Tag: anarchism

Shifu’s Purist Anarchism: How His Beliefs Separated Him from Other Anarchists

Although Shifu’s introduction to anarchism followed similar paths of his fellow anarchists, his later articulation of a pure anarchist ideology and critiques of various anarchists differentiated him from others.

Born as Liu Shaobin in 1884, Liu grew up in a supportive, prosperous family. His father encouraged progressive ideals, such as educating his daughters and advocating to end foot binding.1 Liu performed well in school, and he eventually went to study abroad in Japan. There, he encountered revolutionary ideas, which served as the preface to many other contemporary anarchists as well. Following this introduction, Liu changed his name to Liu Sifu and joined Sun Yat-Sen’s Revolutionary Alliance, which promoted assassination as a means for reform. After a failed assassination attempt, Liu lost his left hand and was arrested. In prison, Liu’s conceptualizations of anarchism would foster, ultimately leading to his rejection of violence as the path for reform and to the creation of his own understanding of anarchism.2 

In 1912, three years after his release, Liu and three others established the Conscience Society. The twelve points of this society serve as the basis of Liu’s anarchist ideology, which members must follow. Despite the inclusion of a loophole for members to join while not precisely following the twelve points, Liu committed to them fully.3 His change of name to Shifu, rejecting the patriarchal power of a family name, most clearly represents his strict adherence to the points. His refusal to eat meat and ride in rickshas, even in his ailing health, further depicts his devotion. Shifu understood anarchism as a rejection of politics. Politics caused corruption in humanity, and the only way to rid this corruption from society was to take on social revolution. Shifu reasoned that ‘government would be replaced by people’s voluntary self-regulation’, which would depend on people’s management of their consciousness and behavior.4 The problem with society was politics; only with the complete eradication—not a mere replacement—of all forms of government could China be free. And in order to initiate this eradication, one must strictly devote themselves to dismantling the structure which society was built on by holding themselves to these specific standards.

His critique of fellow anarchists illustrates how Shifu’s strict belief in a pure anarchism separated him from other contemporaries. Shifu condemned multiple people for a failure to uphold anarchist ideology, including Zhang Ji and Wu Zhihui of the Paris anarchists and Sun Yat-Sen and Jiang Kanghu of the socialists. For Shifu, to maintain the anarchist ideology, one must reflect on themselves to completely reject the current structure of society: politics. Restructuring is difficult to do, for a complete reimagination of the foundation of society is often impractical. So, many anarchists accepted offices in the new Republican government, such as Zhang Ji and Wu Zhihui, under the pretense that these offices would allow them to strengthen their beliefs through government-backed organizations.5 However, Shifu contended that this acceptance of governmental office fundamentally went against the concept of anarchism and leaders of the Paris anarchists failed to moderate their own behaviors. Thus, Zhang and Wu could no longer be considered anarchists, for they did not align with Shifu’s strict anarchism.

Furthermore, Shifu discredited socialism as anarchism, on the basis of socialism’s narrowness. Shifu’s explanation that socialism concerns only the economy, while anarchism concerns all politics, sets the foundation for his criticism. In this explanation, anarchism is the broader concept which socialism fits under.6 Socialism argues for social policy to economically equalize society, not social revolution and the elimination of politics. Moreover, socialism works within the government to enact these policies; it simply replaces one government with another sympathetic to its ideology. Therefore, socialists should not portray themselves as anarchists, for they do not follow all of the requirements of anarchism. From this separation between socialism and anarchism, Shifu cements his concept of anarchism, which is strictly followed, as true anarchism. Thus, Shifu’s pure anarchism distinguishes Shifu from other contemporary anarchists.

  1. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism (Lanham, 1998), p. 2. [↩]
  2. Ibid., p. 7. [↩]
  3. Ibid., p. 115. [↩]
  4. Ibid., p. 119. [↩]
  5. Ibid., p. 121. [↩]
  6. Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (Berkeley, 1991), p. 142. [↩]

Shifu: Can We Consider the Views of China’s Famous Anarchist ‘True’ Anarchy?

Born to an upper-class family as Liu Shaobin, Shifu (1884-1915) lived through the collapse of the Qing dynasty and converted to anarchism while studying in Japan.1 Known for his commitment to living anarchist principles, Shifu’s purist example and devotion to promoting the common good through his educational reforms influenced subsequent generations of Chinese anarchists, attracting others to the anarchist movement which reached its peak in the early 1920s.2 While Shifu’s early career mirrors other anarchists of the time in his support of assassination and revolution-driven violence, some argue that, because his later efforts depart somewhat and are marked by a renunciation of violence, he fell away from anarchy. Furthermore, in his book, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism, Krebs argues that Shifu’s later career has a conservative moral quality, because it is inspired by traditional Chinese literature, despite the radical reforms he espoused. So, can Shifu be considered an anarchist given his departure from a violent past and tendency toward cultural conservatism? And does it matter?

The current, popular view of anarchy often mistakenly reduces anarchism to terrorism and violence. According to political theorist John P. Clark, there are many ways to define anarchy and reaching a consensus on a singular definition is difficult. He argues that we should consider classical anarchist theory, history of anarchy movements, and the scholarly debate around anarchy when attempting to define ‘anarchism’.3

Greek for ‘without rule’, in theory, anarchy could apply to anyone who advocates for the necessary abolishment of government.4 For example, Shifu was familiar with Kropotkin and Bakunin’s ideas of anarchy, which Kropotkin defines as ‘a principle or theory of life and conduct in which society is conceived without government’ and Bakunin as the aim of abolishing the state.5 Other scholars define anarchism as the opposition of authority, or even society, itself—which Shifu also advocated for.6 Clark argues that to be a ‘true anarchist’ one must meet four criteria: ‘(1) a view of an ideal, noncoercive, nonauthoritarian society; (2) a criticism of existing society and its institutions, based on this antiauthoritarian ideal; (3) a view of human nature that justifies the hope for significant progress toward the ideal; and (4) a strategy for change, involving immediate institution of noncoercive, nonauthoritarian, and decentralist alternatives’.7 This definition allows for some flexibility in classifying anarchists (i.e. people that meet some but not all four of the criteria can be considered ‘weak’ anarchists).7

According to Clark, Shifu can be considered a true anarchist because he meets all four criteria, although his later views on anarchism just before his death might be better described as anarcho-communism due to their anti-capitalist rhetoric and communal nature.8 First, Shifu advocated for a classless society in which resources were held in common without government involvement.9 Second, Shifu criticised state socialism and Confucianism for encouraging idealogues to preach an empty ‘fake morality’ while advancing their own self-interest.10 Third, he believed in the capacity for human beings to change, which he argued could only be achieved through educating the masses. Lastly, Shifu developed a comprehensive, twelve-point plan for moral reform across China at a societal level. ((Ibid, 6.)) His solution for the eventual abolition of government (partly inspired by Tolstoy and Kropotkin’s philosophies) included the abstention of the following: partaking of meat, liquor, smoke, marriage, using family names, using servants, riding in rickshaws, serving in the government or military, joining political parties, and religion.11 Another way he hoped to implement his ideal society was through communal living and Esperanto projects.

Although Shifu failed to bring about his ideal society, his critiques of existing social institutions and politics were influential in shaping China’s transition into a modern republic, and he inspired hope in following generations of intellectuals for a brighter future.

  1. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism, (Rowman & Littlefield, 1998), 1-2, https://www.vlebooks.com/Product/Index/336439?page=0&startBookmarkId=-1. [↩]
  2. Krebs, Shifu, 13. [↩]
  3. John P. Clark, “What is Anarchism?” in Nomos, vol. 19, (1978), 3, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24219036. [↩]
  4. Clark, “What is Anarchism?” 4. [↩]
  5. Ibid, 4. [↩]
  6. Ibid, 5. [↩]
  7. Ibid, 13. [↩] [↩]
  8. Krebs, Shifu, 83. [↩]
  9. Ibid. [↩]
  10. Ibid, 102. [↩]
  11. Ibid, 8, 103. [↩]

Uchiyama Gudō’s Anarchist Buddhism – The Impact of International Socialism on Japanese Buddhism

Anarchism, described by Fabio Rambelli as part of the international socialist movement, inspired Japanese Buddhist intellectuals to synthesize their respective philosophies for the benefit of the newly emerging working class. The Buddhist priest Uchiyama Gudō sought to utilize the revolutionary concepts of anarchism in order to implement theoretical Buddhist social principles. Gudō believed that both Buddhism and socialism, at their core, ‘aimed to improve the living conditions of the people’.1 Thus, the communication of both Buddhist ideas and socialist anarchism to the working-class villagers were not dissimilar; Gudō understood his Buddhist sermons to be inherently socialist, as well. Uchiyama Gudō’s background in Buddhism inspired his socialist beliefs; therefore, he understood socialism and anarchism not as departures from Buddhism, but as natural expressions of Buddhist egalitarianism. What he failed to grasp, however, were the conflicting natures of Buddhism’s inner liberation and anarchism’s outer revolution.

Rambelli’s Zen Anarchism: The Egalitarian Dharma of Uchiyama Gudō highlights Gudō’s connections between Buddhism and anarchism. In a 1903 serialization of Heimin shinbun, a socialist newspaper, Gudō cites three excerpts from prominent Buddhist sutras as his reasoning for becoming a socialist. However, Rambelli argues that the excerpts were taken ‘out of context and re-signified…in a socialist fashion’, highlighting Gudō’s core Buddhist beliefs, attempting to utilize socialist motivations for societal change.2 Moreover, Gudō established links between the social equality of anarchist communism and that of traditional Buddhist monastic life, still present in China. In doing so, Rambelli claims that Gudō shifted the ‘idealized utopia’ of the Buddhist sangha to a smaller scale to include a ‘self-contained social space’, more in line with the beliefs of socialist utopias.3

Gudō’s belief that social change begins through moral example reveals the Buddhist foundation of his activism. His support of the anarchist concept where the working class follows ruling-class leaders who renounce their property reflects his commitment to a radical, egalitarian ideal of shared equality.4 The working class should not revolt and take down the ruling class, as that would deem the latter as lesser than the former in the new anarchist society, according to Gudō. Furthermore, he firmly believed that the awakening of the masses by the aforementioned examples supports the ‘Zen Buddhist soteriology of…responsibility’; it was the responsibility of the leaders and workers5 Gudō’s ideological stances on these issues reveal his Buddhist core and depict him as a Buddhist involved in the anarchist movement.6

Gudō initially hesitated to support the anarchist violence necessary for a successful revolution, as it fundamentally opposed Buddhist principles. By the time Gudō fully accepted anarchism, however, the anarchist movement had begun to shift toward ‘direct, sometimes violent, action’.7 This shift had a clear impact on Gudō, as a key argument in his work Museifu kyōsan kakumei states that ‘readiness to use violence’ was necessary ‘to achieve’ a ‘revolutionary movement’.8 Despite his reluctance, the deteriorating medical condition of his socialist colleague Kōtoku Shūsui provided the final push toward his acceptance of the violence required to initiate a revolution.9 Gudō’s evident internal difficulty to accept violence revealed itself in his depiction of a god who ‘loves revolutionary martyrs’ in his writings, as no buddhas would love such individuals ‘in a modern Japanese context’.7 This internal difficulty demonstrates his inability to accept the inherent conflicting natures of Buddhism and anarchism.

Uchiyama Gudō’s growing acceptance of a violent revolution led him to distance himself from his original, more Buddhist understanding of anarchism. Gudō originally accepted socialism , and subsequently anarchism, as social methods for change and revolution, as they aligned well with his Buddhist beliefs. However, as he became more involved with socialism, it began to take precedence in his life, molding him into a Buddhist who was involved in the anarchist movement. Furthermore, Gudō came to embrace violence as necessary for a revolution and the success of anarchism in Japan. This acceptance created internal strife, as the anarchist path to outer revolution diverged significantly beyond the Buddhist path to inner liberation.

  1. Fabio Rambelli, Zen Anarchism: The Egalitarian Dharma of Uchiyama Gudō (Berkeley, 2013), p. 15. [↩]
  2. Ibid., p. 13. [↩]
  3. Ibid., pp. 20-21. [↩]
  4. Ibid., p. 16. [↩]
  5. Ibid., pp. 27, 13. [↩]
  6. Ibid., p. 30. [↩]
  7. Ibid., p. 23. [↩] [↩]
  8. Ibid., p. 18. [↩]
  9. Ibid., p. 26. [↩]

Morality in Anarchism and He-Yin Zhen’s Conception of Female Liberation

He-Yin Zhen is an early Chinese feminist and anarchist, who alongside her husband Liu Shipei, published the journal Natural Justice.1 Published between 1907-1908, it is in Natural Justice that He-Yin would articulate much of her feminist theories, in articles such as ‘On the Revenge of Women’, and ‘The Feminist Manifesto’. ‘On the Revenge of Women’ is a text which, through analyses of classical texts in Chinese literary canon, etymologies that embed in them the degradation of women, and the role of social institutions in formalising male domination of women, educe the “instruments of male tyrannical rule”.2 Examples from throughout Chinese history are used to argue that women had long been deprived of the right to bear arms, to hold political power, to be educated, and that in their hapless deaths they were denied their right to life itself.3 As with much of her other writings, the ultimate goal of the article is to advocate for a social, economic, and feminist revolution to the ends of the abolition of private property and the state, as a means of achieving true equality between men and women in the absence of the imbalance of power and wealth that results in domination and the oppression of women by men.4

Much like other Chinese anarchists of the time, He-Yin saw the necessity of a social revolution as a means of bringing an end to the oppression of the state, and to achieve true equality between men and women. The nature of the social revolution — the bounds of acts and acceptability, arguably constitute a standard of morality by which her feminist-anarchism is to be achieved. It is a standard of morality most explicitly articulated in the article ‘The Feminist Manifesto’, echoing ‘The Communist Manifesto’, of which the earliest Chinese translation can also be found in Natural Justice.5 The brief and direct nature of the article suggests her intentions towards the writing as a call-to-arms. In it, He-Yin lists seven actionable things which she implores women to carry out, as a means of combating four basic inequalities which she had identified: monogamy, maiden names, valuing daughters equally, raising daughters without discrimination, separation in marriage, rules for remarriage, and the abolish of brothels.6

Condemnation of prostitution and concubinage is a recurring point in her articles. Polygamy, too, is rejected even if extended to women, considered a transgression and a succumbing to lust.7 In imploring women to strive for the seven goals, He-Yin sees women’s role in rejecting the oppressive social institutions as paramount to achieving universal justice. The emphasis which she places on social revolution carried by women echoes the primacy which Chinese anarchists of her period accorded to social revolution and education in the struggle against the state for equality.

  1. ‘Biography’, in Lydia H. Liu, Rebecca E. Karl and Dorothy Ko (eds), The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (New York, 2013), p. 51. [↩]
  2. He-Yin Zhen, ‘On the Revenge of Women’, in Lydia H. Liu, Rebecca E. Karl and Dorothy Ko (eds), The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (New York, 2013), p. 146. [↩]
  3. Ibid., pp. 147,152. [↩]
  4. Ibid., pp. 107-108 [↩]
  5. ‘Introduction: Toward a Transnational Feminist Theory’, in Lydia H. Liu, Rebecca E. Karl and Dorothy Ko (eds), The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (New York, 2013), pp. 5-6. [↩]
  6. He-Yin Zhen, ‘The Feminist Manifesto’, in Lydia H. Liu, Rebecca E. Karl and Dorothy Ko (eds), The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (New York, 2013), pp. 182-183. [↩]
  7. Ibid., pp. 183-184. [↩]

Cai Yuanpei’s ‘New Year’s Dream’ and the contradictions in its views of foreign powers

Cai Yuanpei was a Chinese anarchist intellectual, at first associated with the Paris anarchist societies and later Republican minister of education and chancellor of the University of Beijing.1 This text, ‘New Year’s Dream’, was written at the height of the Russo-Japanese War and describes Cai’s dream of the future, in which China reaches a period of happiness and prosperity, having defeated foreign invaders of the country and instructed the world on how to achieve global peace.2

The text follows Yimin Zhongguo, an intelligent young man from Jiangnan who, having travelled around the world for his education, returns to China during the Russo-Japanese War. Yimin’s life and, in particular, his foreign education draws similarities with the author, who studied in Paris and Leipzig.

After entering into discussion with a group of strangers, in which he dismisses the celebration of New Year’s Eve as ‘just one day at random’ and accuses them of being selfish and idle, he goes home to rest. At this point his dream begins, which takes up most of the text and can be understood as Cai Yuanpei’s anarchist vision for the future.

In his dream he enters into a large assembly hall, its seating arrangement reflecting the country except divided according to China’s river basins, dialects and local customs rather than arbitrary provincial boundaries (as Cai would see them). A speaker begins to implore the audience that they must begin building the nation of China, lest their country becomes a battlefield for wars between Japan, Russia, England, Germany or France. He likens China’s population to selfish children who care only of their toys when their house is robbed, unaware that the money and deeds being stolen guaranteed their future. This argument is much the same that Yimin deployed on the idle strangers celebrating New Year’s Eve the day before.

The man then distributes a pamphlet with five proposals guaranteeing an effective administration of China: a survey of the land and of the population, a survey of the country’s planning and construction, discussions on employment, and ordinances dictating the life-cycle of a person (education between ages 7 and 24, work between ages 24 and 48) and their daily routine (8 hours work and 8 hours rest).

Another pamphlet is distributed, calling for the recovery of Manchuria: the eradication of foreign spheres of influence; and the dismantling of foreign concessions. Ways to grow China’s military strength are discussed at length.

After a discussion of Yimin’s next steps, his dream then accelerates into the future and describes a situation in which foreign powers repeatedly invade China but are ‘driven back every time’. The invaders convene in Berlin where they lament: “the love of the Chinese for their country is so pure that I fear there is no way to break it”!

Having defended their country, the Chinese propose the abolition of every country’s individual army and their replacement with a world army; this is so popular that other countries ‘took it as words from heaven’. From then on, there were no more wars, ‘and people lived happily and peacefully’ – although, Yuan adds of course, ‘with the happiness of the Chinese naturally greatly exceeding that of others’.

China reaches a Utopian state, with railways built across the country, a new easier-to-learn national language implemented, and designations such as ‘father’, ‘son’, ‘husband’ and ‘wife’ cease to have relevance.

Yim at this moment wakes up and, forgetting his previous dislike of New Years’ festivities, exclaims “Greetings! Congratulations! It is the New Year, a new world has come!”.

 

What is most interesting about Cai’s text is its seemingly contradictory views about foreign countries. Yimin is clearly a model Chinese citizen – smart, hard-working, and shrewd – a fact which might be owed to his education in the US (‘because he loved the ideas of freedom and equality’), Germany (‘the vanguard of technology’), France, England, Italy, Switzerland, and Russia. Cai, having also studied in Europe, clearly believed this education was both useful and a source of pride.

However, Cai laments the fact that Russia and Japan are at present warring over Manchuria, and fears for the future when the Yangtze region, Fujian or Guangdong might also be battlegrounds for foreign powers. When describing the invading foreigners of the future, he writes: ‘they looked at China and saw it as this wonderful melon that they had discussed carving up a number of times, and now their occasion had finally arrived’, describing them as malicious and power-hungry.

A further irony of this view is that, in Cai’s vision of the future, China sources her military strength from abroad. The speaker rejoices that ‘the cadets which we had sent to study in England have now returned’ and they plan to, instead of building their own warships, ‘send representatives to the largest shipyards abroad, and […] buy warships that are almost finished’. This contradiction – that one should expunge foreign influence, yet use foreign education and manufacturing to do so, is one of the defining contradictions of Chinese anarchist thought – a philosophy that originated outside of China, yet focused solely on China.

  1. Dirlik, Arif, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (University of California Press, 1991), pp. 117, 120, 156. [↩]
  2. Cai Yuanpei, New Year’s Dream (1704). Published in Andolfatto, Lorenzo, Hundred Day’s Literature: Chinese Utopian Fiction at the End of Empire, 1902-1910 (2019), pp. 199-212. [↩]

“Mr. Earnest”: Shifu and dedication to Anarchism

Liu Shifu grew up in a changing time in China’s history. He was born in the 1880’s and died of tuberculosis in 1915, but was still a major figure in the anarchist movement in China. There were many movements that were slowly forming in the time period of Liu Shifu, and his dedication to the movement helped shape it to continue after he was gone. The chapter The New Beginning: Shifu Launches the Conscience Society in the book Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism by Edward S. Krebs detailed the later years of Shifu when he gains importance in China, started the Conscience Society and a printing press owned by himself and his close friends and family, spread his message through China, and unfortunately died of tuberculosis before his work is done. Shifu was astoundingly dedicated to his values of anarchism that he writes in 1912 with his close group of friends and colleagues, and they guided how he taught and lived anarchism for the three chaotic and jam packed years of his life before he died.

In 1912, Shifu and his close compatriots convened for the spring and summer, during which Shifu created a list of twelve points that were “essential” to his personal brand of anarchism.1 The twelve points were abstinence from meat, liquor, tobacco, servants, riding in sedan chairs or rickshaws, marriage, use of the family name, serving as an official, a member of a representative body, a political party, the army or navy, and religion.1 For the rest of his life, he committed himself to these values. While his colleagues would ride rickshaws to a block before their office where they printed their paper and taught about anarchism, and then walk the last block, Shifu would walk every day back and forth.2 When his doctor suggested that he eat meat in order to help his ailing health that turned into tuberculosis that killed him in 1915, he refused because of his promise to never eat meat, as it was seen as upholding the labor structure of the corrupt government. His values above everything else earned him the nickname of “Mr. Earnest” by his fellows, and was mainly a good way to describe Shifu in his quest for anarchism.2

There are many things that can be said about Shifu’s dedication to the cause of anarchism and his commitment to his values, however, there are places within his life where he seemed to be hypocritical in his values. Shifu’s continued closeness to his siblings and employment of them when printing the Cock-Crow Record in in the face of one of his 12 points, do not use a family name. His belief that family should not be especially important in an individuals life is forgotten when it came to his own siblings and their prominence in his employment of them. One of his sisters married one of his friends who was also intimately involved with his cause. His fathers support and familial monetary funds that went into his printing press also showed his blindness towards his values. “Did he fail to see the irony in this situation?” the text asked, voicing the question that I also had when thinking of his title as “Mr. Earnest”.3 Additionally, Shifu’s partner, Ding Xiangtian, felt no support or affection from Shifu when she was pregnant with their daughter in 1912.2 After she was born, he refused to create a public nursery to raise his child in.4  To him it was compromising his values, but in doing so, he was leaving his child to no education or support from her father.

While Shifu was determined to stay true to his values of anarchism and the twelve points that were made by the group in 1912, Mr. Earnest may have strayed from being totally earnest in his dedication to anarchism.

  1. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism (1998) pp. 102. [↩] [↩]
  2. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism (1998) pp. 115. [↩] [↩] [↩]
  3. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism (1998) pp. 108, 115. [↩]
  4. Edward S. Krebs, Shifu, Soul of Chinese Anarchism (1998) pp.116. [↩]

Paradise on earth: Uchiyama Gudō’s imaginations of a (Buddhist) anarcho-communist utopia

The utopian vision of Uchiyama Gudō (1874-1911), a Zen Buddhist priest who was executed for his purported role in the plot to assassinate the Japanese Emperor Meiji in 1910, offers a unique example of the fusion of Buddhist and socialist ideas in early twentieth-century East Asia. Throughout his writings, Gudō repeatedly imagines a vision of tengoku, explicitly evoking the Christian idea of “soteriological and eschatological” paradise rather than the Buddhist jōdo (Pure Land) or gokuraku (land of bliss).1 Although connections between Christianity and the development of socialist revolutionary thought in Meiji Japan by Rambelli help to contextualise the contemporary meanings and connotations of tengoku, it is arguably most significant in the negative sense; that is, the imagination of an earthly, anarcho-communist utopian ‘paradise’ over a Buddhist heavenly bliss.

Gudō’s (Buddhist) anarcho-communism formed part of a broader wave of emerging Radical Buddhism in late Meiji Japan. He was not alone in his focus on earthly paradise; contemporary anarchists like Tanaka Jiroku were similarly advocating ideas of genseshugi (‘this-world-ism’).2 In China, both Taixu (1890-1947) and Lin Qiwu (1903-1934)  developed similar imaginations of a “pure land in this world” where anarchist utopia and Marxism respectively were “one and the same” as the Buddhist Pure Land.3 Yet, not only do Gudō’s ideas predate many of these other anarchists, his utopian imagination also differs in a critical way in its absence of Buddhist spiritualism. Avoiding references to the pure land, Gudō situates his paradise purely in the earthly realm; in a way, he subverts Radical Buddhism, which views socialism and anarchism as paths to an explicitly Buddhist ‘pure land’, and instead proposes an anarcho-communist revolution in which consciousness and freedom is achieved through Buddhism (as Buddhism and socialism are two sides of the same coin) yet paradise itself is defined by its material, social and political conditions rather than ‘heavenly bliss’. For example, during his interrogation for his alleged role in the High Treason Incident of 1910, Gudo describes his intellectual conversion to anarcho-communism as a result of reading about the communal lives of the Buddhist sangha in Chinese monasteries4. However, this is framed from a specifically worldly perspective; it was the communal and egalitarian aspects of the sangha that appealed to Gudō, as opposed to their spirituality and religious practice. Thus, Gudō removes the distinction between Buddhism and anarcho-communism; he is not striving for a spiritual awakening to nirvana or pure land, but for a (Marxian) social revolution through labour unions to achieve “the ideal land of anarchist communism, where all are free and live a comfortable life”.5

As Rambelli emphasises, Gudō was seeking to transform the (earthly) world as a Buddhist anarcho-communist, rather than “striving for a socialist form of Buddhism”6. Paradise would be distinctively and exclusively anarcho-communist. Whilst inherently informed by the semantic, epistemological, and ontological frameworks of Gudo’s Buddhism, paradise on earth in its realised form seems more rooted in classical Marxism. Paradise would thus begin when the capitalist bourgeoisie “reject[s] the old crime of living out of his capital” and “realize[s] that all human beings must secure their clothing and food through their own labor”.7

Consequently, Gudō’s vision for paradise was both inseparable from his conception of Buddhism and yet fundamentally material. This fusion of Buddhism and socialism was the path necessary to achieve individual and collective consciousness to eliminate oppression and achieve freedom. Attaining social consciousness and establishing paradise would be achieved through Buddhism not because he imagined a future land of heavenly bliss, but instead because the worldly anarcho-communist ‘paradise’ envisaged by Gudō would be the true realisation of Buddhism on earth.

  1. Fabio Rambelli, Zen Anarchism: The Egalitarian Dharam of Uchiyama Gudō (Berkeley, 2013), p.31. [↩]
  2. Lajos Brons, A Buddha Land in This World: Philosophy, Utopia, and Radical Buddhism (Santa Barbara, 2023), p.76. [↩]
  3. Brons, A Buddha Land in This World, pp.92-95. [↩]
  4. Rambelli, Zen Anarchism, p.20. [↩]
  5. Uchiyama Gudō, Museifu Kyosan kakumei, quoted in and translated by Rambelli, Zen Anarchism, p.50. [↩]
  6. Rambelli, Zen Anarchism, p.30. [↩]
  7. Uchiyama Gudō, Heibon no jikaku, quoted in and translated by Rambelli, Zen Anarchism, p.63. [↩]

Utopia: Futuristic Goal or Idealistic Impossibility?

A utopia is, by definition, impossible to achieve. This may seem like a bold statement, but there is good reason behind it. Firstly, the idea of a utopia, or utopian world, must be separated into two distinct forms: religious, and political. In a religious sense, a utopia is therefore the ideal world, a perfect state which an adherent believes they will find themselves in or otherwise attain, whether during their life or after death. On the other hand, a political utopia is defined as the creation of a perfect state on earth, whether through governmental actions or otherwise. By comparing the religious utopian beliefs of the Christian Heaven or Paradise and Buddhist Nirvana or Pure Land with the political utopian goal of Anarchy, this piece will argue that the goal of a utopian future cannot ever be realised in actuality, as it must remain an impossible ideal to give hope for the future and serve as a reminder of one’s place in society and awareness of one’s circumstances.

A religious utopia, as it is understood in both Buddhism and Christianity, is the creation or realisation of a perfect state of both world and being. As Joseph Kitagawa puts it, “Every religion, every culture, and every civilization has a characteristic view of the future as well as a characteristic way of recollecting the past, which together influence its understanding of the meaning of present existence.”1 Kitagawa argues that the Maitreya, the Future Buddha, served as a focus point for the laity, and the belief in the coming of the Maitreya therefore “gave them grounds for optimism and hope”. 2 It is the last past of Kitagawa’s understanding that is the most important, that it is the present existence that shapes an individual’s perception of their world and their place in it, on a cosmological scale. In this sense, religion therefore serves as a positive influence, as believers hold on to the possibility of a better world.

In contrast, Melissa Anne-Marie Curley’s analysis is far more pessimistic, as she outlines the way in which belief in the Buddhist Pure Land ideology in Japan waned over the course of the 20th century. In her words, people became disillusioned with the idea of a better future as “modern people, embarrassed by those hopeful images from the past, are set the impossible task of working toward the transformation of reality even as they are sworn to this world as it is.”3 Her analysis shows that as a society becomes more technologically advanced, belief in a religious utopia correspondingly diminishes, as people turn away from the promise of a heavenly paradise towards the creation of a better world for themselves.

Is there a more positive outlook to be found in the political ideal, then? Curley is even more pessimistic here, pointing out that in Europe, and to a lesser extent in Japan, goals of utopia “repeatedly curdled into totalitarianism”.4 Here, she notes that prominent Japanese Pure Land figures went even further in their views, arguing that the only way to achieve religious utopia was through the total separation and withdrawal of religion from the state. 5

This is not to say that political goal of utopia were equally impossible, per se. Rather, as Arif Dirlik notes in his analysis of the Chinese Anarchist movement of the early 20th century, it largely came down to a lack of planning. Dirlik points to the goal of ‘rural utopianism’ set out by Liu Shipei, noting that revolution was “ultimately a continuing process with no foreseeable end.”6 Curley echoes this view, noting Theodor Adorno’s and Ernst Bloch’s argument that a true utopia, whether religious or political, is thus “defined only in terms of absence”, such as hunger or constraint, and, perhaps most importantly, not here, not now [own emphasis7]. In other words, a utopia can only exist ‘somewhere else’- either in the future, or in a different realm of existence. A utopia is therefore something than cannot exist in the ‘here and now’. It must remain an ideal, always tantalisingly out of reach, neither fully defined nor denied, but out there, waiting to be realised.

  1. Joseph Kitagawa, ‘The Many Faces of Maitreya: A Historian of Religions’ Reflections’, in Sponberg, Alan, (ed.) Maitreya, the Future Buddha. Reissue edition. Cambridge, 2011, p. 7 [↩]
  2. ibid, pp. 15-16 [↩]
  3. Melissa Anne-Marie Curley, Pure Land, Real World: Modern Buddhism, Japanese Leftists, and the Utopian Imagination, Honolulu, 2017, p. 4. [↩]
  4. ibid [↩]
  5. Ibid, p. 12 [↩]
  6. Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution. California, 1991, p. 100. [↩]
  7. Curley, Pure Land, p. 4 [↩]

The Capitalism of Christianity

The opening of Japan in the mid 1800s resulted in an intellectual exchange between Japan and the “Western” world as Western countries vied to establish ties with Japan and to exert their own cultural influence on the country.  While the general model for imposing cultural conventions is through capitalist systems, Christian influences took a different approach.  The prevalence of capitalism in the nineteenth century permeated all aspects of life in the United States and many European countries, including missionary work.  H. B. Cavalcanti uses the case of American missionaries in Latin America to demonstrate that even religion could be commodified and used as a means of exerting capitalist influences on other countries.  He describes the competition between American Christian denominations which “competed openly in the American religious market, vying for ‘shares’ of the country’s faithful (Finke and Stark 2000). Once those churches established foreign-mission programs, it was only natural that they tried to reproduce in host countries similar market conditions to the ones enjoyed at home.”[1]  While the spread of capitalism in the nineteenth century seemed to be an unstoppable force which, among its other political, economic, and social consequences, effectively exported Christianity globally, this was not the case in Japan.

Instead, the diplomatic relations between Japan and Russia led to a transnational exchange of ideas which led to the emergence of a form of religious anarchy.  Sho Konishi argues that this cultural exchange was highly influenced by the popularity of Russian literature translated into Japanese.[2]  Populist Russian literature introduced new, and complemented existing solutions to “social problems” which both countries were facing in the aftermath of their revolutions.  A running theme in translations of Russian literature was that “‘society’ began to be defined in this context as a problem of unfettered capitalism.”[3]  The socialist and anarchist themes in Russian literature built off pre-existing anarchist traditions in Japan, creating an anti-capitalist base among Japanese intellectuals.

This Russian translation culture was not only anarchist in nature, but Christian as well.  Konishi uses the popularity of Leo Tolstoy in particular to illustrate this fact.  Just as “Tolstoy became a dangerous apostate of the Russian Orthodox Church, he was gaining a widespread religious following in Japan, where many regarded him as a prophetic religious thinker and a saint.”[4]  But, the Christian ethic which was popularised by Tolstoy does not conform to either the typical Western Christian theology or the methods of its dissemination.  Instead, “The resulting conversions to what was called ‘Tolstoyan religion’ (Torusutoi no shūkyō) or ‘religious anarchism’ (shūkyōteki anākizumu) in Japan occurred in the total absence of the converter, that is, without a missionary or church institution.”[5]  Unlike the missionary organisations which operated in other countries, Christianity in Japan was not the result of capitalist systems imposing religious doctrines, but a unique religious theory which rejected the very idea of capitalism.  This “religious anarchism” was both a political stance and a utopian dream for a future universal human religion.

 

[1] H. B. Cavalcanti, “The Right Faith at the Right Time? Determinants of Protestant Mission Success in the 19th-Century Brazilian Religious Market,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 41, no. 3 (2002): 423–38, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1387454, 423.

[2] Sho Konishi, Anarchist Modernity: Cooperatism and Japanese-Russian Intellectual Relations in Modern Japan, 1st ed. Vol. 356 (Harvard University Asia Center, 2013), https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1x07vz6, 95.

[3] Ibid., 74.

[4] Ibid., 93.

[5] Ibid., 95.

The Value of Education: A Comparison of Confucianist and Anarchist Objectives

A common element of Anarchism and Confucianism is the value both philosophies place upon education, and the role education held, whether theoretically or in practice, in propagating their objectives. In their chapter ‘Propagating Female Virtues in Choson Korea’, Deuchler explores the role of literature for ‘indoctrination’ in promoting Neo-Confucian ideals and virtues among elite women which proved to ensure the stability of the domestic realm, and subsequently the stability of the state and society functioning under Confucian hierarchy. Through exposure to works such as Elementary Learning (1189), Illustrated Guide to the Three Bonds (1432), and Instructions for Women (1475), virtues and morality were to be transplanted into the household, and women were to act as ‘the guardians of Confucian norms in the inner realm’ in Korea.[1] Too, Tocco in their ‘Norms and Texts for Women’s Education in Tokugawa Japan’ discusses the extent of women’s education within Tokugawa Japan, and provides example of a woman’s education as accessed through moral guides and texts whose foundations lay in Neo-Confucian ethical precepts which stressed the importance of filial piety and kinship. Both Deuchler and Tocco illustrate well how the education of women in preparation of their managerial and ethical domestic responsibilities came to play a role in the upholding of a Confucian hierarchical society and ideals of filial piety.

A direct comparison between Confucianism and Anarchism can perhaps be made in their conflicting objectives; the Confucian upholding of hierarchy versus the anarchist aims to dismantle hierarchy and those social institutions which serve it, namely state institutions, and familial structures. The value of education therefore is found and placed in competing goals.

Dirlik in Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (1991) emphasises the perceived importance of education among early twentieth century anarchists in achieving revolutionary change. Education is presented as an ‘instrument of revolution’, a tool to create a self-awareness/revolutionary consciousness which would in turn allow for a successful, conscious uprising to dismantle those institutions.[2] Education within anarchist philosophy is also presented as the equivalent of revolution, for there is no distinction made between process and goals of revolution: revolution is a necessary condition for the possibility of anarchist education, but revolution cannot be achieved without education. An anarchist education therefore taught truth and public-mindedness – freedom, equality, and the ability for self-governance – as the means and ends of anarchist revolution.

Kanno Sugako (1881-1911), a central figure in the early Japanese anarchist movement, clearly voiced the need for women to develop self-awareness, and is reflective of wider anarchist ideas on the importance of education in achieving this social consciousness:

‘For us women, the most urgent task is to develop our own self-awareness […] women with some education and some degree of social knowledge must surely be discontented and angry about their status.’[3]

Here she also suggests how education may allow for women to think critically of their status within society. Kanno implies the importance of education in achieving self-awareness, and suggests that this self-awareness of women’s status in society is not recognised to a great extent. Yet, she also suggests that some degree of education must be enough to make one critical of their status – perhaps even one of a Confucian grounding. This seems to conflict slightly with one argument presented by Deuchler, that Japanese women, through their ‘indoctrinating’ education, were complicit in and ‘contributed to the perpetuation of the Confucian system’ which in turn served to promote hierarchy and uphold patriarchy.[4] While this may be true on a macro-scale, their use of the term ‘indoctrination’ suggests those educated women themselves were uncritical, and it is this implication I find dubious. With little evidence written by women themselves proving as a limitation in their work, no outright rejection of a system which suppressed the visibility of women at this time does not necessarily mean there was no critique or ‘self-awareness’. Rather, it serves as a reflection on the success of the patriarchal system in limiting women’s purpose to the domestic realm.

Despite the value of education being found competing goals, both philosophies emphasised the importance of moral teaching. The moral aims of Confucian education however were confined within the family, and were to ensure good Confucian household and the teaching of children Confucian moral values, whereas moral education among anarchists aimed to achieve a public revolution of morality as to achieve its humanitarian goals. This apparent divergence from private teaching of filial piety towards a public revolution promoting equal respect across humanity is interesting, and raises the question of whether the popularity of anarchist ideals within China and Japan was viewed as, or came as a rejection of traditional values of Confucianism.

 

[1] Martina Deuchler, ‘Propagating Female Virtues in Chosón Korea’ in Dorothy Ko, JaHyun Kim Haboush and Joan R Piggot (ed.) Women and Confucian Cultures in Premodern China, Korea and Japan (Berkeley, 2003), p. 152.

[2] Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (Berkeley, 1991), p. 90.

[3] Mikiso Hane, Reflections on the Way to the Gallows: Rebel Women in Pre-war Japan (Berkeley, 1993), p. 53.

[4] Deuchler, ‘Propagating Female Virtues in Chosón Korea’ in Women and Confucian Cultures, p. 165.