BASC70076 - Chinese Political Thought

Course Description

For millennia, China has centered its literature on politics and government more thoroughly than any other major civilization, and its tradition of political thought poses significant challenges to Western concepts and assumptions. In this class we’ll examine the three most influential theories of government that took shape in
ancient China—Confucian, Daoist, and Legalist—and compare them with the theories that Americans tend to take for granted. Classical Chinese thinkers relied neither on divinely revealed laws nor on the concept of free individuals endowed with rights; they never imagined republican institutions (let alone democratic ones), though they were keenly attentive to the informal power available to people of every rank and station. While all three theories of government willstrike many citizens of contemporary democracies as “authoritarian”, their disagreements with each other as well as their shared loathing for injustice and tyranny will complicate that picture considerably.

Course Outline

Reading List:

Yuri Pines, tr. The Book of Lord Shang (abridged edition) (ISBN 978-0231179898)

Van Norden, tr. The Essential Mengzi. (ISBN 978-0872209855)

Major et al., trs. The Essential Huainanzi. (ISBN 978-0231159814)