Zhuoyao Li

The rise of populism and the decline of western liberal democracies in the recent decade have pushed many contemporary Confucian political theorists to re-examine the relationship between Confucianism and liberal democracy. On the one hand, whether or not Confucianism and liberal democracy are strictly compatible with each other is no longer important to many. Instead, it is theoretically more interesting and practically more urgent to try and explore the best of both worlds. On the other hand, if the relationship can be understood in such a way as to pivot the question from what liberal democracy can do for Confucianism to what Confucianism can do for liberal democracy, then it seems that political Confucianism...

This paper aims to connect the issues of pluralism, Confucianism, and democracy in East Asia. Through engaging with empirical evidence, I will argue that although Confucianism still has a strong yet shallow moral and cultural hold on East Asian societies, it no longer has dominance over how citizens in East Asian societies envision their political future. Then, I will examine the idea of pluralism and argue that neither the Confucian classicists nor the liberal-minded Confucian political theorists take pluralism truly seriously, because both sides ultimately adopt the same internal view of pluralism that contains and addresses pluralism from within Confucianism. In contrast, an external view of pluralism is needed to treat Confucianism as one of many comprehensive doctrines coexisting with one another in East Asia. Finally, I will conclude by proposing a two-track strategy that takes advantage of two distinct approaches toward a better understanding of pluralism, Confucianism, and democracy.

This paper aims to connect the issues of pluralism, Confucianism, and democracy in East Asia. Through engaging with empirical evidence, I will argue that although Confucianism still has a strong yet shallow moral and cultural hold on East Asian societies, it no longer has dominance over how citizens in East Asian societies envision their political future. Then, I will examine the idea of pluralism and argue that neither the Confucian classicists nor the liberal-minded Confucian political theorists take pluralism truly seriously, because both sides ultimately adopt the same internal view of pluralism that contains and addresses pluralism from within Confucianism. In contrast, an external view of pluralism is needed to treat Confucianism as one of many comprehensive doctrines coexisting with one another in East Asia. Finally, I will conclude by proposing a two-track strategy that takes advantage of two distinct approaches toward a better understanding of pluralism, Confucianism, and democracy.

This book contributes to both the internal debate in liberalism and the application of political liberalism to the process of democratization in East Asia. Beyond John Rawls’ original intention to limit the scope of political liberalism to only existing and well-ordered liberal democracies, political liberalism has the potential to inspire and contribute to democratic establishment and maintenance in East Asia. Specifically, the book has two main objectives. First, it will demonstrate that political liberalism offers the most promising vision for liberal democracy, and it can be defended against contemporary perfectionist objections. Second, it will show that perfectionist approaches to political Confucianism suffer from practical and theoretical difficulties. Instead, an alternative model of democracy inspired by political liberalism will be explored in order to achieve a multivariate structure for citizens to come to terms with democracy in their own ways, to support a neutral state that ensures the establishment and stability of democracy, and to maintain an active public role for Confucianism to prevent it from being banished to the private sphere. This model represents a more promising future for democracy in East Asia.

Sungmoon Kim’s pragmatic Confucian democracy tries to provide a mediating position between the instrumental model and the intrinsic model of democracy. However, this model of Confucian democracy is problematic because it fails to justify the unique role Confucianism plays in accommodating democracy when it is one among many comprehensive doctrines in East Asia. To be truly pragmatic about democracy is to hold a pluralistic attitude toward how people will come to terms with it. This article aims to push the pragmatic tendency further and propose an alternative model of democracy that has a multivariate structure, a neutral state, and an active public role for Confucianism. This multivariate model represents a more promising future for democracy in East Asia.

Recent discussions by Martha Nussbaum and Steven Wall shed new light on the concept of reasonableness in political liberalism and whether the inclusion of epistemic elements in the concept necessarily makes political liberalism lose its antiperfectionist appeal. This article argues that Nussbaum’s radical solution to eliminate the epistemic component of reasonableness is neither helpful nor necessary. Instead, adopting a revised understanding of epistemic reasonableness in terms of a weak view of rationality that is procedural, external and second-order rather than a strong view that is substantial, internal and first-order can help political liberalism maintain an epistemic dimension in the idea of reasonableness without becoming perfectionist. In addition, political liberalism can defend a stronger account of respect for persons against liberal perfectionism on the basis of the revised understanding of epistemic reasonableness. Both arguments serve to demonstrate the strength of the political liberal project.

This paper proposes an interpretation of the conception of morality that remains relatively vague in John Rawls’ political liberalism. It begins with Rawls’ remark that the political conception of justice is also a moral conception, which is puzzling when taking into consideration Rawls’ explicit avoidance of comprehensive moral doctrines in constructing the political conception of justice. In response, this paper proposes the public conception of morality that is structurally justificatory rather than substantively foundationalist. This conception is then further developed by addressing two critical questions concerning the necessity of avoiding comprehensive moral foundations and the source of objective prescriptivity in a justificatory view of morality. The former is situated in an analysis and reinterpretation of Alasdair MacIntyre’s reading of Søren Kierkegaard’s Either/Or, and the latter is demonstrated through a comparative study of two leading justificatory theories of morality by Rainer Forst and Thomas Scanlon. Finally, the public conception of morality is fully developed to show that it both defines and defends the political conception of justice.

Modern Confucian political philosophy has long been divided between the more comprehensive branch of theories that prioritize Confucian classics and traditions and the more moderate branch of theories that attempt to modernize Confucianism so as to better accommodate contemporary East Asian societies.1 Recently, Joseph Chan and Sungmoon Kim, two leading thinkers from the latter camp proposed their distinct approaches to advocate what for them are the most promising versions of political Confucianism. Chan advances what he calls "Confucian political perfectionism," which is based on the belief that "Confucians should embrace modern institutions and measures if they are effective and tie them to the Confucian...