With the ascension of the state known as the People's Republic of China in recent years to a position of global prominence, there have been those whose pathways towards criticizing it, or in some cases, praising it, and its policies are based upon an reading of its ideology as "Confucian". Notably, thinkers such as Jason Reza Jorjani have been critical of China's ideology because of its "Confucian paternalism and collectivism" in opposition to the radical Western individualism of which he is an advocate. However, attempting to analyze the state ideology of the mainland from this point of view may not be valid for a number of reasons, many of which stem from a basic lack of understanding of the history of China and, beyond that, a lack of an understanding of what exactly Confucianism is. Criticizing the People's Republic is valid in any case, but, I believe, censure must be grounded in a strong and intellectual understanding of underlying ideology and strands of thought, or else it is as effective as arrows with no bow.
In a previous article, I discussed Confucianism and gave a rough sketch of it and its history. Here I will do so again, with a little more detail. Confucianism is sometimes analyzed as an ideology and sometimes as a religion. Because the 6th century BC lecturer and statesman Kong Qiu (孔丘) or Zhongni (仲尼), better known as Master Kong (孔夫子, kongfuzi, whence English Confucius), is worshiped as an ancestral figure in China and other Confucian countries, many have opted to analyze it as a religion. However, it is easiest to understand it as simply a collection of philosophical principles, particularly with regard to social ethics. The religious character it took on in later time periods aside, Confucius actually had little to say with regard to the worship of divinities and spirits; the gist of his teachings can best be summarized as a philosophical reaction to the decline in the prestige, culture and political power of the then-centuries-old Zhou (周) dynasty. This--the political, social and cultural environment in which Confucius lived--is the first thing one must keep in mind when discussing Confucianism.
Confucius' surname was Kong (孔), given name Qiu (丘) and courtesy name Zhongni (仲尼). He is best known as Master Kong (孔夫子). In this depiction, he is given the epithet 'Most Holy' (至聖).
If we were to try our hand at categorizing Confucius using modern terms, we would say he was a Traditionalist. Like the Traditionalist Catholics of today, Confucius advocated for a return to the mores, values and ways of life which were at their peak centuries before he was even born. And that brings us to our next point, "Confucianism" itself and the values it advocates are not really things that were originated by Confucius, but rather, having declined by the time of his life, were transmitted and revived by him. This quote from the Analects should sufficiently illustrate:
子曰：「述而不作，信而好古，竊比於我老彭。」(論語 7.1)
Confucius said: "I transmit (doctrines) but do not create (doctrines), and I trust and love the ancients. I compare myself to old Peng." (Analects 7.1)
Much like our time period today, the time period Confucius lived in was one of great social and moral degeneration. The official Royal authority wielded by the Kings of Zhou, as allotted to them by the Mandate of Heaven, existed in name alone. The princelings of subordinate feudal states began putting on airs and vying among each other for the position of Hegemon (霸, ba), and eventually many upgraded their titles from 'duke' to 'king', claiming equality with the Zhou kings. According to the rites of Zhou, there was a hierarchical system of privileges. For example, only the King of Zhou was permitted to have 9 high ministers; the governments of subordinate states were only allowed 3. However, by the time of Confucius, many privileges which in theory belonged only to the Zhou kings had begun to be usurped by the lords of lesser houses. One complaint of Confucius in particular, regarding Mr. Ji (a powerful lord in the state of Lu), is that he employed 8 rows of dancers at official functions, which was the privilege only of the kings of Zhou. "If this can be tolerated, what cannot be tolerated?" (Analects 2.1) is what Confucius had to say about this. His belief that such overstepping of the bounds of propriety is what leads to the chaos and degeneration of the world is what lead him to advocate for a return to the standards of propriety and respect for hierarchy which had been set down at the beginning of the Zhou dynasty by its founders.
"But why should men be bound by such trivial rules, anyway?" This is the line of thought that likely was repeated by many of Confucius' contemporaries, certainly among the haughty nobility of the feudal Zhou states. Modern liberals would also likely resonate with such a sentiment. "Why can't Mr. Ji have as many rows of dancers as he likes? Why should any man be inferior to another?" I can hear them saying. Well, Confucius understood the importance of what we are calling 'propriety' (禮, Li), which in those days encompassed what we would consider 'rituals', 'rites', 'ceremonies', as well as 'manners' and 'proper conduct'. Propriety included anything from the amount of land each noble rank was allowed to control to the way a man sat down on his mat. He understood that all of this was both an expression and and influence on the thoughts (and thus the actions) not only of the individual, but of society at large. If today rulers are calling themselves 'kings', and sporting 8 rows of dancers, tomorrow they will likely have no problem convincing themselves they are justified in marching troops on the Royal capital. Similarly, if subjects saw their rulers revolting against their superiors, they themselves would begin to think it just fine if they revolted against their own superiors, and so on until the connections of loyalty and integrity (i.e. fides) that kept society afloat collapsed, and the society along with it. Confucius understood that the great majority of people have a 'monkey see monkey do' attitude (which certainly still rings true today), and this is the foundation of his social, moral and political philosophy.
The "Zhou Dynasty" as it appeared at the outset of the Warring States Period. One can see the official territory of the Zhou Kings wedged between Han and Zheng.
If anything, it seems Confucius has been proven correct by the course of History. Not long after his death, the Zhou dynasty more or less fell apart completely, as a number of powerful states began to outwardly assert their independence from the Royal court of Zhou. In this time period, known as the Warring States Period, the old Imperial system of the Zhou dynasty had completely collapsed in all but name, and major states such as Qin, Chu, Wei, Qi and Han were engaged in continuous warfare, intrigue and competition. This period of chaos would continue for a few centuries until the Zhou dynasty was officially disbanded in 256 BC, and not long after that the state of Qin, recently reformed under a new philosophy known as Legalism, united all of the states under a new Imperium: the Qin (秦) dynasty. The establishment of the new Qin dynasty was a huge blow to Confucianism. Under the Legalist system, any competing ideologies or philosophies were banned and anyone endorsing them risked the death penalty. This lead to the infamous Burning of the Books and Burying of the Scholars, where Confucianists and adherents of other schools of thought were systematically executed by the Qin government, and had their verboten books burned. Many books from the pre-Qin era were lost in this manner--those that survived are the result of scholars going to extreme measures to hide them, even concealing them in walls. The Qin dynasty, however, was short lived. With the establishment of the Han dynasty in 202 BC, Confucianism made a major comeback, becoming the official state ideology, which it more or less remained until the destruction of Imperial China in 1912.
Continuing our discussion of Confucianism, while keeping this important historical background in mind, we come to a few of the main tenants of Confucianism as a social and moral philosophy
The first of these, and perhaps the cornerstone of Confucianism, is the reverence of the Ancient. The axiom that "old = good" is clearly a regional expression of the concept of cyclical time, which is one of two main paradigms of time, the other being linear time. While most people today subscribe to the notion of linear time, or the view of time as an 'arrow', this actually has its origins in Semitic cultures, which believed that God created the world at a fixed point in the past, and will destroy the world at a fixed point in the future, and that nothing exists beyond these two extremes. Originally throughout many Eurasian societies, people held the notion of cyclical time, or that time flowed in an endless loop of repeating patterns. This shows up in more familiar forms such as the Four Ages of the Indo-Europeans. According to this doctrine, humanity starts out in a state of perfection, either being gods themselves, or living among gods in a Golden Age. As time goes on, however, the state of humanity only declines; living standards, morality, level of culture, etc. all dissipate with time until the Iron Age, where humans live in a desperate, despondent condition. At the end of the Iron Age, a superhuman hero cleanses the world of filth, and creates a new order, ushering in another Golden Age, and the cycle starts all over again. Since ancient times, Chinese practiced an animistic, nature-oriented religion not unlike most other Eurasian peoples, which they likely picked up from contact with Altaic people. Not surprisingly, the concept of cyclical time was definitely known and accepted among them. Confucius certainly endorses this view:
子在川上，曰：「逝者如斯夫！不舍晝夜。」(論語 9.17)
Confucius, standing upon a river, said, "What flows (or 'passes', in the sense of 'passing on') is just like this! Day and night, it never stops." (Analects 9.17)
In other words, the numerous intricacies of human life flowed from one to the next in no different way than water flowed. Rather than starting one day in the past and ending some day in the future, they will continue to occur for all eternity.
A map showing the approximate locations of the prehistoric tribes.
The ancient Chinese held the notion of a prehistoric Golden Age as well. According to mythology, the first Chinese state was founded by Huang Di (黄帝), or the Yellow Emperor. He united the two tribes of Youxiong (有熊, his own) and Shennong (神農, that of Yan Di (炎帝), or the Flame Emperor), and defeated a creature or demon known as Chi You (蚩尤), who represented the old order. This resulted in the creation of a new political and social order and is generally considered the beginning of Chinese history. A number of virtuous rulers followed Huangdi, including the famous trio of Yao (堯), Shun (舜), and Yu the Great (大禹), however, afterwards the decline begins to take place, and the people find themselves needing to periodically rise up to depose tyrants, such as Kings Jie (桀) and Zhou (紂, not the same 'zhou' as above). As one can see, the ancient mythohistory seems to corroborate the view that the ancients held a notion of cyclical time and the general motif (once again, found in many societies throughout Eurasia) of the prehistoric Golden Age. That being the case, it is no surprise that Confucius is always singing the praises of the ancient sage rulers, especially Yao and Shun, and taking them to be paragons of virtue which all ought to emulate. "As a sovereign, how great was Yao! How majestic! Heaven alone is great, but only Yao corresponded to it (i.e. ruled according to Heaven's laws). How vast was his virtue!" (Analects 8.19) For these reasons, high antiquity was held in the most reverent regard, and seen as superior to and more real than the present age. A parallel might be drawn in Daoist philosophy (itself derivative of the same animistic, nature-oriented spirituality as Confucianism), which held that the supreme state of humanity was in the purity, the 'blank slate', of the newborn baby.
Yao and Shun. Depicted here is Yao famously abdicating his throne to Shun.
Taking this as a basis, it is easy to understand why things such as ancestor worship and paternalism are among the fundamentals of Confucianism, especially compared to the pragmatic Legalism or egalitarian-universalist Mohism. How does this compare to the Western, Aryan philosophies and their so-called 'individualism'? We are able to see a foundation of similar, almost identical, composition, but from which can be detected two offshoots of later independent development. Like the Indo-Europeans, the ancient Chinese worshiped a paternalistic sky god, known as Tian (天). Tian is without doubt a local reflex of the same prehistoric god whence the IE supreme god Dyeus-Phter (in turn Zeus, Jupiter, Dyaus Pitar, etc.), and the Turko-Mongolic god Tengri. Further, as much disdain as Jorjani has for ancestor worship, and its inherently 'collectivist' nature, it is hardly of Confucian, or even Chinese, origination. In fact, ancestor worship was widely practiced among all the major branches of Indo-Europeans. For example, see the Di Manes of the Romans, as well as the Genii (from gens, lit. 'a tribe or lineage', implying worship of clan or racial progenitors). Among native faith groups in Europe even today it is still practiced. Thus the practice of ancestor worship can only be implied to be congenital, along with the worship of a patriarchal sky God, in a supremely ancient race, which spread it to the proto-Indo-Europeans and Altaics either through contact, or else by directly siring those races, and then from the Altaic race it spread to the Sinitic.
The notion that Confucianism, or Chinese culture in general, is inherently 'collectivist' is grossly mistaken. In my opinion, it is equally as ludicrous as the notion that Aryan culture is inherently 'individualist'. The entire 'individualist' vs. 'collectivist' dichotomy is a bit of a trap. It begins to severely break down when we analyze societies of the Traditional type, because it largely evolved out of the Renaissance and Enlightenment thought in Europe, and thus out of the notion of Humanism, which is antithetical to Traditionalism for a number of reasons. However, I will save that discussion for another article.
That leaves us with only the main question still left unanswered. Does it make sense to characterize the modern People's Republic of China as "Confucian"? On the surface, it definitely makes a lot of sense. It is no secret anymore that in the People's Republic, especially when compared to North America and Western Europe, there is a high degree of social conservatism, of the type that would make even the top "conservative" thinkers in the West blush. It cannot feasibly be imaged that the People's Republic anytime would be ready to take in millions of third-world immigrants as Western governments, nor do they allow what is often called social degeneration, in such forms as hedonism, feminism, homosexuality, and others, to reach the levels at which they stand in the West. At the same time, the government of the People's Republic seems to have embraced what in the West would be labeled as extreme ethnonationalism. Indeed, there is no way a contemporary European ethnonationalist can look upon China's Emperors Yan and Huang Giant Statue, a massive (106m tall) monument dedicated to the divine founders of the Chinese race, without a bit of jealousy.
So can this conservatism and apparent ethnonationalist tendencies of the modern Chinese state really be attributed to Confucianism? Well, not really. In fact, despite the good image Confucius has today and the apparent widespread implementation of some of his philosophy, the People's Republic can hardly be described as a Confucian state. Confucianism is a doctrine, a dogma, but the People's Republic is not dogmatic, it is pragmatic. The Han race, which makes up the overwhelming majority of China's population, is both the most populous and least united group of people in the world, both modernly and anciently. There were several episodes throughout its history which, like the Warring States Period, involved multiple factions, each with their own goals, vying among each other for supremacy. To make a long story short, despite thousands of years of history, the entire Han race, to whatever extent it can be said to exist, has never all been on the same side. The People's Republic, which inherited a territory fought over by warlords for half a century, from the very beginning was concerned with creating a unified, modern state.
Today, their approach to unity can best be described as a pragmatic one. Previously, they had embraced dogmatically the Marxist-Leninist thought, and sought unity by brute-forcing it into the national consciousness, overtaking every aspect of life. However, when they found out this did not work (Marxism is antithetical to human nature), they quickly switched to a more pragmatic approach, embracing whatever ideologies and methods would be beneficial, while shunning those which were not. A large part of this involved appeals to the ethnic affinities of the approximately 50 official ethnic groups living in Chinese territory. For the Han people, which make up a greater than 90% majority, embracing Confucius, whom they had previously demonized as a 'feudalist' and 'reactionary' during the Cultural Revolution, desecrating his tomb and temples across the country, seemed like a natural course of action. It is no wonder why so many today, even mainlanders themselves, consider them Confucianist. But we should not be fooled. Modern China's embracing of Confucius cannot be seen as much more genuine than their apparent endorsement of Genghis Khan. In the 1950s they built a mausoleum to the Mongolian ancestor, where official sacrifices were held for him, all in a ploy to guarantee the Mongols living in Inner Mongolia remained loyal to them. It is just a shameless tactic which abuses humans' natural feelings of love and affinity towards their kinfolk, and the affinity and love people of Eurasian races naturally feel towards their ancestors and their fatherland, in order to garner loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party. As soon as they have found a more efficient way to guarantee loyalty and social "harmony", we can expect the name of Confucius to again be defamed, and his temples to again be set on fire.
The destruction of Confucian Temples during the Cultural Revolution, committed by the Red Guards under the auspices of the Chinese Communist Party and Maoist insanity.
As for the objectively socially conservative practices going on in the People's Republic with official sanction from the government, while they are indeed in line with Confucianism, it can hardly be said that they are implemented because of Confucian influence. Rather, they are implemented simply because they lead to a strong and healthy nation. It is no secret that runaway hedonism, feminism and homosexuality weaken the nation, while notions such as ethnonationalism and paternalism strengthen the nation. What weakens the nation they have abolished, and what strengthens the nation they have embraced, not as a doctrine, but as a strategy. If they truly embraced Confucianism as a doctrine, then why is that so many other Confucian ideas are 'conveniently' left out? Confucianism holds the family as the most important unit of society, yet the People's Republic, with its child-limitation policies, general socialist disdain for private property, and acceptance of abortion as a means for birth control, can hardly be said to be pro-family. This is because they are aware that to strengthen the position of the family would be detrimental to state loyalty, as it would promote family loyalty instead. Only when one realizes that the Chinese establishment views everything through the lens of state power, state strength and state loyalty, can one begin to understand modern China. In this way, modern China is much more similar to the ancient Legalist Qin dynasty, with its strict, authoritarian government, use of censorship to suppress competing ideologies, and emphasis on unity, assimilation and state loyalty above all else.
I hope the reader has learnt a bit about Confucianism, its history and the true content of this philosophy, as well as the modern Chinese People's Republic, and why it cannot in any true sense be considered Confucian. Hopefully I have dispelled a few of the common myths that are often circulated regarding these topics. It is also my hope that I have demystified, in the eyes of those who are not too familiar with China, modern or ancient, an important part of its history and worldview, as well as the origins thereof. In any case, China due it its heavy influence in Asia for thousands of years, is an ancient, and indeed glorious, part of the Eurasian story. Ancient nations from Vietnam to Japan were not mistaken to be influenced by the exquisite high culture of the Tang dynasty, for instance. However, even more so than other nations, China has always been a sort of 'two-faced' nation. Further, the 'idea' of China has never completely overlapped with the people of China (that the last 2 of 3 Chinese Imperial dynasties were ruled by non-Chinese speaks volumes). I leave the reader with a warning: do not confuse the modern state known as "China" with the ancient, prestigious, cultured Confucian Empire and Nation, which, in my humble opinion, took its last breath in 1912.
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