This paper addresses three interrelated questions about Confucianism in East Asia. First, it qualifies the claim that late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Chinese reforms destroyed Confucianism, arguing instead that while the ideology lost its dominant status, it survived in cultural practice. Second, it compares the impact of Neo-Confucian reforms on women in Chosŏn Korea and Tokugawa Japan, finding that Korean women faced far stricter restrictions while Japanese women gained comparatively broader educational access. Third, it evaluates Herr's contention that a reconstructed Confucian family can support a uniquely East Asian feminist future, concluding that theoretical compatibility is possible but practical outcomes depend heavily on cultural context and women's self-determination.
Although the reforms implemented in China during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries undoubtedly had significant implications for followers of Confucianism and its status as a state ideology, it would be an overstatement to say that those reforms spelled the end of the tradition or that it was completely eradicated. While the followers of Confucianism today represent only a small fraction of the world's total religious community, millions of individuals still follow and practice the teachings of Confucius. With that said, an argument can be made that sometime before this period marked the peak of Confucianism's influence in China, and that its influence plateaued before falling out of favor among the vast majority of Chinese intellectuals. It could therefore be said that Confucianism lost its position as the dominant worldview of the large majority of Chinese citizens as a result of these events. Yet, even despite the evolution of Chinese religious preferences, the impact that Confucianism had on the collective culture can still be felt in many aspects of Chinese society today.
The impact of the Western world's scientific and technological achievements is undoubtedly one of the primary factors in the evolution of Chinese ideology, as China attempted to reconcile new discoveries with age-old traditions. After the Enlightenment, the West developed a largely materialistic worldview that saw nature as a mechanistic system, which in turn led to a range of discoveries concerning the planet's natural phenomena. Chinese thinkers, who wished to absorb some of the scientific progress they were witnessing, sought to merge certain Western ideas within their own cultural identities.
The following passage reflects this intellectual shift:
"The world consists of nothing but actual physical phenomena or concrete things. The Way is the Way (or Ways) of actual phenomena, but one cannot describe the actual phenomena as phenomena of the Way. 'When the Way is nonexistent, so is the actual phenomenon' is something that anyone is capable of saying. But if the phenomenon exists, why worry about its Way not existing? The sage knows what the gentleman does not, and yet ordinary men and women can do what the sage cannot . . . . 'When the actual phenomenon is nonexistent, so is its Way' is something that few people are capable of saying, but it is really and truly so."
— Quanshan yishu, Zhou Yi (Theodore de Bary)
This passage reflects the Chinese desire to move from a worldview centered on supernatural forces toward one that is more mechanical in nature — likely because it was precisely this epistemology that had driven so many discoveries in the West.
By contrast, materialism and Confucianism have been argued to stand in direct opposition to each other. Confucius did not promote materialistic wealth, nor did he promote a materialistic view of nature (Low). Confucius appears to have believed that such views fostered greed and were harmful to society in general. The fundamental human values embedded in Confucian teaching encouraged individuals to work diligently, but also to be prudent and to direct the fruits of their labor toward bettering the family and the community. The Western view, by contrast, encompassed a significant degree of individualistic consideration and competition among members of society — a stance at odds with the collective nature of the Confucian way of life. The individual within the Confucian tradition understood himself or herself solely as a member of a group, following a humanistic approach to ethics that considered the collective well-being of the community and society as a whole. Once Chinese leaders began to aspire to certain components of Western thought that they believed could drive progress, they were essentially compelled to abandon many of the pillars of Confucianism, as the two worldviews proved irreconcilable.
Neo-Confucian ideas were not implemented uniformly across all geographies and cultures. One example of a particularly strict interpretation of Confucian ideas can be found in the Chosŏn dynasty. Virtually all women under Chosŏn Neo-Confucianism were confined to domestic duties; even elite women rarely participated in non-domestic activities (Deuchler). Women were generally not permitted to make their opinions or voices heard beyond the domestic realm, and only a portion of women were literate enough to correspond with people outside the home. This represented a retreat from previous dynasties that had allowed women greater political, economic, and cultural freedoms. Following the injection of Neo-Confucian values into this society, women experienced a range of regressive measures that strictly limited their existence to the familial home and further curtailed their ability to leave that arrangement if they found it unsatisfactory.
Under the Chosŏn system, women were confined to a highly structured patrilineal social order in which they were entirely dependent upon their husbands for their livelihood (Deuchler). The dynasty used various textbooks — such as the Elementary Learning text — to transform the ideologies embedded in the new social norms, and these texts were expanded upon and propagated throughout society so that nearly everyone became familiar with them. They set strict guidelines for the types of relationships considered virtuous within the family, the community, and society at large. Although women often learned to read and write through their families, they were not permitted to display any education beyond the walls of their family homes. The primary wife was tasked with managing the entirety of domestic affairs, the reasoning being that this freed the husband to devote his full attention to matters outside the home.
"Tokugawa women had broader educational access than Korean counterparts"
"Theoretical reconciliation possible but depends on self-determination"
Given the range of different influences that Neo-Confucianism has had on various cultures across East Asia, it is not clear whether every society can successfully reconcile older traditions with new ideologies. It is reasonable to suppose that Confucianism and feminism can be reconciled on a theoretical basis, as some scholars have argued, but the resulting circumstances for women are likely to be largely dependent on each specific culture and its capacity to reform traditions and embrace new ideas. Although Herr argues that these ideologies can be conducive to one another, it is far from certain that they would be in practice.
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