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Hard Paternalism and Confucian Familism

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Abstract

In this paper, I criticize Joel Feinberg’s argument of soft paternalism, which stands against hard paternalism, as being untenable. As assessing one’s voluntariness is very difficult and controversial, paternalistic measures would be preferable to be implemented by hard paternalism rather than soft paternalism. I then examine four usual criticisms of hard paternalism from the perspective of utilitarianism and the principle of autonomy. I argue that these criticisms are unsound and unfounded, and I defend hard paternalism from the perspective of Confucian familism. I argue that as one’s life and identity are inseparable from one’s family, “self-regarding” actions, traditionally understood, do not only affect the self, but also one’s family members. Thus, paternalistic measures to protect individuals from self-harming are also aimed to protect their family members which are indeed compatible with Mill’s harm principle.

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Notes

  1. Cristiano Castelfranchi (2022: 111–115) dislikes the term “paternalism” because the word usually refers to something manipulative, hypocritical, and deceptive; it has negative, authoritarian, masculine, and hierarchical connotations. Thus, Castelfranchi, instead, discusses “tutelary relation” which is positive, fundamental, unavoidable dependence relation and is considered the ground of theory of paternalism. Indeed, Feinberg (1989: 4) also dislikes the term “paternalism” because “the word is derogatory and thus tends to be tendentious and question‐begging in its bare application,” and it is easily confused with the term “paternalistic” which refers to “attitudes, practices, and rules that are not even remotely benevolent.” However, Feinberg, and this article also, continues to use “paternalism” because this has now become standard usage.

  2. The Confucian familism in this paper is based on Classical Confucianism, or Pre-Qin Confucianism. This includes The Four Books (Legge 1861 trans.) and Five Classics as well as Xunzi. Basically, I disagree with Zhuxi’s exclusion of Xunzi, and I don’t think that Mencius (Van Norden 2008 trans.) and Xunzi (Hutton 2014 trans.) are mutually exclusive. The reference styles for Confucian texts are “book.passage” for the Analects (e.g., Analects 12.1), “chapter-division-passage” for the Mencius (e.g., Mencius 2A2), “chapter.ICS section/ICS page/line) for the Liji (e.g., Liji, 25.36/128/6) according to ICS Concordance (Lau and Chen 1992).

  3. Although Qi Jing (2023), in his response to Bell, is right to remind us that Chinese culture is also influenced by Daoism and Legalism, I would argue that the general Chinese view of family is mainly shaped by Confucianism, in particular the idea of filial piety and five cardinal relationships (wulun 五倫).

  4. Recently, instead of providing a usual Kantian reading of Mou, Tseng (2023: 2) argues that Mou’s political philosophy is kind of “a Hegelian form of ethical liberalism rooted in the spirit of ren 仁 (humaneness).” However, this reading is really controversial, and I cannot go into details here. One may refer to Tzuli Chang’s (2023) analysis and criticisms.

  5. However, there are also controversies about Lee’s and Mou’s deontological interpretation of Confucianism. See Elstein (2014: 104) and Bai (2022) for further discussion.

  6. Some liberals may refute the communitarian argument and argue that the community can be maintained by atomistic liberal self without any notion of common good and paternalistic measures. I am dubious of such thesis. In my recent articles (Hung 2022c), I argue that recent phenomenon of political fragmentation in the USA seems to show that atomistic liberal democracy cannot be sustained in the long run. However, I cannot go into details here.

  7. In the author’s (Hung 2022a) article, I defend a kind of modern Confucian familism from the challenge of the postmodern family and the criticisms of Confucian familism as unequal, hierarchical, and nepotic.

  8. There are controversies as to whether prostitution will affect marriage stability. Abramson et al. (2003: 116) argue that prostitution can channel excess male sexual energy away from others' wives or unwilling sexual partners, and women would prefer their husbands to cheat on them with prostitutes because this finance-based external sexual liaison is the least threatening to the stability of long-term relationships (Meskó et al. 2012). However, such defense of prostitution can only support the comparative argument that prostitution is less harmful to marriage than adultery and rape; it cannot refute the fact that prostitution harms the marriage relationship and thus threatens the stability of marriage.

  9. Confucian ideas of familial shared identity and relational autonomy may be considered similar to Rousseau’s ideas of republican freedom and general will that may be oppressive. However, I think that there are a few fundamental differences between Rousseau’s republicanism and Confucian familism. While Rousseau’s republican community is absolutely sovereign and formed by social contract (Pettit 2016: 169, 185; Hung 2022c), the Confucian family has no such absolute sovereignty and is based on natural family affection and family bonding. Nevertheless, I cannot go into details here.

  10. While nudges seem to be a mild paternalistic strategy, it is not without controversies. For instance, Castelfranchi (2022: 141) considers nudges to be a kind of hidden manipulation. However, we cannot go into details here.

  11. The recent failure of the war on drugs in the USA led to certain controversies regarding the criminalization of drug use. On the one hand, some commentators (Human Rights Watch 2016; Discover Recovery 2021) point out that the criminalization of drug use has led to a vicious cycle of crime, corruption, discrimination, and hurting individuals and families. And thus, we should endorse a peaceful drug policy such as marijuana reform that focuses on health, not criminalization, and encourage drug users to seek help rather than hide in fear. On the other hand, some Chinese commentators (Xin 2023; Xinhua News Agency 2023) have criticized the US government for not being determined enough to fight drugs, but instead tend to have legalized drugs in recent years, in particular marijuana, to reap economic benefits and earn the support of drug decriminalization advocates. Basically, I agree that if the paternalistic policy is proven to be ineffective and will cause certain unintended negative consequences, the policy should be revised or even repealed. Nevertheless, based on my experience of fighting drugs in China and Hong Kong, I believe that prohibition and criminalization remain the most effective ways to reduce drug use. In addition, to achieve a higher impact, criminalization should be integrated into a comprehensive prevention policy framework, with dedicated educational programs and holistic addiction treatment. However, this is not the main concern of this article, and I cannot go into details here.

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My work on this article is partially supported by a grant [SSHD-2023-299(I)] from the College of Professional and Continuing Education, an affiliate of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

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  1. Division of Social Sciences, Humanities and Design, College of Professional and Continuing Education, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, 9 Hoi Ting Road, Yau Ma Tei, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China

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Hung, A.T.W. Hard Paternalism and Confucian Familism. Fudan J. Hum. Soc. Sci. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40647-024-00404-5

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