with

implications for socio-economic and political stability, and for development. This project

draws upon Chinese intellectual history to explore Confucianism in relation to power,

social mobility, and social change. This work aims for an in-depth exploration of the

evolution of another reality, or Weltanschauung, in the context of the Chinese ideological

superstructure; its longitudinal role in development; and its implications for China’s

transition to modernity. The scope of this work places a Chinese conceptual framework

within the field of Western macrosociology. This study explains how this comprehensive

social construct influences a pattern of large scale change.

As Cold War assumptions dissipate, China is opening up to the rest of the world.

At this critical time of reform, Western scholars and policy analysts face the challenge of

understanding Chinese social, political, and economic decisions. In particular, Western

scholarship is interested in China’s resistance to “wholesale” Westernization. The goal of

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. this project is to broaden Western understanding of a Chinese worldview by identifying

and explicating two theoretical models: a conceptual framework of the Confucian

ideological superstructure; and a longitudinal model of change.

Western scholarship suggests that links can be made between current social and

political structures and tendencies in the West, and the classical literary heritage of

Western civilization. Similarly, the same argument can be offered in the East, with

respect to classical Chinese literature and China’s present development model. The

ensuing body of research draws upon advances by Western sinologists and philologists,

and upon the application of hermeneutics and textual analysis. This project explores

seminal ideas of Chinese intellectuals — both of the Axial Age and within what this

dissertation calls the process of “syncretic conditioning.” This study suggests that core

ideas are critical in understanding current social, political, and economic issues.

While China’s intellectual schools are vast, this study focuses on the Confucian

school for two reasons: 1) its leading role in China’s political and social history, and 2) its

prominent place in Weberian social science literature, and more specifically, Max Weber’s

position regarding the relationship between Confucianism and economic

underdevelopment in China. The present project rejects the dominant research trend in

Western social science that measures China’s incorporation into a Western model.

Instead, it offers a research paradigm that explores how China continues to incorporate

new ideas into a regionally pervasive and enduring Chinese worldview.

iii

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. EXPLANATORY NOTE

Chinese words and names are rendered in Pin Yin and Wade Giles romanization;

and Chinese names are in Chinese order, with the family name first and the personal name

last, so not to burden the text with alternative names or spellings. See GLOSSARY for

definition of terms.

Note to scholars of Chinese literature: This work is primarily written in the

discipline of sociology. Due to academic parameters, it is beyond the scope of this work

to explain philological arguments in the field of sinology. The author acknowledges the

complexities of interpretation, and some textual references in this work are at risk of

over-simplification.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

There are many people I wish to thank for their generous support during this long

academic process. First I want to thank my excellent dissertation committee for their

guidance over the last few years. My committee chair, Jurg Seigenthaler, not only

brought me into the field, he also played the central role in providing an academic

atmosphere that was conducive to creative thinking. As my mentor, I owe him sincere

gratitude. Russell Stone’s unflinching optimism and commitment to scholarship was a

vital source of inspiration. I am also grateful to my committee members at Harvard

University: I wish to thank Michael Puett, of the Department of East Asian Languages

and Civilizations, whose interest, insights and advice sustained my own faith in the

worthiness of this project. I deeply appreciate the instruction from Tu Wei-ming,

director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute, and later benefitted from our discussions on

Confucianism in modem society.

Numerous other conscientious educators offered various contributions to my

intellectual growth. My theoretical work drew from courses and conversations with

professors Peter Bol and William Kirby. I am deeply grateful to Lanting Xu for many

long and thought provoking discussions on Chinese dissent and other debates. Diane

Obenchain encouraged and organized my research stay at Beijing University. Julia Chang,

also of Beijing University, played a cmcial role in my auspicious journey to Qufu,

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Shangdong. I thank Ester Chow for encouraging me to participate in my first academic

conference where I presented and tested some of the ideas that went into this dissertation.

Methodologically, this dissertation benefitted from my undergraduate work the

field of Near Eastern Studies. Without this academic background my project would not

be as broad in scope. My professors and colleagues at the University of Toronto are in

my intellectual debt. Donald Redford, the late R. J. Williams, Nick Millet and Ron Lutz

introduced me to the relevance of ancient thought to our understanding of Western

civilization and methods of textual analysis. Fellow students Roberta Shaw and Ron

Leprahon shared in the challenge of finding social constructs embedded within ancient

Egyptian and Hebrew.

My journey would not have been as rewarding or as enjoyable without the

encouragement of others who gave instruction and listened to my ideas in gestation. Lois

Vitt was the pivotal force in redirecting my interests to the field of sociology during my

position as research assistant under her direction at the Institute for Socio-Financial

Studies. The friendship, support, and instruction from Liz Colton benefitted me

enormously and raised my thinking to the macro level. Other individuals that deserve

mention are Greg Lewis, Vivian Lu, Katharine Moseley, and Dana Fenton.

The gracious administrative presence of Ron Suleski at the Harvard-Yenching

Institute set a tone that embodied the ideals of the Confucian scholar-official. I thank all

the staff at Harvard-Yenching Library, especially the director, Mr. Liu, James Cheng, and

Ms. Chien Ho; the staff at the Library of Congress; especially Bruce Martin and Helen

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Poe. Mr. Liu Ruiqin of the Cultural Office at the Embassy of the People’s Republic of

China in Washington, D. C. was generous in sending the Beijing Review to me. Karen

McMahon on many occasions solved mysteries of the computer and the coma. At the

critical point of preparation, David Alan carefully read and reread the manuscript to bring

clarity to this work.

Finally, I wish to thank my family and friends for their love and support. First of

all my deep gratitude goes to my parents, Charles and Elizabeth Phillips who did not live

to see the completion of this work. Their examples continue to fuel my growth and

productivity. I am grateful to my daughter Beth who, even during her serious medical

challenges, cheerfully encouraged me to complete this work and supported my travels to

Cambridge and China. Many friends were supportive throughout the long process of this

academic pursuit. My dear friends Shao Liming and Lu Rong Zhen cheered me on during

my years in Cambridge. I am likewise grateful for the friendship of Margo Thoming,

Marie Pelzer, Georgia Herbert, Christopher Marston, and Tracy Ho. A very special

thanks goes to William von Eggars Doering for his impatient prodding and the constant

reminder that challenge is the road to distinction.

vii

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ABSTRACT...... ii

EXPLANATORY NOTE...... iv

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... v

LIST OF TABLES ...... xi

LIST OF FIGURES...... xii

Chapter

1. INTRODUCTION...... 1

2. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS ...... 12

Conceptual Development of the Study ...... 13

Methods ...... 17

3. WESTERN DEVELOPMENT THEORIES AND THE...... 21 EAST-WEST PROBLEMATIQUE

Modernization Theory ...... 22

Dependency Theory ...... 28

World-Systems Theory ...... 32

viii

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Intrusion of the West: Scientism ...... 39

4. MODELS OF SOCIAL CHANGE...... 44

Critique of Weberian Model ...... 44

A Confucian Theory of Social C hange ...... 51

5. TEXTUAL ANALYSIS...... 78

Core Assumptions and Effective Actions ...... 78

Setting an Example Observance of Rituals Self Cultivation/Scholar Tradition

Social M obility ...... 96

Yi Yin Mencian Theory Human Nature in Potentia Mencian Political Theory

Political Power and the Merchant C lass ...... 108

Context of the Han Context of the Song Summary: Power Linked to Scholar Officials

6. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION...... 124

Chinese Ideological Superstructure ...... 124

Convergence and Divergence of Ideologies ...... 128

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Divergence: Militarism and Capitalism

Contemporary Problematique ...... 145

Rites versus Rights: Rujia vs. Fajia

Transvaluation: Feminism

Causality of Change and Value Measurement ...... 169

7. CONCLUSION ...... 195

APPENDIX I: Chronological Table of Rujia fH H e...... 220

APPENDIX II: Glossary ...... 223

APPENDIX III: Figure 6: Hermeneutic Circle ...... 228

APPENDIX IV: Jiang Zemin’s Speech ...... 229

BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 233

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Table 1. Syncretic Conditioning ...... 202

Table 2. Chronological Table of Rujia M M -...... 220

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Figure 1. Weber’s Model of Social Change ...... 46

Figure 2. Confucian Model of Social Change ...... 54

Figure 3. Model of Causal Relationship ...... 58

Figure 4. Conceptual Fram ework ...... 61

Figure 5. New Paradigm Model of Social Change ...... 151

Figure 6. Hermeneutic Circle ...... 228

xii

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INTRODUCTION

Chinese intellectual history is an important ally of Chinese studies in the field of

Western social science. Drawing on advances in the field of sinology and methods of

i 'y philology and hermeneutics, this project explains a coherent ideological superstructure,

thereby working to develop social theory from classical Chinese thought. This study also

will suggest that when Western scholarship integrates core assumptions within Chinese

thought, one is de facto challenged to rethink Western social theory. This project will

show that without Chinese theoretical tools of analysis based on Chinese assumptions,

Western scholarship remains limited in addressing Chinese issues; the work strives to

broaden Western objectivity in relation to the study of Chinese social, political, and

economic issues. The scope of this work places the Chinese worldview of Confucianism

1 My understanding o f early Chinese thought derives largely from Michael Puett, with whom I studied in the Department o f East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University.

2 “Ideological superstructure” refers to thoughts: patterns in which members of society think, conceptualize, evaluate and feel, whereas “structure” refers to behavior and action. Superstructure includes: general ideology (beliefs, values and norms); religion; shared beliefs and values, powers, or forces; and how these intervene directly in operation o f society. These are articulated via: art and literature: symbolic images or representations having esthetics, emotional, or intellectual value; oral or verbal; science: sets o f techniques for acquisition o f knowledge relying on observation and or experience. See Stephen K. Sanderson, Macrosociology: An Introduction to Human Societies. (New York: Harper Collins, 1995), p.2.

3 In this research project, the term “Confucianism” refers to the Scholarly tradition, rather than the deification of Confucius. While we acknowledge a variety of interpretations o f this term, it is beyond the scope of this work to survey those understandings. See Rule, Paul A. 1986. K ’ung-Tzu or Confucius: The Jesuit Interpretation of Confucianism, (London: Allen and Unwin. Eno, 1986) for the suggestion that

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in the field of Western macrosociology; its crucial contribution is to integrate sinological

advances into a model of social development. Confucianism is not the only Chinese

worldview: however, because it can be defined as a coherent, rational social model, this

study considers it, more than any other world view, as operative in Chinese identity and

assumptions that affect social, political, and economic stability, mobility and change.

Macrosociology can be defined as a discipline that is concerned both with large-

scale social patterns, as well as with world networks of interacting societies. This field

concentrates on total societies and their major elements, such as economy, political

system, mode of family life, and the nature of the religious system (s)4

Goals of the Study

Theoretically and methodologically, this study will integrate two disciplines:

sociology and sinology; it strives to demonstrate that social science research concerning

China must be informed by China’s intellectual heritage. This project will explain a

conceptual framework that explores the idea of a Chinese ideological superstructure, while

describing a Chinese longitudinal model of change. From this theoretical position, it will

identify specific Chinese traditional values and discuss these in relation to salient issues

of the transition to modernity. This study will provide a conceptual framework to explain

because the term “Confucian” is so burdened as it is with ambiguities and irrelevant traditional associations, it would be best to relinquish the term. He suggests calling the members of the Confucian school by the name they originally bore: Ru. For the purposes of this study it is too cumbersome to refer to the Confucians and their assumptions Ruist. My future work will apply the terms Ru, Ruist and Ruism. See Zhang Binlin 51® , 1909. Yuan Ru jj[f|§ (On the Origin ofRu). 4 Stephen K. Sanderson, Social Transformations: A General Theory of Historical Development, (Cambridge: Blackwell Publishing, 1995), 2.

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the difference between Chinese assumptions and those in the West, and why

Westernization presents a problem. By establishing a set of core Chinese assumptions in

these fields of scholarship, scholars thus can identify rational, coherent Chinese social

theories and integrate them into Western social science; and confront Western academic

biases toward Chinese development, encouraging more authentically “universal” and

“value-free” social science research and international relations.

In the Weberian sense, Chinese, rather than Western, assumptions produce

“value-free” scholarship on Chinese social science research and analysis. This study will

apply the Confucian model to support the contention that China’s transition to

modernity is being pursued in a specifically Chinese fashion. Drawing on coherent

Confucian assumptions, it will be argued that China’s transition is following a longitudinal

pattern that parallels the dynastic cycle, and that modem development in China has been

and will continue to be different from any other development model commonly

expounded by Western social scientists.

This research takes the position that if Western social science research on China is

to be robust in the twenty-first century, it must be informed by a comprehensive

knowledge of indigenous longitudinal ideas and debates. In order to have a more clear

understanding of Chinese society and the trajectory of its development, two things are

necessary: first, a coherent conceptual framework that explains the assumptions behind

Chinese tradition, values and change; and second, the link between this conceptual

framework and the unique geography of China.

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Importance of the Study

The application of Chinese intellectual thought is especially significant at this

time and space for two reasons: first, China’s current state of reform and transition; and

second, because of unique changes in global dynamics. In the current course of

modernity, China struggles with an “identity crisis.” The study of identity is a serious

social science enterprise that broadened as a scholarly endeavor after World War II.

Sociologists often define “identity” as shared beliefs and sentiments, and also as enacted

social roles and statuses that maintain the social order under what Durkheim called

“collective conscience” the “glue” or organic solidarity.5

Western Enlightenment mentality, which was introduced by the May Fourth

(1919) intellectuals, resulted in China’s transition to modernity.6 This “intrusion” of

Western ideals presented radical social challenges, including the moral crisis brought on by

the vilification of tradition and the resulting identity crisis; the rise of the free market;

and the concern that unified China may break up into “many Chinas.” As Tu Wei-ming

elaborates:

5 For important conceptual antecedents see: Emile Durkheim, 1964. The Division o f Labor in Society, trans.George Simpson (New York: Free Press, 1964); and George H. Mead, Mind, Self and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1934).

6 See Hu Shih, Chongfen Shijiehua yu Quanpan Xihua. (On the Full Universalization of Complete Westernization), in Hu Shi yu Zhongxi Wenhua j t l b (Hu Shi and Chinese and Western Cultures), (Hong Kong: Lienyi Shudian, 1974) 35-52; Maurice Meisner, Li Ta-Chao and the Origins of Chinese Marxism, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982). 7 See Tu Wei-ming, “Cultural China: The Periphery as the Center”; Wang, “Study o f Chinese Identities in Southeast Asia, Ling-chi Wang, “Roots and Changing Identity o f the Chinese in the United States.” Daedalus 120 (Spring 1991). See Kim and Dittmer in reference to the study o f identity crisis and its initial impetus to individual and collective identity crisis set in motion by nationalistic global war in China's Quest for National Identity (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993), 238.

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The Enlightenment mentality is so radically different from any style of thought familiar to the Chinese mind that it challenges all dimensions of the Sinic world. While the Enlightenment faith in instrumental rationality fueled by the Faustian drive to explore, know, and subdue nature spurred spectacular progress in science and technology, it also became a justification for imperialist domination and colonial exploitation. As the international rules of the game, defined in terms of wealth and power, were superimposed on China by gunboat diplomacy, Chinese intellectuals accepted the inevitability of Westernization as a necessary strategy for survival.8

The result of this strategic decision on the part of the May Fourth intellectuals resulted in

an iconoclastic attack on “the rich cultural resources of the Confucian tradition.”9

The materialist path was further necessitated by the crippling and humiliating

condition that China suffered due to the marketing of opium by the British beginning in

the nineteenth century.10 When the craze for chinoiserie “things Chinese” swept over

eighteenth-century European aristocracy, it created a trade imbalance that drained British

silver resources. China’s refusal to engage in a trade agreement led the British to traffick

opium via the East India Company. While this endeavor was largely successful in filling

the silver reserves of the British Crown, China suffered social and economic devastation.

Decline originated in the merchant class of Canton and moved to the elites of Peking.

Western presence in China has influenced the vilification of Chinese culture and

tradition, and left a humiliating mark on its social and economic history. Today, the

8 Tu Wei-ming “Implications of the Rise o f “Confucian” East Asia,” in DMDALUS: Multiple Modernities, Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 129, (Winter 2000) No. 1.: 201. 9 Ibid., 210. 10 See Carl Trocki, Opium, Empire and Global Political Economy: A Study of the Study o f the Asian Opium Trade 1750-1950. (New York: Routledge, 1987). Martin Booth, Opium: A History (New York: St. Martin Press, 1996).

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Chinese government explicitly expresses the position that China will continue to develop

differently from the West and other societies; there is a move to reclaim China’s cultural

roots. When President Jiang Zemin addressed the student body of Cambridge University,

he described China’s model of development as one that will continue to incorporate

“Chinese characteristics” based on Chinese tradition and values; “China will not follow a

Western model,” he said explicitly (Appendix IV).11

What seems to be lacking at this critical time, both implicitly and explicitly in

Western understanding, is an overall conceptual framework of these uniquely “Chinese

characteristics.” The purpose of this dissertation is to demonstrate that Chinese

intellectual history, specifically the Confucian school, is the crucial key to understanding

what President Jiang refers to as “Chinese characteristics” in the current development

model.12

Today, technological advances, the intrusion of Western ideology, and changes in

Chinese economic, political, and social policies bring East and West to a new level of

contact and communication. As Cold War assumptions fade, new paradigms emerge.

Andre Gunder Frank’s work, ReOrient, describes “a coming shift in global hierarchy,”13

and Samuel Huntington poses the “Confucian world” as a new military threat.

As Karl Mannheim remarked, “different societies developed differently” because

11 For the speech given by Jiang Zemin at Cambridge University on October, 1999,Beijing Review Nov., 1999 see APPENDIX IV.

12 Ibid. 13 Andre Gunder Frank, ReOrient, Global Economy in the Asian Age (Berkeley: University of California, 1998).

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underlying social assumptions are different, they lead to different expressions.14 This

view is critical to a clearer understanding of longitudinal and current Chinese social

structure, institutions, mobility and change. In the Mannheimian sense, Jiang Zemin has

asserted that we should expect and accept that China will continue to develop a different

model of society — with “Chinese characteristics.”15

This study argues that, in the Weberian sense, the Confucian scholarly tradition

continues to influence action in terms of social institutions, structure, change, mobility,

and conventional social habits. This study shows how a conceptual framework and

ideological superstructure based on Ruism, as introduced in this paper, is vital to research

and analysis concerning the current transition in China.

Advances in sinological scholarship now allow us to understand the coherent

assumptions of Chinese thought more clearly, permitting scholars to push beyond

previous work that tends to essentialize Chinese society.16 Therefore, this work

proposes a clear distinction between Chinese Studies as a sub-field of social science, and

sino-sociology, which requires integration of sinological advances in hermeneutics (i.e., a

sub-field specifically aimed at the application of the sinological approach drawing on

primary sources of Chinese intellectual history). This distinction suggests the reversal of

14 Karl Mannheim, Collected Works of Karl Mannheim, (New York, Routledge, 1997).

15 See APPENDIX IV; Jiang makes explicit reference to Confucius as the teacher o f conventional wisdom. This worldview is highlighted in relation to the values o f traditional Chinese culture. 16 i.e, the latinized version by Catholic interpretations: see Lionel M. Jensen, Manufacturing Confucianism: Chinese Traditions and Universal Civilizations (Durham and London: Duke University, 1997).

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. the approach that applies study of China to Western thinking, and works to clarify

Chinese theories on thier own logic and terms. This dissertation will explain a coherent

logic behind this Chinese ideological superstructure that supports and drives China’s

reform and transition to modernity in a “Chinese fashion.”

Statement of the Problem

Confucianism is known in the West more for its obscure complication than for its

profundity. As Heiner Roetz notes, Chinese ethics have “for the most part had rather bad

press in the West.” 1 7 During the past three decades, Western scholars in the field of

sinology18 have worked to translate and interpret classical Chinese literature, and thus

provide a coherent body of Chinese thought. Though facing substantial resistance by the

Western philosophical tradition, the anthologies of Chan and de Bary were ground

breaking achievements that began the movement to eradicate language, conceptual, and

cultural barriers between East and West. The works of Wing-Tsit Chan, K.C. Chang, de

Bary, D. C. Lau, James Legge, Arthur Waley and Burton Watson can be understood as

significant intellectual advances in Western understanding of Chinese thought.19 Tu Wei-

17 For an explanation o f how late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century philosophy, especially German Idealism, has been the significant influence see Heiner Roetz, Confucian Ethics o f the Axial Age: A Reconstruction Under the Aspect of the Breakthrough Toward Postconventional Thinking (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993). 18 See list o f Classical literature at the end o f the bibliography. 19 See Wing-Tsit Chan, A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973); William Theodore de Bary, ed. Sources of Chinese Tradition ; Kwang-chih Chang, Shang Civilization, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980). James Legge, The Works o f Mencius, (New York:Dover Publishing, 1970); D. C. Lau. The Analects o f Confucius, (London: Penguin Books, 1993);

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ming notes that “our generation” put Confucianism on the same intellectual level with

Plato and Aristotle. Three steps facilitate a more realistic understanding of Chinese social

policies and cultural behavior: first, the above-mentioned advancements in sinology;

second, Western philosophical scholarship began to accept this body of thought as

worthy of study (during the past three decades); and third, integration of the body of

coherent Chinese intellectual thought into the field of Western social science research.

Some scholars point to an academic bias toward Chinese intellectual thought in

Western social science. The contention is made that analysis of China is limited to

Western theory and assumptions, and therefore overstates an interest in measuring the

Westernization of China in terms of social, political,and economic change. Ronald

Inglehart’s (1977,1990,1997,2000) ambitious longitudinal study that draws on the

World Values Surveys concerns Modernization in relation to trajectories of social change

is a useful example to explore this debate. This study measures democracy and religion in

relation to economic growth. The Weber study on the Protestant ethic established a

substantial trend of analogies (Bellah, et al.) Some critics contend that Western research

written from the ambitious perspective of measuring “world” values faces inherent limits

0 f) and is Eurocentric. Inglehart’s study also fails to reflect sufficiently Chinese

modernization in terms of indigenous assumptions. This project will show how

Arthur Waley, The Analects o f Confucius, (New York: Vintage Books, 1938); Burton Watson, Hsun Tzu: The Basic Writings (New York: Columbia University Press, 1963); Burton Watson. Chuang Tzu: Basic Writings, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996). 20 Ronald Inglehart, Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic, and Political Change in 43 Societies. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979).

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Inglehart’s research project overstates Western assumptions and overlooks other social

realities such as China’s transition to modernization with Chinese characteristics, based

on indigenous assumptions.

Iain Johnson notes for example, that “much of Western and Chinese literature

accepts that contemporary Chinese strategic thought was to an important degree

influenced by ancient traditions in philosophy and statecraft, in particular the Confucian-

Mencian discourse.”21 Johnson’s systematic work on Chinese political sociology

demonstrates how the Confucian-Mencian model can be applied to contemporary

strategic theory and, thus, that this tradition is relevant to modernity. He asserts the need

to “simply to understand and demystify” Chinese thinking. This study will address that

problem by suggesting that cultural values circumscribe social action, primarily by

directing people’s interest in certain directions; and it sets out a basic Chinese theory of

historic social change. Clearly, the ideas of Eastern and Western thinkers address the

same sociological issues of social stability, structure, change, and mobility, but in very

different ways. Only when informed by a comprehensive knowledge of the inherent logic

of these indigenous ideas can Western scholarship reflect value free research and analysis

and hence, lead to balanced social, political, and economic debates in terms of international

affairs and foreign policy.

21 See Iain Johnson, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995).

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Organization of the Thesis

This study is divided into six chapters. Chapter 2 establishes the conceptual

development of the study and its research methods. Chapter 3 places the Chinese

perspective of the intrusion of Western Enlightenment thought into Western theories of

development; this chapter highlights the theoretical cleavage between Western and

Chinese development assumptions. Chapter 4 draws on the Weberian theory of

development to illustrate the limitations of Western assumptions in relation to Chinese

development, and it explains how to incorporate core Confucian debates as a unique

development model of “syncretic conditioning.” Chapter 5 analyzes the seminal works

of Confucian thought within primary sources of Chinese intellectual history. Chapter 6

identifies the ideal type of Confucianism by explaining an ideological superstructure

within a longitudinal model of change, and suggests how traditional values relate to

modern China. Chapter 6 also points to the limitations of Western assumptions

concerning causality of change and value measurement. Chapter 7 concludes from this

analysis the importance of traditional Chinese assumptions as a rational theory in social

science research.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER 2.

RESEARCH DESIGN AND RESEARCH METHODS

This chapter contains a brief description of the conceptual evolution of this

research design and the importance of its interdisciplinary nature, followed by an

explanation of the methods that test the theoretical model. The historical ideal type of

Confucianism is the key concept of analysis.

This project applies two methods of research: first, intensive Chinese language

study and textual analysis of primary sources in Chinese intellectual history; and second,

comparative analysis of Western social theories of change and a theory of Chinese

development. The orientation of this qualitative research is predominantly historical, and

develops an idea of Chinese social theory conceived with the practical intention of

providing a tool of analysis that facilitates seeing another “social reality.” The model

integrates Chinese ideals of the past and turns on assumptions that cultivate social

solidarity. The study identifies three important elements in relation to the development

of core Confucian assumptions: the rational line (the break with Shang), the rise of the

Zhou ideal, and the persistent drive to unify and perfect society within a fixed geography

of vast resources.

The study will identify the historical ideal type of Confucianism as the key

concept for analysis. The conceptual framework includes social action, solidarity, and

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mobility. The application of textual analysis strives to support the notion that

Confucianism can be understood as complex social theory that addresses macro issues of

power, policy, social stability, unity and large scale social change, as well as micro issues

of social norms and values, social mobility and class, and family stability.

Conceptual Development of the Study

Hermeneutics and Philology

Previous academic coursework and fieldwork in the 1970s, in the Department of

Near Eastern Studies at the University of Toronto, introduced me to methods of

hermeneutics and philology as research tools in fields of ancient civilizations. As an

Egyptology major, course work requirements in ancient Egyptian languages and Hebrew22

demonstrated to me the critical importance of close readings of primary source materials

(i.e., original texts and interpretation.) The historian of ancient civilizations must develop

a mastery of all forms of written language within his or her area of concentration. Only

then can the units of analyses (e. g., social, political and/or economic issues) be fully

placed within the specific historical context.

22 For comprehensive texts on script, morphology, syntax, and vocabulary, see Sir Alan Gardener, Egyptian Grammar (London: Oxford University Press, 1973); Adolf Erman,Neuagyptische Grammatik Leipzig: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1968); Adolf Erman und Hermann Grapow, Agyptishes Handwdrterbuch, (Berlin: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandelung Hildesheim, 1974). For texts in English: Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature: The Old and Middle kingdoms Readings. (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 1973); James B. Prichard, ed. Ancient Near Eastern Texts: Relating to the Old Testament Kitchen, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969); K. A. Ramesside Inscriptions: Historical and Biographical, (Oxford: B. H. Blackwell, Ltd., 1970); Winston D. Thomas,Documents from Old Testament Times. (New York: Harper & Row, 1961).

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As Wilkinson points out, “Language is one of the most sensitive barometers of

change in society.” 23 Detailed study of subtle nuances allows researchers to examine

closely the evolution and variations of ideas, norms and values, as well as the contingency

of events.

Methods of hermeneutics24 and philology demonstrate that indigenous ideas are

best understood and analyzed through primary rather than secondary sources. My

experience in Toronto’s Department of Near Eastern Studies with professors Donald

Redford, the late R. J. Williams, Nick Millet and Ron Lutz taught me the importance of

the development of words and language and their relationship to social and cultural

development. It was at Toronto that I studied how core cultural assumptions are

embedded in ancient writings, and began to think about the links between antiquity and

the evolution of societies. Though I did not continue to pursue the field of Egyptology,

the influence of those lessons on my thinking is evident in this research.

Equally influential at that time was one elective survey course in Chinese

philosophy.25 This introduction to seminal works of Chinese intellectuals, their ideas,

and their debates had a pivotal influence on the development of my interests. The

substance of this literature made a lasting impression — in particular, the Confucian

23 Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: a Manual (Cambridge: Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series, 46, 1998) 17. 24 For discussion of the theory o f hermeneutics see Kurt Mueller-Vollmer, The Hermeneutics Reader. (New York: The Continuum Publishing Company, 1997). 25 For one o f the first anthologies in English see Wing-Tsu Chan, A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973).

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concept of filial piety and the assumptions concerning elders, sages, and ancestors. At

that time, I began to consider the importance of core Chinese values; and now, in this

forthcoming research, I will make the connection between seminal Confucian concepts and

norms and their relation to contemporary China. While I value and employ the methods I

learned in Toronto’s Department of Near Eastern Studies, the ideas and debates of and

about the Ancient Far East have held my lasting professional interest. In this current

research, I join the historical methods with social theory to develop a longitudinal model

of social change.

Sociological Perspective

My introduction to the sociological perspective came via experience in the field of

gerontology which focused on social and economic policy concerning the elderly. In

1994,1 began work as a research assistant at the Institute for Socio-Financial Studies on

the publication of the Encyclopedia o f Socio-Financial Studies under the direction of Jurg

Seigenthaler and Lois Vitt. Among my responsibilities, this position gave me the

opportunity to write an article on the bias toward the elderly in American media.

At this point that I began to reflect on my previous introduction to Chinese

debates, and the crucial Chinese cultural ideal of filial piety — the respect for elders. I

began to think about the core assumptions at work behind these differing American and

Chinese attitudes in relation to social theory. I decided to explore these and other

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sociological issues on the macro level in terms of a dichotomy between Eastern and

Western assumptions.

During my introductory methods course work in 1995,1 designed and carried out

a research study that strived to measure the relationship between the rise of the free

market in China and traditional Chinese values. In the Weberian sense, I began to think

about a Confucian conceptual framework, purely from the Chinese perspective. The goal

was to push beyond the some limitations in the interpretation of Confucianism and,

drawing on previous research perspectives of Near Eastern Studies, to approach core

cultural assumptions by exploring the embedded roots within original Chinese texts. It

was clear that a comprehensive knowledge of Chinese intellectual history was essential as

a research method for analyzing social change in China. I made the commitment to study

Chinese language and history. This study is the evolution of that 1995 project.

Chinese Intellectual History

With letters of recommendation from my home university dissertation committee,

I applied to and was accepted by Yale and Harvard universities to engage in intensive

Mandarin language courses in the summers of 1995 and 1996. During the academic year

of 1996-1997,1 read Chinese intellectual history at Harvard in the department of East

Asian Languages and Civilizations with professors Michael Puett, Peter Bol, and Bill

Kirby. This study provided the foundation of my understanding of the earliest ideas and

events that influenced the development of China up to the modem period. At the same

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time, I studied with Tu Wei-ming, director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute,

participating in his conference course on the debates and literature of contemporary

Chinese intellectuals. This comprehensive work with these scholars at Harvard formed

the crucial component of my research and understanding of Confucian assumptions and

their role in the current Chinese value system.

Methods

Textual analysis

This project applies the scholarly method of the historian (hermeneutics) to the

field of social science. As Feng Yu-lan points out, for example, the function of a history

of philosophy explains what the words of the philosophers of the past actually meant to

these men themselves, and not what we think they ought to mean

Drawing on my research on core Confucian assumptions and the historical events

that are crucial to the conceptual framework of this work, I placed social science

perspectives in the context of these ideas and historical events in time and space. The

result was the identification of the longitudinal pattern that I interpreted as a theoretical

model of development and change.

My position is that the evolution of the Confucian ideological superstructure and

its longitudinal role in development, can be extracted from and supported by analysis of

26 Feng Yu-lan, 1976. A Short History of Chinese Philosophy, trans. Derk Bodde (New York: Free Press, 1976), 332.

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the classical works of Analects, Mencius, Hsun Tzu and Dong Zhong Shu. The intention

is to explain how seminal ideas found in these texts played a powerful role in the

unification of China over the long span of political and intellectual reform, and transition;

and also to support the contention that while the formal Confucian institutions and the

imperial meritocracy are now history, the core assumptions and values are still operative

norms. In large part, the Confucian ideological superstructure remains intact in the minds

and actions of contemporary Chinese.27

Confucian intellectuals developed the enduring Chinese propensity toward

unification. Chinese history is characterized by a contingency of unification periods,

followed by periods of collapse, then returning to reunification under Confucian ideals.

Careful study of the intellectual debates during times of collapse, reform and transition

reveals the continued position of power.

Confucian intellectuals made the argument that morality is crucial to the unity of

society and the state, and took the position that power should not fall into the hands of

the merchant class. Confucian scholar-officials fought to maintain their powerful

influence over statecraft and government. I will suggest that Weber’s interpretation that

Confucianism worked to repress commerce and trade in general is flawed, and that the

scholar-officials worked to keep the merchant class out of government positions, not out

of business.

27 The argument concerning Confucian authoritarianism goes beyond the scope of this project.

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Part 1 will look at the beginning of the cycle o f social unification in terms o f the

continuum o f the Confucian debates on society and the state, and elaborate on the

Confucian cycle as a continuum that parallels the dynastic cycle and its crucial effect on

society and history.

Part 2 will examine the roots o f social mobility embedded in the Mencian

interpretation o f Yi Yin explaining the social construct places literati (shi) at the top of

the social hierarchy. We will elaborate on his stated importance o f setting a moral

example, and relate Mencian theory to the development model.

Part 3 will consider intellectual debate concerning the profit motive in the context

of the Han and Song periods. The analysis will demonstrate the Confucian position that

power should remain linked to moral principle, and it will show how these Confucians

worked to limit the power o f the merchant class. Later, we will identify similar

ideological tensions at work in current reform concerning the rise o f the free market and

the Chinese resistance to Western capitalism.

Theory Development

This thesis draws on classical debates to develop the Confucian ideal of moral

education and self-cultivation into a model of power, social mobility, and change, one that

is linked to China’s social and political and economic development. The strong link

between education and political life permeates ancient Chinese literature; and by the late

twelfth-century CD, the institution of the civil service examination was based on the

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candidate’s knowledge of the Confucian classics. Zhiyong Xiong, Dean of the Foreign

Affairs College in Beijing, spoke to the issue of Sino-American relations at a recent

Chinese Studies conference on education in Washington, D. C. Zhiyong identified the

crucial block in Sino-Westem relations as the lack of Western understanding of Chinese

culture. He postulated a the connection between this lack of Western understanding and

current Western vilification of China. This theoretical work attempts to diminish the

cleavage between Eastern and Western understanding by elaborating on core values of

unity and exemplary citizenship that can be generalized to the global population.

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WESTERN DEVELOPMENT THEORIES

This chapter examines the literature concerning assumptions of the

Modernization, Dependency and World-Systems theories. The death of Chinese Premier

Deng Xiao Ping in February 1997 passed the baton of China’s formal power to President

Jiang Zemin. During what is widely regarded as China’s state of post-Communism and

progress toward a market economy, substantial Western literature speculates on Chinas

development strategy in terms of structural adjustment and future direction. The critical

issue is how this still-centralized government will integrate modernity through political,

economic and social reform; will China follow a Western model of societal development?

According to the U.N. 1997 Human Development Report, China is exhibiting

enormous growth. In the past forty-five years, China has made impressive reductions in

human poverty; infant mortality has been reduced from two hundred to forty-two per

1,000 births; and life expectancy has increased at birth from thirty-five to sixty-nine

years. Today, almost all children go to school, and adult illiteracy (80 percent in the

1950s) has fallen to 19 percent.

Substantial literature attempts to explain why societies on the East Asian

periphery made the industrial breakthrough while other Asian societies did not. Scholars

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have made a strong argument to support the notion that because these five societies share

a Confucian heritage, the key to their industrial success lies in Confucianism.

This literature considers the unique historical conditions of mainland China's

economy, politics, and ideology, and explores some of the specific problems facing the

mainland that were not a consideration for the industrialization of East Asia. The

transition to a free market economy in China began to emerge after some of the

assumptions of Western classical modernization theory were challenged. The intellectual,

political, and economic changes due to technological advances in a Global economy have

created a new and different social environment.

Modernization Theory

Following the Second World War, the Modernization school developed as a

means to research a model of development for promoting economic and political stability

in the third world that would resist the loss of new states to the Soviet Communist

bloc.28 The U.S. spearheaded two initiatives to reconstruct the world economy: the

Marshall Plan and the Bretton Woods program. The Marshal Plan transferred billions of

dollars in U. S. aid to European states and Japan to restore trade and price stability, and

to raise production both functioning as geopolitical goals in the Cold War. In 1944, the

Bretton Woods conference laid the cornerstones for the international banking system (the

International Monetary Fund and the World Bank) in order to revitalize regions

28 Alvin Y. So, Social Change and Development, Modernization, Dependency and World systems Theory, (California: Sage Publications, 1990), 17.

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devastated by war and colonialism. Funding was committed to extending free

enterprise.29 During the postwar period, the U.N. declared the 1960s and 1970s the

“Development Decade.”

Modernization Theoretical Assumptions

Levy defined “Modernization” as the extent to which tools and inanimate sources

of power are used.30 This paper will address three specific assumptions that came under

criticism in the 1960s: Modernization assumes that trade is mutually beneficial;

Modernization does not recognize culture; and Modernization's view of poverty is that

inequality is a natural part of the first stages of industrialization. Both Modernization

praxis and theory were questioned.

The assumption that trade is mutually beneficial for both periphery and core

nations was challenged because there is evidence that many periphery nations have

suffered economically, socially, and culturally from first world expansion.

No episode in modem history is more exemplary of trade aggression than the

Opium War of 1839-1842.31 For the Chinese, this is the glaring statement of barbaric

29 Philip McMichael. Development and Social Change, (California: Pine Forge Press, 1996) Chap. 2. 30 Ibid. 31 According to Wilkinson 1840 is the beginning o f the Opium War. For discussion on recent historical trends on periodization see Wilkinson pp. 1-8. For discussion o f the Opium War see Arthur Waley, The Opium War 'Through Chinese Eyes (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990); Jonathan Spence, The Search for Modern China, (New York: W. W. Norton & Company. 1990) 155-158; John King Fairbank, 1965. A History of East Asian Civilization: East Asia the Modern Transformation, (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1965) Vol. 2, pp. 136-146; Conrad Schirohauer, 1991. A Brief History of Chinese Civilization (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1991), 261.

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Western imperialism. From the point of view of Modernization, the nineteenth-century

British moved rapidly ahead in industrial technology, organizational skills, and military

power; and by their Enlightenment attitudes of individual freedom and economic growth,

Britain justified demanding commercial opportunity in China. However, the persistence

of Western trade expansion did not penetrate the immovable inertia of Chinas institutions.

Chinese society, grounded in a system and attitude of self-sufficiency, refused

trade sanctions and continued to sell tea to the West; but as a protection of its internal

industry, refused to trade. There was nothing that the Chinese wanted in sufficient

quantity —- there was no market for luxury items, that could strike a balance.

As a result, mounting concern over the silver drain from the purchase of tea,

and Chinas refusal to trade, caused the two nations to stand in opposition. During the

late-Ching period in China, the British (with no diplomatic relations) launched one of the

crucial intrusions of the West by marketing opium via the East India Company.

Aggressive trade began along the Chinese coast affecting the lowest social members, the

merchant class; and soon the addiction swept up the social scale and across the mainland.

By the 1820s and 1830s, the spread of addiction resulted in the outflow of silver that

affected the bimetallic currency system. China was crippled, economically and socially,

when this public health problem became a fiscal problem.

In 1834, the British Crown abolished the East India Company's monopoly on

the China trade, which was seen as a victory for English advocates of free trade. This

resulted in an increased flow of opium, and China’s problem worsened. By 1836, the

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Confucian government, led by the Manchu, considered legalizing opium, but the moralists

won and agreed on suppression. Dealers and addicts were prosecuted with great vigor,

and imprisonments and executions were widespread. After repeated pressure and

warnings from the Chinese government to the British Crown of prohibition enforcement,

news reached the Crown that royal subjects had been arrested. The British employed

force with sophisticated guns and warships, slaughtering weakened Manchus, armed only

with knives. Opium use remained a serious social problem until the early 1950s.

The events of the Opium War preceded the Modernization project, but they

are a vivid example of what has been perceived as a legacy of Western economic

aggression and its negative results on China. These details concerning the Opium War are

significant for two reasons: They are a potent example of one major criticism of a tenet of

classical Modernization, which argues that trade is mutually beneficial; and they are also

an explicit example of what can be the hegemonic, ethnocentric nature of economic

expansion, as well as being exemplary of the long-term social, economical, and political

effects on China as postulated by Dependency theory.

Western Assumptions Concerning Culture

Modernization has been criticized because it discounts culture and does not

take into consideration the force of national identity. Philip McMichael and Gordon S.

Redding argue that culture is more salient in some economic systems than in others. The

Confucian model is an example of linking economic development and the role of culture.

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The economic culture of the Chinese is the aggregate of the shared beliefs of the actors in

the economic system. Chinese entrepreneurship is a specific form of organization in

which the economic process has not fundamentally altered the original values that shape

the rules by which people cooperate with each other.32 Redding maintains that

entrepreneurship is the spirit of their form of capitalism. To understand this cooperative

system, it is essential to understand Confucianism as the structure that supports the

economic system.

Confucian debates through which the diffusion of ideas and decisions became

manifest inform researchers on Chinese cultural code and identity. The campaign of Mao

Zedong's cultural revolution linked Confucianism with the feudal class of literati elites,

and thus was formally banished. (Confucian scholar officials had been a powerful

defining force behind all the hierarchical social, political, and economic institutions that

Mao sought to eradicate.)

Assumption Concerning Inequality

Modernization’s view of poverty (that inequality is a natural part of the first

stages of industrialization) came under the same attacks as Parsonian functionalism.

Both justified inequality as part of the system and thus, supported the status quo,

leaving little room for change at the fundamental level. Confucian attitude would be

32 Gordon S. Redding. The Spirit of Chinese Capitalism (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1993), 238.

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more in line with the ideals of Marx as a fairer system in theory than a system that

defends inequality and individual gain outside of the collective system.

Andrew Nathan describes how in August 1980, Deng presented an eloquent

statement of the benefits of democracy in an effort to put the tectonic movements of

the reform process into place. He points out that in Deng’s address, democracy would

provide wisdom for economic development, assure a smooth leadership succession,

recruit new and more able cadres, restrict overcentralization of power and consequent

bureaucratic immobility, and prevent “hasty decisions” by cadres. It would also

discourage corruption and prevent the reemergence of a one-man dictatorship, all of

which would promote the smooth development of Modernization.33

While most in the East and West at all levels were shocked by the 1989

incident at Tiennamen Square, many nonetheless believe that Deng Xiao Ping is entitled

to credit for Chinas economic boom. Though formally Confucianism is not

acknowledged as an active ingredient in this success, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, and

Singapore could set the example.

The assumptions of Modernization have been challenged. Significant literature

argues that trade is not always mutually beneficial and that modernization often has a

negative effect on existing cultures. In response to rigorous criticism, the

Modernization school revised some of these basic assumptions and invited new

research agendas.

33 Andrew Nathan. Chinese Democracy, (Berkeley: University o f California, 1985), 224.

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Dependency Theory

The Dependency school rose as a critique of the mainstream Modernization

school by defining the harmful effects of economic expansion resulting from the

economic dependency of third world countries. Dependency theory seeks to explain

underdevelopment as the product of the failure by periphery nations to adopt the more

efficient systems of developed countries.34 Its principle assertion is that the economy

of one country is dependent on that of another due to the development and expansion

of the other’s economy. Theotonio dos Santos described this relationship, based on

world trade, as a polarized relationship between the dominant, or core, first world

countries and the dependent, or periphery, third world countries. Because of the

nature of this relationship, it is possible for the periphery nations to reach a

self-sustaining economy. Conversely, they could remain in the shadow of the

expansion of the core countries, at the expense of their own indigenous industries. The

Marxist tradition has looked at imperialism as a study of the process of expansion of

the imperialist centers and of their subsequent domination. Modernization theorists

responded to the criticism by characterizing these perspectives as a propaganda

fragment of Marxism.

Explicit in this theoretical position is the need to redefine “development.”

Modernization encompasses more than industry, production, and improved living

34 Theotonia dos Santos, “The Structure o f Dependence” in Development and Underdevelopment and Underdevelopment: the Political Economy o f Inequality (Boulder: Lynne Reinner Publishers, Inc. 1993), 194.

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standards. Dependency theory strives to incorporate the cultural impact of economic

change. According to Dependency theorists, rescue policies of foreign aid actually

created debt problems for periphery nations, while giving profit and control to banks of

the core nations. Latin American nations, Mexico and Brazil are classic case studies in

Dependency theory.35 Dependency theorists challenged the notion that categorized

nations as failures because they had not adopted what the First World defined as the

more effective systems of developed countries.

In the 1970s, Herman Kahn36 argued that societies based on the Confucian

ethic may, in many ways, be superior to Western societies in the pursuit of

industrialization, affluence and modernization. He asserted the strengths of the

Confucian ethic in the modem world, postulating that the central difference is less

emphasis on advancing individual (sell) interests. Emphasis on cooperation among

complementary elements and on the familial model, produces a synergism of

harmonious human relations. A sense of hierarchy and complementary relations is

much stronger in Confucian than in Western societies. Kahn wrote on the cultural

origins of economic growth in relation to the enormous industrial development of

Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, after World War II. The success of these peripheral

countries is attributed to the cultural influence of Confucianism. Kahn questions if the

3 5 Fernando Henri Cardoso and Enzo Faletto. Dependency and Development in Latin America, trans. M. M. Urquiedi, (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 1977); So, 1990, Chapter 7.

36 Herman Kahn. “The Confucian Ethic & Economic Growth,” in Development and Underdevelopment, the Political Economy o f Inequality, (Boulder: Lynne Reinner Publishers, 1993), 170.

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absence of a “Confucian ethic” held back the development of nations such as those in

Latin America and Africa. He also reminds us of Weber’s argument that the Protestant

ethic was useful in promoting the rise and spread of Modernization in the West.

Culturally, Western societies tend to strive for likeness in identity and group

habits, thus, setting themselves apart from each other as “better” and hence develop in

the much applauded ‘competitive spirit,’ setting one group against the other.

Confucianism promotes acceptance of other groups as part of a whole, without which

the individual cannot succeed. Kahn offers:

Since the crucial issues in a modem society increasingly revolve around these equity issues and on making organizations work well, the Neo-Confucian cultures have great advantages. As opposed to the earlier Protestant ethic, the modem Confucian ethic is superbly designed to create and foster loyalty, dedication, responsibility, and commitment and to intensify identification with the organization and one’s role in organization.37

The economic successes in post-World War II Asia are built on these neo-Confucian

principles, rather than those whose identification and association tend to lead to

egalitarianism, disunity, confrontation and excessive compensation or repression.

Neo-Confucian societies that are motivated by and dedicated to the loyalty of various

institutions have higher growth rates than other cultures.

In his 1979 work, Kahn reported that during the previous twenty-five years an

extraordinary talent for economic development was demonstrated in the People’s

37 Ibid.

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Republic of China, in both North and South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and

Singapore; and other various Chinese ethnic groups in Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia.

Much of the literature in the 1960s challenged Modernization theorists for

assuming that trade is mutually beneficial. Some significant evidence suggests that some

periphery nations have suffered economically, socially, and politically because of First

World efforts to advance these nations economically. A pointed criticism contends that

Modernization is limited because it does not recognize the role of culture. We have

suggested that the Modernization movement, though it was presented as a humanitarian

effort, was hegemonic and ethnocentric in its consequences.

As with Functionalism, Modernization's view of inequality as a natural part of

the first stages of industrialization is presented as a justification, and therefore is

unacceptable to Dependency theorists. There is also evidence that classical

modernization was politically and economically determined. After serious criticism in the

1960s, new Modernization took a more sophisticated multi-institutional approach to

multilineal paths of development that included interaction between external and internal

factors.

Entrepreneurship

Classical Modernization argued that entrepreneurial familism was a form of

nepotism that weakened discipline and thwarted the free market in Hong Kong. Wong

criticizes this view of classical Modernization theorists for not acknowledging the

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important role of entrepreneurial familism in promoting economic development. He

points out that failing to accept this economically dynamic ethos as the competitive

strength of Hong Kong's burgeoning industry was a gross oversight. ”5 Si

Vogel's work, The Four Little Dragons: the Spread o f Industrialization in East

Asia, contends that because the East Asian nations in his study, (Taiwan, South Korea,

Hong Kong, and Singapore) shared a Confucian heritage, their economic success was due

to neo-industrial Confucianism. He postulates that their growth derives from Confucian

bureaucrats who, selected on the basis of merit and moral judgment, had a sense of

responsibility for the collective rather than individual gain, and a sense of responsibility

for social order, including the overall moral tone of society.39

The West is just beginning to understand neo-Confucian industrialism as the

structure of these nations’ development. Wong’s position supports the notion that

China’s pattern of modernization will proceed with familial enterprises, though it will

diverge somewhat because of differences in social and political structures.40

World-Systems Theory

Unlike Dependency scholars who focus on the boom and bust of nation-states,

World-Systems theorists consider the historical dynamic of the world

38 R. Bin Wong, China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience (New York: Cornell University Press, 1997).

39 Ezra F Vogel, The Four Little Dragons: The Spread o f Industrialization in East Asia, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991), 93. 40 So, 1991, p. 63.

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economy.41 The ideological contention between the Modernization school and the

Dependency school coexisted as contrasting perspectives of American social scientists in

an effort to study the problems of the third world development 42

During the mid-1970s, a third intellectual contender entered the academic arena of

Development theory. Led by Immanuel Wallerstein, researchers identified new aspects in

the capitalist world-economy that had not been explored by the other schools. The goal

of this new perspective was to rethink critical issues by treating the entire world as its

unit of analysis, and to apply a historical methodology that perceives reality as a state of

flux. Theoretically, it operates on a trimodal structure and transcends the deterministic

view of the direction of development.

World-Systems theory moves beyond Dependency in that it no longer operates

within the confines of the capitalist world-economy. Influenced by French historical

methodology, World-Systems analysis perceives social reality as a state of flux; it seeks

to explain a transforming reality. Though it recognizes the profound impact of socialist

revolutions, World-Systems analysis does not acknowledge their viability of that as a

solution to Third World development. Conceptually, World-Systems studies the long

term, large-scale wholes relative to time-space autonomy and integrity, which Wallerstein

41 Immanuel Wallerstein, The Politics of the Capitalist World-Economy (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1984), 13-26. 42 See Dependency writers: Samir Amin, Accumulation on a World Scale (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1974); Cardoso, Fernando Henri and Enzo Falett, Dependency and Development in Latin America, irons. M.M. Urquiedi (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977).

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calls “historical systems.” It is a system which has a history, i. e. it has a genesis,

historical development, and a close.43 Theoretically, World-System’s capital economy

includes a third element, the semiperiphery, which exhibits characteristics of both the core

and the periphery.

This three-tiered model adds another dimension to understanding and studying

the nature of change; whereas in the Dependency model, the core always exploits the

periphery and the periphery is bound to Dependency development. The theoretical

addition of the semiperiphery is consistent with the new paradigm of development in

East Asia and the transcendence of their peripheral statuses in the late twentieth century.

This much broader research focus provides a more appropriate conceptual and

theoretical structure for this study’s research question. Indeed, the inclusive World-

Systems perspective is appropriate to this field of inquiry. The utility of knowing the

origins of nations, to understand the conditions and ideologies of a society, is of necessary

value; and Wallersteins’ approach, which looks at the long-term holistic mechanisms of

society, provides a compatible theory from which to analyze China's transition.

Chase-Dunn and Hall argue for a shift in the unit of analysis to produce more

powerful theories of long-term historical development better to serve problems in a global

system.44 Conceptual stratification then provides an apparatus which divides the global

43 So, 1991 p. 169. 44 Christopher Chase-Dunn and Thomas D. Hall, 1997, Rise and Demise: Comparing World- Systems (Boulder: Westview Press, 1997).

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hierarchy of labor to include intersocietal interactions of societal change in terms of

regions, communities, firms, neighborhoods and households.

Theories of both Marx and Weber pointed to limitations of societal change:

Marx’s economic model argued an evolutionary line of social change would end with

Communism. Weberian theory asserted that capitalism would never develop in

Confucian societies because of the lack of the Protestant work ethic. However, some

scholars have surmised ideas beyond what they see as the Western limits of capitalist

ideals, just as a succession of theorists and analysts failed to predict that the economic

boom in Asia would be related to the Confucian ethic. Vogel reasoned that the

Confucianism worked in modernity, and explained entrepreneurial business based on

familial enterprize, a phenomenon that perpetuated small businesses into industrial

giants.45

Andre Gunder Frank: ReOrient-ation

Gunder Frank postulates an inter-connected world rather than abstracted group

social constructs. He contends that the universality of social theory has not gone far

enough in the social sciences — scholars should begin by accepting that the world

economy did not begin in Europe. He points to the need for scholarship that produces

new histories, believing that new theory and new political policy will follow. It is his

45 Vogel, 1991.

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contention that we need “horizontal integrative macro history” which looks for

connections throughout the world.”46

Frank challenges the Marxist and Weberian assumptions that Europe spawned the

beginning of the world economy through some unique genius. “European genius,” be it

biological, environmental, institutional, or economic, had become justification to colonize

and take possession of resources the rest of the world.47 Frank argues that this

conventional worldview is pure racism. His work merges the world economic system,

ideas of history, and social theory.48 He acknowledges a broader history of economic

and political reality in the context of “Globalization.”

Frank addresses a political situation that is responding to a social and economic

reality: the rise of Asia, particularly China. The world is de facto being “re Oriented,”

and policy will necessarily be informed by these trends. This shift of the center of

economic gravity to the East is accepted as evidence of the continuation of a cycle, and he

argues that the World-Systems predates Europe in the nineteenth century.

Frank asserts that Western hegemony is predatory, and cites as evidence the

marginalization of China due to Colonialism and the Opium War. He emphasizes the

need to “deconstruct what we were taught — the conventional wisdom that European

46 See Andre Gunder Frank, ReOrient, Global Economy in the Asian Age (Berkeley: University o f California, 1998). “World System Economic Cycles and Hegemonical Shift to Europe 100 B.C. to 1500 A.D.,”Journal o f European Economic History 22:1 (Spring): 155-183. 47 Ibid.

48 Andre Gunder Frank and B. K. Gills. “World-Systems Economic Cycles and Hegemonical Shift to Europe 100 B,C, to 1500 A.D.” in The Journal o f European Economic History, 22, No. 1 (Spring 1993), 155.

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genius is responsible for economic development — and look at Asia before Europe when

Asia was predominant until 1800. Then, the prevailing false consciousness in the West

gives way to the realization that Asia is simply recovering from Western aggression and

marginalization. The world “reorientation” to Asia (hence the title of his work, ReOrient)

is given a new perspective. To make his point, Frank describes how India and China were

much more advanced than Europe and cites that Voltaire and Adam Smith acknowledged

China as a world economy. Frank primarily singles out Marx and Weber as intellectuals

who began, in the nineteenth-century, the current Western perspective that asserts: “it all

began in Europe.” In this light, David Landes describes Western unique genius, in terms

of biological, institutional, and environmental mental postulates of an inter-connected

world.49 Frank challenges Huntington,50 warning that the call to confront the “coming of

Islam and China” is dangerous and at the base of ethnic cleansing.

East-West Problematique

The Last Confucian: Liang Shu Ming

Guy Alitto’s biography of Liang Shu-ming,51 the Conservative Nationalist and

49 David S. Landes, The Unbounded Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969). 50 Samuel Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs 72 (Summer) 1993. 51 Alitto, Guy S. The Last Confucian: Liang Shu-ming and the Chinese Dilemma of Modernity (University o f California Press, Berkeley, 1986). Also see Liang Shu-ming "Eastern and Western Civilizations and Their Philosophies" in Wm. Theodore de Bary, et al., Sources of Chinese Tradition, Vol. 2 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987) 187-191.

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China’s foremost Confucian, elaborates on distinctions between contrasting ideologies of

East and West in the context of China’s dilemma of modernity and traditional Confucian

morality.52 Liang’s position reflects Chinese opposition to Western assumptions. His

systematic defense of Confucianism and Eastern assumption against the intrusion of

Western ideology was manifested by the May Fourth iconoclasts. To clarify the cleavage

between Eastern and Western thinking, it is useful to discuss the distinctive characteristics

of these contrasting ideologies.

Unlike the indigenous French and British Enlightenments, the Chinese

Enlightenment and transition to Modernity resulted from the intrusion of the Occident and

the encroachment of Western ideology. As in the advent of rationalism in Europe, the

Chinese Enlightenment challenged core ideology, morality, and spirituality.

Liang’s cultural theory was a reaction to the new thought of the May Fourth

period.53 that rejected science and democracy in favor of harmonic traditional Confucian

social values. Rationalism (science) challenged all spiritual values by reducing man to a

materialistic function according to physical law, and thus eliminated responsibility for good

and evil. Liang characterized the West in terms of war, conflict, struggle, individuality,

52 My knowledge of Liang Shu-ming and issues of modernity and ideological and political issues facing Confucianism over the past century derived from a conference course with Tu Wei-ming at Harvard University during the academic year o f 1996-1997. The scope of this course covered the primary works of modem Chinese intellectuals, as well as Western social thinkers and moralists such as John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Alexis de Tocqueville, Max Weber, David Landes, and Andrew Nathan. 53 My knowledge o f these thinkers derives from my course work with Tu Wei-ming at Harvard University. Some o f the notable May Fourth intellectuals were Hu Shih, Li Ta-Chao, and Chen Tu hsiu. See Hu Shih (Shi) The Chinese Renaissance. (New York: Paragon Book Reprint Corp. [1934] 1963; Sung-k’ang Huang. Li Ta-Chao and the Impact o f Marxism on Modern Chinese Thinking. (The Hague: Mouton) 1965; Ch’en Tu Hsiu, “On Literary Revolution” in Wm. Theodore de Bary, et. al., Sources o f Chinese Tradition, Vol. 2, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964) 162.

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utility, action, and rule by law, while he saw the East in terms of peace, harmony,

conformity, repose, family, emotions and passivity. His crucial argument was that the

World War was the result of science, which equipped technology with the means for

destruction while stripping away moral standards and almost civilization itself. He

explicitly warned against the faults of the omnipotence of science and of unending material

progress through unbridled competition.

Theoretically, Liang asserted that traditional China’s major weaknesses were the

West’s two greatest strengths: organization and science. He pointed out that China’s low

political, social, and economic morale at the turn of the century were manifestations of a

cultural crisis. Rural Reconstruction had to be a cultural rather than a political movement.

The basic task of his Rural Reconstruction program was to create organizational forms for

economic development, technological diffusion, education, and political reform. Liang’s

position was that correct consciousness, motivation, and morals took precedence over an

individual’s intelligence or technical competence. Liang’s organizational model, hsiang-

yueh (village convenient) was a mutual aid institution with no government sanctions or legal

standards, and was implemented by pairing the peasants and intellectuals in the

countryside.

Intrusion of the West: Scientism

The assumptions that Liang opposed are rooted in Western ideology. Western

Enlightenment ideology springs from the Lockean notion of the pursuit of happiness.

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Scientific observations of animals (such as the amoeba moving from the stimuli of pain)

inspired the notion that human nature works to maximize happiness and minimize pain.

The pursuit of happiness, now explicitly reflected in the Declaration of Independence,

drives a common Western understanding of human nature and the concept of the individual:

each autonomous individual is justified in Promethean self-interest. Locke’s idea of the

social contract is based on individual competition and the need for a public contract.

Yen Fu’s translations of Locke, Hobbes, J.S. Mill, Montesquieu, Spencer, Smith,

Huxley, and other Western thinkers, informed the May Fourth iconoclasts: Hu Shih, Li Ta-

Chao, and Chen Tu Hsiu;54 and set the stage for the new century to accept modem science

as a value system. These classical liberals charged that Confucianism kept China backward.

Confucianism is an all encompassing ideology that began as a simple model of statecraft

based on a filial and hierarchial model, with an enduring propensity to ideological and

geographic unification. This ancient political culture, understood by Chinese as the scholar

tradition, advanced to the state level, and has survived through continuity of ideals and

resources. Since the third century b .c .E., Confucian intellectuals have made the argument

that moral principles are crucial to the unity of society and the state. This ideal has

remained constant in Chinese consciousness and continues to empower unification.

In any investigation concerning principle, it is necessary to consider the action that

54 See Benjamin Schwartz, In Search of Wealth and Power: Yen Fu and the West (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964); Hu Shih. “Our Attitude Toward Modem Western Civilization,” in Wm. Theodore de Bary, et. al., Sources of Chinese Tradition, Vol. 2 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964) 191-192, fromHu Shih wen-ts ’tin, Collection III, Ch.I, pp. 1-13.; Maurice Meisner, Li Ta-Chao and the Origins of Chinese Marxism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982). See Ch’en Tu Hsiu, “On Literary Revolution” in Wm. Theodore de Bary, et al., Sources of Chinese Tradition, Vol. 2 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964) 162.

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puts principle into effect because, without effect, principle alone is of little value.

Throughout Chinese history, the Confucian literati set forth moral principles in the form of

rules that were presented through example, the observance of rituals, and rigorous study of

classical texts. This principled tradition stresses the good of the community rather than the

individual. The notion of individualism was not introduced to Chinese consciousness until

the intrusion of Western ideas.

Deng’s famous statement, “Let the Chinese make money,” encouraged the

transition to modernity. The price was the threat to its traditional moral system. Since

1978, with the advent of economic liberalization and the decline of Marxist Leninism, there

has been an absence of a popular ideology in China. In the wake of this gap, many

contemporary Chinese — reflecting the influence, however implicit or explicit — of

Confucian ideals, fear what they see as the dangers of American values.55 A century later,

following Liang’s Confucian line, contemporary Confucian scholars like Tu Wei-ming argue

in favor of Confucian humanism.

The passing of Deng Xiao Ping and the new leadership of Jiang Zemin mark another

landmark moment in China’s history. In the political and economic arena, China is

developing fresh ideas, and restructuring traditional ones. The challenges of establishing

stable political and economic relations between China and the West in the twenty-first

century are set in the context of a moral dilemma on both sides of the globe.

55 Indeed, many European and American writers as well, from Alexi de Tocqueville to Daniel Bell have warned o f the seduction o f American values; See Alexi de Tocqueville. Democracy in America, 2 Vols (New York: Random House, 1990); Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism (New York: Basic Books, 1976).

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Liang wrote of the traditional struggle to find a way to implement ethical behavior

in the context of modernity. Liang’s Rural Reconstruction program, which sought to

maintain Confucianism, did not solve the problem of material inferiority nor satisfy the

political realities of the time. Significant literature suggests that this failure indicates the

incompatibility between traditionalism and the requirements of Modernization and

political success. As Scientism rose in China, Liang argued that while rationality and

rationalism are significant, as a value system they are not insufficient and create a vacuum.

Confucians took the position that Scientism undermined the underpinnings of moral

education and spirituality. They held that actions of humans unlike those of matter,

organisms and vertebrates can be altered by self-cultivation. Science evades core values

which these scholar officials argued were imperative as a pragmatic safeguard against

disunity and against social, political, and economic chaos.

Social identify is grounded in geographic location, collective thinking and the

trajectory of tradition. We have discussed the current Chinese identity crisis and make the

claim that it is being resolved in a uniquely Chinese manner. Perry Link points out:

In the money-first ethos that has prevailed recently in China, the underlying cultural values of education and proper behavior have seemed to recede. The problem in China today is that there is no publicly accepted set of moral values to define proper behavior. Intellectuals speak today of a sixiang weiji (crisis of ideology) and even a jingshen weiji (spiritual crisis). The gap is especially discomfiting because of the traditional role that moral ideology enjoyed in China.56

56 Perry Link, “China’s “Core” Problem,” inDcedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Spring, 1993, Vol. 122, Number 2, p,192.Perry Link, “China’s “Core” Problem,” in Dcedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Spring, 1993, Vol. 122, Number 2, p. 192.

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The Chinese “identity crisis” resulting from the intrusion of Western ideology and

the Cultural Revolution is important to Western sociological scholarship on social

identity. Significant literature addresses the Chinese “identity crisis” as a result of the

intrusion of Western thought, culture, and consumerism.57 Kim and others point out the

explicit awareness that Chinese people have in terms of inferiority to and humiliation by

the West since its demise during the eighteen century.

Modernization in China is faced with the task of creating a modem identity to

cope with conditions created by China’s confrontation with the Western world. As

David Yen-Ho Wu asserts, the Chinese were obliged to deal with foreign concepts,

including that of nation, state, sovereignty, citizenship, and race, and more recently, with

cultural and ethnic identity.58 How this identity crisis is being resolved will be a

fundamental part of this research. Indeed, this issue is crucial to future Sino-American

relations.

57 See Samuel Kim and Lowell Dittmer in China’s Quest for National Identity (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993) 280.

58 David Yen-ho Wu, “The Construction o f Chinese and Non-Chinese Identities,” in The Living Tree: the Meaning of Being Chinese Today, ed., Tu Wei-ming (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994) 148.

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MODELS OF SOCIAL CHANGE: CHINA

Critique of Weber’s Analysis of China

Weber’s methodological and theoretical contributions play a substantial role in a

wide range of sociological concentrations, including Chinese Studies as a sub-field of

macrosociology. His most widely read analysis of China, published in his Protestant

Ethic and the Spirit o f Capitalism, falls under the larger socioeconomic research question

of why modem capitalism occurred in the West and not in other parts of the world. His

work sets out a basic thesis of historic social change that is placed in the context of the

Western industrial revolution. Weber’s other important work on China, The Religion o f

China, is a companion piece. In both works, Weber contends that both the Puritan and

Confucian ethics are embodied in rationalism.

At the time of Weber’s research, in the late nineteenth century, Marxist historical

materialism had moved to the center of the theoretical arena. Weber’s approach put ideas

and ideals into the causal position and, thus, challenged the dominant economically based

theory of explanation. Weber reasoned that the pervasive moral convictions of

Protestantism during the sixteenth- and seventeenth-centuries influenced the florescence

of capitalism in the West. He argued that independent stages of material development in

different regions reached similar conditions conducive to the rise of the similar capitalist

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socioeconomic systems. However, he wanted to show that religious ideas were also

influential in either blocking or fostering bourgeois capitalism. Both China and India

served as quasi-control groups for comparison.

As Turner point out, Weber first had to identify the required conditions in order

to qualify these two groups of comparison59 Weber successfully identified the following

factors that existed in China that were suitable to the development of capitalism: (1) vast

internal commerce and trade with other nations; (2) equal opportunity and status

attainment through the 1,200-year-old exam system; (3) social stability and peace; (4)

large urban centers and few restrictions on the economy; and (5) China’s status is

arguably more advanced in Weber’s view, with gunpowder and book printing as examples.

Weber’s findings suggested a number of empirical factors in addition to the

influence of the religious ethic in China as inhibitors of capitalism: (1) the monetary

system was problematic; (2) China had no autonomous political units because of the

nature of early, unified, centralized government—which limited capital enterprise; (3)

China had substantive ethical law rather than legal judgment and procedures; and (4) in

terms of the work force, people were classically educated rather than technically trained.

Weber’s research design compared ideal types of historical religious systems in his

causal analysis to investigate the driving forces behind social change. To explore the layers

of influence, he first postulated the historical ideal type, Protestantism, as a key concept.

59 Jonathan H. Turner, Leonard Beeghley, and Charles H Powers, The Emergence o f Sociological Theory. (Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing, 1995), 168-229.

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The duty to produce, as a Protestant ethic, is related to the value of economic success,

and included the concept that economic success must be legal. Therefore, Protestant

training in terms of appropriate behavior was linked to economic success 60

Traditional domination

/ Instrumental Charismatic — Chance o orientation f effective \ -y{ Crisis ------>- Chance Rational-legal — Chance A ^Charismatic domination ineffective Value-rational orientation

Figure 1.______Weber’s model of social change Note: Schematic borrowed from Turner

Weber’s approach to social change is derived from his theoiy of social action, with

emphasis on content. Weber classified social action into four types of orientation:

traditional or habitual orientation; affectional orientation or emotional feeling of actor;

rational orientation to an absolute value; and purpose-rational. In his theory of social

change, Weber identifies three types of authority: charismatic, traditional, and rational-

legal. The rational-legal system, which operates through a bureaucracy and enforces laws

that, ideally, work in the interest of the public, was crucial for development.61

60 Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, (London:Unwin Hyman, 1990). 61 Turner, 1995.

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Methodologically, Weber’s analysis drew upon the application of the ideal type

for recording variations in historical cases, and for comparative and causal analyses.

These applications served three goals: (1) Weber wanted to refute the Marxist analysis

was prevalent at the turn of the century, and challenge the reductionist level of this

position; (2) he wanted to prove that cultural values circumscribed social action, primarily

by focusing people’s interest in certain directions; and 3) he wanted to posit these

theories as advancements that would explain why capitalism emerged in the West.

Limitations of Weber’s Analysis

What makes Weber’s sophisticated analysis of China so impressive is that he did

not travel to China; he had no formal knowledge of the Chinese language; and he did not

have the advanced understanding of current sinological interpretations. But, by drawing

on subsequent advancements in Western understanding of Chinese intellectual history, a

number of critical points can be raised.

Critique of Weberian Approach

Vogel’s position is that the recent, so called economic miracle of East Asian

industrial revolution in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore supports Weber’s

thesis that the Chinese Confucian ethic worked as an inhibitor of free enterprise

Building on Weber’s approach, Vogel has identified four clusters of institutional and

62 Vogel, 1991.

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traditional (Confucian) influences that he suggests fostered the rise of industrial East Asia:

1) the meritocratic elite, bureaucrats selected on merit; 2) entrance exams that included

Confucian teaching through language and history; 3) group importance, which is the

tradition of the collective; and 4) the crucial Confucian ideal of self-cultivation.

Further, Vogel argues that the Confucian familial structure fostered

entrepreneurship that developed into a successful economic force on the global scale.

Acceptance of Vogel’s argument would constitute a progressive step for the Confucian

revival project.

To reconcile the beliefs of Vogel and Weber, consider these cases as examples of a

new Confucian synthesis. Confucianism has a long history of adaptation. While Weber’s

analysis is methodologically and theoretically apt, he was denied the opportunity to test

his hypothesis because the recent economic phenomenon in East Asia and other events in

history had not presented themselves in his lifetime. This issue needs to be explored in

future research.

In consideration of Vogel’s argument, it is important to review Weber’s model

and ask 1) where Weber would place these East Asian industrial Confucian societies, and

2) how Weber’s model allowed for the continuous struggle for power in every society

(i.e., would Weber consider these new industrial nations to fall under his value-rational

orientation?) The important question is at what time did these influences begin to work

to influence those economies? The process was slow and pervasive from the start. Weber

would consider these East Asian cases to have embraced a value-rational orientation.

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Confucian Position

A traditional Confucian critique of Weber’s analysis would be that it is clearly

part of a Western intellectual tradition that links wealth to power. Arguing that the

Protestant ethic has an influential relationship is a way of legitimizing personal gain.

Further, it could be argued that this model does not allow for the historical pattern of

Chinese social change, nor for the four East Asian case studies. These factors present

major challenges to Weber’s model. Clearly, some Confucians would argue, we have to

rethink the Weberian model.

Further, Confucians would argue that Weber’s model is based on the Western

assumption that the rational-legal system of authority is the only system. A system of

political parties with social strata that struggle for power and fight for domination to

advance economic interests, is antithetical to the Confucian moral system of development.

The Confucian position would contend that the traditional domination and value-rational

system should not be separated by rational-legal domination in the model. This point will

be discussed further in Chapter 6., C. 2.

The Post-Modern position, with which Confucians can find some compatibility,

is that tradition kept China from progress and Modernization is not necessarily positive.

Both would cite the last century of war and mass destruction as the product of the

advancements of “progress” as the heightened state of the struggle for resources at the

expense of indigenous cultures and the environment.

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The Post Modem argument would be that Weber’s model, and his analysis of

China in relation to the Western economic drive, is eurocentric and hegemonic. This

position would challenge the accusation that tradition works against the institution of

economic competition (and thus, some might say, foreign domination. This is similar

relates to Dependency theory, as well. Clearly, the Post-Modems, Confucians and

Dependency theorists would agree with the concerns expressed by de Tocqueville, Bellah,

Bell, and Madsen in terms of the ethical/moral problems that face the world due to

consumerism and individualism.

Weber reasoned that Confucianism meant adjustment to the outside conditions of

the world. Tu Wei-ming points out that “Confucian rationalism meant rational

adjustment to the world” is correct only if adjustment does not mean compliance to the

status quo.63

Weber made the landmark contribution to social science research by moving

cultural values into the causal position in relation to social and economic change. Now,

because of the East Asian cases and a broader understanding of the Confucian position,

which shines light on the different ways that the two ethical systems (Confucian and

Protestant) developed, we need to rethink Weber’s model of social change. We question

whether or not his model actually allows for social change in all societies, as he intended.

63 Tu Wei-ming. China in Transformation. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994). p. 165.

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A Confucian Theory of Social Change

Based on my understanding of Confucianism, a theory of social change

hypothetically could be envisioned as follows:

A Confucian theory of social change requires exploration of what put China at the

core as a unified state structure. It would be necessary to consider why, after periods of

disunity and instability due to the accidents of history, the core remained in the same

general region (the “middle kingdom”); and why, in contrast to the rise-and-decline of

Western empires, China repeatedly reunified under virtually the same system, while

Western empires did not. A Confucian theory would account for the stabilizing element

of the Chinese ‘middle kingdom.’ As with the models of change that Weber and Marx

envisioned, the Confucian model would be endogenous.

A Confucian model allows for the dominance of pragmatic leadership that is not

charismatic, but meritocratic. One Confucian argument is that Confucius was no more an

idealist than Marx. Confucian statecraft is based on moral rituals li Confucians would

argue that stability comes from harmonic rather than competing states and is strengthened

by moral concern for the self and concern for the community.

A Confucian theory of social change would include a dynamic relationship

between ideas and materialism. The philosophers that fostered the Confucian ideology

were set in an environment that did not demand international trade, but could develop an

internal system of dominance based self-sufficiency of resources. An example is the

debate during the Opium Wars; Britain was concerned because British sterling was being

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drained by the voracious British consumption Chinese tea. 64 China resisted entering into

trade dependency, and when samples of English goods were sent, the argument was that

China did not need nor want trade items.

As in the Weberian model, the Confucian theory would allow for the possibility

that the Legalist system of the Qin would develop into a rational-legal system of

dominance. Although Confucians successfully remained the elite, competing intellectual

traditions continued to via for their power. The success stems from the ability to

incorporate an overarching vision of rituals li as an imperial vision via confluence of the

ideas, e. g., Dong Zhong Shu’s acceptance of Legalist views in the Han.

In defense of this model, Confucian ideology should be considered closely.

However, to suggest that ideology alone is responsible for social change is inadequate.

Material influences would need to be considered.

First, in the Weberian sense it could be argued that there is something specifically

propitious or suitable about Confucianism as an ideology for a large

state structure; it could be viewed as cultural capital. As Weber argued in favor of the

Protestant ethic as a positive influence in the rise in capitalism, Confucians similarly

would argue that Confucianism fuels state building.

Second, on the materialist side, the history of the region must be considered to

analyze the difference in the nature and availability of resources and geographic placement

64 Kirby refers to the Opium War as “the war o f two addictions.” British society developed around the pleasure o f taking tea and the opium habit in China. (Class lecture, Harvard.) See Martin Booth, Opium: A History (New York: St. Martin Press, 1998).

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between China and our Western quasi-control groups (such as Britain). Drawing on the

comparative method, it is important to study Western trade centers in relation to China’s

geographies — to argue that Western empires developed around maritime areas, whereas

China’s vast inland expanse did not.

Weber suggests that when society develops to the stage of rational-legal authority,

it is unlikely that it will revert back to traditional. However, he also acknowledges chance

in his model. If it is accepted that the Qin dynasty was a form of rational-legal

domination, then the opposite could be argued as well (Figure 2. below). Confucians

would say that China reverted to the traditional (Confucian) value-rational system rather

than developing the rational-legal system. The key to this model is the understanding of

value-rational. This is where the crucial terms must be defined and argued. Confucians

could reason in their model that China had already reached a value-rational orientation in

the Han.

Drawing on a sinological and close reading of the Qin system, it is important to

understand that system as rational-legal. The Qin government aimed to enforce laws that

would strengthen the state and its military power, as well as to support agriculture. In

that sense, it was rational-legal, but whether it qualifies for Weber’s distinction is

debatable.

Hsu Cho Yun’s textual analysis (in the 1960s) of the Shih Ching can be cited to

argue that by the end of the Warring States period (Chan Kuo), China, in the Weberian

sense, had developed from the traditional to the rational-legal. That argument could also

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be used to put Confucian statecraft in Weber’s model. Also the legacy of the Qin

Dynasty, and the debates with the Legalists that are linked to Chinas interpretation of

law. The term Legalism and other terms that refer to contending schools of thought are

necessary to completely explain what was happening from the Confucian perspective.

Therefore, we argue that Confucianism explains development in the context of Chinese

debates, not Confucianism alone.

Crisis Collapse

Value-Rational / Confucian System ~~i=— Chance

Chou -Chance Rational-Legal Maoism \ Westernization 0/n/Legalist

Figure 2. Confucian Model of Social Change

Most theories of social change can be perceived as turning on the notion of

progress. As described above, Weber’s model of historical social change is an example.

Western theories of social change include evolutionary theories, influenced by Spencer’s

and Darwin’s work in the natural sciences.

Comte and Durkheim express ideas of social change that include the principles of

self-perfection, morality and anomie. Durkheim differs from Confucian concept because

he asserts the necessity of the development of a legal tradition, which is problematic for

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Confucians. Durkheim’s theory of social evolution is defined by the emergence of organic

solidarity, and distinguishes those changes due to social demographics. He contends that

society reaches a point when it has to be supported by the legal system.

The Confucian argument would assert that this evolutionary model is problematic

because, as this study will show, it would not fit within the trajectory of Chinese

development. Here is where the integration of the debates within Chinese intellectual

history concerning Confucian and Legalists ideals can inform Western research (to be

discussed at length in Chapter). The other option — of a functionalist approach — is

problematic also because it does not allow for change and, hence, supports the status quo.

Chinese development is linked to a pattern of ideological adaptation, which this study

calls “syncretic conditioning.” This unique method of Chinese development which

involves a dialogue of debates and crucial points of confluence of ideals between

Confucian and other schools will be discussed in the next chapter.

Bellah’s concept of the evolution of religion is helpful in understanding our model

of “syncretic conditioning.”65 To account for the resilience and vitality of the Confucian

theory of change, the comparison could be made to Bellah’s model of conceptual

evolution. Bellah identifies four stages: primitive, historic, early modem and modem. His

twentieth century stage envisions a transition to humanistic ethical concerns of a secular

variety. In the Confucian evolutionary model, Confucians could argue that this

conceptual advance took place in the third century BCE The Analects could be cited to

65 Robert Bellah, et al. Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life. (New York. Perennial Library) 1985.

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make the distinction that Confucians had passed through the otherworldly phase. As

Herrlee Creel and David Kneightly point out, with the rise of statecraft in the Zhou

period, clearly there was a break with the old Shang religious ideas and the development

of a rationally based value system of governance.66

A Confucian theory of social change could be envisioned as evolutionary and

cyclical process we call “syncretic conditioning.” Unlike Weber’s model, it would not

apply to all societies. This study will show how the dialogue within this fundamental

body of Chinese literature is related to social change and how a Confucian theoiy of social

change posits a dynamic relationship between ideals and materialism.

Confucian Social Theory

The objective of this research is to present a Confucian model that identifies

specific ideas and actions which influence behavior, social structure, and social change.

This approach does not seek simply to show a causal connection empirically; rather, it is

theoretical. Theoretically, the model includes both idealism and materialism, but it gives

ideas and ideals causal priority; it explains that the basic features of society are driven by

ideas, rather than by the practical, material conditions of human existence. Because this

project falls within the larger social science research question concerning the direction of

66 Herrlee G. Creel, The Origins o f Statecraft in China, Vol. 1, (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1970) and David N. Kneightley, Sources of Shang History: The Oracle-Bone Inscriptions of Bronze Age {China. Berkeley: University o f California Press, 1985).

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causality in social development, it is important first to consider the relationship of ideas

to geography (Figure 3), and resources, and, in that sense, this argument follows the

Weberian line. Later in Chapter 5, this study will evaluate the limitations of Western

debates concerning the direction of causality in relation to Chinese development.

In early centuries, as societies developed throughout the regions of China, the

unique ideals of the Western Zhou developed in relation to the geography of the middle

kingdom Zhongguo |i[. Geography played a crucial role in Chinese intellectual

thought and development because of the nature of the geography and because of the

importance these intellectuals placed on unification within that geographical setting. This

study asserts that there is a strong relationship between the vast resources of the fertile

land mass, the development of the pragmatic ideology and the identity of community.

Later, it will be argued that geographical differences between Western and Chinese

civilizations help explain the current cleavage between their development models. The

case can be made that, in large part, Modernity and power in the West are defined by the

ideas of accumulation of wealth. If a comprehensive study of the classical literature of

Western civilization were to be made (such as the Homeric tradition found in the Iliad and

the Odyssey) it would be clear how ideas developed in relation to a maritime geography of

trade ports and divisive bodies of water. The literature carries a sense of justification and

duty to compete, conquer and colonize empires. Accordingly, using this methodology,

Western ideals could be traced from the Homeric tradition, up to Jefferson and the

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emergence of democracy and the American Constitution. We will see how Chinese

classical thought is related to ideas of expansion, law and government.

Political

Ideals Economic

Geography

^ Social

Figure 3. Model o f causal relationship:

The focus of this chapter remains on China, where another reality emerged that

defined power not by expansion, but by a pragmatic scholarly tradition. This study will

show that, within different geographical makeup, a different set of ideas and literature

influenced the development of meritocracy and, as Chaihark Hahm suggests, these

indigenous ideals, specifically rituals li, may be the defining element of a “Confucian

Constitution.”67

A substantive review of the etymological reference to geography and its link to

the development of Chinese ideology is beyond the scope of this study, but it will be

helpful to cite three that are illustrative of the model of causal relationship. First, the

Mandarin term for China: Zhongguo cb UK means middle kingdom. The first character

zhong is a vertical line centered on what is meant to represent the center of a map, and the

67 See Chiahark Hahm, Confucian Constitutionalism, Harvard University dissertation, 1999.

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latter, guo is a more detailed map. Together these are symbolic references of the fertile

land mass that became synonymous with Chinese ideology and identity. Our study will

reveal how the name Zhongguo (China) is linked to concepts of pragmatism, self

sufficiency, community-before-self, and self-cultivation.68 China’s enthocentric nature

and strong propensity to boundary maintenance clearly can be linked to Confucian ideals.

Conceptual Framework

The basic thesis of this research identifies Confucianism as an ideal type in the

context of social theory. Concisely stated, Confucianism can be defined as a set of

rational assumptions based on the idea of a sense of being of the same race, and originating

in a common cognition and geographical region with emphasis on ancestry. “Enlightened

self-interest” places the individual in the context of the collective. This research will

show, through a coherent conceptual framework that evolved out of the function and

content of self-cultivation, not as “an eloquence of syllogistic reasoning, but an elegance

of educational design.”69 In the research model, ritualistic actions or actors in the Shang

and Zhou are shown to have contributed to the later pivotal rationalization of these

actions in the Axial Age (c. 600-200 B.C. E.).70 Thus the Confucian/Mencian intellectual

lineage evolved into an ideological superstructure paralleling the dynastic cycle and

68 In the same way America stands for individual freedom and the pursuit o f happiness. 69 Robert Eno, In The Confucian Creation of Heaven: Philosophy and the Defence of Ritual Mastery. (State University of New York Press, 1990). 70 For discussion of Shang see David N. Kneightley, Sources o f Shang History: The Oracle- Bone Inscriptions of Bronze Age China. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985).

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beyond to the New Modem Confucianism that may be thought of as a Neo-Axial trend. 7 1

Our research suggests a conceptual framework articulated by a taxonomy of four

dimensions that influence social solidarity, statecraft and social mobility: 1) cultivation of

positive aspects of human nature, 2) rituals (li (H), 3) example (junzi If-^p)72, and 4) the

scholarly tradition (ruxue (Table 2). Self-cultivation of human nature and

functions as the keystone of the Chinese social architecture. Specifically, this primary

assumption holds that a social system based on the cultivation of the positive innate

aspects of human nature is more likely to produce social solidarity than is a system based

on force and punishment. The research design identifies three actions— example, rituals,

and scholarship—that perpetuate the ideological superstructure. The attendant textual

analysis, will show that the literature reveals how these actions became linked to the civil

service examination, statecraft, and social solidarity. The civil service examination system

was based on a knowledge of Contucian classical literature, individuals gained access to

government positions. Hence, it can be argued that these actions of self-cultivation

influenced social solidarity, leadership, and social mobility in Chinese society.

71 For discussion of New Modem Confucianism see Hsin-chung Yao. An Introduction to Confucianism, (Cambridge University Press. 2000). 72 The conventional translation, as in Waley, Lau, and Graham, o f junzi is “gentleman.” Other translations may be more useful, such as “profound person,” used by Tu Wei-ming. For the purposes o f this study “exemplary person,” used by Roger Ames and Henry Rosemont, Jr., is most fitting. As Jones points out, “gentleman” is misleading for Western students, especially American students. Waley and Lau chose this translation because o f the relation between a gentleman, “being gentle,” and the Latin root gens and the Greek root genus where the clan gives rise to the gentleman. For discussion o f junzi see David Jones, “Navigating Our Way Through the Analects ” in Education About Asia,Fall 2000 ,Vol 5, No. 2, P 11

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Cultivation positive aspects of human nature

-X n i f x - junzi ruxue flflp- Rituals Example Scholarly tradition t Social solidarity Leadership Social Mobility State Craft

Collective Conscious identity/values

Figure 4. Conceptual Framework

Ultimately, this study suggests that the Confucian model of self-cultivation

accounts for Chinese collective consciousness, identity and cultural values. Further, while

other ideologies have had an impact, including indigenous contending schools

(particularly, Legalism and Daoism) as well as foreign ideological influences (notably,

Buddhism and the more recent Enlightenment mentality) this evidence suggests that

Confucianism is more influential in terms of power, social mobility and change. Self-

cultivation is the crucial concept in the Confucian model, and this research shows that it is

central to social and political development. The critical point of departure is that the

Confucian assumption of the self did not engender an idea of self-interest as it is thought

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of in Western individualism or democratic liberalism. The interpretation of the self in

relation to society will be discussed later in this section on pages 68-69.

The intention of this conceptual framework is to link Confucianism to social

structure, even though China was at no time ideologically homogenous; and some

discussion of contending schools is important to our argument. Furthermore, these ideas

and actions are extant in Chinese collective consciousness today, regardless of whether the

Chinese consider them “Confucian.” Our work supports the claim that with the Song

advent of the Neo-Confucian link of state ideology and the literati scholar-officials to

positions of government, the ideal of self-cultivation and the actions identified above

permeated all of society from the top down and worked toward harmonious relationships.

Although the highly contentious debates between scholars within the Confucian school

are acknowledged, this study attempts to identify the social phenomenon of the scholar

tradition, as the uniquely Chinese cultural identity that remains extant in the memory,

consciousness, and habits of Chinese people; and that it is manifested in social and

political reform.

Process of Change

Up to this point we have discussed how to envision a conceptual framework that

supports a Confucian ideological superstructure. Now, we make the claim that the

Confucian ideological superstructure not only survived and evolved by historical

73 See Alexis du Tocqueville,Democracy in America (New York: Random House, 1990).

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contingency, it is extant and continues in a state of flux. In this context, it is critical to

define tradition. This study rests on the notion that tradition is not limited to the past,

but rather is in a constant state of change. As shown earlier, some scholars (Weber, et.

al.) argue that Confucianism and tradition in general reside in the past and therefore have a

negative effect on modernization.74 Since the term “tradition,” like the term

“Confucianism” is heavily encumbered, the comprehensive term ideological

superstructure is preferable. However, the terms are basically interchangeable.

The term “flux,” in relation to China’s long process of dynastic reform and

reunification, can be explained by syncretism. The term syncretism expresses the process

of harmonizing ideas, principles or cultural aspects. In the context of this study,

syncretism expresses the method by which Chinese intellectuals “merged two or more

ideas into a general impression.” 75 The historical contingency or succession of periods

of rise and demise known as the dynastic cycle demonstrate the resilience of the

Confucian ideological superstructure. No attempt is made here to introduce a

comprehensive survey of dynastic or intellectual history. As Creel points out, “No other

system of government has maintained its sway over a state of any approaching

74 See Max Weber. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit o f Capitalism, (London:Unwin Hyman, 1990); The Religion o f China, (New York/ Macmillan Company, 1964).

75 See New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles, ed. Lesley Brown, Vol. 2, N-Z, Clarendon Press. Taken from the Greek, “union or reconciliation of diverse or opposite tenets or practices, esp. philosophy or religion aim to harmonize beliefs.

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comparable size for two thousand years in almost uninterrupted succession.”76 Rather,

we will consider syncretism in broad terms.

For the purposes of this work, four stages are distinguished: (1) the Shang, Zhou

periods actions are identified; (2) the Spring and Autumn, the Warring States, and up to

Dong Zhongshu (in the Han) are identified as the formative creative stage; (3) the dynastic

cycle is identified as the interpretive stage; and (4) the post-dynastic period of the

Modern New Confucians is identified as the present adaptive stage.77 For the purposes

of our argument, we expand on the so-called three epoch theory of New Modem

Confucians to add a fourth stage. It is useful to include the Shang and Zhou to give

sufficient evidence of the beginning of the pattern of change because the model explains

actions (rituals li in the Shang and Zhou) that continue vis-a-vis ideas that change in

relation to the later creative stage.

76 Creel studied the origins o f administrative techniques in China,and traced political ideas and government institutions from earliest times to the beginning o f the Christian era. The latter date determined by the fact that in Han times the imperial government was in a full stature that continued to the twentieth century. Further, he argues that the European system comes from China. See Creel, Origins o f the State.

77 Specific stages are subject to debate within the Confucian scholars. Tu Wei-ming makes the most convincing claim of the three epoch theory. Fung Yu-lan (1895-1990) another of the Modern New Confucians, divided this history into two ages, creative and the interpretative. Fung dates the creative from the time of Confucius to the date of Prince of Huainan (d. 122 bce), the so called Period o f the Philosophers (zi xue); and names of the interpretative age begin with Dong Zhongshu (179-104 BCE) to Kang Youwei (1858-1927 ce), the period o f Classical Learning (jingxue). See Fung, 1953:2. Fung’s two part division reveals essential characteristics o f the development of the Confucian tradition, as we will suggest in the body o f this study. The second interpretive period demonstrates the relationships of the tradition to social and political development. Yao warns that this “two-fold” pattern is seriously limited. He criticizes merely singling out the methodological features o f Confucian Learning because “this division under-estimates the distinctive contributions made by distinguished masters and overlooks the multidimensionality of various Confucian schools, nor does it take into account the interplay between Confucianism and the many other schools that existed in its long history and development.

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Ideas in Time and Space

A substantial literature documents the development of the meritocracy and the

no bureaucratic institutions of Imperial China in relation to Confucian values and tradition.

The imperial court ruled through an elegant and sophisticated bureaucratic system that

was administered by classically literate officials.79 Elman makes the case “that both local

elites and the imperial court continually influenced the government to reexamine and

adjust the classical curriculum and to integrate new ways to improve the institutional

system for selecting those candidates who were eligible to become officials.”80 Set in a

long historical context, a pattern of response can be identified to a contingency of

accidents in time and space that manifest a succession of chaos and collapse, whether the

result of inferior interior rule, or territorial intrusions. The concern here is the pattern of

Q 1 intellectual response, not a survey of dynastic rise and demise.

Four phases are distinguished in the development model. The first is the earlier

recorded evidence of actions upon which the tradition will build. The second phase is the

reflexive break with the Shang in the Axial Age. In the third phase, there is evidence of

78 Benjamin A. Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 2000). 79 For discussion of the civil examinations see Benjamin A. Elman, “Education in Song China,” Journal of the American Oriental Society III, 1 (Berkley. University of California Press. 2000). For recent views on Neo-Confucianism see essays in William Theodore de Bary and John W. Chaffee, eds. Neo- Confucian Education: The Formative Stage (Berkley University : of California Press, 1989).

80 Elman, 2000, p. 232. 81 For discussion o f the Confucian dynastic reform cycle see Gilbert Rozman, ed. The East Asian Region: Confucian Heritage and its Modem Adaptation (Princeton Princeton University Press 1991) 8. Theory o f Historical Contingency: Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure o f Man, (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1996).

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the beginning of a pattern of harmonic reform, syncretism, and recovery that parallels the

dynastic cycle and intellectual shifts. The fourth phase is Modernity and a resulting shift

from formal institution and transvaluation within New Modem Confucianism. The

remarkable aspect is that on each occasion of dynastic collapse, order and unity over this

large land mass was eventually restored by the reinstatement of the Confucian system.

The pattern is in stark contrast to the rise and fall of Western empires that emerged as

economic power centers, then collapsed, followed by the rise of a new cultural economic

center in another geography in a concession of points moving westward on the globe —

Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, Europe, and on to the Americas. In the case of

China, the centralized core continues to survive after a succession of intrusions. Now we

will discuss each of these stages by selecting some of the larger events and resulting

intellectual shifts that relate to our larger argument concerning the direction of change.

In order to appreciate fully the pivotal change during what we choose to call the

intellectual or rational stage during the Axial age, it is critical to explain the Shang as the

beginning of the continuum.82 First, the root (actions) can be identified within the

complex traditions of the Shang. The starting point begins with practices of divination,

etc., because it is here that the first records of ritual action are found. Numerous

82 According to the three epoch theory, the creative stage refers to the Spring and Autumn and Warring States which corresponds to what Karl Jaspers refers to as the Axial Age. Since we choose to include the Shang, we refer to it as the creative stage, although it is not part o f the intellectual tradition in the rational sense. See Karl Jaspers, 83 Shang: Kwang-chih Chang, Shang Civilization (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980) and “Ancient China and its anthropological significance,” in Archaeological Thought in America, edited by C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky (Cambridge University Press, 1989) 162.

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contending schools are traced to the Shang and it is here that we find the earliest reference

to social activity and related ideology. Sinologists point to evidence of social and

ideological shifts between the Shang and the Zhou. According to literary references,

Confucius claimed that during the Zhou period M U , society progressed to a “perfect

state” under the exemplary leadership of the Duke of Zhou Zhou Gong M 4i 84 The

later collapse of the Zhou was followed by a time of social and political upheaval, as in

the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States periods, which resulted in an intellectual

explosion of contending schools of thought.85

The second stage is characterized by the florescence of reflexive thinkers who

began to concentrate on social order and moral decline.86 The defining moment was when

these seminal figures reasoned that ritual performance functioned to develop moral

character of the living, rather than to appease the deceased. The crucial intellectual

contribution included a concept of spirituality. Spirituality became linked to the self,

society, and nature, rather than to a single or pantheon of Salvationist gods as in other

traditions, or to the ideal of leaving this world. In the case of Confucian self-cultivation,

rationalism does not conflict or compromise spirituality, because spirituality and

transcendence are linked to the relationship between the self and society. Self-cultivation

based on self-reflection of human limitations involves transcendence and thus transforms

84 The Zhou emerged in the first millennium B.C.E., in northern China in the state of Lu H H

85 Carl Jaspers includes these event and thinkers as part o f what he calls the Axial Age. 86 Rozman, 1991, p. 8.

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society. This construct turns on the idea of looking to the self to change society.

Following Schwartz’s definition, it is — “a kind of standing back and looking beyond — a

kind of critical, reflective questioning of the actual and a new vision of what lies

beyond.”87 Zhou makes the argument that the “procedure revealed in the Daxue A #

Great Learning — cultivating personal life, regulating familial relations, ordering the

affairs of state, and bringing peace throughout the world — in the cosmological setting —

is in opposition to a dichotomous pattern of man vs. nature, or individual vs. society as

with most modem moral discourses.88 Zhou contends that the self as axis of the

relationship of cosmic order and moral autonomy constitutes “a self identity for the

Confucians in particular and Chinese intellectuals in general throughout the history of

China.”89

It is during what I have identified as the second stage that we can describe these

intellectuals as social theorists. In sociological terms: These thinkers began a critical

analysis of existing social problems of particular populations, concerning social decline,

order, power, family, and moral beliefs. The literature of that time revealed a high level of

social stability within the previous population of the Zhou society. Careful study of this

87 Benjamin Schwartz. “The Age o f Transcendence,” DAiDALLIS: Journal o f American Academy of Arts and Science 104 (2): p. 3. 88 Zhou Qin, Cosmic order and Moral Autonomy: the Rise of Confucian Ethics in Axial Age China, Harvard University dissertation, June 2000. Zhou Qin’s thesis on the reinterpretation of moral Confucianism in terms o f autonomy argues that ignoring spiritual transcendence, and interpreting Confucian discourses as imperial ideology as it appeared in later times, is anachronistic.

89 Ibid., p. 202; for a systematic explanation o f the process o f the self in this pattern, see Tu Wei-ming, “Embodying the Universe: A Note on Confucian Self-realization,” The World and I (August, 1989): 475-485.

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unit of analysis revealed that specific ritual practices influenced individual behavior that

was linked to social harmony and conflict resolution. Confucians hypothesized that if

these practices were reestablished, society was more likely to recover from chaos and

regain social, economic, and political solidarity. As history confirms, when these

practices were reinstated, the hypothesis was confirmed. The model is replicated in

continuum with the dynastic cycle. Confucian scholars contributed to the literature: As

Eno point out, “Confucius absorbed much from ritual specialists and from other

traditional sources; he himself viewed his teachings as wholly derivative.”90 This

endeavor of thought is significant and has been overlooked as a body of classical social

theory.

This second phase reveals a model of change that is determined by harmonic

cultivation rather than struggle or conflict. In the social science literature, Confucianism is

overstated by interpretations from the perspective of Western religious traditions because

of the spiritual quality of the tradition. However, this study suggests the integration of

this intellectual body of literature as a social theory of conflict resolution that harmonizes

the self in relation to society.

Third, within the so-called dynastic cycle, we can find the hallmark of Confucian

development in periods that witnessed rapid social and economic change.91 For example,

the society that appears in literary sources concerning the Han period differs in

90 Robert Eno, The Confucian Creation o f Heaven, (State University of New York, 1990) 53.

91 Unification of the Han Dynasty (450 BC- AD 220).

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fundamental respects from either the idealized portrayals of early Zhou in the classics or

the society reflected in the writings of the philosophers. For one, the system of

Q-J provinces replaced the feudal domains. Also, after Emperor Wu’s fiscal policies were

relaxed there was a brief period of prosperity, but the national economic climate soon

worsened. The economic reforms implemented by Wang Mang soon led to corruption

that spread through the government from top to bottom, as the merchant class began to

take control of the wealth and large land holdings.94

Beginning in the Han, these ideas became linked with leadership; then, in the Song

and subsequent dynasties, these ideas were raised to the level of state ideology. The

formal institution within the tradition became identified as Neo-Confucian (Daoxue Ht# ).

In Chapter 5, an analysis of selected texts from the Han and Song will demonstrate the

implementation of social policies that stabilized society.95 The purpose of this analysis

is to illustrate how Confucians maintained power and their methods of political reform.

92 Ebrey, in Rozman, 1991, p.59.

93 Conrad Schirohauer, A Brief History of Chinese Civilization (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1991)67. 94 William Theodore de Bary, ed., Sources of Chinese Tradition: Introductions to Asian Civilizations, Vol. 1 (New York: Columbia University, 1964) p. 224. 95 See Bol, 1994. This Culture of Ours. Ming and early Qing:“Hanxue” (Han Learning) was a discipline within Ru (Confucian) learning. Hanxue began in Ming and early Qing period and, over a period of two hundred years, developed methods o f empirical research, using philosophical and phonological evidence among either types o f empirical evidence, in an effort to recover “the original texts” of early Confucian scholarship. This approach worked to recover the original meaning o f these texts perhaps in an effort to challenge the rivaling schools o f the Song-Ming Ru (Confucian).

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Next, in this chapter, we will illustrate the method of Confucian syncretism by

citing the ideological shift during the Tang concerning Buddhism and economic results 96

We make the case that Confucianism is linked to economic growth during the

Tang. Following our larger argument concerning causal direction, we want to link an

ideological shift to economic growth or decline in relation to the dynastic collapse. The

florescence of Buddhism is illustrative of our claim. First, we will explain how

Confucians as power elites resisted this foreign ideology, and then make the analogy of

the current resistance to “wholesale Western Capitalism.” The intention is to argue that

Confucian ideology was and remains a powerful influence.

Buddhologist Stephen Teiser’s account of the florescence of Buddhism in China is

illustrative of the process of syncretism 97 Initially, when Buddhism first made its way

to China via the Silk Route during the Han period, Confucians viewed the “otherworldly”

nature of Buddhism as a threat to society. Confucian conceptions of finite human

existence oppose ideas of transmigration — Buddhism, in contrast, assumes a negative

view of this life as a constant state of suffering. The major tenets of the Buddhist canon,

the Four Noble Truths, suggest that this life and, by implication, society should be

extinguished. In these terms, Buddhism is antithetical to the Confucian tenets that focus

on the positive relationship of the self in society.

96 Some scholars put the introduction o f Buddhism into China at around 67 A.D. during the reign of Emperor Ming (58-75 A.D.) o f the Later Han. See Horace Too, in “The development o f the Traditional Chinese Synthetic Jurisprudence” in Chinese Culture: A Quarterly Review , (Vol. XXXII, No. 3, September 1996), p. 20 97 Stephen F.Teiser, The Ghost Festival in M edieval China, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988).

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Teiser’s position claims that on the local level the role of a coherent myth and the

development of ritual practices actively placed Buddhism at the very center of Chinese

social interaction. Arthur Wright explains the problem of communicating complex

abstract concepts and how it constituted a major task to introduce them. The cultural and

ideological gap required adaptation by substantial textual changes in order for Indian

Buddhism to be accepted by the Chinese. This slow process of adapting the India sect of

Mahayana Buddhism, beginning in the Han, eventually resulted in the widespread

adoption of Chinese Buddhism in the Tang.98 While Wright explains that the political

decline of the time created a climate of unrest that is conducive to Salvationist and

messianic movements, clearly the sinofication and adaptation of Indian Buddhist ideas

and practices to meet the Chinese cultural code was vital to attract and continue

conversion.99 Both in function and content, the monastic life took actors out of society,

so it worked against social structure rather than building on it.

Teiser explains that this sect was more compatible, and he identifies the Buddhist

ghost festival (festival of the dead) as the link for two reasons: This endeavor brought the

monks into society, and the festival activities functioned much like the Confucian festival

of the dead, based on the Shang and Zhou rituals. In the collected saying of Confucius,

98 Teiser, 1988. For discussion on the doctrine see Paul Williams Mahayana Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations. Broadly speaking, there are two forms of Buddhism: the “Hinayna” (Small Vehicle) and “Mahayana” (Great Vehicle). As Teiser suggests, only the latter gained the status o f Chinese Buddhism. The Former are a form o f preparatory doctrine for the disciples whose minds are not yet receptive to the ultimate truth, see (Horace Too, 1996). 99 see Arthur F. Wright,Buddhism in Chinese History, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1957.

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the Analects (Lun Yii M in), Confucius made the pivotal point that performing the old

traditional Shang and Zhou rites and rituals honoring the ancestors was still crucial to

society because these actions carried the moral system forward. The pragmatic Confucian

line asserted that these actions functioned primarily to influence social behavior and

cultivated the self and hence, society, not the dead. Confucius was not concerned with an

afterlife; his primary interest was social reform and leadership. While the Buddhist and

Confucian festivals of the dead were diametrically opposed ideologically, functions of

social interaction and the ideal of honoring the dead were acceptable enough to allow this

foreign ideology to assimilate into China.

Some Confucians claimed that economic influence of Buddhist institutions was

responsible for the eventual collapse of the Tang dynasty. The Confucian contention was

that the spread of Buddhism and the concurrent expansion of massive monasteries drained

the government.100 However, sinologists suggest that this argument is not convincing.

Current Adaptation

Evidence suggests that ideological adaptation influenced social, economic and

political change in recent Chinese history. Scholars point to the acceptance of Marxism

as an example. The revolution of the working class in Europe was adapted to the

revolution of the peasant class in China. History implies that intrusive ideology, such as

100 See Wallerstein, Andre Gunder Frank and Christopher Dunn for discussion o f the rise and demise o f world economic system in relation to China.

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Marxist assumptions, is secondary to pervasive Confucian assumptions. As Schwartz

suggests, “The fact that anarchism with its fear of state power, per se, was to remain an

exotic growth in China, while Marxism-Leninism, with its confidence that state power ‘in

the proper hands’ could lead man to the good society, was to win wide and lasting

acceptance, may perhaps itself reflect the abiding influence of Confucian habits of thought

in Chinese life.”101 Two periods of Chinese history mark the attempt to completely

eradicate Confucian ideology completely: the Qin and the Cultural Revolution. Neither of

these failed attempts lasted more than a half century.102

Early twentieth-century China fell to a highly disorganized society because the

traditional order and basic fundamentals had collapsed. China was confronted with a

hostile international environment; thus political power had to be built on an explicit

ideology that was borrowed in part or completely from abroad. The new organizational

structure — Marxism-Leninism — was adopted by a group of radical, alienated

intellectuals. Tang Tsou explains how China had to “solve in decades problems that the

West encountered and dealt with seriatim over the centuries: commercial revolution,

industrial revolution, the Enlightenment, political revolutions, and the more recent,

incremental changes and reforms within the political, social, and economic realms.” 103

101 Benjamin I. Schwartz, Chinese Communism and the Rise o f Mao. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966)33. 102 See Leo S. Chang and Hsiao-po Wang. Han F ei’s Political Theory. Honolulu: University press, 1986.

103 Tang Tsou. The Cultural Revolution and Post-Mao Reforms: a Historical Perspective. Chicago: University o f Chicago Press, 1987) 327.

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The strategy first to form a strong centralized state before tackling fundamental problems

— industrialization, education, cultural “renaissance,” and the promotion of science and

technology — is clearly what our model of change would suggest.

This research suggests that Confucianism survives through syncretism and

adaptation. Confucianism persisted despite two massive attempts of eradication: one

during the Qin, another during the Maoist cultural revolution. The debate concerning

China’s current transition is highlighted by the fear of over-Westernization and the

abandonment of Marxist values. Ultimately, this project will show how Jiang Zemin’s

reference to “Chinese characteristics” in a Chinese model of development fits into a

Confucian model.

Syncretic Conditioning

The term syncretism expresses the process of harmonizing ideas, principles or

cultural aspects. In the context of the present model, it expresses the method by which

Chinese intellectuals “merged two or more ideas into a general impression” within the

Confucian core value system.104 This study identifies in the Chinese literature a pattern

of ideological resilience in response to a succession of ideological and territorial intrusions

that challenged Confucian assumptions and identity, and describes the nature of social

transitions. Change in China is related to a process of absorption and synthesis. The

104 See (New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles,) ed. Lesley Brown, Vol. 2, N-Z, Clarendon Press. Taken from the Greek, “union or reconciliation of diverse or opposite tenets or practices, esp. philosophy or religion aim to harmonize beliefs.

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research will show that the model begins with the Zhou ideal and includes to the present

intrusion of the Western Enlightenment and merchant-class mentality. The challenge is to

test this model in relation to the current dilemma of social, political and economic reform

in China. Discussion will focus on the resistance to so called “wholesale Westernization”

and the Capitalist economy, and will suggest that at this juncture, another Confucian

cycle of synthesis is being observed by the adaption of the free market and Scientism.

The next step is to explore resulting behavior and action in Chinese society to

support the argument that China’s transition to modernity is being resolved in a Chinese

fashion. The Confucian model functioned as the primary social, political and economic

unifier of China because Confucianism, more than any other ideology in Chinese history,

is at the base of China’s identity.105 These assumptions and their continuing effects are

unique to China.

Confucian ideals remain extant today as an implicit and explicit unifier of Chinese

people: implicit in terms of the continuation of identity with and the behavior in

response to Confucian ideals; and explicit in terms of those who still claim their

Confucian heritage. This study shows the current intrusion of the West as another

process of syncretism, and thus, will consider the events and ideological debates

concerning China’s transition to modernity within the model.

The sociohistorical phenomenon of social change only developed in China for

three reasons: 1) the nature of the Confucian ideological superstructure; 2) the method of

105 Other contending schools include Taoism, Mohism, Legalism, and Buddhism.

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ideological adaptation we call “syncretic conditioning,” and 2) China’s geography. A

sociohistorical model developed in response to indigenous intellectual debates and later

foreign ideological and territorial intrusions. Within this continuum, the study identifies

and explains pertinent events and resulting intellectual shifts. It explores the dynamic

social, political, and economic intrusions and changes. It explains how order and stability

was restored by reinstating Confucian institutions. Finally, the study relates this to the

later argument that Chinese identity cannot be separated from Confucian core values.

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TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

Core As«ro^ QnajndJSffigtivg Action

In an investigation concerning principles and their derivations, it is necessary to

consider the actions that put the principles into effect because without effect, principle

alone is of no value. The focus of this chapter is to identify three actions as constants

that empower Confucianism, and then to emphasize the integral link between these

actions and the effect on social mobility, power, and change. Confucius (. Kongzi ,

and the first figures in the literary tradition expounded on the importance of: 1) setting an

example; 2) observance of rituals li H ; and 3) rigorous study of the Confucian classical

literature, D oxuq, ;MP, Great Learning. By identifying these concepts and vocabulary

through partial and selected textual analysis, this chapter supports the Confucian model

discussed in the previous chapter. Later, it will be suggested that the model can be

understood as the substantive component that unifies and stabilizes Chinese civilization.

Selections from seminal Confucian literature (the Analects, [Lun Yu |j§];Mencius j

Hsun Tzu Id1?; and Dong Zhong Shu )106 will be cited to explain the

106 The Analects is a compilation of alleged sayings and dialogues between the master (Confucius) and his followers. These posthumous selections were recorded by his disciples and constitute the seminal work o f Confucian literature. The core assumptions are derived from the earlier Zhou Dynasty period. The Chinese title Lun Yu is generally rendered “selected sayings;” the English title is of Western origin. As Arthur Waley points out, the term Analects proves to be a reasonably acceptable equivalent in English. The term Lun, found within the text(Analects Bkl4:9) refers to the process o f editing a

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foundations of the Confucian meritocracy and the national unification of the middle

kingdom, ( Zhongguo , cj3|S|). From a historical perspective, focusing on only three

components might seem an oversimplification of the crucial elements of unification over

the span of radical political and intellectual fluctuations. However, for the purposes of

this study, these examples shall suffice.

Over time in Chinese history, setting an example, observance of rituals and reading

Confucian classical literature proved successful in unifying and stabilizing the middle

kingdom {Zhongguo, As they became entrenched in the culture, Confucian literati

{ru f§) set forth what is known in China as the scholarly tradition {ruxue $£4p), the

institution of proper government and diplomacy.107 The civil service examination

system founded on the study of Confucian classics {ruxue put candidates in

bureaucratic positions of scholar-officials (shi). Undeniably, the scholar officials

represented power, and the Confucian civil service exam was the vehicle of social

mobility. History demonstrates that Chinese civilization developed an enduring

document. Benjamin I. Schwartz noted, “The consensus among modern scholars is that our most reliable source for the Confucian school, if not for the vision o f the master himself, is a collection o f brief dialogues and gnomic utterances in the collection called tin Chinese the Lun Yii, translated by Legge as Analects, and by Waley as ‘Selected Sayings.’” In the opinion o f some scholars the Legge translation is far more influential. Legge headed the Anglo-Chinese College in Hong Kong for thirty years, and then became the first professor o f Chinese at Oxford. His numerous publications, which are unmatched in ambition and scope, include the massive Chinese Classics in twenty-eight volumes. The name Confucius is o f Western origin and is the Latinized version o f the Chinese K’ung or Kong Fu-tzu. Mengzi or Meng Tzu is known to the West by a latinized name Mencius. This figure has the distinction o f being considered the second important figure in the Confucian line o f intellectuals. He argued that man’s nature is innately good, but moral behavior must be cultivated. See Lau, p.7. Xunzi or Hsun Tzu made a radical departure in the Confucian line by arguing that man’s nature is evil and moral behavior must be forced. This figure is linked to Legalism, the most contentious school. 107 For discussion on the Civil Service Exam, see Benjamin A. Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 2000); and Peter K. Bol, This Culture o f Ours (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994).

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propensity to be unified over the longest span of time over the largest area.108 Like the

undulations of a silk festival dragon moving along a procession, Chinese history is

characterized by a flow from the rise to unification to collapse into disunity, followed by

reunification, a succession of rise and fall known as the dynastic cycle.

Confucian intellectuals made the argument that morality is crucial to the unity of

society and the state. Other intellectuals (e. g., Xunzi or Hsun Tzu Zhuangzi or

Chuang Tzu the Legalists Fa $£, Mohists, and later the Buddhists) did not

support the importance of morality.109 This chapter makes the argument that

Confucianism, more than any other intellectual or religious discipline, is the thread

running through Chinese thought that is central to the unification of the Chinese

civilization over two millennia. The basis for this argument is the connection between

Confucianism and the form of government that was established after the An Lu Shan

rebellion by Dong Zhong Shu. Confucian moral principles are defined as those referred to

and described in the classical literature.110 Moreover, no study on the topic of moral

principle can avoid a discussion of whether morality is objective or conventional. In other

108 Creel, 1970, p. 256. 109 See Hsun Tzu, trans. Burton Watson, 1963 .Hsun Tzu: The Basic Writings (New York: Columbia University Press); Li Ssu, trans, de Bary, Shih Chi; Lao Tzu, trans. D, C. Lau, Tao te Ching, New York: Penguin Books, 1970); Chuang Tzu, trans. Burton Watson, 1996. Chuang Tzu: Basic Writings (New York: Columbia University Press). 110 As Confucian learning became more entrenched, the process o f self-cultivation was inevitably contingent upon study and interpretation o f ancient texts. For example, the classic textLiji (Records of Ritual) is an anthology of various writings on li. As with many works in the long tradition o f Near Eastern scholarship, this work is a scholarly treatise on interpretations and meanings o f ritual li.

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words, it is important to consider how a moral system functions — whether it is

rationally based.

It is important to emphasize the moral system and unified society as an integral

link to Chinese social structure and social change. These intellectuals set up an

institutional framework that was designed to discipline the ruler according to his

understanding of the previously successful Zhou government. While it is beyond the

scope of this study to discuss whether specific behavior is moral, immoral, or amoral,

three actions are identified in this social and political system that can be considered the

underpinnings of social solidarity: setting an example; the observance of rituals; and self-

cultivation through the scholastic tradition.

Setting an Example

The act of setting an example in the Confucian tradition is a central theme in the

classical literature. Confucius was considered a political thinker during his life, and the

compilation of his thoughts by his disciples in the Analects demonstrates his primary

concern for good government via good leadership.111 As these ideas began to influence

Chinese society, one of the earliest and most significant debates concerning social strata

surfaced among intellectuals. Because the Analects can be interpreted as being written

111 This is not to say that Confucius or the general discourse at that time included all individuals o f society. Scholars debate this issue, but it is generally held that the audience was restricted to rulers and authority figures. Substantial criticism points to the fact that Confucius excluded certain groups o f individuals, e.g. peasants and women. Later in the tradition, Mencius made the significant contributions that broadened the theoretical base and commentary by suggesting that self-cultivation could be an ideal among the general population as well at the elite.

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specifically for those at the top (i.e., those in leadership positions and government

officials) it was argued that the moral teaching should be extended to the community at

large and thus to all strata of society.

Setting a moral example had the effect of directly influencing society, and

therefore included the individual, and the community, as well as authority figures.

Intellectual thought had a direct influence from top down, rather than remaining rarified as

an elitist affectation. Confucius set a personal example as a teacher for the individual. As

an example of the first professional moral teacher, his own life exemplified moral

character. Confucius first set an example as a student: “At fifteen I set my heart on

learning” (Analects, Bk I I ). He made a commitment to the contemplation and the teaching

of social order. The concept of perfectibility is central to his thought, and the action of

good behavior and study are the mainstays. I will argue that moral self-cultivation is the

hallmark of this intellectual tradition and remains synonymous with the Chinese cultural

code today.

His student and disciple, Yen Yuan, attests to the example that Confucius set as a

teacher: “The master is good at leading one step by step. He broadens me with culture

and brings me back to essentials by means of the rites. I cannot give up even if I wanted

to, but, having done all I can, it seems to rise sheer above me and I have no way of going

after it, however much I want to.” ( Analects ix. n) Not only was it important to set an

example by personal deeds, this passage points to the importance of continuing to

cultivate oneself. The utility of this work is clear from both perspectives: 1) set oneself

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up as an example, and 2) remain the constant cultivator. This rational approach

developed the propensity to control the emotions as a primary goal. The point in this

tradition is not to become better, but “equal.” “When you meet someone better than

yourself, turn your thoughts to becoming his equal. When you meet someone not as good

as you are look within and examine your own self.” (Analects rv. 17)

The Zhou dynasty became the central example for the perfection of society and

government. This exemplary state of leadership became the symbol of stability and

unity in statecraft and the model for moral character and moral acts, as well as the model

for perfection in government.

Confucius lived during a period of radical change, disunity and turbulence that

followed the Zhou dynasty.113 As a social thinker and moralist, he considered the

relation of the self to society during this radical new period of instability. By conducting

textual analysis and or through the oral tradition, he hypothesized that society needed

leadership and social norms that had been successful in the past:

The Duke of Zhou said to the Duke of Lu, “he gentlemen does not treat those closely related to him casually, nor does he give his high officials occasion to complain because their advice was not heeded. Unless there are grave reasons, he does not abandon officials of long standing. He does not look for all-round perfection in a single person.” (Analects, Bk XVffl, 10)

112 The Zhou dynasty f 10277-771) was a period o f unity and stability. While more than one person held the title Duke o f Zhou, it is generally held that the individual referred to in the seminal literature became the regent for a child emperor. 113 The Spring and Autumn period (722-481 B.C.) is chronicled in the Annals, allegedly written by Confucius.

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The example of the “perfect state” of Zhou continues as a central theme in the

development of Confucian thought, and contributes to the lasting durability and resilience

of Confucian morality. During subsequent periods of collapse, intellectuals returned to

this example of the Zhou period of “moral stability through self-cultivation” as a constant

source of guidance.

Xunzi, another influential Confucian thinker of the third century B C E, developed

a radically different argument concerning the innate quality of morality.114 He still based

his philosophy on the importance of moral behavior, however, and he continued to use

the Zhou dynasty as a model. He explicitly refers to the previous example which had

been set for them by the moral rulers of the Zhou dynasty: “As to one’s will, to be

earnest in one’s moral conduct, to be clear in one’s knowledge and deliberations, to live in

this age but to set his mind on the ancients (as models), that depends on the person

himself’ (Hsun Tzu, Chan trans., p 120).

Confucius advocated the effectiveness of good government through example rather

than punishment, and was committed to the notion that rulers and government officials

must set a moral example. Much of the Analects focuses on proper government for the

good of the community. Book Vffl refers to a number of sage rulers: Tang, the founder of

the Yin or Shang dynasty; Yu, the founder of the Hsia dynasty; and King Wu, who ruled

successfully through moral example:

114 Hsun Tzu; The Basic Writings, trans. Burton Watson (New York:Columbia University Press, 1963). (Xunzi in pin yin)

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The Master said, “Great indeed was Yao as a ruler! How lofty! It is Heaven that is great and it was Yao who modelled himself upon it. He was so boundless that the common people were not able to put a name to his virtues. Lofty was he in his successes and brilliant was he in his accomplishments” (Analects, Book vni, 19).

Book xm describes proper diplomacy, and is a timeless reference for proper behavior and

moral ethics. Repeatedly, we find support of the notion that officials must present

themselves as honorable examples. Here the reference is to setting an honorable example

abroad: “While at home hold yourself in a respectful attitude; when serving

in an official capacity be reverent; when dealing with others do your best. These are

qualities that cannot be put aside, even if you go and live among the barbarians” (Analects,

BK xm, 19).Perhaps the most crucial point Confucius makes is that if those in places of

leadership set a proper example, society as a whole will conform to this objective model.

Logically, these thinkers would expect to see, in the fullness of time, the emergence of a

social convention.

Confucius expounded on the importance of those in positions of authority to

accept correction. For the common people to look up to the example of the elites in

positions of authority, these figures of power must not set themselves above the law. To

be effective leaders, they must not contradict their example. They must be correct in their

example, if not they must stand corrected. “The Master said, ‘If a man is correct in his

own person, then there will be obedience without orders being given, but if he is not

correct in his own person, there will not be obedience even though orders

are given” (Analects, BK XIII. 6). The idea of self-cultivation by “li” developed through

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the use of the example of past lives, not through the religious tenet of salvation through a

supernatural being. Rather, each person has the innate ability to be moral, just as were

those in past generations. The Confucian tradition is based on this life, not on mystical or

otherworldly ideas. The concepts of redemption, salvation, and prayer were not built

into the Confucian moral system. Although Xunzi’s concept of heaven, human nature,

and the innateness of morality in the self differed from that of Confucius, he clearly

continued the precept of looking to self-cultivation rather than to heaven for moral

development:

Therefore the superior man is serious (ching) about what lies in himself and does not desire what comes from Heaven. The inferior man neglects what is in himself and desires what comes from Heaven. Because the superior man is serious about what is in himself and does not desire what comes from Heaven, he progresses every day. Because the inferior man neglects what is in himself and desires what comes from Heaven, he retrogresses every day. The reason why the superior man progresses daily and the inferior man retrogresses daily is the same. Here lies the reason for the great difference between the superior man and the inferior man (Hsun Tzu, Chan trans., p. 120).

The Confucian idea of heaven does not correlate to the Judeo-Christian concept of a

judgmental deity or deities. A Messianic movement, based on a prophecy that a “holy

one” will come to save believers, did not develop in the rational Confucian thought. The

Confucian perspective, generally, places control with the individual. Here, the focus is on

developing self-control, rather than the “Salvationist” approach. This moral line o f

thought puts responsibility on the individual in the context of society and self-cultivation

through study and the practice of rituals can be understood as a cause and effect method

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of morality. This practical approach did not appeal to supernatural beings to assist, or

the “angry” God to judge, condemn, or punish. Nor did it consider the perfect state to be

otherworldly, i.e. “heaven”. Rather, this approach contended that the truly moral

(perfect) society had existed during the unified state of the Zhou dynasty and could be

reestablished if each person accepted responsibility for his or her own morality. This

model of self-development produced a lasting effect on Chinese intellectual thought and

thus, on Chinese society.

Observance of Rituals

It is difficult to understand the entrenchment of Confucianism into the

development process without looking at the tradition of ritual/propriety (lijiao ffi# ) in

relation to the political-ethical society. As the following selections will demonstrate,

early literature describes observance of rituals in terms of the responsibility to promote

the welfare of the common people.115 Officials, rulers, and emperors studied primary

works as well as commentaries to the classical books as part of the curriculum of

statecraft. Neo-Confucians inherited this tradition. Zhu Xi’s ( ^ c ||) commentaries on the

Four Books (The Great Learning [^ C # ], Analects Mencius [JfeiF], Doctrine of

the Mean) became the standard texts for the civil service examination.

The notion that society should return to the practice of the Zhou rituals is explicit

115 See for example Yao Xinzhong, An Introduction to Confucianism (Cambridge University Press, 2000) 190-204.

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in Confucian literature. The objective is to regain social order that existed in time and

space or, in others words, to revisit a better time in history. The critical point to be

emphasized later involves the rationalization of ritual practices, that the application of

these practices contributes to the good of the community, if not to the good of the

departed ancestors. The trajectory is based on a syncretic culture that was involved in a

tradition that made a grand contribution to state government:

To return to the observances of the rites through overcoming the self constitutes benevolence. If for a single day a man could return to the observance of the rites through overcoming himself, then the whole Empire would consider benevolence to be his. However, the practice of benevolence depends on oneself alone, and not on others. (Analects, BK 12. 1)

Observance of the Zhou rituals in the Confucian tradition did not go unchallenged.

Controversy developed, as some argued that these rituals were archaic and elitist

The Mohists attacked the observance of the Zhou rituals and the refinement of the

mind, charging that both were a waste and an ostentatious consumption of

ceremony.

Mohist thought is built on a foundation of simple life and rigid social

philosophy. The Mohists argued that rituals were not enough, and that moral

feelings developed through duty. A major departure from Confucian thought is

made by their argument that moral feelings should embrace everyone and should

expand beyond the family: “Therefore the sage kings of ancient times took great

pains to honor the worthy and employ the capable, showing no special

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consideration for their own kin, no partiality for the eminent and rich, no

favoritism for the good-looking and attractive” (Mo Tzu, Honoring the Worthy,

Part II, Section 9). Here, Mozi condemns the Zhou rituals concerning filial piety

that set forth the hierarchial system for government and the attention to dress and

proper appointments that were described in the ritual literature. However, in this

passage the Mohist intellectuals also explicitly joined the Confucians in pressing

the importance of moral principle, and used the same sage kings as examples of

correct behavior to argue their points. Though the observance of Zhou rituals

became an elaborate exercise, the issue became a matter of heated contention.

Self Cultivation and Reading the Classics

These seminal ideas of the scholarly tradition (ruxue f t # ) that developed

from these and later writers in the traditions (rushih f l i ) became influential in

governmental policy and social norms of the community. Early figures such as

Confucius, Mencius, and Dong Zhongshu emphasized the importance of classical

education. This endeavor was critical to social solidarity, social mobility and

social order. Confucius said:

Where does learning begin and where does it end? I say that as to program, learning begins with the recitation of the Classics and ends with the reading of the ritual texts; and as to objective, it begins with learning to be a man of breeding, and ends with learning to be a sage. If you truly pile up effort over a long period of time, you will enter into the highest realm. Learning continues until death and only then does it

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cease. Therefore we may speak of an end to the program of learning, but the objective of learning must never for an instant be given up. To pursue it is to be a man, to give it up is to become a beast. (Analects, Sec. l, p. 19)

As noted above, Confucius placed central importance on learning and

study; as with many other traditions in the world, this became fundamental to the

Confucian tradition and its effectiveness on society and government — due in

large part to the belief that morality must be taught rather than forced.

Punishment was not enough. Moral character is instilled by perfecting innate

goodness through careful study of the classical texts:

Confucius was benevolent, wise, and free from obsession. Thus, although he studied the doctrines of the various other schools, he established his own school, taught the way of the Zhou, and showed how it could be put into practice, for he was not obsessed by old habits and prejudices. Hence his virtue is equal to that of the Duke of Zhou, and his fame matches that of the sage kings of the Three Dynasties. (Hsun Tzu, p. 126)

Confucius taught that learning, or “cultivating the mind,” was the basis for

proper thought. Confucius said, “If one learns from others but does not think, one

will be bewildered. If, on the other hand, one thinks but does not learn from

others, one will be in peril.” (Analects, BK II. 15)

The story of Yi Yin played a demonstrable role for an educator. According

to the story, Yi Yin taught himself to be moral; and because he taught the ruler

Tang to be a principled leader, he received the Mandate of Heaven and founded the

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Shang dynasty.116 Yi Yin was a farmer who was offered the throne because he

was regarded the most principled man, but he rejected it. Mencius writes:

Yi Yin was a farmer in the lands of the prince Hsin, delighting in the principles of Yao and Shun. In any matter contrary to the righteousness which they prescribed, or contrary to their principles, though he had been offered the throne, he would not have regarded it; {Mencius Book V part A, 7)

The story of Yi Yin was central in the writings of Mencius, the second

influential Confucian intellectual. Mencius saw himself as Yi Yin in his role as an

educator. Like Yi Yin, Mencius chose to teach rather than rule. By making this

choice, both Yi Yin and Mencius conveyed a message that placed a high value on

the role of the teacher. They honored the academic role by declining the throne.8

As Wang Gungwu points out, “It is well known that Confucian social and

political philosophy placed the merchant at the bottom of a four-tier social

structure, beneath the literati, the peasant and the artisan.”117 This is where we

see the beginning of the Confucian line of thought that linked the literati with

power, which became an explicit element in Chinese social strata.

Dong Zhong Shu ( c. 179-104 b .c .e .) another leading Confucian intellectual, restated Confucianism by synchronizing the ideas of two influential schools of the Warring States philosophers, the Legalists and Taoists. The

116 Heaven in Chinese thinking differs from the Western concept. For discussion on the mandate o f heaven see Robert Eno, The Confucian Creation of Heaven: Philosophy and the Defence of Ritual Mastery (State University o f New York Press, 1990). 117 Wang Gungwu, 1990,The Culture o f Chinese Merchants, Working Paper Series No. 57, (University of Toronto-York University, 1990) Joint Centre for Asia Pacific Studies, March p.3.

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importance of education was fundamental to his new interpretation of the

tradition:

Man’s nature may be compared to the eyes. In sleep they are shut and there is darkness. They must await the awakening before they can see. Before the awakening it may be said that they possess the basic substance (quality) to see, but it cannot be said that they see. Now the nature of all people possess this basic substance but it is not yet awakened it is like people in sleep waiting to be awakened. It has to be trained before it becomes good (Dong Zhongshu, Chan, trans., p. 275).

Following the An Lu Shan rebellion, Confucian Literati took control of the

government; and at the formal Imperial level, moral teaching became the new state

ideology.

Dong Zhong Shu set up the Imperial Academy and reviewed Classical

texts; he chose the Book o f Songs, the Book o f Changes, the Spring and Autumn

Annals, the Book ofRites and the Book o f Documents as the five Classics to guide

Confucian government ministers. The state examination was put into effect for the

purpose of teaching morality. Ministers had to pass the exam in order to attain a

place at court:

The people receive from Heaven a nature which cannot be good [by itself], and they turn to the king to receive the training which completes their nature. It is the duty of the king to obey the will of Heaven and to complete the nature of the people. (Dong Zhongshu, Chan, trans., p. 276)

Though example, observance of rituals, and study of the classics all served

to put moral principle in action, the notion of learning and self-cultivation became

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the primary working force in the tradition and has made a substantial and lasting

contribution to Chinese consciousness.

Selections from the Analects, the works of Mencius, Hsun Tzu, and Dong

Zhongshu the Imperial Confucianist, reveal the seminal works of an underlying

ideological and political force in China. This study examines the rational rather

than religious nature of this literature, to support the contention that three actions

— setting an example, observance of rituals, and learning — set in motion the

underpinnings of government and institutional bureaucracies.

By identifying the ideal type of statecraft and good government, these

selections illustrate some of the earliest theory of social structure. Strategically,

these thinkers were in agreement on implementation. Simply put, they believed

that once the role models of the exemplary state of the Zhou were put into place,

social order would be reinstated and the previous ideals would become

conventional social norms.

An examination of this literature reveals how the study of classical texts

and the scholastic tradition were embedded with perceptions of government.

These works became the core curriculum of the civil service examinations.

Evidence suggests that the British civil service examination system was modeled

on the Confucian system.118

118 One controversial supposition, beyond the scope o f this dissertation, is that these literary works influenced the British Crown.

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This study highlights which specific early ideas ultimately stabilized and

unified Chinese society. Beginning in the context of social and political unrest, the

ideas of Confucius developed into a model of social change and succeeded as a

profound political and social reform strategy. These ideas are central to the

meritocracy that endured times of collapse or intrusion by powerful foreign forces

and strengthened and unified the Middle Kingdom ( Zhonggou ). This project will

argue that these ideas remain operative in current development policies.

The seminal ideas examined in this chapter will be discussed as compelling

evidence of a pattern of social change that empowered the return to social, political

and economic order. Repeatedly, the intellectual elites gained power and stabilized

the Chinese world order. This research looks at what sinologists refer to as the

dynastic Confucian reform cycle in terms of a model of social change and

development.

Over the course of this long history, the scholastic tradition and the

concept of setting an example were the substantial and enduring contributions of

Confucianism to Chinese society. Education and study of the classics developed

into a scholastic tradition and cultural identification with scholarship that is

uniquely Chinese. Thus, education can be seen as a primary, if not the most

significant, effect of the Confucian tradition.

Confucianism is uniquely Chinese, original and indigenous. The “people of

Han,” as the ethnic Chinese refer to themselves, take pride in a cultural identity of

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humility, integrity, pursuit of wide learning, and powerful ethics. Confucianism is

pervasive in the Chinese consciousness and has survived attempts at total

eradication, beginning with the Qin.119 The findings in this literature suggest how

the scholarly tradition (ruxue is linked to social norms and social identity.

These social thinkers remained effective in much the same way that modem

sociologists do, by adapting and expanding the critical literature and social dialogue

to encompass the current issues of the time. These thinkers were primarily

concerned with issues of the self in society and society as a system. Periods of

war, social, political and economic collapse, moral impoverishment, and ideological

intrusion raised the concerns of individuals who were initially professional

ritualists and teachers. What is most striking is that these thinkers looked beyond

the practice of rites and their own economic needs to redirect their attention to the

chaotic social and political situation of the times. As we shall see, these seminal

social thinkers established lines of thought that evolved into comprehensive

intellectual debates. As these lines endured they became influential in how the

Chinese see the world, such as in Weberian and Marxist lines in the Western social

theoretical literature. The continuity of Chinese thought has not yet been fully

understood as “social theory” due to a number of fundamental barriers such as

119 While it has been argued that at the hand of iconoclasts, Confucian literati were buried alive and the Classic books were burned by the Qin, there is no archeological evidence to support this fact.

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language and unique conceptual constructs. For example, the Chinese idea of the

self in society remains unexplored as social theory in Western literature.

This study suggests that three actions are key to the perpetuation of the

ideological superstructure: 1) setting a moral example, 2) the performance of

rituals, and 3) the development of the scholarly tradition. Accordingly, to

continue the argument that these assumptions kept in the mainstream and continue

to drive Chinese development.

Social Mobility

The preceding section demonstrates how certain intellectual concepts could

affect the orientation of government and individuals — in particular, how reason rather

than religious faith provided a pragmatic system of moral self-cultivation. Following the

argument that Confucians were successful in linking the scholar tradition (ruxue t f # ) to

power, it is important to discuss debates and tensions regarding social mobility.

The civil service examination system became the vehicle of social mobility in

China. Furthermore, the examination system, based on knowledge of Confucian classical

scholarship, perpetuated the tradition of the Confucian literati, the ± . The scholar

tradition (ruxue f t f§) developed from the ideal of sagehood, which became the model for

i o n the scholar official. As Tu Wei-ming points out, “sagehood is the authentic

120 See Benjamin A. Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 2000). Hierarchical terms: gentleman (junzi worthy (xianren) sage.

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manifestation of humanity.’ 1 0 In 1 the deeper sense, becoming a Great man (dazhangfu

was based on self-transformation in relation to one’s society, not as isolated self-

control nor collective social sanction.122 The premise of this study is that the idea of

sagehood was applied as social theory. Scholars such as Etienne Balazs characterized

Chinese philosophy as predominately social philosophy. In this section, I will

consider sagehood in relation to social mobility. As a debate on human nature, the idea

became well-known among Chinese students and led to heated political contention.

To gain a more clear understanding of the social construct of social mobility, it is

important to consider how the early writers succeeded in expressing moral realities in

rational terms as political theory. The writings of Mencius (Mengzi f f f f 372-289 B.C.

E ) , were valued by the political leaders of his time and later became entrenched in

political administration.124 Mencian theory can be linked to Confucian social

mobility.125 It is important to note that shi (instructors or masters) taught within

121 Tu Wei-ming. See li as process o f humanization in Humanity and Self-Cultivation (Boston: Cheng & Tsui Company, 1998) 30. 122 Ibid, p. 18 (see footnote 15 for reference to sagehood as spiritual individualism and ethical socialism). 123 Etienne Balazs. Chinese Civilization and Bureaucracy: Variations on a Theme, trans. H. M. Wright (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1964). 124 See Lau, D. C., trans., Mencius (Penguin Books, London, 1970). The Mencius along with the Great Learning (Daxue the Analects (Lun Yii « !§ ) and theDoctrine of the Mean became known as the Four Books. These were the essential text books used for the curriculum o f all Chinese students up until the Cultural Revolution. For the first biography o f Mencius see the Records of the Historian (Shih Chi ± ) written by Sima Qian (Ssu-ma Chien W] MiH) during the first century B.C.E. For further reading on the life o f Mencius see the Han shih wai chuan o f the second century B.C.E. and the Lieh nu chuan written more than a century later, both in Lau, Appendix 2.

125 Mencian policies became the orthodoxy from the Sung period ( 960-1279 C.E.) forward. For an application of Mencian theory as contemporary political theory see Iain Johnson, Cultural Relativism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History. For discussion of Mencian position on the

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various ideological traditions vying for power at this time, just as in Athens. The critical

aspect of this argument is that the Confucian/Mencian line succeeded as the dominant

force.126

The goal of this study is to isolate the essence of social mobility within Mencian

expression, and to show how these expressions and the embedded ideas are linked to

historical contingency and development. We will focus on the Mencian expression of

sagehood and self-cultivation in relation to social mobility, social order, and stability by

discussing the interpretation of Yi Yin. Next, this section will explain the Confucian-

Legalist dichotomy and the radical departure from established Confucian thought, while

also looking at the doctrinal question of the root of immorality and the Mencian position

on human nature. An explanation of both the Menci an interpretation of Yi Yin and the of

theory on human nature allows us to see why this work is important as the conveyer of

important ideals, and why it was included as one of the essential text books (Four Books)

used for the curriculum of all Chinese students until the Cultural Revolution.

innate goodness of man see A. C. Graham, “The Background of the Mencian Theory of Human Nature.” Ch’ing-hua hsiieh-pao (Tsing Hua Journal of Chinese Studies) 6 (1967): 215-71; Reprinted in idem, Studies in Chinese Philosophy and Philosophical Literature, pp. 7-66. (Albany: State University o f New York Press, 1960).

126 The shi gf[3 (instructors) were not always of the same ideological tradition as had been the case in the Spring and Autumn period. For example, in the Warring States and later shi followed other teachers. The etymological evidence suggests that it was necessary to distinguish between simple shi and the combined form ru shi M Sfl to denote the followers o f Confucius (Kungzi); See Diane Obenchain, Ministers o f the M oral Order: Innovations o f the Early Cho King, the Duke o f Zhou, Confucius and Ju. Harvard University Dissertation, 1984. pp. 307, 512.

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The Mencian Interpretation of the Story of Yi Yin

The Mencian interpretation of the story of Yi Yin can be linked to the

development of the ideal of the sage minister as the model for the scholar official. Adding

irony to the story, history tells us that Mencius actually lived out the story of Yi Yin by

playing an instrumental role in establishing the new dynasty, as well as solidifying the

relationship between government and the Confucian school of thought.

This interpretation embodies the major tenets of Menican political theory. First,

we find the element of self-cultivation: Yi Yin cultivated himself through nature. Second,

the sage, Yi Yin, was the primary sage because of his innate moral nature. Third, there is

the ideal of the scholastic tradition, that is, the study of the Confucian classics to achieve

office in the bureaucracy and influence the ruler on the merit of his morality. Fourth,

there is the notion of unity: through Yi Yin’s influence, unification came under the Shang

dynasty. Fifth, there is a prophetic element in the interpretation: Yi Yin instructed the

first moral ruler, and Mencius was instrumental in influencing the new dynasty.

Next, we will look at the concept of innate virtue in human nature. The legendary

figure, Yi Yin, thought to be initially either a cook or farmer, became a man of great moral

virtue through natural process. Because Yi Yin was distinguished for his moral character,

he was appointed to teach and direct one of the Bronze Age rulers, Tang. 1 The"7 7 legend

127 No written or archeological evidence supports that Yi Yin was anything other than a legendary figure of the Hsia dynasty. After the development o f the writing system around 1200 BC, references to three dynasties; the Hsia, the Shang and the Zhou (1027-771 BC ) began to appear. The first reference of Yi Yin is found in the list o f ministers in the Zhou period. Later, interpretations o f this oral tradition begin to appear in written form during the Warring States (403-221 BC). Intellectuals including: Confucius (551-479 BC), Mencius (372-289 Be), Han Fei (280-233BC ), Hsun Tzu (298-238 BC ), refer to Yi Yin in varying degree and interpretation.

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has it that, through the moral guidance of Yi Yin, Tang was successful in establishing the

Shang dynasty, and Yi Yin advanced to the position of the first sage minister at court.

“Take the case of Yi Yin. Tang had him first as a tutor and only afterwards did he treat

him as a minister. As a result, Tang was able to become a true King” (Mencius, BK. n, B,

2)-

It can be argued that this legendary figure is the primary ideal of the sage minister

and was humanized by Mencius. Furthermore, this image manifests the political power

that the Mencian line enjoyed throughout much of Chinese history in the legitimation of

the Confucian school. At this point, the ideas behind the old practices were generating

new possibilities of influential government, and Mencius made the point that issues

concerning this line of thought are critical to debates throughout the Warring States period

and beyond.

Much as Confucius had, Mencius lived in a time of high disparity and wrote in

response to social and political collapse. The Warring States period was one of moral

decline and disunity. Mencius records, “When the world declined and the Way fell into

obscurity, heresies and violence again arose” (Mencius, BK III, B 9). Mencius identifies the

problem as one of leadership. “Moreover, the appearance of a true King has never been

longer overdue than today; and the people have never suffered more under tyrannical

government than today” (Mencius, BK II, A, I). As one of the most conservative and

idealistic thinkers of the Warring States period, he opposed the Legalist policies of force

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rather than leadership. He made the case that the heresies and violence of the time were a

product of Legalist policies that lacked moral example and leadership.

Mencius reasoned that any ruler who accepted his guidance could become the next

king and reestablish a unified state of peace and prosperity as had existed in the previous

Zhou dynasty, thus bringing an end to the existing chaos and destruction. Around 320

B.C., the situation compelled Mencius to establish a new world view that made a radical

departure from established Confucian thought. Until this point, Confucians had argued

i for the method of reestablishing social order on the model of the Zhou dynasty.

Confucians saw morality as a direct product of these rituals. Mencius agreed that

morality was the key to a stable society, but the idea of returning to the Zhou dynasty

was obsolete according to his theory of human nature. Obviously, this departure carried

serious political implications. Rather than reestablish the Zhou dynasty, Mencius argued

that it was time to establish a completely new moral dynasty under a new moral leader.

This new sage king would de facto found the fourth dynasty and continue the line of

earlier moral kings through the aid and direction of a sage minister.

The Mencian perception of the ideal of sage king and the implementation during

this period of raging warfare is critical. Theoretically, the position held that moral actions

of the sage king would draw people to him and they would want to serve him: “It is not

by boundaries that the people are confined, it is not by difficult terrain that a state is

rendered secure, and it is not by superiority of arms that the Empire is kept in awe. One

128 That is to say, the reinstitution o f the Zhou rituals: Zhouli “rituals o f the Zhou.”

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who has the Way will have many to support him; one who has not the Way will have few

to support him” (.Mencius, BK II, B l).

The point is that the use of negative devices such as strict law enforcement and

military force was problematic. It was always a concern that harsh treatment and strict

restraints on society could actually pose a threat to the ruler. It was understood that a

prudent leader could maintain order and cultivate society with ultimately a more

sophisticated and enlightened approach. A secure and stable existence came from the

promotion of humanitarianism and the emulation of exemplars that carried a sense of

loyalty: “Practice benevolent government and the people will be sure to love their

superiors and die for them” (Mencius, BK. I, B, 12).

Mencius argued for and was successful in launching the idea that rituals,

ceremony, propriety, manners, and etiquette were highly effective in regulating behavior.

The efficacy of moral cultivation would produce loyal court ministers. By comparison,

this methodology did not embody the possible threat to the court of a more negative

approach. Strategically, this system assured both the monarch and the ministers of

mutual respect. Most importantly for the monarch, there was less concern of an eventual

retaliatory attack resulting from severity of the rule. In theory, benevolent leadership was

beneficial on all administrative levels.

The sage minister played a central role in the implementation of his program. The

sage minister influenced the sage king in government decisions and aided him in setting

moral standards. It was the duty of a sage minister to teach the Way to the sage king and

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establish benevolence as the banner of the unified state. Yi Yin was the role model

(.Mencius, BK V, B. I). The pivotal role in the Mencian theory was the sage minister, who

had the quality of understanding the Way, the ability to teach it, and a sense of duty to do

so.

Mencius saw himself as Yi Yin and wanted to play the same instrumental role in

the Warring States period that Yi Yin had played in establishing the Shang dynasty.

Mencius was confident that he was competent to teach a ruler the Way of benevolence.

He set out to find a ruler who would implement his political policies and offer him a

court position: “Accordingly, there was the behavior of Tang to Yi Yin, he first learned

of him, and then employed him as his minister; and so without difficulty he became

sovereign” (Mencius, BK. II.8).

The position of sage minister at court was central, not only to the establishment

of the new dynasty, but crucial to the continuation of the unified state and to its lasting

stability. Only through continued direction by the sage minister could the king achieve

great things(Mencius, BK. II, B, 2).

Human Nature in Potentia

The genius of Mencian theory lay in the notion that human nature in potentia is

disposed to goodness, but, it must be cultivated.129 This thesis suggests that the 129 The innate virtues include: humaneness (ren), righteousness (yi), Propriety (li) and wisdom (zhi). The seeds o f virtue (ducm) originate at birth and are only spawn the senses o f compassion, shame, respect, right and wrong through self awareness and cultivation. Then, compassion becomes humaneness, the feeling of shame becomes the virtue o f righteousness, respect becomes propriety and the sense o f right and wrong become the virtue of wisdom. ( Mencius, BK 6,6). See Yao, 2000, p. 76.

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development and nurturing of this innate goodness to the utmost will enable a man to

fulfill destiny and become a “Great Man” (dazhangfu ^ :3 t^ )-130 Another important

contribution to the Confucian school is that Mencius directed this thesis to all actors, not

just to rulers as before in the Analects. This argument later perpetuated Confucian

scholar-officials as regulators and advisors to the courts. Conversely, the traditional

Legalist view of human nature stood in direct contrast to the above, i.e., the quality of

man lacked innate goodness, and a system control and punishment was imperative to

bring order and social stability. These opposing positions developed into the ideological

dichotomy that played a significant role in history. As we will see later, the Legalists

threatened not only the Confucians’ power position, but, as history tells, us under the

Qin dynasty (Ch’in the Legalists threatened the Confucian line of thought with

extinction by allegedly executing the scholars and destroying all the literature.

Ultimately, Mencius believed that the predispositions of the self (heart/mind), the

innate or unlearned goodness in mankind, could be refined and nurtured through Confucian

methodology of the Zhou model, as discussed in the previous section.131 In opposition,

the most contentious Chinese intellectual and political system to challenge the Confucian

school is Legalism. The tension stems from the opposing interpretation of human nature

that the innate quality of man is bad and, therefore, government must be forceful and

authoritarian.

130 Xinzhong Yao, 1999.An Introduction to Confucianism,Cambridge University Press, p. 76. 131 For a discussion of contemporary debates see Kwong-Loi Shun, Mencius and Early Chinese Thought, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997).

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These opposing positions on human nature appeared in the works of Mencius and

Hsun Tzu. The term Legalism refers to a strongly centralized administration based on the

belief that man is inherently evil and can only be controlled by fear of punishment. “In an

orderly country punishments are numerous and rewards are rare.”132

This propitious moment presented doctrinal questions: if the problem is

immorality (and Mencius’ theory claimed that the king can be moral), then where does

morality come from? Mencius built his theory on the tenet of human nature. Mencian

theory of human nature stated that man in potentia is good, and he employed metaphors

from nature to support his contention: “Man’s nature is naturally good just as water

naturally flows downward. There is no man without this good nature; neither is there

water that does not flow downward” (Mencius, BK 6. A. 2).

Though it was implicit in conventional Confucian thought, Mencius made a

profound contribution to Chinese intellectual thought by challenging the position that

man’s innate nature is evil, and, thus, must be forced to be good. He based his argument

on the quality of compassion. He observed that man naturally behaved in a manner that

expressed feelings of shame and duty, and displayed a sense of right and wrong without

being taught or forced. The “germ” sense of compassion is therefore innate: “The heart

of compassion is the germ of benevolence; the heart of shame, of dutifulness; the heart of

132 This thinking developed from a time of war, the Warring States period (475-221 BC). Shang Yang, the first important legalist established the foundation o f the Qin administrative system (361-338). Han Feizi ( 'H # T ) wrote the definitive work on Legalism. Li Si advisor to the first emperor, Qin Shihuangdi (221-210 BC), and credited with influence in the success o f the consolidation o f the empire. In opposition to feudal aristocracies, the Qin was governed by a centralized military. The Qin originally came from the west, probably from the steppe region o f modem Gansu.

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courtesy and modesty, of observance of the rites; the heart of right and wrong, of

wisdom. Man has these four germs just as he has four limbs” (Mencius, BK 6, II A. 2).

The qualities or “germs” of shame, duty, courtesy and modesty are inherent principles of

benevolence. His theory suggests that “germination” of compassion can produce true

benevolence.

Critical to development is the influence of the environment. Mencius would argue

that even if the negative attitudes had been developed, they could be rectified. Equally

inherent is the dispassionate, aggressive side of human nature which must be tempered. A

violent, immoral environment will develop man’s nature accordingly, but, human nature is

neutral, and hence, can be shaped. “Human nature is like the willow tree, and

righteousness is like a cup or a bowl. To turn human nature into humanity and

righteousness is like turning the willow into cups and bowls” {Mencius, BK, VI A. l).

Mencius states that the nature of man is such that a truly good person and government

can be cultivated because of natural feelings of what is right and wrong.

This part analyzed selections from The Mencius concerning his interpretation of

the legend of Yi Yin. The fact that Mencius took this position on human nature is crucial

for two reasons: (1) because man is good “in potentia” and must be taught rather than

forced, as the Legalist would have it, in effect Mencius strengthened the legitimacy of the

scholar status/class, and (2) this position led to the most violent debates in Chinese

intellectual, political and social history. The Mencian argument on human nature forms

the opposing tenet to that of the Legalist school and the roots of the Confucian/Legalist

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dichotomy which, will be discussed later as a critical force at work in political theory

today.133

It is important to note that Mencius qualified the problem, developed a theory,

and devised the implementation of a system. History tells us that this reform program

succeeded in his time and continues to be useful as theory. It is clear that Mencian

theory made a significant contribution to intellectual history and thus, influenced Chinese

development. Also, we see that this story was lived out in social and political history

because Mencius influenced and changed ideas and government by his own self

transformation. These successes are later linked to the social constructs of power and

social mobility: he became the second most important figure in the Confucian scholar

tradition.

This section demonstrates that social mobility in China became synonymous with

Confucianism. A common misconception is that Confucianism is backward and retards

individual growth. This analysis suggests the opposite. We have found that the major

tenet of Confucianism, self cultivation, is based on the rational concept of individual

growth in the context of the community. Of course, the explicit illustration is official

social mobility based on the Confucian curriculum of the civil service examination system.

Confucian discipline can be said to have a double objective: to promote individual virtue,

133 As Lau points out, William James made the distinction that Mencius (Mengzi jS-Tj was ‘tender-minded’ and Hsiin Tzu (Xunzi irjTO was ‘tough-minded.’ There are a number o f arguments concerning why the latter was less influential on subsequent thought.

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as well as to promote the individual as a means to bring stability and moral order to

society at large.

In terms of a Confucian development model, we suggest that the Mencian ideal

perpetuated the beginning of the cycle of social and political change and development.

For example we demonstrated that rather than reestablish the Zhou dynasty, Mencius

argued that it was time to establish a completely new moral dynasty under a new moral

leader. After a period of collapse and chaos, Mencius was instrumental in continuing the

line of previous moral kings through the aid and direction of a sage minister. In

consequence, the social construct developed to secure Confucians as power elites and

built a system moral government. Later, we will discuss how the Mencian line continues

to play a significant role in political theory and informs scholar-official as political actors

who are committed to the maxim “governance of people through self-cultivation” (xiuji

zhiren) .134

Political Power and the Merchant Class

As discussed in previous chapters, unification under Confucian ideals had a

positive effect on Chinese social stability and change. The course of Chinese history

involves a cycle of unification and times of economic expansion, and even economic

explosion in both the Han and Song dynasties, as well as collapse. Literati argued that

material enrichment and the profit motive led to corruption in government, and that

134 Hahm, 1999. p.240.

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those in positions of power should not engage in commerce or mercantile endeavors. In

this chapter, we consider the intellectual debate concerning the profit motive. It is not the

purpose of this study to discuss the numerous theories on these debates. Rather, we

intend to demonstrate the continuation of the Confucian position through history up to

the present, and its relation to the stability and change.

Drawing on selections from the Han and Song periods we will examine the

moralists’ point of view in the context of tensions and perspectives concerning self-

interest, exploitation and the threat of corruption. This study will demonstrate the

continuation of the Confucian position that power should remain linked to moral

principle. It will show how the literati worked to limit the power of the merchant class.

Later, we will identify similar ideological tensions at work in current reform, concerning

the rise of the free market and the Chinese opposition to Western Capitalism.

First, we will examine the debate between the Han imperial ministers and literati

concerning government monopolies on salt and iron. Then, we will explore the New

Reform of Wang An-Shih in the Song, the social reformer whose ideas were part of the

Confucian revival that dominated eleventh-century intellectual life. Next, we will

consider the criticism of Zhu Hsi, a Confucian literatus who formulated Dao-xue, known

in the West as Neo-Confucianism.

The framework of the inquiry is built on ethical perspectives and the crucial

question is an issue of principle. The literature reveals that important intellectual

contributions in the Han and Sung periods continued a line of thought that supports the

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hypothesis that social change and stability are linked to the Confucian moral tradition.

These two periods were unified in terms of economic expansion and social well being.

We will show the connection between these intellectuals and positions of power during

times of economic stability and reform, as well as the critical dialogue concerning the

merchant class.

Until the late Ch’ing period, the term shang (merchant) was used loosely. The

scope of the word included persons who engaged in any form of commerce (import and

export, wholesale and retail sales) and financial (banking and brokerage) or industrial

(manufacturing) pursuits.135 The evidence reveals that Confucians focused on commerce

and trade as an endeavor of concern in terms of ethics and moral principle. Explicit views

on the profit motive and the merchant class in general are reflected in the literature.136

This notion is recorded in the seminal Confucian works and continues throughout Chinese

history until modem times.137 “Marketing controls originated with the Supervision of

the Market in the Zhou dynasty and the Price Stabilization and Equalization System of

the Han dynasty.”138

135 Albert Feurerwerker, Chinese Early Industrialization. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1958) 17. 136 For contrasting arguments of the role of the merchant class in modern times see William T. Rowe, Hahow: Commerce and Society in a Chinese City. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984). 137 Feurerwerker. 1955, p. 244. 138 Peter Bol, “Government, Society, and State: On the Political Visions of Ssu ma Kuang and Wang An-Shih,” in Ordering the World, (Robert P. Hymes and Conrad Schirokauer, ed.), pp. 413-419 and 423-425.

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Beginning in the Warring States period (475-221 BCE), merchants as a class were

thought to be nonproductive parasites. As a matter of policy, they were discriminated

against and restricted to doing business in designated market places under the eye of state

officials. By the time of Emperor Wu’s rule in the Han period, merchants were forbidden

by law to ride in carriages or wear silk. More seriously, merchant families could not own

land. “These consequences of wealth, however, failed to stand in the way of their display

of arrogance, nor did they keep men of any social status from seeking it.”139 As Wang

Gungwu points out in his work on the culture of the Chinese merchants, “it is well know

that Confucian social and political philosophy placed the merchant at the bottom of a

four-tier social structure, beneath the literati, the peasant and the artisan.”140 Endorsed

and reinforced by the Qin-Han imperial bureaucracy, merchants remained officially, and in

the eyes of most Chinese people, in the lowest position of stratification until modem

times. Also, the character for merchant means unpleasant odor.

Context of the Han

China in the beginning of the Han dynasty ( 202 B.C.- A.D.220) began to

recuperate from the turbulence of the Warring States era and the harshness of the Ch’in

under laissez-faire policies.141 Under the unified Han, China expanded militarily,

139 Charles Hucker, China ta 1850, a Short History, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995) 63. 140 Wang, Gungwu, The Culture o f Chinese Merchants, Working Paper Series No. 57, University of Toronto-York University Joint Centre for Asia Pacific Studies, March, 1990, p. 4. 141 Hucker, 1995. p. 58.

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diplomatically, and commercially.142 It realized assets in production, progress in

technology, and the development of mercantile activities. As Gemet points out, “The

dynasty’s institutional and ideological policies contributed to the formation of a

bureaucracy staffed by those of similar classical education, values, historical orientation

and family background.”143 Archaeological evidence, as well as textual allusions suggest

that private enterprises created by families of rich merchants played an important role in

the economy of Han China.

Iron metallurgy was a rich innovation of the two preceding centuries from which

the Han profited. The working of iron was the most active and important craft of this

period. In 117 B.C., the state monopoly in iron and salt was instituted and forty-eight

foundries were established by the government. The manufacture of salt and iron was

placed under state control by license. Thus, wholesale distribution was monopolized by

state agencies, and private profiteering in these essential products was stopped, with the

profits then accruing to the state.144

The debate within the literary text, Discourses o f Salt and Iron, is illustrative of

the tension between the literati and those who favored strong state centralism (Legalists),

in this case the Imperial ministers. The Imperial Chancellor issued an edict inquiring into

the question of government monopolies, which supported revenues for military defense.

142 Jacques Gemet, A History of Chinese Civilization (Cambridge. Cambridge University Press, 1996) 138. 143 Conrad Schirohauer. 1991, :p. 57. 144 Hucker, 1995, p. 63.

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The literati responded: “It is our opinion that the principle of ruling men lies in nipping in

the bud wantonness and frivolity, in extending wide the elementals of virtue, in

discouraging mercantile pursuits, and in displaying benevolence and righteousness. Let

lucre never be paraded before the eyes of the people; only then will enlightenment

flourish and folkways improve (Ch. I, b),” It is clear from the opening comment that the

objection is not directed to government use of funds per se. Explicitly, the problem rests

in the nature of the role of the merchant. For the government to enter “into financial

competition with the people” is to place officials in the role of the merchant class. The

bias is explicitly stated, “sanctioning propensities to selfishness and greed (Ch. I, e).”

The merchant-class is cast as a destructive and ruinous element to society,

“Wealth breeds extravagance and frivolity that leads to the disruption of society and to

the decay of virtue.” A dichotomy is explicit in terms of the simple virtuous life and that

of merchant class “Lead the people with virtue and the people will return to honest

simplicity; entice the people with gain, and they will become vicious (Ch., I, j).”

The scholar-officials (shi ± ) maintained that merchants “prosper unduly (Ch., I,

1).” Conceptually, the efforts of the “middle man” were not realized as a viable

contribution. The service of sales for profit, seemed problematic. Markets for

commodities of exchange assured that the economic system, void of profit, kept virtue

intact.145

145 See Gungwu Wang, The Culture o f Chinese Merchants, Working Paper Series No. 57, University of Toronto-York University Joint Centre for Asia Pacific Studies, March, 1990.

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The literati placed high priority on the role of agriculture, which was considered

the fundamental industry of the Empire. Manufacturing and trade were considered non-

essential industries. Over-developing the merchant class would be a detriment to

agriculture, because the farmer class would be tempted into the merchant class by the

want of material gain, thus leading to an imbalance that could lead to the collapse of the

food supply (Ch. I, c).

Now sturdy natural qualities decay and artificiality thrives, and rural values decline when industrialism flourishes. When industrialism is cultivated, the people become frivolous; when the values of rural life are developed, the people are simple and unsophisticated. The people being unsophisticated, wealth will abound; when the people are extravagant, cold and hunger will follow. (Ch., I, c)

The critical point these moralists make is that the desire for wealth and excess will

undermine agrarian life.

Reference is made to ancients who forbade merchants and shopkeepers to be

officials. “Their purpose was to discourage habits of greed and fortify the spirit of

extreme earnestness. Now with all the discriminations against the market people, and

stoppage of the sources of profit, people still do evil.”146 This can be taken to mean that

constraints fail to solve the problems, and hence are beyond control. This, then, would be

a strong argument to eliminate mercantile activities altogether.

Part of the dilemma, of course, was that the merchants did provide economic

services: “Without merchants commodities will be cut off.” Commercial endeavors were

a necessity: “we depend on the merchants for their distribution.” There is reference to

146 Wang, 1990, p. 231.

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mercantile activities in the Book o f Changes , “Facilitate exchange so that the people will

be unflagging in industry.” (Ch. I, i) The artisan and peasant class enjoyed a different

respect from the moralists “without artisans, the farmers will be deprived of the use of

implements (Ch. I, j).” Of the four-tier class strata, the literati, the artisans, and the

peasants were considered above the merchant class, even though merchants were

acknowledged for contributing to the farmer class by providing the tools for production.

Still, greed and exploitation were a major consideration for the scholar officials in the Han

period.

Context of Song

The Song dynasty (^ 5|§ 960-1279 B.C.)experienced a dramatic economic

expansion that resulted in qualitative and quantitative changes in the realms of industry,

agriculture, and commerce, to the point that scholars referred to these advances as

revolutionary. Literary scholarship broadened and production in paper and book making

also expanded.147

During the Song, new elites took positions of power and office and thus replaced

the old hereditary aristocracy of the Tang, whose positions was diminished by the decline

of the dynasty. Landownership became the mark of wealth. Education was the

prerequisite for office, which in turn provided opportunities for the acquisition and

147 Schirokauer, 1991, p. 133.

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protection of wealth. But, scholarship, office and wealth were not evenly distributed.

The overeducated poor and the undereducated rich complicated the social strata.148

Despite the expansion of trade, commerce, and the booming population, the Sung

was militarily weak. The primary military problem was the dynasty’s inability to bring

the north to subjection, and the military ineffectiveness prompted a heavy financial

burden for the Song state.

Wang Anshih (.EE 2c 5 1021-86 A.D.), social reformer, shi (literati class) and eclectic

thinker, passed his exams, rose to power in the South of China and became one of the

most influential officials of his time.149 In his first important work, Memorial to the

Emperor Jen-tsung, sometimes called The Ten Thousand Word Memorial, Wang “strikes

a balance between the importance of laws and institutions (the Legalist tendency) and the

Confucian view that good government depends ultimately on men of character and ability,

unhampered by legalistic restrictions.”150 His program demanded the unification of

politics and morality, as well as government and society. These reform efforts also

addressed the contention among the scholar officials, “unify all who learn,” in an effort to

prevent disagreement among literati.

148 Ibid, p. 133.

149 Peter Bol. 1994.This Culture of Ours, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994) p. 212; and Peter Bol, “Government, Society, and State: On the Political Visions o f Ssu ma Kuang and Wang An- Shih,” in Ordering the World: Approaches to State and Society in Sung Dynasty China, eds. Robert P. Hymes and Conrad Schirokauer, pp. 413-419 and 423-425. 150 Bol. Ibid. 2, p. 413.

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Wang An shi’s new policies were the culmination of a reform movement. Though

the institutional changes that were issued came later in the dynasty, the problems

stemmed from the beginning of the Song.

During the first decade of the Sung, emperor Shen-Tsung’s reign, the bureaucracy was split into opposing camps by the issues raised in Wang An shi’s attempt to reform the state. The tension between the new reform party and its opposition continued through the remaining half-century of the Northern Sung and re-echoes in Chinese history down to the present.151

The primary problems facing the Song involved the relationship between the state

and society, as well as the kind of education appropriate for the political elite in carrying

out their responsibilities. Wang’s vision was to restructure government and society under

a program that combined institutions and values. His program expanded the civil service

examination system and intended to utilize every talent in harmony and prosperity as a

coherent organic system of nature. His intellectual style analyzed antiquity in order to

discern a universal system that was applicable to the present.152

In Wang’s view of the economy, it was clear that government must “manage

wealth” in order to keep private wealth from increasing to the point that people become

indebted to private interests. The result of this would threaten the uniform

implementation of policy. A major premise in Wang’s reform was to break the power

151 Michael Dennis Freeman, Lo-Yang and the Opposition to Wang An-Shih: The Rise of Confucian Conservatism, 1068-1086. Yale University dissertation, 1974.

152 Bol. 1994, p. 187.

153 Bol. 1994. 1, 162.

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of the wealthy who made others dependent on them.154 We can make the case the

Wang’s Confucian Dependency theory predates Cardoso’s. Wang sees the merchant

class as a threat on the individual level. Members of other social groups or even other

members of the merchant class stand to be controlled by the wealth of others:

Managing wealth was the basic means of establishing the control over society necessary for creating an integrated human order that could be commanded from above. Just as control over government required silencing those independent-minded officials on whom other officials depended, so control over society required suppressing those of independent means on whom the poor depended. Benefiting society (li min, li t’ien-hsia) involved controlling those private interests that, by their simple existence, threatened the government’s command of society.155

Like the literati in the Han, exploitation by the merchant class was viewed as a

threat not only to individuals, but to society as a whole. “However, we are aware of the

fact that commodities and money do not circulate very well in the empire. It is feared

that officials eager for personal fame and rewards will seek to achieve speedy results

within a year’s time, and thus the system will be subverted.”156 When members of

society were affected, the social and economic system was influenced as a whole.

Wang’s market controls guarded against profiteering. He supported a constant set

of principles or a single set of rules: “The Way of order and chaos is on a single thread in

154 Bol, Ibid. 1, p. 130. 155 Peter K. Bol, K. “Government, Society, and State: On the Political Visions o f Ssu ma Kuang and Wang An-Shih,” in Ordering the World, (Robert P. Hymes and Conrad Schirokauer, ed.), pp. 413-419 and 423-425. p. 174. 156 Bol., 1994. 2, p. 425.

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past and present.”157 “Wang Championed Mencius.”158 The Mencius begins with a

powerful discourse on profit. “Benevolence and righteousness, and let these be your only

themes. Why must you use that word- “profit?” His position on wealth and control of

profits is founded in one of the first explicit references of the moral admonishments of

“profit” (Mencius, Ch. I, l).

Another important Song intellectual Zhu Xi (Chu Hsi ^ c | | 1200- 1130 B.C.)

articulated the concern corruption and its relation to the profit motive.159 Zhu Hsi, who

wrote, compiled and edited books throughout his entire adult life, developed ideas on the

concept of ko wu, “apprehending the principle in things.” He expressed man’s refinement

of himself by making the connection with his original moral nature.160

Song Neo-Confucians were vigilant about self interest and greed and their teaching

focused on the ideal of selflessness.161 For example, Zhu articulates this position in the

context of “Hsing-Li-Hsuen” the philosophy of human nature162 and discusses the

157 Bol, Ibid. 1, p 158. 158 Bol., Ibid. l,p. 132. 159 Zhu Hsi was born o f the Southern Song Dynasty. Following the wishes of his father, Zhu Song, who was a man o f literary reputation, continued his instructions, passed the government examinations and received the highest title o f Chin Shi. See Oaksook Chun Kim, Chu Hsi & Lu Hsiang- shan: a Study of Philosophical Achievement & Controversy in Neo-Confucian,( (Ph.D. diss., University of Iowa, 1980) 20. In the characteristic manner o f East Asian writers, his ideas were presented as commentaries rather than a systematic philosophical treatise. His teachings received official recognition and became orthodox in the second quarter o f the thirteenth century. 160 Daniel K.Gardner. 1990.Chu Hsi: Learning to Be a Sage. (Berkley: University o f California Press, 1990) 9. 161 Conrad Schirohauer. 1991 .A Brief History of Chinese Civilization, New York:Harcourt Brace, p. 150.

162 Oaksod Chun Kim. 1991.Chu Hsi & Lu Hsiang-shan: a Study o f Philosophical Achievement & Controversy in Neo-Confucian., p. 74-87.

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human mind being ruled by innate moral principles and regulated by purpose rather than

by self-seeking desire and the will. The mind naturally works to maintain morality; it is

human to fall from it.163 Here the Song literature reflects the Mencian position on innate

good and applies it to the material gain. Zhu articulates on self-interest thus:

Moral principle is what the body and mind naturally possess. Yet when you lose it, you don’t know how to recover it. Wealth and position are things external to the body. Yet you seek them, fearing only that you will not get them. Even supposing you did get them, they wouldn’t do your body or mind the slightest bit of good; moreover, you can’t be certain of getting them. Now if you were to seek moral principle, you’d get it; and, if you were capable of not losing what you had, you’d become a sage or a worthy. What’s beneficial and what’s harmful are extremely clear then. As for the impartiality of the human mind, it’s always obscured by selfish desire. Thus you mustn’t let go of it [i.e., the mind] but must always be vigilant about these two things [i.e., the beneficial and the harmful], 164

Zhu points to what he considers normative self-interest of the merchant class and

warns that this behavior is a potential threat to society. He directed specific attention to

the “s/zz families,” making the point that their fortunes in the long term would come from

simple-conduct and the avoidance of self-interest. Obviously, the temptation existed, as

it does in every age — in time in space — to forsake ethical standards in order to increase

ones share in wealth and power.165

The writings of Zhu illustrate his attitude toward ethical purpose as part of the

educational process. His identified a lack within the local educational system and

163 Ibid, p. 108.

164 Bol, 1994. p. 12.

165 Ibid. 1, p. 12.

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questioned the motives of students in terms of personal gain. He points out that “The

sages and worthies did not simply want people to engage in the memorization of texts and

composition of verse and essays for the purpose of winning a reputation and obtaining

wealth and office.”166 To implement improvement in the educational system for the

scholar-officials he admonished ambitions of wealth and power. There was the double

purpose in his efforts: first, he perpetuated a civil society and, second, he encouraged

scholars sense of responsibility to society by highlighting a dichotomy between the

socially conscious and the disinterested aristocracy: “Accord with the righteous, do not 1 £7 seek profit; illuminate the Way, do not calculate the advantages.”

Zhu accomplished change in the curriculum with the introduction of his syncretic

work Daoxue (Tao-hsueh H t#), known in the West as Neo-Confucianism.168 This

harmonizing interpretation incorporated ideals of Daoism and Buddhism into rujia fflf J|f.

As we explained in Chapter 4, B, the methodology of the scholarly tradition (ruxue Iff Sf§

) was to adapt new ideas with time and change. This new interpretation of Confucian

learning, supported state and society with an “organic system” in which each aspect

reinforced the other in theory, as well as in practice. During the Han period, the syncretic

method was employed to derive various concepts from other traditions and practices.169

For example as Schirokauer points out, complimentary opposites were emphasized as

166 Gardner. 1990. p. 31.

167 Ibid. p. 30.

168 Ibid. p. 35. 169 Schirokauer, 1991. p. 57.

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interacting polarities, such as knowledge and action. This model allowed distinctions

without disturbing the ultimate organic unity.170 To understand and strive for balance in

the constant state of flux was critical to order in the universe.

Han literature reveals criticism of the merchant class and demonstrates the

moralists point of view on the profit motive. Within the economic system, mercantile

activities were subject to government restrictions and merchants were socially

marginalized.171 The prevailing argument claimed that the merchant class posed a threat

of moral decay as a result of greed that spread to other individuals and then to the general

population. Accumulation of wealth as normative behavior could lead to moral decline

and social decay. Relative to the efforts of the farmer class, which was the driving force,

the efforts of the merchant class were perceived as non-productive and of less value to

society. Sophisticated industrialization was seen as a threat to the established agrarian

system. Fear largely focused on the possibility of a fundamental break with the

traditional agrarian economy and the conservative economic outlook. On the other hand,

some Government officials of the Han did not agree. They argued that merchant activity

and the distribution of goods as an important and valued service. Trade and commerce

contributed to the agrarian system by providing implements and tools to farmers.

The Song literature reflects a different criticism. Wang An Shi’s critical point was

to protect society from being controlled by “people of wealth,” i.e., the merchant class.

170 Ibid. p. 149. 171 Evidence reveals that the perspectives o f both the Han and Sung intellectuals were initially Confucian, but similar objections were expressed differently, thus, the rhetoric is not constant.

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His reforms put controls on trade and commerce to maintain balance. Where the Han

officials argued the market controls from the need of military funding, Wang is explicit in

the position that profiteering by officials would lead to corruption.

This textual analysis has demonstrated how Confucian scholar-officials sought to

maintain political power and why these intellectuals were opposed to members of the

merchant class in positions of leadership. Intellectual debates within the Han and Song

dynasties illustrate tensions concerning corruption in government by linking the

accumulation and control of wealth to exploitation and greed. This study suggests that

Confucians were persistent in limiting the role of the merchant class within society.

We make the claim that the explicit articulation of this position by the Song

intellectual Zhu Xi can be interpreted as a theory of economic dependency. That is to

say, his theoretical concerns can be compared to those of Fernando Cardoso, Enzo Faletto

and Samir Amin. The debate over mercantile activities that lead to monopolies and how

these activities lead to corruption guided by self-interest are clear in early Chinese

thought.

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FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Ideological Superstructure

Textual analysis of selected classical Chinese literature reveals that Confucian

moral realities were expressed in rational terms of political and social theory. Initially,

the objective of these intellectuals was conflict resolution. Confucius and later Confucian

figures in the long tradition were instrumental in social and political reform and

development. Over time, a system was implemented by objectifying and using specific

actions that influenced (from top down) the method of governance and, thus, social

behavior of the public. “Governance of people through self-cultivation” (xiuji zhiren)

became the maxim of the scholar officials, the (shi i ) power elites. In this

comprehensive literature we find a cogent concept of social stability and unity in

statecraft that is based on the historical model of the Zhou period (,If}45 1027-771

B.C.E.).172

The literature expounds a belief system that was conceived on exemplars of

leadership. In particular, we have elaborated on the alleged Duke of Zhou (M'& ) and the Mencian interpretation of Yi Yin. The primary tenet of this system is social order through the transcendence of the self. The findings reveal that the ideological

172 Confucius claimed that the Zhou dynasty (10277-771) was a period of unity and stability and could be considered an exemplary state.

124

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superstructure was perpetuated by setting an example and by the observation of specific

rituals li (^t) and classical study rnxue (ff #)■

Confucius (Kongzi JLT1) (551-479 BCE) has been identified as the first reflective,

systematic thinker in the Chinese tradition.173 We submit that Confucian social theory

begins at the point of objectification of the convention derived from the performance of

Shang rituals //; that is, when the performance of li was interpreted as having a practical

effect on the living rather than on the dead. As Chaihark Hahm notes, “Even though

there are passages in the classical texts which suggest thatli originated from a superhuman

source, li is generally understood to be a human origin, whether it be timeless custom or

conscious effort to embody some universal moral principle.”174 Based on our

understanding of the Confucian interpretation, the performance of li is both objective and

conventional. Thus, we have an intellectual shift when the appeasement of ancestors

becomes the seminal rationalization of religious practice.

On the personal level, this meant rejecting the idea of engaging with the other-

world; instead, li transformed the living. We emphasize that this study does not consider

how or when this intellectual shift became part of public awareness. The point is that

ritual elements rather than corporal punishment became the instrument of social order.

173 Frederick W. Mote, Intellectual Foundations of China, New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc. 1989 , p. 37., Julia Ching considers him ‘seminal thinker,’ see Chinese Religions. 1993. The Macmillian Press. 174 Chaihark Hahm, Confucian Constitutional. Ph.D. diss. Harvard Law School Dissertation, 1999 p. 121.

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Also, in the ancient classical texts, the Mencian theory of human nature — the cultivation

of the innate goodness.

The ideological superstructure developed positive norms from these two seminal

ideas: the objectification of li and the Mencian theory of human nature. The findings

revealed that, initially, the discourse reflected in the Analects was directed to at leaders

and the importance of their role, in what was envisioned as a “top-down” social structure.

Later, the audience of the discourse expanded to include the public sphere. The ideal of

moral norms (li and self-cultivation) had worked well previously, during the Zhou period

of social order and prosperity, as a model for good government and the perfection of

society.

The patterns of social change appear to have been linked to Confucian leadership,

specifically, moral leadership. As Fairbank points out, “The Confucianists won out over

the other schools of Warring States philosophy because they claimed to be, and became,

indispensable advisors to the emperor.”175 We have examined a number of important

historical events in relation to intellectual shifts throughout Chinese history to illustrate

how the Chinese writing system, the use of rituals, the importance of example, and the

ruler’s adherence to the literati all relate to polity, unity, and change.176 We found

evidence of how these ideas were implemented.

175 John King Fairbanks and Merle Goldman, 1998, China: A New History (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1998) 67. 176 Ibid. p. 112.

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Reform, rather than revolution, became a central cultural trait; and li played an

ongoing role in reform. As later figures in the Confucian line developed the ideas, the

model became a powerful convention. As Dong Zhong Shu in the Han states:

“When change (genghua) is obviously needed [in the state] but is not subsequently made,

the state cannot be governed well even in the hands of great sages.’ 1 7 7 Confucians

explicitly emphasized that harmony could not be achieved without change and adaptation.

For example, the well-known reform program of Wang Anshi, discussed in a previous

chapter, relied on one of the Three Classics on li, the Ritual o f Zhou (Zhouli JWf$I)- Other

classics, the Records o f Li (Li ji HtfB) and the Ceremony ofLiYi (ii! j|) were apparently

used in the same manner. 1 7 Initially, £ it is in the Zhou period that we find the seminal

example and some of the first recordings of these ideas. In the Warring States and Spring

and Autumn periods we find the reflexive — Axial — thought, and later, in the dynastic

cycle, a pattern and method of reform and repeated reinstitution of the system that led to

social, political and economic recovery. This study does not attempt to offer a

comprehensive sinological explanation of the scholarly tradition ffuxue Iff

our findings do reveal a coherent system of beliefs that is useful in clarifying the cleavage

between Chinese and Western development models. We have found that China’s

intellectual history is thoroughly intertwined with its cultural values and reflection on its

social, political, and economic development.

177 Yao, 2000; Hanshu, 1997:2505. 178 See Hahm, 2000, p. 121.

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In the previous chapters, we have explored how the discourse of Confucian

intellectuals began to conceptualize social norms. Our discussion thus far elaborated on

the Confucian ideological superstructure and illustrated its relevance to Chinese

development during the long fluctuations of imperial China’s intellectual history. But our

greater challenge is to relate these ideals to change and development in modem China.

The next sections of this chapter will expand on the intellectual convergence and

divergence between China and the West. Then, we will look at the Western social science

problem of value measurement, and identify the problematique of modem Chinese culture

and policy.

Convergence and Divergence of Ideologies

We now turn to the convergence and divergence of ideas. We submit two

dimensions of intellectual and cultural impact that resulted from the introduction of

Western Enlightenment ideas into China. The study suggests a process of convergence

through education and science (ideas that were adapted) and divergence (ideas that

remained in contention, such as militarism, capitalism, legalism, and feminism). First, we

will discuss the intellectual and cultural context at the time of convergence.

Intellectual and cultural connections between China and the West came relatively

late. During the Han period (202 B.C. E. - C E 220), Chinese silk was marketed via the

“Silk Route” to imperial Rome. This trade was conducted by middlemen, and there is

little evidence that Chinese merchants or diplomats traveled further west than the

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Portuguese, who were the first Europeans to arrive in China in 1514, but the contacts that

followed in the nineteenth century by the Europeans and Americans had a greater impact

by introducing basic cultural themes. It is generally held that a more indirect connection

to the West came through Japan. Assessing earlier history, we could argue that China had

more cultural influence on the West than vice versa. The insular nature of China, with its

resistance to foreign contact, was influenced by early Chinese intellectuals. Scholasticism

and culture, with its many representations, were given high priority by Chinese

intellectuals. Protection of culture thus became a high priority, up until the iconoclastic

Maoist cultural revolution.

China experienced previous periods of broad cultural diversity, such as in the

Tang. During these periods, cultural “intrusions” caused new intellectual debates, such as

with the florescence of Buddhism, which was discussed in Chapter 4. Buddhism had

much more cultural influence than any of the later invasive Western religions. Drawing on

Teiser’s argument, we discussed how the Buddhist performance of the Ghost festival was

compatible with the Confucian practices of li. Buddhism’s particular forms of ritual and

social interaction by the monks were initially accepted, although at the doctrinal level it

was considered antithetical.

Christianity, especially Catholicism, had more effect on military uprisings than on

Chinese intellectual history or culture. Ideologically, the Christian and Islamic religions

presented two problems. First, considering our explanation of China’s adaptive nature, by

the time these religions were introduced, China had developed ideological pluralism of

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three traditions: Confucianism for statecraft, civility, and moral transformation; Taoism

for relating to the natural world; and Buddhism for conceiving the ‘otherworld,’ — an

ideological pluralism that allowed each to function on separate levels. Religious pluralism

in the West refers to the ability and freedom of different religions to be practiced. But,

according to their respective doctrines, it is impossible to adapt any of these to function

as part of the others (in their own tradition or the Chinese), because the redemption of sin

and transcendence can occur only through a single faith. However, Confucians and other

Chinese and Western scholars, including theologians and scholars of the history of

religion, focus on adaptation and the assimilation of Confucianism and Christianity.179

Ethnocentrism is common in many cultures, but China’s concept is perhaps the

most radical. This resistance remained a substantial block for cultural interchange.

Chinese intellectual literature reflects a long tradition of the idea that China considered

itself the only civilized nation, as the previous chapters demonstrated. The so-called

“people of Han” refers to the ethnic Chinese. Europe’s powerful and aggressive pressure

to trade with China and “elevate” the Chinese to Western Enlightenment ideas met with

strong resistance. The continuation of the British opium trade increased Chinese

antagonism toward Europeans, and all Westerners in general. Because of the great

disparity in assumptions concerning the nature of the world, Western cultural exchange

came at an enormous price for the Chinese in the following century.

179 Obenchain, D iane, Ministers of the Moral Orders: Innovations of the Early Zhou King, the Duke o f Zhou, Confucius andJu, H arvard U niversity D issertation 1984; Fanggang Yang. Chinese Christians in America: Conversion, Assimilation, and Adhesive Identities, (U niversity Park, Penn: The Pennsylvania State U niversity Press, 1999).

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Convergence: Education and Science

Now we will consider the convergence and adaptation of Western Enlightenment

ideas in terms of two important areas: education and science. We will begin with a

discussion of how connection with the West made a powerful impact on China through

the education system.

The Chinese intellectual reformers at the turn of the last century who had formal

exposure to Western education were willing to reexamine their basic Chinese assumptions.

The intellectuals of that generation had also received a Confucian education, but ideas that

challenged that tradition came back to China as Chinese students were allowed to study in

Europe, Britain, the United States, and Japan. The first important evidence of Western

education as pervasive in China is the work of Yan Fu, who was influenced by Adam

Smith’s Wealth o f Nations, Thomas Huxley’s Ethics and Evolution, and John Stuart

Mill’s On Liberty. The introduction of Western ideas lead to major debates and

eventually to what is considered by many today as the loss of China’s cultural identity;

the iconoclasm and protest that erupted out of debates over these differing assumptions

are referred to as the May Fourth Movement of 1919. With the abolition of the

Confucian examination system, these Western ideas began to influence the Chinese. The

Confucian view that resists technical skills and specialization in favor of classical training

implies that modernity is incompatible with Confucianism. Concepts of democracy,

science and technology presented critical problems for Confucianism. Because the status

of the scholars remained unchanged, the old line debates continued to be vital to reform.

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Westernization among Chinese intellectuals began to prevail. In 1915, Chen

Duxiu, who had studied in Japan, founded the New Youth publication, which denounced

traditional intellectual views, especially Confucianism, in favor of modernization under

liberal ideas. Kang Youwei, the highly original thinker whose work was grounded in

Confucian and Buddhist training, worked to justify Confucianism theoretically to include

the progress of Modernity, but was unsuccessful.180

Some scholars, in particular those who went abroad to study in Europe and the

United States, supported the strong movement toward wholesale Westernization within

the academic community. For example, Hu Shih, a former student of John Dewey, argued

that the Chinese should write in the vernacular (baihua )> rather than in the classical

language. This, as one might expect, had a substantial cultural effect. Other May Fourth

figures, such as Lu Xun, influenced change by affecting the style and content of Chinese

literature. His protagonist in A Madman’s Diary introduced Western satirical style.181

Another Chinese scholar, Xu Zhimo, began to write poetry modeled on English verse and

rhyme.182 Through the ability to read American and British literature, these and other

Chinese scholars of that period eventually changed the literary writing style in China.

180 Kang Youwei, Ta T ’ung Shu, The One-World Philosophy o / K ’ang Yu-Wei, trans. by Laurence G. Thompson (London: Allen and Unwin, 1958). 181 Lu Xun. A Madman’s Diary. (Honolulu: University Press, 1990).

182 See Conrad Schirohauer, A Brief History of Chinese Civilization (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1991)211.

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The influence of Western education resulted in changes in China’s culture, the

most significant of which was the promotion of modernization and the remodeling of the

bureaucracy. Ultimately, these events and debates led to the introduction of the Western

ideas of Marxism and its Chinese interpretation. Mao, a contemporary of Chen Duxiu,

adapted Marx’s revolution of the workers into a peasant revolution. Mao’s Cultural

Revolution targeted two cultures: the by-then pervasive Western culture and China’s own

traditional culture.

In the area of scientific study, Western science had been accepted and developed

into “Scientism” in China, what nearly could be described as a religion in China. The

Western position on science —that the scientific method is the only method for arriving

at truth — hinges on empirical measurement and verifiable facts. The Chinese method,

which has a much longer tradition, is based on metaphysics and is considered

“superstition” by scientists in the West.

Criticism of the Western tradition rose after the spectacle of World War I and its

devastation of Europe. This war led some intellectuals to reconsider Chinese traditional

values. Promises of Western scientific methods presented serious moral issues and the

proponents of science and metaphysics were and continue to be seriously debated. The

problem hinged on interpretation and evaluation of Chinese and Western cultures, and

resulting tensions.

As we discussed in Chapter 3, Liang Shuming — considered by some scholars to

be “the last Confucian” — identified China’s culture crisis in relation to the rise of

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Western science in China. Liang’s cultural theory was a reaction to the positions of the

May Fourth intellectuals, and, as we noted, Liang rejected science over traditional

Confucian values because he foresaw that rationalism (science) would create a spiritual

crisis. Explicitly, he argued that the rise of individual intelligence and technical

competence needed moral guidance. Liang’s Rural Reconstruction plan — a cultural

rather than a political movement — was designed to create new forms of economic,

technical and educational development, as well as political reform all based on Confucian

values. As history has shown, these last efforts to avoid Western thought and the

Kuomingtang’s impersonal legalist bureaucratism did not survive the later development of

Mao’s cultural revolution.183

Divergence: Militarism

In the preceding section we discussed examples of adaptation and absorption

regarding Western Enlightenment ideas. Now we direct the discussion to areas of

divergence. We identify four ideological dominions that affect modem Chinese intellectual

history: militarism, capitalism, legalism and feminism.

We will begin by considering why the West became viewed as “militaristic. ” The

prevailing view by the Chinese of their own cultural superiority was heightened as a

result of contact with foreigners. Western aggression helped define the first broad

183 The Kuomingtang was a coalition of coalition of feudal classes and bourgeoisie, see Benjamin I. Schwartz Chinese Communism and the Rise of Mao (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1951).

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perceptions of the West. From the first encounter, the European presence in China was

perceived as demanding and intrusive. We have discussed the Opium War as a pinnacle of

Western aggression on China — the result of Chinese resistance to engage in trade

agreements. The search for trade markets, exploitation of resources, and the thrust of

Colonization, all frequently sanctioned by the religious justification of salvation,

contributed to military attacks. Thus, the first perception of the West was based on fear

of new technological power that threatened to destroy the whole culture.184

As evidenced in previous chapters, the intellectual foundations of Chinese thought

are concerned with the perception of order and stability. The West posed a serious

intellectual challenge because these first encounters entailed forceful debates over

resources and trade. The result was a breakdown in diplomacy and a perceived arrogance

on both sides, which ultimately led to European military offensives that crippled China

— socially, politically, economically, and culturally, but ultimately not intellectually.

Chinese intellectuals continued to maintain the position that they were culturally

superior because they developed a tradition that placed moral leadership, not the

accumulation of wealth, in a primary relationship to power. Much Chinese literature

suggests a perception of Western culture driven by the accumulation of wealth. China,

with its vast resources, was considered “irresistible game.” Exploitation by Western

expansion over the past one hundred and fifty years by Britain, German, and Japan has

184 The first glaring example was on the occasion referred to as the Opium War, when the British, armed with the latest rifles invaded and slaughtered thousands o f Manchus armed only with knifes. William Kirby class lecture, Harvard University, March 23, 1996.

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influenced this Chinese perception of the West and is explicit in Chinese debates on

social, political and economic reform. As the West continues to negotiate trade with

China, China struggles with the central issue of how to modernize and at the same time

resist Western culture. While there have been innumerable wars and colonial expansions b

Chinese history, this overarching perception of the West influences the resistance to

Western culture.

Divergence: Capitalism

This study has revealed significant evidence that development in China is driven

by a different reality. Some scholars, such as Rowe suggest that changes in China’s

socioeconomic development, “commerce, personal identity, social structure, and social

organization are the result of a course dictated by internal logic.”185 This section will

consider what accounts for the reticence on the part of China to embrace Western

capitalism.

Capitalism is a philosophy and an ideology, as well as an economic system, which

uses private wealth to produce goods and services for profit. Capitalism requires a legal

structure to conduct enterprise; and once the legal underpinnings are in place, they carry

social and ideological implications.186 The decline and dismantling of the Communist

185 For a study o f Hankow that details the escape o f the heavy-handed bureaucratic dominion and highlights a number o f assumptions that are specific points o f divergence from the Weberian model. William T. Rowe, Hankow: Commerce and Society in a Chinese City (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984). 186 William S. H. Kirby “ China Unincorporated: Company Law and Business Enterprise in Twentieth-Century China,” in The Journal o f Asian Studies 54, no.l (February 1995):43-63.

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Party State and the establishment of the Legal Parliamentary State allowed for China to

1 87 move towards a limited, free market economy. These events transformed the

discussion into scholarly conversation that formed an entire field of research in Chinese

studies.

Literature on “capitalism in twentieth-century China” is set in the context of

radical change: the fall of the Qing Empire and the end of the old order, followed by eight

decades of reform. It details the development of private business beginning with the

legacy of the Qing court at the turn of the last century to the present.188 Weber’s

comprehensive study and Bergere’s work on the short lived “golden age” of capitalism

opened discussion on the reticence of the Chinese to develop capitalism. First,1 80 we will

187 Much of South East Asia is industrialized and exercising a new level of development. The aim of Deng’s “open polity,” was to transform China into a modem industrial state and to establish the Legal Parliamentary State. Since the advent o f Deng Shao Ping’s open door policy, China has experienced a very rapid development of the private sector, although state ownership and regulation remain far larger than in Western Capitalist economies.

188 Literature concerning capitalism in twentieth century China includes studies o f commercial law (Hung, 1932; Fang, 1989; Allee, 1994; Kirby, 1995); the modern Chinese business class (Levy, 1949; Godley, 1981; Berger, 1986); Chinese family business (Omohundro, 1981; Lane, 1989; Maurice et al., 1980, 1986; Redding, 1990; Sorge and Warner, 1986); merchant and middle class (Chan, 1977; Wang, 1990; Glassman, 1991; entrepreneurship Cheng, 1994); economic regulations, organization and management Redding, 1980, 1982, 1982a, 1982b, 1986; Hamilton, 1988) market processes (Chao, 1977; Redding, 1993); industrialization (Feurerwerker, 1958; Li, 1981); bureaucracy (Redding, 1990; Zhou, 1992; Li, 1994); and private business (Young, 1995). 189 The collapse o f the Qing empire was followed by what Marie-Claire Bergere calls China’s “golden age” o f capitalism, 1916-1927. See Marie-Claire Bergere, The Golden Age o f the Chinese Bougeoise, trans. Janet Loyd (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986); see William S. H. Kirby, “ China Unincorporated: Company Law and Business Enterprise in Twentieth-Century China,” in The Journal of Asian Studies 54, 1991, No. 1 (February) :43-63 pp. 48-49 for discussion on how competitive opportunities created by World War I and the weakening o f state authority were supportive o f industry, banking and shipping. From the latter part o f the nineteenth century until the outbreak o f war in 1937, much o f Chinese business was physically and organizationally destroyed or weakened. However, even in a weakened state, law played a positive role in economic expansion.

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discuss the ideological legacy of the Qing and then consider some of the literature that

addresses the resistance by China to adopt Western capitalism.

Legacy of the Qing

The assumption of the Qing reformers was that the essential vehicle for private

Chinese economic development would be the modem corporation on the Western

model.190 The Qing assumption proved mistaken; and after the collapse of the Qing, two

things developed. First, law ultimately proved useful as the means to define limits to

foreign economic activity in China; the Chinese state itself became the corporate form of

business activity. Second, the nationalization of the corporation, 1929-45, manifested in

the reemergence of an intmsive central government with ambitions of state-controlled

economic development.191 When the Communists took over in 1949, 70 percent of all

Chinese industry was controlled by the government and more than half of government

enterprises had reorganized as limited companies (you gongsi) or, in a few cases, limited-

190 The history of company law in twentieth-century China began in 1903, when the Qing Court ordered the compilation o f a commercial code. This effort was undertaken to facilitate commerce, strengthen industry and serve the goal o f creating Chinese companies to compete with the foreigners who were producing and marketing their goods on Chinese soil. The Ministry o f Commerce (Shangbu) was formed the following year and issued China’s first company law (Gongsilu). Very little is written concerning Chinese law that addresses the regulation o f private economic activity prior to the Company Law o f 1904. Chinese Company Law was the first modem law drafted by the Imperial Law Codification Commission, followed by more than eight decades o f revision that involved different emphasis from different governments. 191 See Kirby for a discussion on how the Qing and early-Republican governments viewed company law as a means o f promoting industry, abolishing extraterritoriality; and, in the process o f achieving these objectives, strengthening the state. The new regime, using law to promote state ascendancy over all private enterprise (Chinese and foreign) enforced the abolition o f extraterritoriality and regulation of private enterprise as part o f a larger agenda o f state-building.

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share companies (gufen youxian gongsi). Formal law that is required for capitalist

enterprise did not materialize because administration and justice became combined in the

power of “officialdom,” which stood in opposition to the old hierarchy of the kinship

system.

The Debates

Weber’s position on why China failed to develop Western capitalism was that it

lacked the political and military autonomy and the organizational unity to act as the

corporate autonomy and unity that had set the financial and legal grounds for rational

development of Western capitalistic enterprises.192 Weber was the first to interpret the

Chinese kinship system as an inhibitor of capitalist development. The filial social

structure and the substantive ethical law that had dominated traditional China was seen as

having negative influence on capitalist development.193

As Feurerwerker points out, the system of “official supervision and merchant

management” ( kuan-tu shang-pan) set the pattern for the earliest efforts to introduce

modem industrial enterprise into China.194 This system developed as a compromise

between the urgings to modernize— arising from the increasing impact of the West — and

192 W eber, 1991, pp. 13, 15, 16, 20.

193 Ronald Glassman, China in Transition: Communism, Capitalism and Democracy ( N e w Y ork: Praeger, 1991).

194 Albert Feurerw erker, China’s Early Industrialization: Sheng Hsuan-Huai (1844-1916) and Mandarin Enterprise (Cam bridge: H arvard U niversity Press, 1968).

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the conservatism of the traditional society. He examines the system of official

supervision and merchant management that underlay this achievement. Describing the

failure of China’s industrialization effort to transform its predominantly agrarian society,

he notes the critical importance of institutional, motivational, and technical factors in

economic change. Like Weber and Jacobs, he argues that the framework remained more

traditional than modified, and therefore no industrial revolution comparable to that in

Japan, other East Asian nations, or the West, was achieved.

Hamilton argues that the key issues are the links between worldviews and

institutionalized economic activity.195 Chinese institutions, in large part inspired by the

long tradition of a Confucian worldview, operate on relationships rather than

jurisdictions, and on trust and obedience to one’s role— not on bureaucratic command

structures. Clearly, Western charismatic elements and systems of authority have little

place in a society where one’s innate duty to maintain his society’s integrity is believed

to have succeeded well. Hamilton contends that in the West, Christianity, combined with

preexisting institutions, produced clear jurisdictional lines of top-down personalized

authority in the economic sphere led to legal definitions of property and ownership.

Fei Xiaotong points to a key difference in Chinese institutional development. He

elaborates that in the West, “organizations are jurisdictional and the individual is,

195 Gary Hamilton, “Civilizations and the Organization o f Economics,” in The Handbook of Economic SociologyPrinceton: { Princeton University Press, 1994) 198.

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conceptually, the main unit of activity and control.”196 What is most problematic

between Western and Chinese worldviews is that jurisdictional principles and the

autonomous individual both are historically absent in the Chinese worldview, and thus are

not incorporated in Chinese institutions. Instead, the normative social relationship,

(iquang shi) or network building, is the primary operative principle “cultural

strategy.”197 Weber wrote: “Asians have used capitalism and rationalism to propel, like

trains on a track, their ideal and material interests, but the civilizational orientation to the

track is still very much in place.”198

On the other hand, Levy describes three levels of resistance to capitalism: (1) the

official; (2) the gentry and (3) the masses. Resistance on the official level usually came

from the central rather than local government. Officials had no vested interest in

economic projects and exercised the power to block them. The gentry were for the most

part landlords, deeply rooted in the community, and even the officials had to consult

them when dealing with significant affairs. Merchants and artisans were under the control

of landlords; in the case of controversy between the gentry and the merchants, the

196 Fei Xiaotong, From the Soil: The Foundations of Chinese Society, trans. Gary G. Hamilton and Wang Zheng. (Berkeley: University o f California Press, 1992).

197 See King, 1991, p. 79, or discussion concerning Asian economies that are network based (Biggart and Hamilton 1992; Hamilton, Zeile, and Kim 1990; Redding 1991; Hamilton). For Japanese economy (Gerlach 1992; Aoki 19900; Okumura 1982). For South Korean economy which is now less network-based, although the networks are institutionalized differently (Amsden 1989; Biggart 1990; Hamilton and Biggart 1988; Kim 1991. For Taiwanese economy, literature suggests the same is true (Numazaki 1991; Hamilton and Kao 1990; Greenhalgh 1988; Hamilton and Biggart 1988), 198 Hamilton and Kao, 1987.

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government sided with the gentry. The masses regarded new industry as a threat to their

employment and their livelihood.199

The development of private business in China has been carefully documented.200

Redding’s study of Chinese family business identifies what he refers to as “the psycho

social legacy of China.”201 He observed that the power of the old value system affects

the way managers see the world. This perspective influences economic systems by the

way in which managers create organizations.

In recent years, China’s fast growing business class is still likely to face significant

political, economic, and social discrimination. Discriminatory practices, make it difficult

to buy land or get loans, for example. Business men are excluded from “the political club”

(the Communist Party) to the point that few even apply. Further, Party members who

choose to engage in business are expected to renounce their membership.202

Today, there is a commitment to the modem world and development based on

199 Marion J. Levy. Jr., “The Social Background o f Modern Business Development in China.” in Marion J. Levy, Jr., and Kuo-heng Shih, The Rise of the Modern Chinese Business Class (New York: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1949).

200 Changes in official attitude and policies toward private ownership aided the growth o f private business in China; see Susan Young, Private Business and Economic Reform in China (Armonk and London: M. E. Sharp, 1995).China had only 150,000 registered private businesses at the beginning of economic reform in 1978. By late 1993, more than 15.6 million individual businesses (getihu) and private enterprises (siying qiye) were registered with the Bureau o f Industry and Commerce. Though Young states that these numbers are considered to be a substantial understatement, she highlights the important role o f the Bureau ( Gongshan Xingzheng Guanli). The first Company Law of the People’s Republic of China came into effect in 1994, providing a legal basis for two forms of companies: the limited-liability company and companies limited by shares. Recently, the contrast between the successes o f the private sector and the difficulties of many state-owned enterprises has led to a reassessment o f the role o f private business as a mere “supplement” to the state sector.

201 S. Gordon Redding, The Spirit of Chinese Capitalism (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1993).

202 Rosenthal, “Capitalist to be Granted Official Status in Communist China,” New York Times, March 15, 1999. A9.

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economic principle. Also, there is speculation that in the twenty-first century China will

follow a similar path, but will develop differently.

Modem capital investment requires rational and calculable law and legal procedure

to function. However, formal law that embodies rationality and calculability has not

flourished in the China. Chinese statutes codified ethical rather than legal norms. We

have discussed how this ideological point has origins in back to the legacy of the Qin and

the Legalist school, and there is evidence that this dichotomy based on the idea of human

nature is still operative. The literature suggest that the Western legal system is

antithetical to the Confucian line.

The Confucian ideological superstructure is built on conformity, overall

orientation toward conciliation and harmony, and a deep-seated anxiety concerning

disorder ( Ivan) rather than on competition, conflict, and a pervasive legal system as in the

West. The European model of disunified worlds of competing states controlled by

mercantile power elite groups is in opposition to these principles. Also, nineteenth-

century Europe created powerful states of destruction. As we discussed in our analysis

of Chinese intellectual history, aristocrats continually emerged, but were limited in social

mobility by the scholar officials, who were linked to the institutions and who prevented

aristocratic wealth from controlling power. Confucians strove to keep social mobility

linked to the education system regardless of social or economic background From the

moralists’ point of view, success in business and other forms of prosperity should not be

the means to power.

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Conversely, the way power in the West became defined by wealth created a

dichotomy. As we found in the case of China, Western ideological principles have roots

in historical events as well. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the aristocracy took

control of local land and centralized bureaucratic states. The merchant class which began

to develop slowly in the sixteenth century called for laws that upheld trade institutions.

Wealth continued to be the means of political power, no matter how the wealth was

gained. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the rise of the middle class produced

autonomous control by political constitutions that guaranteed liberty. These

constitutions and laws guaranteed that the state cannot take private property, and

allowed for individual influence upon political controls.

Thus, China and Europe developed differently. As Wong points out, “The basic

template of modern European history was determined by the entwined processes of state

making and capitalist development. No analysis of any other part of the world can

comfortably make the same claim.”203 We have pointed to some of the same intellectual

tensions at work in the current debates regarding economic and political reform.

On the Chinese side, the issues behind the struggle between dominant figures at

the Confucian imperial court are still being played out today by some of the same

competing forces. In the West, assumptions that evolved out of trade and the search for

resources and markets drive consumerism and market ideologies, that in turn influence

203 R. Bin Wong, China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience. (New York: Cornell University Press, 1997) 207.

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Western social, political, and economic theory. In a decade, Deng’s 1989 economic

reform led to the rise of a free market; and there is evidence that China is simultaneously

reclaiming traditional cultural values. While this study explains the cleavage between the

models of development, it also point to the confluence of some ideas.

This section provides substantial evidence of the “syncretic conditioning” of

Western Enlightenment ideas. First, we demonstrated how to envision an ideological

superstructure as the cultural code that influences Chinese social norms. By explaining

the core cultural assumptions and debates, as well as the method of “syncretic

conditioning,” we can see why it is more likely that the convergence and divergence of

Chinese and Western ideas would take place, rather than China’s submitting to a

“wholesale” Westernization. In our examples, we have described how education and

science have been integrated culturally. Old line debates are evident in the concerns over

power and wealth. Now we will look at how the old debates between the Confucians and

the Legalists are important in understanding the Chinese resistance to Western concepts

such as human rights. First, we will discuss the debates; then we will look at the issue of

Chinese feminism.

Contemporary Problematique

We have surveyed relevant Chinese intellectual history to examine debates in

relation to social theory. We have discussed events and ideals that influenced Chinese

impressions of the West and the intrusive nature of the first encounters. Because our

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study is interested in China’s resistance to the dissemination of Western ideas we will

now deliberate on ideas that bear decisively on the ideological adaptations in the

nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the present.

Rites Versus Rights

Rujia HI ^ and Fajia ^

If we were to emphasize the single most significant finding in our study of the

differences between Chinese and Western thought, it would be the implications of the

dichotomy between Rujia f | f H i and Fajia jj+ j L Confucian preference for rites over

laws relies on moral restraints of ritual to curb excesses and direct power.204 By

comparison, the Legalists expressed the function of law primarily in the Lu Code of

Criminal Law 205 As we discussed in Chapter 5, Part B, the tension between these

indigenous contending schools involved opposing positions on human nature “in

potentia.” In many respects these debates are useful in explaining contemporary

polarities between China and the West. These contrasting modes of discourse within

Rujia i f f % and Fajia M- are ideal types that can be thought of as roughly analogous to

intellectual differences between China and the West. As we discussed in the previous

sections, China views the West as legalist and militarist. Now we will explore

204 William de Bary. Asian Values and Human Rights: A Communitarian Perspective. 2000. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 205 See Horace Too. 1996 “The Development of the Traditional Chinese Synthetic Jurisprudence in Chinese Culture: A Quarterly Review, Vol. XXXII, No. 3, September, p. 2.

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implications of this dichotomy to illustrate how Confucian thought relates to international

relations and political theory, as well as the prospects for a future Chinese constitution

and human rights issues.

As we illustrated in our textual analysis in Chapter 5, part B., Mengzi

developed the Confucian line that punishment and strict rules were not enough. The

concept of li, the long and arduous task of self-discipline, was required to such an extent

that practitioners ultimately would supposedly transcend the distinction between the

internal and the external.206 Chaihark Hahm asserts that the political significance is based

on the interpretation of li as “discipline” without a repressive “disciplinary” environment.

On the other hand, Xunzi K yp argued that self-cultivation through emulation of

exemplars of the past, restoration of an ideal past, favoring the status quo, and

preservation and transmission of tradition was not enough. Strategic preferences found in

the Legalist dialogue emphasized offensive and coercive measures. The so called “legacy

of the Qin” is a vivid image of a rather ruthless and grim Emperor of Qin, Qin Huang-di,

who employed the use of harsh and severe punishments (xing JftJ) to attain a well-

ordered and peaceful state.207

206 Chaihark Hahm, 1999. Confucian Constitutionalism, Harvard University Dissertation, p.78.

207 The Xian exhibit o f terra cotta military figures is a monument to this oppressive regime of the first unified state of Qin. For in-depth reading on the Qin see Derek Bodde. 1986. “The State and Empire o f Ch’in,” in Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe, ed., The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 1: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B. C.- A.D. 220. Cambridge, pp.21-102.

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Strategic Preferences

The Rujia M M — Fajia M dichotomy relates to achieving and preserving

state security. Sinologists, relying heavily on the Sun Zi Bing Fa and its articulation of

nonviolent paths to state security, have supported the position that the Confucian-

Mencian line preferred defensive/punitive strategies over offensive and expansionist

ones 208 We find linguistic constructs like “using force under unavoidable circumstances,”

which shifts the responsibility for warlike behavior onto the enemy 209

The conventional view of sinologists suggests that decisions makers in the

Confucian-Mencian paradigm historically preferred to defuse security threats internally

through moral government, and externally through he qin il -type policies, such as

diplomatic maneuvering, bribes, formal and informal alliances, trade, tributary relations,

appeasement, and policies that could be broadly labelled accommodationist grand

strategies.

On the other hand, Hahm contends that the Confucian ideal of “rule ofli fit”

should not be equated with rule by moral persuasion and example; the concept of li

instead can be thought of as a regulatory political ideal. 1 1 There 1 is evidence that even

208 See Sun Tzu: The Art o f War, trans. Roger Ames (New York: Penguin, 1993). 209 Alastair Iain Johnson, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History, Princeton: Princeton University, 1995) 68.

210 Essentially he fp to establish harmonious relations with, and qin J|| to draw close to the enemy ruler or faction in his court. Diplomatic accommodation can subsume a broadly defined notion of he qin. but here we take it to mean the diffusion o f threats and the maintenance o f reasonably peaceful political relations. Johnston, 1995, p. 116, footnote 18. For the broader meaning o f he qin see Zhang. 1990, p. 449, and Rand 1977: 212-18. 211 Chaihark Hahm. 1999. p. 70.

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during the Zhou period, violations of li resulted in what can be understood as

“institutional” sanctions that were beyond moral castigation or social censure. He points

to evidence in some cases that is contrary to the conventional image. To some extent,

Confucians regarded penal institutions as a vital part of their vision of constitutional

order.

Etienne Balzas concludes from his survey of relevant chapters of Chinese official

dynastic histories that political institutions and laws began to outweigh the importance of

ritual in terms of chapters devoted to them.212

Iain Johnston argues a different interpretation based on some Chinese historical

military documentation that reflects a realpolitik pattern of choice; and he therefore

makes the claim that the Chinese used force more than sinologists realized.213 In the

international studies arenas, analysis of Chinese strategic preferences relies on an

understanding of the Rujia M — Fajia W- dichotomy. Scholars such as Johnston

and Samuel Huntington conclude that Confucian cultures may pose a military threat in the

new global paradigm. Hahm counters that Confucians consistently emphasized that the

role of punishments was secondary or supplementary. Our evidence suggests that to

Confucians, li was the primary institution for government214

212 Etienne Balazs. 1964. Chinese Civilization and Bureaucracy: Variations on a Theme, trans. H. M. Wright. New Haven: Yale University Press. 213 See Steve Chan, “Chinese Conflict Calculus and Behavior: Assessment from a Perspective of Conflict Management.” World Politics 30:3, 1978, pp.391-410; John K. Fairbank, “China’s Foreign Policy in Historical Perspective.” Foreign Affairs 47, 1969, pp. 449-63; Frank Kierman and John Fairbank, eds., Chinese Ways of Warfare. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974). 214 Hahm. 1999.

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China’s Resistance to a Judiciary

In Chapter 4, Part A, (p. 49 and p. 55) I analyzed the Weberian model of change

and argued that, because his model is based on Western assumptions and thus constructs

a linear progression to the rational-legal system of authority, it does not allow for the

Chinese model of change in history or the future. In the case of Confucian society, we

suggest that an amendment to Weber’s model is in order. Our evidence suggests that in

the context of Confucian society, traditional domination and a value-rational system

would be one and the same. We would collapse these two categories into rational-//

domination, or simply “value-rational” domination. We could argue that Qin China

achieved the rational-legal domination, but did not remain the preference of Confucians

who held power. It is questionable yet as a viable Chinese model. Our evidence suggests

a new paradigm model of social change that incorporates the Chinese harmonic

determinism and the Western economic-legal determination (see Figure 5.).

McMullen and Balazs would support the argument that Confucian society had

developed to a point of rational domination, but also distinguished itself from the Legalist

perspective with its emphases on enriching the state and strengthening the army.215 The

Weber construct highlights rationalization and bureaucracy, and relegates tradition to the

linear realm of the past.

215 Hahm, 1999. p. 156; Balazs, 1964. pp. 140, 144-45.

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Regarding the question of a constitutional order, our findings suggest the line of

research will draw on a concept of the rule of li. Hahm’s work, innovative in the fields of

both Chinese studies and legal studies, is possibly the only work to date that has

Rational-// Rujia flS ^ domination \ Charismatic . Chance Chance ss'' effective Chance Rational-legal Fajia ip W. ^ Charismatic domination ineffective

F i g a r o ,------N e w P a r a d i g m M o d e l o f S o c i a l C h a n g e ______(Amended from Turner, 1990.)

addressed what is likely to be a salient topic. Beginning in the Han, imperial rituals were

not only conducive to social solidarity, after codification in the Tang, they were a

significant part of state business right up until the end of the imperial era.216

Human Rites —- Rights

Now let’s look at the human rights issue. It is generally held that Confucianism is

216 Hahm 1999, pp. 130-33. For example: Guest Rites(Binli) regulating the ceremonies dealing with state visits by foreign emissaries and Military Rites (Juli) regulating conduct o f military exercises and expeditions. These were sanctioned by theZhouli and The Book o f Documents, see Lin Yin. annot. & trans. 1985. Zhouli Jinzhu Jinyi [The Rituals o f Zhou with Modem Notes and Translation], Beijing: Shumu Wenxian Chubanshe. For discussion on compilation o f ritual code traced back to the Han see David McMullen, 1987. “Bureaucrats and Cosmology: the Ritual Code o f Tang China,” in Rituals o f Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies, David Cannadine & Simon Price eds., pp. 181 & 188. Ritual codes of later dynasties include: D aM ingJili [Collected Rites o f the Great Ming] and Da Qing Tongli [Comprehensive Rites o f the Great Qing],

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incompatible with human rights 217 In the West the discussion on human rights is

couched in legal terms. In the traditionalist discourse of Anglo-American law, the

Enlightenment view that celebrates traditional-independent rationality has conditioned

Westerners to conceptualize rights as free from any external authority; the individual

consequently enjoys the legal protection of these rights 218 On the other hand, Confucian

discussion places the strength of human respect and civil relationships in terms of rites

and their ability to instill individual discipline that transcends the need of punitive efforts.

We see expression of Ru/Fa values, and one naturally expects a substantial challenge to

attain some level of confluence between these ideological superstructures. However, it is

clear that these two different realities express the same commitment to the common social

good on the micro and macro levels.

As de Bary remarks, in the Confucian version of human relationships, the

individual is no less entitled to respect than the individual in Western human rights

concepts. This case rests on the social system based on the concept of li, self-discipline,

which was successful to the extent that respect and human decency in human

relationships became internalized and transcended the need for coercion. 'y i q

Indeed, neither system in human relations has been exemplary. As is widely

known, while the founding political documents of the United States (such as the

217 Roger T. Ames. 1988. “Rites as Rights: The Confucian Alternative.” in Leroy S. Rouner ed., Human Rights and the World Religions. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press.

218 Hahm, 1999, p 104. 219 Hahm, 1999, p. 78.

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Declaration of Independence and the Constitution) suggested that individual rights were

inherent and to be enjoyed by all, in practice women were excluded from full political

participation in society until legislation and constitutional amendment much later.

In the midst of cultural diversity, there is evidence of a positive commitment by New

Modem Confucians to transvaluate the rights of women. The issues are being addressed,

just as inequities were in the American civil rights movements of in the recent past. I will

pay particular attention to the issue of women’s rights in the next section.

As I pointed out in the textual analysis on page 89, the importance that was

placed on education and study of the classics, as with many other traditions in the world,

underlay the Confucian tradition and its effectiveness on society and government. The

belief was that morality must be taught rather than forced — punishment was not

sufficient. “Guide with criminal laws and keep them in line with punishment and people

may stay out of trouble, but will have no shame. But if you guide them by your virtue,

and keep them in line with acts of decency, the people will develop a sense of shame.

Then they’ll keep themselves out of trouble.”220 This section highlights the significance

of the dichotomy between Rujia fff and Fajia We have illustrated how

Confucian-Mencian thought continues to play a significant role in contemporary debates

concerning political theory — moral leadership verses coercive strategic preferences, as a

cmcial indicator of future international relations. As we have observed some scholars,

such as Huntington and Johnston, do not see Confucian culture as benign. Rather, they

220 Hahm , 1999, p. 125.

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make the claim that Confucian tradition can be linked to contemporary China’s military

threat (as they perceive it). The discussion in the preceding chapters that explains a

standard methodological model of conflict resolution suggests the opposite. Our findings

purport that decision-makers in the Confucian-Mencian paradigm historically preferred

non-military avenues.

In this section, we have also looked at how the dichotomy between Rujia f i t )§ C

and Fajia jjj aids in our understanding of the Confucians concept of the protection of

human rights, and why China has resisted a judiciary such is found in Anglo-American

law. Now we will turn to an in-depth discussion of Confucianism in relation to women’s

rights issues.

Transvaluation: Feminism

Perhaps the most daunting ideological challenge facing the revitalization of

Confucianism is feminist theory. Today, the vitality of Confucian traditions depends on

the transvaluation of male-centered dispositions into an inclusive, humanistic project

embodying the perspectives of both women and men.221 At the turn of the twentieth

century, the new consciousness of the May Fourth Movement brought women into the

anti-imperialist, anti-feudal New Culture Movement as an overture to the formation of

221 Tu W ei-m ing, ed., Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity: Moral Education and Economic Culture in Japan and the Four Mini-Dragons, (Cam bridge. H arvard U niversity Press, 1996) p. 3 4 8

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the social ideals of today’s Chinese women.222 Western assumptions based on

democracy, autonomy, and individualism opened the way for the development of Chinese

feminist theory 223 This section will take a radical position and pose a synthesis of

feminism and New Modem Confucianism. The harmonizing response from New Modem

Confucians and persuasive textual analysis of classical Confucian literature by women

scholars suggest a harmonic theoretical development that places women within the

revitalization of Confucian Humanism.

In an effort to explore how Confucianism is linked to gender inequality and the

pervasive abuse of women, this study reviews contemporary Chinese feminist theory, as

well as classical literary sources in relation to women’s issues. The feminist literature

argues three areas of contention: (1) Some Confucian texts explicitly demean women; (2)

the entire Confucian system of holism is based on inequality and excludes women; and (3)

Confucianism does not argue for women’s position. Included in this review is the work of

Rey Chow, as well as Patricia Buckley Ebrey’s work concerning Chinese women and

Confucianism in relation to ancient and modem Chinese literature.

While New Modem Confucians take the position that moral decline in China is a

result of the intrusion of Western ideology, they nonetheless see the need to address

matters of inequality and women’s rights as a process of transvaluation. The primary

222 Qingyun Zhang, “The H istorical D evelopm ent of the Ideologies o f W om en’s Ethics,” W om en’s Ethics: A Contem porary Perspective on Q uestions of M orality and Socialism (I) in Chinese Studies in Philosophy, Spring, 1995, Vol. 26. No. 3, p.44.

223 Y u-ning Li, ed., Chinese Women Through Chinese Eyes (N ew Y ork: Arm onk, Sharpe, Inc, 1 9 9 2

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Confucian response to feminist challenges is that within the classical literature, moral

teaching was meant to protect women. The New Modem Confucians suggest that by

harmonizing and revitalizing the moral system to include both men and women, women’s

voices will be articulated in the tradition. Women could be the determining factor in the

survival of Confucian Humanism. This responsibility is as daunting as the feminist

challenge.

The challenges put forth by feminists allege that women, throughout history and

the Confucian literature, have been excluded. According to the conceptual framework

described in the previous chapters, it is assumed that women were excluded from the

actions supported by these principles: setting an example, observing rituals, and

providing social mobility through the scholastic tradition to positions of power and

authority. The findings reveal that while the hierarchial structure of imperial China is

built on the model of the family (filial piety [xiao # ] ) women are said to have been

restricted from ritual practice, and the woman’s voice is lacking in the classical literature.

Feminist Theory

Feminism can be defined as the advocacy of equal rights for women and men,

accompanied by a commitment to improve the position of women in society. Thus, it

presupposes an underlying condition of inequality. Feminist theory involves an entire

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body of literature.224 The longest feminist tradition in the U.S. and Britain is that of

democratic, liberal feminism. Margrey Wolf points out that the roots of these somewhat

radical ideas lie more obviously in indigenous European political traditions: utopian

socialism, anarchism, libertarianism, Marxism, as well as Mao Zedong’s adaptation

Marxist political consciousness.225

On the other hand, there is the opposition to the feminist argument. These views,

held by both men and women, suggest that feminist theory is both hostile and sexist, and

strikes at the core of the family structure and values. Illustrative of this heated debate is

Virginia W oolfs provocative description of feminism as a “vicious” and “corrupt” word

that has done much harm in its day.

Feminism did not emerge from the most victimized women, those beaten

physically and spiritually. According to some critics, Betty Freidan, in her seminal work,

The Feminine Mystique, wrote as if minority women did not exist.226 Essentially, it is

held, Friedan’s work addressed only the problems of the middle-and upper-class,

224The founding texts of this tradition are M ary W ollstoncraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792 and John Stuart M ill’s essay The Subjection o f Women in 1869 (M ichele B arrett, in The Blackwell Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Social Thought, Blackw ell Publishers, 1993, p. 226). Educational and professional barriers w ere the focus of fem inist cam paigns during the nineteenth century. W estern societies since the late 1960’s have experienced the rise and fall o f fem inist m ovem ents w ith a m ore radical edge, proposing a revolutionary political shake-up o f society rather than a redistribution of rights and resources. The accusation that the oppression o f w om en is em bedded in deep psychic and cultural processes required fundam ental rather than superficial change. The principal focus o f these cam paigns aim ed at m en’s violence against w om en and children, and the fight for w om en’s control over their ow n bodies-notably the abortion issue. This second w ave o f fem inism can be linked to the politics em erging from the A m erican Civil Rights m ovem ent of the 1960’s.

2 2 5 S e e Revolution Postponed, 1972, for M argrey W olfs position that the victory o f the Com m unist revolution in China in 1949 did not really liberate Chinese w om en from their traditional roles. A ccording to W olf, inequality and w om en’s liberation in China, contrary to the Com m unist propaganda, actually has been postponed; and see Franz Fanon’s w ork on the internalization of colonialism .

226 B etty Friedan, Feminine Mystique (N ew York: N orton, 1963).

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educated, married, white American women who were bored with leisure, home, children,

and consumption. Gloria Steinam was ferociously criticized when she made the

statement that the most oppressed women are upper-class white women who are sent to

elite schools to be groomed for marriage rather than professional careers in an effort to

protect inherited wealth. However, Betty Freidan and Gloria Steinam nonetheless paved

the way for the contemporary feminist movement in which black feminists began to

deliver eloquent critiques of the failure of white feminism to engage in questions of racism

and ethnocentrism 227

On the other hand, Rey Chow’s “Chinese feminism” challenges the feminist belief

that society has oppressed women in favor of the position that women are not merely

victims.228 Chow contends that women have accepted and chosen to be identified by the

male cultural code. “Women’s agency” is a feminist term that is used to define a woman

as a “subject” that carries out a project. Women were treated as objects upon which men

exercised their power and, thus, who were oppressed. “Objectification” refers to the

identification with the male “cultural code.” Chow argues that the problem is not the

male cultural code; rather it is that women do not accept the freedom to establish their

own “values.” Chow claims that only when women establish themselves “as subjects”

can they begin to change their situation. When they do not, they contribute to their own

227 Barrett, 1993, p. 227.

228 Rey Chow, Women and Chinese Modernity: the Politics of Reading Between West and East (M inneapolis: U niversity of M innesota Press, 1991). Chow assum es know ledge o f Fem inist and Freudian theory, and her m ethodology applies both.

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oppression. The term “other” refers to the characterization of the male ideal of what

women should be. Women have not seen themselves without the male eye, which has

established the cultural code. Chow argues that women can and should change the mind

set. Based on their own existential situation, they need to reject the “male gaze.”

Sinologist Patricia Buckley Ebrey’s textual analysis of Song literature offers

compelling evidence to defuse some of the more extreme accusations against

Confucianism. As with Chow, Ebrey holds that presenting women as victims

bothersome and argues that it demeans women. Emphasizing women’s agency during the

Song period, Ebrey makes the case that women occupied positions of power just as men

did, and made choices that helped to recreate and subtly change the family and kinship

system. There is also evidence that women had particularly strong property rights during

the Song period. This interpretation brings to the fore women responding to the

opportunities open to them and accommodating or resisting those around them.

On the other hand, the Song is of special interest to feminist scholars because of

its association with the spread of footbinding, the strong condemnation of remarriage by

widows, and the prevalence both of widow suicide and infanticide. Ch’en Tung-yuan

argued that the condition of women’s lives started to deteriorate after the philosophers

Ch’eng 1 and Chu Hsi promoted the idea that women must value chastity. 229 “Because

male dominance in Chinese history has so often been explained as a matter of ideology,

scholars have looked to the revival of Confucianism in the Song to explain these

229 Ch’en Tung-yuan, History of the Life of Chinese Women, 1 9 2 8 .

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changes.”230 Some scholars hence point to the Song as the point at which the quality of

women’s lives began to decline.

Confucian Texts Demean Women

Chinese feminism alleges that the male cultural code that assumes inequality of

women is implicitly and explicitly manifested in Confucian classical literature; and

because of the influence of this tradition on Chinese society, Chinese social norms

concerning women still carry a negative code. Feminists find this apparent code

offensive. For example, in the Nu Jie, Ban Zhao describes the “virtuous woman” as one

who is obedient, gentle and mild, courteous, thrifty, and modest.231 The first of these —

obedient — is perhaps the most offensive to feminists. According to the “Three

Obediences”:

in the home, a woman must obey her father; after marriage, she must obey her husband; once widowed, she must obey her first son. Gentle and mild: a woman must assume a humble rather than an assertive attitude. Courteous: a woman must show respect to her parents, in-laws and her husband. Thrift: a woman must budget household expenses to fulfill her duty to help the family accumulate wealth. Modest: a woman should not complain or compete and should control her bitterness as well as other’s.232

The notion of obedience by a woman to her husband and son is odious to feminism.

During the Song, Zhu Xi outlined Confucian family ethics in his Elementary Learning. In

230 Ebrey, 1993, p. 5-6

231 Ban Zhoa, Nii Chieh (Instruction for Women and Girls) trans. S. L. Baldwin, (N ew Y ork: Eaton and M ains, 1900).

232 M argrey W olf, Revolution Postponed: Women in Contemporary China. (Stanford: Stanford U niversity Press, 1972) 112.

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this work, Zhu cites earlier ritual texts: “A wife is someone who submits to another.

Therefore she has no independent authority, and there is the rule of the three

obediences.”233

On the other hand, Ebrey notes that “much of people’s sense of what was right

was based on Confucian family ethics, which placed marriage in the context of the

universal obligations to parents and to patrilineal ancestors. Confucian didactic writing

from Han times on regularly stressed the need for sons to obey and honor their parents

and wives to serve their husbands’ families.” For example, in Ssu-ma Kuang’s

Precepts for Family Life, the wife is portrayed as a woman of decorum, frugality,

restraint, and respectability; this text is less likely to be considered offensive. Some argue

Confucians implicitly included women in the discourse according to the general purpose

of moral behavior for men; the term “obedience” is discussed in the context of that time.

In view of Enlightenment mentality and feminist theory, it would be expected that this

term and other language could be interpreted as hierarchical. This and other “offensive”

tenns will need to be a of consideration to New Modern Confucians in subsequent

writing.

233 Ibid., p. 5 0 .

234 Ebrey, 1993. p. 49.

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Ebrey contends that Confucian scholars wrote about virtue and chastity out of a

concern and a need to protect daughters and sisters during a period when the marketing of

women was a major concern. The term “wife” is not included here because wives were

not marketed. The general assessment regarding the virtues of women can be understood

in relation to a growth in the economy that led to a market for women as maids,

concubines, courtesans and prostitutes:

Confucian scholars wanted to fix people in well-defined roles. To protect their sisters and daughters from the market in women, upper-class men had to see that they were taught rigid notions of modesty and given educations untainted by any suggestion that they were playthings. Men and women alike had to exert moral effort to keep distinctions of rank, function, and role in place.235

Ebrey makes the argument that Confucianism did not define the virtuous woman

specifically as a means for submission to men; rather, it was meant to define her role as a

respectable person. Her virtue would lead to the opportunity to achieve a better life of

education and wealth. Chow’s feminist argument, conversely, is that Confucian virtues,

especially the references to obedience, are written from the male gaze and should be

rejected. New Modern Confucians have acknowledged the need to harmonize relations

between the genders and have opened the dialogue with women.

Confucian System of Holism Excludes Women

Feminism argues that if the theory behind Confucianism embodies a hierarchial

235 Ibid. Ebrey points out that w ives w ere not included in this passages because w ives w ere not m arketable and therefore not at risk like the daughters and sisters, p. 269.

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structure by which society is organized, the system it advances is therefore unequal. The

Confucian system of holism is founded on the theory of hierarchial relationships,

beginning with the position of paramount importance at the top. The Five Cardinal

Relations (wu lun) constitute the framework upon which society is constructed. These

include those between sovereign and subject, father and son, elder brother and younger

brother, husband and wife, and friend and friend. All of these distinctions, prerogatives,

and authorities are delegated to the senior with respect to the junior. Failure to uphold

the proper role behavior was considered disruption of the harmony of society.236

Feminists charge that the social construct of the wu lun creates inequality and excludes

women.

On the other hand, the inequality of the wu lun has been said to creates inequality

for men as well. In The Psychology o f the Chinese People, Bond and Hwang distill many

aspects of Chinese social behavior from Confucian norms. Their study suggests that

though the Confucians do not make specific references to women in their discussion,

power inequality in this system applies to both men and women. Bond and Hwang agree

that the problem of inequality in China is linked to the wu lun which, by definition,

involves considerable inequalities of power — but, that the inequality is not restricted to

women.237 The three essential aspects of the wu lun are: (1) man exists through, and is

defined by, his relationships to others; (2) these relationships are structured

236 W right, 1962.

237 Bond and Hwang, The Psychology o f the Chinese People, H ong K ong:O xford University Press, 1987)213-216.

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hierarchically; and (3) social order is ensured through each party’s honoring the

requirements in the role relationship.

Confucianism Does Not Argue for Position of Women

Feminism claims that Confucianism does not argue the position of women.

Confucian primers such as the Classic o f Filial Piety, which were recited in childhood, did

not address the problems of women. Confucian classics (principally the Analects and

Mencius) focused on male-dominated leadership roles. A central issue for men of the

literati class was to control desires of ambition for worldly success and tendencies toward

greed and self-indulgence. Suppression of their feelings of possessiveness toward women

or of their sexual drive was not an explicit concern. “Philosophers did not consider at any

length the problems women might have in controlling complex emotions”238 For

example, because the household order of the upper class included concubines, jealousy

was a serious problem for women. In response, Ebrey suggests that while many women

were not aware of their won jealousy, some would have identified it in their own

behavior. In an application of Chow’s theory, Ebrey points to women’s agency: “Given

the upper-class women’s high levels of literacy, it is indeed striking that so little was

written (by women) to meet these needs.”239 Ebrey asserts that part of the

responsibility rests on the women of the Song. Chow, on the other hand, would contend

238 Ebrey, 1993, p. 170.

239 Ibid., p. 1 7 0 .

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that women who were able to write should have contributed to the “female gaze.”

Hermeneutically speaking, it cannot be fully understood, from our vantage, why women’s

consciousness was not raised.

To some, footbinding exemplifies the most potent symbol of male dominance and

abuse. Feminists assume a connection between Confucianism and footbinding. Yet this

study revealed no Confucian texts explicitly condoning this practice. On the contrary, the

Neo-Confucian scholar Hsu Chi (1028-1103) of the Song period refers to the custom when

he praised a widow for “knowing about arranging the four limbs [for burial], but not about

binding her two feet.”240 Ebrey asks us to “set aside modem readings of the symbolism

of footbinding and to try to see how, in Song times, both men and women, at least in the

upper classes, could have seen tiny bound feet as symbols of beauty rather than

subjection.”241 This somewhat erotic foot fetish was regarded as a type of beautification,

one that has been even compared to the Western fashion of high-heeled shoes, because

both have an effect on the gait that attracts men. As a social norm, it functioned as an

interactive process in which men were attracted to the suggestive fashion of the day,

under the presumption that women want to attract men.

In the context of many societies, marrying — and marrying well —is a means of

social mobility for women. In the Confucian tradition it was perhaps the only means of

social mobility. Chow’s position would argue that women should not be slaves to

2 4 0 Ibid., p . 3 8 .

2 4 1 Ibid, p . 3 7 .

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fashion in order to please the male gaze, suggesting that women should take responsibility

for the choices they make. But in terms of footbinding, this study found no reference to

women being forced to bind their feet. What men force women to do is an issue that may

fall within the sphere of human rights; but there is no evidence that this fetish was forced

on women any more than there is proof that modem Western women are forced to

regurgitate food as a means to social mobility through “attractive” figures. The social

contexts that inspire footbinding (or anorexia) as an avenue to advantage may be subject

to criticism; but with regard to footbinding, no evidence suggests that Confucianism

advocated this practice solely for the gratuitous physical humiliation of women per se.

Some sinological scholarship suggests that Song texts can be interpreted in favor of

the position of women. The claim has been made that the Confucian model gave more

dignity to wives than the legal model did. Rather than presenting women solely as the

objects of the actions of men, literary interpretations suggest that women, as actors, in

fact helped create, interpret, manipulate, and contest the conditions in which they lived.

There are explicit and potent images of women driven by notions of female sexuality and

female achievement; women as indulgent or jealous wives; and women as mothers and

exemplars of spiritual merit. Ebrey notes that, “There are many congruences between the

Confucian ritual model of kinship and the laws on marriage.”242 Both emphasize roles

and relationships over age and gender, obligations over rights. Ebrey points to implicit

subtle differences: “Men as actors in the ancestral cult were not complete without wives

2 4 2 I b i d , p. 4 0 .

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to assist them.” 0 A."X Not only were wives needed so that men might have heirs, wives also

were needed in the participation of ancestral rites. For example, “other women, such as

concubines, could bear heirs, but only a wife could be paired with him in serving the

ancestors. Moreover, only a wife would stay next to him in death — her tablet paired

with his on the ancestral alter and only her body next to his in the grave.244 Chow would

argue that women were given dignity only through their relationship to the male gaze, not

independently; but it might be added that, in the historical context, prior to the last

century, Chow’s point is not unique to Confucian China, and would apply to all women

of all cultures.

Today, in response to the challenge that Confucianism does not argue the position

of women, New Modem Confucians openly express a concern for the rights of women.

Confucian scholar Tu wei-ming asserts, “The time is ripe for feminist critiques of the

^ AC Confucian tradition and possible Confucian answers to such a mode of inquiry.” In

the context of the nineteenth and twentieth century, the women’s movement is credited

with improving the quality of life for women. New Modem Confucians are responding in

a harmonic and syncretic manner: “To be fully human, the self must enter into continuous

dialogue with others within the structures of human relationships.”246

243 Ibid., p. 47.

244 Ibid, p. 52.

245 Tu, 1994, p. 349.

246 Tu W ei-ming, Confucian Ethics Today: The Singapore Challenge, H arvard University Press, 1984) 5.

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In response to the claim that Confucianism does not argue for women’s position,

purported evidence to the contrary has been discussed. Many scholars suggest a less

contentious interpretation of classical literature, and argue in favor of the inherent

humanistic qualities of the tradition. A total rejection of Confucianism would raise

serious cultural issues. As shown in the previous chapters, there is a strong propensity

of Confucianism to adapt, and we might expect to see a new ideological phase of inclusion

rather than abandonment.

Most religious traditions have faced and responded to the same accusations of

exclusion and abuse by Feminist theory. However, women within these traditions often

have fought for their place within the traditions (such as moves by women to become

ordained in the Catholic Church), rather than arguing for abandonment. The Confucian

revival project likewise strives to revitalize Confucian humanism as a positive restorative

effort and unifying force, at a time when China is experiencing both a moral and an

identity crisis.

Conditions and circumstances that have faced all women, and Chinese women in

particular, are grave. Feminism has been given credit for the advancement of women in

society, polity, and finance. This study has taken into account evidence of heated debates

within the feminist movement itself. Principally, the debate is divided between those

who seek harmony between men and women in addition to the attainment of rights for

women, and those who are concerned exclusively with the rights and issues of women,

having little care for such harmony.

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We have maintained, through reference and appeal to the classical and

contemporary literature, that there is a need not only from New Confucians, but also

from women scholars to re-interpret Confucian literature. Scholarship from this

perspective will likely enhance other fields of inquiry. Work has already begun that

suggests that women must exercise their freedom and responsibility. Some women

scholars now take the position that being identified as a “victim” is offensive. This

concept of “self-strengthening” is compatible with Confucian notion of self-cultivation.

We suggest that this is where the New Modem Confucian Feminist movement starts.

The next section addresses how to push beyond cultural limitations.

Causality of Change and Value Measurement

Previous sections of this chapter have addressed three aspects of the ideological

cleavage between China and the West: First, we have discussed a cogent model of the

Chinese ideological superstructure in relation to Confucianism; second, we looked at the

ideological convergence and divergence between China and the West; third, we identified

two critical ideological problematiques in Chinese modernity.

This study argues that indigenous assumptions drive theory. A critical point is to

emphasize the appreciation and measurement of Chinese rather than Western values when

studying and measuring change, because theory and research regarding cross cultural

values are meaningless if they only consider one value system. In the case of China, the

claim is made that greater clarity of Confucian ideology and culture is imperative.

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For the model we have described in the preceding chapters to be useful it must

now be shown to fall into the Western social science dialogue concerning the causality of

change. The hypothesis of the previous chapters of this study was that China’s

development was unique and driven by different principles than Western economic

change. To test our model, it is useful to critique a research project concerning the

measurement of traditional values: Ronald Inglehart’s (1977,1990,1997,2000) ambitious

longitudinal study that draws on the World Value Surveys concerns Modernization in

relation to trajectories of social change. It explores the research question, do economic

development, cultural change and political change produce coherent and roughly

predictable patterns? We will demonstrate the lack of clear Chinese value measurement

and the lack of a model of change in the method and analysis of this study. We will argue

in favor of the theory of Multiple Modernities and elaborate on the significance of

Huntington’s model of cultural zones that distinguishes East Asia as a Confucian zone.248

Western Debate over Causality of Change

The classical debate over the direction of causality between cultural change and

economic development continues in the social science literature. Modernization theorists

from Karl Marx to Daniel Bell argue that economic development drives social change.

Drawing on observations of nineteenth-century industrialized England and Europe, Karl

Marx envisioned a directional path of change, based on the assumption that the working

248 Samuel H untington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, ( N e w York: Touchstone Books, 1996).

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class would rise up in a proletarian revolution that would end history. Bell’s vision

defined post-industrial society by the changes in the nature of the work that had major

political and cultural consequences. As Weber predicted, history negated these

modernization claims with the rise of the middle class. Scholars supporting a Weberian

line such as Samuel Huntington argue that cultural values play a role in the development

and change of society. While Bell emphasized changes in the nature of work, and

Inglehart emphasized the consequences of economic security, both they and others agreed

that cultural change in post-industrial society was moving in a new direction.

Ronald Inglehart’s ambitious longitudinal study is part of this debate. This

project examines trajectories of social change and explores the research question: Do

economic development, cultural change and political change produce coherent and roughly

predictable patterns? The most recent article (Inglehart-Baker, 2000) suggests a revised

concept of Modernization by claiming that evidence from the World Values Surveys

demonstrates the importance of cultural change and the persistence of distinctive

traditional values. Inglehart broadened his analysis by applying Samuel Huntington’s

cultural zones to the empirical model.

This chapter summarizes and critiques the methodology and research design of the

Inglehart-Baker report. Because China’s current state of transition to modernity is a

relevant and hotly debated case study, we will discuss the Inglehart-Baker analysis in

relation to China. We will elaborate on the significance of Huntington’s.249 model of

2 4 9 I b i d .

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cultural zones that distinguishes East Asia as a Confucian zone and Tu Wei-ming’s

9 s n Confucian position on Multiple Modernities

Summary of World Values Surveys

Modernization theory’s central claim is that coherent, and to some extent

predictable, social and political patterns occur with the rise of economic development.

These patterns include responses to industrialization in terms of occupational

specialization, rising educational levels, rising income levels, as well as changes in gender

roles and attitudes toward authority and sexual norms 251 While Modernization was once

an immensely influential concept, it was challenged in the 1970s.

The rise of Postmodern society is characterized by a shift away from an

emphasis on economic security and economic growth to an increasing emphasis on the

quality of life. The new Postmodern trajectory demonstrates that ideological

metanarratives and great religions are losing their authority among the masses. The

Postmodern shift from Modernization reflects the principle of marginal utility. Inglehart

contends:

Industrialization and Modernization required breaking the cultural constraints on accumulation that are found in any steady-state economy. In Western history, this break with traditional constraints was what Weber described as the rise of the

250 Tu W ei-m ing, “M ultiple M odernities: Im plications o f the Rise of “Confucian” East A sia,” in D7EDALUS: Journal of the Am erican A cadem y of A rts and Sciences, W inter 2000, Vol. 129. N o. 1., pp. 1 9 5 - 2 1 8 .

251 Inglehart, 2000 p. 21.

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Protestant ethic. Eventually, when Western societies had become rich, diminishing returns from economic growth lead to a Postmodern shift, which in some ways is the decline of the Protestant ethic. 252

Now, a growing number of researchers contend that instrumental rationality gained an

exaggerated predominance during the rise of industrialization.

Economic development seems to be linked to a shift away from absolute norms

and values toward more rational, tolerant, trusting, and participatory values. But when

taking into consideration the broad cultural heritage of a society — Confucian, Islamic,

Orthodox, Judeo-Christian or Communist — there is strong evidence that these traditions

endure. Inglehart and Baker demonstrate the persistence of traditional values in the

context of economic growth on a global scale by measuring what they identify as two

dimensions of cross-cultural variations. Religious differences within given societies are

much smaller than are cross-national differences. The authors contend that it is the cross

national difference, rather than the religious difference that becomes part of a national

culture which in turn becomes transmitted by educational institutions and mass media.

These findings suggest to Inglehart and Baker the need to propose revisions of

modernization theory.

252 Inglehart, 1997, p. 324.

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Data

Inglehart and Baker draw on the World Values Surveys database to analyze key

values and beliefs among representative national samples of societies around the globe.253

The data collection was carried out in three waves of representative national surveys: in

1981-1982,1990-1991, and 1995-1998. Inglehart’s 1997 publication looked at 43

societies representing 70 percent of the world's population and covered a full range of

variations. The current paper includes the most recent data for 65 countries, increasing

to 75 percent of the total percentage of the world’s population.

Most of the 1995-1998 surveys were carried out in 1996. Argentina, Australia,

China, Croatia, Ghana, Nigeria, Japan, Puerto Rico, Russia, Slovenia, Taiwan and the

United States were surveyed in 1995. Data for 15 countries draws on the 1990 European

Values Survey: France, Italy, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Iceland,

Ireland, Northern Ireland, Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Romania 254

253 See Appendix for survey instrum ent. The code book docum ents data from the 43-nation w orld values survey carried out in 1990-1993, and the 24-nation w orld values survey carried out in 1981-1984. Because the 1990s data replicated key item s from the 1980 survey, the tw o sets o f data w ere m erged into a single data set.

254 M ethods of weighing and im putation w ere applied in som e cases. For example: W here the China sam ple is 90 percent urban, and the sam ples from China, India, and N igeria undersam ple the illiterate and rural portions o f the public, these data oversam ple the m ore educated and urban portions. The w eight variable is designed, and applied in these cases, to correct for these problem s by giving greater w eight to the less educated. In som e cases, data are not evenly collected, or m issing data m ay require a m ethod o f im putation. Estim ations are calculated based on like/valid data to fill in gaps.

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Measure

The two most important dimensions identified in the analysis of the aggregated

nation-level data were economic, because the worldviews of the peoples of rich societies

differ systematically from those of low-income societies across a wide range of political,

social and religious norms and beliefs. Further, the two dimensions reflect cross-national

polarization between traditional versus secular-rational orientations toward authority; and

survival versus self-expression values. The survival/self expression dimension taps a

syndrome of trust, tolerance, subjective well-being, political activism, and the self-

expression dimension emerges in post-industrial societies (Bell 1973) with high levels of

security. Conversely, people in societies experiencing insecurity and low levels of well

being tend to emphasize economic and physical security above all other goals, and feel

threatened by foreigners, by ethnic diversity and by cultural change. The measures of

intolerance are taken in variables that suggest intolerance of gays and other outgroups, an

insistence on traditional gender roles, and an authoritarian political outlook.255

The study looks at the dimension of traditional/secular-rational values to reflect

the contrasts between differing societies. Major themes of preindustrial societies are

religion (God, church, absolute good-evil, and the after-life), and family values (divorce,

respect for parents, and children). Traditional values emphasize the opposite of those

255 These dim ensions w ere derived through factor analysis. Ten com parable m easures o f cross- cultural variations both at the individual and the national level w ere selected that tapped the tw o dim ensions and that appeared in the sam e form at in all three w aves of the survey m easures o f cross-cultural variations. The traditional versus secular-rational and the survival versus self-expression dim ensions w ere aggregated to the national level, and w e see the results from the sam e variables draw n from the individual- level data. From these cam e tw o clearly defined dim ensions w ith a basic structure sim ilar to the national l e v e l s e t .

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that are deemed secular-rational. As we would expect, God, fatherland and family

emphasize social conformity rather than individualistic tendencies.

The other dimension, reflects the polarization between materialist and

postmaterialist values. A wide range of values were linked with the survival versus self-

expression dimensions. These societies are characterized by relatively low levels of

subjective well-being (as in a Likert happiness scale), relatively poor health, and low

interpersonal trust. The authors reason that when survival is not taken for granted, there

are low levels of subjective well-being, relatively poor health, low interpersonal trust,

intolerance of outgroups, a lack of gender equality, emphasis on materialist values,

relatively high levels of faith in science and technology, relatively low levels of

environmental activism and relatively favorable to authoritarian government. Conversely,

societies with opposing preferences are considered to hold self-expression values.

The authors selected Huntington’s concept of cultural zones probably because of

its relation to ideological systems and cross-cultural societies. The authors point out that

the most striking polarizations in the survival/self-expression dimension are over new

gender roles. Historically, gender inequality is significant. In the world as a whole, a

majority still accepts that men make better political leaders than women. While in

societies where survival is a concern, women, gays and lesbians, foreigners, and other out

groups tend to be rejected, the societies that have moved to self-expression values tend to

be more accepting of these outgroups.

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Findings and Discussion

The findings reflect the Marxist position that economic development moves

societies in a common direction, and the fact that the cultural zones have remained

distinctive after two centuries of industrialization. Another indicator of a societies’ level

of economic development is the percentage of the labor force in agriculture. The

traditional/secular-rational dimension is associated with the transition from agrarian to

industrial society. The study confirms that some cultures may have traditions that have

preordained secular based values, especially Confucian and Communist societies.

These data fit the predictions of Modernization theory: as societies develop

economically, their cultures tend to shift in a predictable direction. However, here the

researchers find evidence of the influence of long-established cultural zones. The authors

acknowledge eight cultural zones, adopted from Huntington’s model because these zones

are conceptually and empirically justifiable in demonstrating the independent impact of a

society’s historical-cultural heritage. Each zone reflects the impact of a common

religious-historical influence and each is relatively coherent in global perspective.

Protestant societies that were previously Communist reflect low levels of

interpersonal trust, Catholics rank about the same as the Protestants. Out of the 10

societies that rank lowest, eight are historically Catholic and none is historically

Protestant. The authors reason that shared historical experience is crucial and thus, cross-

cultural differences do not reflect the contemporary influences of the respective churches.

The study generates additional insights into the transmission of religious

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traditions by demonstrating differences between the religious groups within religiously

mixed societies on the two dimensions of cross-cultural variation. The authors identify

two possible insights from the individual-level data. One possibility is that

contemporary religious institutions instill distinctively Protestant, Catholic, or Islamic

values in their respective followers within each society. Another possibility is that given

religious traditions have historically shaped the national culture of given societies, but that

today their impact is transmitted mainly through nationwide institutions, to the

population of that society as a whole, even to those who have little or no contact with

religious institutions.

This model suggests to the authors that, once established, the cross-cultural

differences linked with religion have become part of a national culture that is transmitted

by the educational institutions and mass media of given societies to the people of that

nation. These data suggest the persistence of distinctive value systems and that culture is

path-dependent. These data provide additional support for the argument that a society’s

values system is systematically influenced by economic development and that cultural

heritage persists and influences contemporary beliefs.

Looking at the percentages of workers in the industrial sector, the historically

Confucian and ex-Communist societies are strongly related to traditional/secular-rational

values. Similarly, the percentages of workers in the service sector were strongly related to

survival/self-expression values. These data also reflect that people of poor societies with

high percentages of agrarian workers tend to hold traditional values. We see that rich

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societies with high percentages in the industrial sector seem to hold secular-rational

values. By controlling for economic level and occupational structure we still see the

influence of a society’s historical heritage.

Some modernization theorists suggest that relationship increased education and

cultural change. The findings in these data are interesting because they do not support

that contention. We would have expected educational levels to have an impact on one or

both dimensions. This challenges the emphasis that some modernization theorists place

on the cultural impact of rising educational levels.

To clarify that previous data are not merely cross-sectional patterns, the next test

explores the value changes over time. The longitudinal test that draws on the time series

data spanning from 1981 to 1998, illustrates data from at least two time points for each of

the 38 societies. To interpret these data, crucial events during this time frame, i.e., war,

economic crisis and political change, etc., are a consideration. For example, ex-Communist

societies in particular have fallen into two groups, some with economic success in the

market economy and some in economic collapse. We would expect some to place an

increasing emphasis on survival values, and some to show a rise in traditional values.

Thus, Russia and Belarus are in retrograde (moving downward and to the left), and

conversely, the thesis holds also in the case of all Soviet successor states that have

experienced economic growth (moving up and to the right). The data on eight low-income

and developing societies also reflected two contrasting patterns that confirm the thesis.

Out of the eight developing and low-income societies, only two, Chile and Mexico shifted

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to secular-rational values (moving up and to the right), and the others; Argentina, Brazil,

India, Nigeria, South Africa, and Turkey do not shift.

Most ex-Communist and advanced industrial societies (with the exception of the

economically prospering Soviet successor states) and only two of the developing and

low-income societies have shifted to secular-rational values. Self-expression rose in all

advanced industrial societies and in most other societies, but not in the Soviet successor

states. Clearly, the findings seem to support that rising security tends to produce a shift

toward secular values of tolerance, trust, subjective well-being and a post-materialist

outlook, as well as, the possibility of a shift in the opposite direction due to economic or

political collapse. Rising security seems to influence a shift toward post-materialist

values, and a decline in security seems to shift values in the opposite direction.

Next, the study moves to the issue of value differences across birth cohorts.

When we consider value differences over time, we face the debate concerning “collective

memories” within a given generation.256 Because cohorts move through life cycles that

present different experiences due to environmental change over time, we expect to find

substantial differences between the values of the young and the old. Theoretically, rising

levels of existential security are the key factors underlying intergenerational value change

(Inglehart 1997:45-47).

While war, disease, crime and other factors are significant, we generally count on a

country’s GDP per capita as a rough indicator of existential security. The best indicator

256 See Schum an and Scott, 1989; Baker, D alton, and H ildebrandt 1981; Inglehart 1977, 1997; Rokeach 1968, 1973.

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in this study is the country’s life expectancy from 1900-1910, which is the childhood of

our oldest respondents at present. Time-series data for most countries do not exist. We

do know that life expectancy in most countries was relatively low at the start of the

century and has risen dramatically in all societies that have experienced economic growth,

improved diet and improved medical care, and related factors.257

The study proceeds with the expectation of finding strong relationship between a

given society’s life expectancy and the size of the intergenerational value differences.

The research looked at the relationships of the two value dimensions within seven birth

cohorts during the span of 70 years from 1907-1976 across 61 societies and tests.

The study suggests that younger cohorts are significantly less traditional that the older

cohorts within advanced industrial democratic and ex-Communist industrial societies.

When we consider that the older cohorts of ex-Communist societies had stronger secular-

rational values, we take into consideration that even though they experienced economic

prosperity in their formative years, the cultural climate was in response to political

powers that worked to eradicate religion and tradition.

To demonstrate the persistence of religious and spiritual beliefs this research

measured attendance of religious services, the importance of God in the respondents life,

and if the respondent thinks about the meaning and purpose of life. The findings reflect

that sixteen of twenty advanced industrial democracies reduced their attendance of

257 Even in the U.S., life expectancy in 1900 was only 48 years, and today it is 76. Societies with high life expectancies today tend to be societies that have experienced relatively large increases in existential security since 1900.

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religious services. The authors suspect that low-income data may overstate the decline of

religious participation due to the fact that the literate segment of the population (and

most traditional) tend to be underrepresented in these surveys. These data suggest that a

decline in the prevalence of traditional religious values characterizes industrialization, but

not necessarily the post-industrial phase.

The authors reason that the need for security is not the only attraction of religion.

They suggest that postmaterialists are less attracted to traditional forms of religion than

are materialists, but they are more likely to spend time thinking about the meaning and

purpose of life. The study revealed that the subjective importance of religious beliefs

has changed little in most advanced industrial democracies. In ex-Communist countries

and developing and low-income countries, we see a strong increased importance attached

to God. Therefore, the data suggest that even though there is a slight decline in advanced

industrial democracies, the subjective importance of God increased in the world as a

whole.

The study demonstrates that broader spiritual concerns have also become more

widespread in the world as a whole. In response to the question concerning how often

respondents think about the meaning and purpose of life, we see a dramatic increase

across the board. Twenty-six of the thirty-seven societies increased their interest in

spiritual concerns. Two contrasting trends are explained by historical turns. The authors

contend that while the power of the hierarchical church may be declining, these data seem

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to suggest that post-industrial society continues to show a growing interest in spiritual

contemplation.

The study concludes with the claim that this evidence demonstrates macro cultural

change and the persistence of distinctive traditional values. The data support the notion

that economic development seems to be linked to predictable cultural change, that is, a

shift from traditional to secular-rational values, and post-materialist society may bring a

shift toward more trust, tolerance, well being, and postmaterialist values. The evidence

also suggests that economic collapse tends to propel societies in the opposite direction.

The authors claim that if economic development continues, we expect a continued decline

of institutionalized religion, however, though empirical evidence illustrates that values can

and do change, a societies cultural heritage continues to have an influence.

From these findings the authors contend that modernization theorists are partly

right, but this study reveals that values are path dependent. They reason that economic

development has not lead to convergence of values, but rather they seem to move on

parallel trajectories shaped by Protestant, Orthodox, Islamic, or Confucian traditions of

cross-cultural zones.

The proposed modifications of modernization theory are as follows: (1)

modernization is not linear; (2) the secularization thesis is over-simplified; (3) cultural

change seems to be path dependent; (4) it is misleading to view cultural change as

“Americanization,” and (5) modernization is probabilistic, not deterministic, i. e., the

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process and path are not inevitable. Any prediction must be contingent on the historical

and cultural context of the society in question.

Limitations of the Data

A close reading of the World Values Surveys258 codebook reveals a number of

issues concerning the limitations of the data set. We will discuss the limitations of the

data and evidence of a Western bias in the survey instrument.

First, a data collection entitled, “World Values Surveys” suggests to us a survey

instrument, (questionnaires) designed to measure other worldviews and values on their

own terms. We would want to know what criteria was used for the sample and does the

criteria for that sample accurately fit the Inglehart project. We assume that Ingleharts’

research draws from the World Values Surveys as secondary data. That is to say that,

Inglehart and his research team did not develop the criteria and the methods of data

collection for the World Values Surveys. This would limit the accuracy of the study,

because, for example, some questions may not have been framed in a specific way to

allow for the desired answer. In light of the broad spectrum of ideologies across these

societies sampled, and the way in which specific questions are framed we contend that

the accuracy of the measures concerning cultural change could be more

precise if the criteria for the survey instrument were more culturally specific and sensitive

258 (ICPSR), the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research at Ann Arbor, Michigan.

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to other religious traditions (as in Confucian, Buddhist, Taoist and/or Shinto societies that

do not believe in a god figure).

We would question the uniformity of the survey instrument in terms of differing

worldviews of all countries. If the questions that we see in the appendix were simply

translated into the languages of each society surveyed, clearly they do not take into

account other worldviews. For example, the question “ God is very important in

respondent’s life ” (which is crucial to the thesis in the research project) could not

accurately measure religious/spiritual importance in a “Confucian” respondent’s life,

because Confucian values did not develop along a Salvationist tradition as did those in

Western societies. Similarly, if a Chinese research design to test the persistence of

traditional values in the West included a crucial variable that read, “Worship o f ancestors

is very important in respondent's life, ” the answer would be meaningless. We contend

that in both cases, the answers would be meaningless, and, hence, the data for all societies

outside of the Salvationist view is skewed. The authors do acknowledge the secular

nature of China, but it is not clear how, or if the survey instrument was adjusted.

We contend that not only is the survey instrument limited, it is strongly biased by

a Western perspective. Individualism which is at the root of Western ideology. The

standard social science "happiness" questions administered via the Likert scale measures

subjective well-being. Questions based on subjective individual attitudes are problematic

for respondents coming from collective societies. In our experience with Chinese

respondents, responses are prefaced with “In my country we . .” We interpret this as a

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cultural given and contend that the “collective” should be acknowledged within these

given societies because it is a core value. Another point we observed is that the

“happiness” questions seem to diminish the seriousness of Western research in the eyes

of some Chinese. One respondent remarked, "Americans are allowed to think irrationally;

their judgement is based on emotion, desire and needs. In my country, we are pragmatic.

Chinese people think in terms of cause and effect."

The collective is one of the major tenets of Chinese, Communist, and other

ideologies, and prominent in the cleavage between East and West. The survey does not

inquire about the collective good or collective thinking in Chinese terms. Our position

argues that the survey instrument, which was operationalized to measure world values,

fails to allow for the measurement of some crucial non-Westem cultural values. In this

case, we refer to this methodological flaw as ideological reductionism.

We have summarized the Inglehart and Baker study that claims to demonstrate the

persistence of traditional values on a global scale. This study reflects variations of values

emphasized by different societies in relation to Huntington’s model of cultural zones,

which are interpreted in relation to contemporary history of economic and political

events.

Discussion

Inglehart’s 2000 paper is, in large part, a departure from his previous publication (1997),

which essentially measured the democratization and “Westernization” of the world, and

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concludes by warning of “dangerously divisive” traditional religions and the rigidity of

absolutism that gives rise to fanatic intolerance. Now, the thesis has pushed forward

from its ethnocentric interpretations and the call for a Postmodern universal perspective

of religious convergence259, to a line that accepts the defining and persistent nature of

cultural history when generalizing to the global population. We strongly agree with the

broadened consciousness of this new interpretation of the data.

Inglehart/Baker’s proposed modifications cited above are precisely the flaws of

the 1997 study. A comparison of the two works is beyond the scope of this paper, but it

would be an interesting and thought provoking-project. These are an excellent example of

how progressive research can draw on the same methods, the same data sets, the same

theoretical base, and then make a stunning turnaround.

What precipitated the radical twist in this interpretation? We will just briefly

suggest three possible reasons for the shift in his thesis: (1) waves of academic

criticism260, (2) events in time and space, and (3) broadened literature review, i. e. James

Watson’s anthropological study in China that challenges the theory of

“McDonaldization.”261

259 Inglehart, 1997, p. 340. 260 a review o f the other criticism o f this study is beyond the scope o f this paper, however for example, the authors explain that a widespread criticism argued that the observed age differences were not a permanent part of the outlook o f given birth cohorts, but simply a life-cycle difference what would fade as the younger cohorts aged. The intergenerational change thesis implied that a long term shift in prevailing values would occur as the young replaced the older cohorts in industrial societies; the life-cycle interpretation implied that no social change was taking place. 261 Watson’s study of McDonalds in Beijing suggests while the American fast food chain is enjoying success in China, it has taken on its own unique cultural meaning. He argues that it is naive to interpret the case of this economic success (or the spread o f the free market system) as the “Americanization” of China. See: James L. Watson. Golden Arches East: McDonald’s in East Asia.

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While we appreciate the elegance of the robust quantitative research design and

strongly support the thesis of the 2000 paper, we contend that the World Values Surveys

data are more appropriate for the purposes of the previous line held by Inglehart, but are

limited in their ability to support the author’s recent interpretation. That is to say, when

measuring the Westernization of the world, these data provide a better fit than when we

attempt to extrapolate or examine fully the tenets and assumptions of other worldviews

across the globe.

We agree with Inglehart’s assertion that cultural theory implies that cultural

changes take place at a slower rate than political changes. Rulers and laws change

abruptly, but basic assumptions of the culture generally take years to change; this is

clearly true in the example of China’s shift to Modernity.

The recent paper (Feb, 2000), more that the 1997 publication on this research,

supports our argument that China's transition is unique, due to historical, cultural, social

and economic specifics. We strongly contend that it is naive to presume that China will

move toward a whole-sale model of Westernization. China is in a state of cultural

transition, but the development model is uniquely Chinese. We agree with scholars who

criticized Inglehart’s research model (1997) that in some ways measures the

democratization and Westernization of the world. The recent paper which draws on

Huntington’s cultural zones suggests, in the Weberian sense, a more “value-free” thesis

(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998); George Ritzer. Post Modernism Social Theory. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1997.

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and conclusions. We agree that traditional cultural values of different regions are

persistent and are resistant to a wholesale Western democratic model.

Watson’s (1998) study of Chinese eating habits at the Beijing McDonalds

restaurants argues that the prevalence of the American fast food phenomenon in China

does not suggest a cultural change. He contends that it is a gross exaggeration to see it a

an indication of the “Americanization” of China. Neither could Chinese social scientists

argue that, because there is a Chinese restaurant in every town in America, Americans are

becoming Chinese in any cultural sense.

Literature suggests Neo-Confucian industrialism as a structure within the

development model that explains China’s transition to modernity. Asian scholars suggest

that the economic miracle in Tiawan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan is in large part due

to the Neo-Confucian industrial model.262 The key to economic development in Asia

springs from network-building (guan-hsi) defined as entrepreneurship by Vogel and

others.

The concept of “multiple modernities” moves research forward from the

eurocentric vision of Modernization that placed the West at the "core." As Tu Wei-ming

eloquently elaborates:

In the global context, what some of the most brilliant minds in the modem West assumed to be self-evidently true has turned out to be parochial, a form of local knowledge that has, significantly, lost much of its universal appeal. In both the

262 See Ezra Vogel, The Four Little Dragons: The Spread o f Industrialization in East Asia, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991).

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Western and the non-Western worlds, the projected transition from tradition to modernization never occurred. As a norm, traditions continue in modemity.263

In large part, this recent publication, is more in line with the theory of multiple

modernities have been under the influence of Confucian education for centuries.264

Clearly, Tu and others argue for a plurality of models of sustainable development. “The

rise of Confucian East Asia suggests that traditions are present as active agents in

modernity.”265 For example, Chaihark Hahm points out that, just as the American

Constitution is a document drafted on traditional values, he suggests the prospects of a

forthcoming Confucian Constitution based on indigenous traditional values

While the 2000 paper is less ethnocentric in its conclusions than Inglehart’s 1997

publication, this study tends to essentialize Western cultural values and is too simplistic.

For example, as sinologists remind us: the Chinese/Asians are no more “Confucian” than

Americans are “Christian.” When considering the religious and traditional plurality of

many nations, critics could argue that this study runs the risk of committing the ecological

fallacy and/or ideological reductionism.

Inglehart argued in 1997 that economic development, cultural change, and political

change go together and even, to some extent, form predictable patterns. Now, the 2000

paper suggests that economic development seems to move societies along a common

263 Tu, 2000, p. 215.

264 Tu, ibid, p. 215. 265 Ibid, p. 217. 266 Chaihark Hahm, Confucian Constitutionalism. (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 2000).

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direction, however, distinctive cultural heritage can be defined in specific zones and that

these zones persist two centuries after the industrial revolution began.

Our position is that Inglehart’s 1997 claims are less impressive because of the

eurocentric nature of his position. He essentially argues that because China is progressing

economically, it will move to the Western model of Democracy. Significant evidence

supports the notion that a new economically improved state in China is following its own

unique development model. This research is limited to the extent that it does not measure

core Chinese values or the Chinese development model. Our research seeks to explain

cultural and social change in terms of Chinese thinking. While many Western scholars

argue that the Confucian worldview faded into the past during Mao’s cultural revolution,

and that it hindered development, we take the position that the Confucian model is the

driving force behind Chinese development.

We find the Inglehart and Baker paper of 2000 more impressive, and we strongly

agree with their conclusion that suggests the importance of cultural heritage. We contend

that more research needs to be done that explores different forms of systematic

transformations of historical cultural systems. We understand Confucianism as a positive

and relevant social force that is increasingly important in the West due to the present

integration of East and West. We encourage scholarship that looks at the transition of

China in terms of a new development paradigm. We are seeing China evolving as an

economic force while at the same time maintaining Chinese rather than Western values.

President Jiang Zemin continues to explain that China is following and will continue to

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follow a unique development process without Western characteristics. The Chinese

government is reclaiming its rich Confucian heritage through education and the media.

This study strives to explain a Confucian model of development.

While Inglehart and Baker note that identifying the specific mechanisms through

which these path-dependent developments have occurred would require detailed historical

analyses that are beyond the scope of their study, this is precisely where our study has

begun.267 We agree with the position that modernization is oversimplified. Our research

suggests that tradition is in a state of flux rather than in the past. Societies or cultural

systems can be understood as articulations of these “traditions.” A broader

understanding of these cultural systems will broaden our understanding of the dynamics

between culture and economic forces. As DiMaggi contends in his critical review of the

relationship between culture and economy:

Most of us are accustomed to the view, assimilated by social research and theory, that economic relations influence ideas, worldviews, and symbols. That the reverse is true, that aspects of culture shape economic institutions and affairs, is less well understood and therefore richer in implication for economic sociology and for interdisciplinary conversations.268

Traditional cultural heritage is not only idealistic or religious, it is in many

respects practical. It is the defining quality of a society. No one explains the causal role

of culture more eloquently than Durkheim:

267 Inglehart and Baker, 2000, p. 38. 268 Paul DiMaggio, “ Culture and Economy” in The Handbook o f Economic Sociology, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994).

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The supreme product of collective activity is that ensemble of intellectual and moral goods that we call civilization that has made man what he is; it is what distinguishes him from the animal: man is man only because he is civilized. To look for the causes and conditions upon which civilization depends is, therefore, to seek out also the causes and conditions of what is most specifically human in man . . . It is only by historical analysis that we can discover what makes up man, since it is only in the course of history that he is formed.269

As Morris Rosenberg asserted, quantitative methods tell us nothing without the

support of qualitative study.270 For a rigorous quantitative research design to produce

robust and meaningful insights across global populations, researchers must be informed

by a broad qualitative understanding of all populations included in the study. Otherwise,

the analysis can be contaminated by the overstatement of one or more sets of values.

Summary

This chapter began by describing an ideological superstructure as a cultural code

that influences Chinese social norms. Then it discussed substantial evidence of cultural

assumptions and debates, as well as the method of “syncretic conditioning.” We can

postulate why it is more likely that the convergence and divergence of Chinese and

Western ideas would take place, rather than “wholesale” Westernization. In our

examples, we have described how education and science have been integrated culturally.

We have demonstrated how old-line debates are evident in the concerns over power and

wealth, and how debates between the Confucians and the Legalists are important in

269 Emile Durkheim, Moral Education: A Study in the Theory and Application of the Sociology of Education. (New York: The Free Press, 1973) 150. 270 Morris Rosenburg class lecture University of Maryland, 1991.

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understanding the current Chinese resistance to Western concepts of human rights; then

we related them to discussion of Chinese feminism.

This study addresses the question: Is Confucianism relevant today? Our findings

suggest that while Confucianism is not the only powerful ideology within the Chinese

culture, understanding of core Confucian assumptions is imperative for broader research

on China. Western social science research on China needs to be informed on two levels:

1) by the debates on and confluences of indigenous ideas in China; and 2) by the debates

on and confluences of Chinese and Western ideas. This knowledge should enable

researchers to predict, with more reliability, cultural value convergence and divergence.

From these findings we can conclude that the European model of development

does not apply to China; neither, would the Chinese model apply to other dominions.

These finding have implications for Western scholarship concerning the measurement of

traditional values.

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CONCLUSION

This study drew upon Chinese intellectual debates and tensions to demonstrate

how and why development on opposite sides of the globe has been and will continue to

differ from experiences of and models formulated by the Western world. The challenge

has been to explore Confucianism in terms of power, social mobility and change in

relation to these concepts in Western development, and in spite of the cleavage between

Chinese and Western thought. The hypothesis of this study suggests that Chinese

development, up to and including the present, can be explained by the Confucian

“ideological superstructure.” My thesis is novel and unconventional in that it argues that

cultural tradition drives development. My contention is that a clear and identifiable

pattern of development emerges from the pages of Chinese — particularly, Confucian—

intellectual thought, one that can be applied to Modernity. Perry Link states it simply,

“It would be naive to suppose that such a long tradition has suddenly disappeared.”271

At the onset of this project, my thesis on Confucian development was met with

substantial skepticism in the Western social science arena. I was cognizant of the

criticisms of Confucianism as the antithesis of Modernization, as an oppressive elite

271 Perry Link, “China’s “Core” Problem,” inDAEDALUS: Journal o f the American Academy o f Arts and Sciences, Spring 1993, Vol. 122, Number 2, p. 192.

195

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culture, and also of heated feminist attacks on Confucianism from Chinese on the

mainland and abroad. Not only were inquiries into Confucianism confined mostly to

history, philosophy, and religious studies, but the inclusion of cultural tradition analysis

in the social science dialogue on modernity had given way to trends of quantitative studies

on economic determinism.

As this research is submitted, there is evidence that some critics are revisiting

culture, so to speak. As demonstrated in Chapter 6, scholars conducting elaborate

longitudinal quantitative research studies are beginning to interpret the significance of

culture in development.

This study responded to scholars, both Chinese and other, who claim that a

problem in international relations between China and the West is the mutual lack of

ideological and cultural understanding of one another. The orientation of this qualitative

research is predominantly grounded in the concept of multiple modernities, and develops

the idea of social theory conceived with a practical intention of explaining another social

reality. I have discussed Confucian thought in indigenous terms ruxue flf , the

scholarly tradition, and others to explain what I argue is a complex social theory

addressing micro issues of: social norms and assumptions; social class and social mobility;

and the macro issues of social unity, stability, power, policy, economic dependency, and

large-scale social change.

Drawing on textual analysis and sinological research methods of philology and

hermeneutics, I defined and explained a coherent model of development by elaborating on

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specific intellectual debates identifiable in history. By exploring the function and content

of classical and contemporary Confucian thought, a cycle of similar conditions and a clear,

recurring line of response and resolution emerged, suggesting similar concerns of a socio

political pattern that provide for change and that encourage individual growth and public

development.

By investigating the primary literature of the Spring and Autumn, Warring States,

Han, and Song periods, as well as that of the last century and contemporary commentary,

we find across these eras a remarkably consistent application of line of thought articulated

and applied as ongoing dialogue. Occasions of social and political upheaval were followed

by a return to order based on an incisive view of human limitations. Stages of collapse

and decline instilled a fear of chaos and a propensity to foster social unity and harmony

through the assertion of a clear cultural and ideological identity.

I have explained why the ideological pressures of modernity were not sufficient to

permit the rise of “wholesale” Westernization in China. Instead, foreign ideology (driven

by the merchant class) and Western capitalism remains excluded from power in the

modem Chinese government. During the twentieth century, China revisited the cycle of

chaos, and intellectuals again debated social and political reform. As in previous

generations, these debates arguably revolve around power, the merchant class, and the

272 While this model relates to current PRC issues and ideology, it is beyond the scope of this research to discuss Communist and Socialist issues. Nor have we chosen to include the debate concerning so-called “Confucian Maoism.” This study focuses on a larger model involving roots o f Chinese thought and culture, and does not attempt to discuss the complexities o f modern political theory and agendas of individual actors.

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new government. Our discussion of a Confucian development model and Mencian

political strategy suggests that Chinese intellectuals would reflect on the classics, and

resolve matters by looking for that next “classically educated” leader who will take China

forward in a traditional manner. We identified what we consider a good fit to our model in

the PRC party line quoted by Jiang Zemin.

It is not my intention to suggest that political reform in China will replicate the

old formal Confucian institutions. Rather, I assert that the Confucian model is useful in

identifying the confluence and divergence of indigenous and foreign ideas, such that the

assumptions and social commitment of intellectuals and the leadership are somewhat

predictable. Thus, I defend the notion that political, social, and economic change in China

can best be explained by the term I have introduced: “syncretic conditioning,” on which I

have elaborated in the previous chapters. It follows that future Western social science

scholarship can benefit from a comprehensive knowledge of the lineage of intellectual

debates, and the apparent trajectory of unique Chinese ideas and social constructs.

Social science is interested in generalizing to the larger population by making

social, political and economic predictions regarding the future. Following the Weberian

line, tradition seems to be obsolete in that endeavor. Also, some historians argue that

traditions, including Confucianism, are elements of the past. I have challenged this limited

assessment of tradition in favor of the broader understanding of tradition as a state of

flux. I contend that the Confucian tradition will play a defining role in the future, and that

it is clearly operative in the present. Korean scholar Chaihark Hahm points out in his

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work on Confucian Constitutionalism that the American constitution, the “banner of

Modernization,” is based on long philosophical, political, legal and historical-

circumstantial traditions. There is evidence that scholars (most of whom are Asian) in

diverse academic fields are beginning to reevaluate the importance of this body of thought.

I have discussed the unique rise of a Chinese free market that is not capitalistic by

Western definition. I envision the similarly unique Chinese development that can be

explained by Confucian assumptions. Furthermore, I argue that research addressing

indigenous historical contingencies broadens our understanding of the trajectories of

different realities within Multiple Modernities. I have defended the notion that ideals of

the past are extant in present assumptions. I that these assumptions will be operative in

the new Chinese paradigm. For example, our discussion on the dialogue between Rujia fljg

(Confucian line) and Fajia $ M. (legacy of the Qiri) is illustrative of a unique

approach to issues concerning social order. Also, our model is useful in understanding the

ongoing resistance to the link between wealth and political power.

Ruxue M #as Coherent Sino-social Theory

I have laid out the epistemological assumptions inherent in Ruxue as coherent

sino-social theory and applied these to a logical progression of development. While this

progression encompasses contending intellectual schools, I have presented the Confucian

line as the central conditioning influence most deeply embedded in Chinese identity and

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consciousness. I suggest that social science must be informed by an understanding of this

unique method of intellectual conditioning.

Syncretic Conditioning

In consideration of China’s distinct phenomena of social change, I have introduced

the term “syncretic conditioning.” I defined the assumptions of the scholarly tradition or

Ruxue as an “ideal type” based on the propensity toward a syncretic methodology that is

both adaptive and cyclical. The lines of debate that this research explores are critical in

anticipating future changes from any point in temporal. Simply put, these debates reflect

unified geography, with emphasis on reverence of ancestry. This ideological continuity

has a defining relationship to social change, and informs researchers on the Chinese

understanding of the individual in the context of society.

This line of research that is proposed in this study complements the work of

World-Systems theorists, as well as the traditionalists we have mentioned such as

Inglehart, Huntington and Johnson. While World-Systems has push back beyond Europe

to explain China as the”economic core” and traditionalists have acknowledged the active

role of a so-called “Confucian cultural zone,” we propose a line of sino-social theory that

looks deeper into Chinese development, to explain it in its own terms.

It likely will be argued, in response, that this development model is restricted to

instances that predate major Western contact, i.e., pre-modem China; the argument might

be made that Western ideals have since overshadowed the indigenous ones. I disagree. I

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argue instead that we can identify a confluence of ideas. Social theory becomes more

general when it can be applied to a broader range of scenarios. As Wong points out,

nineteenth-century social theory was focused on explaining patterns of European social

change.273 Social science thus was committed to the achievement of explaining the

European dynamic. Consequently the study of change in China was ignored in part for

two reasons: 1) The academic accomplishments of sinologists to produce a coherent

understanding of Chinese assumptions were still in progress, and 2) the perception at the

time was that change had not occurred in China. This research demonstrates that we no

longer need to be confined by previous theoretical limitations, by drawing upon the

advances in sinology. For example, I have used the theoretical lines of both World

Systems and Weber to demonstrate the need for a unique Chinese model of change to aid

in these endeavors. These theories, and the contributions of sinologists, enable new

theories and conclusions. Given current global circumstances, it is my contention that

such avenues of inquiry are needed and appropriate.

From the debates discussed in this study, I have shown that Chinese intellectual

concerns were largely consistent over time. While they often addressed issues similar to

those in the West, they have been articulated differently. As we have shown, this was

due to historical contingencies — accidents in time and space — and the result is a unique

reality. The literature of most cultures address these topics, such as concern for social

273 R. Bin Wong, China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience (New York: Cornell University Press, 1997) 288.

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order and solidarity; the norms and institutions that govern; concern for how the world

works; and how to envision the next world (Table 1). In the case of China, as in other

cultures, there are a number of different components that comprise their cultural realities.

I suggest that six categories demonstrate some of the specific components of long

complicated process of syncretism that have been addressed in this study.

On the Chinese side are concepts of reality expressed by Confucianism, Taoism

and Buddhism. It is has not been my intention to compare and contrast the two realities

within strict relationship to Western concepts of government, science and religion.

However, I think it is helpful to propose these categories, as I have because it illustrates

Table 1. Syncretic Conditioning______

Social Order/ Solidarity How world works Otherworld

China Confucianism Taoism Buddhism

West Government Science Religion

the “syncretic conditioning” of rujia, daojia and Buddhism, as well as Western traditions.

As I pointed out, Zhu X i’s ^ r l | (i 130-1200 b.c.e.) interpretation of Confucian learning

(rujia (H M) harmonized ideals of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism into a holistic

approach that supported state and society with an “organic system,” in which each

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aspect reinforced the other in theory, as well as in practice.274 The Taoist concepts of

complementary opposites were emphasized as interacting polarities, such as knowledge

and action. This model allowed for distinctions without disturbing the concept of an

ultimate organic unity.275 To understand and strive for balance in the constant state of

flux was critical to order in the universe.

One of the striking differences between these two unique realities (Western and

Chinese) is that China’s “organic system” does not have the same conflicts between

church and state that are held in most modem democratic Western societies. Chinese

spiritual qualities are anchored in the relationship between the self and society, whereas

our Western spirituality posits a relationship between the self and God. The advent of

the scientific method has created arguments concerning the existence of God; it does not

have the same implications for Chinese constructs. Further, Chinese science and medicine

does allow for an energy force Chi that can not be measured. From these distinctions, we

can conclude that understanding of the total framework of ideas is important in social-

theoretical studies of China.

274 Interpretation in progress o f the Guodian Tao Te Ching is expanding sinologists understanding of the relationship between Confucianism and Taoism, see “Ancient Script Rewrites History” in Harvard University Gazette, 22 February 2001, p.7; and note on p. 11 in Zhou Qin Cosmic order and Moral Autonomy: the Rise of Confucian Ethics in Axial Age China (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, June 2000). 275 Schirokauer, 1991, p. 149.

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Ru: Missing Scholars in Western Social Science Literature

Despite more than two decades of courses and colloquia, programs and

publications, university courses and texts by sinologist that interpret the foundations of

Rujia, this scholarship has had scant impact on mainstream social science.

During what I have identified as the second stage of Confucian development,

intellectuals emerged as what I describe as social theorists. In sociological terms, these

thinkers began a critical analysis of existing social problems of particular populations,

notably social and moral decline in relation to the restoration of order and power. These

Axial Age scholars carefully reviewed the literature of the previous Zhou society, and

extrapolated the existence of a high level of social stability and solidarity within that

population. Their analyses revealed that the influence of specific ritual practices on

individual behavior was linked to social harmony and conflict resolution. Confucians

hypothesized that if these practices were reestablished, society would be more likely to

recover from chaos and regain social, economic, and political solidarity. As with the ideas

of many scholars, these works were not applied until later. In the case of Confucius, his

reform theory did not come to fruition until after the fifty-year Legalist experiment (the

Qin dynasty) had failed; the unified Han dynasty implemented the Confucian reform

package by reviving the Zhou institutions. Confucius hypothesized that these

institutions would unify society. History confirmed his hypothesis and we have

evidence that the model was replicated in continuum with the dynastic cycle and as I have

argued the assumptions are still at work in modem China.

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The intellectual contributions of these scholars can be interpreted as social and

political policy such as is understood in the West. I strongly argue that these intellectual

endeavors are significant and have been overlooked as classical social theory. We have

identified economic dependency theory within Ruxue

supposition that mercantile monopolies would lead to large scale economic dependency is

explicit in the early thought of Zhu Xi.

Until recently, the Scholasticism of the Confucian dialogue has been cited as

oppressive rather than for its important pedagogical capacity. I disagree. For example, I

have identified through the textual analysis an example of economic dependency theory in

the Han dialogue that is similar to twentieth-century Western social theory. Confucians

sought to maintain political power; these intellectuals thus were opposed to members of

the merchant class assuming positions of leadership. Intellectual debates within the Han

and Sung dynasties illustrate tensions concerning corruption in government by linking the

accumulation and control of wealth to exploitation and greed. Because Confucians were

successful and persistent in limiting the role of the merchant class within society, even in

times of prosperity and expansion, policy reform continues to reflect these positions.

Confucius did not represent himself as a charismatic; he was an objective social

thinker who based his theories on realism, on a model of society that was recorded in

history: “I am not one of those of innate knowledge. I am simply one who is drawn to

the past and who is diligent in investigating it (BK VII, 19).” Nor was there any

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implication that Confucius or his intellectual followers expounded the idea of being

“chosen.”

I have discussed landmark debates within Chinese intellectual history as evidence

of coherent classical sino-sociological theory. The discourse of the rushi f f ± (followers

of Kongzi) and later within the ruxue fff # {scholarly tradition) demonstrate social

concern and social theories.

The Notion that Assumptions Drive Theory

If we accept the notion that assumptions drive theory, a logical next step, I

contend, is that these debates and assumptions concerning Ruxue cannot be separated

from Chinese development any more than Anglo-American assumptions of state-building,

individualism, and the accumulation of wealth can be separated from the debates in the

Lockean, Kantian, Hegelian, and Jeffersonian traditions.276 Enlightenment ideas of

science are underlined in Positivism, i.e., Newtonian methods of uncovering how the

world works, and reflected in Marxist views that development turns on economic

principle and mode of production.

The plurality of historical pasts is overlooked by Western social science in the

overstatement of theories based on economic principles. Traditionalists argue that such

theories are limited. Because large-scale and long-term historical change is path-

dependent, we reduce the abilities to predict if we fail to factor in historical and

276 Chaihark argues that the U.S.Constitution is based on historical traditions.

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ideological continuities. A comprehensive investigation of how power relations construct

reality involves a knowledge of ideals in relation to historical contingency — accidents in

time and space. 277 Considering that Chinese history developed in relation to specific

geographical conditions and particular intellectual responses, its differences from Western

models of development assume a validity that requires unique approaches of inquiry.

Application to Western Misconceptions of Chinese Society Following my argument that Confucian assumptions are in a continual state of

flux and are extant in contemporary Chinese society, we would expect to be able to

identify them in contemporary observations. If this thesis is successful in explaining core

assumptions, they should clarify Western misconceptions concerning Chinese society.

Now I will consider some of the well known points of contention and misconception in

relation to the evidence I have presented.

Social or Political Criticism

Oppressive elitism and a supportive status quo allows for little social or political

criticism. Confucians engage in a mode of argumentation, a style of discourse, that

advocates moral restraints as a means to curb excesses and to direct power for the

common good. In the third century b . c . e , Li Ssu wrote that a distinguishing mark of

Confucians is that they “talked together about the Odes and Documents” as a way of

277 For a compelling example of historical contingency, Steven Jay Gould The Mismeasure of Man (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. 1996).

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invoking the past to criticize the present. In another example, William de Bary points to

Fang Tung-shu’s view on the importance of promoting the active discussion of public

issues.278 The same Confucian sensibility can be illustrated in current effort to meet the

challenges of reform. For example, sociologist Richard Madsen’s response to his (1991)

encounter with Chinese intellectuals is useful in applying the model:

Madsen was struck by how caught up the intelligentsia was in China with its role as social critics, drawing on a well-spring of iconoclastic idealism about the need for the renewal of society. There was a coherence to the intellectuals’ criticisms of their society which seemed to draw on Confucian ethics. This, Madsen felt, was a reflection of their having been wedded to a long tradition, a common background that served as a foundation for their criticism. Madsen sensed a profound anguish among the intellectuals in the way they used the language of the past to debate the future.279

I think that current reform challenges are better understood when we are informed by the

Confucian positions, because the responses to many debates can be identified and

predicted from those recorded in historical documentation. From the model offered in this

study, resolution and implementation will emerge by synthesis in Mencian terms — a

distinctly new dynasty intellectually — shaped by what the Chinese find acceptable to

their unique ideological superstructure.

278 William Theodore de Bary, The Trouble with Confucianism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991) 87. 279 Quoted in The Confucian World Observed: A Contemporary Discussion of Confucian Humanism in East Asia ed. Tu, et. al., 1992 Asia (Honolulu: The East-West Center, Hawaii) p. 34. This compilation of articles came out o f a workshop set up on the Great Learning. Apparently, Madsen was a member of the scholars’ workshop.

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Misconceptions: Weber’s “Confucian Ethic”

There is the misconception that Confucian policies, referred to by Weber as the

Confucian ethic, kept China economically backward. I have shown instead that Chinese

history and the intellectual literature suggest that Confucians played a powerful political

role during long durations of economic prosperity and expansion. Writers in the

nineteenth and twentieth centuries misinterpreted policies that were meant to minimize

corruption and to curb excesses of those in political power, to mean that commerce and

markets were restricted.

Weber and others wrote in the context of nineteenth-century China’s stark decline.

The European model was enshrined as reflecting the genius of economic progress.

China’s economy and society were marginalized by opium trafficking by the British East

India Company, imposed in large part as a retaliatory effort to balance the treasury of the

British Crown. But the claim was made that China would remain economically, socially

and intellectually “backward” as long as the Confucian “ethic” was enforced. History

may have proven Weber wrong on that point.

We can relate Confucian policies to contemporary attacks on corruption and abuse

of power. Li Peng, China’s second-highest party official after President Jiang Zemin and

head of the National People’s Congress (the Chinese legislature) reportedly warned

colleagues about corruption.280 Pointing to the treasury audit charging that officials ran

280 Christopher Bodeen, “Top Chinese Legislator Warns Colleagues About Corruption,” in The Washington Post (Beijing. Associated Press. March 10, 2000) p. A17.

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up a loss of more than $2.5 billion through waste and fraud, Li offered concrete

suggestions of education and law, as well as oversight, to prevent corruption. However,

in a public show of determination, Li’s former deputy, Cheng Kejie, was executed for

abusing his position to amass a fortune. The implementation of such strict punishment is

not sanctioned by Confucian ideals. This is reminiscent of the Qin. However, the notion

of education is Confucian, and Confucians fought to implement moral teaching and

example, rather than extreme punishment. Perhaps this is echoed in the U.S., amid

concerns over moral decline, the break down in the education system, and the

overcrowding of prisons. In China, the Party is now reintroducing Confucian education in

the middle schools. The purpose is undoubtably to establish moral self-cultivation

through the study of debates, like those we have observed within the opposing schools of

Rujia §§ and Fajia $£ As a top-down model of moral propriety, the young

generation in China will have regained their displaced moral system. There is evidence

that following China’s moral decline during the last century, it may now be “reOrienting”

itself.281

Conversely, a system that limits the power of the merchant class in government

remains antithetical to the Western economic principles based on laws that protect and

foster the accumulation of wealth by the public and officials. However, the problems,

concerns and repercussions on society on both sides of the globe are similar. The

perceived state of moral decline in the U. S. will be familiar to readers. Even the very

281 Frank, 1999.

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young are resorting to gun violence to acquire consumer goods, while our prisons bulge.

Western intellectuals such as Alexis de Tocqueville, Daniel Bell, and others suggest

contradictions between capitalism and democracy.

Symbolically, we have Prometheus in the West driving competition and trade; and

in the East, Mencius considering formal institutions in relation to moral leadership.282 In

the West, the concepts of modernity and development are indivisible and inseparable

from capitalist market economy. In Gary Hamilton’s paper Civilizations and Economies,

we find the fundamental question: Has Western civilization become the model of global

civilization; or are the world’s civilizations giving rise to their own versions of capitalism,

each with their patterns of development and their own trajectories?283 He writes that

although a “full discussion of the Chinese worldview at this point is, of course,

impossible,” the key issues are the links between world-views and institutionalized

economic activities.284 I agree, and this dissertation is meant to inspire a full line of

discussion of the Chinese worldview (s).

282 David S. Landes, The Unbounded Prometheus, Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969). 283 Gary Hamilton, “Civilizations and the Organization of Economics,” in The Handbook of Economic Sociology, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994) 199.

284 Ibid, p. 199.

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Concepts of Human Rights

Human rights and political liberty are now very much part of the prevailing

rhetoric worldwide. We have explained the disparity between “rites and rights.”

Confucian concerns for human dignity and norms of ritual respect for the human person

are little different from Western concerns for human rights. New Confucians have

acknowledged that the concern for the dignity of women was insufficient by limitations,

imposed within ritual practice. On our findings suggest misconceptions concerning

individual rights of women, religion, and political freedom. I will discuss each of these.

Women’s Rights

I will discuss women first because New Confucians highlight feminism as the most

daunting challenge of Confucian revival. As I discussed in Chapter 6, section C, part 2,

feminists allege that the Confucian position on women in China is extremely negative. As

evidence, they note that women in China have and continue to suffer from social

inequality.

Some conditions and circumstances that have faced Chinese women in the past

and today are indeed egregious.285 The serious nature of the abuses of women by both

men and other women lead to explosive debate in the context of Confucian revival. I think

it is a misconception for Chinese women to regard the Western perception of women will

285 See for example Merle Goldman Fall 1983 “Human Rights in the People’s Republic of China,” in DALDALUS.

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eliminate abuse. The abuses of women in the West — even in the U.S. where women

enjoy the greatest freedom of rights — remain a serious problem.

What is striking in the Chinese intellectual tradition is the absence of women

writers in Chinese literature. Our evidence suggests that this is somewhat of a

misconception. Sinologists are interpreting the works of some Confucians to show that

these thinkers did not expressly exclude women from the dialogue, as seen in the literature

concerning the “virtuous women,” for example. Women in other intellectual and doctrinal

literature did not fare better; however, I have argued how Confucians expressed concern

for the self, concern for society and concern for women. These writers articulated the

concern for the self in society through a dialogue on social cohesion derived through the

rational cultivation of virtues. The Chinese feminist line, expressed by Rey Chow,

suggests that women take responsibility and contribute to the women's’ voice in

Confucian revival project. This may encourage modem Chinese women to create gender

harmony within their cultural and moral system.

Though Confucianism is regarded by some feminist critics as the central

perpetuator of the oppression of women, we find no textual reference to condone explicit

abuse (for example the binding of the feet). In fact, we have evidence to support the

opposite. This work will inform scholars on the work of New Modem Confucians to

append the male-centered dispositions and the exclusion of women in the discourse.

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Religious Freedom

Western media highlights the recent highly publicized demonstrations by members

of the Fu Lungong sect of Taoist followers in Beijing. I suggest that Western media has

failed to state the Party position accurately on this religious sect. Beijing Review states

the PRC position on Fu Lungong is that it is a threat to society because of its suicidal

tendencies. This concern for religious radicalism is analogous to the recent case in the

U.S. involving the so-called Branch Davidians, lead by David Koresh in Waco, Texas.

The Jim Jones cult mass suicide incident is another example. The radical views of these

Messianic cults are of interest to scholars in the field of sociology of religion, and there is

a body of evidence that these cults are a growing concern worldwide. Occasions of

political, economic, and social decline that result in a climate of unrest are thought to be

conductive to Salvationist and messianic movements.286 These cults no longer pose a

threat only to the individual in society; now scholars have identified a growing trend that

suggests that these groups are threatening government systems.

Confucian concepts of finite human existence oppose ideas of transmigration in

Buddhism or Messianic suicide movements. Clearly, the PRC, Confucians and

mainstream Western sentiments are aligned on this social element as a threat. I see this as

a matter that should be addressed as a shared concern, rather than an issue of political

contention.

286 See Peter L. Berger, Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New York: Anchor Books, 1990).

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When we discuss religion in China, it is helpful to clarify the distinction between

Western and Chinese understandings of religious pluralism. In Western rhetoric we refer

to religious freedom as religious pluralism, which refers to the constitutional right to

practice any religion. For example, Americans are said to be free to practice their religion

of choice, but according to specific doctrinal limitations of Christianity, Judaism, and the

Islamic faith, the choice is limited to one. On the Chinese side, ideological and religious

pluralism refers to the integrated nature of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism. As we

explained, through ZhuXfs work to find confluence in these three schools of

thought; they are now part of an organic system. However, each stands alone as well.

The term “freedom” is problematic because of the dichotomy between Rujia and

Fajia — the interpretation of rights versus rites discussed in Chapter 6, section C, part 1.

This research shows that the concerns for the good of society are the same in China and

the West, the problem is semantical and ideological. If my theoretical model is successful

in explaining why China will continue on its unique path, it will have pedagogical capacity

within the new global paradigm. Global peace may depend on confluence or acceptance

of political pluralism in some form.

Political Anomalies

Following our claim that Confucian assumptions are operative in social reform

and help explain the cleavage between China and Westerization, we shall consider the

prime example of ideological clash of civilizations: the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.

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Confucian self-cultivation worked to “strengthen control over one’s emotions and

required study and reflection rather than activism.”287 This strong cultural propensity

was challenged when publics in the East Asian societies begun demanding and acquiring a

greater voice in government. A decade later, some of those intellectuals have reconsidered

their activism in light of what is now called the “genius” of Deng’s strategy to establish

economic institutions first before rushing forward with political reform.

The Vilification of China: Racism

Western misconception often finds expression in the continual vilification of

Chinese people. Sinophobia, a racist fear of Chinese people, persists in many Western

countries. Ironically, history attests that economic aggression by the West and the

incentive of the opium trade by the British, humiliated and marginalized China in the

nineteenth century. The end result was the decline or displacement of harmonic ideals.

Sinophobia has been attributed to China as a military threat. It is not Chinese society per

se that is objectionable in the Western view; it is the political regime. As Cold War

assumptions dissipate and economic and political reform are reshaping Western views of

China, the line of research I propose is important for two reasons: First, because the

Chinese are beginning to study and encourage the revival of traditional values, a full

discussion of Chinese assumptions is imperative in terms of international relations and

more balanced Western research and Second, if Frank is correct in asserting that the

287 Vogel, 1991, p.101.

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economic core is reOrienting to China, Western economic stability will depend on more

informed policy. Western academic fields can take the lead in fostering understanding

above negative stereotypes.

Future Research

In trying to predict the future of Confucianism, we can look to scholarship that is

not colored by an overstated negative picture of its past. More work needs to be done to

merge sinology and social science, not only to be more informed but also to foster better

sino-Westem relations. As Endymion Wilkinson points out,

. . . as the this-worldly influence of the Confucian state ideology and examination system for officials fades ever further into the past, and after the failure of the state ideologies which succeeded it, there is a growing appreciation of the importance of religions, both systems of belief and as a body of ritual and practice embedded in every nook and cranny of daily life. For the same reasons, the earlier Western interpretations of Chinese history and culture based on the self-view of the world is now also increasingly questioned.288

More research remains to address the current synthesis and transvaluation in New

Modem Confucianism. In the new vision of multiple modernities, scholarship can

broaden the understanding of diverse articulation of similar social concerns, and of why

these societies will not unilaterally accept a Western model of development. Amartya

Sen was awarded the 1998 Noble Prize in economic science for his work Development as

Freedom.289 Chosen for his sensitive understanding of economics, this author stresses

288 Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A Manual (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1998). 289 Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999).

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the social commitment over numbers. More work needs to be done to fully discuss the

Confucian positions on social commitment in relation to contemporary policy issues. As

Julia Chang Bloch notes,

What is needed is a more coherent long-term framework for a new bipartisan China policy. The United States needs to revamp its approach. The US must help to integrate China into the international community and induce it to abide by a reasonable set of principles and rule in both its economic and its political actions. 290

My response is yes, it is clear that the United States needs to revamp its approach. The

important question is how to define “a reasonable set of principles” that articulates the

differing assumptions that have been discussed in this study. A coherent long-term

framework for a new bipartisan China policy should include the clarification and

distinction between Confucian, Communist and American ideologies, because, as I have

demonstrated in this study, indigenous ideology drives societal development in China.

Final Remark

In this thesis, I intended to present, analyze, and defend another reality — the

assumptions that are going to play a crucial role in the new paradigm. Confucians provide

a compelling model of harmonic conflict resolution and social commitment. However, at

this time in space, sinologists and even Chinese citizens are not sure of its role or destiny,

outside of the history class. Perhaps some New Modem Confucians envision the

290 Julia Chang Bloch, “Commercial Diplomacy,” in Ezra Vogel Living with China: U.S.- China Relations in the Twenty-first Century (New York: W.W. Norton, 1997).

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creation of new institutions infused with the spirit of antiquity. Of course, there is the

question of whether the model could or should be replicated in the present. To be sure,

the preservation and transmission of the tradition is underway in mainland China. Now,

in the spirit of global peace, Confucians express a responsibility to diminish the disparity

between China and the West.

I have argued that Confucianism continues to be relevant to Western scholarship.

This work has demonstrated how coherent assumptions of the indigenous ideological

superstructure are useful. I have emphasized that the nineteenth century marginalization

of China is the result of Western economic development, not the indigenous moral

system. After World War II, the West became heavily invested in modernization,

capitalism, the middle class, wealth, autonomous institutions that control the state, and

laws that prevent state control. Consequently, some scholars tended to overstate a

Western Weltanschauung by widely speculating that in the twenty-first century China

will follow a similar Western democratic model. Further, it presumes that China will

follow the European path of development, the model of Prometheus unbound

perpetuated by the Faustian drive. By assessing Chinese intellectual literature, my

research suggests the emergence of the next Yi Yin.

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FOUR STAGES OF RUJIA

Table 2______Chronological Table of Confucianism

Social Im plications Chinese history Confucianism Rujia STAGE 1: Creative Sage-kings: O ral Tradition Legendary ages Yao, Shun, Yu the Great

C e r e m o n y Jie, the last K ing a X ia D ynasty (Hsia) condem ned tyrant Rituals and D ivination (2205-1600 BCE) Yi Yin exam ple Beginnings of W riting Shang Dynasty Tang, the founding father s y s t e m (1600-1100 BCE)

STAGE 2: Reflexive thought Zhou Dynasty (Chou) Zhou Gong (Chou) (1100-249 BCE) Duke of Zhou Contending Schools Confucius (Kongzi) (551-479 BCE) Social Collapse Com pilation of Spring and Autum n Analects ( L u n Y u ) p e r i o d

Identification of Exem plars (770-475 BCE) School of Zisi (483-403 BCE) R ationalization o f Rituals The Great Learning Doctrine of the Mean Com pilation of Classics

W arring States period M encius (M engzi) (475-221 BCE) (732-289 BCE)

Hsun Tzu (Xunzi) (313-238 BCE)

H i a t u s Qin Dynasty (Chin) Burning of the books and mass execution of Confucian scholars

L e g a l i s t

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Table 2 (continued) Chronological Table of Confucianism Social Implications Chinese History Confucianism STAGE 3: Interpretive Han Dynasty Confucianism became the state orthodoxy Hanchao Classics annotated Unified State new Moral (206 BCE-220 CE) Grand Academy established Leader Old Text School Sima Qian Dong Zhongshu Grand historian Sui-Tang Dynasties Confucianism gradually regained its Cultural Diversity (581-907) prestige; civil service examination system established Economic Expansion An Lu-shan Rebellion (756) Han Yu (768-824) Florescence of Buddhism LiAo (772-841) LiuZongyuan (733-819) Decline and Collapse

New Elites Song Dynasty N eo-Confucianism (960-1279) Dao xue Education Prerequisite for Northern Song Office (960-1126) Synthesis of Taoism and Southern Song Buddhism Increased urbanization (127-1279) Rationalistic School ZhuXi (1130-1200) Formal Confucian institutions Yuan Dynasty Harmonizing standard for civil service (1260-1368) examinations: Four B o o h Rationalism and Idealism (1313) Mogul adapt to Wu Cheng (1249-1333) Chinese culture Annotation of Zhu X i' s Four B ooh

Ming Dynasty Chen Xianzhang (1428-1500) (1368-1644) Wang Yangming (1472-1529)

Manchu Conquest Schools of Wang Western Intrusion Yangming LiZhi (1527-1602) Christian conversion efforts begin Donglin School Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci Gao Panlong (1562-1626) (1552-1610) Liu Zhongzhou (1578-1654)

Western Economic Aggression Ching Dynasty Learning of the Han (1644-1911) School of Evidential Research Taiping Rebellion GuYanwu (1613-1682) Opium War Boxer Rebellion WangFuzhi (1619-1692) New Learning Last Emperor Pu Yi KangYu-wei (1858-1927) Marginalization of China

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Table 2 (continued) ______Chronological Table of Confucianism

Social Implications Chinese History Confucianism

STAGE 4: Neo-Axial Age

Intrusion of Western Ideals Republic of China Liang Shuming (1893-1988) ( 1 9 1 1 - ) M odernization M odern New Confucianism

Post M odernization People' s Republic of China Xiong Shili (1885-1968)

( 1 9 4 9 - ) Fung Yu-lan (1895-1990) TangJunyi (1909-1978) W ing-tsit Chan (1901-1994) M ou Zongsan (1909-1995 W .T. de Bary Okada Takenhiko Cheng Chung-yin Tu W ei-ming 1

Adapted from Yao

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pin yin Wade-Giles

bai hua £[ M vernacular dahua 4clb great transformation dao tao M. daoxue tao-hsueh Neo-Confucianism da zhangfu great man fa & law fajia ji'M fendou Hr f*sJ Maoist ideology of struggle genghua M lb change guanxi |S % method of business xing hsing '[4 tendencies of human nature hu harmonious relations jinshi chinshih highest degree, palace jindai modem times jing xue M l# Period of Classical Learning junzi fti21 exemplar, profound one kexue science ko wu apprehending the principle li W. ritual lijiao tradition of ritual/propriety luan ML disorder pinyin #fi=f type of latinization qin i§: to draw close to the enemy ruler or faction in his court

223

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS (continued)

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pin yin Wade-Giles

ren t humanity ren xing « human nature ru ju fiB scholar rujia m ruxue mm scholarly tradition rushih m i followers of Kongzi shangbu Mm Ministry of Commerce shi shih ± scholar official shih m instructor, master sixiangshi mmx. intellectual history sixiang weiji mm crisis of ideology tianming mandate of heaven wenhua Xih culture wen ming (zhi) xm civilization wu lun s # five cardinal relations xianren M A worthy xiao hsiao filial piety xiaoxue training in filial piety xing m punish, coercive means xiuji zhiren A governance by self- cultivation yi righteousness zi xue =Fm period of the philosophers

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS (continued)

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pm ym Wade-Giles

Proper Names

Daxue k m Great Learning Dong ZhongShu Tung Chung-shu F ang Yu Lan F ung Y u-lan 73M Han (Dynasty) Hanchao m m 206 b.c. - 219 a.d Han Feizi Hanxue H an Learning Hu Shih King Wen King Wu Kongzi K’ung-tzu Confucius Latinghua ifcT fb to alphabetize Liang Shuming mmm Li Si Li Ssu Liji Records of Ritual Lu (state) Lun Yii HR Analects: selected sayings Mengzi Mung Tzu Mencius Mozi Mo Tzu 279-438 b.C. Song (Dynasty) Sung Sima Qian Ssu-ma Chien wjl historian Tang (Dynasty) Dao xue Tao-hsueh Neo -Confucianism Qin (Dynasty) Ch’in Qing (Dynasty) Wang Anshi Wang An-shih Wangdi Western Zhou Chou

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS (continued)

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pin yin Wade-Giles

Proper Names continued

Xia (Dynasty) Hsia Xunzi Hsun Tzu Yao Yi Yin Yili Ceremony and Ritual Zhou Gong Chou Duke of Zhou Zhouli Rituals of the Zhou Zhongguo Middlekingdom Zhongwen Mandarin language ZhuXi Chu Hsi Zhuangzi Chuang-tzu Zisi Tzu Ssu Shih Ching Book of Odes Ssu-ma Chien

Transliteration without characters:

jingshen weiji spiritual crisis

Gongshan Xingzheng Guanli Bureau of Industry and Commerce

getihu individual businesses

siying qiye private enterprises

you gongsi limited companies

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS (continued)

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pin yin Wade-Giles

Proper Names continued

Xia (Dynasty) Hsia Xunzi Hsun Tzu Yao Yi Yin Yili Ceremony and Ritual Zhou Gong Chou Duke of Zhou Zhouli mm Rituals of the Zhou Zhongguo Middlekingdom Zhongwen Mandarin language ZhuXi ChuHsi Zhuangzi Chuang-tzu Zisi Tzu Ssu Shih Ching + Book of Odes Ssu-ma Chien

Transliteration without characters:

jingshen weiji spiritual crisis

Gongshan Xingzheng Guanli Bureau of Industry and Commerce

getihu individual businesses

siying qiye private enterprises

you gongsi limited companies

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GLOSSARY OF CHINESE TERMS (continued)

Transliteration Chinese Characters meaning

pin yin Wade-Giles

Transliteration without characters:

gufen youxian gongsi limited-share companies

kuan-tu shang-pan official supervision and merchant management

Hsing-Li-Hsuen philosophy of human nature

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HERMENEUTIC CIRCLE

Historical Context

Rhetorical Context

Sentences

Words

Philology Phonoloev

Semantics Syntax

Literary Analysis History Social Sciences

International Relations Global Paradigm

Figure 6. Illustration based on Fuller’s H erm eneutic Circle and m odified to this study.

228

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—Speech made by President Jiang Zemin at the University of Cambridge on October 22,1999. The following is full text of his speech.

wcufo .ice to thank you, Sir Awe Broets, V-ee Chancellor, tor Each nation with its own cultural background, social system and me invitation, which brings me to me famous Cambridge value, w-i continue to lead a life in its own way. This diversify is University, it gives me greal pleasure to be together with the very reason why the world is toil of competition, vigor and young friends m a discussion on how mankind siioutd rise up innovation Countries should enhance exchanges and under Ito the challenge in (he new century and build a better iuture. standing, and move ahead together on the bas s ol mutual respect Cambridge University is a world-rerowned university wttfi a and equality. They should not allow the diversity to be a barrier to history of more Son 700 years, ft has nurtured great scientists, their forward match, si# less should they deliberately provoke thinkers and poets such Newton, Bacon, Milton, Byrcn and confrontation and confkst, To respect and develop inn diversity ot Darwin, who made outstanding contribution to the progress of world civilization and identify therefrom common interests are a mankind. Today. Cambntigo University, whrch has produces more great diving force proposing human society forward. Nobel Prize winners than any other university, stilt takes a signifi Here, S wart to share with you some of my thoughts on China's cant place among aft the institutions o' higher learning in (he development, in the hops that it will give you a better understand world. ing ol my country. Over 50 years ago when * was a university student, many The People's Republic of China has just celebrated its 50th young Chinese students were longing for an opportunity to come anniversary. Fifty years are but a brief moment for Chinese civi and study in Cambridge, This university began its contacts with lization that has been going on for more than 5,000 years. China as early as the beginning of the last century A hundred However, in the past 60 years, earth-shaking changes have taken years ago, Cambridge started the Chinese language course. The pteca on this ancient Chinese land. It has taken on a completely fete Or. Joseph Needham ot Cambridge University enjoyed a high new look. China in modem history was a semi-coioraai and semi- prestige in the Chinese academic circles. He devoted his entire feudaJ society, ft was weak, feeble and felt a prey to foreign inva He to the writing or Science and Cnrfcaton in China, a mono sion, with lots of land annexed and its people plunged into an mental work (or study on ancent Chinese science and technology abyss of misery. The Chinese people fought tenacfouay to and cultural achievements for 100 years, many Cninese scbef- change their miserable destiny. From the middle of the last centu ars, bed represented by Mr. Hua Luogeng. an outstanding ry to that of this century, the Chmese people went through set Chinese mathematician, have traveled long distances to study to backs and deteal to their struggles, but they never yielded. Finally, Cambridge. Today, the Chinese academic community stiff main under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, they won tains good exchanges and cooperation with Cambridge, This has national independence and Sberaftort and founded New China. played a positive rote in and exerteo a sound irltuence on From then on, China entered a completely new era of develop enhanced cultural exchanges and friendship between the Chinese ment to its history. The Chinese people of all ethnic groups, who and British people and progress in science and technology as well have taken their destiny in their own hands and enjoy indepen as in thinking dence. unity, peace and stability, are now aWe to devote ail then in the 20th century, mankind has created material and spiritu energy to the cause of building up their country and realize ttte at wealth unmatched by any other time in history. Regrettably, a is folty ideal of national rejuvenation. They deeply cherish (he r ha>d- also in these TOO years that humanity has experienced unprece wor right to be masters of the country and the righi path to devel dented hardships, particularly the havoc of the two world wats. opment. that is, M ding socialism with Chinese characteristics. However. it is always the people ol the woiid that make and write Thrs is a road they have found after years of difficult exploration. world history. In this sense, justice wifl inevitably prevail over ewt. Both history and realities tell tis that only by sdher ng to ail this can light over darkness and progress over backwardness. Mankind China obtain a sustainaoie development and ftte Chinese people will undoubtedly keep on overcoming tftaculties end obstacles, lead to a happy life haze new trails and steadily move forward to a better future. Toe Our strenuous efforts ut the pas! 50 years have brougm about 2tst century is approaching. The people of the worid sNI face a substantial boost in are overall national strength and social pio- many tough challenges, but definitely they also see enormous duc’ivity and a maiked improvement of peoples livetihood From opportunities for development So long as the peopie of the world 1952 to 1996, China's GDP grew at an average annual rate of 7,7 work m unison and form a strong force to tackie at: challenges, percent, much higher m an the world average of 3 percent m the mankind with its civilization wilt continue to march forwa'd same period its economic aggregates are the seventh largest to against all odds, like a ship braving the wind and the waves. me world, its foreign exchange reserves the second largest, anc The world is colorful and diversified. People of bitterer.! coun its total forego trade volume the '-lit: largest in the p a s two tries have traversed different roads of nistonoaf development. oscades, the poverty-stricken papulation in its rural areas has

229

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been reduced by mote than 200 trillion, and more than 95 percent and hence made positive contributions to progress in the grabs? ot larateis have got enough and to spare Life expectancy has human rgbts cause. increased from 35 years prior to the founding of New China to the The Chinese nation has persistently pursued an independent current n , The illiteracy rate among adults has (bopped frwr 80 national spirit and mad to development. We. toe Ch nose peope. percent to <65 percent. ffotnaritabte achievements have been regaitl independence as the foundation on which to tatkS the saved m both the materra* and spiritual civilization Cone forever country. We have created a spiencio Chinese rtiwizaiion by mak are the days :n which Cfona was poor and weak There are con': ing unremitting endeavor over 5 030 years. We grew stronger by monte hem worid opinion 11 ruts taken Ch na only one generation relying cm our own efforts in toe struggle to resist foreign aggres to achieve what woufct have taken other countries severs1 cen sion and gatn national tiberetion «• modem times and f rwfy times to accomplish,' What China has accomplished has not only became masters of cur own destiny independence and se“- ted a sa'te toondalior to; grits all the ethnic groups are protected by the Constitution Continued to speak of. To ensure our people these rights rs si itsdf a major soc-at and economic progress has been made in the regions contribution to tire progress of the work) human rights cause. inhabited by ethnic minorities The relations between diflerem eth Collective and WMduai human i,grits have to go hand in hand nic groups based on eauafety, solidarity and mutual help have and (Tar cotxtinated development shocks be pursued, so do eco- grown stronger and stronger The Chinese people of all ethnic nomc.soc a' and cultural rights on the one hand and civil and polit groups are firmiy opposed to any attempt to split the Chinese ter- ical rights on toe ofoer Pus is in keeping wth China's specific ntoty and sovereigrtty.Dr. Sun Yat-sen. toe great forerunner of the nahonal conditions and is therefore She only way to progress in Chinese democratic revolution and the founder of the

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settlement of Hie Taiwan question, we do not undertake to national problems such as environmental degradation, arms pro renounce ‘tie use of fores precisely tor the purpose ot factftafcng liferation. international crimes and terrorism, tf we fait to address a peaceful settlement. Tne Chinese people w* certainty accorr- these ma.-or problems prompify if win be difficult tor Hie worid to pt$h the complete reunification ot the country. develop further With regard to wha couree to follow and how fo The Chinese nation always loves freedom and peace Thu resolve these problems, the initiative is in the hards of the people Chinese people have always longed tor peace prevailing across of Hie world. To help establish a just and rational new internation the wood and wish to live pp. harmony with the people of all the al political and economic outer is a task of vital importance, a task other countries. "Benevolence and gcxto-neighborimess'' were all that people of all countries and far-sighted statesmen have to pgn along regarded as a treasurer! maxim py our ancestors. In mod Per over its senousness and with prudence. era times, the Chinese people suffered immensely Pom the To safeguard work! peace and promote common develop scourge of war and aggresswn. so now they feel afc tne rrors ment. a# countries must comply with the wriversafy reoognwed strongly the value ot freedom and peace

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csited security at the expense of the security interests ol other corner The beautiful future ol mankind wilt depend on (he efforts countries, it » essential to burkf confidence through tfatogue. ot young peopte generation after 060.013500 it is my hope that the seek security through CQoperei.c.n respect each other's sove'- youth of China and the UK will meet the needs of if* times and eignty ana settle disputes through peaceful means follow the tide of work) devetopmnn'. study hard, move ahead in Cyntaos, an outstanding educator and thinks ot C hm a w ho dekance of difficulties and make then due contribution to the was bom about 2550 years ago. once sard The passage oi time development of then own countries, maintenance 0 ! worid peace is jus! Me the how ol water. which goes on day and nigh;" The and advancement ol the cause o? human progress. tapse of time is irreversible. The 2tst century $ just around the

Jaing Zem in. "Speech m ade by President Jains Zem in at the U niversity ol' Cam bridge on October. 1999 Beijing Reric^v. November, 1999.

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