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“What Did the Emperor Ever Say?”—The Public Transcript of Confucian Political Obligation

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Abstract

The idea that imperial Confucianism demands the commoners’ absolute political obedience is widespread. Although some scholars have tried to challenge this popular idea, they leave a theory of imperial Confucian political obligation unaddressed. By engaging with political propaganda of the Qing 清 dynasty, specifically The Amplified Instructions of the Sacred Edict (Sheng Yu Guang Xun 聖諭廣訓), I argue that imperial Confucian political obligation is a theory of paternalistic gratitude. Accordingly, the commoners’ political obligation is conditioned upon the ruler’s parental benevolence, and as a matter of history, this theory guided discursive interaction between the Qing court and the commoners. Indeed, when the empire’s policies made their lives difficult, the commoners tended to appeal to the public transcript of paternalistic gratitude to justify their political disobedience. Both in theory and practice, then, imperial Confucian political obligation is not absolute, but rather a conditional theory of paternalistic gratitude.

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Acknowledgment

I would like to thank my anonymous reviewers, whose rich and constructive comments were of great help in improving this manuscript.

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  1. Department of Political Science, Virginia Commonwealth University, 827 West Franklin Street, Richmond, VA, 23284, USA

    Shu-Shan Lee

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Lee, SS. “What Did the Emperor Ever Say?”—The Public Transcript of Confucian Political Obligation. Dao 19, 231–250 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11712-020-09720-5

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