A Study On State Governing Thoughts In Huainanzi

Huai Nan Zi,whose another name is Huai Nan Hong Lie,was compiled during the period between Emperor Han-Jing and Emperor Han-Wu in Western Han Dynasty by Liu-An, King of Huainan and his guests in the kingdom.It assimilated various experiences on managing state affairs in Pre-Qin and early Han Dynasty,trying to probe into the law controlling the natural and the social development ,with its original intention to offer a set of theories for the supreme ruler of the feudal empire of Han Dynasty in running the coutry well and giving the people peace and security in that situation.The book preserves abundant and precious cultural materials,with the contents referring to philosophy, politics, economics, history, astronomy, geography, medicine and so on. The paper tries to elaborate these valuable cultural resources from the standpoint of state governing. The main body is composed of seven parts as follows:The background from which the thoughts on state governing in Huai Nan Zi generated. It was a time when the economy had achieved great progress after a series of reforms by the ruler in early Han Dynasty,when the rulers began to adopt"action"instead of"inaction"as their principle guiding the governing policy,when the scholarship integrated greatly promoted by the liberal policy on culture in early Han Dynasty,which also resulted in the flourishing of the academics,with the Confucianism and Taoism being the two main thoughts.What's more,the cultural qualification of Liu-An and Huai Nan kingdom's advantageous cultural environment also contributed to the thoughts on managing the state affairs.Thoughts on Political Management. This part is a key element of the article, accounting for quite a proportion, mainly discussing the thoughts on making the people to be the essential to the country,including the importance of the people in state govening, benefiting the people and stablizing the people; the thoughts on the governing way of the ruler, including the inaction of the ruler, different ways between the ruler and ministers in governing, the ruler's self-cultivation; the legal thoughts, including the importance of the law, thoughts on legislation and thoughts on law enforcement; the thoughts on personnel appointing, including its pointview on talent, personnel selecting and appointing ;and its conception on a perfect regime form. Thoughts on Economic Management.This part refers to the specific pointviews of Huai Nan Zi in agriculture, industry and commerce and the social distribution .The agriculture-oriented thoughts consist of the importance of agriculture in the economy and the detailed management on agriculture.Thoughts on industry and commerce explain the status of and the managing methods on industry and commerce. Huai Nan Zi's thoery on the social distribution has positive effects.Thoughts on Education. Huai Nan Zi inherited and developed various philosophical thoughts concerning education in Pre-Qin Dynasties and synthesize them into one system to some extent. It embodied the intercomplementarity and conflict between Confucianism and Taoism.This part is divided into the role of education in the society ,the specific thoughts on teaching and learning, and the content of education.Thoughts on Military. Military is an essential part closely related to the success of a state management, which was especially stressed in ancient time. Huai Nan Zi also attaches great importance to its role in state governing, specially explaining it in the piece BingLue. This paper will discuss the military theory from the following three aspects: the pointview on war, the methods on deploying the troops and the qualifications of a good general.Thoughts on Ecological ethics.There are rich thoughts on ecological ethics in Huai Nan Zi,which are valuable and inspiring in today's improving the relations between human and nature and construction of a harmonious ecological environment. The discussion is comprised of four parts:the ecological-wholism, ecological-equality, the"inaction"principle in ecological ethics and ecological protection thoughts.The last parts is the evaluation of the state governing thoughts in Huai Nan Zi,containing its influence in later ages and its value in modern world.Huai Nan Zi has abundant elite thoughts with regard to the management of state affairs and still has value for reference in modren state managing. Furthermore, after a deep discussion and study of the state governing thoughts in Huai Nan Zi,we can also deepen our knowledge in the characteristic synthesization of different schools in the academic development in Han Dynasty.