The West as a ‘truth-spot’: An analysis of the reception of ‘Western’ ideas by 20th Century Chinese philosophers

Sociologist Thomas Gieryn, having analysed how places influence what is believed to be true, proposed the notion of ‘truth-spots’: locations which, by design, facilitate the credibility of beliefs that are associated with them. For example, a scientific discovery claimed by someone working in a lab is considered more credible than if it were claimed by someone working out of their garage. To put simply, the credibility of claims can be said to be shaped by the places they are associated with.1

In the 20th century, many Chinese philosophers carried out a formalised assimilation of Chinese philosophical thought with that of the West. I argue that the manner in which this took place may have been caused by a perception held by Chinese philosophers (at the time) of the West as a truth-spot. This is reflected in their adoption of Western methodologies and ideas to reinterpret elements of their own philosophical tradition.2

Consider how the very discipline of philosophy came about in China: initially, fields like history, philosophy and literature were clubbed under a singular pursuit of study, ‘ethics’. However, the birth of ‘philosophy’ as a singular, distinct discipline took place in 20th century China, as an emulatory response to the kind of divisions (based on fields) that existed in institutions in the West.3 Further, Chinese thinkers took on the responsibility of drawing insights from Chinese philosophy that were mainly relevant to topics under scrutiny by Western Scholars; for example, Chinese scholars turned to ‘Masters Studies’- a term denoting scholarly work that took place during the Warring States era- because they were able to derive insights from it on psychology, logic and history.4  We see here, then, that Chinese thinkers associated intellectual practises and ideas that were birthed in the West- be it institutional organisation or topics of investigation- as more credible than their own schools of thought; as a consequence, they believed that this warranted a reshaping of their own philosophical schools.

A key example of this is the notion that Chinese philosophy is inherently ‘deficient’ in comparison to Western philosophy- since its mode of articulation is dominated by ‘aphorisms, allusions and illustrations’ and not the kind of systematic, logically rigorous forms of expression characteristic to the Western philosophical tradition.56 This belief led many Chinese philosophers to rework elements of their philosophy, articulating them in a manner accessible to the West. For example, Feng Youlan, a noted philosopher, engaged with the emerging ‘New Realism’ school of thought in the West, which was concerned in the validity of metaphysics. Youlan argued that ideas of Zhu Xi (a Neo-Confucian philosopher) addressed some of the questions related to New Realism, however, they were articulated in a ‘moral framework of reasoning’. So, Youlan rewrote them, employing a logical method of expression.7

Gieryn suggests how places can act as truth-spots by imposing order; this is evident in Western philosophy- both in the way institutions are organised, and in the systematic method via which thoughts are expressed in it. He also notes that places may be viewed as truth-spots because they ‘manipulate time’, and this may be true for Chinese philosophy because of the preservation/survival of tradition reflected in it.8 It would be extreme to say that 20th century Chinese philosophers saw the West as the only truth-spot, and saw no signs of credibility in the beliefs associated with their own environment. However, it may, at the very least, be said that they perceived the West, in some sense,  to be a a truth-spot superior to their own.

  1. Gieryn, Thomas F.. Truth-Spots: How Places Make People Believe. University of Chicago Press, 2018. Chicago Scholarship Online, 2019 [↩]
  2. Note that conversely, the works of Western scholars who studied Chinese philosophy at the time (or the East in general) are often infamously termed as ‘Orientalist’ because of exploitative undertones present in them [↩]
  3. Lin, Xiaoqing Diana. “Creating Modern Chinese Metaphysics: Feng Youlan and New Realism.” Modern China 40, no. 1 (2014): 42-44 [↩]
  4. Ibid. [↩]
  5. Ibid., p. 48 [↩]
  6. Youlan, Feng. A Short History of Chinese Philosophy. (ed.) Bodde, Derek. New York, 1958): 12 [↩]
  7. Lin, “Creating Modern Chinese Metaphysics”, pp. 47-51 [↩]
  8. Gieryn, “Truth-Spots”, pp. 173-175 [↩]

Religion, philosophy, or neither? The challenges of engaging Confucianism in global cultural dialogues

Throughout the twentieth century, tensions between (Western) modernity and (Chinese) national culture dominated Chinese philosophical and intellectual debates. This was, and continues to be, especially the case in the difficulties in attempts to reconcile contemporary (liberal) political thought with traditional Chinese socio-political culture, questions that have remained “largely unanswered”.1

Confucian revivalism which seeks to relate and place Confucianism into direct conversation with Western-centric concepts can thus be problematic. Whilst conceptually useful in terms of introducing Confucian ‘motifs’2 to non-Sinitic intellectual spaces, its appropriateness in the reverse sense, when framed through non-Confucian notions, can be contested. The hegemony of Western modes of thought means that Confucianism, when related to other schools of thought, is often conceived through the lens of philosophy or religion. Whilst there is value in translating Confucianism into something more directly comparable to Western concepts, enabling Confucian ideas to be reappropriated into different cultural-historical contexts, it is also delimiting, rigidly fixing Confucianism into externally-produced intellectual ‘boxes’. This fails to account for the more comprehensive ways in which Confucianism interacts with, shapes, and is enacted in social and political life. Rather than an abstract ‘idea’ like democracy, liberalism, or Marxism which can be transported to different contexts, or a religion that can be ‘adopted’ and followed, Confucianism is more deeply and specifically entwined within Sinitic civilization or culture.

The civilizational discourse promoted by the New Confucian movement, inspired by the thought of Xiong Shili (1885-1968), thus seems most appropriate for conceptualising Confucianism in a global sense. This approach views connections between civilizations, in their comprehensive totality, as a means for Chinese “national character to reach higher places of perfection”,3 adopting a broader notion of Confucianism as the core of an all-encompassing Chinese civilization. The ‘Confucian Constitutional Order’ advocated by Qing Jiang4 or the political philosophy of “Confucian political perfectionism” envisioned by Joseph Chan5 offer examples of engaging with and at times integrating Western ideas yet remaining fundamentally rooted in and derived from a Confucian basis. These scholars have not pursued a complete Sinocentric approach: they recognise and engage with alternative (namely, Western political-philisophical) models of thinking about society. Yet, they have adapted them into a distinctly Confucian (Sinitic) civilizational framework: Confucianism provides the intellectual lens through which other cultures are approach, rather than fitting Confucianism into external concepts of philosophy or religion. This means that engagement with other cultures can take place through Confucianism in its comprehensive form, as a form of inter-civilizational dialogue, rather than a distorted, appropriated ‘Confucianism as philosophy’ or ‘Confucianism as religion’.

The idea of a ‘world philosophy of culture’ as advocated by the ‘Boston Confucians’6 is a valuable framework at the general, global level. However, when engaging with Confucianism specifically, utilising Western-derived concepts like philosophy or religion can distort, appropriate, and delimit Confucianism. As Sun has highlighted, such discourses have sometimes been reproduced in China itself,7 as, in attempts to relate Confucianism to other (Western) ideas, Chinese intellectuals recast Confucianism according to these conceptual labels, which shapes how Confucianism is studied, imagined and manifested in contemporary China.   Consequently, inter-civilizational dialogue perhaps provides the most appropriate, albeit similarly inherently imperfect, means for intercultural exchange and translation.

 

 

  1. Edmund S.K. Fung, The Intellectual Foundations of Chinese Modernity: Cultural and Political Thought in the Republican Era (Cambridge, 2010), p.94 [↩]
  2. Tu Weiming, ‘Foreword’ in Robert C. Neville, Boston Confucianism: portable tradition in the late-modern world (Albany, 2000). [↩]
  3. Carsun Chung, ‘Manifesto for a Reappraisal of Sinology and the Reconstruction of Chinese Culture’, The Development of Neo-Confucianism, pp.465-483 in W.M. Theodore De Bary and Richard Lufrano (eds.), Sources of Chinese Tradition: From 1600 Through the Twentieth Century (New York, 2001), p.553. [↩]
  4. Qing Jiang, A Confucian Constitutional Order: how China’s ancient past can shape its political future, translated by Edmund Ryden, edited by Daniel A. Bell and Ruiping Fan (Princeton, 2012). [↩]
  5. Joseph Cho Wai Chan, Confucian perfectionism: a political philosophy for modern times (Princeton, 2014). [↩]
  6. Robert C. Neville, Boston Confucianism: portable tradition in the late modern world (Albany, 2000) [↩]
  7. Anna Sun, Confucianism as a World Religion: Contested Histories and Contemporary Realities (Princeton, 2013) [↩]

Jiang Qing’s Confucian Alternative to Democracy.

Confucian scholar Jiang Qing (not to be confused with the wife of Mao Zedong) makes no secret of his belief that democracy, liberal, socialist or otherwise, is not the way forward for China in terms of its political development. Jiang argues that democracy, especially in the Chinese case, fails to maintain the Confucian ideal of social harmony. In place of the model of popular sovereignty espoused by democracy, Jiang argues that political authority ought to be based squarely on what he calls the “Way of Humane Authority,” a fundamentally undemocratic system dominated by a what is essentially a constitutional monarchy dominated by a Confucian theocracy. Though adapted for the modern age, the Way of Humane Authority represents a fundamentally anti-modern and reactionary strand of Confucian thought.

The main concern of the Way of Humane Authority is the issue of legitimation. To Jiang, how authority is to be legitimized is far more important than how it is to be implemented: implementation is but the means by which legitimate authority is realized. While the implementation of authority is heavily dependent on circumstance, the legitimization of authority is timeless and universal. Thus, legitimate authority can in theory be implemented through a variety of systems of government depending on the context.1

Jiang identifies three forms of political legitimacy: spiritual legitimacy, cultural legitimacy, and popular legitimacy. Spiritual legitimacy is based on the power of morality and faith. Cultural legitimacy is based on the power of tradition and history. Popular legitimacy is based on the power of the people. Effective implementation of the Way must be based on maintaining proper balance between all three forms of legitimacy.  If too much  emphasis is placed on a single form of legitimacy, disharmony and calamity is the result.  This is not to say that all forms of legitimacy are equal, however, as will be soon shown; indeed Jiang’s conception of balance is strictly vertical and not horizontal in nature.2

While monarchy has historically been the means through which legitimate authority has been realized in China, Jiang argues that the present circumstances no longer support such a system and that any future system must be based on the tripartite separation of powers. But in contrast to western democracies where this separation is based on executive, legislative, and judicial authority, Jiang proposes separation along the lines of spiritual, cultural, and popular authority. The highest branch of government in Jiang’s model is the Academy. The academy is entirely the domain of spiritual authority. Its main function is to ensure that the rest of the government continues to uphold a Confucian values and traditions. To fulfill its role, the Academy is granted six powers: the power of supervision and remonstrance, the power of education and examination, the power over rituals of state, the power of recall, the power of mediation between the other bodies of state, and the power to uphold morality.3

The next branch of government is the tricameral parliament. In this parliament each of the three forms of authority is represented. Spiritual authority is represented by a body of qualified scholars chosen either by recommendation or examination. Popular authority is represented by an assembly of representatives elected in the same manner as in the West. Cultural authority is to be represented by a body of hereditary nobles selected from prestigious lineages (i.e. descendents of great men). Each house of parliament can propose legislation, but it must pass at least two of the three houses. Importantly, the house representing spiritual authority has unlimited veto power.4

The third branch is the office of a hereditary monarch, who is the symbolic head of state. This office is hereditary because Jiang believes that elected leaders lack cultural legitimacy. Jiang proposes that in China’s case, the monarch should be a descendent of Confucius, on account of the House of Kong’s universal prestige. While the monarch plays no role in common matters of government, he has supreme authority in transcendent matters of state. The monarch has the power to make war and peace, sign legislation into law, appoint civil and military officers, declare emergencies, and pardon criminals.5

It is quite evident that in Jiang’s proposed model of government, disproportionate power is given to spiritual authorities, and very little is given to popular authorities. Not only do spiritual authorities have complete control over the most important branch of government, but also wield significant power in another. Meanwhile, popular authority is only represented in one part of a single branch of government. Even cultural authority would have a greater share of power, being not only represented in parliament, but also embodied in the monarch. Thus, Jiang’s imagined government is one where effective judicial, supervisory, examinatory, and legislative power is concentrated into the hands of a Confucian scholarly elite, with most of the remaining powers in the hands of a hereditary aristocracy. The common people receive only a token share of power. This system ultimately more closely resembles an idealized version of an old European monarchy than anything modern or anything Chinese.

  1. Qing Jiang et al., “The Way of the Humane Authority,” essay, in A Confucian Constitutional Order: How China’s Ancient Past Can Shape Its Political Future (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017), 29–32. [↩]
  2. Jiang et al., “The Way of the Humane Authority,” 28-40 [↩]
  3. Qing Jiang et al., “The Supervisory System of Confucian Constitutionalism,” essay, in A Confucian Constitutional Order: How China’s Ancient Past Can Shape Its Political Future (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017), 44-64 [↩]
  4. Jiang et al., “The Way of the Humane Authority,” 40-3 [↩]
  5. Qing Jiang et al., “A Confucian Constitutionalist State,” essay, in A Confucian Constitutional Order: How China’s Ancient Past Can Shape Its Political Future (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017), 71–96. [↩]

Inoue Tetsujirō: The Confucian Revival and Fascism in Japan

Beginning in 1868, the Meiji Restoration was a state-led effort to modernize Japan. As the Tokugawa government was abolished, the Confucian backbone of the state was viciously attacked. Religious persecution grew in the years of the Restoration as the new Meiji government sought the establishment of Shinto as Japan’s national religion, an idea influenced by the centrality of Christianity for European states.1 By the late 1880s, Confucian institutions (like schools) and religious practices nearly vanished from Japanese Society.2 The state viewed Confucianism as backward, “the antithesis of Western Modernity,” but this is exactly what led to its revival3

Inoue Tetsujirō (1855-1944) led the Confucian revival in the 1890s. Inoue was a professor at the Tokyo Imperial University and a political commentator in major public debates of the late Meiji Period. His experience studying in Europe for six years (1884-1890) was formative, taking inspiration from the strength of German nationalism through its centrality of Christianity.4  With a long anti-Christian tradition and the Meiji era’s emphasis on Shinto in ‘National Learning’, Christianity could not be replicated in Japan.5. Instead, Inoue would try to replicate Germany’s model by positioning Confucianism as central.

Although the revival of Confucianism was a traditionalist movement, the religion was transformed to fit the modern Japanese context. Tetsujirō would adapt Confucianism from a religion to a Philosophy; He argued Confucianism was an “ethical system” that would foster “National Morality”, while being “scientific” because it does not undermine the modern emphasis on secular education.6 Tetsujirō argues Confucianism’s secularity and rationalism (through the hierarchical structures of Confucianism akin to Western ideas like Social Darwinism) makes it superior to the West’s Christianity.7 This unique rebrand of the old religion builds on Western ideas, borrows traditional concepts, and espouses Japanese national exceptionalism, making it a ‘Japanese Confucianism’.

As critical discourse grew in response to the Meiji policy of Westernization (seen in the debates on Overcoming Modernity) traditionalists saw the Confucian Revival as a way to bridge the modern and the idealistic past. Although Confucian Academies never completely recovered from the pre-Meiji times, the state increasingly absorbed the philosophy. Inoue’s influence can be seen through his advisory role in the “official interpretation of the Imperial Rescript on Education” which adapted the 1890 order to teach Confucian values.8 Confucianism grew closer to the state over time and embedded itself as a core ideology, alongside Shinto. This is evident through through state rituals and ceremonies, common in the late 1920s, which were often Confucian or Shinto.9 As the state came to dominate Confucianism, it became susceptible to adoption into the fascist imperial doctrine of the 30s and 40s. The ‘Kingly Way’ became the ‘Imperial Way’

Insoue’s ideas became problematic during the ’15 Years War’ between the Manchuria Invasion and the end of WW2. The revival of Confucianism in Japan justified imperialism in China as defending East Asian values against the Communists (CCP) and Chinese Republicans (KMT) who saw it as the antithesis of their mission.10 The Japanese saw themselves as defending the East from the Western cultural and political hegemony. However in Korea, a nation that was centrally Confucian under the Choson state, their colonial subjects were forced to adopt Japanese last names after 1937, going against the Confucian core value of Filial Piety11. Although this attempt failed, it still demonstrates the contradiction of their imperial ideology – the failure for the Japanese to uphold and protect Eastern Confucian traditions and values.12

In the post-war years, Insoue’s ideas and Confucianism in general became taboo and associated with fascism. The author states the philosophy “was best forgotten”.13 However, it may be time to reconsider the legacy of Confucianism and fascism. Many pre-war figures, like those from the Kyoto School, were rethought and reconsidered in ‘modern’ contexts. A similar attempt should be made with Inoue Tetsujirō and Japanese Confucianism.

  1. (( Paramore, Kiri. “Confucianism as Facism (1868-1945).” Japanese Confucianism: A Cultural History. New Approaches to Asian History. Cambridge University Press; (2016): 148. [↩]
  2. ibid., p. 153 [↩]
  3.   ibid., pp. 147-8 [↩]
  4. Davis, Winston. “The Civil Theology of Inoue Tetsujirō.” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 3, no. 1 (1976): 7. https://doi.org/10.2307/3023095. [↩]
  5. Paramore, Kiri. “Confucianism as Fascism (1868-1945).” Japanese Confucianism: A Cultural History. New Approaches to Asian History. Cambridge University Press; (2016): 155 [↩]
  6. ibid., 150 [↩]
  7. Davis, Winston. “The Civil Theology of Inoue Tetsujirō.” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 3, no. 1 (1976):7. https://doi.org/10.2307/3023095. [↩]
  8. Paramore, Kiri. “Confucianism as Facism (1868-1945).” Japanese Confucianism: A Cultural History. New Approaches to Asian History. Cambridge University Press; 2016: 152 [↩]
  9. ibid., p. 156 [↩]
  10. ibid., p. 159 [↩]
  11. ibid., p. 164 [↩]
  12. ibid., p. 165 [↩]
  13. ibid., p. 166 [↩]

An analysis of Ci Jiwei’s ‘Moral China in the Age of Reform’

Ci Jiwei’s Moral China in the Age of Reform argues that China, since the collapse of Maoist communism, has been facing a profound moral crisis with no end in sight.1 He attributes many reasons to this moral crisis, such as the faulty nature of the Chinese Party-Government and the lack of past moral standards. His work engages in interesting analytical philosophy with the influence of Nietzsche and Foucault, yet is often too philosophical and anecdotal for what he identifies as a real problem affecting over a billion people.

 

In his first chapter, Ci writes that China’s moral crisis is greater than any other societies’ and that every aspect of society is implicated. The nature of this crisis is that cooperation is breached on a massive scale; that elementary norms are violated; and that this state of affairs is normalised. Evidence of this is the prevalence of unsafe foods and medicine, poor quality of water and dangerous levels of traffic.

As the book progresses, he describes many reasons for why this moral crisis has come to be. For example, the end of communism saw the rise of individualism, in which ordinary people became uninterested in collective endeavours and thus abandoned altruism. His third chapter particularly deals with what he calls the progression from utopianism to hedonism via nihilism – that is, the progression from communist hopes to the open pursuit of wealth and pleasure through the erosion of the belief in communism.2 Yet also bearing responsibility for the moral crisis is the Party-Government, which has designated itself as the initiator and authoriser of morals and norms, yet is understood by nearly everyone to be corrupt. The Party-Government has replaced what Confucianism was for traditional China and what communism was for Maoist China; but unlike Confucianism and communism, the perception of the Party-Government is not as infallible.

 

To combat this moral crisis Ci recommends a number of liberal reforms. He believes that democracy is a positive influence on society, as individuals contribute to the maintenance of societal norms; and that an increased presence of checks and balance limits corruption. However, this is where Ci begins to partly contradict himself; for he also writes that too much liberalism (i.e. individuality) can lead to selfishness, and he attacks the ‘superficial criticisms’ of China for its supposed lack of freedom when compared to Western societies.3

 

Although Moral China in the Age of Reform is interesting for its analytical philosophy, its real-world applications fall short. Firstly, it relies on mostly anecdotal evidence to confirm the presence of a moral crisis: reused cooking oil and overly-negative news stories from Jiaodian fangtan are definitely problems, but not evidence of a widescale moral collapse which has occurred since (not during) the reign of Mao. Widespread corruption is similarly anecdotal; China is only ranked 76th out of 180 countries in Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index, on par with the countries of Moldova and North Macedonia.4 This does not seem to suggest the vast and globally unique “moral crisis” China finds itself in.

Secondly, Ci engages in very strict analytical philosophy to describe the every motivation and moral character of over a billion people. It must be questioned if it really is the case that every person in China, deciding the practices of their everyday lives, enact moral agency either through freedom or identification.

Finally, Ci seems to support a form of Chinese exceptionalism. He criticises Thomas Metzger’s A Cloud across the Pacific – a book, as Ci writes, about the ‘profound’ differences between China and the West – because it makes too many comparisons between China and the West.5

But these criticisms should not undermine Ci’s entire book; Moral China in the Age of Reform is a deeply analytical and profoundly interesting evaluation of modern Chinese society, a cultural monolith with huge influence on the state of the world now and into the future. It will almost definitely remain a classic in the decades following its publication.

  1. Ci Jiwei, Moral China in the Age of Reform (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). [↩]
  2. Ibid, pp. 25-26. [↩]
  3. Ibid, p. 37 [↩]
  4. Transparency International, Corruption Perception Index 2023, www.transparency.org/cpi. [↩]
  5. Ci, Moral China, p. 106 [↩]

Mohism and Confucianism: ‘father and state’, the case of Mencius.

Mohism is the third biggest schools of China, following Confucianism and Daoism.1 The core values of Mohism, in relation to the state, is the “impartial-treated nation”[jian tian xia], which highlights on the universal love. Confucianism, on the other hand, places the “the family-governed monarchic nation” [jia tian xia] at its core, highlighting the concept of the differential and preferential love.2

A discourse over the relationship between the individual and the state is afoot. Both schools of thought offer different insights. Confucianism focuses on righteousness (yi) and looks down upon benefits (li), finding them polar opposite to one another as values.3 However, Mohism finds both righteousness and benefits to be well-integrated, highlighted together both theoretically and practically.4

Mohism, likewise, unlike Confucianism, does not stand for the fixed social ladder,or the basic social structure of “king, minster, father and sons” (jun, chen, fu, zi).5 Instead it sees a connection between freedom or autonomy of life in the universal values and individualism of man.5 Confucianism takes the priority of group value rather than the individual value in the social order. Mohism, on the other hand, Mohism takes the priority of individual value rather than group value in the society.5 Confucianism took the priority of the state with a centralized form of power – in contrast that Mohism took the priority of decentralized power and dispersive small states.5 This is all important to establish in order to understand the respective schools’ thought on state and man as it shows how Confucianism took the priority of nation integrity over the common people, the civilian, which is the complete opposite to Mohism.

Whilst both Confucian and Mohist ethics embraced both universal love, as well as love for one’s own parents, they differently configured competing values.6 They disagreed on which degree to which one was more important. Confucians did give love for one’s parents a priority comparatively higher than Mohists do, whilst Mohists gave universal love the priority comparatively higher than Confucians.7 And it was due to these different ethical schools having different configurations of values that they presented competing configured perspectives on whether to love the state more than one’s own parents.

Examples of moral values of filial piety and loyalty to the state (i. e. the emperor) although both highly valued in Confucianism, pre-Qin Confucianism would have given filial piety a higher priority than to the loyalty to the state, the emperor.8 In the example of Mencius as Chenyang Li’s article provides, Mencius’s student, Xian Qinmeng, raised a significant question. The question regarded the people who in serving the state were ‘too busy with state affairs to care for their own parents’8 – what should they do? To whom first came filial piety – the state or own parents? Mencius replied ‘the sons utmost act of filial piety is to honour his parents; the utmost act of honouring parents lies in supporting his parents with the entire country. Being the emperor’s father is the highest honour; being supported with the entire country is the utmost form of support’. The service to the country was the greatest act of filial piety in his eyes.9

 

 

 

Bibliography:

 

Song Jinzhou, Mohist Theoretic System: The Rivalry Theory of Confucianism and Interconnections With the Universal Values and Global Sustainability, in Cultural and Religious Studies, Vol. 8, No. 3, Shanghai (2020)

 

Chenyang Li, Does Confucian Ethics Integrate Care Ethics and Justice Ethics? The Case of Mencius, in Asian Philosophy, Vol. 18, No. 1, (2008).

  1. Song Jinzhou, Mohist Theoretic System: The Rivalry Theory of Confucianism and Interconnections With the Universal Values and Global Sustainability, in Cultural and Religious Studies, Vol. 8, No. 3, Shanghai (2020), p. 178 [↩]
  2. Song, Mohist Theoretic System, p. 178. [↩]
  3. Song, Mohist Theoretic System, p. 178, [↩]
  4. Song, Mohist Theoretic System, pp. 178-179. [↩]
  5. Song, Mohist Theoretic System, p. 181. [↩] [↩] [↩] [↩]
  6. Chenyang Li, Does Confucian Ethics Integrate Care Ethics and Justice Ethics? The Case of Mencius, in Asian Philosophy, Vol. 18, No. 1, (2008), p. 71. [↩]
  7. Li, Does Confucian Ethics Integrate Care Ethics and Justice Ethics?, pp. 71-72. [↩]
  8. Li, Does Confucian Ethics Integrate Care Ethics and Justice Ethics?, p. 72. [↩] [↩]
  9. Mencius 5A:4 [↩]

Acting and Reacting: Easternization in Chinese Confucian Renewals

This week’s blog post is diving into the wild, wacky world of Chinese Confucian revivals in and beyond the early twentieth century. Throughout this time period, all manners of Chinese scholars and philosophers considered how Confucianism might be preserved, honored, and adapted into the Chinese culture of the future as the nation collectively reacted to and, more importantly, acted upon western ideas of globalization and modernization. Historian Edmund S. K. Fung discusses a key component of this discourse: cultural conservatism and a deeply held faith in traditional values which might be harnessed and revitalized for the purposes of modernization.1
I want to focus in on a specific concept which cropped up–propagated by some, disparaged by others–within this space of ‘cultural conservatism and modernity’ thought. Consider the term Easternization, especially with regards to the historically charged Westernization and all its implications of an encroaching, dominating, assimilating set of European ideas. The introduction and use of this word in Chinese philosophical discourse is deeply linked to Confucian revivals when considering the different ways in which Confucianism was harnessed as a cultural tool in the early twentieth century. Fung even suggests that Easternization may be understood “as a quest for global recognition of the universalism of a reinvigorated Confucianism…”.2 Let’s investigate what Easternization meant to some Chinese thinkers, how it was utilized, and the sorts of philosophical visions that were crafted in relation to it.
Many voices, both contemporary and historical, focus on the distinctions or incompatibilities between Western and Chinese systems and societies when discussing Chinese modernity. There are many fundamental differences which make this work relevant, but I personally tend to gravitate toward the points of similarity and connection among us humans. In this case, Western and Chinese philosophers offered valuable commonality as Confucianism found itself in conversation with different flavors of European humanism.3 Suddenly, Parisian philosophers were seeking deeper understanding of Confucian texts while German philosophy was being translated into Chinese and spread in academic circles. Confucianism was just the thing for China to share with the world; the Confucian spirit was just the way to Easternize. Indeed, Chinese thinkers viewed their Confucian spirit as a crucial dimension of their culture which could fill a needed role for a western world filled with religious and moral declension.4
It’s tempting to use language like “cultural export” or similar terminology to describe this sharing of Confucian ideals and Easternization more generally, but there’s a very specific reason why I’ve avoided doing so. The concept of Easternization goes much further than a one-sided imposition or the dropping of some imported goods on the doorstep. In order for classic and revivalist Confucian teachings to be shared to a western audience, a two-sided exchange of ideas needed to occur. Early twentieth century Chinese philosophers demonstrated this through their engagement with European philosophical circles and their amalgamating of Confucian ethics with European economic and political structures. Easternization demonstrated a story of Chinese cultural flexibility and active engagement with the direction of global modernization, offering a perspective far from the story of Westernization.5
When considered in this light, Easternization strikes me as an engaging space for study and teaching. Why had I never heard this phrase before now, when Westernization is so commonplace as to hardly warrant a critical thought outside of the classroom? I’ll leave today’s post with this question: how can we continue to identify and address Euro-centric narratives in our classrooms, and how can we perhaps utilize ideas like “Easternization” to combat such narratives?
That’s all for this week. Stay safe, folks!

  1. Edmund S. K. Fung, The Intellectual Foundations of Chinese Modernity: Cultural and Political Thought in the Republican Era (Cambridge, 2010), pp. 61-62. [↩]
  2. Ibid., p. 73. [↩]
  3. Ibid., pp. 69-70, the New Humanist work of Irving Babbitt in particular. [↩]
  4. Ibid., pp. 75-76. [↩]
  5. Ibid., p. 67. [↩]

Tosaka Jun and the concept of ‘Everydayness’

Tosaka Jun’s exploration of the concept of ‘everydayness’ was a noteworthy philosophical study that reconceptualised everyday life in early 20th century Japan. It emphasised reducing individual experiences of time to the immediacy of ‘today’, likening it to a worker focused on meeting their immediate tasks that are necessary for survival, unaffected by the concerns of ‘yesterday’ or ‘tomorrow’1 This focus on the present highlights the importance of factual reality over abstract notions of time, which Tosaka argued was essential for conceptualising historical time and social change. Harootunian critically examines Tosaka’s distinct contribution to Japanese philosophy, emphasising his advocacy for a rational, efficient modern culture in Japan.

The growth of a new social life in Japan, with new subject positions in Japanese society, from “the people (minshu ̄), the masses (taishu ̄), the modern boy (mobo), modern girl (mogaru ̄), cafe waitress, bar maid, and so on”, made Japanese life increasingly unprecedented2. Tosaka argued that these growing modern customs were constantly reshaping society, and couldn’t be accounted for in philosophical analysis without the presence of ‘everydayness’. He evaluated key dimensions of Japanese life, particularly the culture of the masses in their customs, social relationships, work and leisure life, and consumption habits, as well as the role of science in this new order3. Tosaka’s utilisation of the concept of ‘everydayness’ was therefore pivotal to move away from a more abstract understanding of philosophy, and towards a deeper engagement with the dynamic, lived realities of society. His work was not just an expression of enthusiasm for modern life; it embodied a strong conviction about the evolving nature of Japanese social life in the 1920s and how this was constantly building towards a new future.

Tosaka was not alone in his philosophical study of ‘everydayness’; his work derived from Heidegger’s prior articulation in Sein and Zeit (1926), and formed part of a widespread enthusiasm in the concept of custom (genjitsu) in Japanese intellectual and popular discourse4. What distinguished Tosaka, however, was his preference to the term ‘actuality’ over ‘gentjitsu’ to express a more factual understanding of everyday life.

Tosaka’s understanding of ‘everydayness’ shaped his approach to custom; he did not see it merely as a record of popular social practices, but as a concept with concealed historical and moral significance. For Tosaka, acknowledging everyday cultural practices (fūzoka, or custom) served as an “agent of…actuality” (genjitsu), providing an understanding of the reality of the masses that phenomenology couldn’t tap into5. He critiqued newspapers for oversimplifying the idea of custom by focusing on its popular aspects, which then failed to integrate the underlying economic and social structures underpinning these practices. Prostitution was a critical example of this, as Tosaka argued that it has been consistently overlooked as a vulgar and “transcustomary” practice, without interrogating it as a modern social problem worthy of philosophical analysis3.

This critique underscores his argument that an analysis of custom must incorporate the “character of the popular” (taishūteki) in order to reflect the thoughts and sentiments of the Japanese people.6.His focus on this topic highlights his broader effort to redirect Japanese philosophy towards its core purpose, serving as a lens that could access the overlooked realities of everyday life.

  1. Robert Stolz, “The Principle of Everydayness and Historical Time”, in Ken C Kawashima, Fabian Schafer, Robert Stolz (ed.) Tosaka Jun: A Critical Reader (East Asia Program, Cornell University, 2013) p.13 [↩]
  2. Harootunian, Harry D. Overcome by Modernity: History, Culture, and Community in Interwar Japan (Princeton University Press, 2001) p. 97 [↩]
  3. Ibid. [↩] [↩]
  4. Ibid. p.127 [↩]
  5. Ibid. p. 122 [↩]
  6. Ibid. p.121 [↩]

A Culture Crystallized over Centuries: The Role of Edo Political Thought in Watsuji Tetsurō’s The Way of the Japanese Subject

Like much of the Kyoto School, Zen Buddhism and concern about modernity played a deep role in the philosophy of Watsuji Tetsurō, with his description of Japanese culture as having “passed through several fires”, positioning “world religions” as an agonistic threat.1. However, The Way of the Japanese Subject was not written in a vacuum, defining Japanese culture through differentiation from its East Asian counterparts predates the Meiji restoration and can be seen throughout the Edo period.

The “Japanization” of Confucianism is a concept on which Tetsurō’s draws from extensive Tokugawa writings.2. Before the Meiji restoration, many Japanese writers had to contend with the idea of China being the “central flowering” of culture, making peripheral nations around China barbarians.3 Due to this reputation as Dōngyí or Eastern Barbarians, Japanese writers up to Watsuji Tetsurō made a conscious effort to argue that Japanese cultural imports had been distinctly differentiated, making them on par with China. An example of this can be seen in the writings of Katsube Seigyo (1712-88), who argued that “Japan is an ingenious nation. We may not be particularly good at inventing things, but we can take something from China, study and learn from it, and make something that works even more splendidly”.4 Similarly, Hattori Taiho (1770-1846) summarized Japanese culture as excelling at “at taking something that someone else has made, utilizing it fully, and adding our own ingenuity to it”.5 Tetsurō takes this idea a step further that while Confucianism is the origin of Japanese obedience, this philosophy “was not an original strain of Chinese Confucianism. It was the Japanese samurai who gave shape to the concept from their own experience.”6

Whilst they reach the same conclusion, the argument that “bushido” was the “living embodiment of the Confucian Way” and the method to which it was Japanized is a major distinction from earlier authors and worth examining.7 The aforementioned emphasis on Bushido is emblematic of the widening cult of the samurai in Japanese culture following the 1890s, however this concept is somewhat anachronistic and therefore the role of warrior codes is less common in Tokugawa writings.8 This could partly be explained with Tokugawa insecurities about being identified with barbarians, as if they overemphasized violence it could play into negative Confucian tropes.9

However, not all Tokugawa writers attempted to define Japan relative to China, the importance of Imperial worship in Japan was emphasized before the Meiji restoration and the Sonnō jōi movement.10. Japan’s position at the “eastern crown” of Asia gave it’s unique claim to the land of the rising sun, and some Edo authors would emphasize its unique position to define Japanese culture 11  . Aizawa Seishisai (1782-1863) would write that the sun was “the source of the primordial vital force sustaining all life and order. Our Emperors, descendants of the Sun Goddess, Amaterasu, have acceded to the Imperial Throne in each and every generation, a unique fact that will never change. Our Divine Realm rightly constitutes the head and shoulders”.7 This statement of Japanese particularism which would put it above its neighbours to the west mirrors the writings of Watsuji Tetsurō that “venerating the emperor embodies the absolute in the Japanese nation” and that this way was “already understood by our ancestors more than one thousand years ago.”6 Even if the Meiji and Showa eras saw a distinct rise in imperial worship, these ideas did not spring out of nowhere but developed naturally from philosophy written during the Shogunate. Similarly grappling with the Japanese place in the world predates contact with Europeans and the crisis of “Modernity”. 

  1. James W. Heisig, Thomas P. Kasulis, and John C. Maraldo, eds., Japanese Philosophy: A Sourcebook, vol. 22, Nanzan Library of Asian Religion and Culture (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2011), 581
    Wm Theodore De Bary, Carol Gluck, and Arthur Tiedemann, eds., Sources of Japanese Tradition: 1600 to 2000 (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 997. [↩]
  2. Ibid [↩]
  3. Watanabe Hiroshi, A History of Japanese Political Thought, 1600-1901, trans. David Noble (Tokyo: I-House Press, International House of Japan, 2012) 279. [↩]
  4. Ibid, 281-282 [↩]
  5. Ibid 282 [↩]
  6. De Bary, Gluck, and Tiedemann, Sources of Japanese Tradition, 998. [↩] [↩]
  7. Ibid. [↩] [↩]
  8. Oleg Benesch, Inventing the Way of the Samurai: Nationalism, Internationalism, and Bushidō in Modern Japan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 76. [↩]
  9. Watanabe, A History of Japanese Political Thought, 279-280 [↩]
  10. Robert N. Bellah, “Japan’s Cultural Identity: Some Reflections on the Work of Watsuji Tetsuro,” The Journal of Asian Studies 24, no. 4 (August 1965): 573-74. [↩]
  11. Watanabe, A History of Japanese Political Thought, 283. [↩]

Can intellectuals avoid totalitarian instrumentalisation? Nishida’s thought and Japanese imperialism

Can an intellectual avoid instrumentalisation of their thought under totalitarianism? That is the problem faced by intellectuals in an environment of totalitarianism, whose options are few and trying: to join or be co-opted by the totalitarian project, to retreat in the face of power, or resist and risk persecution. For Nishida Kitarō, and for the philosophers associated with the Kyoto School, this was the prospect faced under Imperial Japan. As an examination of the activities of the philosophers and their period writings show, many were co-opted into providing an intellectual basis for Japanese imperialism, and for Nishida, who intellectually resisted the procession of totalitarianism and ultranationalism of the period, still found his resistance to be ineffectual, and his thoughts ignored or co-opted in service of justifying Japan’s imperial project.

In the context of Japan from the 1920s onwards, this totalitarianism appeared in the form of rising ultranationalism that policed the boundaries of acceptable public discourse, and thus the limits and language within which academic philosophy, as practised by Kyoto School philosophers, must reside. A number of events marked the rise of nationalism and its intrusion into the academic space. The 1925 Peace Preservation Law, the establishment of the Superior Special Police Force and the Research Centre for National Spiritual Culture, as well as the Takikawa Incident and Minobe Incident, saw the gradual tightening of the bounds of acceptable discourse in academia.1 This was the effective prohibition of support for liberalism and questioning of the Emperor’s divine authority. The publishing of the Fundamentals of the National Polity set most explicitly the lines and language of political orthodoxy, effectively within which academia must preside.2 It is within this context which Nishida and other Kyoto School intellectuals operated, and in which their response to totalitarianism should be understood.

One consideration may be whether the weaponization of the Kyoto School’s thoughts was deliberate, either by Nishida himself or by other intellectuals associated with his philosophical thoughts. For Nishida, who had fundamental disagreements with the political orthodoxy, participation in politics implied much resistance and persuasion within the acceptable discursive language, though resistance was ineffectual and co-option still pervasive. The case of the Principles of the New World Order is a pertinent case. Written in 1943 with the prospect of influencing the Tōjō government, Nishida’s initial essay was rejected on grounds of being too difficult to understand, and on revision by Tanabe Juri, an associate, was submitted to the government’s audience. Nishida would be disappointed by Tōjō’s understanding of his writing.3 Accounting for Nishida’s indifference towards Tanabe’s draft, Principles stand as a case of the inability of intellectuals to resist and effect change in a totalitarian environment. Both because of its rewriting and the need to follow the language of political orthodoxy, such as Nishida’s use of hakkō ichiu, in its subversion leaves open the space for misinterpretation in support for Japanese imperialism.

For other philosophers of the Kyoto School, their divergent treatment of Nishida’s thoughts is emblematic of the different approaches to working in a totalitarian context. Miki Kiyoshi, a student of Nishida, argued for a theory of cosmopolitanism based on Nishida’s thoughts that privileged Japan’s position as a leader of Asian countries as a product of its unique good qualities.4 For Tanabe Hajime, who drew on Nishida’s concepts of negation, the dialectic between state and individual, particularly one’s absolute rejection in death, could be construed to advocate for the sacrifice of individuals in service of the state.5 In both such cases the co-opting of philosophy in service of totalitarianism was deliberate, as Nishida’s thoughts are taken beyond the control of its originator. Thus is the limit of an intellectual’s ability to avoid instrumentalisation in totalitarianism.

  1. Christopher S. Goto-Jones, Political philosophy in Japan: Nishida, the Kyoto School, and co-prosperity (New York, 2005), pp. 73-75. [↩]
  2. Ibid., p. 77. [↩]
  3. Ibid., pp. 79-81. [↩]
  4. John Namjun Kim, ‘The Temporality of Empire: The Imperial Cosmopolitanism of Miki Kiyoshi and Tanabe Hajime’, in Sven Saaler, J. Victor Koschmann (eds), Pan-Asianism in Modern Japanese History: Colonialism, regionalism and borders (London, 2007), pp. 156-160. [↩]
  5. Ibid., pp. 163-166. [↩]