Comparative Study Of Liang Shuming’s And Qian Mu’s Views On Political Meritocracy

Political meritocracy is an important political ideal and practice in traditional Chinese history.Through the continuous extrapolation of ideal politics by Confucians and other traditional scholars,the tradition of political meritocracy,which can be traced back to the abdication system,developed in the pre-Qin period with an emphasis on morality and influenced the morality and mission of the great unified government after the Qin and Han dynasties.With the refinement of the system,political meritocracy developed into the politics of moral and competent people selected through certain institutional ways and procedural norms,so that they could be qualified for politics,assume political responsibilities and achieve the welfare of the people.The principles of political meritocracy can be summarized as follows:first,politics should be led by those who with superior ability and virtue;second,their virtues and abilities should exceed the social average;and third,the scope of virtuous politics includes all systems,organizations,and cultures that select and ensure the leadership of these morally and competently superior people.Zeongit Wong paid attention to the rationalization of the development of ancient China’s political system and the formation of bureaucratic system when sorting out the context of the political meritocracy during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods.However,he did not clearly define the connotation of political meritocracy or expand it into a more representative concept of political history.This paper argues that the traditional interpretation of political meritocracy is not limited to moral connotation,but has three aspects closely related to political society,i.e.,"Jian","Cai","De".In terms of the subject dimension,political meritocracy is the"Jun-Shi-Min" cycle of relief model;the political subject must be in a regulated environment and limited by power.In the institutional dimension,virtuous politics is a collection of the examination system,the admonition system,the education system,and the system must be committed to the selection of virtue.In addition,the political level of meritocracy consideration is supported by the social level of morality and ethics and the cultural level of ritual and music system to ensure the viability of political meritocracy.Despite the decline of the traditional system of political meritocracy,some scholars have always believed in the positive value of advocating political meritocracy and attempted to bring the ideals of meritocracy back into modern politics.As leaders of modern Neo Confucianism,Qian Mu and Liang Shuming are particularly representative among a group of scholars who advocate for political meritocracy.At the beginning of the twentieth century,in the process of studying Western democratic politics,Liang Shuming and Qian Mu chose the path of establishing the state by the ideal of political meritocracy.The special features of Liang Shuming and Qian Mu are the following:First,both Liang Shuming and Qian Mu have a strong tendency toward political meritocracy in their thinking,and they have fused the ideal with Western democracy to open up new ideas,which is especially valuable in the era of the loss of traditional learning and the admiration of Western politics.The existing studies emphasize too much on the old-fashioned side of their thought,and they are mostly from the perspective of Confucian philosophy and culture,but there are few studies on their political thought and they lack the perspective of political meritocracy.Second,Liang Shuming’s and Qian Mu’s ideas on political meritocracy have strong comparative value.In terms of relevance,both of them have inherited some of Sun Yat-sen’s considerations of political meritocracy,and advocate reconciling the spirit of Chinese virtuousness with the spirit of Western democratic politics to develop an ideal Chinese-style democratic politics.In terms of differences,they have different interpretations of tradition,different reconstructions of democracy,and different state-based and social-based approaches.Third,in terms of the feasibility of comparing Liang Shuming and Qian Mu,their similar family heritage,educational backgrounds,and traditional positions provide a good basis for comparative studies,and can reflect the life trajectory and creative thinking of some Chinese intellectuals during the period of dramatic social transformation in the Republic of China.Fourth,in terms of the value of the comparison between Qian Mu and Liang Shuming,the comparative study of the two will fill the lack of a comprehensive and systematic comparison of the two scholars’ thoughts in existing studies.In order to reconstruct political meritocracy,it is necessary to respond to the critique of traditional authoritarianism.Liang Shuming argued that China’s governance was based on rituals,and that Chinese politics was a politics without soldiers,a politics of passivity and inaction.Rather than the dictatorship of the emperor,it was the rule of the people,represented by the sages,who were self-reliant and self-made.Qian Mu reorganized the ancient history of China and put forward a non-authoritarian theory.He argued that the traditional Chinese government was the government of the scholars and the sages,and that Chinese politics was the politics of propriety and trust.They also argued that democratic politics is not about external forms,but about the expression of the democratic spirit.At the cultural level,both of them redefined the spirit of human democracy and thus advocate the political path of reconciling Eastern and the Western ways of democracy.Therefore,Qian Mu proposed that Chinese democratic politics is a kind of "public loyalty and non-partisanship" politics for all people,while Liang Shuming believed that the path of Chinese politics is "majority politics under human rule".In terms of practical solutions,Qian Mu built on Sun Yat-sen’s constitutional line of a five-power constitution,proposed specific measures to improve Western-style elections,and advocated cultivating new scholars through systematic educational reform.Liang Shuming followed Sun Yat-sen’s line of local self-government,and his aim was to build a new society and create a new culture.These improvement measures are still not lacking in realistic concerns.In terms of historical value,this thesis distinguishes between the scope and boundary between imperial dictatorship and political meritocracy;in terms of theoretical value,it supplements the ideal of meritocracy with the concept of democracy;in terms of practical value,it accumulates the experience of practical exploration of the Chinese political path.Liang Shuming’s and Qian Mu’s views on political meritocracy also have many limitations,such as the theoretical ambiguity between political ideals and real practice,the institutional inability to overcome the rigid mechanism of virtuous selection,and the lack of a systematic design for the benign combination of state and society in the path to Chinese-style democracy.Today,even though the tradition of political meritocracy has long since dissipated,the ideal of virtue,with its emphasis on morality and competence,has been inherited and is an important contribution to the development of Chinese democracy,the refinement of mission-oriented political party,and the construction of a new form of human civilization,and is bound to provide useful resources for governance.