People Logic

Under the guide of historical materialism, this dissertation studies the logic of the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation, including the interior and exterior mechanism. The interior mechanism refers to its emergence, growth and theoretical structure; the exterior mechanism means the cause of its existence, its historical functions, the prerequisite of its being put into practice, the relation between this kind of thoughts and democracy and its realistic significance.The dissertation illustrates that Regarding the People as Foundation has the following meanings. In the first place, the people are the foundation of the country and monarch. In the second place, the country and its monarch should take the people as their foundation.The violent replacement of Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasty made this kind of thoughts grow slowly beside the thoughts of Regarding the God as Foundation as new element which interpreted the political changes, and finally took place of the thoughts of Regarding the God as Foundation and became the mainstream of the political thoughts in ancient China. There are two clues we can pursue for about the growth of the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation. One is the thoughts which regard the people as ends of political measure; the other is the thoughts which regard the people as means of monarch. Though the two thoughts have overlapping parts, the latter is on the whole the mainstream. When the thoughts are analyzed, it is made of one theoretical premise and three compositive parts. This is the theory of four essential factors about the Regarding the People as Foundation. The theoretical premise is the land under heaven should be owned by the people under the heaven. Three parts are that setting up a monarch is for the people, the obligation of a monarch is bringing up the people, and the people are trusted to the rights of revolution when the monarch does not bring up the people. The four aspects are recurrent relation and the premise is the core of the structure.There are mainly two causes why the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation had continually existed in the history of China after it emerged. Firstly, the people is the financial resources of the country. Secondly, peasants' wars made the rulers realize strong capability of the people. It is the secondary cause that this kind of thoughts agrees with the despotic ruling. The thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation have a lot of effects on Chinese history. First of all, it is theoretical weapon of political critique. Then, its practice benefits to the life of the people. Last but not the least, it is the native cultural source that realizes and accepts the democratic thoughts of the West.The necessary condition that put the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation into practice is that there are good emperor and good officials. However, it is very difficult to satisfy the above precondition, which results in the Utopia nature of this thought.From comparative viewpoint, the difference between Chinese and Western political thoughts is the difference between Regarding the People as Foundation and democracy. Why this difference is brought out can be analyzed from two historical phases. At the branching fountainhead, it is main causes that there are different conditions in consanguinity, commerce, ties of geography and social economic condition between China and West. At the consolidating phase after the branching phase, the main causes are different samples of the forms of government, different political thinking and different political practice between Chinese and Western. Even though Regarding the People as Foundation is different from democracy, it contains some democratic elements. Regarding the People as Foundation argues that the people should own some collective rights. These rights include that the people should own and enjoy the land under heaven, the ruler should respect the popular will and the revolutionary right of the people.This dissertation concludes that the load from the Regarding the People as Foundation to democracy is a blind alley, but the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation should be inherited. The most proper position of the thoughts of Regarding the People as Foundation is supplementary of the democratic system. The concrete method of realizing it is in two steps and introducing two things from the West. Two steps are as follows. In the first place, cut the Regarding the People as Foundation and democracy in two. In the next place, put Regarding the People as Foundation in the field of personal understanding. The two sort of introduction are as follows: introduce human rights and the rule of law.