Tasan Lecture #1: The Ecological Turn in New Confucian Humanism

By Tu Weiming

Citation: The Tasan Lectures, Korea, November 2001.

For the continued existence of the human species, in principle and practice, a fundamental reformation of our relationship to nature is critical. This reformulation will require the selective retrieval and discerning reappropriation of the spiritual resources of the world’s religious traditions. Such a process of retrieval and reappropriation may result, in the renewal of the tradition itself. Historically vibrant religious traditions have always undergone major changes over time, often as the unintended consequences of economic, political, social, and cultural influences. Today virtually all axial-age civilizations are going through their own distinctive forms of transformation in response to the multiple challenges of modernity. (1) One of the most crucial questions they face is what wisdom they can offer to reorient the developmental trajectory of the modern world in light of the growing environmental crisis.

The role of China and the Confucian tradition will be especially significant in this reorientation because of the size of China’s population and the scale of her current efforts at modernization. A radical rethinking of Confucian humanism occurred in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when China was engulfed in an unprecedented radical social disintegration as the result of foreign invasion and domestic dissension. In the late 20th century this reformulation continued in the New Confucian movement led by concerned intellectuals, some of who left Mainland China for Taiwan and Hong Kong when Communism was established as the ruling ideology in the People’s Republic in 1949.

An intriguing phenomenon has taken place among these intellectuals in the last twenty-five years. Three leading New Confucian thinkers in Taiwan, Mainland China, and Hong Kong independently concluded that the most significant contribution the Confucian tradition can offer the global community is the idea of the “unity of Heaven and Humanity” (tianrenheyi). This idea embraces not only Heaven and Humanity but also the great triadic unity of Heaven, Earth and Humanity as a distinguishing feature of Confucian thought. I have described this vision as an anthropocosmic worldview, where the human is embedded in the cosmic order rather than the anthropocentric assertion that the human is alienated, either by choice or by default, from the natural world. (2) By identifying the comprehensive unity of Heaven, Earth and Humanity as a critical contribution to the modern world, these three key figures in New Confucian thought signal the movement toward both retrieval and reappropriation of Confucian thought.

As retrieval this anthropocosmic worldview denotes a religious counterpoint to the secular humanism of contemporary China by highlighting the mutuality of Heaven and Humanity. As reappropriation, it marks an ecological turn by emphasizing reciprocity with the earth. The three key New Confucian thinkers, speaking as public intellectuals concerned for the direction of the modern world, articulated this idea of unity, mutuality, and reciprocity in distinctive ways.

Qian Mu (1895-1990) in Taiwan characterized his understanding of this precept as the mutuality between the human heart-mind and the Way of Heaven. (3) Tang Junyi (1909-1978) of Hong Kong emphasized “immanent transcendence,” meaning that since Heaven confers our nature, we can apprehend the Mandate of Heaven by understanding our heart-and-mind; thus, the transcendence of Heaven is immanent in the communal and critical self-consciousness of human beings as a whole. (4) Similarly, Feng Youlan (1895-1990) of Beijing rejected his previous commitment to the Marxist notion of struggle and stressed the value of harmony not only in the human world, but also in the relationship between humans and nature. (5) Since all three of them articulated their final positions toward the end of their lives, the unity of Heaven, Earth, and Humanity symbolizes the wisdom of these elders and public intellectuals in the Sinic world. I would like to suggest that this marks an ecological turn in contemporary New Confucianism that is profoundly meaningful for China and the world.

An Ecological Turn

Qian Mu called this new realization a major breakthrough in his thinking. When his wife and students raised doubts about the newness of this insight—the idea of unity between Heaven and Humanity is centuries old—Qian, already in his nineties, emphatically responded that his understanding was not a reiteration of conventional wisdom but a personal enlightenment, thoroughly original and totally novel. (6) However, since he never showed any strong interest in Confucian metaphysics, his fascination with the idea of mutuality between the human heart-and-mind and the Way of Heaven, and his assertion that this idea is a unique Chinese contribution to the world, attracted the attention of several leading intellectuals in cultural China. (7)

Tang Junyi, on the other hand, presented his view from a comparative civilizational perspective. He contrasted Confucian self-cultivation with Greek, Christian, and Buddhist spiritual exercises, and concluded that Confucianism’s commitment to the world combined with its profound reverence for Heaven offered a unique contribution to human flourishing in the modern world. The Confucian worldview, rooted in earth, body, family, and community, is not “adjustment to the world,” (8) submission to the status quo, or passive acceptance of the physical, biological, social and political constraints of the human condition. Rather, it is dictated by an ethic of responsibility informed by a transcendent vision. We do not become “spiritual” by departing from or transcending above our earth, body, family, and community, but by working through them. Indeed, our daily life is not merely secular but a response to a cosmological decree. Since the Mandate of Heaven that enjoins us to take part in the great enterprise of cosmic transformation is implicit in our nature, we are Heaven’s partners. In Tang’s graphic description, the ultimate meaning of being human is enabling the “Heavenly virtue” (tiande) to flow through us. His project of reconstructing the secular humanist spirit is, therefore, predicated on an anthropocosmic vision. (9)

Feng’s radical reversal of his earlier position is an implicit critique of Mao Zedong’s thoughts on struggle and the human capacity to conquer nature. His return to the philosophy of harmony of Zhang Zai (1020-1077) signaled a departure from his Marxist phase and a re-presentation of his Confucian ideas in the 1940s prior to the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The opening lines in Zhang Zai’s “Western Inscription” state:

Heaven is my father and Earth is my mother, and even such a small creature as I finds an intimate place in their midst.

Therefore that which fills the universe I regard as my body and that which directs the universe I consider as my nature.

All people are my brothers and sisters, and all things are my companions. (10)

The “Western Inscription” can be regarded as a core Neo-Confucian text in articulating the anthropocosmic vision of the unity of Heaven, Earth, and Humanity. Accordingly, Feng characterizes the highest stage of human self-realization as the embodiment of the “spirit of Heaven and Earth.” (11)

On the surface, Qian, Tang and Feng’s ecological turn was an attempt to make the “local knowledge” of New Confucian humanism universally significant by retrieving the spiritual resources of the classical and the Neo-Confucian heritages. Their efforts to employ Confucian ideas to enunciate their final positions seem no more than personal choices for their own distinctive styles of philosophizing. Yet, they were obviously convinced that their cherished tradition had a message for the emerging global village; they delivered it in the most appropriate way they knew. Their use of a prophetic voice suggests that their Confucian message was addressed not only to a Chinese audience but also to the human community as a whole. They did not wish merely to honor their ancestors but also to show that they cared for the well being of future generations. As such they were not only retrieving the tradition, but also reappropriating it for contemporary circumstances.

What was the ethos of cultural China when they encountered the ecological issue? Were they even conscious of the ecological implications of their final positions? Surely, Taiwan, Hong Kong and, later, Mainland China were all involved in the restless march toward Western-style modernity. Modernization was the most powerful ideology in cultural China. The brave new world of industrialization so seriously challenged China’s traditional agriculture-based economy, family-centered social structure and paternalist government that its ascendancy sealed the fate of Confucianism as no longer relevant to the vital concerns of the contemporary world. (12) Perhaps Qian, Tang and Feng were nostalgic for the kind of “universal brotherhood” or “unity of all things” that Max Weber and others have long critiqued as outmoded in our disenchanted modern world. However, while longing for a lost world (traces of romantic sentiment can be seen in their writings), they discovered a new vitality and a persuasive power in the tradition. An appreciation of this renewed sense of intellectual creativity merits a reminder of the nature of the broad historical context in which these public intellectuals formulated their ideas.

Holistic Confucian Humanism

Prior to the impact of the modern West, Confucian humanism was the defining characteristic of political ideology, social ethics and family values in East Asia. Since the East Asian educated elite were all seasoned in the Confucian classics, what the three contemporary thinkers advocated as a unique Confucian contribution to the human community was, in fact, the shared spiritual orientation of scholars and officials as well as the populace of China, Vietnam, Korea, and Japan in the pre-modern period. Of course, specifying the salient features of this shared spiritual orientation is not a simple matter. Regional, class, gender, and ethnic differences have led to conflicts of interpretation not unlike the differences to be found in the world’s religions. The famous “eight steps” in the first chapter of the Great Learning provide a glimpse of what Confucian humanism purported to be:

The ancients who wished to illuminate their ‘illuminating virtue’ to all under Heaven first governed their states. Wishing to govern their states, they first regulated their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they first cultivated their personal lives. Wishing to cultivate their personal lives, they first rectified their hearts and minds. Wishing to rectify their hearts and minds, they first authenticated their intentions. Wishing to authenticate their intentions, they first refined their knowledge. The refinement of knowledge lay in the study of things. For only when things are studied is knowledge refined; only when knowledge is refined are intentions authentic; only when intentions are authentic are hearts and minds rectified; only when hearts and minds are rectified are personal lives cultivated; only when personal lives are cultivated are families regulated; only when families are regulated are states governed; only when states are governed is there peace all under Heaven. Therefore, from the Son of Heaven to the common people, all, without exception, must take self-cultivation as the root. (13)

This holistic vision of a peaceful world rests on a carefully integrated program of personal self-cultivation, harmonized family life, and well-ordered states. At the heart of this interconnected program is an embedded sense of home that implies not only the human community, but also the natural world and the larger cosmos. Speaking directly to this passage, Wm. Theodore de Bary observed, “Chinese and Confucian culture, traditionally, was about settled communities living on the land, nourishing themselves and the land. It is this natural, organic process that Confucian self-cultivation draws upon for all its analogies and metaphors.” (14) He noted that the farmer poet, Wendell Berry, made the Confucian point: “(H)ome and family are central, and we cannot hope to do anything about the environment that does not first establish the home—not just the self and family —as the home base for our efforts.” De Bary concluded that:

If we have to live in a much larger world, because ecological problems can only be managed on a global scale, the infrastructure between home locality and state (national or international) is also vital. But without home, we have nothing for the infrastructure, much less the superstructure, to rest on. This is the message of Wendell Berry; and also the lesson of Confucian and Chinese history. (15)

Underlying this prospect of human flourishing, from self-cultivation to universal peace, is a worldview that entails an overall vision of the proper niche of the human in the cosmos. The idea of home, in this sense, is expanded beyond the local community. The human, so conceived, is an active participant in the cosmic process with the responsibility of care for the environment. Thus in the classical period of Confucianism we see a holistic humanism expressed in the Great Learning. Furthermore, an environmental perspective implicit in the Great Learning is explicitly articulated in other core Confucian texts. A statement in the Doctrine of the Mean succinctly captures the essence of this cosmological thinking:

Only those who are the most sincere (authentic, true and real) can fully realize their own nature. If they can fully realize their own nature, they can fully realize human nature. If they can fully realize human nature, they can fully realize the nature of things. If they can fully realize the nature of things, they can take part in the transforming and nourishing process of Heaven and earth. If they can take part in the transforming and nourishing process of Heaven and earth, they can form a trinity with Heaven and earth. (16)

Obviously, this idea of the interrelation of Heaven, earth, and humans was precisely what the three thinkers had in mind in stressing the centrality of the precept of “the unity of Heaven and Humanity,” although for more than a century it had been totally relegated to the background as an archaic irrelevance in cultural China. The excitement of rediscovering of this central Confucian precept was a poignant reminder of how much had already been lost and how difficult it was to retrieve the elements that remained significant. What had caused this loss of the tradition?

The Secularization of Confucian Humanism

Although the fate of Confucian China since the Opium War of 1839 has been well documented, the story of the modern transformation of Confucian humanism has yet to be told. In the period between the Opium War and the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, Chinese society was afflicted with at least one major destructive event every decade: the Taiping Rebellion, the unequal treaties, the Western encroachment, the Sino-Japanese War of 1895, the Boxer uprising, the 1911 Revolution, the internecine conflicts among the warlords, Japanese aggression, and the struggle between the Communists and the Nationalists. Since 1949, until the “reform and open” policy was put into practice in 1979, Chinese society was subjected to profoundly disruptive campaigns approximately every five years: the Korean War, the Great Leap Forward, the campaign for Collectivization, and the Cultural Revolution, just to mention a few.

The highly politicized and ideologized master narrative about modern China’s restless landscape is the story of the decline of the Middle Kingdom, principally due to Western imperialism, and of the Chinese people’s struggle, against overwhelming odds, to regain their independence. It is the story of China’s tortuous road toward modernization. The introduction of Marxism-Leninism, the emergence of the Chinese Communist Party and the rise of Mao Zedong as a revolutionary leader are integral parts of the narrative. For Confucian humanism, the single most critical event was the intellectual ferment of the 1919 May Fourth Movement. The iconoclastic attack on Confucianism, an aspect of the May Fourth ethos, was explained in simplistic utilitarian terms: in order to save the nation it is imperative that we transcend our “feudal past” to learn from the modern West. The sole criterion for judging the value of Confucianism was its compatibility with modernization as defined by Western values. It was the modernist turn that definitively restructured Confucian humanism toward a secular humanism. Certainly, ecological concerns were not on the agenda.

Some scholars have noticed the paradox embedded in the May Fourth approach to national crisis. The intellectuals’ total denial of the Confucian tradition and their thorough commitment to the well being of China as a civilization-state compelled them to find a new cultural identity and to reject the stream of thought that had for centuries defined Chinese polity and society. (17) Although a group of sophisticated intellectuals tried to tap the rich resources of non-Confucian traditions, such as Moism, Legalism, Daoism, and folk religions, to formulate new visions of being Chinese, the scholarly community’s tendency was to equate modernization with Westernization. As a result, Confucian humanism lost much of its persuasive power. The courage to transcend the “feudal past” was considered imperative for China to emerge as an independent nation. Ironically, nationalism was the motivating force for China’s intellectual elite to reject Confucian humanism and adopt the Enlightenment values of the modern West. While wholesale Westernization was no more than a radical slogan, the Chinese perception of the Western source of wealth and power became the guiding principle for action.

Science and democracy were widely accepted as the most effective Western formulas for transforming China into a modern nation. It was not the search for truth or the dignity of the individual that prompted Chinese intellectuals to embrace them. Intent, rather, on making China wealthy and strong, scientism and populism were promoted as instruments of nation building. They were techniques for the mass mobilization of material and human resources, necessary, many people felt, for China to rise again as a unified nation. The overall ethos was shaped by materialism, progressivism, utilitarianism, and instrumentalism. The Enlightenment mentality as a form of secular humanism was adopted primarily as an ideology for survival.

Under the shadow of the “feudal past,” the New Confucians of the May Fourth generation stringently criticized Confucian practices deemed contradictory to the modern spirit. The Confucian ideology that asserted the authority of the ruler over minister, father over son, and husband over wife (the so-called “three bonds”) was demolished. Instead, the five relationships based on mutual exhortation—affection between parent and child, rightness between ruler and minister, orderliness between older and younger siblings, division of labor between husband and wife, and trust among friends — were critically analyzed in a new context. While the need for differentiation was obvious, social ethics predicated on hierarchy, status, gender, and age were severely scrutinized. Even family values were thoroughly reexamined. The widely held though naive belief that family is always congenial to wholesome self-development was seriously questioned. Arbitrary authority based on age, gender and status was rejected. Any assertion, even statements in the classics, which evoked sentiments of authoritarianism, male chauvinism or hierarchical mechanisms of control, was denounced. The viciousness with which Chinese intellectuals, including the New Confucians, deconstructed the Confucian heritage was unprecedented in Chinese intellectual history, perhaps unprecedented in world history.

Critical Voices for an Ecological Turn: New Confucians and the Earth Charter

Both from within the Confucian tradition and from without, critical voices have emerged regarding the dominating Enlightenment vision of secularization, rationalization, progress and development at any cost. Even at the height of the May Fourth generation’s obsession with Westernization as modernization, some of the most original-minded New Confucians had already begun to question the individualistic worldview and utilitarian ethics implicit in the Enlightenment project. Their views are profoundly meaningful for the Confucian ecological turn. Two key examples are Xiong Shili (1883-1968), who articulated a compelling naturalistic vitalism, and Liang Shuming (1893-1988), who called for restraint and moderation in using natural resources. Xiong Shili reconfigured Confucian metaphysics through a critical analysis of the basic motifs of the Consciousness-Only school of Buddhism. He insisted that the Confucian idea of the “great transformation” (dahua) is predicated on the participation of the human in cosmic processes, rather than the imposition of human will on nature. He further observed that as a continuously evolving species, human beings are not created apart from nature but emerge as an integral part of the primordial forces of production and reproduction. The vitality that engenders human creativity is the same energy that gives rise to mountains, rivers, and the great earth. There is consanguinity between us and Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things. Since his naturalistic vitalism is based on the Book of Change and some Neo-Confucian writings, the ethic of forming one body with nature looms large in his moral idealism. (18)

In yet another case, Liang Shuming characterized the Confucian life-orientation as a balance between detachment from and aggression toward nature. Although he conceded that China had to learn from the West to enhance her competitive fitness for the sake of national survival, he prophesized that in the long run the Indian spirit of renunciation would prevail. (19) Liang may have anticipated Toynbee’s ethical recommendation toward the end of his life:

According to Toynbee, the twentieth century’s intoxication with technology has led to the poisoning of our environment and has created the possibility that humanity may destroy itself. He believes that any solution to the current crisis depends on self-control. Mastery of the self, however, cannot be achieved through either extreme self-indulgence or extreme asceticism. The people of the twenty-first century must learn to walk the middle path, the way of moderation. (20)

While Liang merely hinted at the possibility of alternative visions of human development, his comparative civilizational inquiry generated a strong current in reevaluating and revitalizing Confucianism at a moment when Westernization dominated the Chinese intellectual scene.

The distinctive contributions of these two thinkers are critical to the ecological turn of Confucianism. Xiong highlights the naturalistic vitalism of the tradition from its classical expression in the Book of Change to its Neo-Confucian articulation in the notion of the fecundity of life (sheng-sheng). Liang maintains that long-term human survival depends on the practice of moderation, a hallmark of Confucian cultivation in attaining balance, harmony, and equilibrium. Thus Xiong and Liang observe that the vitality of natural processes must be respected and preserved through restraint.

However, neither Xiong nor Liang was able to sustain an argument in favor of a non-anthropocentric, not to mention eco-friendly, ethic. The modernist trajectory was so powerful that Confucian humanism was profoundly reconfigured toward a secular humanism. The rules of the game determining the relevance of Confucianism to China’s modern transformation were changed so remarkably that attempts to present a Confucian idea for its own sake were largely ignored outside a small coterie of ivory tower academicians. Thus the goals of modernization and economic development overrode broader humanistic and communitarian concerns.

As Amartya Sen and others have noted, however, it has become clear that the modernization process, used simply for utilitarian ends of development, is insufficient for the full range of human flourishing. (21) Instead, there is a broader understanding emerging that development must include not only economic indicators but consider human well-being, environmental protection, and spiritual growth as well. To this end, there is a growing awareness in the world community of the need for a more comprehensive global ethic for sustainable development. (22) This coalesced in the Earth Charter that was developed over the last decade since the United Nations Earth Summit was held in Rio in 1992. (23) An international committee spent three years drafting the Charter before its formal release by the Earth Charter Commission at a meeting in Paris in 2000. Hundreds of consultations were held with organizations and individuals throughout the world to insure that it would be an inclusive people’s charter. The Charter sets forth principles for ecological integrity, social and economic justice, democracy, nonviolence and peace. When measured against these principles of a global ethic for sustainability, a narrowly conceived modernization process such as China’s is inadequate. This critique is an important external counterpoint to modernization within an Enlightenment framework of instrumental rationality.

If China’s modernist project had followed the democratic ideal of building a society that is “just, participatory, sustainable, and peaceful,” (24) as formulated in the Earth Charter, it could have had a salutary effect on China’s overall conception of development. A counterfactual exercise is in order. Surely the global issues mentioned in the Earth Charter are far from being resolved in the modern West, but had they been put on the national agenda for discussion in China, the Chinese intellectual ethos could have been much more congenial to the culture of peace and environmental ethics. After all, “eradicating poverty as an ethical, social, and environmental imperative” (25) and promoting human flourishing as well as material progress are both socialist and Confucian ideals. Although “upholding the right of all, without discrimination, to a natural and social environment supportive of human dignity, bodily health, and spiritual well-being” (26) may appear to be a lofty goal, it is compatible with the Chinese notion of realizing the whole person. Furthermore, “affirming gender equality and equity as prerequisites to sustainable development” and “ensuring universal access to education, health care, and economic opportunity” (27) are clearly recognized modern Chinese aspirations. The traditional Confucian sense of economic equality, social conscience, and political responsibility could have been relevant to and significant for debate and conversation on these vitally important matters. The cost of the secularization of Confucian humanism was high. The single-minded commitment to progress defined in materialist terms has substantially confined the scope of the national agenda to wealth and power. As China completely turned her back on her indigenous resources for self-realization, she embarked on a course of action detrimental to her soul and her long-term self-interest.

The Confucian Revival as a Modernist Ideology

The revival of Confucianism since the end of the Second World War, first in industrial East Asia and, more recently, in socialist East Asia, seems to suggest, on the surface, that the tradition has been modernized for certain political and economic ends. Actually, some of the most brilliant Confucian thinkers were instrumental in transforming the tradition from an agrarian mode of thinking to an ethic congenial to an industrial, cosmopolitan society. While China was going through major turmoil in the last five decades, the neighboring countries were not adversely affected. Moreover, industrial East Asia (Japan and the Four Mini-Dragons) achieved spectacular economic growth. (28) For years, Confucianism enjoyed state sponsorship in the three Mini-Dragons, namely, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore. The fourth Mini-Dragon, Hong Kong, followed a largely western capitalist mode of development under British rule. If Confucianism has survived as a political ideology in industrial East Asia, it seems to have transcended its “feudal past” and become a viable tradition shaping East Asian modernity. (29)

Initially, Mainland China, under the influence of Maoism, was openly hostile to Confucian theory and practice. Yet, Confucian ideals manifested as the habits of the heart have been pervasive in all walks of life, especially among the workers, farmers and soldiers in the People’s Republic. In the last decade, there has been something of a revival of Confucianism across East Asia. Socialist East Asia (China, Vietnam and North Korea), challenged by industrial East Asia, has taken a more positive attitude toward its Confucian roots. North Korea has thoroughly politicized Confucian ideas for her cult of the “great leader” personality and family values. Vietnam has begun to retrieve her Confucian cultural resources. Even the Beijing government is now actively promoting Confucian ethics. Unfortunately, the Confucian Way that has been inherited is at best a mixed blessing.

The Confucian ethics that have emerged in socialist East Asia, under the influence of the modernist ethos, is often a confirmation, rather than a critique, of the Enlightenment mentality. Because it takes instrumental rationality as its modus operandi, its precepts can be easily co-opted by deft social engineering as a mechanism of control. Scientism is the basic life-orientation and religion is equated with backwardness. This rationalist and scientistic ethos is thoroughly anthropocentric. Successful nation building requires the accumulation of economic capital, enhancement of technical competence, upgrading of cognitive intelligence, and improvement of material conditions. On the other hand, little attention is paid to the long-term significance of social capital, cultural competence, ethical intelligence, spiritual values, and ecological ethics. The strong preference for technological solutions to well-defined problems and the pervasive influence of the technocratic mindset means that non-quantifiable issues are often totally ignored or inadequately understood. As a result, ecology and religion are seriously misunderstood. The gigantic hydraulic project of the Three Gorges on the Yangtze River is an obvious example. This massive damming project has leveled local communities and historical sites, as well as compromised the ecological areas it affects. However, little sensitive consideration has been given to these effects. Even when major international groups withdrew their support, the government persisted in its single-minded development regardless of the long-term cost to people and the environment.

The promotion of Confucianism as mere secular humanism is unfortunate because its rich resources for developing a truly ecumenical worldview and global ethic will not be tapped. Instead, a narrowly defined notion of progress, rather than the broad agenda for human flourishing, will be underscored. Confucian humanism is not secular humanism; as an anthropocosmic vision, it emphatically rejects anthropocentrism as an impoverished idea of humanity. Yet a simple retrieval of the anthropocosmic vision is also insufficient. It needs to be reappropriated with sensitivity to its potential ideological uses. For example, Confucians insist that we begin our journey of self-realization with the acknowledgement that we are concrete living human beings embedded in the world here and now. While this positive attitude towards the world enables us to appreciate our natural and social environment as an inseparable dimension of our humanity, it may predispose us to accept the status quo as intrinsically reasonable. The danger of abusing the reconstructed Confucian values as a neo-authoritarian justification for domination is ever-present.

Asian (Confucian) values have been enthusiastically promoted as positive factors in economic growth, political stability and social cohesiveness. Self-discipline, duty-consciousness, diligence, frugality, networking, cooperation, consensus-formation, and harmony are identified as salient features of Confucian economic and political culture. At this critical juncture in Chinese history these values might be considered more relevant for nation building than are exclusive concerns for liberty, rights and individual autonomy. The Asian values discussion, as a critique of the human rights rhetoric, is itself a reflection of the Enlightenment mentality that promoted the values of anthropocentrism, social engineering, progressivism, scientism, and instrumental rationality. As long as the reconstructed Confucian humanism is incorporated into the discourse on modernity, its anthropocosmic insight is lost and its possibility for promoting “a holistic, non-anthropocentric, egalitarian, eco-friendly worldview respectful of nature and compassionate to all forms of life” (30) is also diminished.

Humanity as Comprehensive Sensitivity, Sympathy, and Empathy

What Qian Mu, Tang Junyi, and Feng Youlan offered is a new horizon, a presentation of cosmological Confucian humanism as comprehensive sensitivity, sympathy, and empathy. Whether or not they consciously propounded their thoughts as a critique of the Enlightenment mentality and, by implication, the discourse on modernity, their new horizon nevertheless extended beyond aggressive anthropocentrism and instrumental rationality. Furthermore, they presented an inclusive cosmological and humanist vision by transcending an “either/or” mode of thinking. This represents a retrieval and reappropriation of core values of the tradition—a non-dualistic understanding of the continuity of heaven, earth, and humanity.

The exclusive dichotomies — spirit/matter, mind/body, sacred/profane, and subject/object — characteristic of modern consciousness working directly out of the Enlightenment are in sharp contrast with the Confucian preference for the “nuanced between” (31) in interconnected binary structures. In the Confucian tradition, such categories as root/branch, surface/depth, former/latter, above/below, beginning/end, part/whole, and inner/outer are employed to indicate interaction, interchange, interdependence, and mutuality. The earth-human relationship, viewed in this perspective, is organically intertwined. Earth is not a material object “out there” but something with which we form one body. Earth is not merely our habitat but our home, not merely a “collection of objects” but a “communion of subjects” linked to our very nature through vital energy (qi). (32) Thus, because we are one body with the earth, the human, for spiritual self-realization, should become not only a caretaker of nature but also a dynamic co-creator with nature in an aesthetic, ethical, and religious sense.

The challenge raised by the Earth Charter is how to “respect Earth and life in all its diversity,” “care for the community of life with understanding, compassion, and love,” and “secure Earth’s bounty and beauty for present and future generations”. (33) For one thing, we must transcend the view that earth is profane matter, a soulless object, and a spiritless body. As the Charter says, “humanity is part of a vast evolving universe. Earth, our home, is alive with a unique community of life.” For the Confucians this is expressed as consanguinity between the earth and ourselves, because we have evolved from the same vital energy that makes stones, plants, and animals integral parts of the cosmic transformation. We live with reverence and a sense of awe for the fecundity and creativity of nature as we open our eyes to what is near at hand:

The heaven now before us is only this bright, shining mass; but when viewed in its unlimited extent, the sun, moon, stars, and constellations are suspended in it and all things are covered by it. The earth before us is but a handful of soil; but in its breadth and depth, it sustains mountains like Hua and Yüeh without feeling their weight, contains the rivers and seas without letting them leak away, and sustains all things. The mountain before us is only a fistful of straw; but in all the vastness of its size, grass and trees grow upon it, birds and beasts dwell on it, and stores of precious things (minerals) are discovered in it. The water before us is but a spoonful of liquid, but in all its unfathomable depth, the monsters, dragons, fishes, and turtles are produced in it, and wealth becomes abundant because of it. (34)

This magnificent display of fecundity and creativity in nature is readily visible, but, only through depth of self-knowledge, can we fully appreciate our place in it and our learned capacity for spiritual communion with it. This is the comprehensive vision of cosmological Confucianism.

As the Earth Charter notes, the recognition that “earth, our home, is alive” and dynamically evolving encourages us to protect “earth’s vitality, diversity, and beauty” as “a sacred trust.” (35) However, our ability to build global security as the basis for a wholesome human-earth relationship has been significantly undermined by the dominant patterns of development in the world today. Despite quantifiable economic progress, injustice, inequality, poverty, and violence remain widespread. China, burdened by a huge population, is particularly apprehensive of her diminishing consumable resources. How can China become a responsible member of the world community without losing sight of her local communities’ basic needs?

China, in her quest for modernity, is aware of the need to embrace Enlightenment values, such as liberty, rationality, rule of law, human rights, and the dignity of the individual. However, it is imperative that she retrieve and reappropriate her indigenous resources to strengthen salient features of Confucian ethics: distributive justice, sympathy, civility, responsibility, human-relatedness, and anthropocosmic connectivity. Otherwise, she will find it difficult to enter the dialogue among civilizations and actively participate in exploring the possibilities of “a global civil society,” (36) such as the Earth Charter encourages. Fundamental changes in her behavior, attitude, and belief, conditioned by instrumental rationality and anthropocentrism, are required before she can make positive contributions, as the Charter proposes, to “a shared vision of basic values to provide an ethical foundation for the merging world community.” (37) For China to develop a sound environmental ethic, it is essential that she nurture a culture of peace and promot social and economic justice.

Strictly speaking, Qian, Tang, and Feng were not ecological thinkers. However, implicit in their concern for the future of China as a civilization rooted in the spirituality of the Confucian humanist tradition is a cultural message with ethical and religious implications profoundly meaningful for human-earth relations. Concretely, they identified the defining characteristic of humanity as sensitivity, sympathy, and empathy. A unique feature of being human is the ability to commiserate with all modalities of being in the universe through loving care. Qian believed that this tender-minded approach, a kind of soft power, delicately maintaining balance and equilibrium in polity and society, was indispensable for China’s longevity as a civilization. (38) Tang, in his exploration of the core values in Chinese philosophy, suggested that the Confucian focus on humanity that entails a warm heart and a brilliant mind, rather than the exclusive concern for rationality, may have helped to develop an all-encompassing humanist vision. (39) Feng was particularly fascinated by Zhang Zai’s four-sentence articulation of the Confucian ideal of human responsibility:

To establish the heart for Heaven and Earth
To establish the destiny for all people
To transmit the interrupted learning of the former sages
To bring about peace and harmony for ten thousand generation (40)

The heart of Heaven and Earth, the destiny of all people, sagely learning, and perpetual universal peace constitute, in time and space, the full distinctiveness of being human. In Feng’s words, “the spirit of Heaven and Earth” symbolizes the highest human aspiration. (41)

Surely, the myth of China as a culture of peace has been thoroughly deconstructed and the idea that Sinicization implies acculturation and moral persuasion is heatedly contested in the scholarly community. China, as one of the oldest continuous civilizations, has experienced more dramatic ruptures in thought and institutions than most other civilizations in recent history. Collective amnesia, rather than historical consciousness, is prevalent in modern Chinese intellectual discourse. China may evoke images of longevity, stability, endurance, and even unchanging permanence, but in reality it is a restless landscape, constantly changing, reconfiguring, and restructuring. Nevertheless, as Tang noted, the New Confucian reconstruction of the humanist spirit, as a response to the contemporary scene, is not an attempt to mythologize China’s past but an effort to imagine what China can become. (42) Qian, Tang, and Feng believed that humanity has comprehensive sensitivity, sympathy, and empathy and thus is capable of forming one body with all things. This is not merely a Confucian ideal but also a moral imperative for the global community.

Wang Yangming’s Cosmological Confucianism: Forming One Body with all Things

Wang Yangming’s (1472-1529) “Inquiry on the Great Learning” offers an elegantly simple interpretation of this idea in Neo-Confucian thought:

The great man regards Heaven and Earth and the myriad things as one body. He regards the world as one family and the country as one person. As to those who make a cleavage between objects and distinguish between self and others, they are small men. That the great man can regard Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things as one body is not because he deliberately wants to do so, but because it is natural to the humane nature of his mind that he do so. (43)

By emphasizing the “humane nature of the mind” as the reason that the great person can embody the universe in his sensitivity, Wang made the ontological assertion that the ability to strike a sympathetic resonance with Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things is a defining characteristic of being human. Even ordinary people are capable of realizing such a seemingly lofty ideal. Since the Chinese word xin entails both the cognitive and affective dimensions, it is often rendered as heart or, better, heart-and-mind. Inherent in the human heart-and-mind is this limitless sensitivity that enables us to be receptive and responsive to all modalities of being in the universe—a blade of grass or a distant star. The great person who possesses this magnificently expansive sense of inter-connectedness does not achieve it through deliberate mental exercise or artificial physical endeavor. Moreover, our limited capacity to do so is primarily because we have neglected to appeal to the sensitivity of the heart-and-mind in our endowed nature.

To demonstrate that this is indeed the case, Wang offered a series of concrete examples:

When we see a child about to fall into the well, we cannot help a feeling of alarm and commiseration. This shows that our humanity (ren) forms one body with the child. It may be objected that the child belongs to the same species. Again, when we observe the pitiful cries and frightened appearances of birds and animals about to be slaughtered, we cannot help feeling an “inability to bear” their suffering. This shows that our humanity forms one body with birds and animals. It may be objected that birds and animals are sentient beings as we are. But when we see plants broken and destroyed, we cannot help a feeling of pity. This shows that our humanity forms one body with plants. It may be said that plants are living things as we are. Yet even when we see tiles and stones shattered and crushed, we cannot help a feeling of regret. This shows that our humanity forms one body with tiles and stones. (44)

These examples clearly indicate that “forming one body” is not a romantic idea about unity, but a highly differentiated sense of inter-connectedness. However, “forming one body” as the unlimited sensitivity of our heart-and-mind is rooted in our Heavenly-endowed nature.

Wang further observed that a realistic understanding of the human condition must also account for our inability to make meaningful connections with anyone or anything:

When (our minds) are aroused by desires and obscured by selfishness, compelled by greed for gain and fear for harm, and stirred by anger, we will destroy things, kill members of our own species, and will do everything. In extreme cases, we will slaughter our own brothers, and the humanity that forms one body will disappear completely. (45)

The ecological implications are obvious. We are capable of either creating a great harmony in the universe by making meaningful connections with other humans and with the cosmos, or destroying the most intimate relationships at home because of desires, selfishness, greed, fear, and anger.

This deceptively simple notion of moral choice is predicated on a firm belief that human beings, as co-creators of the cosmic order, are responsible not only for themselves but also for Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things. The more we are able to move beyond our self-centeredness, the more we are empowered to realize ourselves. Yet we are rooted in the world as our proper home. We do not create a spiritual sanctuary outside the earth, body, family, and community. We are embedded in them. Our embeddedness allows us to form one body with children, birds, animals, plants, tiles, and stones; it is the reason that we embody others in our sensitivity. Moving beyond selfishness into an ever-expanding network of relationships enables us to fully realize the full potential of our humanity, for our self-realization is personal and communal rather than egoistically private.

As Heaven’s partners, we are individually and communally entrusted with a sacred mission. To borrow Herbert Fingarette’s felicitous phrase, our mission is to recognize “the secular as sacred.” (46) Indeed, it is “to transform our earth, body, family, and community into the emanations of Heaven’s inner virtue (de) which is creative vitality or simply creativity in itself.” (47) Our recognition of the sanctity of the earth, the divinity of the body, the holiness of the family, and the sacredness of the community is the first step in transforming our sense of the outside world from “a collection of objects” into a “communion of subjects.” (48) This holistic cosmological vision of the human is predicated on the idea of mutual responsiveness between Heaven and humanity: far from being a static relationship, the idea of “unity” is the attainment of an ever-renewing dynamic process.

We in the modern world are acutely aware that we have seriously polluted our home, substantially depleted the unrenewable resources available to us, endangered and exterminated numerous species, and gravely threatened our own existence. Obviously, we need to rethink human-earth relations. Since virtually all developing nations consider economic growth and the eradication of poverty the highest priority, the development strategy directed by a modernist ideology has pushed environmental concerns to the side. The strong commitment to development as a positive good clearly outweighs the fear of ecological degradation. The urgency of the environmental crisis is often relegated to the background.

One of the most depressing scenarios of the human condition is that with increasing clarity we know what we ought to do to prevent environmental degradation from seriously threatening the viability of our species, yet for structural, mental, conceptual, and other reasons, we are moving ever closer to a point of no return. For those who have helped us scientifically, economically, politically, culturally and religiously to see the self-destructive trajectory of development, it must be agonizing to realize that, despite all the effort and energy, their cautionary warnings have not yet made enough of an impact to turn the tide. Against this background, the advocacy of the precept of the cosmological unity between humanity and Heaven is a counter-current philosophical position, a cultural criticism—indeed, a vision of the future, rather than nostalgic attachment to the past.

Confucian Humanism as an Anthropocosmic Vision

Qian, Tang, and Feng saw the potential for Confucian humanism to occupy a new niche in comparative civilizational studies. As a partner in the dialogue among civilizations, what message can Confucians deliver to other religious communities and to the global village as a whole? To put it simply, can Confucian humanism informed by the anthropocosmic vision deepen the conversation on religion and ecology? Specifically, can the Confucian self-cultivation philosophy inspire a new constellation of family values, social ethics, political principles, and ecological consciousness that will help cultural China develop a sense of responsibility for the global community, both for its own benefit and for the improvement of the world’s state? Can Confucian thinkers enrich the spiritual resources and broaden the Enlightenment project’s scope to embrace religion and ecology?

The idea of the unity of Heaven and humanity implies four inseparable dimensions of the human condition: self, community, nature, and Heaven. The full distinctiveness of each enhances, rather than impedes, a thorough integration of the others. Self as a center of relationships establishes its identity by interacting with community variously understood, from the family to the global village and beyond. A sustainable harmonious relationship between the human species and nature is not merely an abstract ideal, but a concrete guide for practical living. Mutual responsiveness between the human heart-and-mind and the Way of Heaven is the ultimate path for human flourishing. The following four salient features constitute the substance of the New Confucian ecological vision:

(1) Fruitful interaction between self and community

Since the community as home must extend to the “global village” and beyond, the self in fruitful interaction with community must transcend not only egoism and parochialism, but also nationalism and anthropocentrism. In practical ethical terms, self-cultivation, reminiscent of Toynbee’s idea of self-mastery, is crucial to the viability of this holistic humanist vision. Specifically, it involves a process of continuous self-transcendence, always keeping sight of one’s solid ground in earth, body, family, and community. Through self-cultivation, the human heart-and-mind “expands in concentric circles that begin with oneself and spread from there to include successively one’s family, one’s face-to-face community, one’s nation, and finally all humanity.” (49)

In shifting the center of one’s empathic concern from oneself to one’s family, one transcends selfishness. The move from family to community transcends nepotism. The move from community to nation overcomes parochialism, and the move to all humanity counters chauvinistic nationalism. (50) While “(t)he project of becoming fully human involves transcending, sequentially, egoism, nepotism, parochialism, ethnocentrism, and chauvinist nationalism,” it cannot stop at “isolating, self-sufficient humanism.” (51) If we stop at secular humanism, our arrogant self-sufficiency will undermine our cosmic connectivity and constrain us in an anthropocentric predicament.

(2) A sustainable harmonious relationship between the human species and nature

The problem with secular humanism is its self-imposed limitation. Under its influence, our obsession with power and mastery over the environment—to the exclusion of the spiritual and the natural realms—has made us autistic to ecological concerns. (52) This de-spirited and de-natured version of the human has seriously undermined humanity’s aesthetic, ethical, and religious significance. (53) As a result, arrogant and aggressive anthropocentrism with little concern for religion and ecology has become the unstated worldview of scientism, materialism, and modernization.

An ecological focus, therefore, is a necessary corrective to the modernist discourse that has reduced the Confucian worldview to a limited and limiting secular humanism. Confucianism, appropriated by the modernist mindset, has been misused as a justification for authoritarian polity. Only by fully incorporating the religious and naturalist dimensions into New Confucianism can the Confucian world avoid the danger of underscoring social engineering, instrumental rationality, linear progression, economic development, and technocratic management at the expense of a holistic anthropocosmic vision.

Confucianism must free itself from the modernist mindset of economic development at all costs and reexamine its relationship to authoritarian polity as a precondition for its own creative transformation. Facilitating sustainable and harmonious human-earth communication is a return to Confucianism’s own home base, rather than a departure from its source. Indeed, the best way for the Confucians to attain the new is to reanimate the old, so that the digression to secular humanism, under the influence of the modern West, is not a permanent diversion.

(3) Mutual responsiveness between the human heart-and-mind and the Way of Heaven

In the appeal of scientists at the Global Forum Conference in Moscow in 1990, religious and spiritual leaders were challenged to envision the human-earth relationship in a new light:

As scientists, many of us have had profound experiences of awe and reverence before the universe. We understand that what is regarded as sacred is more likely to be treated with care and respect. Our planetary home should be so regarded. Efforts to safeguard and cherish the environment need to be infused with a vision of the sacred. (54)

Obviously, the ecological question compels all religious traditions to reexamine their presuppositions in regard to the earth. It is not enough that one’s spiritual tradition make limited adjustments to accommodate the ecological dimension. The need is for none other than the sacralization of nature. This may require a fundamental restructuring of basic theology by requiring the sanctity of the earth as a given. Implicit in the scientists’ appeal is the necessity of a new theology adding nature as a factor in the largely God-human relationship.

For the New Confucians, the critical issue is to underscore the spiritual dimension in the harmony with nature. Wing-tsit Chan notes in his celebrated Source Book in Chinese Philosophy: “If one word could characterize the entire history of Chinese philosophy, that word would be humanism—not the humanism that denies or slights a Supreme Power, but one that professes the unity of man and Heaven. In this sense, humanism has dominated Chinese thought from the dawn of its history.” (55)

The “humanism that professes the unity of man and Heaven” is neither secular nor anthropocentric. While it fully acknowledges that we are embedded in earth, body, family, and community, it never denies that we are in tune with the cosmic order. To infuse our earthly, bodily, familial, and communal existence with a transcendent significance is not only a lofty Confucian ideal but also a basic Confucian practice. In traditional China, under the influence of Confucian thought, Daosist ritual, and folk belief, the imperial court, the capital city, literary temples, ancestral halls, official residences, schools, and private houses were designed according to the “wind and water” (fengshui) principles. While these principles, based on geomancy, can supposedly be manipulated to enhance one’s fortune, they align human designs with the environment by enhancing intimacy with nature. Similarly, Chinese medicine as healing rather than curing and the mental and physical exercises such as the ritual dance of the great ultimate (taijinqun) and various forms of breathing disciplines (qigong), are also based on the mutual responsiveness between nature and humanity.

(4) Self Knowledge and Cultivation to Complete the Triad

Confucians believe that Heaven confers our human nature and the Way of Heaven is accessible through self-knowledge. They also believe that to understand the Mandate of Heaven we must continuously cultivate ourselves. This is completing the triad of Heaven, Earth, and humans. Nature, as an unending process of transformation rather than a static presence, is a source of inspiration for us to understand Heaven’s dynamism. As the first hexagram in the Book of Change symbolizes, Heaven’s vitality and creativity is incessant: Heaven always proceeds vigorously. The lesson for the human is obvious: we emulate the constancy and sustainability of Heaven’s vitality and creativity by participating in human flourishing through “ceaseless effort of self-strengthening.” (56) The sense of “awe and reverence before the universe” is prompted by our aspiration to respond to the ultimate reality that makes our life purposeful and meaningful. From either a creationist or an evolutionist perspective, we are indebted to Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things for our existence. To repay this debt we cultivate ourselves so as to attain our full humaneness amidst the wonder of existence.

Mencius succinctly articulated this human attitude toward Heaven as self-knowledge, service and steadfastness of purpose:

When a man has given full realization to his heart, he will understand his own nature. A man who knows his own nature will know Heaven. By retaining his heart and nurturing his nature he is serving Heaven. Whether he is going to die young or to live to a ripe old age makes no difference to his steadfastness of purpose. It is through awaiting whatever is to befall him with a perfected character that he stands firm on his proper destiny. (57)

Self-realization, in an ultimate sense, depends on knowing and serving Heaven. The mutuality of the human heart-and-mind and the Way of Heaven is mediated by cultivating a harmonious relationship with nature. Through such cultivation, humans form a triad with Heaven and Earth and thus fully realize their potential as a cosmological as well as an anthropological being. This sense of mutuality and completion of the triad is a far cry from the imposition of the human will on Heaven and the human desire to conquer nature.

Establishing the Confucian Ecological Turn: Broadening the Frame of Reference

Ironically, at the time Wing-tsit Chan made his extraordinary assertion about humanism, very much in the spirit of the ecological turn characterized by Qian, Tang. and Feng, the ethos of cultural China, especially the People’s Republic, was overwhelmed by secular humanism. On the occasion of the Stockholm Conference on the Environment in 1972, the Chinese delegation refused to sign the preamble, rejecting its proposed limitation on economic growth and the parameters restricting the advances in science and technology. Their obsession with development and their faith in human ingenuity made them, for a while at least, oblivious to environmental concerns. (58)

The situation has improved substantially, but the ethos of scientism and materialism persists. Since the “reform and open” policy of 1979, Beijing has transformed itself into a developmental state, thoroughly embracing the market mechanism as a strategy of globalization. At first blush, commercialism, mercantilism, and international competitiveness are characteristic of the current Chinese mentality. Having been humiliated and frustrated by imperialism and colonialism for more than a century, the rise of China symbolizes the total triumph of secular humanism.

As a victim, survival has been China’s primary concern. Now, however, she is no longer a victim but a rising power. What kind of philosophy will guide China’s leaders as she enters into the global community? If retaliation is not a viable option and sharing power has only a limited appeal for encouraging China to be a responsible player, what else can motivate her new identity? Is China comfortable with the thought that the realization of her aspirations depends mainly on the persistent misery of the less fortunate areas of the world? Can China participate in an international effort to make the world more equitable and humane? Will She take an active role in facilitating a new world order that is, in theory and practice, non-hegemonic? How can China move beyond the mindset of development defined exclusively in terms of wealth and power?

As a growing economic, political and military power, China is one of the most important players in constructing a new world order. Although China endured much travail in her long march toward modernization, her externally inflicted and self-imposed isolation for almost thirty years prevented the internal calamities from having a major impact on the security and stability of the neighboring countries, or the Asia-Pacific region in general. The current situation is totally different. The Chinese economy and polity are such an integral part of the larger world that “Whither China?” is a local and national issue with profound regional and global implications. If secular humanism, whether socialist or Confucian, remains the ruling ideology in China, its adverse influence on the wholesome growth of cultural China and the rest of the world, let alone the environment, will be overwhelming.

To go beyond secular humanism, the first difficult step is to broaden the frame of reference for China’s quest for modernization. So far, the obsession with the modern West (North America and Western Europe) has blinded China to many of her indigenous resources. I have advocated, albeit with only limited success, that the Chinese intellectual community take India as a reference society and Indic civilization as a reference culture for her future development. Certainly, China would do well to avoid the negative examples in India’s economic strategies, political arrangements, and social practices; the rise of militant Hindu nationalism and communal conflicts are obvious cases. Yet, India—the most populous democracy, with millions of English-speaking intellectuals, bureaucrats, entrepreneurs, and social activists—has a great deal to offer for China’s self-reflection. India’s religious pluralism, linguistic diversity, and cultural heterogeneity provide alternative visions of modernity that challenge China’s conception of progress. In the present context, India’s most valuable asset is her richly textured spiritual landscape. In spiritual matters, India is a major exporting civilization. Liang Shuming predicted in 1923 that the Indian way of life would endure in the long run, even though he strongly urged China to learn from the West. (59) China’s iconoclastic attack on tradition is in sharp contrast to India’s continuous reaffirmation of her spiritual roots. What lessons can Chinese intellectuals learn from the Indian experience?

If China takes India seriously as a reference society and culture, she will begin to appreciate her indigenous Mahayana Buddhist heritage. Anti-religious humanism, vividly captured by Hu Shi’s reflection on the Indianization of Sinic civilization, can be substantially transformed. (60) Already, in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Chinese Diaspora, humanist Buddhism is the most powerful religious movement. (61) Its impact on economic culture, social ethics, political behavior, moral education, and, above all, environmental ethics has been considerable. If Mahayana Buddhism reemerges in China as a major spiritual force, religious Daoism may have a chance to flourish and the Confucian humanism that professes the unity of Heaven and Humanity, rather than secular humanism, will prosper.

Since Tibet looks to India as its spiritual source, Chinese political authorities and intellectual elite could better appreciate Tibet as a culture if India were invited to enter the Chinese mind as a reference. If Beijing recognized Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, and Mahayana Buddhism as modern expressions of human spirituality, it could deepen its understanding of Tibet as a religious resource. It could also plausibly refrain from dealing with the so-called Tibetan question simply as a political issue threatening national unity. As a result, the ethnic conflicts, laden with religious import, between Han Chinese and the nationalities (Uighurs and Mongols as well as Tibetans) could be handled with more cultural sophistication and ethical intelligence. An added benefit of this value-orientation is that new religions would be better assessed and their possible contribution to social solidarity better recognized. Assuming that religion will be a powerful force shaping the cultural identity of the new China, a fundamental change in the social constructivist approach to nation building is unavoidable. If the Chinese political authorities and intellectual elite become more accepting of spiritual matters, they will develop a more appreciative attitude toward their own indigenous traditions. Consequently, they will become more sensitive to ecological concerns.

Still, even if China is able to broaden her frame of reference to include non-Western experiences in her modernization strategy, notably the Indian experiment, her participation as an active contributor and a responsible member of the international community depends primarily on her interaction with the West, particularly the United States. With a view toward the cultivation of what United Nations’ Secretary General Kofi Annan has advocated as the culture of peace, the Sino-American relationship is perhaps the single most important bilateral relationship in the world today. Unfortunately, the asymmetry between China’s obsession with the United States and the American disregard of China has made the relationship extremely complex and difficult. Since the Tiananmen tragedy in 1989, China has often been portrayed in the American mass media as a pariah state. Issues of human rights, religious freedom, Tibet, Taiwan, and trade have made China the target of criticism from the radical left to the Christian right. This unusual alliance in American politics has significantly tarnished the image of China as a responsible member of the international community in the eyes of the general public. Yet the United States is in a unique position to offer an alternative model for China’s modernization.

It should be noted that cooperation between American and Chinese scientists dealing with the environment has been cordial and productive. Realistically, however, this kind of collaboration, under the strict protocols of scientific exchange, cannot be easily broadened to include critical ideological issues on the agenda. Yet it seems obvious that involving China’s active participation in international projects dealing with environmental degradation, such as global warming, is critical from a long-term perspective. (62)

More broadly, the way the Chinese leadership deals with domestic affairs such as political dissent, religious cults, freedom of speech, and the cultural expressions of the minorities, will be taken seriously by the international community concerned with human rights, which in turn will have a substantial effect on China’s acceptability to the American public. On the other hand, from the Chinese perspective, the United States as the only superpower ought to be obligated to play an active and constructive role in improving the state of the world. Given that the United States, which holds only 5% of the world’s population, produces 22% of the globe’s greenhouse gases, (63) and that the average American standard of living is beyond the wildest imagination of the overwhelming majority of Chinese people, the question of fairness and distributive justice must be raised. It is not surprising that China criticizes America’s use of national interest as its guiding principle in foreign policy and as a pretext for acting unilaterally in critical international situations.

Even so, a wholesome Sino-American relationship based on a series of fruitful dialogues on religion and ecology as well as human rights, trade, education, science, and technology is possible, desirable, and necessary. On the Chinese side, social Darwinism will have to be replaced by a much broader vision of human flourishing. If China widens her frame of reference, which seems inevitable, she will find her niche in an increasingly interdependent pluralistic world, rather than in the narrow trajectory of linear progression. In addition to India, many other non-Western societies such as those in Southeast Asia, Latin America, the Islamic Middle East, and Africa will become relevant to China’s intellectual and spiritual self-definition. The United States’ need to transform herself from a teaching civilization into a learning culture is obvious. As a great immigrant society, the United States has been a vibrant learning culture oriented towards Europe for centuries. Since the end of the Second World War, America’s self-image as a tutor of Confucian East Asia has been so ingrained in the public consciousness that the teacher-disciple relationship, as in the case of John Dewey and his disciples Hu Shi and Feng Youlan, has been accepted as the norm. It is now time to work at a new equilibrium of mutual learning and appreciation.

Sustaining the Ecological Turn: The Role of the Public Intellectual

The Copenhagen Social Summit in 1995 identified poverty, unemployment, and social disintegration as three serious threats to the solidarity of the human community. Globalization intensifies and enhances the felt need for rootedness in primordial ties. Thus, it often generates fierce competition and strong tension in identity politics. Our community, compressed into a “village,” far from being integrated, blatantly exhibits difference, differentiation, and outright discrimination. (64) For the South to appreciate the environmental movements of the North, the contradiction between ecological and developmental imperatives will have to be resolved. The North’s advocacy of elegant simplicity as an alternative lifestyle is not persuasive, if the South considers development, in the basic material sense, a necessary condition for survival. China as a developing society has been thoroughly seasoned in the Southern mentality. If her sense of responsibility is not simply confined to nation building, China can become a constructive partner on global environmental issues. She could be encouraged to do so if the North, especially the United States, demonstrates moral leadership. Without encouragement and reciprocal respect from developed countries, it is unlikely that she will independently embark on such a path. Actually, on a limited scale, mutually beneficial dialogues on religion and ecology as well as human rights, trade, education, science, and technology between China and the United States on the one hand and the European Union on the other have already begun.

The ecological turn, as an alternative vision, is particularly significant in this regard. To make it sustainable and, eventually, consequential in formulating policies, the need for public-spiritedness among intellectuals is urgent. The emergence of a public space in cultural China provides a glimmer of hope. Although full-fledged civil societies in the Chinese cultural universe are found only in Taiwan and Hong Kong, the horizontal communication among public intellectuals in several sectors of society in the People’s Republic has generated a new dynamism unprecedented in modern Chinese history. If we define public intellectuals as those who are politically concerned, socially engaged, culturally sensitive, religiously musical, and ecologically conscientious, they are readily visible and audible on the political scene. (65) Indeed, public intellectuals in academia, government, mass media, business, and social movements are articulating a variety of cultural messages relevant to China’s quest for modernity. They may never “find the unifying thread, the balancing mean, the underlying value, or the all-embracing conception” (66) that can serve as a standard of inspiration for all concerned citizens of the nation. However, they are strategically positioned to generate new discussions on the ecological way, “as macrocosm, overarching unity, and ultimate process”; indeed, as a necessary reference for “the human enterprise in its fullest dimensions, deepest reflections, and most dynamic activity.” (67)

Given the current political ethos in China, religion is a particularly delicate matter. Whether or not religion will play an active role in shaping China’s development strategy is one of the most crucial indicators for assessing her new cultural identity. The possibility of a sound environmental ethic depends heavily on the Chinese intellectuals’ ability to transcend nationalism informed by secular humanism and their willingness to take religion seriously in considering human integrity and self-fulfillment. The government’s appeal to science and national security as a way of outlawing superstition, as in the case of the Falungong, has not been effective. Its technocratic approach to religious issues merely reflects an increasingly unworkable instrumental rationality. Religion as a vibrant social force is widely recognized by public intellectuals in government, academia, business, and the mass media. Although it is difficult to predict precisely how religious and ecological discourses will converge in China, tolerance of religion often entails sensitivity to ecology. When public intellectuals in China begin to appreciate the profound religious implications of the ecological turn and the importance of retrieving and reappropriating indigenous spiritual resources to develop an environmental ethic, they will be ready to take part in a dialogue among civilizations concerning religion and ecology.

In a broader context, for religious and spiritual leaders to play a significant global role in articulating a shared approach to environmental degradation, they must assume the responsibility of public intellectuals themselves. As the Millennium Conference at the United Nations in September 2000 clearly showed, unless religious and spiritual leaders can rise above their faith communities to address global issues as public intellectuals, their messages will be misread, distorted, or ignored. Notwithstanding the demands for recognition and representation, identity politics is detrimental to fostering a global ethic for human survival and flourishing. China is particularly suspicious of the intentions of religious and spiritual leaders, if they are exclusively concerned about the well-being of their own faith communities. Yet, the time is ripe for spiritual and religious leaders outside China to engage Chinese public intellectuals in mutually informative and inspirational conversations on religion and ecology.

The New Confucian ecological turn clearly shows that an inseparable aspect of a sustainable human-earth relationship is the creation of harmonious societies and benevolent governments through the self-cultivation of all members of the human community. At the same time, Confucians insist that being attuned to the changing patterns in nature is essential for harmonizing human relationships, formulating family ethics, and establishing a responsive and responsible government. As Mary Evelyn Tucker notes:

The whole Confucian triad of heaven, earth, and humans rests on a seamless yet dynamic intersection between each of these realms. Without harmony with nature and its myriad changes, human society and government is threatened. (68)

Since each person’s self-cultivation is essential for social and political order, the public intellectual is not an elitist but an active participant in the daily affairs of the lifeworld. The Confucian idea of concerned scholars may benefit from the wisdom of a philosopher, the insight of a prophet, the faith of a priest, the compassion of a monk, or the understanding of a guru, but it is the responsibility of the public intellectual that is the most appropriate to their calling. The Confucians remind us that, in order to foster a wholesome worldview and a healthy ecological ethic, we need to combine our aspiration for a harmonious relationship with nature with our concerted effort to build a just society.

Public intellectuals in China should prevail upon the political leadership that it is in an advantageous position to “promote a culture of tolerance, nonviolence, and peace,” (69) as recommended by the Earth Charter. They should recognize that the Chinese people are well disposed to Mahayana Buddhism and religious Daoism as well as inclusive Confucian humanism. Therefore they can appreciate the value of the coexistence of Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things and can “treat all living beings with respect and consideration” (70) as an expression of their humanity. Furthermore, as an increasing number of public intellectuals in the academic community have already forcefully articulated their ecological concerns, they should be encouraged to “integrate into formal education and life-long learning the knowledge, values, and skills needed for a sustainable way of life.” (71) Many liberal-minded public intellectuals have openly suggested that the major challenge in Chinese political culture is democratization at all levels, which must begin with greater transparency and accountability in governance at the top. As the rule of law, rather than the rule by law, is widely accepted as the legitimate way to provide access to justice for all, the ideal of “inclusive participation in decision making” (72) is no longer unimaginable.

New Confucians fully acknowledged that in their march toward modernization in the cause of nation building, their primary language has been so fundamentally reconstructed that it is no longer a language of faith but a language of instrumental rationality, economic efficiency, political expediency, and social engineering. They are now recovering from that modernist malaise. Their reanimated Confucian anthropocosmic vision will provide sources of inspiration for the public intellectuals to envision a new worldview and a new ethic. This ecological turn has great significance for China’s spiritual self-definition, for it urges China to return to her home base and rediscover her own soul. It also has profound implications for the sustainable future of the global community.

(1) For a contemporary discussion on the axial-age civilizations, see Shmuel N. Eisenstadt, ed., The Origins and Diversity of Axial-Age Civilizations (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986).

(2) See Tu Wei-ming, “Embodying the Universe: A Note on Confucian Self-realization," World & I (August 1989), 475-485.

(3) Qian Mu’s last essay, “Zhongguo wenhua dui rennei weilai keyou di kongxian” (the possible contribution of Chinese culture to the future of humankind), first appeared as a newspaper article in the United News in Taiwan (September 26, 1990). It was reprinted, with a lengthy commentary by his widow, Hu Meiqi, in Zhongguo Wenhua (Chinese culture), August 1991, vol. 4, 93-96.

(4) For an elaborate discussion on this, see Tang Junyi, Shengming cunzai yu xinling jingjie (Life existence and the spiritual realms; Taipei: Xuesheng Book Co., 1977), pp. 872-888.

(5) Feng Youlan, Zhongguo xiandai zhexueshi (History of modern Chinese philosophy; Guangzhou: Guangdong People’s Publishers, 1999), pp. 251-254.

(6) See Hu Meiqi’s commentary, note 1.

(7) For example, Ji Xianlin of Peking University, Li Shengzi of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Cai Shangsi of Fudan University and a number of other senior scholars all enthusiastically responded to Qian’s article. My short reflection appeared in Zhonghua Wenhua (Chinese Culture), August 1994, vol. 10, 218-219.

(8) Max Weber, The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism, trans. Hans H. Gerth (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press, 1951), p. 235.

(9) Tang Junyi, Shengming cuizai yu xinling jingjie, pp. 833-930.

(10) Chang Tsai (Zhang Zai), “The Western Inscription,” in Wing-tsit Chan, trans., A Source Book of Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 497.

(11) Feng Youlan, Xin yuanren (New origins of humanity) in Zhenyuan liushu (Six books of Feng Youlan in the 1930s and 1940s; Eastern Chinese Normal University Press, 1996), vol. II, pp. 626-649.

(12) Joseph Levenson, Confucian China and its Modern Fate: A Trilogy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968).

(13) The “Text” of The Great Learning. Although I have made a few changes in my translation, it basically follows Wing-tsit Chan's version. See Wing-tsit Chan, trans., A Source Book of Chinese Philosophy, p. 86.

(14) Wm. Theodore de Bary, “ "Think Globally, Act Locally,' and the Contested Ground Between,” in Confucianism and Ecology, edited by Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Berthrong (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Center for the Study of World Religions, 1998), p. 32.

(15) Ibid., pp. 32-33.

(16) Zhongyong (Doctrine of the mean), XXII. See Tu Wei-ming, Centrality and Commonality: An Essay on Confucian Religiousness (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), p. 77. This translation is slightly different from Wing-tsit Chan’s version cited in the book.

(17) See Lin Yü-sheng, The Crisis of Chinese Consciousness: Radical Antitraditioanlism in the May Fourth Era (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1979) and Vera Schwarcz, The Chinese Enlightenment: Intellectuals and the Legacy of the May Fourth Movement of 1919.

(18) Xiong Shili, Xin Weishilun (New theory on consciousness-only; reprint, Taipei: Guangwen publishers, 1962), vol. I, chap. 4, pp. 49-92.

(19) Liang Shuming, Dongxi wenhua jiqi zhexue (Eastern and Western cultures and their philosophies; reprint, Taipei: Wenxue Publishers, 1979), pp. 200-201.

(20) Daisaku Ikeda, A New Humanism (New York: Weatherhill, 1996), p. 120.

(21) Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom (New York: A. Knopf, 1999).

(22) See Hans Küng, Global Ethic, A Declaration of the Parliament of the World's Religions (New York, 2000).

(23) The Earth Charter, www. earthcharter.org

(24) Ibid.

(25) Ibid.

(26) Ibid.

(27) Ibid.

(28) Ezra Vogel, The Four Mini-Dragons: The Spread of Industrialization in East Asia (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press, 1991), pp. 83-112; 128-132.

(29) See Tu Wei-ming, ed., Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity: Moral Education and Economic Culture in Japan and the Four Mini-Dragons (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996).

(30) Donald K. Swearer, “Principles and Poetry, Places and Stories: The Resources of Buddhist Ecology,” (Daedalus article) p. 2.

(31) I am indebted to Benjamin Schwartz for this idea. His essay, "The Limits of 'Tradition versus Modernity': The Case of the Chinese Intellectual" is particularly relevant here. See Benjamin I. Schwartz, China and Other Matters (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press, 1996), pp. 45-64.

(32) Thomas Berry, The Great Work: Our Way into the Future (New York, Crown Publishing Group, 1999).

(33) The Earth Charter.

(34) Doctrine of the Mean, XXV:9. Wing-tsit Chan, trans., A Source Bookof Chinese Philosophy, p. 109.

(35) The Earth Charter.

(36) Ibid.

(37) Ibid.

(38) Qian Mu, Cong Zhongguo lishi laikan Zhongguo minzuxing ji Zhongguo wenhua (Chinese national character and Chinese culture from the perspective of Chinese history; Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 1979).

(39) Tang Junyi, “Chinese Culture and the World,” in Zhonghua wenhua yu dangjin shijie (Chinese culture and the world today; Taipei: Xuesheng Publishers, 1975), pp. 865-929.

(40) Feng Youlan, Zhongguo xiandai zhexueshi, pp. 245-249.

(41) Ibid.

(42) Tang Junyi, Renwen jingsheng zhi zongjian (The reconstruction of the humanist spirit)

(43) Wang Yangming (Wang Yang-ming), “Inquiry on the Great Learning, “ Wing-tsit Chan, trans., A Source Book of Chinese Philosophy, p. 659.

(44) Ibid., pp. 659-660. Since Wang Yangming wished to demonstrate that the mind of the small man can form one body with all things as well, he used “he” rather than “we” in the text.

(45) Ibid., p. 660.

(46) Herbert Fingarette, Confucius—the Secular as Sacred (New York: Harper and Row, 1972).

(47) Tu Weiming, “Crisis and Creativity: A Confucian Response to the Second Axial Age,” in Steven L. Chase, ed., Doors of Understanding: Conversations on Global Spirituality in Honor of Ewert Cousins (Quincy, Ill: Franciscan Press, 1997), p. 414.

(48) Thomas Berry, see note 32.

(49) Huston Smith, The World’s Religions (San Francisco: HarperSan Francisco, 1991), p. 182.

(50) Ibid.

(51) Ibid., pp. 186-187.

(52) See Thomas Berry, The Dream of the Earth (Sierra Club Books, 1990) and The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era -- A Celebration of the Unfolding of the Cosmos (Harper San Francisco, 1994).

(53) Anthony Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age (Stanford, CA.: Stanford University Press, 1991), pp. 144-180.

(54) Quoted in Mary Evelyn Tucker, “The Emerging Alliance of Religion and Ecology,” in Steven L. Chase, Doors of Understanding, p. 111.

(55) Wing-tsit Chan, trans., A Source Book of Chinese Philosophy, p. 3.

(56) The Book of Change, "image" of the first hexagram, qian (heaven).

(57) Mencius, VIIA:1. See D. C. Lau, trans., Mencius (Penguin Classics, 1970), p. 182. My translation of the first line is different.

(58) It should be noted that, under the direct encouragement of Zhou Enlai, Chinese environmental protection movements actually began shortly after the Stockholm Conference in 1973.

(59) Liang Shuming, Dongxi wenhua jiqi zhehue, pp.199-201.

(60) Hu Shi's attitude towards the Indianization of Chinese culture is vividly captured in the following statement: "With the new aids of modern science and technology, and of the new social and historical sciences, we are confident that we may yet achieve a rapid liberation from the two thousand years' cultural domination by India." See Hu Shi, "The Indianization of China," in Independence, Convergence, and Borrowing in Institutions, Thought and Art; Harvard Tercentenary Publications (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press, 1937), pp. 247.

(61) For an example of the humanist Buddhist movements in Taiwan, see Stuart Chandler, Creating a Pureland on Earth: the Fo-kuang Buddhist Perspective on Modernization and Globalization (Ph.D. dissertation, Committee on the Study of Religion, Harvard University, 2000).

(62) Michael B. McElroy notes that the future of controlling global emissions of carbon dioxide “will depend in large measure on what happens in large developing countries such as China, India and Indonesia,” see “Perspectives on Environmental Change: Basis for Action,” (Daedalus article) p. 16.

(63) Ibid.

(64) Tu Weimimg, "Global Community as Lived Reality: Exploring Social Resources for Development," in Social Policy & Social Progress, Special Issue on the Social Summit, Copenhagen, 6-12 March 1995 (New York, United Nations, 1996), 47-48.

(65) The case of Qu Geping merits special attention. Since the Stockholm Conference on the Environment in 1972, he has been instrumental in developing an infrastructure within the governmental system for dealing with environmental protection in China. As Chairman of the Environmental Protection and Resource Conservation Committee of the National People's Congress, he plays a pivotal role in formulating national policies and encourages non-governmental agencies in raising environmental concerns. For a retrospective look at his own career, see Qu Geping, mengxian yu qidai: Zhongguo huanjing baofu di guoqu yu weilai (Dreams and anticipations: the past and future of China's environmental protection; Zhongguo huanbao kexue chubanshe, 2000).

(66) Wm. Theodore de Bary, Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy and the Learning of the Mind-and-Heart (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981), p. 216.

(67) Ibid. It should be noted that although de Bary's main concern here is the Way in the "learning of the mind-and-heart," the ecological implications are self-evident.

(68) Mary Evelyn Tucker, “The Emerging Alliance of Religion and Ecology,” in Steven L. Chase, Doors of Understanding, p. 120.

(69) The Earth Charter.

(70) Ibid.

(71) Ibid. Currently more than a hundred programs (including departments and research centers) focusing on the environment have been developed in China's institutes of higher learning. While the majority of these programs are primarily concerned about technical engineering issues, quite a few of them have integrated disciplines in the social sciences and the humanities in their multi-disciplinary approaches to environmental protection.

(72) Ibid.