The Meanings of Democracy: The Shadow of Confucianism

Shi, Tianjian; Lü, Jie

doi:10.1353/jod.2010.0012

Cited by 90 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…More than different regime types, culture may shape understandings of democracy. Research on China and Asia has suggested that Confucian tradition leads to an alternative definition of democracy where governing legitimacy comes from positive social outcomes, not electoral procedures (Shi and Lu 2010). We adopt two strategies from the literature to address the challenges of measuring democratic attitudes across culture and context.…”

Section: A T Amentioning

confidence: 99%

The Long-Term Impact of Social Movements and Repression on Democratic Attitudes

Desposato¹,

Wang²

2020

J. East Asian Stud.

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Democracy movements in authoritarian regimes usually fail and are repressed, but they may still affect attitudes and norms of participants and bystanders. We exploit several features of a student movement to test for enduring effects of social movements on democratic attitudes. College students were the core of the movement and had wide exposure to the ideas and activities of the movement, as well as the suppression of the movement. College-bound high school students had limited exposure to the movement and its activities. Time of college entry could in theory be manipulated and endogenous, so we also use birthdate as an exogenous instrument for enrollment year. Applying a fuzzy regression discontinuity, we test for the impact of exposure to the movement on long-term attitudes. We find significant attitudinal differences between those in college during the movement, and those who started college post-movement. These results are strongest for alumni of the four universities that were most connected to the movement.

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Section: A T Amentioning

confidence: 99%

The Long-Term Impact of Social Movements and Repression on Democratic Attitudes

Desposato¹,

Wang²

2020

J. East Asian Stud.

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“…In a free democracy, such participation is the fundamental right guaranteed by the social contract between citizens and their government. In the doctrine of the "people as the roots," however, the political participation of civilians is limited to expressing their concerns with the authorities (Shi and Lu 2010). With this view, it is not easy to concede that Confucianism is democratic or antidemocratic.…”

Section: "Democracy" In Vietnamese Societymentioning

confidence: 99%

People as the Roots (of the State): Democratic Elements in the Politics of Traditional Vietnamese Confucianism

Nguyen

2019

Journal of Nationalism, Memory &Amp; Language Politics

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In this paper, the concept of "people as the roots" (of the state) is explored through its myriad expressions in Vietnamese history: the emphasis of Vietnamese feudal rulers on fulfilling the people's will, loving the people, and ensuring peace for the people. From these historical examples, the authors argue that in the politics of Vietnamese traditional Confucianism, there has been the presence of democratic elements. Yet, they do not reflect a full-fledged democracy and should be seen only as signs of village democracy. This view holds an important implication for the process of democratization of modern Vietnamese society: while the concept of "people as the roots" is essential for a village democracy and is valuable for building a democracy, it does not necessarily mean a straightforward translation to a modern democracy. Here, the authors suggest that civil society will play an important role in making this transition smoother.

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“…In other words, the societal agreements on the form of democracy might vary substantially across different societies, and such variations are largely neglected in the attempts to operationalize a "common" definition of democracy. For example, Tianjian and Jie [8] argued that majorities in China are driven by Confucian concept of democracy, claiming strong support for collectivism and, at the same time, a high level of satisfaction with the country"s authoritarian regime, which is in sharp contrast to many western countries. In Confucian theory, the most important premise of a democratic society is the assurance of societal harmonythe democratic processes should only be taken place with the presence of great order.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The More, the Merrier? on the Relationships of Democracy and Happiness in China

Xu¹

2020

Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Social Science, Public Health and Education (SSPHE 2019)

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Happiness is associated with and precedes numerous successful outcomes. According to the research conducted by United Nations Development Program, the subjective feeling of happiness, or more formally subjective wellbeing (SWB), serves as a critical indicator for quality of lifehealth, longevity, income and social skill. Among many potential antecedents of SWB, political and social scientists have long debated on whether democracy can bring happiness. Despite numerous research conducted, the results are far from conclusive. I argue that one important reason causing the inconsistencies of the findings is that the definition of democracy varies across countries, especially among non-western countries. In the specific context of China, researchers have found that the majorities in the country agree on the Confucian model of democracy, characterized by strong support for the governing regime and the Confucian culture. Because of the various potential definition of democracy, the application of subjective measurements of democracy is preferable in that it effectively takes into account the variations of the personal definition of democracy. The current study investigates the impact of subjective measurement of democracy (i.e. perceived level of democracy of the nation) on individual's SWB, using a sample of Chinese residents. In addition to directly examining the effects of democracy on SWB, I tested additional hypotheses concerning the group differences of such effects. I utilized the Chinese dataset from World Value Survey (WVS) Wave 6, which consisted of the responses from a representative Chinese sample. The hypotheses were tested with stepwise linear regression. The results confirmed my hypothesis that the perceived level of democracy was positively related to individual SWB, and that the income level positively moderated such effect. However, surprisingly, I also found that the social class negatively affected the relationship between perceived level of democracy and individual SWB. The potential explanation as well as the implications of the findings were discussed. Last, I address the limitations of the current study and pinpoint two directions for future research: (1) longitudinal studies could be carried out to theoretically avoid the endogeneity problem and replicate the current findings; (2) more researches are needed on how social policies would affect SWB in non-western context.

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The Meanings of Democracy: The Shadow of Confucianism

Cited by 90 publications

References 9 publications

The Long-Term Impact of Social Movements and Repression on Democratic Attitudes

The Long-Term Impact of Social Movements and Repression on Democratic Attitudes

People as the Roots (of the State): Democratic Elements in the Politics of Traditional Vietnamese Confucianism

The More, the Merrier? on the Relationships of Democracy and Happiness in China

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