Study On Xu Fuguan's Confucian Liberalism

Xu Fuguan(1903-1982)was active in the 20 th century which the tradition culture and modern culture had intense conflict.The first half lifetime's experience in the military and political area and the latter lifetime's academic thought finally formed Xu Fuguan's unique features----"Defend Confucianism in Traditionalism,but criticize political in Liberalism"(Wei Zhengtong).Unlike the Westernized Liberalists who draw ideological resources from western classical liberalism,Xu Fuguan is more concerned with liberalism in western 20 th century,such as Dewey.He believed that political freedom must be based on moral freedom as a fundamental prerequisite.Xu Fuguan's Confucian liberalism thought and widely social action was an important bridge to communicate cultural conservatism and westernized liberalism in the history of Chinese modern thought.Xu Fuguan's primary task of constructing Confucian liberalism was to sort out and clarify the tension and entanglement between Confucianism and autocracy,and to critically combine Confucianism with Western liberalism to form an inclusive thought system.His Confucian liberalism was culturally opposed to individualism and nihilism,advocating cultivating the self for life's value,emphasizing both the individual and the group,and stressing moral and scientific in the same time,which could be summarized in Humanism.In the political perspective,he opposed to autocracy,totalitarian,and political-religious unity,and approved representative democracy as political form,the smallest government to achieve the people's "likes and dislikes" and ultimately achieved social autonomy.In the economic area,opposed to the planned economy and capitalist free economy,and advocated socialism for economic equality and reduced desire to resist material consumption so as to realize conservation of resources and surroundings.Xu Fuguan was not reconciled to“abandon his own family endless wealth for mendicancy from door to door as a poor man”(Wang Yangming),and devoted his life to the self-renewal of traditional Confucianism,the firming of Western liberalism in China and the integration of the two different thought.His Confucian liberalism was based on both traditional Confucianism and Western resources to solve practical problems,so it was difficult to make a simple classification.In particular,the principle of mediation was of great significance to the theoretical exploration and social practice of China's reform,which transcends radicalism and conservatism betweenancient,modern,China and the West to seek for harmonization.