Yong Li

This paper criticizes liberalism as a way of life by contrasting liberal assumptions, autonomy, reciprocity, and individual equality, with Confucian insights on relational personhood, care, and obligation. First, it argues that liberalism’s scope is limited: familial care, dependency, and many social roles do not operate according to reciprocity or autonomous choice. Second, it contends that liberal values lack substantive resources to resolve life’s central questions – childrearing, eldercare, and duties to kin. Third, it examines ‘liberaldom’, where liberal ideals coexist with capitalism and meritocracy, and argues that an atomistic liberal anthropology helps produce inequality. The paper proposes a Confucian relational moral vocabulary attentive to care and cultivation.

Sungmoon Kim is a paradigm case of a Confucian pragmatic democrat whose commitment is to democracy. This paper argues that Kim’s overall Confucian political philosophy project faces the following three challenges. The first challenge is about Kim’s reading of early Confucian texts, such as his reading of Mengzi and Xunzi. The second challenge deals with Kim’s understanding of the relationship between Confucianism and democracy. The third challenge is about the distinctiveness of Kim’s Confucian democracy.

According to Confucianism, in an ideal family, parents care especially for their children, and children especially love and respect their parents. However, in a non-ideal situation, parents might be negligent. In this paper I present a relational view of filial piety and argue that this view helps explain how Confucians should deal with the non-ideal situation, especially when the parents are not caring. The structure of the paper is as follows. In the first section, I explain how filial piety and family are understood in early Confucianism. In the second section, I show how the justification for the obligation of filial piety offered by early Confucians presupposes an ideal situation. In the third section, I argue that the traditional view of filial piety fails to deal with non-ideal situations and that a relational view could be a good alternative. In the last section, I will reply to several objections to the above relational view.

This book conducts a comparative study between Confucian political philosophy and contemporary political philosophy in the analytic tradition. The author demonstrates the relevance of Confucianism to contemporary discussions on important political ideals, such as equality, democracy, human rights and global justice. He also introduces individual Confucian thinkers, including both historical figures like Kongzi, Mengzi, and Xunzi, and contemporary thinkers such as Kang Youwei and Mou Zongsan. By arguing whether certain Confucian ideals can broaden current debates in political philosophy, the book moves the discussion further. The book will appeal to graduate students and scholars studying ethics, political philosophy, and Chinese philosophy.

Situated within the framework of Confucian family-oriented ethics, this book explores the issue of familial partiality and specifically discusses whether it is morally praiseworthy to love one's family partially. In reviewing the tension between familial partiality and egalitarian impartiality from different perspectives while also drawing on binary metrics to understand the issue - that is, the weak and strong sense of familial partiality in Confucian moral theory - the author carefully discusses the efficacy of three major arguments to justify moral partiality. It is concluded that the tree argument fails to justify moral partiality in Confucianism, the evolutionary argument only justifies moral partiality in the weak sense that we should devote more resources to our family, and the care argument fails to justify moral partiality in the strong sense that family takes priority in any case even at the expense of the principle of justice. Seeking to address the quandary, the author advances an alternative argument based on Thomas Aquinas' theory of love to interpret Confucian view of partial relationships, holding that partial treatment is assumed in partial relationships. The title will appeal to scholars and students interested in Confucianism, Chinese Philosophy, Moral Philosophy, and Comparative Philosophy.

In China, political philosophy is still a comparatively new academic discipline. While there is no such phrase as "political philosophy" in ancient Chinese texts, there are elements within them that could be considered part of that field. Central questions of Chinese ancient political philosophy include the legitimacy of the source of political power, the foundation of moral rationality for the use of political power, and the purpose of political activities. This book explores the ideas of rights, the foundations of law, transference of power, democracy and other topic as debated in ancient times. Focusing on important political thinkers in Chinese history, such as Kongzi, Laozi, Xu Fuguan, Liang Qichao and Li Dazhao, the book explains characteristics that are particular to China, such as the system of abdication, the general will of the people, and the society of Great Harmony. While making comparisons between Chinese and Western political philosophy, the book also discusses how to establish a Chinese modern state and how to promote Chinese culture today so that it can influence more and more people around the world. The book will be a valuable reference for scholars of Chinese philosophy, political philosophy and Chinese culture.

When we disagree with each other at the beginning of a debate, we are confident that we are right and the other side is just wrong, 2017). But at the end of the debate, we could be persuaded that we are wrong and the other side is right. This happens a lot when we disagree on empirical or factual claims. However, when we disagree with each other on moral issues, it is quite rare that either side is persuaded. We could be frustrated by the other’s stubbornness. But sometimes we come to see that the other side has a point. Their view seems reasonable. We might even feel that we could have taken their moral perspective and values. This phenomenon of moral ambivalence is discussed extensively by David Wong as part of his argument for moral relativism that there is no single true morality. Recently, Agustín Vicente and Agustín Arrieta write to refute Wong’s argument. They argue that moral ambivalence is a phenomenon of moral pluralism, the position that there are different acceptable courses of actions, rather than moral relativism. In this paper, I argue that moral ambivalence does not support the kind of moral pluralism that Vicente and Arrieta argue for. Furthermore, I point out that moral ambivalence does not support Wong’s naturalism, the position that morality has human nature constraints, but it does support the kind of relativism that he endorses.

In this paper I will defend a version of pluralistic relativism. In the first section of this paper I will present my view of a functional morality by appealing to the moral diverse traditions in China. If each is indeed conceptually consistent and practically sufficient, then it seems to me that each is a functional morality. In the second section I explain the connection between moral plurality and the perception of moral ambivalence that our own moral beliefs might not be true. In the third section I argue that radical moral relativism and weak universalism cannot accommodate moral plurality and moral ambivalence. In the fourth section I explain why pluralistic relativism can best accommodate moral plurality and moral ambivalence. In the last section I present how pluralistic relativism helps us to deal with disagreement and motivates us to respect those who are different from us.

In this study, I will examine the famous 'divine command theory' of Mozi. Through the discussion of several important chapters of Mozi, including Fayi (law), Tianzhi (the will of heaven), Minggui (knowing the spirits) and Jianai (universal love), I attempt to clarify the arguments of Mozi offered in support of his distinctive ideas of serving heaven, knowing the spirits and loving all. The analysis shows that there are serious problems with his assumptions, hence they fail to support his conclusions as to the heaven-human relationship, and the man-man relationship. That is to say, at least in the texts covered, Mozi did not justify the moral or social relationship in society by appealing to the religious relationship.

In this paper I argue that Confucianism provides a foundation for human rights. First, I will survey the current debates on the issue of whether Confucianism can embrace the idea of human rights. Second, I will focus on a “thin concept” of human rights and point out some historical developments pertinent to this idea and various aspects of the concept. Third, I will explain the type of interpretation of Confucianism on which I want to focus. Fourth, I will argue that Confucianism is not only compatible with human rights but also provides a foundation for human dignity, which is a basis for human rights. I argue that the Confucian virtue-based approach can overcome certain challenges that thwart an autonomy-based approach to human dignity and human rights. Finally, I will address some objections to this view.

Since the early 2000s, there has been a debate about the ?the father-covering-son? puzzle in the Analects. In this paper, I present an argument to support that a family-oriented ethics would justify the father-covering-son action; then I argue that this argument provides a perspective on this father-covering-son puzzle but does not solve the puzzle. The argument for the family-oriented ethics has two steps. The first step holds that the contemporary evolutionary theory of kin selection and moral emotions explains our special attachment to our family. The second step of the argument holds that the special attachment to our family justifies our familial partiality. Combining the two steps together, one may conclude that the family-oriented ethics is justified in supporting the covering action. However, I will argue that the principle of justice may render the two-step argument less successful than it appears to be

Ryan Nichols in his recent article ‘A genealogy of early Confucian moral psychology’ argues that the discussion of Confucius and Mencius on moral emotions can be provided an evolutionary analysis. Nichols’ argument is based on the evolutionary value of kin-relations and the origin of emotions toward kin in human society. In this article I argue that Nichols’ argument is flawed because he endorses an adaptationist program of human moral psychology. The adaptationists treat kin-relations and our emotions toward kin as a straightforward result of natural selection and adaptation. They ignore any non-adaptationist interpretation of biological traits. As more and more evolutionary biologists discover that the adaptationist program is too simplistic to understand the diverse evolutionary pathways of living beings, Nichols’ project is not justified due to its reliance on this problematic adaptationist program

The Confucian tradition is famous for its family value. This tradition emphasizes that, after one's moral sentiments are cultivated in the family, one is capable of caring for people outside the family. However, since the early 2000s, there has been a debate in the Chinese Philosophy community about how to understand the ?the father-covering-son? story in the Analects. The story tells that a father covers for his son's stealing a sheep. This is a puzzle because while Confucius's virtue theory implies that concealing a theft is wrong, Confucius contends that a father's covering is right. In this paper I discuss two arguments, the tree argument and the argument of the whole, implicitly held by the Confucian scholars for the priority of the family love in this debate. I argue that none of the arguments are convincing