Home The vital centre: understanding the concept of Yao 要 in the Han Feizi 韓非子
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

The vital centre: understanding the concept of Yao in the Han Feizi 韓非子

  • Federico Brusadelli ORCID logo EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: April 15, 2021
Become an author with De Gruyter Brill

Abstract

The eighth chapter of the Han Feizi is dedicated to the ways of “wielding power” (揚權). As the entire book attributed to Master Han Fei is arguably dedicated to the problem of power – establishing, exerting and protecting it from external and internal enemies, this section of the book is crucial for the entire text. The present article starts from the term “yao 要” and applies the method of conceptual history to this pre-imperial text. It intends to shed light on the conceptual associations between the survival of the State, the ruler’s position, the importance of a political centre, and the use of objective ruling techniques, within a newly conceived “political sphere” with its own laws and necessities. The paper then addresses the heritage of the Han Feizi to conceptualizations of politics during the imperial period, eventually considering the function of the ruler in Han Fei’s thought.


Corresponding author: Federico Brusadelli, University of Naples “L'Orientale”, Piazza San Domenico Maggiore 12, 80134 Naples, Italy, E-mail:

References

Bostrom, Nick / Yudkowsky, Eliezer (2014): “The ethics of artificial intelligence”. In: The Cambridge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence. Edited by Keith Frankish and William M Ramsey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139046855.020Search in Google Scholar

Burgess, Michael (2006): Comparative Federalism: Theory and Practice. London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203015476Search in Google Scholar

Chong, Kim-chong (2002): “Mengzi and Gaozi on Nei and Wai”. In: Mencius: Contexts and Interpretations. Edited by Alan K. L. Chan. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 103–125.10.1515/9780824863609-007Search in Google Scholar

de Bary, Wm. Theodore / Bloom, Irene (1999): Sources of Chinese Tradition, 2nd ed., vol. 1. New York: Columbia University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Denecke, Wiebke (2010): The Dynamics of Masters Literature. Early Chinese Thought from Confucius to Han Feizi. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center.10.1163/9781684170586Search in Google Scholar

Duindam, Jeroen / Dabringhaus, Sabine (eds) (2014): The Dynastic Centre and the Provinces. Agents and Interactions. Leiden: Brill.10.1163/9789004272095Search in Google Scholar

Esherick, Joseph (1990): Chinese Local Elites and Patterns of Dominance. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Search in Google Scholar

Galvany, Albert (2013): “Beyond the Rule of Rules: The Foundations of Sovereign Power in the Han Feizi”. In: Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei. Edited by Paul R Goldin. Dordrecht: Springer, 87–106.10.1007/978-94-007-4318-2_5Search in Google Scholar

Graham, Angus (1989): Disputers of the Tao: philosophical argument in ancient China. La Salle, IL: Open Court.Search in Google Scholar

Graziani, Romain (2015): “Monarch and Minister: The Problematic Partnership in the Building of Absolute Monarchy in the Han Feizi 韓非子”. In: Ideology of Power and Power of Ideology in Early China. Edited by Yuri Pines, Paul R. Goldin, and Martin Kern. Leiden: Brill, 155–180.10.1163/9789004299337_007Search in Google Scholar

Harris, Eirik Lang (2016): The Shenzi Fragments: A Philosophical Analysis and Translation. New York: Columbia University Press.10.7312/harr17766Search in Google Scholar

Heng, Jiuan (2002): “Understanding Words and Knowing Men”. In: Mencius: Contexts and Interpretations. Edited by Alan K. L. Chan. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 151–168.10.1515/9780824863609-009Search in Google Scholar

Hobbes, Thomas (1655): De Corpore, chapters 1–6. In: Part I of De Corpore, A.P. Martinich (tr.). New York: Abaris Books, 1981.Search in Google Scholar

Houn, Franklin W. (1965): Chinese Political Traditions. Washington DC: Public Affairs Press.Search in Google Scholar

Hui, Victoria Tin-bor (2005): War and State formation in ancient China and early modern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511614545Search in Google Scholar

Hwang, Kyung-Sig (2013): “Moral Luck, Self-Cultivation and Responsibility: the Confucian Conception of Free Will and Determinism”. Philosophy East and West 63.1: 4–16.10.1353/pew.2013.0010Search in Google Scholar

Kim, Youngmin (2018): A history of Chinese political thought. Medford, MA: Polity Press.Search in Google Scholar

Kincaid, John (ed) (2011): Federalism. Volume I: Historical and Theoretical Foundations of Federalism. London: Sage.10.4135/9781446261620Search in Google Scholar

Koselleck, Reinhart (1979): Vergangene Zukunft. Zur Semantik geschichtlicher Zeiten. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.Search in Google Scholar

Lee, Theresa Man Ling (1998): “Local Self-Government in Late Qing: Political Discourse and Moral Reform”. The Review of Politics 60.1: 31–53.10.1017/S0034670500043928Search in Google Scholar

Liao, W.K. (tr.) (1959): The complete works of Han Fei tzŭ: a classic of Chinese political science. 2 vols. London: Arthur Probsthain.Search in Google Scholar

Phillips, Steven (2008): “The Demonization of Federalism in Republican China”. In: Defunct Federalisms. Critical Perspectives on Federal Failures. Edited by Emilian Kavalski and Magdalena Zolkos. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, 87–102.10.4324/9781315576305-7Search in Google Scholar

Pines, Yuri (2013a): “From Historical Evolution to the End of History: Past, Present and Future from Shang Yang to the First Emperor”. In: Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei. Edited by Paul R Goldin. Dordrecht: Springer, 25–46.10.1007/978-94-007-4318-2_2Search in Google Scholar

Pines, Yuri (2013b): “Submerged by Absolute Power: The Ruler’s Predicament in the Han Feizi”. In: Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei. Edited by Paul R Goldin, 67–86. Dordrecht: Springer.10.1007/978-94-007-4318-2_4Search in Google Scholar

Pines, Yuri (2012): The Everlasting Empire: The Political Culture of Ancient China and Its Imperial Legacy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.10.23943/princeton/9780691134956.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Puett, Michael (2001): The Ambivalence of Creation. Debates Concerning Innovation and Artifice in Early China. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Sato, Masayuki (2013): “Did Xunzi’s Theory of Human Nature Provide the Foundation for the Political Thought of Han Fei?”. In: Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei. Edited by Paul R Goldin. Dordrecht: Springer, 147–165.10.1007/978-94-007-4318-2_8Search in Google Scholar

Thompson, P. M. (1979): The Shen-tzu Fragments. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Vogelsang, Kai (2016): “Getting the terms right: Political realism, politics and the State in Ancient China”. Oriens Extremus 55: 39–71.10.13173/OE.55.1.039Search in Google Scholar

Vogelsang, Kai (2012): “Conceptual History: A Short Introduction”. Oriens Extremus 51: 9–24.10.13173/OE.51.1.009Search in Google Scholar

Watson, Burton (tr.) (1964): Han Fei Tzu. Basic Writings. New York: Columbia University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Zhao, Dingxin (2015): The Confucian-Legalist State: A New Theory of Chinese History. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199351732.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Zhou, Zhenhe 周振鹤 (2005): Zhongguo difang xingzheng zhidu shi 中国地方行政制度史. Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe.Search in Google Scholar

Zhu, Xue’en 朱 学 恩 (2010): “Xunzi, Han Feizi shu sixiang bijiao 荀子、韩非子 “术” 思想比较”. Qiushi 求索 08: 131–133.Search in Google Scholar

Received: 2019-10-22
Accepted: 2021-01-04
Published Online: 2021-04-15
Published in Print: 2021-03-26

© 2021 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 11.10.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/asia-2019-0041/html?lang=en
Scroll to top button