UC San Diego Chinese Conceptions of Rights Reading Reflection Paper Write a reading reflection in 400-500 words. (focus on reactions instead of sumarry) Ch

UC San Diego Chinese Conceptions of Rights Reading Reflection Paper Write a reading reflection in 400-500 words. (focus on reactions instead of sumarry) Chinese Conceptions of “Rights”: From Mencius to Mao- and Now
Author(s): Elizabeth J. Perry
Source: Perspectives on Politics, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Mar., 2008), pp. 37-50
Published by: American Political Science Association
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Art’icles
Chinese Conceptions of “Rights”:
From Mencius to Mao-and Now
Elizabeth J. Perry
The recent explosion of popular protest in China, often framed as a demand for the fulfillment of “rights,” has captured widespread
attention. Some observers interpret the protests as signs of a “moral vacuum.” Others see the unrest as signaling a powerful new
“rights consciousness.” In either case, the protests are often regarded as a major challenge to the stability of the political system. In
this article, an examination of Chinese conceptions of “rights,” as reflected in the ethical discourses of philosophers, political leaders,
and protesters (and as contrasted with American understandings of rights), provides the basis for questioning prevailing assumptions
about the fragility of the Chinese political order. For over two millennia, Chinese political thought, policy, and protest have assigned
central priority to the attainment of socioeconomic security. As a result, the meaning of “rights” in Chinese political discourse differs
significantly from the Anglo-American tradition. Viewed in historical context, China’s contemporary “rights” protests seem less
politically threatening. The Chinese polity appears neither as vacuous nor as vulnerable as it is sometimes assumed to be.
n recent years, U.S. newspapers and magazines have
been filled with dramatic stories about all manner of
popular protest in China: tax riots by aggrieved peasants
in the agrarian countryside, strikes by disgruntled workers
A distinctly normative tone, inflected with an Anglo
American language of human rights, can be seen in many
of the recent writings on this issue. On the one hand,
some journalists (and more than a few scholars as well)
in the industrial rustbelt, petitions by feisty retirees whose
describe the contemporary protests as symptoms of a per
pensions fall short of expectations, resistance by irate vil
lagers to the illegal sale of their collective lands, and so
vasive “moral vacuum” in which Chinese supposedly find
themselves. Post-Mao China is depicted as a society where
Marxism has been discredited, but-absent a Western
this issue. The study of contentious politics in contempo
appreciation of individual natural rights-Chinese have
rary China has of late become a rapid-growth industry no moral compass to guide their changing and confused
among American social scientists.’
lives.2 Because of this alleged ethical and spiritual vac
uum, we are told, millions of Chinese have turned to
other forms of solace (e.g., Falun Gong, underground
forth. Journalists are not the only people writing about
Elizabethj. Perry is Henry Rosovsky Professor of Govern
ment at Harvard University and is the current President ofthe
Association forAsian Studies (eperry@latte.harvard.edu).
A preliminary draft of this paper was delivered as a keynote
address at the conference on Socioeconomic Rights andJus
tice in China held at Dickinson College in April 2004. The
author is grateful to the conference organizer, Neil Dia
mant, for the invitation to consider these issues andto the other
conference participants (especially David Strand andJer
ome Cohen) for their challenging comments and questions. A
substantially revised version was presented at the confer
ence in memory ofBenjamin Schwartz, held in Shanghai at
East China Normal University in December2006 Thanks
are due to the conference organizers andparticipants (partic
ularly Zhu Zhenghui, Xu Jilin, ZhangJishun, Tong Shi
jun, and Roderick MacParquhar) for their stimulating
suggestions. Appreciation is also extended to Stephen Angle,
Nara Dillon, Mary Gallagher, and Kevin O’Brien for
their critical reading ofan earlier draft.
Christianity, and so forth) that often result in the tram
pling of their unprotected human rights by the state. On
the other hand, many scholars (and some journalists as
well) have detected in the surge of popular protest in post
Mao China an emergent “rights consciousness”-indicating
a supposed bottom-up claim to citizenship and auguring
a fundamental breakthrough in state-society relations.3 In
the judgment of these American analysts, “rights talk”
among Chinese protesters represents a powerful new social
phenomenon, posing a potential challenge to the survival
of the Communist state.
The Chinese government paints a very different pic
ture, of course. In a State Council White Paper, issued in
the year 2000 and entitled “Fifty Years of Progress in China’s
Human Rights,” the government credits the People’s
Republic with having bestowed upon the Chinese people
an unprecedented enjoyment of human rights-most nota
bly in the form of socioeconomic justice. Interestingly,
this official Chinese White Paper does not suggest that
DOI: 10.1017/Si 537592708080055 March 2008 1 Vol. 6/No. 1 37
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Articles I Chinese Conceptions of “Rights”
such rights were entirely absent before the Communist
rary Chinese political order is neither as vacuous nor as
revolution. Rather, the State Council report contends
that-prior to the advent of Western imperialism-the
Chinese people had experienced some minimal fulfill
vulnerable as sometimes depicted.
The 2000 White Paper makes crystal clear, as have
ment of rights, but that this safety net was demolished by
before and since, that-when it comes to human rights
numerous other publications by the Chinese government
the foreign assaults of the mid-nineteenth century. To quote
socioeconomic considerations rank first among its priori
directly from the 2000 White Paper:
ties. The recent amendment of the Chinese Constitution
Invaded and enslaved by various foreign powers, old China lost
its state sovereignty, and its people’s human rights lost their mini
mum guarantee. The first important achievement of the Chinese
Communist Party … was to drive the imperialist invaders out
of China, paving the way for China to realize real indepen
dence…. The genuine and complete independence of China
has created the fundamental premise for the Chinese people’s
selection of their own social and political systems … and for the
uninterrupted improvement of human rights in China.4
to include a provision respecting and protecting human
rights does not change this basic conception of human
rights. The 2004 Chinese White Paper on human rights
progress, issued two weeks after the amendment of the
Constitution, states the following: “The Chinese govern
ment continues to put the safeguarding and promotion of
the people’s rights to subsistence and development on the top
of its agenda.”9
The government asserts, in other words, that its people
have a right to some minimum standard of living (“sub
Beyond its obvious propagandistic flavor, this passage is
revealing in several respects. First, it suggests that before
the opium wars of the mid-nineteenth century, imperial
Chinese regimes did have some commitment to a mini
mum guarantee of “human rights” for their people. And
second, it makes clear that-in the eyes of the contempo
rary Chinese government-the West was responsible not
for bringing to China a newfound appreciation of human
rights, but rather for depriving the Chinese of rights that
they had previously enjoyed. State sovereignty and national
independence are seen as the basic prerequisites for a fur
sistence” or shengcun)-and, moreover, they have a right
to expect an improvement in that standard (“develop
ment” orfazhan). The first idea-that people have a just
claim to a decent livelihood and that a state’s legitimacy
depends upon satisfying this claim-goes very far back in
Chinese political thought. It has roots in the teachings of
Confucius (sixth-fifth century BC) and was elaborated by
the influential Confucian philosopher Mencius (fourth
third century BC). Although Mencius never framed his
arguments in a language of “rights,” he did emphasize the
links between economic welfare and legitimate rule. The
ther improvement in human rights, an improvement that
second idea-that the state should promote socioeco
must after all be founded in a political and social system
of China’s own choosing.
nomic development-is a more recent notion, advanced
Amnesty International and other human rights groups
by Chinese political leaders since the late nineteenth cen
tury and articulated with particular force by Mao Zedong
immediately labeled this Chinese White Paper a “white
wash” and denounced the PRC’s failure to live up to its
own claims.5 The U.S. State Department chided China
during his revolutionary drive to power and afterwards.10
Both of these concepts, subsistence and development, are
for a “poor” human rights record marred by “numerous
and serious abuses.”6 The Chinese government responded
phers and statesmen; they are also central to the ways in
which ordinary people in China think and act politically.
with an equally unflattering assessment of America’s human
rights record, pointing to flagrant racial discrimination,
callous neglect of the poor and homeless, and so on.7 This
war of words continued, and even escalated, in sub
sequent years.8
My purpose in this article is not to evaluate the actual
not simply abstract mantras uttered by Chinese philoso
Concerns about socioeconomic justice are not pecu
liarly Chinese, of course. T.H. Marshall, in his classic work
on the rise of citizenship in Western Europe, pointed to
“social citizenship”-or the collective right to economic
welfare and social security-as the highest expression of
citizenship. In Marshall’s evolutionary account, a mini
human rights record of either America or China-whether
at present or in the past. My purview is limited to concep
malist civil citizenship-or the guarantee of individual rights
tions of rights, as reflected in the ethical discourses of Chi
in eighteenth-century Europe, while the nineteenth cen
nese philosophers, political leaders, and protesters (and as
tury saw the emergence of a more developed sense ofpolit
contrasted with American understandings of rights). In
examining these normative claims, I will question both
ical citizenship or the right to participate in the exercise
of government power. Only in the twentieth century, how
the “moral vacuum” and the “rights-based challenge” per
spectives that infuse much of the Western literature on
contemporary China. Arguing that an enduring emphasis
ever, did a claim to full social citizenship (as embodied in
on collective socioeconomic justice distinguishes main
stream Chinese political thought from an Anglo-American
focus on individual rights, I conclude that the contempo
to property, personal liberty, and legal justice-appeared
the modern welfare state) become widespread across
Europe.1
Samuel Fleischacker, in his recent history of distributive
justice, traces the acknowledgment of”a right of all people
to a certain socioeconomic status” back to the eighteenth
38 Perspectives on Politics
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century, to the writings of Rousseau, Smith, Kant, and
besides an expressed concern for collective welfare, was an
Babeuf.’2 According to Fleischacker, however, “for most of
explanation-and in Mao’s case even a celebration-of
human history practically no one held, even as an ideal, the
popular uprisings as a legitimate response to a government’s
view that everyone should have their basic needs satis
failure to fulfill its social responsibilities. When Mencius
was asked by one anxious king what he should do in order
fied.”‘3 ‘While Fleischacker may well be correct in his cri
tique of early Western thought, his argument entirely
to hold onto the throne, Mencius answered simply: “Pro
overlooks the Confucian tradition. An abiding concern with
for more than two millennia.’4 Contrary to the scenario
tect the people.”‘9 He continued, “An intelligent ruler
will regulate the livelihood of the people, so as to make
sure that … in good years they shall always be abun
that Marshall outlines for Western Europe, in China an
dantly satisfied, and that in bad years they shall escape the
appreciation of “social citizenship” predated political citi
danger of perishing.”20 Here then was a crisply stated
Confucian “moral economy” that made protecting and
promoting the people’s livelihood the cornerstone of
distributive justice has marked Chinese political thought
zenship by many centuries.15
In the U.S., by comparison with both ancient China
and modern Europe, a commitment to social citizenship statecraft.
has been notably weak. American political philosophers,
The Book of History (Shujing), an ancient Chinese
in pondering the primary function of government, have
philosophical text from which Mencius-like Confucius
historically emphasized the protection of individual free
drew many of his central ideas, contained the notion of
doms (or what Marshall regarded as the lowest form of the Mandate of Heaven (tianming) which treated rebel
citizenship). This view, which prizes strict limits on state
lion as Heaven’s way of removing the mantle of leadership
intervention, has pervaded popular political sentiment in
from immoral rulers and bestowing it instead upon those
the U.S. as well. The political theorist Louis Hartz char who were virtuous enough to replace them. The concept
acterized the American Way of Life as “a nationalist artic
of the Mandate of Heaven as a rationale for rebellion first
ulation of Locke which usually does not know that Locke
appeared in China around the founding of the Zhou
himself is involved.”‘6 Fundamental to Locke’s political dynasty in the eleventh century BC. Seven hundred years
philosophy was an emphasis upon natural rights as both later, Mencius expanded upon this idea by linking the
prior-and superior-to laws enacted by the state. Locke’s authority of Heaven (tian) with the support of the people
understanding of natural law stressed individual inalien
(ren). When asked by one of his disciples how a ruler had
able rights (to life, liberty, and property). In his concep
gained the realm, Mencius replied, “Heaven gave the empire
tion, the role of government was a limited one; the state
to him; the people gave it to him” (tian yu zhi, ren yu
simply guaranteed the social order necessary to permit the
zhi).2′ He went on to explain, “The people are the most
exercise of individuals’ natural rights. Rebellion was justi
important element . .. Therefore to gain the support of
fiable, but only if government violated the “social con
the ordinary people is to become emperor.”22 Mencius’
tract” either by failing to ensure public order or by
idea of anchoring political legitimacy in the assent of the
aggrandizing its powers vis-a-vis society.’7 Locke’s views
people may not seem particularly noteworthy today; after
were consistent with mainstream European political
all, since the American and French revolutions most mod
thought in his day, which saw the state’s responsibilities as
ern states have advanced far bolder claims to popular sov
highly circumscribed.
ereignty. But considering the time in which it was proposed,
By contrast, Chinese statecraft since the times of Men
more than two millennia ago, this stress on popular sup
cius has envisioned a more proactive role for government
port was truly extraordinary.
which was expected to promote economic welfare and
When we compare the Mencian Mandate of Heaven
security. Such expectations carried important practical con
with a European divine right of kings or a Japanese belief
sequences. As R. Bin Wong observes in his comparison of
in an unbroken imperial line descending from the Sun
European and Chinese state formation, “‘When we turn Goddess, the contrast is stark. In Mencius, royal blood
to issues of material welfare, we find a [Chinese] tradition
did not constitute a continuing basis of political legiti
of intervention in subsistence issues that dwarfs European macy. The Mandate of Heaven was subject to change (tian
government efforts to address the insecurities of agrarian
mingfeichang),23 and required constant renewal through
economies.”” The idea that good governance rests upon popular support. How did one garner such backing? By
guaranteeing the livelihood of ordinary people has been a
behaving benevolently and providing for the people’s live
hallmark of Chinese political philosophy and practice from lihood. The ancient emperors, Mencius noted with nos
Mencius to Mao-and beyond. It is reflected not only in
talgic approval, undertook frequent “tours of inspection”
government pronouncements and policies, but also in grass
for the purpose of ensuring a bountiful harvest: “In the
roots protests-an issue to which I shall return later in spring they examined the plowing, and supplied any defi
this paper.
ciency of seed; in the autumn they examined the reaping,
Another thing that the ancient philosopher Mencius
and supplied any deficiency of yield.”24 Only when the
and the modern revolutionary Mao shared in common,
harvest was secure and the peasantry was satisfied did a
March 2008 1 Vol. 6/No. 1 39
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rti I hinese onceptions of ights”
ruler enjoy the Mandate of Heaven. To neglect the people’s
the Chinese Communist Party were still focusing on work
livelihood was to invite rebellion: “When the hungry go
ers in the cities rather than on the rural peasantry. Based
without food … the people become unruly.”25 The most
upon a 32-day investigation of five counties in his home
important virtue of a ruler was benevolence (ren) or sym
province of Hunan, Mao described his awakening to the
pathy with the plight of the people. If a sovereign failed to
importance of the peasantry. As he wrote:
provide for the well-being of his people, rebellion was the
natural reaction. As Benjamin Schwartz noted, “It is made
amply clear in the Analects and particularly in the Men
cius, that the moral behavior of the masses is dependent
upon their economic welfare.”26
The differences between the Chinese and other impe
rial systems (European as well as Japanese) were signifi
cant, but so too were the differences with many modern
republican political systems. Compare Mencius’ view of
rebellion with that of Thomas Jefferson, for example. Both
Mencius and Jefferson stress the granting or withholding
of popular support, but to very different ends. Jefferson’s
understanding of revolution drew not on the Book of
In a very short time, in China’s central, southern and northern
provinces, several hundred million peasants will rise like a mighty
storm, like a hurricane, a force so swift and violent that no
power, however great, will be able to hold it back. They will
smash all the trammels t…
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