2024 Introduction: The fa Tradition in Chinese Philosophy (original) (raw)
Related papers
2023: Tao Jiang on the Fa Tradition (法家)
Philosophy East and West 73.2, 449-458, 2023
This is part of the multi-author review of Tao Jiang's opus magnum, Origins of Moral- Political Philosophy in Early China, published in Philosophy East and West 73.2 (2023), 449-458
Asian and African Studies, 2001
The aim o f this article is to briefly analyse the use o f the character fa in early Chinese philosophical texts and in the works of so-called Legalists, and give some justifications for the claim that the meaning o f the character did not simply change from 'standard', 'to mod el' in the texts o f the Confucians into the meaning 'law ' in the intentions o f legal positivism, as it is often interpreted in the books on Chinese philosophy.
2011
Confucius was and still is one of the most eminent Chinese philosophers. Such is the importance of Confucius's teachings; it had influenced all aspects of social life in Chinese societies. In the post-Enron, post-Worldcom, and post-Global Financial Crisis era there are raising doubts in the mantra of the so-called conventional wisdom about law and economic order. Whilst many recent publications offered solutions to those problems like advocating for more laws, rules or reforms in regulatory institutions to enhance the regulation of corporate governance. What Confucius advocated was a non-legal, social mode of regulation based on moral ideals that should be embedded into the minds of every person. Whilst this is an ancient concept from primitive societies, its relevance and merits could be seen in modern Chinese societies like Hong Kong. In essence, Confucian principles of governance build on relational and paternalistic order based on moral ideals.
The Existence of Li and Fa Legal Politics in Chinese Teachings
International Journal of Social Science And Human Research, 2022
This study aims to examine the existence of Li and Fa in the legal system and legal politics that develops in China. This study employs a normative legal approach through a historical approach. The results of the study show that the legal system and legal politics in Chinese highlight the terms Li and Fa. In essence, Li's teachings focus on a set of ethical or moral rules that regulate patterns of human behaviour that must be obeyed and upheld by every human being. Meanwhile, the term Fa is known as a written law that every Chinese citizen must obey. In essence, Fa is a law inherent in a nation, generally applies equally to all human beings, and is formed into statutory regulations. These two terms become the benchmark for the legal system and legal politics that develops in China. Indirectly, China, which adheres to communism, applies the rules of moral ethics and legislation as a guide to life.
Chinese law and governance: moving beyond responsive authoritarianism and the rule of law
In his essay, Francis Fukuyama offers a vision of Chinese governance that I contend is flawed in at least three important respects: the basic framework of his three pillars (and in particular, his conception of the rule of law), his characterization of the Chinese legal system, and his assumption of the strength (and even agility and responsiveness) of China’s bureaucratic state structure. After examining his arguments, I outline a different framework, drawn from my current research, which I call legal regimes and explain how it can be applied to understand the contemporary realities of China’s legal system. I also draw on my recent findings to challenge any assumptions of state strength or resilience, before examining the implications for current Chinese politics and possible future trajectories.
Heaven beyond the law: Chinese constitutionalism as a form of legal and cultural pluralism
Academia Letters, 2021
By the time of the drafting of the 1954 constitution of the People's Republic of China (PRC), according to Mao Zedong constitution-making was "a matter of science"[2], a process aimed at pragmatically providing a society with basic rules. It was therefore a mean to regulate and discipline the exercise of power, apparently based on the Western notion of constitutionalism, intended as a response to "the need for subjecting all authority to legal restraints"[3]. Nevertheless, the development of PRC constitutionalism in the following decades, and the effective dominion of the Communist Party of China (CPC) over the country's political and social life, proved that this phenomenon was indeed much more complex and multifaceted, and by no means comparable to its Western or even Soviet counterparts. However, if it is undoubtedly erroneous to analyze Chinese constitutionalism based on Western standards, it would be equally misleading to dismiss it as a "façade whereby the Party legitimises its own right to rule"[4]. Evidently, the question cannot be dealt with according to such simplistic approaches, and need a to be carefully examined based on a more appropriate understanding. Jiang Shigong proposed an interesting reading of PRC constitutionalism, considered to be a form of living and uncodified political governance, thus moving beyond of the positivized normative sources[5]. In particular, this interpretation provides a more contextualized understanding of the interplay between State and Party, two pivotal entities that established an informal way of governing based on "a special cooperative relationship between the written constitution and the unwritten constitution"[6] of the PRC. Evidently, this offers an explanation of the tortuous ways of power in mainland China, which could appear as simply "unconstitutional" to the Western jurist lacking a deeper knowledge of the country's history and culture. In this article, I move from Jiang's position to suggest that PRC constitutionalism be more
The Internal Morality of Chinese Legalism
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2005
It is widely held that there are no indigenous roots in China for the rule of law; it is an import from the West. The Chinese legal tradition, rather, is rule by law, as elaborated in ancient Legalist texts such as the Han Feizi. According to the conventional reading of these texts, law is amoral and an instrument in the hands of a central ruler who uses it to consolidate and maintain power. The ruler is the source of all law and stands above the law, so that law, in the final analysis, is whatever pleases the ruler. This essay argues, to the contrary, that the instrumentalism of the Han Feizi is more sophisticated and more principled than the conventional reading recognizes. It suggests that, by examining the text of the Han Feizi through the lens provided by American legal theorist Lon Fuller, we can observe an explicit articulation of what Fuller called the internal morality of law. The principles of this morality are elaborated and their importance explained. In this way, the Han Feizi is retrieved as a significant reference point for thinking about legal reform in China today.
International Communication of Chinese Culture, 2020
The article studies the image of Guan Zhong, a historical figurehead from the Spring and Autumn period China, in East Asian Confucian discourse on humaneness (ren 仁, "benevolence") and related political questions. It traces the development of Confucian discourse on Guan Zhong from its beginnings in the Analects of Confucius and in the thought of his later disciple Mencius, to later discourses on humaneness in Chinese, Joseon Korean and Tokugawa Japanese Confucian thought. In so doing, it establishes a comparative perspective of how Guan Zhong's humaneness (or inhumanity) was interpreted in socio-political environments of individual East Asian countries, establishing a correlation between their interpretational tendencies and overall intellectual tendencies of local Confucianisms-as, for instance the philosophy of Practical Learning in Joseon Korea and Tokugawa Japan. Concurrently, the article also illuminates the special characteristics of the notion of humaneness which also gained its expression throughout East Asian Confucian ethical evaluations of Guan Zhong's political achievements. The article is an abridged translation of the Chapter 9 of Chun-chieh Huang's book Dongya Rujia Renxue Shilun 東亞儒家仁學史論 (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2017, pp. 377-414). Chun-chieh Huang 黃俊傑-Huang Chun-chieh [Huang Junjie 黃俊傑] is the Distinguished Chair Professor of National Taiwan University and a member of Academia Europaea. Translated and abridged by Jan Vrhovski-Jan Vrhovski is a research fellow at University of Ljubljana, working on history of formal logic, philosophy and intellectual history of modern China.