Political Meritocracy –Alternatives to Confucian Visions

Abstract:

Recent advocates of political meritocracy who draw upon Chinese philosophy often seem to equate meritocracy with Confucianism, restricting what we can learn from a vast, deep, and multi-vocal intellectual tradition. Most, if not all, prominent political thinkers throughout China’s long intellectual history advocated versions of political meritocracy, and there is no a priori reason to privilege Confucian version(s) over those offered by others. 

If we wish to think about how meritocracy can and should play a role in contemporary governance, there are benefits to investigating this tradition more broadly Broadening our investigation to other strands of meritocratic thought in early China gives us access to insights and arguments that may be more persuasive than those obtained by looking solely at the Confucian position. Additionally, insofar as these traditions offer strong challenges to Confucian visions of political meritocracy, we should be concerned the potential viability of any Confucian meritocratic theory. 

This talk sketches alternatives to Confucian meritocracy as they arise in the Mozi, Laozi, and Han Feizi – not merely as negative criticisms of Confucianism, but as positive meritocratic visions worth investigating in their own right.