Universal Bureaucratic State as the Sole Agent of Justice in Han Feizi’s Thought

This chapter focuses on the last fajia thinker, Han Feizi (c. 280–233 BCE), who was a grand synthesizer of many aspects of all classical Chinese moral-political discourse in his effort to perfect the operation of the impartialist state. His political project explicitly rejected the XQZP model by problematizing its every aspect. He sought an alternative model that provided the intellectual foundation for a system of impersonal and uniform bureaucratic machinery that could dispense reward and punishment automatically with as little interference from the ruler as possible. His goal of instituting a set of impartial, transparent, and uniform administrative and legal code and standard in governing the state, often in defiance of the interest of powerful aristocratic families, points to the principle of justice operative in his statist project. However, he could not solve the core tension between the monarch and the monarchy, dooming his project of building an impartial political order.

What Is Adaptive Agency?

Chapter 1 provides an illustrated guide to the Chinese philosophy of adapting, covering the following seven core aspects: (1) the design of strategies ad hoc, (2) the lack of constant standards to select the right course of action, (3) the difference between constitutive standards and structural goals, (4) the radical question: how to act in a world without standards, (5) adapting as a procedural meta-model of action, (6) how to train in adaptability, and (7) how masters educated others in adaptive agency. Both manuscripts and received texts are used to provide illustrations for these claims, including Analects, Han Feizi, Zhuangzi, Lü‎shi Chunqiu, and the Mawangdui Wu ze you xing tu manuscript.

An Exceptional Portrait of Yang Zhu and Mozi

This paper examines the coupling in early texts of two masters, Yang Zhu 楊朱 and Mo Di 墨翟. The two thinkers are most famously paired in the Mencius as the prominent preachers of extreme doctrines, while they are also sometimes presented in other early texts such as the Zhuangzi and Han Feizi as useless debaters on trivial topics. These alternative portrayals of Yang-Mo are usually simplified as a second-rate imitation or repetition of the standard Mencian depiction. The paper argues that such a reading represents a serious misunderstanding of the pre-imperial textual transmission. Unfamiliarity with Yang-Mo as sophists may also be the result of the unconscious acceptance of Mencius’ description. The unconventional portrayal of Yang-Mo, very likely relatively unrelated to Mencius’ portrayal, had its own history in early China. Presented in various contexts, this alternative Yang-Mo image was once circulated in various forms for different intended audiences.

Worth Vs. Power: Han Fei’s “Objection to Positional Power” Revisited

This article discusses the chapter “Objection to Positional Power” (Nan shi 難勢) of Han Feizi 韓非子. It provides a full translation cum analysis of the text and explores systematically the chapter’s structure, rhetoric, and its political message. The discussion, which contextualizes the chapter’s message within broader trends of the Warring States-period political debates, demonstrates that beneath the surface of debates about “positional power” (shi 勢) versus “worth” (xian 賢), the chapter addresses one of the touchiest issues in Chinese political thought: that of the intrinsic weakness of hereditary monarchy. Furthermore, “Objection to Positional Power” also addresses problems of the meritocratic system of rule and elucidates some of the reasons for Han Fei’s dislike of meritocratic discourse. By highlighting some of the chapter’s intellectual gems I hope to attract further attention to the immense richness of Han Feizi as one of the most sophisticated products of China’s political thought.

The vital centre: understanding the concept of Yao 要 in the Han Feizi 韓非子

The eighth chapter of the Han Feizi is dedicated to the ways of “wielding power” (揚權). As the entire book attributed to Master Han Fei is arguably dedicated to the problem of power – establishing, exerting and protecting it from external and internal enemies, this section of the book is crucial for the entire text. The present article starts from the term “yao 要” and applies the method of conceptual history to this pre-imperial text. It intends to shed light on the conceptual associations between the survival of the State, the ruler’s position, the importance of a political centre, and the use of objective ruling techniques, within a newly conceived “political sphere” with its own laws and necessities. The paper then addresses the heritage of the Han Feizi to conceptualizations of politics during the imperial period, eventually considering the function of the ruler in Han Fei’s thought.