The Concept of “Educational Transformation” and its Relationship to Civilizing Missions in Early China

Abstract

This article examines the early history and evolution of the concept of jiaohua (教化 “educational transformation”) as a reference to civilizing missions in China. It explores Ru (Confucian) concepts advocating the widespread education of the masses, showing how such concepts were linked to notions of ethnicity and moral attainment. Then it contextualizes the first uses of educational transformation in writings concerning statecraft. Xunzi emerges as a pivotal figure who helped adapt the statecraft rhetoric on educational transformation to the largely Ru goal of spreading a morally superior Huaxia culture among the masses and to peoples of other cultures. I then move beyond this conceptual history to examine a few civilizing missions in the Han era. My purpose is to link large-scale, civilizing missions in Chinese history with the early philosophical rhetoric and show how history was shaped by these underlying conceptual orientations.

Southeast Asian Interconnections

“…Given the proximity of the Vietnamese coastline to south China, it is not surprising that as early as the first century BCE, the Chinese state, whenever it was consolidated and assertive in south China, would establish military commanderies or administrative districts in the Red River delta. These administrative systems included personnel who were responsible for the commerce that was conducted at these places (Brindley, 2021). Less clear were the policies and perspectives of the kingdoms that variously governed over south China during the interregnum period from the collapse of the Han dynasty to the advent of Tang rule (third to seventh century CE).…”