Ji Gang And Fa Du

The characteristics of system thinking in Ye Shi’s political thought have been widely concerned.The existing studies are more general analysis of Ye Shi’s system thinking,without discrimination of the specific meaning of political system.On this basis,this paper divides the political system into two concepts: Ji Gang and Fa Du,and points out that Ye Shi put forward a set of political system theory including system interpretation,system attribution and system reform.Inspired by the methodology of historical contextualism,this paper holds that the political system theory is not only Ye Shi’s response to the reality of Song Dynasty’s accumulated disadvantages,but also the product of his discourse struggle with Neo Confucianism.The first chapter studies Ye Shi’s era from three aspects: political background,social culture and personal life.In the Song Dynasty,Ye Shi’s thoughts were shaped by the weak external and internal political environment.The spiritual outlook of the scholar bureaucrats’ returning to the three generations and taking the world as their own duty and the relatively loose cultural environment,especially the academic tradition of Yongjia school and the sincere demands of Neo Confucianism represented by Chu His became the academic resources for Ye Shi to learn from and talk with.The experience of Ye Shi’s study and official career indicates that the political system theory can be divided into three stages: germination,maturity and decline.The second chapter combs the main contents of Ye Shi’s political system theory from three aspects:system interpretation,system attribution and system reform.As two different levels of institutional provisions,Ji Gang and Fa Du have the property of gain and loss,and play an important role in social and political life.The institutional root of the internal and external troubles in Song Dynasty lies in the over-specialized-Ji Gang and the over-dense-Fa Du.The way to rectify the deviation is to follow the basic principles of drawing lessons from the ancient system,profit and loss according to the time,and to adopt the reform plan of emphasizing power and decentralization,and simplifying Fa Du.The third chapter evaluates Ye Shi’s political system theory.On the one hand,Ye Shi’s political system theory has the unique contribution of enriching the thought of ching-shih,establishing the system based thinking of Shigong school and raising the thoughts of later generations in the history of Chinese traditional political thought.It can start a dialogue with the new institutional politics and help the political development and state governance at present.On the other hand,Ye Shi’s political system theory is deeply bound by the autocratic monarchy,and his reform proposals are unrealistic and utopian.Taking Ye Shi’s political system theory as the starting point,we can get some experience in studying the history of Chinese political thought.