human security and the chinese state: historical transformations and the modern quest for...

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The modern state is the dominant ndash but not exclusive ndash provider of human securityChina has attempted to reconstitute itself as a modern sovereign state on severaloccasions in the past century driven by the quest for security and order In additionto the state family and social institutions have extended human longevity byreducing violent and preventable deaths Twenty-two centuries ago the imperialConfucian state increased human security its collapse in 1911 led to severalexperiments in state-building and adaptation This groundbreaking book outlines aworking theory of human security and applies it to an analysis of the dynamics ofthe Chinese state Professor Bedeski demonstrates how sovereignty of the statereflects primary human concerns of survival where the statersquos fundamentalpurpose is to preserve citizensrsquo lives Using his theory of human securityhe describes eight ldquometa-constitutionsrdquo from the Legalist Qin empire to thepotential federal state represented by Taiwanrsquos continued autonomy Theincompleteness of Chinese sovereignty remains a key variable in understandingthe policy and strategy of modernization both within China and amongneighboring East Asian states

His study bridges humanist and social sciences in combining political theorywith historical literary cinematic and sociological materials and ideas HumanSecurity and the Chinese State provides an original approach to the last twothousand years of Chinese political history that will appeal to scholars of Chinesepolitics history human security and political theory

Robert E Bedeski is Professor Emeritus Department of Political Science andProgram Professor Emeritus Centre for Asia-Pacific Initiatives (CAPI) at theUniversity of Victoria British Columbia Canada

Human Security and the Chinese State

Routledge contemporary China series

1 Nationalism Democracy andNational Integration in ChinaLeong Liew and WangShaoguang

2 Hong Kongrsquos TortuousDemocratizationA comparative analysisMing Sing

3 Chinarsquos Business ReformsInstitutional challenges in a globalised economyEdited by Russell Smyth andCherrie Zhu

4 Challenges for ChinarsquosDevelopmentAn enterprise perspectiveEdited by David H Brown andAlasdair MacBean

5 New Crime in ChinaPublic order and human rightsRon Keith and Zhiqiu Lin

6 Non-GovernmentalOrganizations inContemporary ChinaPaving the way to civil societyQiusha Ma

7 Globalization and the ChineseCityFulong Wu

8 The Politics of ChinarsquosAccession to the World TradeOrganizationThe dragon goes globalHui Feng

9 Narrating ChinaJia Pingwa and his fictional worldYiyan Wang

10 Sex Science and Morality inChinaJoanne McMillan

11 Politics in China Since 1949Legitimizing authoritarian ruleRobert Weatherley

12 International Human ResourceManagement in ChineseMultinationalsJie Shen and Vincent Edwards

13 Unemployment in ChinaEconomy human resources andlabour marketsEdited by Grace Lee andMalcolm Warner

14 China and AfricaEngagement and compromiseIan Taylor

15 Gender and Education inChinaGender discourses and womenrsquosschooling in the early twentiethcenturyPaul J Bailey

16 SARSReception and interpretation inthree Chinese citiesEdited by Deborah Davis andHelen Siu

17 Human Security and theChinese StateHistorical transformations and themodern quest for sovereigntyRobert E Bedeski

Robert E Bedeski

Human Security and theChinese StateHistorical transformations and themodern quest for sovereignty

First published 2007 by Routledge2 Park Square Milton Park Abingdon Oxon OX14 4RN

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canadaby Routledge270 Madison Ave New York NY 10016

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor amp Francis Groupan informa business

copy 2007 Robert E Bedeski

All rights reserved No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented including photocopying and recording or in any information storage or retrieval system without permission in writing from the publishers

British Library Cataloguing in Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication DataBedeski Robert E

Human security and the Chinese state historical transformations and the modern quest for sovereignty by Robert E Bedeski

p cm ndash (Routledge contemporary China series 17)Includes bibliographical references and index1 China ndash Politics and government 2 Social contract 3 Security

(Psychology) ndash Political aspects ndash China 4 State The 5 SovereigntyI Title

JQ1510B43 2007320150951ndashdc22 2006024055

ISBN10 0ndash415ndash41255ndash2 (hbk)ISBN10 0ndash203ndash96475ndash6 (ebk)

ISBN13 978ndash0ndash415ndash41255ndash1 (hbk)ISNB13 978ndash0ndash203ndash96475ndash0 (ebk)

This edition published in the Taylor amp Francis e-Library 2007

ldquoTo purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor amp Francis or Routledgersquos

collection of thousands of eBooks please go to wwweBookstoretandfcoukrdquo

ISBN 0-203-96475-6 Master e-book ISBN

For dolce Pamela

Contents

Preface xList of abbreviations xiii

1 Human survival human institutions and human security 1

2 Dimensions of human security foundations in individual human life 4

3 The modern sovereign nation-state (MSNS) 24

4 Prologue to a theory of human security 44

5 A notational theory of human security 62

6 Actualizing imperial sovereignty in ancient China 77

7 Claiming dynastic sovereignty under the imperial meta-constitution 103

8 Sovereignty and state-building in late Qing and Republican China 130

9 Contemporary Chinarsquos incomplete sovereigntyfusion succession and adaptation 155

Notes 173Bibliography 178Index 187

Preface

Security is a twentieth-century political concept that has been intrinsic to themodern state Wars revolutions and national security have derived their rationalesfrom protecting the state to the extent that citizens have become the instrument ofits defense rather than the state protecting the individual The modern welfarestate emerged in part to compensate citizens for their obligations by transferringsome of the statersquos resources to those who would fight its wars With the end ofthe Cold War in 1991 decades of war and preparation for wars seemed over andstates could decrease the claims of paramount defense The United Nationsstepped in supported by a new NGO infrastructure to transform security from astate-centric to a human-centric priority

States not only had sovereign rights and institutions to protect themselves butmany had magnified and abused their power at the expense of the lives and wealthof their citizens The opportunity for a new global order based on protectinghumans rather than states presented new hope Human security represented sucha shifted outlook and evolved as an enlarged program of human development ndashone which subdues and subordinates state claims over citizens A global outlookand appropriate institutions would replace the parochial actions of states whichacted only in their narrow national interest Human security became a program ofaction to demonstrate the efficacy of transnational actors in humanitarian opera-tions and in the process build institutions to replace ldquoselfishrdquo states

After a decade and a half following the Cold War the vision of a new worldorder based on regional and global institutions to deliver security to people hasdiminished The United Nations has proven to be as corrupt as some governmentsand remains ineffective in critical issues When the post-earthquake tsunamistruck Southeast Asia on December 26 2004 states ndash led by the United States ndashproved most rapid and effective in delivery of critical material and equipment InRwanda Sudan Yugoslavia and other places of human crisis international orga-nizations have been largely peripheral The modern sovereign nation-state(MSNS) still governs the distribution of security benefits to humanity

This is not to dismiss the importance of human security as a global concernbut to remind ourselves that protection of human life is the primary goal of polit-ical action Whether this protecting is accomplished by NGOs the UnitedNations religious orders or nation-states is less important than beneficial outcomes

Preface xi

To determine the best agency or agencies to maximize human security ndash theprotection of human lives ndash it is necessary to understand how this had beenaccomplished in the past If past agencies have been successful even partiallytheir lessons ought to be examined and the agencies themselves made more efficient But an adequate approach to human security requires an inventory oftraditional and recent institutions Some states and societies have been moresuccessful than others as a cursory glance at life expectancy tables demonstratesLongevity of citizens is not only a by-product of industrialization and democracybut can be considered the primary goal of human security

The first part of this book dissects the concept of human security as a productof human existence Each of us exists in the modern world at levels of individualperson and citizen and each level of existence provides a degree of human securityGlobalists seek to add a fourth level based on speciesrsquo collective responsibility ndash notnecessarily a fanciful or unrealistic proposition but an idea that can be effectiveonly by building on existing adaptations and instruments of securityImprovement of global human security entails propagating the benefits ofWestern modernization to more benighted regions of the world ndash a propositionnot likely to be welcomed among an emerging global elite consisting of Westernand non-Western leaders

The primary purpose of this analysis of human security is to build a theorywhich can be an instrument for discovering variations in the historical Chinesestate Herein theory is a means not an end in itself The second part applies thetheory of human security to the history of China ndash a society which achieved a rel-atively high level of pre-modern well-being for significant numbers of peopleover many centuries With the breakdown of the Confucian state Chinese elitesattempted several variations of the nation-state to establish a new order Theseexperiments in state-building continued after the Communist revolution in 1949and the contemporary challenge from Taiwan is that Chinarsquos current unitary statemay not be the final solution for the Peoplersquos Republic of China (PRC) A federalstate may be one resolution of the cross-straits question although its acceptabil-ity to Beijing is doubtful at present Chinarsquos long history represents an alternativeapproach to human security and modern experiments in state-building emphasizehow Chinese elites sought to achieve wealth and power by transforming theirpolity into a MSNS ndash though their task remains incomplete as long as Taiwanretains its autonomy

My two-stage approach is admittedly unique and some might call it idiosyn-cratic Much of my intellectual life has been spent trying to reconcile Confuciuswith Thomas Hobbes ndash the individual in the family versus in the state In thisquest students colleagues friends and anonymous critics have stimulated me toexplore questions and approaches not well travelled The joys of retirement fromteaching have been leavened by existential questions especially why are we sofortunate in the advanced industrial world to have increasing longevity muchlonger than our ancestors or in less advanced countries As I pursued this questionin the context of human security the answers opened up an analytical frameworkfor making sense of Chinese history and the pursuit of state-building While these

xii Preface

may appear to be two very distinct questions modern Chinarsquos quest for humansecurity and sovereignty cannot be understood merely through historicalnarrative I hope my formulations of human security will be useful to scholars inseeing new patterns of continuity as well as a reminder that the modern stateremains a fundamental fact of human existence ndash for better or worse

Chalmers Johnson has been a continuing source of encouragement and inspi-ration in this search Kathleen Chrsquoi Wei-li Bedeski has been my pillar of supportand insight in seeing family as the core of human security Daughter Pamela asshe goes from home to a wide and wonderful world motivated me to ask if it issafe out there To her I dedicate this book in the hope that she will find securityhappiness and fulfilment

Victoria CanadaDecember 2006

Abbreviations

Av Allocated valuesCc State claims on citizensCCP Chinese Communist PartyCPSU Communist Party of the Soviet UnionDMS7 Dengist Market State (1979ndashpresent)DPP Democratic Peoplersquos PartyDPRK Democratic Peoplersquos Republic of KoreaEi Natural environmentEp Political economyEs Social economyER External relations of statesERc Reciprocal claims by statesF FamilyFDR Franklin D RooseveltGLF Great Leap ForwardGMD GuomindangGRS4 Guomindang Republican State (1928ndashpresent)HSc Human security in the state citizenHSi Human security of individualHSp Human security of personHSF Human security failureICS2 Imperial Confucian State (206 BCndashAD 1911)Ki Knowledge individualKp Political knowledgeKs Knowledge socialKMT KuomintangLp Political libertyLs Social libertyM MilitaryMCS6 Maoist Communist State (1956ndash1976)MSNS Modern Sovereign Nation-StateOc State obligation of citizensOs Social obligation

PF Political friction coefficientPLA Peoplersquos Liberation ArmyPRC Peoplersquos Republic of ChinaQLS1 Qin Legalist State (221ndash206 BC)RNS3 Republican Nation State (1911ndash1927)ROCOT Republic of China on Taiwan (1949ndashpresent)Sa Actualized sovereigntySc Claimed sovereigntySCS5 Stalinist Communist State (1949ndash1956)SEZ Special Economic ZonesSF Coefficient of social frictionTc Territorial claims of the stateTIS8 Taiwan Independent State (1949ndashpresent)UNDP United Nations Development ProgrammeUSSR Union of Soviet Socialist RepublicsVe Value ndash equalityVl Value ndash libertyVo Value ndash orderWi Individual will to liveWMD Weapons of mass destruction

xiv Abbreviations

The human species is naked in his stories stripped of those tendencies towardgood which last only so long as the habit of civilization lasts But the habit ofcivilization is fragile a sudden change in circumstances and humanity reverts toits primeval savagery

(Milosz 1953 122)

To climb a mountain the adventurer must prepare two things ndash a plan and properequipment The plan includes route alternatives and objective Equipmentdepends on the nature of the mountain whether there are glaciers and sheer cliffsanticipated weather and the competence and experience of the climber himselfSafety is a primary concern but risks are inevitable The safest course is not tostart the adventure at all but reaching the summit can be the most exhilaratingevent of a lifetime

The Chinese state is a conceptual mountain ndash it has been mapped and describedby historians and political scientists We know this ldquomountainrdquo exists for it hasbeen part of the global landscape for over two millennia It has quaked periodi-cally but returns to unity and power Chinarsquos latest convulsions occurred with thedeath of Mao Zedong in 1976 and it is now a major economic and military powerin the world Language culture geography and social patterns forge strong linkswith the past yet technology industry and government seem to break sharplywith tradition

How can we map this conceptual mountain My plan is to examine the Chinesestate as it evolved from the empire of Qin Shi Huangdi (221ndash206 BC) through thevarious dynasties to the Republic and Peoplersquos Republic of China The 2100-yearhistory is rich in human suffering and accomplishment and has been amplyresearched and described by scholars Simply to retell that story offers littleinsight into the dynamics of the Chinese state so we must gather our ldquoequipmentrdquoMuch has been written on Chinese politics and a large body of literature on statenation and sovereignty exists in the West This ldquoclimbing equipmentrdquo is solid andtested but is it appropriate for climbing the Chinese mountain without some mod-ification Can we carry out our plan by treating China as an ordinary state ndash a case study like any other state The political literature on China suggests

1 Human survival humaninstitutions and human security

otherwise The modern Chinese state has followed a unique course in the twentiethcentury From the start in 1949 Chinese Communism has displayed a renegadeMarxism now transmogrifying into a proto-capitalist society under CommunistParty dictatorship

To overcome this contradiction ndash Chinese uniqueness versus the Westernconceptual vocabulary drawn from and specific to Euro-American historicalexperience ndash a human security approach will be used There are significantlimitations with the existing literature in this relatively new concept with itsemphasis on humanitarian policy and delicacy over sovereignty and use of forceso some adaptations are in order that can provide our necessary equipmentThomas Hobbes (1588ndash1679) is the originator of modern thinking about humansecurity In his Leviathan he saw men as atomized creatures at war with eachother and with nature until they rationally surrendered their autonomy to theLeviathan state He described the paradox of how men acquired a large incrementof self-protection by giving up their right of self-protection to the state Modernhuman security writers tend to embellish this role of the state by calling on suc-cessful states (those that are able to deliver the benefits of human security thatresult in extended longevity and relative freedom from want and fear) to sharetheir resources with less fortunate nations and peoples At the same time inter-national organizations are summoned to disburse these state benefits to the vic-tims of failed states

Taking our cue from Hobbes a human security approach offers fresh perspec-tive on manrsquos relation to the state and can provide an analytical framework forunderstanding the evolution of the Chinese nation-state The merit of humansecurity is that it begins with the individual person in contrast to much of thetwentieth centuryrsquos concern with national security Human security is simplyldquoprotection of the individual humanrdquo What is ldquohumanrdquo In Chapter 2 we analyzehow humans exist at five levels individual (biological) person (social) citizen(political) globizen (globalspecies consciousness) and soul (religious) and howthese layers of existence express a declining efficacy of human protection Thatis to say a human life is best protected by an individualrsquos own efforts and leastby religious belief

Chapter 3 examines the state as a human security apparatus and how it has beendistorted in the last century In Chapters 4 and 5 a theory of human security isdeveloped through the vehicle of five notational formulae Each formula addressesa level of human existence (excluding globizens and souls belonging to the realm ofsentiment rather than efficacy in the present though often having the power to evokehuman security actions) The formulae are cumulative starting with individualswith subsequent formulae building on each previous one The individual humanlife is the existential and conceptual starting point of our theory of human securityWhereas Hobbes linked the human individual more or less directly to the sovereignstate my theory of human security emphasizes the importance of personsocietyas a critical link between individual and state In China society provided humanprotection when the state was weak and fragmented during those periods when thestate was unable to deliver human security to its subjectscitizens

2 Humans survival and security

Chapter 6 examines the application of human security theory to the ImperialChinese state Formula three addresses actualized sovereignty and derives itsefficacy from the aggregated human security of individualspersons in the stateand is modulated by other factors Actual sovereignty encompasses the real scopeof a statersquos control and jurisdiction In this military effectiveness remains primary

States also make extensive claims of sovereignty over citizens and territory andChapter 7 explores this claimed sovereignty in the context of the imperial state Theseclaims express general values of how government and society should be organizedand are identified as order equality and liberty The continuity of the imperial state(abbreviated as ldquoICS2rdquo) over numerous dynastic shifts suggests a recurring patternof claimed sovereignty This pattern is termed ldquometa-constitutionrdquo and allows us toidentify at least eight state meta-constitutions since unification of China in 221 BC tothe present The immediate precursor of the ICS2 the unifying Qin empire was sub-stantially different in its meta-constitution from subsequent state-forms and thoughbrief deserves examination as the Qin Legalist State (QLS1)

Chapter 8 analyzes the Republic of China 1912ndash49 and the transfer of theGuomindang Republican State (GRS4) to Taiwan in 1949 The simultaneousexistence of two meta-constitutions ndash one on the mainland and the other onTaiwan ndash has resulted in the continued ldquoincomplete sovereigntyrdquo of both in termsof the difference between actualized sovereignty and claimed sovereignty Thissuggests the theorem that the greater the gap between these two forms of sover-eignty the more intense the potential for conflict The possible emergence of athird meta-constitution (Taiwan Independence State TIS8) further complicates thesovereignty map of contemporary China In the final chapter we examine contemporary China through the lens of human security theory ThreeCommunist meta-constitutions in a space of thirty years (1949ndash79) emerged andeach competed for sovereignty with GRS4 Half a decade into the twenty-firstcentury the latest Communist meta-constitution must deal with two competingnonCommunist meta-constitutions for the soul of China

In these pages human security theory will provide equipment for ldquoclimbing theChinese mountainrdquo From the summit details will merge in the distance below andwe should be able to discern larger patterns States are the tectonic plates of humanhistory and humans ndash as individuals persons and citizens ndash are the energy sourceof state formation transformation and collapse Acting purposefully ndash to live andto live well when possible ndash mankind has created and assembled social institutionsand created states The MSNS has demonstrated its lethality to its citizens and tocitizens of other states in the twentieth century and yet remains the supreme glob-ally accepted form of political membership and action Europeans are trying tomove beyond the nation-state creating a supranational European Union as a typeof confederal state and liberal intellectuals regard the nation-state as passeacute andeven obsolete as history moves on For the other three-quarters of mankind how-ever the MSNS remains their vision of future completeness and they see it as notyet accomplished In Chinarsquos view only unification of Taiwan with the mainlandwill fulfil its sovereign destiny Thus for China the MSNS remains in the futurewhile in the West it is a legacy to be transcended

Humans survival and security 3

I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country (Nathan Hale)

No one wants to die Even people who want to go to heaven donrsquot want to die to getthere And yet death is the destination we all share No one has ever escaped it Andthat is as it should be because Death is very likely the single best invention of LifeIt is Lifersquos change agent It clears out the old to make way for the new Right now thenew is you but someday not too long from now you will gradually become the oldand be cleared away Sorry to be so dramatic but it is quite true

(Jobs 2005)

And death is as finite as it gets It has closure Plus the death ratio is low only 11 inoccurrences per person

(OrsquoRourke 1998 3)

Human security and human life ndash narratives of survival

Human security is the life-safety of individuals ndash its absolute minimum require-ment is life with death as the limiting condition Modern polite society hasbracketed discussion of life and death as unpleasant and even unspeakablealmost pornographic though personal experience popular culture and religionmanage to keep the subject as an immediate presence One cannot discusshuman security without confronting the fundamental mortality of all life Whois responsible for the safety of individuals The Christian asks ldquoAm I not mybrotherrsquos keeperrdquo And the sceptic replies ldquoDoesnrsquot onersquos lsquobrotherrsquo have theresponsibility for his own safety particularly if that lsquobrotherrsquo is a total strangerrdquoHuman security is enhanced by personal responsibility plus altruism or at leasthelpful concern for others and by adding sponsorship of life to the scope of thestate death can be presumably postponed to the limits of natural longevity Noman is entirely helpless although individual ability and resources to survive indifficult circumstances vary greatly Prudence is the sense to avoid dangerousand life-threatening conditions but as the 2004 tsunami demonstrated millionswere caught by surprise through no fault of their own and many thousands perished by an ldquoAct of Godrdquo

2 Dimensions of human securityFoundations in individual human life

Human security in individual human life 5

Human security begins with individuals ndash a term I will use to denote humansas discrete biological organisms with rational and emotional faculties This doesnot include the overt self-consciousness of modern individualism a relativelyrecent development Historian F J Teggart noted the absence of individuality inprimitive life

It is difficult for the modern man to realize that in the earlier period indi-viduality did not exist that the unit was not the single life but the groupand that this was the embodiment of a relatively fixed system from whichescape was normally impossible So completely was the individual subordi-nated to the community that art was just the repetition of tribal designs lit-erature the repetition of tribal songs and religion the repetition of tribalrites

(Teggart 1962 272)

In our own age of individualism literature and film are rich sources for por-traying the drama of individual survival For example the film Touching the Voidtells of two mountain climbers and their perilous 1985 ascent of the west face ofSiula Grande in the Peruvian Andes After Joe breaks his leg he falls into acrevasse summons every skill and mental resource to return to base camp alone ndashdemonstrating the near-limits of human endurance and self-rescue His climbingcompanion decided that the altruistic risk of endangering his own life to find Joewhom he assumed had died in the fall was not worth taking Safety is both theavoidance of life-threatening danger and saving life when danger has beenencountered

Stories of self-rescue demonstrate the innate ability of individuals to pre-serve their lives in extremis and provide an inventory of what an individualrequires and possesses to survive Many stories portray exceptionally strongindividuals provide a definition of heroism and also demonstrate the limits ofhuman survival They may provide a realizable ideal although only rarelyachievable Weak or unlucky individuals perish Through narrative we canidentify elements of individual human security that contribute to individualextreme survival and this helps to identify how groups and societies have builtinstitutions to provide safety and security for weaker members ndash those who areless able to protect themselves from the rigors and cruelties of the savageworld ndash generally the aged the infirm women children and infantsInstitutions also establish norms of behavior that reinforce solidarity andmechanisms for group preservation Whether these security institutionsemerged out of altruism self-interest biological imperatives or social con-tract is less important than the fact that key social institutions are built on iden-tifiable human security elements internalized and carried by each individualand they reflect the efficacy of those elements in the general protection andenhancement of human life

Building a theory of human security starts with the life-requirements of theindividual We will then adapt and extend these parameters to social institutions

6 Human security in individual human life

and upon these observe how the social matrix of persons has been incorporatedinto the MSNS which ideally delivers human security benefits to its citizens

The test of human security ndash biological life of the individual

Human security begins with recognition of the human individual as a biologicalentity with a primeval will to live an intellect to comprehend and respond to hisenvironment senses that provide information to mind and body limbs that act oncommand and direction of the individual and emotions that engage him1 in actionwith self and others The ultimate test of human security is whether the individ-ual lives or dies under abnormal circumstances ndash defined as the occurrence of adeath caused by other than natural exhaustion of a bodyrsquos inborn and acquired liferesources Jean-Paul Sartre captured the mindndashbody dilemma in his existentialistnovel La Nausee in which his protagonist expresses disgust with man as a phys-iological being determined by the laws of nature and society and subject to thedestructive effects of time ldquoI exist I am the one who keeps it up I The body livesby itself once it has begun But thought ndash I am the one who continues it unrollsit My thought is me thatrsquos why I canrsquot stop I exist because I think rdquo (Sartre1973 135) His Cartesian soliloquy disengages mind from body but he ndash as mind ndashwill cease to exist when the body dies unless he believes in an eternal soul ndash whichhe likely will not

The individual human is a mortal being ndash he lives and he dies Medicine andother sciences combine to prolong life and postpone death but there is no escapeThe biological individual incorporates mind and is a thinking creature able toremember the past observe the present and contemplate various futures as wellas to monitor the condition of his body for hunger pain fatigue heat or cold and to take voluntary action to maintain life and health The individual will avoiddanger evade threats or confront them if necessary to maintain his own life Thewill to live is the most powerful drive not only in humans but in all speciesThis will to live is intrinsic to the core of human security ndash the biological individ-ual is the primary steward of his life

Human evolution continues to be at the center of manrsquos view of the humanspecies Increasing questions are raised about Charles Darwinrsquos theory of evolu-tion which is criticized as lacking adequate evidence and not a theory at all Ideasof a designed universe once dismissed as disguised creationism are finding awider hearing Biochemistry the study of life at its molecular level is openingnew directions of inquiry and forcing us to consider man as an intricate machinewhose parts could only most improbably come together as a functioning unit Forscientist-writer Michael J Behe the molecule is ldquoDarwinrsquos Black Boxrdquo and isonly in the past several decades being opened and explored (Behe 1996) In thesocial sciences biopolitics has attempted to incorporate and integrate biologicaldiscoveries particularly from the Darwinian perspective into new insights intohuman political behavior

The ldquoblack boxrdquo of the social sciences is the human individual whose DNA-determined physiology is rigorously homogeneous in fulfilling the functions of

life sustenance Nearly every organ in the human body has a role to play and biochemists are discovering how the ldquomachinerdquo works at the molecular level Fewof the organs respond directly to the brain ndash the supposed source and center ofhuman reason ndash the machine insouciantly carries out its practical role of supply-ing and processing the nutrients and ridding waste products having no con-sciousness of its own and generally responding to few orders from the brainAppetites and passions tend to be unresponsive to reason and are directly connected to the will to live

But let us suppose there is one specific organ in each human body ndash invisiblebecause it is embedded in the complex of neurons and cells ndash which is the uncon-scious system of integrating all the life-sustaining functions that have such pre-cise activities and summoning all possible resources when the body faceslife-threatening emergency Suppose this ldquoorganrdquo consists of an invisible webanalogous to the electronic worldwide web ndash constantly sending signals andresponding searching the environment and contacting different nodes For thesake of convenience let us call this ldquoorganrdquo the Life Web because we can deduceits existence from the self-regulating mechanisms of the body but we can neithertrace its origins nor see it under dissection or microscope nor even map it out ndasheven at the molecular level We can deduce that it is connected to the brain sinceinformation of the senses flows there and the brain commands a response orstores the information for future use Finally let us suppose that the Life Webeither evolved or was created to prolong the life of the biological organism andthat man presumably the most advanced of living creatures possesses the mostperfect or complex Life Web Why is he the most advanced Because he is ablenot only to prolong his individual existence with immediate ldquoinstinctiverdquo behaviorto flee visible danger and avoid pain but has interacted developing language alongthe way with other humans to cooperate and accumulate tools and weapons andknowledge to prolong existence Human dominance in the world may be the resultof superb integration between the brain and Life Web in our species Certain kindsof collective behavior are observable in most animal species some attributable tolearning and some to inborn traits but nothing approaching the sophistication andcomplexity of humans owing in large part to sophisticated language

Mindndashbody cooperation facilitates survival There are rare cases when humansldquochooserdquo death but these might be explained as events where individuals (a) anticipate a future of unbearable pain (b) altruistically sacrifice themselvesfor their fellow human beings or (c) envision an afterlife far sweeter than the pre-sent The dominant principle of the mindndashbody relationship of the individual is tomaintain the life ndash the survival and well-being ndash of the human organism Thisrequires preservation from harm and injury accumulation of materials that con-tribute to biological existence (food water shelter) avoidance of danger and painand keeping company with others who will contribute to this life-enhancing project Human security is a strategy of inquiry proceeding from these elemen-tary considerations particularly the presumption that the human mindndashbodyentity not only seeks its own preservation in an animalistic way of pain anddanger avoidance but in a uniquely human way of using language and tools


forming alliances and establishing bonds and accumulating knowledge andinstitutions to refine and extend existence of the individual

The dilemma of the human security approach (as I undertake it) is that eachbeing struggles a lifetime (however long that may be) to stay alive and ultimatelyfails (So as Jobs declaims there will be room for others) The consciousness ofeach individual is the ldquoghost in the machinerdquo and is subjectively aware of lifersquosbattles This conscious experience is unique and each personal crisis is unique inthe history of mankind The specific details of a particular aged aunt strugglingwith stomach cancer in Brooklyn never occurred before in history and will neverhappen again Each surge of pain has a particular fingerprint of time and sourcenever to be replicated Snowflakes will sooner become identical than any humanexperience will be exactly duplicated Recognizing the principle that the humanmindndashbody primarily strives to survive we can assemble some observations onhow we actually postpone death and analyze these to provide a starting point fora theory of human security which focuses chiefly on human survival Recognizingthat each human experience is unique and fundamentally incomparable with anyother we nonetheless can take a certain class of human experience ndash crisis of survival ndash and try to understand how people have succeeded or failed ndash that islived died or suffered yet survived

The dichotomy of mind and body as the essence of individual is severely testedin the lives of prisoners The state as chief prison-keeper in totalitarian orwartime democratic societies transforms mindndashbody individuals into homoge-neous units Under prison conditions the unit individual is primarily a biologicalorganism whose life condition is a binary toggle ndash either ldquoonrdquo or ldquooffrdquo The roleof mind is reduced to maintaining a will to live Hitler or Stalin or Mao Zedong orPol Pot genocides consisted of turning off the life ldquoswitchrdquo of millions of indi-vidual prisoners or adjusting it dangerously close to ldquooffrdquo One of the innovationsof the nineteenth-century MSNS was the prisoner of war camp with its twentieth-century heirs the concentration camp and the gulag Once the enemy class wasrounded up ldquoenemyrdquo individuals could be eliminated or at least the scope of theiractivities seriously limited In the totalitarian state all individuals are inmates ofa virtual prison though some have more privileges than others

A prison can be a metaphor for the state in which it exists North Korean eacutemigreacute Kang Chol-Hwan described the gulag to which his family and relativeswere condemned as a quantitatively intensified deprivation of material comfortsand liberty compared to their former lives in Japan and subsequently in Kim Il-Sungrsquos DPRK (Democratic Peoplersquos Republic of Korea) (Kang 2001) Only afterabandoning their life of comfort and freedom in Japan to serve the Communistregime in North Korea did they realize that they had chosen a downward spi-ralling imprisonment the moment they stepped off the ship onto DPRK soil Theprison was a metaphor of state values In the work camp which was a community ofprisoners and guards he noted the complex hierarchy that existed even amongthe prisoners ndash a hierarchy that coerced order in the camps2 Nominal equality ofprisoners was contradicted by tiny privileges accorded to some ndash especiallythose who collaborated with the guards Liberty was virtually non-existent with


ldquoeducationrdquo and self-criticism sessions designed to suffocate whatever realm offree thought remained The prisons of the state crushed compassion even tofamily members

I saw fathers released from the camps with their bodies broken and depletedturned out of their childrenrsquos homes hungry mouths with nothing left to giveSometimes the fathers were left by the side of the road to die of hunger Onlytheir demise could bring any good by clearing the way for the familyrsquos pos-sible rehabilitation The system seemed specifically designed to stamp outthe last vestiges of generosity

(Kang 2001 143)

He also described how ldquosexual relations were banned in Yodok prison becausethey threatened to give life to a further generation of counterrevolutionaries people of undesirable origins should disappear or at the very least be preventedfrom reproducingrdquo (ibid)

Individuals in extremis the starting point for a theory of human security

Examples of adventurers in life-threatening situations or prisoners living in astate-created hell suggest evidence of mindndashbody unity in individuals Underextreme circumstances the individual will to live is a powerful and decisiveinstinct This will usually surfaces at extremes of the human condition On a con-tinuum of human security genocide stands at one extreme where the state has allpower to destroy life (and often does) and the individual has none having beenstripped of all resources by terror violence and intimidation The other extremeis the lone individual in the state of raw nature in full possession of endowed andachieved elements of self-protection

How does man in extremis survive in raw nature Selected narratives describemen who directly face extinction in a societyless and stateless nature and iden-tify individual qualities and resources which enable men to overcome imminentdeath From these stories we derive the qualities and characteristics that we ashumans either possess or can develop individually as human security inputs to prolong life in very difficult circumstances The theory of human security will showthat these individual human security inputs are channelled into cooperative rela-tions (society) with other humans at the personal level and projected into the state3

Our first example is Aron Ralston alone and dying in the Utah desert whodescribed his thoughts as he was immobilized by a rock that had unluckily pinnedhim inside a cave (Ralston 2004) ndash recalling family and friends calculating howhe might be rescued video-recording his farewells and estimating the rate andtrajectory of slow death Ultimately only self-amputation freed him This mightseem to be an atypical case for human security but illustrates man in extremis ina near-total natural environment ndash a next-to-null point of human security Hisenvironment was less than completely natural since he carried advanced tools and


equipment plus knowledge garnered from years of strenuous and extremeoutdoor adventuring In addition he had a character of confidence coolness andcourage that was formed by family and education as well as seeking and confronting challenges in the past In extremis his human security resources ndash thephysiological material and psychological tools to remain alive ndash were limited tohis mind and bodyrsquos sweep His personhood ndash bonds and relations with others ndashdid nothing to activate rescue attempts and he decided he would be dead by the time he was missed and a search effort could find him Family andfriends would grieve but could do nothing for him in his immediate situationHis status as political actor and citizen also had no meaning in his entrappedcondition

The rock-imprisoned Ralston was thus nearly pure individual ndash in those fivedays of entrapment he alone was responsible for his life and so he made thepainful choice of severing his arm so that the rest of his body could live We cansummarize his human security resources as the following

A powerful will to live A strong body in excellent condition A few tools equipment and some food warmth and water to slow starva-

tion hypothermia and dehydration Knowledge and experience that enabled him to calculate the consequences of

whatever actions he undertook and Judgment and fortune were largely negative to his individual human security ndash

he had not notified anybody of his hiking plans he dropped some of his lastremaining water he chose to hike alone and left no information on his routeand a huge rock fell on his arm just at the moment he was climbing

From this we derive a few general observations about an individualrsquos humansecurity resources prior to involvement of society and state It is important toisolate these resources to avoid the error that human security is completely theresponsibility of state and society The Ralston narrative reinforces our con-tention that human security is primarily the responsibility of the individual andthat society and state are agents of augmentation ndash secondary responders so tospeak

His dilemma and solution verify a vivid life-force The will to self-preservationis universal in all species The phenomenon of suicides always relativelyrare does not alter the overwhelming presence of the will to live It is influ-enced by numerous factors including subjective evaluation of human rela-tionships strength of character religious beliefs and degree of pain ndash whichcould cause a preference for death

Physical body The body is the vessel for life and there will be wide varia-tion in the ability of the human body to endure stress and to extricate from alife-threatening situation Even under conditions of extreme pain and duresslife will be preferable to death



Tools In an emergency as Ralston discovered much depends upon whichtools are available within an armrsquos reach of an immobilized body Animalsare observed to use tools and some will even modify a tool to make it moreeffective These skills can be passed on to younger animals as they observeadults using the implements Humans invent use and modify tools withastonishing efficiency and variety Many tools are highly effective indirectly expediting human survival and many more indirectly prolonghuman life

Knowledge and experience Culture is a collective and cumulative responseto manrsquos requirement to live in a portion of the earthrsquos environment As soci-eties increase in complexity the division of labor becomes narrower in termsof skills Ralston was trained as an engineer but became an outdoor equip-ment salesman so he could devote his energy and time to his passion forwilderness sports His education and experience helped him in calculatingescape but there was little help in that ldquomind-centeredrdquo background to helpin his risky escape back through the desert minus one arm Knowledge oftrapped animals that would gnaw off a limb to escape a trap provided themetaphor which affected his decision

Judgment and fortune ldquoStay out of potential harmrsquos wayrdquo is perhaps themost effective maxim to prolong onersquos life and a corollary would be ldquostayaway from things people and places where there is a probability of harmrdquoYet people continue to settle and work in flood plains on ocean shores or inharsh climates High risk is forced on people in desperate economic condi-tions who wager that disaster will not visit them in the foreseeable futureRalston could have avoided his entrapment if he had pursued less adventur-ous diversions

Individual survival ndash literary and cinematic examples

The prisoner of the totalitarian statersquos gulag lacks every fundamental liberty andopportunity for spontaneous action His survival is at the whim of the state At theopposite end of the spectrum of individual liberty is the adventurer or castawaywhose survival depends on his own strength wit and luck with no immediate4

intervention or assistance from society or stateThe notion of individuals as discrete units to be counted classified and ana-

lyzed is fundamental to modern social science as well as to the MSNS The notionis also important as a point of departure for understanding collective (social andstate) human security But to understand how individuals contribute to their ownsecurity and survival is also critical to understanding of human security A pas-sive prisoner who has lost all hope may die without a whimper while a free indi-vidual also without hope will fight to the last breath to survive The individualas organism has other resources of security besides the genetic and the materialFaced with a choice of living or dying individuals will choose life When choiceis removed passivity and fatalism may result


Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders ndash individual and person

The power of the will to live can be illustrated with narratives drawn from fiction and fact Thomas Hobbes examined natural man in the abstract and tracedhis sensations emotions and logic as the source of the state and society in amethod that proceeds as if he were proving a theorem of geometry His theory of thestate remains a monument of rational plausibility although based on the fictionthat there was a collective rational decision to enter into civil society Subsequentevolutionary and anthropological explanations have added further details on theformation of states and civil societies Yet it was in literature where flesh has beenadded to Hobbesrsquo theory Daniel Defoe (1660ndash1731) a prolific writer of popularfiction may not have consciously set out to portray the various stages ofHobbesian man as plausible characters but the result was clearly that InRobinson Crusoe (1719) Defoe describes a man who saves himself from drown-ing and survives on a deserted island ndash the lone individual facing raw nature MollFlanders (1722) is a fictionalized first-person account of a woman determined tobecome a lady largely to escape the fate of most low-born men and women whoselives were at high risk Unlike Crusoe her adversarialresourceopportunityenvironment was not raw nature but British society Where Crusoe lives as anindividual Flandersrsquo navigation through the pitfalls and opportunities of societymarked her life as a person existing by grace of friends lovers husbandsrelatives and native intelligence Her survival challenges were ameliorated byother people (society) in contrast to Crusoersquos material resources that provided for his existence and protection

A third Defoe work the semi-novel A Journal of the Plague Year (1722)intimates yet another layer of human existence ndash citizen He describes how peopleand institutions responded to the 1665 bubonic plague in London ndash a widerange of individual behavior that included extreme irrationality as well asimpeccable prevention of further infection by individual and collective actionProtostate regulation and the self-sacrifice of upstanding local officials (althoughthe monarchy remained distant and largely irrelevant) had some effect on miti-gating the plague although many individuals and families evaded controls to thedetriment of others In these three novels Defoe addresses the three layers ofhuman security modern man has accumulated for the protection of individual life

Will to live society and state

The ldquowill to liverdquo is the starting point for the human security of individuals Thisldquolife forcerdquo has been explored most vividly in fiction In the Chinese novel Dreamof the Red Chamber Black Jade recovers quickly from illness when she believesshe will marry her childhood companion Pao Yu and then dies (losing the willto live presumably) soon after discovering he is betrothed to another A humansecurity crisis occurs at those moments when an individual faces a lifendashdeathcrisis and mobilizes all his resources to stay alive Do men and women respondto these crises similarly A further question to be explored is whether there is

a ldquouniversal individualrdquo existing unbound by the dominant culture and environmentAre men and women similar in that core of humanity that corresponds to the ldquowillto liverdquo Defoe hints they are though he situates his protagonists in differentenvironments that severely test their respective wills to survive ndash Crusoe innature Flanders in society and Londoners in a matrix of state and society

Empirical evidence of life-force or determination to survive under overwhelmingodds tends to be anecdotal The survival of Arctic and Antarctic explorers underthe most trying conditions individuals who amputate a limb to survive (Ralston)concentration camp prisoners who survive disease starvation and brutality orother escapes from certain death relate how man overcomes extreme adversityand raise the question of whether todayrsquos urban-comforted denizens could rise tothe task if similarly challenged Western popular fiction thrives on this settingand Robinson Crusoe one of the most popular novels in the English language isbased on one manrsquos exile from state and social props of survival

It begins with a description of the life-force of one man Crusoersquos throwback toa primeval environment sets his adventure but starts with his seizure of life fromcertain death in the sinking ship In a fateful moment in the swirling currents andcrashing debris he fought to survive with every breath and heartbeat After over-coming the shock of survival he collects what he can from the shipwreck anduses accumulated skills and knowledge to enable a life that duplicates in roughdimensions that of a country gentleman except for human company Crusoe pro-vides a paradigmatic case of individual human security with these elements

Individual life force He overcame a life-threatening crisis through a primi-tive human will to live the good fortune of living when all shipmates hadperished and strength and wit to swim to safety

Knowledge He utilized the accumulated knowledge of a lifetime ndash includ-ing winemaking ndash to adapt to his environment and survive

Economy He took advantage of the materials he found on his island includ-ing that which he salvaged from the ship to build and furnish shelter and tohunt and raise food and

Family Although alone his body was the legacy of his parents Life was thegift from his mother and father and their care enabled him to survive toadulthood providing education along the way Had he been flung on theisland as an infant or adolescent without parents or others to care for himhis chances of survival would have been nil Although isolated in raw naturehe maintained his subjective membership in society by keeping a diarymarking a calendar and otherwise preventing the evaporation of his person-hood With the arrival of the native he named Friday he creates a newmicrosociety Later with other castaways a more complex social networkemerges In the final pages he even establishes a hierarchical state thuscompressing the evolution of human institutions into a personrsquos half lifetime

In his picaresque novel The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous MollFlanders (1722) Defoe describes a woman whose odds for survival much less



fortune and status were low Her ambitions to become a lady and to escape thehigh-risk circumstances of her birth (her mother was a condemned thief inNewgate Prison) were more than an aspiration to high status for its own sake Shewas as Defoe described her

during a life of continursquod Variety for Threescore Years besides her Childhoodwas Twelve Year a Whore five times a Wife (whereof once to her ownbrother) Twelve Year a Thief Eight Year a Transported Felon in Virginia atlast grew Rich livrsquod Honest and died a Penitent

(Defoe 1971 Title page)

Hers was part morality tale and part portrayal of a woman determined to live herlife as well and as long as possible ndash at nearly any price In contrast to RobinsonCrusoersquos defiance and adjustment to nature Moll Flanders both defied andadjusted to society Like so many in her station she could have easily succumbedto a life that was nasty British and short Deprived of decent family and escapingfrom gypsies she was adopted by a gentry family learned gentle arts wasseduced by one brother and married another Marriages ransomed her life andgranted security while they lasted In the first novel knowledge of nature andintelligence enable Crusoe to facilitate his security of life Moll Flanders uses herknowledge of men and women in society to secure her daily bread and statusNeither protagonist had much use for the state

Human security in cinema

As we lay foundations for a human security theory starting from the level of theindividual we can summarize observations so far

The individual human organism has an overpowering ldquowill to liverdquo thatenables him to overcome what may seem to be superhuman difficulties

Family is a primary incubator of individuals and provides protection duringthe years he becomes a person as well as the education which is the basis ofsurvival knowledge5

The individual requires physical inputs to maintain life ndash food water protectionfrom elements and so on which are naturersquos gifts but require labor to acquire

Knowledge and the intelligence to apply it appropriately vary widely fromindividual to individual and according to immediate circumstance In a socialsetting formal and informal education diffuses knowledge to all persons hav-ing membership in that society and thus adds an important increment ofhuman security to their existence

We can illustrate a contemporary adaptation of Hobbesian human security inthe state of nature with two American films The Edge written by playwrightDavid Mamet depicts four men flying and crashing into Alaskan mountainwilderness killing the pilot The remainder survive by their wits what they carry


in their pockets and Charles Morsersquos (the billionaire acted by Anthony Hopkins)lore of wilderness survival Their nemesis is a huge grizzly bear who symbolizesthe ldquobrutishrdquo element in the state of nature The bear kills the third man leavingHopkins and Robert Green his younger friend (played byAlec Baldwin) to dealwith the grizzly (Bart the Bear) and also find their way back to civilization

Similar to Robinson Crusoe the two survivors must exist on what the environ-ment offers but unlike Defoersquos hero Morse and Green face a much more dan-gerous nature ndash a gauntlet to run before they reach the safety of society Theircooperative friendship (a fragment of society carried from civilization) allowsthem to pool their strengths and overcome their ursine adversary Once the bearhas been killed and their return to human habitation in sight socialsexualfamilyconflict is no longer submerged by the necessity of cooperation and Green plotsto kill his friend to win Morsersquos wife with whom he has an ongoing affair Theolder man outwits his rival but hardly exults in victory saving his own life andlosing a friend whom he forgives

The two parts of the narrative ndash men in the state of nature and then returningto the sexual rivalries of society ndash convey

Manrsquos struggle for individual survival and the value of cooperation A parable of how once the immediate struggle has been won man has the

luxury of social existence ndash with all its conflicts and cooperation At the endof the story Hopkins does not rebuke his supermodel wife but only indicateshe was aware of her affair with his friend ndash preferring domestic amitythrough implicit forgiveness to punishing her infidelity and destroying theirmarriage Essentially The Edge fuses Robinson Crusoersquos battle againstnature and Moll Flandersrsquo sexual bonding as a strategy for survival ndash exceptthat in the film sexual bonding is a source of conflict between two menrather than cooperation when they reach ldquothe edgerdquo of civilization

The film Cast Away is a modern-day variant of the Robinson Crusoe storyFrom the very title through the names of characters it is rich in ironies TomHanks stars as a FedEx executive trying to complete one last trans-Pacificassignment before Christmas He excels in his profession because he is fixated ontime-saving the supreme virtue in his business Leaving his fianceacutee (HelenHunt) Hanks decides he can finish one last journey before the holidays Theplane crashes into the Pacific and he fights for his life as the plane breaks up inpounding waves echoing Crusoersquos initial crisis and separation from the life-sustaining vessel

He awakens on a beach surrounded by FedEx packages and has no idea wherehe is He can survive until help arrives Happy to be alive he assembles the flot-sam from the crash and awaits rescue ndash which never comes He is forced to ldquocastawayrdquo his former life and build a new one based on his rudimentary requirementsfor survival Marking time for him is no longer a matter of minutes and secondsbut days months and years No ldquoFridayrdquo appears and in his loneliness and delir-ium his bloody handprint on a surviving soccer ball (Wilson brand and thus he

names it ldquoWilsonrdquo) becomes another ldquopersonrdquo with whom he carries on imaginarydialogues Through supreme effort of will he escapes the barrier reef that protectedhis island from storms and returns to his Memphis home His fianceacutee assumingthe death of Hanks has married another His rescue was a resurrection but hecould not return to his former personhood which had been ldquocast awayrdquo

Cast Away addressed the four elements of individual human security and addi-tionally brings the next level of protection ndash society into focus Hanks wasstripped of his personhood by accidental exile to the island Though not physi-cally dead he ldquodiesrdquo to the society that had contained him A ritual funeral hadbeen held in Memphis to provide closure to his life and enabling fianceacutee Hunt tomove on to a flesh-and-blood marriage For Hanks [playfully named ldquoChuckNolandrdquo (No-land)] his physical survival was not enough ndash his life demandedpersonhood which he created by endowing the soccer ball with human qualitiesHis virtual society of two enabled him to maintain his relative psychologicalintegrity in the years of isolation

On the island he rediscovers arts of survival forgotten in urban life and per-haps remembered from novels and Boy Scout training Making a fire with fric-tion between two pieces of wood is a major triumph for him The contents offlotsam FedEx packages including a pair of ice skates and video cassettes aretransformed into primitive tools and materials Familiarity with the manufacturedobjects enables Hanks to put them to good use reaffirming that previous socio-material experience is a component of individual knowledge (By contrast theKalahari Bushmen in The Gods Must Be Crazy find an empty Coca-Cola bottleand regard it as a gift from the gods and throw it off ldquothe edge of the earthrdquo asthey know it because it brought nothing but misfortune to their simple existence)

Where Robinson Crusoe found the ldquootherrdquo in Friday Chuck Noland createsldquootherrdquo out of a sports item By this act he restores a semblance of personhoodto his existence Huntrsquos photo in a watch that no longer works exists as a reminderof his previous persona ndash a now idealized existence replaced by the immediacy ofldquofriendrdquo Wilson Realizing the hopelessness of his situation he considers suicidebut decides instead to build a raft to escape his isolated island This high-risk venture is preferable to certain isolation and death He observes and records theseasonal winds storms and tides and successfully navigates out of the lagoonthat both sheltered and trapped him Upon his return home after four years hereclaims the personhood assumed by all to have terminated with the airplane dis-appearance While Chuck the individual had survived Chuck Noland the personhad expired during his absence

The title itself is a play on ldquocastawayrdquo and provokes three interpretations Thefirst is the obvious reference to castaway ndash the conventional term for a shipwrecksurvivor although the protagonist was a victim of an airplane crash Second wecan interpret the space in the term to mean that society ndash that sector with whichhe interacted ndash had ldquocast awayrdquo Chuck with the formal funeral ritual as hadHelen through marriage to another and childbirth Assuming he had physicallydied society had cut the human bonds and healed the absence by adjusting exist-ing bonds around the ldquowoundrdquo of his perceived death Third recognizing that


central parts of his pre-crash personhood had been ldquocast awayrdquo by society Chuckresigned himself to the loss of his former other-defined personhood At the endof the film he stands at the intersection of two rural highways poised to decidewhich new personhood he would pursue At that moment he completes the ldquocast-ing awayrdquo of his old personhood that began the moment he climbed ashore thedesert island when he saved Chuck as individual and started the unconsciouscreation of new personhood for himself The single FedEx package he had notopened and treasured on his life-raft escape from the island contains a clue to hisnew personhood and when delivered to the addressee may reveal its contents

The film is conceptually important in its separation of human individual asphysical and sentient organism from human personhood as social convention andartifice It is a story where individual survival is due to circumstance will knowl-edge and availability of a cooperative natural environment ameliorated by planecrash detritus As to the role of family we can assume that Chuck was born of twoparents who protected him and nurtured him from infancy through or up toadulthood or similar quasi-family protections His store of knowledge and hisability to plan and calculate were vital in survival including extremely painfulself-surgery (with the blade of an ice skate) for a tooth problem His escape wasonly possible through the same individual elements6

Chinese lives Wild Swans

The ldquoman in raw naturerdquo genre of fiction did not seem to have had much currencyin Chinese literature perhaps partly because the concept of man has been so inti-mately linked to family and society and partly because the notion of an individualcut off from humanity was not very interesting as a setting for narrative develop-ment The Cartesian mathematics and Copernican astronomy that stimulatedHobbes to seek first principles in politics did not flourish in traditional Chinaand when introduced hardly triggered a reexamination of man as self-containedindividual

Man versus nature has been a major theme in Western literature With thediscovery of the Americas by Europe and vast areas of relatively sparse popula-tion human drama had an entirely new stage Age-old questions of human natureand natural law could be investigated and tested in the new environment Menconfronted raw nature ldquored in tooth and clawrdquo Each reader of adventure storiesasked himself ldquoHow would I react in those new situationsrdquo

The apparent non-existence of ldquoman versus naturerdquo adventure narratives inChinese literary tradition is understandable in a society that was far more conti-nentally oriented than maritime and where human security threats came mostlyin the form of social economic and political breakdown or interruptions of foodsupply accompanied by or caused by natural disasters Life without others andculture was practically unthinkable or at least uninteresting ndash even in fictionalimagination The attitude toward unmediated nature seems to be more Daoist ndash itwas the edge of the cosmos not the edge of civilization or the source of individ-ual enlightenment The response to raw nature was immersion not engagement



Chinarsquos natural landscape was transformed by human activity millenia ago andoutmigration began in large numbers only in the nineteenth century Overseascolonies naval rivalries and the prospect of wealth through overseas maritimetrade were not prominent in China depriving her literature of some of the contextof European stories In contrast to the individualistic subjectivism that saturatesso many Western novels (James Joycersquos Finneganrsquos Wake for example) social lifeprovides the predominant context

A genre of contemporary Chinese literature addresses survival in the twentiethcentury ndash a period of war and revolution As in many new nations the centralthreat to human security comes from breakdown of the old order whose institu-tions had structured and restrained people into civilized society The dissolutionof the imperial Chinese state tempted foreign interventions and saw the emer-gence of regional militarism Survival of individuals required far more of MollFlandersrsquo social pragmatism than Crusoersquos materialist ingenuity Reliance on familysolidarity has long been the key to human security in China and its efficacy isillustrated in Jung Changrsquos family narrative Wild Swans

Her story addresses key elements of human security spanning the crucialperiod when the modern Chinese nation-state was undergoing several transfor-mations The record of lives lived and the numerous challenges to individualhuman security are the subjects of Wild Swans The central story is how her fam-ily paralleling the fate of China itself went from prosperity to ruin and turbu-lently returned to a modicum of well-being Narrated from a womanrsquosperspective it illustrates the family element in human security The Chinese indi-vidual is highly dependent on the social matrix whose core axis is the lineagefamily Even in one of the most famous of Chinese picaresque novelsShuihuzhuan (All Men Are Brothers) the outlaw band is an ersatz family and anumber of the band have their status enhanced as descendants of historicalheroes The autonomous individual may be a Western invention and the literatureof individual survival gives him continuity of presence in our imagination

Wild Swans demonstrates how family has been the primary shield for humansecurity in China even to the extent of subordinating individual identity to lin-eage and consanguinity There exists a near-fusion of individual and person inthe sense that family is not only a group according membership but a primaryfocus of loyalty identity human security and meaning throughout onersquos life7

The human security elements of the traditional family include

It is the primary agency of protection and socialization for infants andchildren

It is a primary economic unit accumulating capital owning land in commonand distributing inheritance

It induces solidarity when the state is weak and unable to carry out its secu-rity role adequately

It represses individuality in the name of collective identity inducing a highersusceptibility to self-sacrifice and

It is the key link between individual and society


In the opening chapter of Wild Swans the Qing Empire was in disarray and state protections were practically inoperative Human security reverted to fundamentalinstitutions and behaviors which preserved individuals and those social relationswhich replenished the social matrix with new individuals Her family narrative oflate Qing Republican and Communist disorder illustrated the difficulties of survivalin modern China Among the remaining protections mentioned by the author were

The walled city design of so many Chinese towns was maintained to protectthe population against warlord bandit nomad and other predatory attacks TheChinese ideograph for ldquocountryrdquo or ldquostaterdquo (guo ) consists of elementsreferring to wall weapon and mouth By extension these elements convey thefundamental aspects of the state bordered and enclosed territory means ofdefence and people (literally renkou or ldquoperson mouthrdquo is the Chinese termfor population)

Public order was maintained by armies and police though during periods of aweak central state competing military formations were often destructive tolives and property until one emerged victorious Cities served economic andstrategic functions The author describes Yixian a northeast market town andtransportation junction marking the frontier of Beijingrsquos authority at the time ofthe new warlords Often cities were havens of peace and order during dynasticdominance as administrative and economic centers but in the inter-dynasticperiods they often became prizes and battlefields between contending forces

Families were the core of social organization and marriage was the processof enhancing human security of individuals within the family Sons had amuch higher value since only they could continue the family name whilewomen were often seen as little more than chattels for continuing the familyline Nonetheless mothers and mothering were highly respected for theirsocializing and education roles Women also tended to be enforcers of socialmores An old saying was that ldquoMen take care of the outside women manageinside (the family)rdquo A wife might be several years older than the husbandand be responsible for part of his upbringing Marriage was an arrangementbetween two families and a duty of individuals8

Confucian stress on education continued in modern China The Confucianempire encouraged education in state-oriented Confucianism and was reinforcedby social custom Education was decidedly conducive to human security of per-sons Under the empire competitive examinations were the road to official posi-tion which was a near-exclusive route to power wealth and status ndash not only forthe examinee but for his family as well After the elimination of the imperialexaminations in late Qing new avenues of upward mobility were sought

Other dynamics of society and human security emerge in Wild Swans

Law did not have the same status and power in China as in the WestConfucian ldquorule by manrdquo ndash rather than ldquorule by lawrdquo had the effect of makingthe word of the officials into a substitute for law

Acquisition of power or indirect protection under power was the key tosurvival

A daughter could provide security benefits for a family if she married wellor became the concubine of a person with power

A successful son would also provide security for the family Loyalty was keyto solidifying these benefits

Bribery was a common direct action to purchase protection Individual will was subordinated to family solidarity

Preservation of strict order and hierarchy within households starkly contrastedwith the disorder and conflict in Chinese society at large Family provided someprotection from the unpredictabilities of the outside world and was therefore acrucial institution of human security Jung Chang relates how she and her parentsserved the Communist revolution and suffered during Maorsquos Great Leap Forward(GLF) and Cultural Revolution

State-building in China at least since the Qin-Han era has exhibited a ldquoweakstatestrong staterdquo oscillation giving rise to the characterization of a historicaldynastic cycle Both state phases and the periods of passage between them havecontained massive threats to human security of Chinese citizens and subjects Inits weak or fragmented condition the components of the Chinese state were infrequent ndash almost constant ndash conflict with individuals paying the price in livesand treasure As one hegemon emerged domestically or intervened from outsidemilitary force imposed unity Only after the fragments of the old state were thor-oughly defeated would a milder form of government normalize human securityThus periods of weak state as well as strong state formation have been highlydetrimental to human security in Chinese history The condition of weak sover-eignty and the process of assembling sovereignty have precipitated much violencein China for over two millennia Only the peace of an entrenched strong state hasaccompanied peace and order though these were not absent during inter-dynasticinterregna In addition periods of disunity decentralized by definition saw thegeneration importation and incorporation of new ideas technology and religionsthat enriched Chinese civilization and pushed each new dynasty to assimilateinnovation rather than to return completely to the last successful patterns ndash asancient Egyptian dynasties had done

The individual and human security

Our selected narratives repeat a fundamental feature of human security All menhave a powerful urge to survive ndash a will to live ndash and most individuals will useevery physical and mental resource to survive crisis and adversity The ego existswithin the corporal body When the immediate lifendashcrisis of survival is overcomeand basic physical needs accommodated there is the ego need for ldquootherrdquo Thesenarratives demonstrate how individual humans are able to survive in difficult andlife-threatening circumstances But prior to the crisis in which the adult has evena slight chance to survive the individual must have been formed While this point


may seem so basic as to seem redundant it is vital in understanding the fullpanoply of human security at the individual level The historic and universal pat-tern of human reproduction and production has been the family based on male-female bonding intercourse gestation birth infancy adolescence adulthood oldage and death as the normal life cycle The human adult individual who is bestequipped to survive traumatic crisis is the ldquoproductrdquo of primary inputs frommother and father and secondary investment from others ndash most commonly closeblood relatives For this reason family is a prior requirement of the individual inthat it gives existence and human security during the most vulnerable parts of thelife cycle and is therefore a prerequisite to formation of an individual A majordifference between the iconic individual in the West and the existentially lessautonomous individual in China is in this magnitude of family affiliation withego in Chinese society

Based on the above exploration of individual survival we can summarize a fewelements in notation form After family (which we will notate as [F]9) investmentin an offspring the immature individual is better prepared ndash physically and men-tally ndash to undergo the trauma and challenges to life10 In any life-threat narrativethe individual undergoes a traumatic experience where life is in balance and exis-tence is grasped from the jaws of death ndash expressing a raw individual will to live(notated as [Wi]) Then using intelligence and knowledge [Ki] he assembles aplan for further survival by calculating and exploring possibilities of food andshelter out of what the environment suggests and provides This natural environ-ment [Ei] provides the material things and conditions needed to ensure survival inthe struggle for existence [Ei] is the foundation of economy in the social setting

We have used fictional and biographical narratives of survival to isolate andpostulate fundamental inputs of individual human security and to characterize thethreats to human life in a pre-social and pre-state environment Cast Away self-consciously depicts the problematique of personhood and survival ndash a relativelypure pre-social ndash as well as post-social ndash condition though the ego retains hissocial identity through memory and anticipation (materially expressed as theunopened FedEx package) Robinson Crusoe acquires new social identity withthe arrival of Friday and in The Edge ego and other cooperate and then engagein lethal contest on ldquothe edgerdquo of their reentry into normal society

In these narratives the state did not play a significant role in security of theindividuals depicted although like the preconditional family to produce themthe state was critical in establishing the infrastructure within which they lived andtraveled The ship that carried Robinson Crusoe was a creature of the BritishEmpire Chuck Nolandrsquos company FedEx operates as a multinational corpora-tion dependent upon the laws and protections of the states within which it oper-ates as well as the international air network operated by states The billionsowned by Morse in The Edge are his private property which would vanish with-out protection of the state and his air flight into the wilderness could not haveoccurred without a state umbrella of transportation and communication technologyand economy Without the state these individuals could not have been propelledinto the situations where their human security was threatened by the stateless



natural environment Strictly speaking they were citizens thrown back to a stateof nature equipped with considerable knowledge [Ki] to increase chances ofindividual survival The narratives of Aron Ralston Robinson Crusoe Cast Awayand The Edge described situations where family-created biological individualsconfront a natural environment beyond the reach of the state11

Given its contemporary ubiquity should not the state be considered a fifthelement in assessing individual human security It can be argued that sincethe earliest establishment of states men have sought protection in its laws andembrace and even the recording of history was not possible until some sort of stateexisted If correct then postulating a fully developed autonomous individual outsidethe state is not possible for both the family and the state have been prerequisitesto the emergence of the modern individuals who were the subjects of the narrativesHowever the complexity of the state its multifunctionality its later emergence inhuman evolution and its creation of a separate level of human existence (as citizen)require separate analytical treatment The benefits of citizenship helped to sustainthe subjects of the narratives but society and state did not directly contribute toimmediate rescue a human security task they performed as individuals

We can postulate a scale for individuals based on human security environmentsas follows with the degree of available freedom as the dependent variable and thecharacter of the state as the independent variable

1 Natural Man At one end of human security is the individual ldquocast awayrdquofrom civil society either voluntarily or by accident He is post-Hobbesian in thathe carries major elements of cultural skills and knowledge derived from living incivil society within the boundaries of a state as important parts of his cognitiveframework He has more freedom than normally possible in civil society and hischoices of action will focus almost exclusively on survival Adventurers such asRalston and Crusoe have undertaken risks for greater freedom but found them-selves trapped by the necessities of survival

2 Democratic Man Less free is the individual living in a democratic civil society ruled lightly by the state He must conform to laws and customs and eco-nomic necessities and in return commonly enjoys the benefits of peace andmaterial well-being Aside from responsibilities of personhood and citizenshiphe is free to pursue the economic social and leisure opportunities offered by hissociety

3 Authoritarian Man Lifersquos choices are more restricted by state andsociety His movement and social mobility are more limited and the priori-ties of his civil society may be determined by emergencies such as warsocial disorder religious dogmatism or natural disaster The state is moreinterventionist and restricting than in democracy but somewhat less than intotalitarian regimes

4 Totalitarian Man The totalitarian state dominates civil society and setsthe priorities for all citizens for the ostensible purpose of providing universalhuman security or transforming society into one more conducive to equal dis-tribution of protections It accomplishes control over citizens by restricting


choice and freedom and taking control of all societal institutions including thefamily

5 Anarchy Man (post-state) Described in early chapters of Wild Swanswhere civil order has collapsed and civil society is rife with conflict agencies ofthe state remain (police military and even bureaucracy) to carry out operationsagainst ldquoenemies of the staterdquo but without legal authorization or accountabilityTribalism regionalism and religious conflicts tatter the social contract and menform vigilante groups or support local warlords for survival Remnant fragmentsof the state ndash especially the military and rogue bureaucracy ndash become majorthreats to human security These fragments endanger human security even morethan the totalitarian state since unrestrained conflict is more likely than in theideologically-ordered state Social units such as families and clans will generallyhave inferior protection against state fragments

6 Prisoner Man At the extreme end of the human security spectrum is theprisoner who may easily become the victim of state sanctioned execution or geno-cide He is post-Hobbesian and has been betrayed by the state which he cannotescape He also possesses a culturally derived cognitive framework but his rangeof possible actions is severely limited ndash the state and its agents have all power12 Theprisoner is isolated from civil society especially in totalitarian states13 Prisonersin democratic and moderately authoritarian states are not normally subjected toextreme deprivation or death or exile except under law

In summary Natural Man lives outside the state and society and takes responsi-bility for his own security The challenges to survival are physical and nonsocialAlone in nature he has neither personhood nor citizenship to protect him At theother extreme is Prisoner Man who is completely subject to the state and itsagents ndash be they jailers police or army His security is delivered almost com-pletely by the state and can be terminated at its whim Similar to Natural Manhe is nearly pure individual but completely subject to the state which has littleinterest in preserving his life except for its own needs In between is a range ofcitizenships (excepting Anarchy Man) where the state has corresponding roles inproviding protection

In this chapter we have identified the individual as the human biological unitof life requiring human security for existence We have suggested several ele-ments that contribute to preservation of human life drawing on several narrativesabout men and women in extremis Man as individual exists in six environmentsidentified above Man alone in the state of raw nature is nearly pure individualkeeping in mind that his prior existence requires civil society and state to providethe personhood and citizenship he carries into the person-less environment Theseconsiderations will be carried as elements in constructing a theory of humansecurity

One death is a tragedy but a million deaths are a statistic(Josef Stalin)

The idea that a number of persons should exercise political rights in commonsimply because they happened to live within the same topographical limits wasutterly strange and monstrous to primitive antiquity

(Sir Henry Maine (Teggart 1962 269))

The role of states in human security

What is human security Philosophers have tried for centuries to define who weare Alexander Popersquos message ldquoThe proper study of mankind is manrdquo invites usto ask what is man Is he a biological creature driven by appetites and fears forhis survival Is he a social creature seeking safety and fulfillment in the embraceof collective existence Or is he primarily a political animal seeking power anddomination at the expense of others The present study postulates that he is com-prised of all three and his security consists of protections provided within thesethree layers of existence which I term biological social and political Man in theunit particular has built his essential humanity as individual (biological) person(social) and citizen (political) ndash each level of existence has an intrinsic set of pro-tections which aggregate as ldquosecurityrdquo We can perceive a fourth level of protec-tion emerging in contemporary history and its precursor was evident in greatempires of the past This fourth level of protection gives men a kind of global orat least transnational security The Roman citizen for example could travel any-where in the empire comfortable in knowledge that he enjoyed the protection ofRomersquos law Today globalization promises similar transnational rights and pro-tections and is expressed in the growing body of international law and organiza-tions A minority is acquiring a self-defining status of ldquoglobizenrdquo meaning thattheir orientation transcends national concerns and their protection is embeddedin the new wave of internationalism A fifth level of existence giving moral andpsychological (but not physical) security is spiritual or religious ndash the beliefthat human existence transcends the world of the material senses and that we

3 The modern sovereign nation-state (MSNS)

The modern sovereign nation-state 25

have a higher nature We can call this level soul though we must leave it totheologians to define Not having direct relevance to individual security weexclude it from human security consideration

The historical MSNS partially remedied the inadequacies of pre-politicalsociety that provided security to individuals only as persons and also furtherintegrated diverse parts of complex societies which emerge out of an increasingdivision of labor The MSNS the special form of state that has become thedominant mode of international relations in the nineteenth and twentieth centuriesemerged out of the evolution of Western European states from the Renaissanceand has become the global standard for political organization In the present ageit is the key political institution for human security and is rooted in individual andpersonal (social) needs for protection of life The MSNS is an artifice created inresponse to the human condition and has become relatively homogeneous in formand function It is not merely a legal military or economic construct

The MSNS also has a lethal side Exclusive nationalism for example has stim-ulated genocide and other forms of discrimination oppression and horrors1

Where the state has embraced radical equality use of coercion has not onlysought to repress individual achievement and difference but has implementedstate policies that eroded or removed prior props of human security One suchprop is the nuclear family which has been in voluntary and intellectual decline inthe West Its role in human security has been weakened and partly replaced by thewelfare state affluence secularism and individualism

Violent death of the individual marks the ultimate human security failure thenull point indicating that all measures to protect a human life have failed at theunit level Fundamentally human security is knowledge and action to postponeinevitability that all particular life comes to an end Each individual has powersto preserve his own life and as Hobbes postulated human reason and fear ofdeath motivate men to create civil society and the state so that life can be happierand longer The causes of death are many ndash homicides wars accidents diseaseor organ failure to name a few Human prudence conflict reduction basichygiene and application of medical knowledge have done much to raise lifeexpectancies But deliberate human killing of other humans has also been agrowth area in the twentieth century though crime and war have always been partof humanityrsquos lot

Genocide is multiple homicide for ostensibly political reasons ndash usually justi-fied in terms of national interests or state security The Nuremburg Trials soughtto criminalize genocide and the modern International Criminal Court seeks tofurther enforce international law against the practice Victims of genocide aremostly innocent of any crime and are only guilty of belonging to a targeted groupThey are stripped of all means of resistance and face the full brunt of the state andits agents They are naked of any means of human security and except in a fewcases international intervention fails to rescue them

Genocide was a tragic fact of the twentieth century and nationalism a frequentmotivation The dark side of a humanrsquos love for his country has been hatred of

26 The modern sovereign nation-state

persons branded as aliens The Turkish massacre of Armenians German holocaustof Jews gypsies and Slavs and the Rwandan bloody elimination of rival tribesare examples of perverse purification of national membership Equally perversehas been malevolent government insouciance toward its own population ndash thegreat famines in the Soviet Union during collectivization the mass starvationunder Mao during and after the GLF and recent deaths of two million in NorthKorea Equally reprehensible has been deliberate government actions murderingits own citizens as in the case of Saddam Husseinrsquos poison-gassing thousandsof Kurds or Syriarsquos mass murder in Hama or the auto-genocide of one-seventhof the Cambodian population or the Sudanese methodical elimination ofChristians today The perverse effect of sovereignty in less than civilized statesis that their claim of absolute jurisdiction over citizens allows them to kill theirown citizens with no accountability since by definition there is no higherauthority than the state itself The lofty sentiments of the UN charter oftenremain unenforced

Three remedies have been possible to reduce or avoid government-sanctionedgenocide so far democracy economic growth and outside military intervention

Democracy and multi-party political systems based on law have the bestrecords in the past century on genocide though far from perfect Liberalideas and outlooks help to inoculate government and citizens againstbeliefs that wholesale slaughter will solve political questions Their legalorder including enforcement and responsible courts further ensureaccountability

Economic growth provides hope and optimism with human energy focusedon material improvement Under successful capitalist expansion the risingtide raises many boats and governments or social groups are less likely toscapegoat ethnic minorities for economic failure

Outside military force has also proven effective although the costs arehigh and must be followed by long-term presence not only to prevent aresurgence of violence and vengeance but also to transform a murderousregime into one that is peaceable Defeat of Germany and Japan followedby US occupation and restructuring transformed them into advanceddemocracies Without sustained remaking of an entire polity permanentdemocracy is unlikely as the United States is discovering in Afghanistanand Iraq

The central paradox of modern human security is that its greatest threat hascome from the modern state ndash the political entity whose putative function is topreserve and enhance the lives of citizens State genocide has occurred largely innew states anxious in their new sovereignty that external and internal enemiesmay threaten newfound independence or determined to purify the country ofldquoalienrdquo elements As a new state emerging in a hostile environment of other statesseeks to preserve its existence and expand its power it demands complete loyaltyfrom its citizens Those residents of state territory who may not share the core

values or attributes or are assumed not to share are often prime targets for stateviolence to subdue or eliminate them

Paradoxes of the modern state

European political theorists and philosophers have sought to define the essenceof the state for centuries Hobbes interpreted it as a human artefact and imbued itwith a human teleological calculation of men creating the sovereign state toremove themselves from the state of nature and to protect them from each otherby establishing a superior authority who alone could resort to force (Houmlsle 200434) Hegel injected history into the state and reformulated it as the vehicle ofhuman transformation toward harmony and peace The MSNS should representthe most effective form of protecting humans from unnatural death and injuryand has become a major agency in postponing natural death ndash through educationpublic health public safety enforcement economic redistribution (that lifts thelowest sectors of a national population out of poverty and marginal humansecurity) and the expanded welfare state While progress has increased lifeexpectancy through state organization of human security it has also enhanced theefficiency of states and groups that wish to destroy lives The horrors of twoWorld Wars and assorted civil wars have also brought home the effectiveness ofstates and technology as killing machines This suggests the paradox of theMSNS as both benefactor and malefactor to human security contributor anddestroyer of human life

The Enlightenment celebrants of the sovereign state ndash from Hobbes throughBodin to Hegel ndash could not foresee that Leviathan unloosed would become sodestructive Hugo Grotius (1583ndash1645) formulated international law derivedfrom natural law to facilitate peace and commerce but realpolitik was rarely sub-ordinated to his principles Our age is one of accelerating dependence on the verystate that has become the major threat to human security

Paradox one ndash the state as killing machine

The central paradox of the state is that its killing abilities have increased as itsscope and technology have been refined while its ability to deliver goods andservices to increase human security of its citizens has improved Democracy as aform of accountable government has confined its killings abroad and intervenedin an increasing number of sectors of human activity to advance securityNondemocratic governments are less restrained in their targets of lethality andimprison and execute their own citizens to retain power They also claim to deliverequality and order while subverting liberty as well as material benefits

States are not equally lethal to their citizens Communist and totalitarian statesstand out as particularly egregious during their heyday Democratic states on theother hand are effective in winning wars and often by their enhanced killingpower most dangerous to their antagonists Today in the first decade of thetwenty-first century dictatorial failing or insecure states are the most liable to


engage in massacre of their perceived internal enemies as well as pose a threat toneighbors

The paradox of the last century is that the MSNS through war genocide andrepression of opposition has become a major agent to deliver violent deaths on amassive scale while in the same time period state-sponsored or state-encouragedtechnology and institutions have increased life expectancies and dramaticallypushed back the thresholds of nonviolent death Moreover the lethal MSNShas also been the facilitating agent of the same technology and institutionsthat have brought many benefits to mankind This paradox is mitigated whenwe acknowledge that incomplete or insecure states where democracy is weak orabsent tend to be much more violent than those which are secure and sovereignand democratic and deliver far fewer life-extending benefits to theirpopulations

Partial resolution of this paradox may be found in the ldquolife-cyclerdquo of theMSNS Simply a mature and complete MSNS is unlikely to inflict genocide onits citizens although its military sophistication may be highly destructive to itsenemies On the other hand states that are aborning or dying often visit greatviolence upon their citizens The optimum MSNS is stable and nonviolent ThisMSNS paradox ndash state benefits and state terror ndash stands at the core of humansecurity The MSNS protects humans but also kills them efficiently

If the notion of a MSNS life cycle is valid then global collective efforts mustfocus on

protecting human life where states are collapsing or emerging even wherethis requires intervention that violates state sovereignty

avoiding preventing and ending wars and conflicts and transferring life-protecting and life-enhancing technology and institutions to

incomplete states in order to assist them to achieve state maturity (alsoknown as ldquonation-buildingrdquo)

Paradox two the individual and the aggregate

A second paradox is contained in Stalinrsquos epigram A single death is a tragic lossto others whose lives were most directly affected by the existence of the deceasedIt is the paradox of egoism (self-survival) versus altruism (negation of egoism)Economic biological and emotional resources are invested in every livingperson and the end of a life is a lost investment so to speak Even several linkedlives ndash a fatal car crash of a family for example can be comprehended as multipletragedy At some undetermined threshold the human mind transforms multipletragedies into a generalized sorrow or regret A million deaths are transformedfrom separate tragedies into a measured and thus abstracted million units of death Body counts replace the intricate and intense emotional sympathy for living and breathing people who were victims of state lethality Yet the aver-age over 154000 deaths2 that occur every day in the world remain abstractions


John Donnersquos tolling bell3 sentiment links the individual sense of sorrow to thedeaths of millions but cannot be sustained with the same intensity that accompa-nies the demise of a loved one

The modern liberal sensibility perceives a necessary global trend towardequality and assumes it to be a paramount goal of ldquosocial justicerdquo ndash both avision and a criterion of human progress For all the noble sentimentality ofequal value of all human lives the reality of individuality consists of three tiersof concern

Self or ego Immediate circle of loved ones All others in descending order of acquaintance or relationship

Humans are moved by altruism in varying degrees and may give up their livesfor the sake of others even strangers and so individualism and accompanyingself-love are not absolute What is the source of altruism Once we reach the pointin our lives when we are capable to look after ourselves most live our lives asegoists and depend primarily upon our individual resources for personal survivalInfants and children are most vulnerable and depend upon parents for basic sus-tenance This period of dependency forms the universal experience of bondingand establishing interpersonal ties If humans were left to their own devicesshortly after birth like baby alligators emerging from their eggs the specieswould have long expired But more importantly the period of dependency estab-lishes the existence of ldquootherrdquo in the life cycle of the ego and creates an identitywe call personhood The individual ego inhabits the multiple roles of the personwhich in turn cultivates obligations privileges and responsibilities that aggregateas ldquosocietyrdquo Altruism is a clear expression of the egorsquos acceptance of mutualdependency on ldquoothersrdquo

Human security is defined as ldquosafety of individualsrdquo It means protectingindividuals from injury and death and by extension freeing individuals fromconstant anxiety over accidental or purposeful harm with the result that humanenergy can be expended in more productive directions Who provides humansecurity The first line of security is the individual ego ndash it alone responds imme-diately to pain and threat It alone possesses the will and knowledge to suppressacquiescent sentiments in the face of danger The second line is the social matrixof the individual as person ndash his family neighbors friends colleagues and fellowhumans Third is the state ndash those agencies which have the legal and moral mis-sion to protect the citizen ndash based on implicit or explicit contract

Human security is the implicit policy of all states though with little overtconcern over unique and particular individuals Every individual is special andstates usually make policy and law only for general categories It is left to eachindividual to provide primary security for himself to join with others forsecondary (social) security while the state should provide tertiary security fromgeneral threats


Paradox three safety versus liberty

Human security activity seeks greater safety for the individual and the MSNS hasmade significant contributions in this endeavor Membership in the state andaccess to its benefits as citizen require surrender of some freedom as Hobbesrightly observed The modern welfare state has increased the human security ofindividuals but at the cost of individual freedom of self-protection This form ofthe MSNS intervenes in family affairs and controls access to weapons of self-defense for the benefit of improving human security of citizens but at theexpense of individual liberty The MSNS also claims authority over the individ-ualrsquos life and material resources in the name of national security (partly to feedthe warfare state) ndash claiming that the existence and well-being of individualsrequire sacrifice for collective security Taxation and conscription (including his-torical forms of corveacutee) have long been a primary nexus of contact between thestate and individual

Human security in contrast to national security starts from the individual It ispossible to quantify human security by measuring aggregate null points (iedeaths) in the form of longevity and death rate figures But this does not measurethe full range of human characteristics that comprise real individuals For pur-poses of human security there are only two conditions that matter ndash safe orunsafe Safe means ldquolife-preservingrdquo and does not require comfort or happinessSafety of an individual requires a minimum of liberty so that his will to survivecan operate independently of imposed conditions Unsafe is the condition of indi-vidual life where violent injury or death is more likely The incidence of violentdeath or injury is a negative measure of human security

Democratic forms of government carry a form of moral hazard4 in giving citi-zens access to achieving wants as well as needs Sophisticated and full-timeactivism can also exert amplified influence on government to the detriment of anunfocused majority diverting tax revenues to special interest benefits for exampleGovernment confiscation of property ndash whether outright nationalization or incre-mentally through taxation ndash is a Hobbesian reduction of liberty Aggrandizement ofthe state at the expense of individualsrsquo rights over property has been acceptablewhen done in moderation or temporarily during national emergency but maybecome a temptation for governments to take property because it has expandingneeds and has the power to engage in takings5

As modern mankind experiences injuries and benefits from the state some par-ties seek to supersede it with a larger transnational political entity while othersare dedicated to containing its power and making it work positively for humansecurity A third persuasion sees the nation-state as the key agent of securitywhich subordinates other considerations to national interest and national securityA fourth group ndash terrorists being the extreme expression ndash fight and die toweaken and destroy the MSNS Islamic extremists consider the materialist andsecular state an obscenity and battle to restore theocratic authority to the succes-sor states of the Ottoman Empire Each persuasion seeks to resolve the statersquosparadox in its own way


General characteristics of the MSNS

The fundamental characteristics of the MSNS are

Sovereignty remains at the center what Bodin called the absolute power ofthe state Sovereignty defines the scope of state power

The state requires territory with adjoining waters as extensions of nationalterritory

A population occupying the statersquos territory is a prerequisite to the state andif they have a bonding identity or better still obligation and allegiance to thestate we call those people a nation

The state must have a government to make and enforce laws embody thesymbols of identity protect its citizenssubjects from harm and mobilizeresources to protect and carry out defense of the state

What distinguishes the traditional state from the modern is that the latter hasmade sovereignty the sine qua non of its existence and authority and has insistedon encompassing its population as an identifiable nation within preciselydemarcated boundaries Traditional states in contrast were more laissez-faireabout allegiance of the general population as long as power and office holderssupported the central government The MSNS evolved over several centuries inWestern Europe and was propagated by war and colonization so that today nearlyall the lands and much of the water of the globe are subject to the sovereignty ofone or another of existing states

The MSNS also occupies a preeminent position in modern thinking about howthe world should be organized Intelligent persons differ on perceptions of thestate ndash is it fact impediment or ideal

As a fact of modern political existence States are the exclusive domains ofpublic activity setting the parameters of public policy monopolizing forcesettling international disputes controlling the main levers of welfare andmanaging behavior through law taxation and regulation For many countriesfull sovereignty remains unfulfilled But regardless of its particular stage ofdevelopment the MSNS exists globally and provides a basis of politicalorder It can be modified and improved but to change it radically into asuper-federation ndash as is being attempted in Europe ndash is an experiment whoseconsequences are unknown

As an impediment or stepping-stone to global peace and prosperity Rootedin the human condition the state cannot be eliminated But this instrumen-talist persuasion hopes that states can be subordinated to internationaltransnational organizations and international law Two examples are theKyoto Protocols on Global Warming and the International Criminal Courtwhich the United States most prominently has refused to approve in the nameof protecting its sovereignty The integration of European nation-states underthe European Union is an experiment to move beyond the MSNS to


subordinate it to transnational order by building a new sovereignty consistingof fragments of the old in order to check and balance the super-powersovereignty of the United States Globalists see the state remainingfundamentally flawed It is often unable to restrain non-state global actors(terrorists international corporations hegemonic states) maintains aninequitable distribution of wealth and facilitates wars as instruments ofnational policy For this persuasion the functions and form of the state areobstacles to human development and must be replaced by new forms

Finally the MSNS exists as an ideal to be achieved by new nationsEspecially those which emerged after World War II Many remain beset withdevelopmental problems and others exist with what they consider territorialincompleteness In East Asia China considers Taiwan as irredentum andJapan demands return of the Northern Territories from Russia Korea is splitinto two halves and remains in a condition of stalemated war since 1953Industrialization and prosperity remain significantly lower in many of thenew nations than in the mature MSNS For those who belong to an incom-plete MSNS achieving the same levels of sovereignty and well-being isthe requirement that must be met before there can be action to move beyondthe modern state For them the benefits of the MSNS are obvious and thestructures need not be reinvented only adapted Japan was successful atstate-building in the late nineteenth century and both Taiwan and SouthKorea though more fragments of states than whole have demonstrated thata modified sovereignty and prosperity as semi-states is attainable and work-able though theoretically vulnerable to conflict and instability China is themajor case in East Asia where the complete MSNS remains a desired ideal

Knowledge and the state

All social and political knowledge is cumulative though there are breakthroughsand innovations by individuals An example of applied knowledge that acceleratedthe power of the state is Alfred Nobelrsquos invention of dynamite ndash a product ofaccumulated chemistry and physics knowledge ndash which hastened building ofroads canals and railways during the age of industrialization and also mademodern bombs far more lethal than earlier versions6 Although Chinese hadinvented gunpowder there had been relatively little further development InEurope it was initially used for war and later for blasting in construction Throughexperimentation ndash often with frightful consequences ndash guncotton and nitroglycerinewere developed and after many difficulties Nobel developed a number of stableand manageable explosive devices One could hardly imagine a similar train ofevents in China or any other precapitalist society leading to a highly profitable andproductive invention Nobelrsquos accomplishment required vision a network of sci-entific information persistence and the prospect of financial payoff A relativelynoninterventionist state also helped by permitting the inventor to proceed withexperiments although his laboratories and factories would hardly meet safetystandards in todayrsquos industrial world This character of knowledge the role ofindividual as its agent and creator and its socioeconomic context point to issues


of how in the West individualspersons have shaped the nature of the MSNSNobelrsquos technical success also illustrates the role of knowledge in the aggrandize-ment of the MSNS

Role of state constitutions

Each MSNS has its constitution ndash usually written and occasionally unwrittenStates vary greatly in their fidelity to their constitutions and blatant inattentionor even betrayal is not uncommon ndash especially in nondemocratic polities whereloyal opposition parties and regular elections that strengthen accountabilityare weak or absent A constitution can be a useful guide to government structurethe values of the nation and the relationship between state and citizen but itcannot express the full or actual range of powers of a state A constitutionprovides an important source of law for the state but more importantly is anexpression of sovereignty ndash the claim of a government to rule a people and aterritory to the exclusion of all other states It is a rare constitution that describesthe reality of sovereignty ndash the actual affairs in a state We can bifurcate theconcept into claimed sovereignty [Sc] and actualized sovereignty [Sa]

The written constitution refers largely to claimed sovereignty and customarilyaddresses the valued ends of the state in a preamble the structure of governmentthe rights and duties of citizens and a method of amendment By stipulatingregular and legal relations between state and citizens a liberal constitution estab-lishes claims to political order legal equality and human liberty Various treatiesand laws will explicitly define the territory of a state in relation to other statesConstitutions are subject to change and are rewritten or amended When they donot respond to major change tensions emerge that reflect the distance betweenclaimed sovereignty and actualized sovereignty

Concept of meta-constitution

Prior to the MSNS something akin to modern constitutions informed the claimspatterns customs and practices of states and their governments Usually framedin religious terms and operationalized in practice with rudimentary administrativestaff military establishment frontier garrisons and monarchy premodern statesexercised sovereignty over subjects often through the intermediary of societyrather than directly as citizens Feudal monarchies ruled Western Europe forcenturies before revolution and war replaced them with republics Imperial Chinafollowed a consistent pattern of dynastic monarchy with Confucianism functioningas state religion and was fairly successful and consistent until the end of thenineteenth century Except for dynastic Egypt of the pharaohs there was nopolitical system of similar longevity in history

Conceptually modern constitutions are contracts between the state and itscitizens in which the former promises security and other values while thelatter implicitly pledges obedience to its laws This contractual concept didnot exist in traditional states and so we must resort to coining a term thatwill describe and encompass the constitutions of states that had no explicit


constitution as well as the assumptions and implicit ideology of modernconstitutional states ndash ldquometa-constitutionrdquo We define a meta-constitution asa pattern of institutions and values which encompass the statersquos claims tosovereignty over people and territory and which energize government and itsagencies to exert coercive power over its claimed dominion Though necessarilyvaguer than constitution this notion has analytical value in identifying at leasteight state-forms in China from the Qin dynasty onwards

A meta-constitution is based on an array of three values ndash order equality andliberty whose relative importance determines the character of a state Themeta-constitution also has a core of esoteric political knowledge [Pk] generallydeveloped by a few theorists and philosophers from the raw material of experienceand history and translated into action by leaders and statesmen Societally acceptedethical norms can form the basis of a state and longevity of a meta-constitution isreinforced by harmonization with universal ethical norms Hobbesrsquo Second Law ofNature for example was based directly on the Christian Golden Rule

That a man he willing when others are so too as farre-forth as for Peaceand defence of himselfe he shall think it necessary to lay down this right toall things and be contented with so much liberty against other men as hewould allow other men against himselfe this is the Law of the GospellWhatsoever you require that others should do to you that do ye to them

(Hobbes 1651 95)

Hobbes extracted Christian principles from the sovereign state and gave it asounder moral basis so that men could be obedient to secular powers and haveconfidence they were also following their religious beliefs and ethical impera-tives In searching for the source of longevity of the Chinese imperial state onecan also discover its claimed conformity to moral and religious principles ndashchiefly derived from the cult of ancestors and filial piety The longevity of theMSNS and imperial state is related to their justification in long-practiced moralpatterns of their respective societies In contrast the short-lived meta-constitu-tions of the Chinese Legalists (QLS1) and Maoists (MCS6) were chiefly artificialconstructs aimed at radical social engineering and were transitionally successfulin injuring or shattering existent states and antagonistic to mainstream statesBoth were also successful (at high human cost) in enforcing actualized sover-eignty through terror and intimidation In the West fascist and the major communist states have vanished as did the French Reign of Terror before themNo meta-constitution is eternal but some have greater staying power than others

The state as primary modern link between individual and human security

For modern China as with many new and developing states the MSNS is bothfact and ideal and less an impediment to larger human goals of peace and justiceDelayed development has stimulated the Chinese appetite to take their place


among advanced countries of the world and a complete state-form is thepreferred vehicle of that consummation The MSNS gives political form andcohesion to the combination of society and territory with the added dimension ofsovereignty Protection of individualspersons as citizens is both a motivation forand the result of full MSNS status Society alone without the concentration ofpower that distinguishes the state cannot offer as much protection to its membercitizens ndash especially when endangered by states which have concentrated powerand are able to pillage or intimidate less organized peoples

How can we link the individualrsquos search for security to the MSNS Hobbesprovided an allegory of why the individual traded some basic liberty for securitybut could not envision that extreme modern states would demand all liberty fromtheir citizens in return for protection In moderate authoritarian and democraticstates the notion of national security claims a degree of sacrifice from theircitizens in the form of controls taxation and conscription ndash a surrender ofliberties nonetheless In theory democratic states are accountable and havelimitations on their power even in emergencies7

The security function of the MSNS ndash protection of individuals

Protection of the individual as citizen is the fundamental function of the state and itsmodern manifestation ndash the mature MSNS ndash has fulfilled this function The tradi-tional Chinese state was also successful in meeting this human security criterion forover twenty-one centuries with varying effectiveness The MSNS based on the the-oretical and legal equality of citizens has not been humanityrsquos only viable model ofthe state In the long transformation of the traditional Chinese state into its modern(and still incomplete) successor it is clear that the global spread and domination ofthe MSNS require all societies to conform to those specifications This was not doneby fiat but through war colonization and imposition of a global ldquostandard of civi-lizationrdquo (Gong 1984) The MSNS has often been as ldquored in tooth and clawrdquo as thestate of nature itself and old states that challenged new ones were eliminated with-out mercy Only conformity to the demands and institutions of the MSNS insuresmodern sovereignty and integration of its organizational forms consolidatesthe political and military strength to preserve sovereignty As the experience of theGuomindang Chinese Republic (GRS4) demonstrated adapting the form ofthe MSNS without having massive material territorial and military substancecould not prevent defeat by the Japanese state and later by the Communists For thepost-1949 Peoplersquos Republic of China (SCS5) the Soviet state model offered directpassage to MSNS-status but was eclipsed by Maorsquos MCS6 and replaced after Maorsquosdeath with the DMS7 Should China remain at peace with the world and her neigh-bours and sustain her economic growth prospects for attaining the material and substantial benefits of the MSNS are likely Full sovereignty will depend on the fateof Taiwan ndash the healthy remnant of the Nationalist Republic established in 1928 Theeight meta-constitutions of China from 221 BCndashAD 2006 have been listed in Table 31

In this modern age we have solved many of the survival challenges thatconfronted and defeated our ancestors We see nature as benign and needing


protection while our forebears saw nature as far more a threat to their existenceneeding conquest to survive Today we have the extensive and powerful statedelivering many of the benefits that contribute to survival as well as longevityhealth education and prosperity that evaded most of our forebears

The state and history

History is a tool to understand and clarify actions and their consequences Teggartstressed the tension between analyzing the elements history and the demand fornarrative as its sole end History in its widest sense

means all that has happened in the past and more particularly all that hashappened to the human race Now the whole body of historical students isin possession of a vast accumulation of information in regard to the for-mer activities and experiences of mankind and the problem which isuppermost at the present time is how this accumulated information ndashwhich already far exceeds the possibility of statement in any narrativesynthesis ndash may be utilized to throw light upon the difficulties that con-front mankind

(Teggart 1916 34ndash5)

As narrative the only complete human history would be the total replicationof every experience of every human who ever lived And if this completehistory were ever assembled it would become part of some humanrsquos experi-ence requiring holistic inclusion in their experiences Such a complete historycould never be finished and would require an infinite number of universes Soperfect history may be similar to a closed loop in a computer program ndash neverachieving closure The practical question is how far we can go in dipping intohistory to understand its ldquoprocessesrdquo without fatally distorting the narrativeArnold Toynbee Otto Spengler Hegel Marx and practically all foundersof the modern social sciences based their hypotheses and observations onimperfect historical narratives often selecting what suited their theory anddiscarding the rest


Table 31 Chinarsquos eight meta-constitutions 221 BCndashAD 2006

Qin Legalist State (221ndash206 BC) QLS1

Imperial Confucian State (206 BCndashAD 1911) ICS2

Republican Nation State (1911ndash27) RNS3

Guomindang Republican State (1928ndashpresent) GRS4

Stalinist Communist State (1949ndash56) SCS5

Maoist Communist State (1956ndash76) MCS6

Dengist Market State (1979ndashpresent) DMS7

Taiwan Independent State (1949ndashpresent) TIS8

Linking the individual to the state

The major conceptual hurdle to be overcome in linking the living thinking workingand life-preserving individual and the political institutions which mankind hasinherited from past ages is that each modern human unit (individual ) is radicallysubjective in views and actions regarding his life while our social economic andpolitical institutions require negation of egoistic particularism (This very wordldquoparticularrdquo derived from the root ldquoparticlerdquo accurately evokes the occasionalsocial science tendency in homogenizing or at least abstracting human qualitiesfrom sets of persons) To build a theory of human security we examine man inthree levels of existence individual person and citizen (ldquoEconomic manrdquo is asubset of person as producer and consumer in his necessary relations with otherproducers and consumers)

Earlier (Chapter 2) we referred to narratives of men surviving in wilder-ness without benefit of collective security institutions In the Western tradi-tion there has been abundant inquiry and interest in the individual as heroartist and revolutionary ndash more commonly than in Chinese culture Setting theindividual against raw nature has been not only a portal to adventure but toreflection on manrsquos character and his place in the cosmos In the later part ofthe twentieth century with industrialization and communism China has turnedthe natural environment into an arena of struggle ndash albeit collectively ratherthan individually

This EastndashWest difference is also reflected in the institutions of human secu-rity ndash particularly the family and the state The MSNS evolved as the paramountstructure of human security in Western Europe and became the standard for adefined political community to gain membership as a participant in the globalsystem Thomas Hobbesrsquo Leviathan demonstrated how the sovereign state couldhave been established by individual humans using their faculties of reason andlanguage This rational foundation was based on the fiction of men contracting toaccept the laws of a sovereign power and thus ending the dangerous state ofnature among men Cooperative relations among men also enabled them to col-laborate and cooperate in generating knowledge enterprises and projects thatwere cumulative and collective in order to overcome the limitations of isolatedindividuals or groups eking a living from a hostile natural environment

The state and human security in China

Many preindustrial societies had state characteristics ndash political affiliation basedon territorial domicile and government claiming exclusive jurisdiction over thatterritory and identifiable subjects Furthermore these states and proto-statescould be characterized as having implicit social contracts in that they providedsecurity to subjects in return for supports in the form of loyalty service andresources Chinarsquos state system was unified highly developed and sophisticatedfrom at least the third century BC The Qin-Han model of the Chinese state persisteduntil 1911 when it collapsed and was replaced by a series of incomplete republics


until 1949 when the Communists established the current Peoplersquos Republic (alsoincomplete)

The legacy of state development in twentieth-century China can be summarizedin human security terms

Twentieth-century China had a historical legacy of the traditional imperialstate (QLS1 and ICS2 ndash 221 BCndashAD 1911) which had provided relativelyadvanced protection for the lives of its subjects though there was a cyclicaldynamic that saw periods of dynastic weakness and collapse A state spon-sored ideology Confucianism characterized periods of peace and prosperitywith stability valued above all The interim periods between dynasties per-mitted new religions such as Buddhism to penetrate society and influenceofficial thinking while still preserving intellectual and social Confucianism

A core principle of imperial Chinese political knowledge [Kp] was the nurtureand preservation of the consanguineous family During the classic period ofimperial state the family was continuous and consistent in providing humansecurity to persons An idealized model of family provided the basis of theimperial state and through the examination system supplied not only personnelbut reinforced the norms of education loyalty and hierarchy to the emperorwhose own position was embedded in dynastic and familial ancestry

Although imperial dynasties collapsed periodically new dynasties emergedto consolidate the state ndash until the late nineteenth century when the industri-alizing and competing states of the West reduced China to what revolution-aries termed a ldquosemi-colonyrdquo It became apparent that the old imperial statecould no longer serve its two-millennia role

In the first half of the twentieth century hundreds of millions of individualsin China were vulnerable to threats of life and possession As before thestructure of family provided some protection but there was little prospect ofhigher level security from a revived dynastic state Japanese mastery of thecreative and destructive powers of the MSNS combined with its drive toacquire external resources and territory at Chinarsquos expense

During this time of troubles Chinese looked outside its borders for statemodels to emulate8 Through the agency of Western European commercialand military expansion as well as imposing legalistic treaties Chinesegovernment was intimidated to reorganize as a MSNS Political intellectualsrecognized the strength of the Western model and advocated a Republic asthe appropriate form of government which would permit participation as anequal in international politics This would end the subordinate status of Chinaand terminate the ldquounequal treatiesrdquo as the Japanese had done by 1900 Moreimportantly from the perspective of human security the Chinese people hadto be transformed from subjects into citizens ndash empowered individuals whocould strengthen the state by combining their individual wills into a generalwill as Rousseau had written

The breakdown of the European state system in the war (1914ndash18) tarnishedthe desirability of imitating Western states The Japanese annexation of


Korea and increasing threats to China further exposed the Western-derivedMSNS as an aggressive war machine to many political intellectuals

The Russian revolution gave birth to a new type of state and inspired theCommunist movement in China for a Soviet-type state Both Republicanismin its present form in Taiwan today and Communism ruling the mainlandhave claimed to be the best custodians of human security in China Followingimplementation of reforms since 1978 Beijingrsquos claims have become morecredible although a much higher living standard and degree of political andeconomic liberty in Taiwan sets a high goal yet to be achieved

As mentioned earlier twenty-two centuries of the Chinese state witnessed at leasteight different meta-constitutions with three of them existing simultaneously atpresent We will expand these observations in subsequent chapters after furtherexploration of state dynamics and specification of human security theory

State and family in traditional China

A major ChinandashWestern dichotomy in addressing human security has been arelative difference in emphasis on personhood and family ndash a difference whichhas affected the evolution of respective state form In China personhood has longbeen fused with familial membership while the Western tradition has been moreconducive to greater autonomy of persons ndash an autonomy reflected in rightssocial mobility individualism and institutions such as marriage and contract

Western liberal thought and the MSNS developed in relative simultaneitytransforming the individualperson into citizen and reorienting loyalty fromfamily church class and locale to the nation A core element in building theMSNS was political knowledge that personal affection could be redirected fromself and onersquos personal circle of relations friends and associates to the largerentity of nation through political participation while retaining the moral spirit ofChristian ethics War proved to be an effective catalyst in this redirection and thetribal dynastic and national wars of post-Renaissance Europe accompanied andhastened the emergence of exclusive patriotism and linguistic nationsNationalism convinced men that they would protect their primary circle of familyand friends by joining in the national cause ndash including war Modern politicsbridges the gap between persons and the state by creating an affective relation-ship that potentially supersedes social bonds

Family has been critically important in the human security of individualspersons in pre-political societies and remained central in the ICS2 moral order InWestern political thought family has been relegated to a secondary role asindividuation into citizenship has progressed When familistic feudalismdominated the political realm in medieval Europe the Church was haven to thoseseeking escape from the confines of family authority Indulgent priests gavemarriage blessings even when forbidden by parents (as in Shakespearersquos Romeoand Juliet) Convents and monasteries proliferated as sanctuaries from familisticdominance (A similar phenomenon occurred in China with Buddhist orders butimperial confiscations limited their long-term effects)


The liberal political tradition of the West oriented persons away from familyand into the public sphere ldquoRepublicrdquo comes from the Latin res publica ndashldquopublic thingrdquo Contrast this with the Chinese term for state guojia ndash literally statefamily When Hobbes first mentions ldquofamilyrdquo as a form of government in hisLeviathan it is tellingly rooted in ldquolustrdquo9 and thus a lower order of emotions thanthe use of reason to establish a commonwealth For him valid protection for allmen can only come from the formation of a sovereign ndash artificial man authorizedby individual members of society Although describing ldquosavage peoplerdquo hereflects a Western intellectual tradition of seeing the family as reflective of par-tial or selfish interests Aristotle also considered the family to be the realm ofthe private in contrast to the polis which was the realm of the public and there-fore superior

The MSNS is heir and beneficiary of this anti-family tradition influenced bythe gradual denial of hereditary feudal familism which governed Europe forcenturies and by its revolutionary elimination in France The modern corporation ndashanother form of artificial person ndash equally runs afoul of anti-feudal liberalismsince many of the largest were founded and run as family firms Marx and Engelsdescribed the bourgeois family as a mainstay of capitalist society with chat-telization of children and wives as property Modern feminist and homosexualmovements attack the traditional family as repressive and demand radical redefi-nition In modern secular society the family is seen under siege on a wide rangeof fronts (Gairdner 1992) Some of this antipathy is a consequence of the Westerntendency to individuation ndash including personal responsibility the Christianconcept of immortal soul and natural rights But new critiques of the family alsocome from those advocating group rights and claiming that traditionalhusbandndashwife roles are demeaning to women and offend other sexualorientations Given this history of anti-familism in the West and the diminishingrole of marriage and family it is not surprising that secular and individualistliberalism today may well tolerate the traditional family as a practical form ofassociation but do not accord it any prominent role in the state

The higher reverence for family in China has been central to the formation of thestate Confucianism regarded it as the critical link between individual and societythe first school of learning and the model for government Family gave personhoodto the individual Confucians believed the family to be a natural phenomenon on apar with Hobbesrsquo state of nature But the family was also an unchangeable part ofthe cosmos whose regulation and well-being was the key to peace and stability in the world Instead of a Hobbesian social contract that enabled men to transformthe state of nature into a peaceable kingdom the Confucian view was that the fam-ily was a natural association that cultivated and improved manrsquos best qualitiesIt reflected and influenced the hierarchy of society and was the cradle of learningand individual virtue The individualperson owed existence and security primarilyto the family and this centrality created the penumbra of filial piety that suffusedstate and society through much of Chinese history

Confucianism was the vital link between human security and the state ndash andcan be considered to be Chinarsquos imperial meta-constitution abandoned in 1911


The strength and durability of Chinarsquos second meta-constitution (Qin was thefirst) was in the congruence between human security and state security TheConfucian state rested on a foundation of individuals in their capacity of familymembers ndash not as discrete individuals From the perspective of Confucianismindividuals had security of life and person only as parents and children not asautonomous individuals

The major difference between the meta-constitutions of traditional and modernChina is that the Confucian state was based on the familistic structure of Chinesesociety which incorporated the pre-state values and institutions of moderatelysuccessful human security The two modern constitutions ndash Republican andCommunist ndash on the other hand modelled themselves after contemporarysuccesses of state-building including Japan the Soviet Union and PrussiaNational sovereignty and national security rather than human security have beenthe central objectives of modern Chinese nation-state forms although humansecurity has also benefited from this emphasis The nearest correlation to nationalsecurity in traditional China was dynastic security but the latter was not indis-pensable to the former A weak or ineffective dynasty could be destructive toimperial security Support for a dynasty depended upon its ability to maintain thefamily virtues that reinforced human security at the family level

In the West the individualperson is depicted as morally and legallyautonomous in liberal society A traditional Chinese view was that there wassomething unnatural to man alienated from his family roots These roots could notbe cut any more than a tree could live after severance from its roots by the woods-manrsquos axe Both imperial and republican China recognized that these family rootsare intrinsic to human security of persons while Communism (SCS5 and MCS6)in trying to build a MSNS saw the family as enemy to that project Today thereis greater tolerance ndash and even encouragement ndash for traditional ldquofamily valuesrdquo inDMS7 as long as there is no return to what have been considered ldquofeudal valuesrdquo ndashsubordination of women legal autonomy from the centralized state and excessiveaccumulation of wealth and power outside the reach of the Communist Party TheSCS5 and MCS6 ambitious expansion of the statersquos role in education economysocial affairs land and property regulation marriage inheritance and other mat-ters through law also adumbrated the influence of the traditional family in con-temporary China Maoist violent repression of family life in the Land ReformsGLF and Cultural Revolution through mutual surveillance and denunciation andthe commune system delivered major blows and mandated that the party-state ndashnot family ndash was the only legitimate object of loyalty As the regulatory competenceof the Communist state expanded the ancient protective shells of family weakenedfurther Today legal economic and social subordination of the family is proceed-ing as a by-product of industrialization and modernization10

Modern approaches to human security

The Leviathan-based MSNS that evolved in Western Europe was founded on avision of individualspersons who are rational autonomous beings Driven by


selfish interests they must be restrained by covenant and a single power abovethem all In this light democracy is a movement to take back some of the powerssurrendered to the state and to return them to their rightful owners ndash persons inthe view of libertarians or groups as advocated by collectivists In contrast to thelibertarians communitarians ethnic interest groups and gender rights advocatessocial conservatives argue for strengthening the traditional family These latterimplicitly agree with Chinese Confucians

Radical libertarians in the West belong to the tradition of highly valuedindividual liberty They see the modern welfare state as smothering individualrights and various social movements ndash insofar as they demand government actionand programs ndash as further eroding liberty The modern welfare state has becomeaccording to some critics a ldquonanny staterdquo and it expresses the vision of a risk-free existence while aspiring to remove as many dangers and threats to humansecurity of citizens as possible ndash even those that might be self-inflicted byindividual choice The problem is that each diminution of risk through the actionsof the state involves a reduction of liberty for persons as citizens Campaignsagainst tobacco smoking are based on the logic of preventing illness but succeedat the expense of ldquosmokersrsquo rightsrdquo This may be a desirable trade-off to societyin general but reduces the freedom of all to indulge in a pleasurable activityHand-gun control also has the laudable aim of reducing violence though itsresults are debated11

The goal of the welfare state is to improve human security through educationintervention and legislation and to resolve the perceived deficiencies of theliberal laissez-faire state One finds the welfare state to be the implicit model forsome of the current thinking on human security The United NationsDevelopment Programme (UNDP) has taken the lead in formulating an interna-tional program of human security and several governments notably in Canada(under Liberal Party rule) followed with their own programs Even Mongolia hasadapted human security themes into its postCommunist defence strategy TheUNDP concept of human security addresses seven sectors combining the goalsof both the liberal laissez-faire and welfare states economic security food securityhealth security environmental security personal security community secu-rity and political security In 2001 the United Nations Millennium Declarationreiterated the concept stating that ldquothe main dimensions of humansecurity that is sustained economic growth improved education opportunitiespromoting health and combating HIVAIDS freedom from conflict the enforce-ment of international and human rights laws and coping with climatic change andother environmental threats to sustainable developmentrdquo (Booysen 2002 275)

Initiated in 1994 the field of human security emerged as a variation of humandevelopment with broader scope than material economic growth and thenarrower economic approaches to development in the past Yet its sponsorship bystates and international organizations necessarily subordinates its assumptionsmethods and goals to those sponsors My own view does not dismiss this officialprogram but sees it in the rush to translate a concept into policy as missing anopportunity to explore the potential analytical richness of the concept Also by


starting from the point of state-delivery of human security benefits through aconduit of international cooperation they may overlook how humans havesuccessfully enhanced their own protection for millennia before the MSNSarrived on the scene and thus engage in the all-too-common misallocation ofresources by newly invented organizations

In Chapter 3 I will formulate with notational formulas a theory of human secu-rity which builds upon pre-state human security from the bottom up and demon-strate that the state is intimately linked to the human condition and manrsquos strivingto survive The statersquos modern lethality and power may have produced the currentof alienation fear and loathing but restoration of its human basis could retrieveand refine the MSNS as an instrument of further civilization as well as toimprove and prolong the lives of citizens who have been denied the full humanepossibilities of the democratic version of the MSNS This MSNS is deeply flawedbut for the next decades there are no likely alternatives so energy and resourcesare best spent in its improvement rather than destruction or replacement byuntried institutions

A theory may be only as useful as its application and application can be apathway of validation Following formulation of the human security theory I willapply it to the state forms that ruled China from the third century BC through thepresent as an exploratory exercise This exercise should provide a historicalcontext to elaborate the theory and perhaps suggest areas where furtherrefinement or amendment is needed It is also possible that the theory of humansecurity can provide a diagnostic tool in measuring the relative ldquohealthrdquo of actualstates and in suggesting areas where helpful policy is needed


Man is the measure of all things of things that are that they are and of things thatare not that they are not

(Attributed to Protagoras (c 481ndash411 BC))

At one time the benevolent affections embrace merely the family soon the circleexpanding includes first a class then a nation then a coalition of nations then allhumanity

(Lecky 1955)

Human social and state security the question of survival

The human individual is both energizerinitiator and object of human security Theprimary justification of the state is that it elevates security of its citizenry Hobbesjudged how the state provides protection at the cost of diminishing human libertyand twentieth-century states have demonstrated how far they would reduce thatliberty even with little increase in human security Society is intermediate betweenindividual and the state if no states existed communities would have to providethe human security required for extended and adequate life With the emergenceof the first state and with its further refinement as organized force other societiesbecame vulnerable and eventually had to create full-time armies and the otheraccoutrements of government The cost of not organizing specialized governmentwas to risk conquest subordination and absorption

The MSNS has evolved toward democracy as citizens and governments attemptto balance the safety of individuals and the security of states Lessons of the pastcentury include examples of governments with unrestricted power stripping awaysocial protection of individuals in the name of broadly defined national securityThe historical record of the MSNS in the past century is dominated by key termsldquostaterdquo ldquonationrdquo ldquosovereigntyrdquo and ldquomodernrdquo are polysemous Rather than grapplewith their multiple meanings I propose to consider them from the perspective ofhuman security ndash their operational relevance in preserving and extending humanlife Starting from the human individual we will postulate how protection of menand women is implemented and how the state addresses basic needs of life

4 Prologue to a theory of human security

The theory of human security provides a framework of analysis which addresses

raw nature (what philosophers have termed ldquostate of naturerdquo) ndash inhabited byldquobiological unitsrdquo ndash human individuals

society ndash composed of individuals bonded by consanguineity and division oflabor and

state ndash comprised of government a people having extensive social andeconomic interaction and contiguous territory

The first step is to identify the primary energizing mechanisms in preservinghuman life At the level of the individual we have described how each organismhas a powerful will to live though its intensity varies individually and over timeand may even shut down under some circumstances Suicides demonstrate theopposite ndash a ldquowill to dierdquo but except among extremist groups (Islamist jihadistsfor example) the will to live is universally encouraged There is a parallelmechanism in the state ndash usually expressed as ldquonational securityrdquo ndash consisting ofwill and force which is triggered at some level of crisis The Japanese justifiedintervention and occupation of Manchuria in 1931 in terms of protecting nationalinterests and by extension Japanese national security though it was also anopportunity for imperial aggression and expansion

The individual is the basic indivisible unit of human security During durationsof strength and health and a stable environment he is usually capable of attendingto his own security When incapable ndash as in infancy childhood illness or old age ndashhe must rely on close family for security Therefore we identify the family as theprimary security structure The protection of persons in pre-state society is maxi-mized by clan and extended family whose mutual cooperation and loyalties expandthe safety of the members The primary security structure of the state is its militaryestablishment which is responsible for defense of the government political orderfrontiers and territory and will be summoned to defend government population andterritory in event of invasion or the breakdown of social order Societies in contrastto the individual and state are acephalous and absent the state lack a centralizeddecision-making apparatus or a full-time professional military to protect ldquosocietalsecurityrdquo Its strength is in reinforcing those institutions which transform individualsinto persons and which coordinate the thoughts and actions of persons Societymediates between state and individuals in a number of ways It

bonds them into communities diffuses knowledge recruits new members through encouragement of stable families whose

members produce children as ldquoapprentice personsrdquo nurtures positive values which strengthen solidarity reinforces trust to facilitate economic production and exchange and midwifes an efficient division of labor through role assignment Stateless

societies where they exist are generally deficient in protecting theirmembers against organized states

Prologue to a theory of human security 45

Knowledge is a critical component of human social and state security withdifferent qualities and applications according to level of existence Its role in humansecurity of the individual is to provide an internal map of onersquos capabilities andpossibilities as well as intimate experience-based acquaintance with the physicalworld necessary for life survival Social knowledge is also a type of cognitivemap ndash an internalized version of collective lore that has been accumulated andarticulated by an interacting set of persons usually over several generationsSocial knowledge contributes to human survival by cooperatively deployingpersons to roles that directly enhance the security of persons and indirectly thatof individuals In premodern and modern societies for example roles of personshave been usually assigned according to family status sex age and physical andeducational characteristics and qualities Rites of passage in many societies signalthe transition from dependent child to contributing member of the communityOnly in postmodern societies has there emerged significant questioning andrearrangement of roles in a way that significantly modifies the divisions based onsex age and other innate or acquired characteristics

State-relevant knowledge is of two types

esoteric statecraft of the rulers leaders and higher officials and restricted toa small minority and

exoteric ndash the outward state symbols rights and obligations of citizenssubjects

The physical environment is a constant presence in raw nature though a recedingone in society and the state Hobbesian man as individual confronts unmediatednature both as a threat and as a source of lifersquos vital supplies For the person insociety nature is less a threat because it is mediated by social matrix It is a sourceof materials for economic production and transaction adding to his store ofhuman security The social accumulation of technical knowledge enhances theutilization of naturersquos riches for economic enrichment and this knowledge alsoprotects life with new foods improved shelter clothing and medicines The statecan further enhance social exploitation of nature by demarcating and defendingthe territorial boundaries of lands and waters against interlopers predatorsand invaders and by facilitating an economic system based on trust and lawTerritorial expansion of the MSNS followed the pattern of premodern empires Inthe age of European exploration and colonization Western states acquired landsand peoples that added wealth though rivalries often led to wars that ruined someand contributed to fragmentation of the globe As historian Paul Kennedy writesthe twentieth century witnessed the rise of the superpowers which interacted withanother trend ndash the political fragmentation of the globe (Kennedy 1987 302) JimGarrison describes the United States as a one-time colony whose later globalinterests were transmuted into a form of expansion through various overseascampaigns to advance American ideals (Garrison 2004 85)

The primary concern of human security is preserving and enhancing human lifeBy having membership in society from the moment of birth (or at the moment ofconception in many societies) the individual acquires additional protection from


others who are committed to nurturing his life The corporeal individual is embeddedin nature while social contacts and networks derive from bonding which is bothpragmatic and emotive based on mutual protection of individuals The state emergedat a later stage of human evolution requiring dominance by some and acquiescenceby most With the organization of force the statersquos rulers and guardians could con-trol and deploy coercive instruments and specialists for the defence of the populationand resources within its claimed territory against external and internal rivals As thestate has become more sophisticated and powerful and as other states emerged incompetition national security replaced human security as the raison drsquoetre of thestate giving birth to raison drsquoetat to supersede the protection of individuals We cansummarize the chief elements of human security in Table 41

In addition to these primary elements there is also a series of second-order ele-ments that are needed to give a more complete rendering of human securityAbraham Maslow (1968 49) describes ldquosafetyrdquo (similar to security although histreatment places most emphasis on subjectivity that is a sense of security) as fun-damental to the personality growth of the child He also lists basic needs asldquosafety belongingness love respect and self-esteemrdquo (ibid 25) From a humansecurity perspective only the first ldquosafetyrdquo would be considered a primary valueand the others secondary By secondary I do not mean ldquounimportantrdquo Security isprimary because without it the other values cannot be implemented When amodicum of security and safety is assured the relative luxury of considering othervalues and arrangements is available

At the social level Chinese Confucianism considered benevolence dutymanners wisdom and faithfulness to be cardinal virtues or values Accordingto Gertrude Himmelfarb citizenship formerly was not merely membershipbut was based on vigorous civic virtues in contrast to ldquocaringrdquo virtues ldquoThevigorous virtues included courage ambition adventurousness audacity creativity


Table 41 Key elements of human security

Level Element

Human Primary Primary Knowledge Physicalldquounitrdquo energizing security environment

value structure(s)

Raw Individual Will to live Nuclear Cognitive Threats andnature family map resources

Society Person Sustenance and Clan Role and Economicreproduction community status resource

relationships opportunitiespracticalknowledge

State Subjectcitizen Statenational Military Statecraft Land andsecurity exoteric maritime

versus territoriesesotericknowledge

the caring virtues are respect trustworthiness compassion fairness decencyrdquo(Himmelfarb 2001 81)

In the best state according to Plato justice was the chief criterion But ldquojusticerdquois usually in the eye of the beholder and can be divided into three components ndashorder (Platorsquos preference) equality (Marxrsquos choice) and liberty (valued by Jeffersonand the American Founding Fathers) Actual states differ on their priorities ofthese three values and usually cultivate one more than the other two to claimjustice as the basis of their rule This variability results in changeability andconstitutional changes of states reflect changes in the relative weight of thesecond-order values The most durable states in terms of longevity maybe those that balance these values and the less durable seem to be those whichhave emphasized and legislated radical equality at the expense of order and liberty

Formulating sovereignty

Sovereignty is the primary criterion of existence for the MSNS For traditionalstates sovereignty was implicit and practical expressed in custom and law butwas not universal doctrine In all historical states sovereignty was both a claimand an actuality and every state could be judged according to both its claims andits actual reach Each state expresses its claims to sovereignty over its subjectscitizens and territory in terms of the primary value state security and purports toexercise that sovereignty in conformity with secondary values Sovereignty isfirst a set of markers and boundaries that demarcate geographical territory andthe extent of government jurisdiction and second a set of claims over its citizenrywith values indicating the relation between state and citizen and citizens witheach other

The value of order for example implicit in all states is most prominent inauthoritarian regimes ndash those determined to preserve existing power arrrangementsand suppress threats of political change Totalitarian states have stressed equalityand order claiming that transformation of society under iron tutelage will liberateits citizens (That equality is always tempered by creation of a class of sub-citizenssuch as the Jews in Nazi Germany kulaks and counter-revolutionaries in the SovietUnion and dissidents in Castrorsquos Cuba ndash the ubiquitous ldquoenemies of the peoplerdquoEquality was also betrayed with the promotion of a single party elite as theenlightened guardians of society) To effect this change all social distinctionsamong citizens based on lineage or education have to be erased although the rulersexercise extensive powers in the name of managing the great transformation

Security itself may become a paramount value in a time of crisis Following theLondon mass transit terrorist bombings of July 7 2005 government policy oftreating all religions and all persons equally faced a challenge from radicalIslamism Civil libertarians in the United States criticize the Patriot Act and theDepartment of Homeland Security as compromising the liberties of citizens andgiving government agencies excessive power

The distinction between actual sovereignty and claimed sovereignty hinges onthe difference between national security (primary value) and the statersquos hierarchy


of second-order values (order equality and liberty) with possible outcomes ofinstability equilibrium or hegemony Sovereignty encompasses the claims of astate over a portion of the earthrsquos surface land and water and also over individualsand persons as citizens The character and enforcement of those claims areexpressed in its hierarchy of secondary values To illustrate we examine how threemodern states have based their sovereignty claims on three second-order values

State allocation of values the Soviet UnionUnited States and China

Every state expresses its sovereignty claims with a moral judgment about thevalues that authorize its actions and existence and also frames the terms ofcitizenship which facilitate those values The political system has been describedas the process which the authoritatively allocates values in society ldquoValuesrdquo referto ldquothings that matter and induce people to fight over themrdquo (Wilson 1993Preface) In this sense the political system provides an arena where rules andpower predominate The sovereign state exercises that authority and has a majorrole in evaluating ndash as well as devaluing ndash those values James Q Wilson seesvalues as standards of moral judgment ndash unprovable but important in carrying outthe role of citizen in the modern state Values are more than simple preferencesand every state makes value claims to justify its sovereign authority makes lawsthat enforce those values and pursues policies to implement values

The Soviet Union ndash dominance of equality as second-order value

The Bolshevik revolution proclaimed the brotherhood of man and establishedthe worldrsquos first state based on ldquodictatorship of the proletariatrdquo and whichbecame the twentieth-century model for modern totalitarianism The totalitarianstate germinated under Lenin and incorporated under Stalin Communistregimes were planted by force in the pseudo-republics of the USSR and theextinguished Baltic Republics and were carried into post-World War II EasternEurope by the Soviet Red Army Soviet totalitarianism claimed its sovereignty tobe based on equality of all citizens (Enemies of the people were either executedor banished to the gulags and were considered to be non-citizens) From thebeginning institutions that violated social political or economic equality werebanned The Orthodox Church based on independent wealth and hierarchicalorganization was broken and its monasteries and churches turned into museumsof atheism The imperial aristocracy was abolished and exterminated their landsand wealth nationalized and its members imprisoned executed or exiled Feudalfamilism was prohibited and Soviet socialism opposed capitalism as it wasclaimed to be the source of modern inequality of wealth As Marx had stipulatedmaterial wealth and power accumulated and concentrated into a dominant classand only by destroying the private property foundation of that power could trueegalitarianism be realized Even the radicals of the French Revolution had notbeen so thorough


Lenin and Stalin reorganized the state to carry out their vision of radicalegalitarianism Socialism would eventually eliminate the state As the creature ofa dominant class it was based on force and exploited the ruled But Lenindeclared that the battle was not over and so the state had to be retained as thechief weapon against the forces of reaction The army was rebuilt the secretpolice resurrected and most importantly the party The Communist Party of theSoviet Union (CPSU) emerged as the will and brains of the state Law and thecourts according to the Communists always had a class character and so underthe Soviet system they would reflect the new proletarian character The Sovietstate became the great equalizer in theory though to quote George Orwell ldquoAllanimals are equal but some animals are more equal than othersrdquo The myth ofegalitarian society accepted by gullible European and American idealists wasbelied by the three-class structure which emerged out of the Bolshevik revolutionand subsequent civil wars While maintaining claims of egalitarianism the Sovietstate proceeded to divide citizens into three categories

party power-holders especially the central organs proletarian masses ndash the general population including workers peasants and

soldiers and class enemies ndash kulaks capitalists national chauvinists and any other

persons who either opposed the Soviet state or were tainted by bloodline orassociation with class enemies

As the egalitarian ideology of Bolshevism was transformed into claims ofrigorous internal sovereignty over citizens of the state the exigencies ofgoverning vast territories and diverse ethnic groups inherited from the tsarsfighting threats from the White Russans Cossacks and other ldquoreactionaryrdquoforces and interventions from abroad radically altered the actual sovereignty ofthe new state

The Communist state was ostensibly established for all citizens but thosewho opposed this new order or were suspected of opposing it were effectivelystripped of citizenship protections and incurred the wrath of state force TheSoviet gulags elimination of the kulaks state-generated famines forcedmigrations of ethnic groups and finally the great purges were all expressionsof isolating and destroying any potential opposition State sovereignty was tobe utilized for the benefit of power-holders and a portion of the generalpopulation but was actually directed as a force to isolate disarm andeliminate persons relegated to noncitizenship The ideology of egalitarianismwas beyond mere hypocrisy and carried the chilling logic that men must beforced to be equal that those doing the forcing will be ldquomore equalrdquo and thatsome were unqualified to be equal so had to be isolated or eliminated Nazismcarried this one step further and built state sovereignty on the basis of aperverted notion of racial hierarchy and a hyper-nationalism based onsuperiority of the ldquoAryan racerdquo


The United States ndash liberty dominant as second-order value

The American revolution created new kind of state ndash one founded on libertyIn stark contrast to the transition of tsarist autocracy to Soviet totalitarianism theUnited States had emerged as a new order in the modern world Its creation restedon rights and traditions from Great Britain though it separated from the mothercountry and created a sovereign nation Its foundation was the claim of free mento manage their own destiny and to break the ties of subordination to a distantpower The 1776 Declaration of Independence created the sovereign UnitedStates the war of independence established it as a political and international factand the constitution launched machinery of government designed to preservefreedom and independence within a legal order Unique among modern states theAmerican experiment purposely designed a system of government with checksand balances that would prevent consolidation of a unitary government Far fromperfect it nevertheless has prevented consolidation of a monolithic state thatrecurrently presents threats to human security of individuals in many other places

During the 230 years since 1776 sovereignty of the American state was chal-lenged and expanded on numerous occasions but none so perilously as in theCivil War That crisis was the conflict between the freedom of federal states to gotheir own way through secession and the national governmentrsquos right to preservethe original union The sovereign claims of the national government prevailedover those of the southern states though at the cost of over 600000 lives and$444 billion (1990 dollars) The equally important issue was freedom ofAmerican slaves ndash which was also a crisis of egalitiarianism The EmancipationProclamation established their liberty but it required a century to achieve fullequality of citizens

The American Civil War raises another human security consideration ndash socialand political friction and disharmony within a state can reduce actual sovereigntyThe southern states which formed the Confederacy demanded liberty in the formof ldquostatesrsquo rightsrdquo based on their ldquopeculiar institutionrdquo slavery The war andsubsequent reconstruction manifested a high degree of political friction betweenNorth and South that decreased the ability of the central government to carry outits tasks We attach a general appellation to this phenomenon which is intrinsic toall states as it affects actual sovereignty ndash coefficient of political frictionldquoPolitical frictionrdquo is the degree of organized resistance to the central authority ofthe state from groups or regions within the territory of the state The higher thecoefficient the greater the negative effect on actual sovereignty so a requirementof increasing actual sovereignty and national security is to reduce that coefficientIts cognate at the social level is the coefficient of social friction ldquoSocial frictionrdquois more amorphous less organized and often feeds into and supports politicalfriction

The liberty claims of citizens were articulated in the first ten amendments ofthe US constitution as the Bill of Rights and rights of citizens were graduallywidened to include all persons Much litigation and court attention in the UnitedStates has been expended in defining and expanding the rights of citizenship


The Fourteenth Amendment to the American constitution was used to expand therights of individual citizens to corporations liberating them from restrictivelegislation that may have hobbled their expansive potential The novel interpretionbestowed legal ldquopersonhoodrdquo on business corporations

Since the 1960s liberty and equality have been fighting for the soul of theUnited States The civil rights movement forcefully reminded Americans thatblacks were still in a subordinate position in society and agitated for theircomplete equality ndash with the result of affirmative action special remedialprograms in government business and schools at all levels The momentum ofthe movement ndash as well as its tactics and language ndash was adopted by feminismhomosexuals the physically handicapped and even immigration lobbyistsdemanding that all barriers to full participation in society and economy bereduced and removed (Paradoxically legislation to remedy a perceived inequalityusually established new inequalities with collective privileges provided toaggrieved groups at the expense of the general public) Welfare and healthcarehave also been battlegrounds of equality with proponents urging erasure ofdistinction between rich and poor producers and indigents The emergence ofconservatism as a counterforce to the momentum of collectivist liberalism hasrevived personal liberty as a political cause Neoconservatives oppose theexcesses of government regulation the expanding welfare state the decline ofpatriotism and national defence and secularization of national identity

China ndash the dominance of order

Order is the absence of chaos Order in human affairs offers predictability In rela-tion to human security order is the minimization of violent death accomplishedthrough impersonal protection of individuals The good order is justice in classicaltheory In Platorsquos Republic justice is accomplished through hierarchy anddivision of labor not unlike the Confucian ideal of moral order based on rule bythe virtuous and wise All modern states imply a vision of justice and order andtheir constitutions declare to be guided by that vision The claims of sovereigntyare basically formulae of legitimacy which derive from a vision of justice

Order is the value most critical in preserving human security and there is thetemptation for governments to trim and limit equality and liberty during times ofcrisis President Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War with over13000 persons arrested One may argue that the values of equality and liberty aremorally subordinate to order and they may be considered as instrumental valuesthat can implement a just order Order is the paramount value of all states whileequality and liberty can be seen as two differing roads to a just order

The Chinese ICS2 possessed a meta-constitution based on the claim that such ajust order had been established in antiquity Subsequent institutional practice valuedthis just order in state and society and sought to match previous precedentsImmediately prior to ICS2 was QLS1 ndash revolutionary in the sense that the Qindynasty implemented a rough equality based on harsh law as the means to establishorder ndash but it was a political order lacking recognizable justice ndash a draconian orderthat hegemonized for the sake of peace and plenty but had little higher vision


except continuity and state prosperity This vision would not be scorned but madethe emperor too powerful at the expense of government efficacy and depended toohighly on one man When the First Emperor died his heir was unequal to thedemands of ruling

After the demise of ICS2 the twentieth-century Chinese state abandoned paststate visions of just order which were summarized in Confucian ideals andadapted to the global exigencies of first liberal (liberty-seeking) democracy andthen of (equality-seeking) Communism Since liberty and equality in theirunalloyed manifestations have certain mutual incompatibilities1 it is not surpris-ing that these instrumental values were carried into the modern Chinese state bytwo opposing movements ndash the Guomindang and the Communist Party

The Guomindang State

The Guomindang derived its program from the successful and apparently superior(in terms of growing equal justice and rights for citizens prosperity and nationalpower) liberal democracies of Western Europe and the United StatesConstitutional democracy was the final stage of Sun Yat-senrsquos program of nation-building and his Five-Power constitution was intended to incorporate the checksand balances of the US constitution with two more functions drawn from ChineseimperialConfucian tradition ndash censorate and examination For the Guomindangdemocracy based on liberty and modified capitalism would produce a Republicof China which could take its place among the civilized nations of the world ndash asJapan had done at the turn of the century Liberty in the Chinese Republics (RNS3

and GRS4) was based more on nation than individualspersons

Communist state-building

Inspired by the Bolshevik revolution the 1921-founded Chinese CommunistParty (CCP) believed that inequality was the source of Chinarsquos troubles ndash theinternational inequality that made China a semi-colony of the industrializedstates and the domestic social inequalities that impoverished and oppressed theChinese people Communists waging class war against rural gentry expressedcommitment to seeking a just society through egalitarianism This instrumentalegalitarianism suffused Chinese Communism through its revolution and in mostof state institutions and policy until 1979 Dengrsquos economic reforms This DMS7

approach has opened opportunities for economic liberty but a commitment toegalitarianism remains intrinsic to the legitimacy claims of the Communist state

Building a theory of human security

We can now proceed to limn and connect these concepts in a notational theory ofhuman security The central components of the theory are

1 Each individual human enjoys three strata of protection which enhance hissurvival chances as biological organism The primary stratum consists of raw


nature with society and state as secondary strata while the global stratumremains peripheral

2 Each of the three strata has a primary energizing core consisting of valuesand structures with individual and state mechanisms most effective in deter-mining life and death patterns In the MSNS institutions of the state havetended to replace social determinations

3 Individual autonomy and state sovereignty share in valuing independencebut apotheosis of the MSNS in the past century created the totalitarian per-version which diminished individual liberty Democratization in many coun-tries has modified latent oppressive tendencies of the state

4 Knowledge at all levels orients action to maximize life preservation Alsoknowledge exists at each level with particular fields of orientation and theremay even be security contradictions between fields A volunteer for militaryservice for example will compromise his individual safety in order toenhance the collective security of the state while emotionally he links hispotential sacrifice primarily on behalf of family and friends

5 As indicated in Chapter 3 state sovereignty consists of two moieties actual-ized sovereignty and claimed sovereignty

Actualized sovereignty is a function of

the human security of all persons in the state the degree of the intensity and reliability of citizen obligation commitments the level of political economy effectiveness of the military the influences threats limitations and opportunities from external

relations and the degree of political friction within the state

From this we derive a way to measure the human security of an individualcitizen which is given an average value based on the total level of actualizedsovereignty of the MSNS

Claimed sovereignty depends on the territorial and external ambitionsof a MSNS and the hierarchical configuration of secondary valuesThe pattern of claimed sovereignty is the basis of a statersquos meta-constitution

These ideas will be expressed in notational form in the following five formulassummarizing the theory of human security Such derived concepts enable us toformulate a fairly comprehensive inventory of the inputs of human security ndashespecially the role of individual will family state and military A globalist ambitionto create new international institutions for improving human security would dowell to examine the mechanisms and institutions already existing and effective asprelude to any grand project

One test of a theory is to implement it in practice and observe outcomesAnother avenue is to check its validity by applying it to the historical record and


determine how much explanatory power it provides In subsequent chapters wewill examine the evolution of the Chinese state in the framework of our humansecurity theory with particular application of the meta-constitution to accomplishdiachronic and synchronic analysis

Levels of human security inputs

Roger Scruton identifies the main components of the MSNS while linking it topre-state loyalties as the social foundation of the state

the emergence of the modern Western state in which jurisdiction is definedover territory supported by secular conceptions of legitimacy has also coin-cided with the emergence of a special kind of pre-political loyalty which isthat of the nation conceived as a community of neighbours sharing languagecustoms territory and a common interest in defence it is through the ideaof the nation therefore that we should understand the pre-political loyaltypresupposed in the contractarian view of citizenship

(Scruton 2002 53)

The balanced combination of strong individuals family-centric society2 and thedemocratic modern sovereign nation-state has proven to be an effective agent ofhuman security and the case for replacing them with new institutions has yet tobe made The end of the Cold War was seen to usher in a new era of internationalrelations ndash decline of the nation-state end to the bipolar division of the worldopen borders and free trade the superiority of markets over planning in economicdevelopment and devaluation of national sovereignty as the basis of politicalorganization This brave new world also required redefinition of national security ndashand of the idea of security itself The notion of human security has gained currency in the past decade as international organizations and nations have soughtto conceptualize and operationalize security actions beyond the confines ofnational security The commonly cited UNDP version of human security encom-passes a wide range of threats to ldquohumanityrdquo Initially the concept referred ldquonarrowlyas meaning threats to the physical security of the personrdquo Fenn Hampson writesabout three conceptions of human security the ldquohuman rightsrdquo approach theldquosafety of peoplesrdquo approach and the ldquosustainable human developmentrdquoapproach (2002 16ndash17) Some of that discussion reformulates developmentalisminto human security terms while other parts emphasize multilateral internation-alism as a necessary balance to the statersquos excesses or failures

Human security is primarily the preservation of human life the protection ofthe human and material resources needed for life and the prevention of violent orpremature death It requires precautions and preventions as well as strenuousactions and extraordinary sacrifices when the threat is greatest The individual isthe primary agent in his own security and humanity has developed additionalinstitutions and structures to assist in increasing human security Violent or acci-dental or preventable death ndash as opposed to ldquonaturalrdquo death from old age ndash is the


clearest measure of human security failure (HSF) HSF at the individual level isa biological event Death is inevitable for all individuals but violent expiration is not3 When HSF occurs in a societal setting the person roles and relationshipsoccupied by the individual are also terminated and the suddenness of deathaffects a wide range of surviving human relationships When the political or statestatus of the individualperson is in place death also terminates an occupier ofthe citizensubject role which is more interchangeable and easily replaced thanthe individual or person himself Modern armies for example are based on thereplaceability and interchangability of citizens to fill the ranks The claim thatwomen should serve in combat roles implies this position ndash that full citizenshiphas been withheld unless all male opportunities responsibilities and roles areopen to them as well

Determining when human life begins or ends given the array of technologyand moral relativism in the modern era goes beyond medical science and intoareas of ethics and subjective decision Partisans for and against abortion havewidely differing viewpoints on when human life begins while euthanasia advo-cates and opponents strongly disagree on who decides when life is not worthliving In between the beginning and ending of life there is broad agreement thatextraordinary measures must be taken to save healthy children and adults whendisaster strikes But consensus breaks down when citizens are victims of govern-ment action whether there will be actual intervention The US-led coalition thatoverthrew Saddam Husseinrsquos dictatorship in Iraq may have been launched forshaky reasons and inadequate evidence but the result was a chance for the Iraqpeople to establish democracy The indecisiveness of the globalist United Nationscontrasted sharply with decisive action of states led by the United States

Human security broadly encompasses the institutions and actions that haveevolved and which have been consciously modified to protect the human species ndashcollectively and one life at a time Life is not self-sustaining and demands constant care and attention How it is sustained and improved provides the neces-sary starting point for understanding human security

The internationalistdevelopmental persuasion of human security emphasizes acollectivist approach In contrast our human security theory starts with a narrowdefinition and individual scope ndash that human security refers primarily to protect-ing the life of the individual human by the individual and for the individualSafety from harm is an objective necessity for this protection but is hardly suffi-cient without energizing the individualrsquos will to live Our theory requires us toidentify those human-designed and evolved institutions which reinforce this cen-tral concern of preserving life An individual-centric line of inquiry is crucial asan inventory of what has contributed to human survival what has become dys-functional and what institutions should be preserved and strengthened

Human levels of existence

From stipulating individual human life as the foundation of human security wenext postulate that human philosophical social and political evolution has


produced a human condition encompassing five levels of existence Patternedbehavior in the form of individual capacity and collective institutions protectsphysical existence and contains a sequence of security objectives

Naturalorganic existence ndash individuals and nature

Humans exist initially and through a lifetime at through the biological level at theindividual unit of existence He survives by grace of nutrients water shelter andother inputs which provide basic security Without these inputs the individualexpires The human individual is more than organism and has a will and deter-mination to live and overcome adversity Reason and knowledge also assist in theacquisition distribution and deployment of inputs as well as improving theirefficiency Maternal and family protection after birth provides primary securityfor infant and child who would otherwise be mostly defenceless in the naturalenvironment Families are also the vital link between human existences as bio-logical and social being

The physical human being is an individual ndash a biological ldquoentityrdquo that is bornlives and dies ndash and is the irreducible indivisible core of human security thestarting point of all other human considerations At this primary level the indi-vidual has no initial identity except as a definable package of DNA cells andorgans plus reason which enables him to acquire and process information intoknowledge and memory beyond mere sensation The family ndash primarily motherand father ndash provides the biological matrix first of organic existence and then ofsocial being which allows the individual to become a person For human securitypurposes parents insure protection for helpless infants and his initial environ-ment for growth and survival Without at least one committed parent or surrogatethe individual infant cannot survive With two committed adults his life chancesare increased Through instruction experiment and experience the individualacquires the knowledge necessary for survival

Social existence ndash personhood and society

Social existence is an overlay on biological life Through social interaction theindividual is transformed into a person who thereby receives additionalincrements of protection After birth the infant has the potential to grow intocomplete personhood with all the attendant protections obligations rights andresponsibilities congruent with social expectations and customs As GertrudeHimmelfarb writes

the family (is) the bedrock of society the family even more than civilsociety is the ldquoseedbed of virtuerdquo the place where we receive our formativeexperiences where the most elemental primitive emotions come into playand we learn to express and control them where we come to trust and relateto others where we acquire habits of feeling thinking and behaving that we


call character ndash where we are in short civilized socialized and moralizedThe family it is said is a ldquominiature social system with parents as the chiefpromoters and enforces of social orderrdquo

(Himmelfarb 2001 51)

She lists the primary functions of the family which correspond to requirementsof human security ldquothe rearing and socializing of children and the caring for itsweakest and most vulnerable members the old and the youngrdquo

Interactions with other individuals create a social level of existence and add alayer of identity ndash the person ndash to the individual This identity layer is initially amotherndashfetus4 motherndashinfant bond that affectively connects father siblings andothers within the immediate family Personhood is not only identity but a claimof protection by stronger and mature members of the family and consanguineousgroup As the child matures he acquires obligations to protect others within thefamily clan and tribe Acquisition of knowledge becomes more complex andstructured in organized society with more resources expended on transmission ofthe collectively accumulated skills ideas and cultural lore to apprentice personsthrough education

In this theory we refer to ldquopersonhoodrdquo as a strictly social category ndash the con-nections identity obligations and rights that an individual is born to and acquiresin living with other individuals in the pre-state context In modern times thenotion of person has acquired legal connotations The Fourteenth Amendment tothe US Constitution used the word ldquopersonrdquo in reference to black males as clar-ified by the Supreme Court Later court cases expanded the scope of theAmendment to cover corporations which were deemed to have equal protectionunder law and were to be treated as legal persons Personhood is thus a legal aswell as a social category

Political existence ndash citizenship and the state

Biological and social existence is prerequisite to a political level of being Withinthe Hobbesian version of state formation a person surrenders part of his right ofself-defense to a sovereign authority which is then authorized by the constituentpersons within society to exercise collective security for the sake of protecting allpersons from each other and from other states which have military and coercivecapacities to deploy at home or abroad The Hobbesian theory of Leviathan radi-cally secularized the state Earlier the dominant view of the political communitywas that it existed as part of Godrsquos plan St Paul wrote to the Romans ldquoEveryonemust submit himself to the governing authorities for there is no authority exceptthat which God has established The authorities that exist have been establishedby Godrdquo (Romans 1113)

ldquoA modern democracy is perforce a society of strangers And the successfuldemocracy is the one where strangers are expressly included in the web of oblig-ations Citizenship involves the disposition to recognize and act upon obligations


to those whom we do not knowrdquo (Scruton 2002 53) This ldquosociety of strangersrdquoextends to nondemocracy as well

In the modern world all persons are subject to state and society rights andobligations and have been transformed into citizens or more precisely acquirean additional level of security existence we term ldquocitizenshiprdquo The actual incre-ment of human security depends on the character of the specific state where theyhold citizenship From the human security perspective the primary importance ofcitizenship is the array of protections the state bestows on persons while notignoring the costs in freedom ldquochargedrdquo for this service

The state consists of territory government and society and is the institutionalframework that provides a higher order of security for persons within societythrough its ability to concentrate coercive force for mobilizing human economicand physical resources against internal and external enemies The ancient Greekpolis the Roman Empire and the modern state all bestowed the identity of citizenon persons who had legal and participatory rights in the state The state demandsexclusive loyalty from its citizens5 Patriotism ndash especially in time of war ndash sets uptwo standards The first requires unswerving loyalty uncritical acceptance ofnational goals and sacrifice of life liberty and property for collective securityThe second standard demands disdain for an enemy who may be drained of humanqualities in order to mobilize collective antipathy Both outcomes of patriotism areuseful to the state but the second is a two-edged sword that capitalizes on the baserproclivities of ethnocentrism For man as moral actor the dissonance between thetwo patriotic standards violates justice and universal love

Globalspecies ndash ldquoGlobizenrdquo existence

Only a global commonwealth where nations cannot claim exclusive loyalty ofcitizens at the expense of universal justice can overcome the sovereign securityclaims of states Citizenship demands exclusivity which values patriotism andloyalty particularly in war Humans have also developed a moral nature whichcan be

Localsocial in the sense of family or society or state specific EdwardBanfield (1958) identified amoral familism at the local level as the basis ofsolidarity and excluding all others Confucianism predominant in ChinaJapan and Korea stressed filial piety and family loyalty as the foundation ofmorality and society or

Species general ndash inclusive of all humanity The Mohist doctrine of universallove in China manifested an egalitarian utilitaritarianism not so distant fromthe harsh theory of the Legalists Stoicism Christianity and later Kantianmorality all stressed the brotherhood of man

The modern version of moral universalism is expressed both in the UN Charter andin the widening scope of global treaties which implicitly claim superiority to the


MSNS Activities and moral imperatives on behalf of humanity ndash regardless ofsocial membership or state citizenship ndash purport to extend human security on a uni-versal basis This process differs from bestowing a new level of citizenship sincethere are few effective coercive or enforcement or accountability mechanisms at aglobal level What would achievement of global security involve It would probablyresemble a world-state without the parochial anchors of nationalism andsovereignty ndash a set of laws global in scope with an economic system benefiting allpeoples equally ndash a global commonwealth Making it accountable or balancing itsagenciesrsquo powers would be another challenge While progress toward this goalappeared possible after the end of the Cold War the 911 event Islamist jihadismliberation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the war on terrorism have halted progress tothe global commonwealth project The larger issue is that the energized Americanstate under George W Bush has overshadowed what had seemed to be an interna-tional juggernaut toward replacement of the nation-state although the EuropeanUnion has taken steps to absorb the sovereignties of major countries accustomed towarring against each other

Spiritual existence ndash the soul and spirituality

We denote the religious vision of peace on earth as Elysium ndash where all men andwomen are saints sages and heroes Perhaps only in an unattainable Elysian exis-tence of utopia where humans have overcome their mortal struggles for exis-tence peace and felicity will the full spiritual vision be achieved At this levelan idealized ldquosoulrdquo realizes this religious vision that transcends physical socialeconomic political and even moral existence Security is banished as a concernin Elysium ndash an earthly Paradise that contrasts starkly with our imperfect world

The modern rationalsecular world discounts the role of beliefs and religion aserror or private orientation at odds with empirical science Yet much of the globalpopulation finds solace and inspiration in the promises and premises of religionReligions have historically generated wars and violent movements or have rein-forced more secular actions causing great insecurity and destruction to theirenemies6 It is unwise to underestimate the influences of non-rational subjectivepsychology in security matters specifically as a triggering or energizing force foraction As a fifth level of existence spirituality in the temporal world seeks peacewisdom and virtue but requires physical security to embark on its contempla-tion Depite its historical flaws religion provides a vision of this utopia which isoften seen as a template for just order in the world Secularists may also share inthe vision though they require it to undergo drainage of any supernatural or the-ological dimensions However from the standpoint of objective human securitythe religious level of human security is the lowest We summarize these levels ofexistence their components and notations in Table 42

Following the method of Thomas Hobbes the theory of human security beginswith man in the state of nature and imagines how society and state have been con-structed as institutional structures for manrsquos protection Globalists are seeking to


construct a fourth structure that will supersede the state or to build a super-statesuch as the European Union to absorb member-states of a region In either caseit is unclear that these efforts can provide the same degree of security as the com-bination of individuals societies and the MSNS Given the central role of thestate in delivering human security in human history and the relatively secondaryrole that alternative structures have played so far we will accord our main atten-tion to it as the center of evolution of the Chinese empire into the yet incompleteChinese MSNS


Table 42 Levels of human existence (shaded cells indicate the scope of the theory ofhuman security)

Context of Human Human Primary Knowledge Materialproductionexistence ldquounitrdquo security affinity component distribution

component unit componentnetwork

Raw nature Individual Human Family Cognitive Tools weapons[I] indivi- security of [F] map nutrition shelter dual will individuals derived natural environmentto live [HSi] from [Ei][Wi] personal

experienceand familyinstruction[Ki]

Society Person Human Clan (pre- Education Market economy[P] security of modern derived driven by division

persons society) from of labor [Es][HSp] association specialized

(modern societalsociety) instruction

[Ks]

State Citizen Human MSNS Elite ndash Political economy[C] security of Nation esoteric driven by state

citizens knowledge priorities [Ep][HSc] masses ndash

exoteric[Kp]

Global Globizen Equal and Humanity Ethically Global economycommonwealth egalitarian derived driven by

security redistributive goals

Elysium Soul Immortality Cosmos Revealed Material world(Utopia) or at least Supreme through transcended

liberation Being religionfrommundaneconsiderations

And reason always favored life over death and profit before loss didnrsquot it(Sienkiewicz 1991)

Human sciences can rarely be expressed in precise mathematics Howeverquasi-mathematic notations are useful in clarification of political relationshipsOur discussion so far has focused on identifying the main elements of humansecurity In this chapter these elements and their relationships will be compressedinto notational form and summarized in five linked formulas For the task ofanalyzing evolution of the Chinese MSNS two of the formulas will be of greatestrelevance and utility Formulas Three and Five address the two forms of statesovereignty ndash actualized and claimed To derive these notational expressions webegin with the core human individual in raw nature

Formula One human security of individual [HSi]

Human securityrsquos primary concern is postponement of the second central event (birthis first) in every individualrsquos life ndash death Humanity has been successful in extendingmortality but with uneven results Women live years longer than men in many soci-eties and poverty has a negative effect on longevity Occupation also plays a role asdoes the social and economic and knowledge infrastructure Over centuries the statehas played an expanding role ndash more with increasing than decreasing life chances forsubjectscitizens A series of formulations express the role of state and society inaffecting longevity by decreasing violence and its effects and address the cumulativeeffect of individuals society and state in affecting the life chances of individuals

Protecting individual life and safety is the primary objective of human securityAlthough modern society has intermingled society state persons group andsecurity in a complex fashion we can abstract pre-institutional tools which menhave devised when confronting the natural environment without benefit of collective institutions As reviewed in Chapter 2 fictionalized and evocativeaccounts are available in literary works or modern films In these and from actualexperience a common set of human security elements emerges that can be

5 A notational theory of human security

A notational theory of human security 63

authenticated from reflection of people who have faced dangers in the wilds or intreacherous situations

1 Individual self-security and the will to live [Wi ] Fear of death the basis ofHobbesrsquo Leviathan is universal An instinctive will to live is the primary sourceof human security subordinating even rational calculation that odds againstsurvival may be too great This will to live includes physical capacity that isindependent of supports from other individuals For infants the aged the infirmand pregnant women there are inherent physical limitations greater than formature healthy males with corresponding lower autonomous capacity of self-protection Although an individual may live and die beyond the boundaries ofsociety he enjoys many of the gifts of societyrsquos accomplishments ndash safety ofenvironment material accumulation concerns of others language ideals andknowledge Aron Ralston Chuck Noland and Robinson Crusoe were physicallyoutside their social network but also existed as creations of their respectivecultures and societies Death of their bodies would signal their end as individualperson and citizen1

2 Family [F] Strictly speaking families produce individuals and nurturethem into personhood While Western sociology refers to this as primary social-ization Confucianism assigned a high moral value to the family bond which isbased primarily on the biological links of motherndashchild fatherndashmother andfatherndashchild and secondarily extended to further links of consanguinityfriendship and royal subject The protection of infants and children begins inthe family and extends beyond the ldquobiological production unitrdquo to otherrelatives and clan members in a combination of pragmatic reciprocity andaltruism Similarly protection of vulnerable family members is naturallystronger than for distant relations or strangers Adult and able-bodied individualsare more self-sufficient and independent than vulnerable individuals and aremore likely to survive adversity than minors pregnant women elderly handi-capped the ill and injured and others requiring protection Human altruismhelps improve the odds for the vulnerable The [F] element may also be anegative factor when primary trust of family is betrayed ndash abortion if oneconsiders the fetus to be an individual rather than mere tissue is one dangerInfanticide families selling daughters into prostitution or sons into slavery orbondage or even cannibalism (Becker 1997) are not unknown though rarelydone except in extreme desperation

3 Knowledge [Ki ] Conscious knowledge comes from observation and reasonand humans and other sentient beings also possess a subliminal knowledgenecessary for survival Pain and discomfort are sensory signals of danger andan individual will usually take immediate steps to remedy the threat Memoryintelligence and calculation supplement instinct and make long-term planningfor survival possible

Michael Oakeshott divided knowledge into two types practical and technicaland they have direct consequences for human security of individuals and


persons Other forms of knowledge can also be identified although they are morerelevant at more complex levels of existence

Practical knowledge is based on experience and addresses how to take careof human survival ndash the skills of using techniques tools and weapons Thisis transmitted by verbal communication and imitation or apprenticeship andusually requires face-to-face communication

Technical knowledge is more theory than practice although it is learned andsummarized from practical knowledge or it may be propounded as untestedtheory It generally requires written language for communication and spe-cialized institutions such as schools and universities for transmission

In addition to Oakeshottrsquos two categories we can identify three more types ofknowledge that have relevance to human security

Self-knowledge refers to matters of identity and how individuals fit into soci-ety Security depends on societyrsquos division of labor ndash the specialized skills ofwarriors technicians scientists physicians nurses producers and home-makers (who are usually omitted from security considerations but are a vitallink in education health and making communities and markets work) Alsothis is knowledge about a society why it is worth defending dying for andeven killing for

Virtual or common knowledge is conventional wisdom that resemblespseudo-knowledge often transmitted as rumor but is more passive and lessmotivational in the sense of energizing action It is public opinion which canbe tested with polls and elections and is highly vulnerable to media manip-ulation in modern societies It is also culture consisting of shared values andcommon informal institutions and behavior patterns

Finally pseudo-knowledge resembles self-knowledge but is characterized bya high degree of subjective certainty It is myth that makes action and sacri-fice possible and necessary It was ldquorace theoryrdquo in an earlier period As ide-ology political myth promises liberation and revolutionary utopias but alsohas been a major source of insecurity for those outside the circle of the electNazism Maoism Communism and Fascism as well as various cultist andterrorist dogmas are examples of modern pseudo-knowledge which maycontain certain insights and have depended upon application of technicalknowledge for expansion and success Ultimately these non-verifiable ide-ologies can be eliminated only by death and defeat and rarely by persuasionand they usually contain some fatal flaw that has not allowed their success tobe permanent In summary human security must include knowledge whichis cumulative and transmittable and has different forms and outcomes

4 Natural environment[Ei ] For human security purposes the environmentof raw nature refers to the material resources needed for survival ndash food watershelter clothing weapons tools medicines and so on Territory is the


primary security realm of an economy that supports individuals and is affected bycharacteristics including terrain climate fertility and strategic defensability whichare vital to human security Man in raw nature becomes economically relevant onlyinsofar as he interacts with others which transforms him into a person

We can summarize the individualrsquos pre-social human security (HSi) as the sumof Wi F Ki Ei in the following notation

Formula One Human security of an individual in pre-society raw nature

HSi Wi F Ki Ei

orThe pre-social individualrsquos human security [HSi] is the aggregate of anindividualrsquos will and physical capacity to survive [Wi] Family inputs[F]Knowledge [Ki] and natural environment [Ei]

Although it is not possible to predict when or how a particular individual will expireFormula One identifies those elements which if deficient will reduce life chances

Formula Two human security of persons [HSp]

The human security of individuals in a pre-social ldquostate of naturerdquo is highly vulnerable Some families and groups will have better life expectancies due tonumbers cohesion and higher individual vectors of Wi F Ki and Ei Theseadvantages will be beneficial not nullified in organized societies which seem tohave emerged as responses to security threats (consisting of economic natural orfrom other human groups) and from the recognition that cooperative relationshipsbased on a division of labor and distribution based on exchange would better enablesurvival of physically weaker individuals and contribute to dominance of the groupAt the same time competition for mates territory and resources stimulatedexpansion of knowledge and development of economic resources Conflicts eruptedwithin and between social groupings and were often destructive but also increasedthe security of one group at the expense of another by confiscation or enhanced bothvictors and defeated if the conflict resulted in incorporation of respective superioradaptations Cooperation competition and conflict thus contributed to human secu-rity of persons (HSp) within the social grouping while sharpening and reinforcingtheir division of labor more deeply embedding their roles as persons in their respec-tive societies The individual can become a person only in society and thereinaccrues a second level to his existence and security This also adds social identity inthe form of status role long-term obligations and behavior restrictions undercustom and culture In acquiring membership in society the individual achievespersonhood and enhances his human security within society as membership denotesone is no longer the prey nor enemy of the group


A personrsquos total human security [HSp] is equal the sum of

his pre-societal (individual) human security [HSi] that is what the individ-ual brings and contributes to his societal membership Note that this elementis derived in Formula One

plus or minus some amount of social liberty [Ls] he has surrendered orgained as the cost or profit of membership in society There is alwaysdecreased social liberty [Ls] in the loss of an individualrsquos unlimited right ofself-protection as well as a narrowing of skills and choices imposed by thedivision of labor and socially imposed restrictions on choice An example ofdiminished liberty is the position of women in Islamic fundamentalist soci-eties such as Taliban Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia compared to generallygreater female freedom in more loosely organized nomadic societies(Mongolia for example) Social membership also expands [Ls] with greatermutual protections material benefits and opportunities for greater scope ofcooperative action and movement and so [Ls] can also have a positive value

plus the increment of social knowledge [Ks] that accrues to persons in societythrough greater exchange and distribution of information and technology aswell as institutions for education The subjects of this knowledge are broaderand more abstract than required in the state of raw nature and require acommon language for communication within a framework of shared culture Itshould be noted that some forms of pseudo-knowledge ndash such as superstitionor nationalndashcultural chauvinism ndash usually subtract from the efficacy of socialknowledge The criterion of social knowledge is the degree to which an item(fact) of knowledge contributes a personrsquos human security and requiresreference to other people For example an individual has a severe headacheand knows from experience [Ki] that willow bark will provide relief A personknows [Ks] a pharmacist who can provide even more effective relief

plus obligationloyalty [Os] to other persons in his social network Bonds oftrust and altruism are critical in energizing human security benefits in soci-ety Intra-familial betrayals of children or parents activate revulsion as viola-tions of expectation of trust while self-sacrifice for the sake of the life orwell-being of a family member is celebrated as intrinsically virtuous

plus or minus economy [Es] the economic advantages of greater exchange ofmaterial goods in more trusting economic relationships with other personscreating the social or market economy Commodities are produced from rawmaterials found in the environment [Ei] or from secondary materials processedby others not directly related to survival ndash such as tools vehicles culturalitems or new foods Participation in a confiscatory social economy may reducea personrsquos or a familyrsquos material standing and so the political economy [Ep]could also be a negative factor for a portion of the population within the state

plus or minus an individual average (indicated by underlines) sum of security advantage derived from the social dividends and penalties of cooperation competition and conflict which is summarized as the averageCoefficient of Social Friction [SF]2 By friction I refer to physical and socialcontact between persons Conflict endangers individuals and so is negative


while cooperation is positive Competition may be either positive or negativeor neutral As a mechanical metaphor in society friction can produce unityof two or more units if they are moving in harmony (cooperation) but if theunits in contact or proximity are moving in different directions (conflict)ldquoheat wear and breakagerdquo will result Competition includes elements ofboth cooperation and conflict and the result may be destructive or positiveA high value for [SF] decreases [HSp]

The human security of a person in society is derived in the following

Formula Two Human security of a person in pre-political society

HSp (HSi Ls s s Es) (SF)

orThe human security of a person in a socially defined group is equal to thatpersonrsquos individual human security plus or minus the liberty he acquires orsurrenders with membership in society plus the access to socially generatedcultural and technical knowledge plus obligation loyalty to other persons inhis social network plus or minus the effects of a social economy and plus orminus the average effects of the social friction coefficient

This formula stipulates that the individual generally gains in life chances (humansecurity) through membership in society ndash that is personhood One conditionwhere there can be a decrease in human security is under conditions of socialanarchy when an existing state collapses and fragments of society acquire somepowers of the full state ndash especially armed military formations Commonly calledwarlordism it has been experienced in China and other countries in historyCollective [SF] is also characteristic of revolutionary activity class or religiouswarfare or other disintegration of state authority In sum that level of existencewe call personhood provides a social layer of human security for the individual

Formula Three human security in the state ndash subjects and citizens [HSc]

To determine the total human security available to an individualpersoncitizen inthe state we must calculate (or at least notationally represent) the vectors of sov-ereignty Only actualized sovereignty has effect in this calculation Society isprior to the formal state whose government can concentrate and deploy forceMax Weber wrote that the state is based on a monopoly of force The character ofthe state and the key to its authority is sovereignty which has claims over citizensand territory The MSNS claims that its law and control extend to its frontier bor-ders and is equal and indivisible in all parts This claimed sovereignty will benotated as [Sc] and must be effectuated by actualized sovereignty [Sa] which is

a descriptive and verifiable measure of exclusive state control over populationand territory The contemporary Chinese state for example claims absolute con-trol over all its territory but exerts no direct control over the province of Taiwanwhich has continuously demonstrated and guarded its autonomy

According to Stephen D Krasner (2001 7)

The term sovereignty has been commonly used in at least four diffe-rent ways Domestic sovereignty involves both authority and control interdependence sovereignty only control and Westphalian and internationallegal sovereignty only authority Authority is based on the mutual recogni-tion than an actor has the right to engage in a specific activity including theright to command others Authority might or might not result in effectivecontrol Control can also be achieved through the use of force If over aperiod of time the ability of a legitimated entity to control a given domainweakens then the authority of that entity might eventually dissipateConversely if a particular entity is able to successfully exercise control or ifa purely instrumental pattern of behaviour endures for a long period then theentity or practice could be endowed with legitimacy In many social and polit-ical situations both control and authority can affect the behaviour of actors

Actualized sovereignty [Sa] or what Krasner terms ldquocontrolrdquo encompasses com-petent national security and directly delivers a layer of human security to theindividualspersonscitizens comprising a national population Sovereignty is thecentral property of the state and derives from the power and authority of its insti-tutions Actual state sovereignty [Sa] is based on power while claimed sover-eignty [Sc] refers to state authority The state further enhances its external andinternal security with military forces augmented by police and other securityforces notated as [M] The state derives additional strength from social solidarity ndasha harmonious and cooperative national society will have greater security than oneriven with conflict This elusive national harmony translated as a low politicalfriction coefficient is designated as [PF] At the high end it is conflict and has anegative value Politics may mitigate or deepen [PF] and in extreme cases resultin civil war

Adding the benefits and dividends of state security to persons transforms theminto citizens but it is not a cost-free benefit Each person must surrender somefurther degree of personal social liberty to the state just as each pre-society individual exchanges natural liberty for the greater protections in a social orderThe costs of citizenship include military service taxes obedience to laws somesubordination to officials and tolerance of other particular interests We can summarize these as Obligation [Oc] In return the citizen receives protectionObligation [Oc] refers to the reciprocity of duties between state and subjectcitizens and is a form of contractual duty encompassing subjective loyalty ndash theorientation of exclusive affection for the state and its symbols Democratic rightscustomarily enshrined in law and constitution are stipulations by the state that itssovereignty claims are not unlimited and that the security rights of individuals



and persons are safe from excessive submersion into citizenship That is thestate is not bestowing anything new on citizens merely setting limits to its ownsovereignty

Political economy [Ep] is the social or market economy enhanced supervised andcoordinated by the state which has a vital interest in extracting resources to carry outits functions To this end the statersquos contribution to society is greatest when it estab-lishes and expands an infrastructure of law to guarantee order preserve property andcontract and defend territory and citizens from predators and other states As Laoziwrote ruling the state is like cooking a small fish ndash it must be done lightly

In the world of multiple states external relations [ER] with other states are acritical factor in a statersquos security Bilateral relations may be neutral alliance orantagonistic and we notate this element with corresponding plus minus or neu-tral effect on state security

We notate the existing national security of a state (actualized sovereignty) as follows

Formula Three Actual sovereignty of a state

Sa (HSp Op) Ep Kp M PF ER

The actual sovereignty [Sa] of a state is a function of

1 the sum of the human security of all persons who are counted as citizens [HSp] and the cumulative intensity of obligations of each citizen to the state [Op]

2 the performance of the political economy [Ep]3 specialized and usually esoteric political knowledge [Kp] drawn from

experience and history and utilized for the establishment preserva-tion and expansion of state power

4 the coercive institutions of the state ndash primarily the military [M] ndash todefend it against external enemies and internal rebellions

5 the coefficient of (domestic) political friction [PF] and6 external relations [ER] may be either positive or negative in their effect

on actualized sovereignty

Formula Three shows how national security is maximized or neutralized ordiminished at the state level An array of positive components with low [PF] willstrengthen actual state sovereignty while low or negative magnitudes and a high[PF] will have the opposite effect Central to this formula is that sovereignty ofthe state is a doubly dependent variable ndash first depending on the human securityof individuals and secondly on the security of persons in society The state doesnot or can not create security out of pure will or superior design but depends onthe aggregate of individualpersons comprising its population


Formula Four validating Hobbes

How does national security reinforce human security of the individualpersoncitizen and contribute to protection of human life The concentration of power inthe MSNS and its earlier precursors could be fatal to enemies as well as citizensAn argument in favor of international law and organizations that restrict the free-dom of states is that states are dangerous to their citizens and other states and sotheir sovereignty over citizens must be accountable and delimited by universalnorms and law The international order of sovereign states may be a form of inter-national anarchy the argument goes If citizens have less security under the statethan they do in society for example this would validate the need to neutralize thestate or bring it more under the control of putative world government

Formula Four Actual human security of one citizen in a state

HSc Sapopulation Sa

The human security of an individualperson as citizen [HSc] of a state isequal to the actualized sovereignty of the state [Sa] (derived in FormulaThree) divided by the number of citizens who are protected by that stateThis operation calculates the average actual security available to each citizenor semi-citizen (those persons who do not have full citizenship priv-ileges but claim protection of the state because of residence relationship toa full citizen or other considerations)

This average rarely reflects reality for citizens where personal differences in sta-tus and wealth influence security This average human security per citizen is anal-ogous to a savings account that is held individually and can be drawn upon intimes of need although in this case the ldquobankrdquo (state) decides to whom and howmuch ldquosavingsrdquo can be withdrawn Each state has ldquoreservesrdquo and the totals willvary over time and from one country to another Normative citizenship derives itspossibility from the actual sovereignty of the state ndash its empirical ability toenforce its laws and rules over all citizens within its territory and to protect itscitizens from the laws and predations of other states It is only after establishmentof actual sovereignty that the obligations and protections of citizenship are possi-ble The subsequent supplementing of citizenship with norms of human rights andnatural rights requires the prior establishment of state sovereignty

In contrast to the mathematical approximation of ldquoaverage human securityrdquo asa function of actual sovereignty the reality is that security and life risks are higherfor those actually engaged in protecting citizens Security workers (mostly males)in the military front-line health workers police fire and rescue forces and so onface greater dangers but also are better trained and equipped to deal with threatsto their individual security and to assist the general population Those who havebetter education economic position health and family circumstances will


have greater human security than the worse off ndash but these derive from pre-statecircumstances as individuals and persons not from the benefits of citizenship3

A new MSNS usually upon establishment of actual sovereignty enunciates itsclaims to what will be included in its scope of government ndash not only territory andpeoples but its relationship to a higher moral order its goals and policies as wellas obligations of subjectscitizens In modern times the enshrinement of averageprotection by actual sovereignty establishes the foundation for normative citizen-ship based on equality Modern egalitarianism is partly derived from an idealiza-tion of the anticipated benefits of the sovereign state Human security can bedelivered to citizens of a strong state and thus they have a vital interest in obey-ing that state contributing to its strength and accepting its claims of sovereigntyas necessary for individualpersonal survival

At this point if we compare Formula One to Formula Four if the friction coeffi-cients are low and other elements positive the citizen has a higher degree of humansecurity than the individual in a state of raw nature This proves Hobbes correct butonly under conditions of a well-ordered state that protects the autonomy and livesof its citizens ndash conditions which elude many an incomplete MSNS

Formula Five claims of the state [Sc] and incompatible values

Finally what a state claims and how much human security the state actually deliv-ers often differ substantially and this difference will be addressed as a centralenergizing element in the MSNS often leading to conflict with other states Inaddition claimed sovereignty expresses the statersquos portrayal of itself its idealsand its claim to authority ndash a pattern of claims we have called meta-constitution

Formula Five Claimed sovereignty of the state

Sc Tc Cc ERc Av(Vo Ve Vi)

The claimed sovereignty of a state is a function of1 Territorial claims [Tc]2 Claims by the state over its citizens [Cc]3 Claims by the state on other states and by other states on the subject

state [ERc] and4 The vector of three Allocated Values [Av] ndash order equality and liberty

(Vo Ve Vi) (ldquordquo conveys the two dimensions ofvalues ndash intensity and variability)

Claims of a state over territory citizenssubjects and other states are activated bya mix of historical experience ambitions of rulers and estimated needs for statesecurity [Av] denotes the mix of allocative values which reflects changing distri-bution and current priorities Thus claimed sovereignty [Sc] is a function of

territorial claims and of allocative values which is a function of changes in orderequality and liberty

[Vo] The political value order is based on state deployment of coercion tominimize overt political friction [PF] State coercion may consist of moralsuasion physical or psychological force or a combination of all threeWithin the scope of claimed sovereignty [Sc] order equality and liberty arevalues only and not substantive products although these values can lead tospecific actions and outcomes

[Ve] The political value equality usually requires state deployment of coer-cion to achieve allocation of security resources based on equal distribution ofhuman security benefits

[Vl] The statersquos political value liberty does not normally depend on deploy-ment of coercion to allow allocation of security resources based on individualpersonal calculations and preferences which are derived primarily fromthe effectiveness of individual human security [HSi] and secondarily from thehuman security of persons in pre-state society [HSp] However coercion maybe deployed to restrain liberty from diminishing equality which can increasepolitical friction [PF] Also coercion may be used to remove social or politicalrestraints on liberty

[] indicates the increase or decrease in the statersquos enforcement of eachof the three political values The interactive and mutual influence of thesevalues are critical in identification of political issues legislation enforce-ment of laws and justification of actions

Political values and the state

The statersquos claim of sovereignty over territory and citizens is mediated by theclaims of other states and by the allocation of values Much discussion ofthe state by political philosophers has focused on justice ndash what it is and howthe state should maximize a just order Every state claims to seek justice and theseclaims are expressed in the combination of values ndash order equality and libertyBecause all three cannot be maximized simultaneously states determine theirpriority reducing one or two so that the third can take the leading role injustification of policy The formulation of claimed sovereignty in the last ofthe five formulas reflects recognition that without actual human security (notdirectly affected by [Sc]) rudimentary justice may not be not possible In rawnature the impossibility of common values is clear Believers in manrsquos essentialgoodness advocate pre-state ldquorestorative justicerdquo to reclaim social moral balancebut in the world of the MSNS this will remain a minor remedy Justice requiresthe prior guarantee of human security and the MSNS has historically developedas the preeminent provider of that security

Values inform the content and direction of government within the sovereignstate All states claim sovereignty but claims do not produce actual sovereigntyActual sovereignty actuates state security and its distribution through trickle-down to unit level (citizens) which the more rhetorical claimed sovereignty


cannot A major difference between [Sa] and [Sc] is that the former more directlyexpresses the life death and well-being chances of individuals as persons and ascitizens while the latter is generated by values allocated by the state Sovereigntyclaims may lead to actions as war or threat of war that will test actual sovereignty(as national security) but in themselves those claims are significantly derivedfrom values

Three principal values are pursued by a state in guiding allocation and distrib-ution of security benefits to citizens Order [Vo] Equality [Ve] and Liberty [Vl]In theory the MSNS adheres to equality in allocating security benefits to citizensThat no citizen shall have greater or less protection than any other is an impracti-cal ideal violated by the very nature of government Heads of state and their min-isters ndash those responsible for representing and making decisions for themaintainence of the government ndash are protected in their office by special guardsand procedures Crime rates in poor urban areas demonstrate the slippage of theegalitarianism of security The demand for egalitarian distribution of state protec-tion makes sense from the perspective of Formula Four by transforming a math-ematical average into an ideal and into a legal target or goal

This human security ideal of full equality [Ve] by means of state action is arelatively radical intervention as QLS1 demonstrated The value of order [Vo] hasprobably the most ancient lineage Allocation of security benefits under the prin-ciple of order specifies that certain social or political categories are more deserv-ing of security than others Contemporary North Korea is the clearest examplewith its Soviet-type three-class division into an elite masses and enemies of thepeople In that benighted polity the political leadership enjoys luxury and maxi-mum security while ldquoclass enemiesrdquo are condemned to subhuman imprisonmentThe Soviet Union had its nomenklatura and Communist China has a complexarray of categories of privilege and both had (and have in the case of China)extensive prison camps for dissidents Communist states despite their proclama-tion of egalitarianism have been among the most hierarchically organized soci-eties in the twentieth century But it is their claim of egalitarianism that has beenused in its core formula of legitimacy

The value of liberty [Vl] is more permissive than allocative insofar as it pre-serves the rights that individualspersons possessed prior to the state and thus dif-fers from order [Vo] and equality [Ve] in that the latter two are active by investingthe state with power to impose its agenda on citizens and more importantly tomodify social relationships Liberty as a political value in the state began hesitantly in ancient Greece was incorporated gradually in European law andcustom and blossomed in the American revolution4 The modern phenomenon ofnationalism in a sense confiscated individualpersonal liberty and reinventedit as ldquonational liberationrdquo for the purpose of collective national liberty fromcolonialism ndash even though this version often tramples on the natural and legiti-mate liberties of citizens

Today individual liberty as a permissive or allocated value can be consideredldquostate-lightrdquo while order and equality are ldquostate-heavyrdquo in requiring state inter-vention to achieve intended results (The ldquorightsrdquo that are usually stipulated inauthoritarian and totalitarian state constitutions are creations of the MSNS with


limited recognition of ldquonatural rightsrdquo and so can be easily abridged or terminatedby state action) This intervention usually requires coercion in the form ofpersuasion confiscation punishment reward and taxation Order has been theprimary value of historical states while equality and liberty are modern and arepossible only after the consolidation of order All three are political values centralto modern claims of sovereignty and critical to the allocation of the statersquos humansecurity resources

Encompassing these values claimed sovereignty [Sc] denotes the scope of stateclaims over citizenssubjects their property and thus their means of self-protection5

as well as claims of territorial jurisdiction Historically these claims ndash and themix of order equality and liberty ndash have been dynamic and interlinked Forexample for a state to maximize order it will decrease liberty by placing citizensin legal categories for administration (three classes in Communist systems andsexual ethnic and racial categories in the contemporary United States)Likewise liberty declines with state-forced enhancement of equality Order andequality are not naturally compatible though the ancient Chinese Legalists triedto construct an egalitiarian order with a single absolute monarch ruling over apopulation consisting of interchangeable farmers and warriors Paradoxically theenforcement of absolute equality destroys the possibility of a stable egalitarianorder since some persons will be naturally less passive than others and willinevitably run afoul of enforced egalitarianism Dissidents through criticism andthe Soviet apparachik beneficiaries of dachas and beryozka through theirhypocrisy shared in dismantling the myth of Communist equality

Or in a presumably better future the anarchist vision of freedom plus equalitycould emerge when humanity has shed its defects of selfishness ndash the Elysiancondition where the state is unnecessary and order is established by universalconsent and compliance In the real world the claims of egalitiarian prioritieshave rested on an enforced order which paradoxically undermines that equalityMichael Polanyi considered the possibility of ldquospontaneous order in societyrdquo aswhen human beings are allowed to ldquointeract with each other on their own initia-tive ndash subject only to laws which uniformly apply to all of themrdquo (Boaz 1997226) It is not difficult to imagine how easily some individuals more avariciousor resourceful than others could accumulate goods and power which wouldundermine any pretense of equality

Values comprise a socio-political wish list ndash preference for predictability andstability (order) fairness and justice (equality) and minimum state interferencein personal affairs (liberty) However by working through human securityFormulas One and Two the final three formulas demonstrate how the values areactually implemented By actualizing sovereignty (Formula Three) the stateestablishes order existing with an intensity that varies according to the stipulatedfactors Where Formula Four provides an approximation of the average humansecurity per citizen this can also be interpreted as the ideal of equality As theaverage degree of human security approaches actual distribution citizens becomeequal in other respects If there were a Gini chart that measured human securitythe coefficient would equal ldquo1000rdquo of an absolutely equal state



The theory of human security summary and conclusion

The first four formulae of human security rest on a relatively measurable output ndashthe decrease in violent deaths of individuals and the prolongation of human lifeexpectancy Personhood and citizenship add protections to individuals in an oftenviolent world By accomplishing a higher degree of human security than mostindividuals can achieve through their own efforts and more than persons in astateless cooperative society the MSNS claims more resources and more obliga-tions from its subjectscitizens in the name of fundamental protection Theseclaims of sovereignty have historically been the engine of legitimizing stateexpansion both at the expense of other states and in diminishing the natural andsocial liberty of subjectscitizens Formula Five approximates the dimensions ofa statersquos aspirations within the limitations imposed by claims of other states Thevector of three values encompassed in [Av] describes the configuration of citi-zenship the state confers on its population as well as the implied relationshipbetween state and citizens

Formulas One and Two address human security in the pre-state context ndash theprotections man brings into the state and which must be accomodated or modi-fied by the addition of state protections Formula Three calculates the power ndashdenoted as actualized sovereignty ndash available to the state and depends upon thehuman security of individualpersons prior to the state Formula Four delivers araw approximation of human security per citizen This average value will beskewed by [Av] in Formula Five since human security resources will be allocatedaccording to where citizens are located in the statersquos hierarchy We have suggestedthat the greater the gap between actualized sovereignty and claimed sovereigntythe more likely is conflict When the gap is relatively small a state can beexpected to remain stable but when that gap increases to a certain intensity majorinternal conflicts will occur and in extreme cases the state will collapse

In the following chapters assessing historical and contemporary China thenotions of actualized sovereignty and claimed sovereignty are central to diagnos-ing evolution of the Chinese MSNS actualized sovereignty reflects the historicalrecord of how Chinese states were established maintained and ended claimedsovereignty refers to how these states designated their authority over territoryand subjectscitizens An identifiable pattern of claimed sovereignty will bedenoted as a meta-constitution

When the Chinese state is viewed from the perspective of the theory of humansecurity from our analytical ldquomountaintoprdquo certain features emerge At leasteight distinctive meta-constitutions can be identified since 221 BC The mostdurable was the ICS2 established on the ruins of its predecessor the QLS1 andwhich dominated most of the historical period It was challenged and brieflyreplaced by the reformer Wang Mang and again nearly defeated by the TaipingTianguo in the mid-nineteenth century But the durability of ICS2 even as a tem-plate for smaller kingdoms during interdynastic periods remains an impressivemonument in the state-building history of the world In twentieth-century Chinathere has been a relative proliferation of meta-constitutions ndash RNS3 GRS4 SCS5

MCS6 DMS7 and TIS8 Contention among these meta-constitutions has been amajor factor in Chinarsquos modern ldquoincomplete sovereigntyrdquo ndash the continuing failureto close the gap between actualized sovereignty and claimed sovereignty

The theory of human security is a useful analytical tool to understand the con-tinuum of institutions that embrace and protect the biological existence of humansthrough society and state By examining the past web of security institutions thatevolved through evolution and history we can develop new and better toolspolicies and institutions to remedy breakdowns of old patterns and confrontnew challenges especially in the non-West The combination of autonomousindividuals family-centric society and the democratic modern sovereign nation-state has proven to be an effective protector of human security in history and thecase for new institutions to replace them awaits proof World security today ndashdespite threats of terrorism and nuclear proliferation ndash is perhaps as high as it hasever been (though far from a perfect Elysium) in terms of

absolute numbers of people who are enjoying longer and more secure lives relative control over mass destruction threats rising living standards life expectancy and health increasing science and technology to enhance life and political stability

Human security threats are also present

proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) ignorance superstition and disease pockets of hunger and famine depletion of environment and natural resources persecution of religious and political dissidents misallocation of scarce resources to military spending terrorism and political violence natural disasters including global warming and dehumanization of man through science mass culture commerce and sexual

exploitation

A major challenge today is to further enhance human security for those whoselives are vulnerable or marginal and this may be done by refining and improvingthose institutions that have verifiably done more good than harm and by modi-fying or abandoning those which have done more harm than good Only then mayit be wise to devise new institutions to ameliorate global human security deficits


One of mankindrsquos most durable creations passed out of existence when oldChinarsquos imperial system of government was submerged under a tide of repub-licanism in the early years of the present century No other government thatpersisted into the twentieth century could claim comparable longevity for itshistory as an institutional system stretched back almost unbroken throughdynastic changes foreign invasions and social and cultural upheavals intothe third century before Christ In the long perspective of history moreoverit is probable that no government ever served its people more effectively as aguardian of social stability territorial integrity and national dignity Despiteits rapid and complete deterioration at the end the Chinese ndash Nationalist andCommunist alike ndash have not ceased recalling its glories with a wistfulnostalgia and many have consistently lamented its passing

(Hucker 1961 1)

The Qin state ndash QLS1

The traditional Chinese state was a remarkable political construction and providedhuman security to hundreds of millions over multiple centuries Even moreremarkable is how its beginning gave little indication of the stability that wouldfollow Before ICS2 was established the multi-state Warring Kingdoms (Zhanguo)fragments had to be bonded into a single state The Qin state (221ndash206 BC) endedthe old system of weak center and hereditary kingdoms and established a centra-lized state template under a single emperor Qin actualized the sovereignty of theChinese empire in a manner that set the pattern for subsequent dynasties

The origin of the first Chinese state is wrapped in myths which are graduallyreplaced by credible history through archaeology and philology There was noaccepted epic of creation divine intervention or a single cultural hero that estab-lished a Chinese people for all time Rather legends tell of a series of innovatorswho introduced the arts and techniques of civilization ndash writing agriculturebenevolent government rituals music medicine and irrigation Principles ofdynastic rule were part of the legendary legacy and the first recorded dynasty theShang fought wars against non-Chinese peoples The succeeding Zhou dynastyhad non-Han origins and first allied with then overthrew (1122 BC) the Shang

6 Actualizing imperial sovereigntyin ancient China

From earliest times external military threats to dynasties came from the west andnorthwest1 The Duke of Zhou suppressed a rebellion and centralized the varioussmall kingdoms into administrative districts but the Zhou political order was nota completely unified central state It has been characterized as feudal withkinship rather than contract-like rights and obligations of the European variety

By the ninth century the feudal lords were fighting among themselves and non-Han raiders harassed the frontiers The western capital city was overrun andsacked and the Zhou moved their capital to Loyang ndash starting the era of theEastern Zhou and ending the effectiveness of the Zhou monarchy The office of Ba(hegemon) was set up to maintain order and a conference of the major states washeld in 681 BC to preserve the peace By the fifth century wars became increas-ingly destructive and various feudal lords sought to unify fragments of the ZhouEmpire In warfare infantry and cavalry replaced the aristocratic chariots whilecrossbows and iron weapons made fighting more lethal Nevertheless during theSpring and Autumn Period (770ndash475 BC) of warfare population increased to overfifty million and new lands were opened to agricultural settlement

In 221 BC the state of Qin transformed its kingdom into empire by intrigue andconquest though its rule lasted only sixteen years During the Spring and Autumnperiod there were around 170 political entities in China with a number existing asindependent states Agriculture had become more productive populations expandedand warfare changed from chariots to massed infantry along with introduction of thecrossbow The old Zhou feudal empire had collapsed before 256 BC with separatestates guarding their frontiers with military and customs barriers forging alliancesand making war and peace with one another Sophisticated administration andcentralization enabled an expanding bureaucracy to control society through codifiedlaw registration of population and land statistical records and penal law In Qin theLegalists gave advice to the ruler on organizing the bureaucratic state Land wasorganized into new administrative units ndash the jun and xian (county)

The early Qin state began on the northwestern frontier ndash a region populated withnon-Han Jung people with whom Qin struggled During 361ndash338 BC the Legalistgeneral Shang Yang introduced a series of reforms which reduced the power ofhereditary landholders His reforms emphasized law to strengthen the power of thestate enforced group responsibility established a hierarchy based on merit andaimed to create a unified and powerful state drawing on an industrious peasantryand disciplined army Intellectual speculation and mercantile activities wereproscribed In 325 BC the Duke of Qin assumed the title of king (wang) Afterconquering present-day Sichuan to secure their southern flank the rulers ofQin fought and acquired the kingdoms to the east culminating in declaration ofthe Qin dynasty Some of the factors that contributed to Qin conquest included(Twitchett 1986 45ndash50)

Geostrategic ndash the home territory was secure against invasion as long as thestrategic passes were held

Economic ndash irrigation made the land productive and the state controlledproduction and distribution

78 Imperial sovereignty in ancient China

Manly virtues ndash hard work and military prowess were stressed over wealthand intellectual achievement

Freedom from the cultural traditions of the Zhou state Longevity of the rulers ndash assassinations and attempted assassinations by

opponents of the Qin state sought to halt its expansion by regicide that wouldinterrupt the confluence of personal and national ambitions to conquer theempire

Administrative reorganization

Similar to the Zhou Qin emerged on the periphery of an already identifiableChinese civilization having absorbed elements of non-Chinese groupsCharacterized as a cruel and ruthless emperor whose dynasty deservedlycollapsed in the second generation Qin Shi Huangdi went far in his policies ofde-feudalization and centralization of the empire In a few years he establishedthe foundation for over twenty-one centuries of dynastic rule by destroying theold kingdoms which had inherited territories of Zhou Though characterized as anepitome of ruthlessness he was the true political founder of the unified Chinesestate ndash a fact that Mao recognized in his homage poem to Chinarsquos political heroesQin Shi Huangdi established the territorial and infrastructural foundations of thetraditional empire Under his direction General Meng Tian consolidated the wallsof the northern states into the Great Wall to defend against nomadic raidersCanals were repaired and constructed and a network of roads built so that theemperor could inspect his empire and troops sent quickly to any trouble spot(Hucker 1975 44)

Qin standardized coinage and measures and collected the weapons of defeatedarmies for melting Written Chinese was purged of variants and the seal style ofcalligraphy taken as standard suppressing up to 25 of pre-Qin script Withoutreform several regional orthographies might have remained making culturalunity more difficult Philosophical disputation was outlawed and hundreds ofscholars reportedly executed so that no dissent or questioning of laws andcommands would be tolerated For the Qin emperor unification was pacificationplus standardization ndash a campaign against centuries of local peculiarities andprivileges presaging the French Revolution two millennia later

Qin sovereign authority derived from two sources based on outcomes ratherthan claims First harsh laws and harsher punishments intimidated subjects intosubmission Transgressions were punished with torture and execution or servicein convict labor on the many public works projects of the new dynasty Secondafter several centuries of warfare the benefits of peace order and growingprosperity were plainly a benefit to those who kept their heads down (and kepttheir heads on) and stayed away from law In the period preceding Qin unificationmany settlers had immigrated to the state of Qin attracted by fertile lands andprotection from wars despite its harsh laws and demands for military serviceThe price of tranquility was high and thousands of subjects were branded andsentenced to virtual slave labor creating resentment and opposition that led to theoverthrow of the Qin dynasty in 206 BC

Imperial sovereignty in ancient China 79

The Legalist foundation of the Qin Empire was a technique of control morethan a philosophy upon which to organize stable government Formulated byShang Yang Han Feizi and others it reduced men to simple terms based onmotivations to fear of punishment and desire for reward By grasping these ldquotwohandlesrdquo and using rigorous laws a ruler could subordinate his subjects hisministers and even his own family to serving him and the state The goal of thestate was wealth tranquility and glory of the dynasty but at the expense ofthought innovation freedom and religion His may have been the worldrsquos firsttotalitarian state and Legalism provided the method for its maintenanceLegalism addressed the management of the population so that people were themajor source of state power Geography was also critical to economic and militarypower Qin was located in the western part of China and enjoyed natural frontiersthat enhanced security but also allowed easy access to the eastern plains Forestsand fertile farmland enabled Qin to accumulate large grain reserves necessary forextended military campaigns as well as lumber for construction and weapons

By ending the plague of internecine war unification of the empire improvedchances of life expectancy ndash human security Chancellor Li Si established tightLegalist control and centralization of the state Qin Empire frontiers were securedand the public works program of canal construction opened new lands for farming ndashnotably in the south ndash with a positive effect on the human environmentUnification of orthography facilitated communication Qin established thefoundation of subsequent Chinese dynasties although it was demonized asthe antithesis of virtue by Confucians

the LegalistConfucian symbiosis evolved during the Han with administra-tive controls at the top merging into self-administered behavioural standardsbelow that gave to the Chinese state the necessary combination of firmnessand flexibility that enabled it to survive Whether one admires the Qinachievement or not it must be recognized for what it was a transformationof the face of China so great both quantitatively and qualitatively that itdeserves the name ldquorevolutionrdquo even though it was imposed from the top notforced from below This rather than the transfer of political power broughtabout by the anti-Qin peasant rebellions was the true revolution of ancientChina Indeed it was Chinarsquos only real revolution until the present century

(Twitchett 1986 90)

Combining human security theory with the first recognizable state in China wesee that Formula Three specifies the elements which comprise actual sovereignty[Sa] and the QLS1 correlates are as detailed in the following paragraph

The personal human security [HSp] of Qinrsquos subjects both before and after theunification of empire was oriented to a single state by coercion and fear as wellas the loss of alternative sanctuaries from oppression and exploitation By exer-cising authority to furthest frontiers Qin eliminated other choices except foroutlawry as a means of livelihood Obligation [Oc] under Qin Legalism wasreduced to soldiering and production using punishments and rewards to motivate


men as simple stimulus and response mechanisms In practice life was not sostark judging from the rapid resurrection of pre-Qin diversity after Qin demise

During the short Qin dynasty the intense program of public works enhancedperformance of the political economy [Ep] The simple measure of dictating theaxle length of carts increased road efficiency by insuring that cartwheels followedspecified tracks instead of each vehicle making its own way rearranging themud and deepening the resulting quagmires during the wet seasons Standardizedcoinage writing and weights also reduced barriers to trade Canal and road-building with increased border security broadened the scope of trade andenabled shipment of grain to the capital

The scope of Qin political knowledge [Kp] was the product of centuries ofreflection on war involving alliances ruses negotiations and strategies Thesewere recounted in works including the Zhan Guo Ce ( ) a renowned ancientChinese historical work on the Warring States Period compiled in late WesternHan Dynasty by Liu Xiang ( ) It recounts the strategies and political viewsof the period Even more famous in the West is Sunzirsquos Art of War( ) whose chapters addressed topics such as ldquoLaying plansrdquo ldquoAttack bystratagemrdquo ldquoTerrainrdquo and ldquoThe use of spiesrdquo The political knowledge of Qinnecessitated by an environment where war and preparation for war wereparamount understandably was derived from authority as command andadministration as mobilization With no more enemies to defeat Qin turned thepolitical knowledge of establishing a huge garrison state at peace with all exceptlawbreakers and dissidents who were dealt with as enemies of the state (We cannote Qinrsquos pre-modern tri-class division of ldquoenlightenedrdquo elites productivemasses and enemies of the state which totalitarians of the last century revived)As this political knowledge was applied to state-building its applicability waslimited to winning and consolidating dynastic hegemony but failed to conferlong-term legitimacy Harsh laws imposed obedience but not reciprocal obliga-tion on subjects and once the Qin founder died his dynasty ndash but not the fact orideal of dynastic empire ndash collapsed waiting to be transformed into a new type ofsovereignty under the Han dynasty

The formidable Qin army was the primary instrument of conquest The Qinmilitary [M] was the sharp edge of the Qin kingdom that overwhelmed anddestroyed rivals and enforced Qin rule under its empire Its organization wasimposed on the civilian population with draconian discipline and heavypunishment for violation Rewards for valor motivated energetic action Thekingdom of Qin was run practically as an army and factionalism was minimizedThe emperor was absolute commander and demanded single-minded loyaltyfrom his ministers and generals Treason was punished without mercy Howeverenforcement of strict laws created an ever enlarging criminal population whowere set to work on the vast public projects of the empire Escapees from the workgangs and levies formed outlaw groups who facing death if recaptured hadnothing to lose by joining rebels Potential political friction [PF] remainedsubsurface during the lifetime of the First Emperor and broke into open rebellionafter his death ndash even destroying his elaborate tombs


In a series of military campaigns that destroyed rival kingdoms and incorporatedtheir territories and populations into his own the king of Qin transformedexternal relations [ER] among equals into uniform domination of empire TheQin kingdom had been on the geographical ethnic and cultural frontier of Chinaand its imperial policies followed traditional patterns of military protectionagainst nomads assimilation of those who adopted Han agrarian ways expandedfrontier boundaries and ldquousing barbarians to control barbariansrdquo ndash that is playingoff rival tribes and kingdoms to prevent their alliances and to weaken their abilityto concentrate offensives against China

With the consolidation of actual sovereignty [Sa] the empire mobilized labor ndashslave convict and peasant ndash to construct canals palaces tombs roads and theGreat Wall The QLS1 drained human and material resources from society for thesake of what we would today term national security The obligation of subjects tomaintain the state was increased and frontier military forces were strengthenedThe coefficient of Political Friction [PF] under the Qin was lowered by the sheerweight of central control Finally with the extermination of rival oppositionkingdoms external relations [ER] were transformed to frontier defence

Key items of the state order established under QLS1 became the pattern for thesubsequent ICS2 to be emulated in form though not in spirit by dynasticfounders for over two thousand years Once ensconced on the imperial throne theemperor would rule with absolutism nearly as thorough as Qin but formulatedclaimed sovereignty [Sc] in terms of humanist Confucianism

The Qin dynasty flourished for a brief sixteen years and the last four witnessedrebellion and rapid acceleration of political friction [PF] once the First Emperordied He left a monumental accomplishment and a legacy of actual statesovereignty [Sa] that persisted for over two millennia within dynasticfluctuations The Qin pattern of military conquest and consolidation becamethe first-stage model for subsequent dynasties accompanied by violence inthe beginning and during collapse Relative peace and human security reignedwhen strong dynasties dominated although the interregnum between the Han andthe Sui was also moderately peaceful once the fighting over the remnants ofthe Han subsided We now turn to the second great dynasty the Han and examinehow it maintained sovereignty for over four centuries

The imperial state ndash actualizing Han sovereignty

Revolts broke out when the first Qin emperor died in 210 BC After civil war theHan dynasty (206 BCndash AD 220) emerged and retained much of the Qin adminis-trative structure But the Han also modified centralized rule in setting up vassalprincipalities in some areas to reward dynastic supporters allowing the problemsof pre-Qin feudalism to resurface albeit based initially on a form of merit ndashloyalty and service to the dynastic founder Nearly two-thirds of Han territory wasdivided into wangguo (kingdoms) and functioned as quasi-independent statesThe new Han aristocracy proved dangerous to the throne evidenced by the failedRevolt of the Seven Kings in 154 BC An imperial decree in 127 BC required equal


division of kingdoms among a deceased kingrsquos sons and thus ended primogenitureIn 106 BC the empire and the kingdoms were divided into thirteen circuits eachheaded by an imperially appointed Inspector Rebellions and conspiraciesresulted in extinguishing many noble families and titles by 86 BC

The harsher aspects of the previous dynasty were modified and Confucian idealsof government were introduced as the state creed Familistic hierarchy returned tostate and society after Qin unification and collapse and Confucian scholarsreceived prominent status in the civil service where examinations were initiatedTwo centuries of Han stability were interrupted by the reformer Wang Mang (AD 9ndash24) who was overthrown and the Han restored which ruled for two morecenturies to AD 220 when it collapsed from internal rivalries and financial problems

Nearly four centuries of disunity and warlords followed the Han collapse Withthe decline of political order there was an influx of non-Chinese who were largelyassimilated into Chinese culture over several hundred years ndash analogous to thecontemporaneous acculturation of tribes in Europe during and after the decline ofthe Roman Empire with Christianization the agency in the West In China thespread of Buddhism filled the spiritual vacuum left by the absence of empire asChristianity had in Europe During this period memory of the great Han Empirewas preserved and many of its institutions were retained in various kingdoms sothere was no decisive or revolutionary break with the past Alien states were setup through infiltration and conquest and most had been previously sinicizedUntil the Sui no dynastic house ruled a unified empire and there was increasingschism between north and south

The Han era established the paradigmatic ICS2 exhibiting several characteristics

Meritocracy increasingly replaced birth or ascription as the key criterion ofpolitical position The founder of a dynasty demonstrated and increased hisability to rule by defeating his enemies and organizing the state in a way thatwould bring peace and prosperity His successors were ideally selected on thebasis of perceived ability to continue the dynasty The hereditary principleamong Chinese below the ruling house was less and less effective over centuries

Each dynasty often had a violent beginning and a turbulent end ndash a few endedwith only a whimper Even during periods of peace and prosperity revoltsand wars occurred and were usually repressed with full force of the state soperhaps the best that can be said is that actualized sovereignty of the ICS2

was a relative and variable condition with [PF] constantly challenging itshegemony

The ICS2 mirrored Chinese Confucian society with its emphasis on a cult ofthe family Ancestral worship imbued clan progenitors with supernaturalpowers but most important were the virtues and values that were family-derived and governed individual behavior These became the guiding valuesof Confucianism as well and included filial piety loyalty benevolence andwisdom Applied to the state these virtues provided a seamless connectionamong individuals family members and the ruling dynasty


Law and the commands of the emperor which had been established as thefirst principle of the Qin dynasty [QLS1] were imposed from above ratherthan generated out of social and customary practices as in the RomanEmpire and in subsequent Western legal traditions Under Qin law had beenheavily weighted as punishment and continued to have this disposition insubsequent eras Imperial law remained an instrument of rule throughoutthe ICS2

The earlier Qin had created a sovereign order which was modified by Han butfailed to eliminate the family-based feudal principles which had permeated state-craft of the previous millennium The founder of ICS2 Han Gaozu turned to thegentry to furnish officials for the new state and these gentry families were oftenbranches of the Zhou nobility although others were of non-noble families whohad become wealthy and acquired land The wangguo aristocracy might have pro-vided a counterbalance to the gentry but they instead collaborated with them andintrigued to limit central power By the first decade BC excessive power of thelandowners threatened the state peasant revolts broke out and Imperial RegentWang Mang seized the throne declaring the New (Xin) dynasty He embarked ona program of radical reform claiming that all land belonged to the state and ini-tiating distribution among the peasants ndash forbidding purchase or sale With thegentry in control of the bureaucracy Wang had few officials to carry out his pro-gram Peasants again revolted and were put down by the gentry and supporters ofthe Han dynasty (restored in AD 25)

Once the Qin had established imperial sovereignty with the throne at the cen-ter the military to enforce imperial rule a bureaucracy to carry out state civiloperations and the frontiers secured the remainder of Chinese state historyremained within those broad parameters A major difference between QLS1 andICS2 was the role of the gentry in mediating between state and society Qinaggressively built a national transportation infrastructure that made movement ofarmies officials and grain revenues more efficient while strengthening the cen-tral government The Han while excoriating its predecessor took advantage ofthat infrastructure and encouraged commerce and foreign trade with paperporcelain and silks penetrating even the Roman Empire Qin Shi Huangdi hadtried to destroy Confucian political knowledge but many texts (written on bam-boo strips) were hidden away and restored after his demise Other texts were lostor remained only in fragments so restoration was sometimes erroneous throughmiscopying

The Han instituted a higher degree of equality of opportunity than had existedduring the period prior to the Qin Liu Bang (Han Gaozu) of commoner origindefeated the last of the old aristocrats his one-time ally Xiang Yu He overthrewthe Qin social order and turned to the gentry to staff his bureaucracy Peasantrevolts remained a perennial problem through the ICS2 and were stamped outwith ferocity Sometimes led by gentry if unchecked they could threaten andoverturn a dynasty Politics was a Darwinian struggle and a successful rebelcould become emperor In terms of human security a growing inequality of


life-protecting resources within a state could redound in the form of rebellionagainst established authority2

The Sui-tang imperial state

The fifteenth-century novel Romance of Three Kingdoms opens with a summaryof the dynastic cycle ldquoThe empire long divided must unite long united mustdividerdquo ( ) Each dynasty with unifying ambitionsreturned to the general pattern of actualized sovereignty established by the Qinand modified by Han and had to deal with the two constant antagonists of thatsovereignty ndash northern border nomads and domestic gentry Vigorous dynasticfounders were sometimes followed by equally active successors but most oftenwere not and the dissipation of authority and power combined with externalfactors ndash natural disasters military usurpation gentry greed nomadic invasionfinancial mismanagement and corruption usually reduced imperial power

Integral to Chinarsquos state evolution were recurring periods of fragmentationwhich also produced socioeconomic transformation and assimilation of newthought technology religion and ethnic groups Separated by geography thoughnot isolated from other centers of civilization (Europe the Middle East andIndia) the rise and fall of ICS2 dynasties was largely unconnected to events inother distant regions The main lines of communication were through CentralAsia and the nomadic peoples who raided settled and assimilated on Chinarsquosfrontiers also connected China with other parts of Eurasia During dynastic inter-regna the weakened or fragmented ICS2 was more vulnerable to external culturalinfluences and presented circumstances that allowed penetration of new ideastechnology and groups permitting or forcing Chinese society to adapt to new cir-cumstances These dynamics enabled ICS2 to reassert actualized sovereignty thattook advantage of new institutions and resources while rationalizing them interms of reviving claims of the imperial mandate Only in the late Qing was therelative separation of China from global state dynamics dissolved permanentlyand a new dependency introduced which ended ICS2 sovereignty The period fol-lowing the Han dynasty was characterized by a high degree of disorder The Hanwas the culmination of centuries of fusion of the Zhou feudal state and Qin cen-tralization When the Han collapsed various regional potentates attempted torevive it but the task remained unfinished Several new factors had to beaddressed

The diffusion of Buddhism eclipsed the dominance of Confucianism and thebuilding of temples and monasteries along with control of land reduced anddiverted state revenues

Central Asian proto-Turkic groups entered Chinese (Han) territory and set-tled sometimes setting up dynasties and intermarrying with local Han

Wars Qin de-feudalization and Han centralization had weakened the oldaristocratic families resulting in circulation of elites ndash new men rose topower through government service sometimes manipulating the throne for


their clan and family benefit Ambitious concubines powerful empressesand generals also became players in the large and small dynasties

Wars of expansion and defence stimulated warlordism during periods ofimperial weakness State insecurity multiplied during periods of fragmenta-tion with resulting human insecurity and greater reliance on family and clan

Cultural traditions of previous dynasties persisted and inspired ambitiousclaimants to reunify the ICS2 From a human security standpoint the absence ofunified imperial sovereignty during these ldquodark agesrdquo permitted an influx ofCentral Asian nomads into Chinese territory Once settled they often abandonedtheir nomadic ways and assimilated into Chinese society or set up their own king-doms adopting some Chinese characteristics and administration Imperial tradi-tion styles and language provided powerful core beliefs and facilitated theSui-Tang re-actualization of sovereignty through reconstruction of empire Thetwo-generation Sui dynasty (AD 581ndash617) had a sovereignty-actualizing careerthat paralleled the Qin conquest of empire but unlike the Qin the Sui revived andconsolidated the Han pattern of ICS2 ndash a pattern that was conservative rather thanrevolutionary and thus saved the Han meta-constitution from oblivion and prob-ably avoiding the European fate of permanent multi-state pluralism

The glory and fall of the Han roughly paralleled the experience of the RomanEmpire In the West the influx of barbarian tribes and their conversion createddual identities ndash localtribal and ecumenical Christian Like their counterparts inChina the immigrants adapted to sedentary agricultural life As in China theunity and prosperity of past empire beckoned rulers to re-create a second RomeThe Byzantine Empire claimed to be Romersquos Christian successor but was notable to subdue Western Europe as the Caesars had done With the establishmentof Charlemagnersquos Holy Roman Empire in 800 a Western counterpart emerged ndashbut was short-lived under Merovingian rule Instead the history of WesternEurope travelled the road of competing nation-states The explosion of Islam andits conquests around the Mediterranean introduced a third force capturingByzantium (Constantinople) in 1453

Post-Roman conditions of Europe were not replicated in China First ChristianRome following Constantinersquos conversion became a fundamentally differentstate than pagan Rome3 No longer was the emperor deified nor the imperial cultsubordinated to the state An ecclesiastical hierarchy emerged as a separate orderso that St Augustine could describe the two cities ndash the Civitas Mundi and CivitasDei Two rival yet cooperative poles of political power weakened the empire sec-ularized the political order and consigned it to a lower order rooted in CivitasDiaboli ndash the city of unbelievers

Buddhism might have had the same effect in China but did not Introducedduring the Han dynasty Buddhism became popular during the post-Han period offragmentation with several local rulers adopting it as their state religion Afterimperial reunification Buddhism flourished under Sui and Tang The Suiemperor utilized it to reinforce his own authority especially among the ldquonewChineserdquo including assimilated nomads Tang sponsored Buddhist expansion


but never surrendered the dominance of the old state cult of Heaven that accordedsemi-divine status to the Son of Heaven Buddhism was useful in reducing fric-tion between the indigenous Han and the new settlers from Inner Asia Templesand monasteries served as assimilating centers

Moreover the Chinese empire had a head start over the Roman by centurieseven though the Zhou was never as centralized The dominance of ethnic Han andtheir language established a principle of cultural hegemony that Rome lackedThe Greeks had established a splendid culture and the Romans borrowed heavilyfrom it Alexander the Great had in effect globalized Greek culture and learningthe Romans built upon the edifice and confirmed its superiority while suppress-ing its political power A renaissance in Greek learning and modification ofChristianity to accommodate this earlier strand of thought including a Greekliturgy in the church set the Eastern Roman Empire on a different course fromthe West No such cultural rival existed to China Buddhism had traveled over theHimalayas and had little political or cultural baggage that could not be subordi-nated to the existing Chinese meta-constitution ndash even when its scope was limitedand fragmented

The North China Plain had been the core of the Han Empire and Chinese civ-ilization and after collapse of the Han dynasty only 20 of the original Han pop-ulation remained there By the early fourth century the core region was controlledby alien groups The region of the Yangzi River alluvial plain received manyimmigrants from the north and prospered Princes in the north aspired to unify allof the territory of the former Han Empire and Turko-Mongol rulers organizedtheir states along lines of traditional Chinese administration The emperor of theNorthern Wei built a formidable military force and ordered sinicization of hisrealm These new dynasties claimed ancient Chinese legitimacy The borderdynasties established military colonies on the North China Plain and the gentryimplemented policies of restoring ancient productivity with regional granaries(Wright 1978 30 38)

At the sub-state level major changes were occurring in Chinese society Socialstrains erupted into rebellion though there was decreasing social friction in pop-ular cultural substrata Chinese increasingly became the language of popularcommunication and Confucian values translated down into proverbs and maximsThe family culture of northern aristocrats was strongly influenced by the ways ofthe steppe peoples with whom they had intermarried for generations Womenwere trained and given more active roles in life than Chinese women Northernwomen with nomadic forebears tended to be more open and independent ndash subtly changing the internal relations of the sexes within the family and even inthe monarchy

Sui unification and restoration of ICS2

The short-lived Sui dynasty represented the gateway through which Chinese government returned to traditional unified empire after a lapse of nearly fourcenturies Post-Han China had witnessed its own ldquodark agesrdquo and the Sui brought


it to an end Yang Jian (605ndash617) reigned as Sui Yangdi and established an empirethat ruled over fifty million people The centuries of fragmentation and unre-stricted nomadic immigration subsided under the unifying Sui dynasty which setthe pattern for expanding culture and state to include and assimilate non-ChineseRace or ethnicity was not a critical criterion of authority in the ICS2 as long asthere had been a reasonable period of integration of the monarchrsquos ancestors andthere was adequate evidence that he adhered to dominant Chinese values ndashespecially those expressed in Confucianism The founder of the Sui dynasty camefrom an old family that had married into the Turkic-Mongol elite and he marrieda non-Chinese woman who became his major advisor and nearly co-equal on thethrone He was an aristocrat of a class ldquosustained by inherited wealth in land andpeasants and by the presumption that members of their class would inevitablyhave a monopoly of all positions of power in societyrdquo (Wright 1978 64)

Yang Jian enacted a series of laws making the dynasty a revival of theConfucian political order with government offices renamed in accordance withRituals of Zhou He seized power in the strategic area of Guan-Zhong where Qinand Han had established their capitals Sui unification was far from complete andregional hostilities continued long after Yang Jianrsquos ascension to the throne Amajor source of cleavage remained between the families of steppe ancestry andthose of old agrarian regions The Sui core group were typical northerners ruth-less men of action Their Confucian learning was rudimentary and most wereBuddhists Sui revived meritocratic Han institutions as a way of countering thehereditary privilege which had been a part of the social landscape during four anda half centuries of disunity

A major challenge to the Sui was reform of local government where institu-tions were in decay with increasing power of the military over civil officials andproliferation of local units and numbers of officials Sui reduced the number ofprefectures commanderies4 and counties and significantly increased state rev-enues in the process Sui had to deal with the multiplication of local governmentunits that had resulted in proliferation of officials staggering expense of theirsalaries low tax revenues and oppression of peasants This was characterized asldquousing nine shepherds for ten sheeprdquo

Yang Jian followed the pattern of the monarch personally affecting change ndash asConfucius had directed in the Da Xue He took an intimate interest in the strictapplication of merit standards to appointments and promotions The merit princi-ple was a necessary precursor to equality of outcome ndash achievement over ascrip-tion but also one which affected the solidarity of the family By stressing meritover hereditary principles in appointment the emperor undercut and counter-vailed the notion that power resided in the great families and that birth alone(ascription) entitled one to elite status Merit shifted power to the emperor inso-far as he could delegate power to his officials and that they would safeguard theinterests of the ICS2 over those of their families On the other hand with thechange from official appointment based on family merit to the criterion of indi-vidual learning the great families of China had incentives to establish their ownlocal schools and direct their resources to the cultivation of candidates for the


examinations so that clans could reap the benefits from one of their own holdingoffice Chinese emperors tried to counter these inclinations by enforcing rules ofavoidance ndash where officials would not be appointed in or near their place of ori-gin to prevent collusion with relatives In theory the examination system alsoreduced the influence of wealth and power which was unevenly distributedamong the population and regions The founder of the Ming dynasty found thatappointments of officials were drawn almost exclusively from one region andordered a more representative sampling of the national population in his civil ser-vice and later emperors sought to insure a similar fairness Thus the relativelymeritocratic examination system was an instrument with egalitarian potentialwhich also produced order by shifting relations among gentry clans from collab-oration to competition

Sui Yangdi held annual celebrations to impress the local officials with thepower and grandeur of the dynasty and used the occasions to check on his pub-lic servants He also personally visited localities appointed itinerant inspectorsand regular censors and established an elaborate system of surveillance ldquoThesystem of recruitment examination appointment and surveillance was far fromperfect in its functioning but it represents a bold and thoroughly ruthless effortto neutralize entrenched local privilege and to discipline local officials to beresponsible only to the central governmentrdquo (Wright 1978 104) Trusted officialswere given latitude in setting local policy but always subject to imperial oversight ndashfeatures adapted in later dynasties as well

War conquest and human security

Actualization of sovereignty requires more than good governance For centuriesdynastic consolidation had been the springboard for Chinese territorial expansionand consolidation ndash notably the reclaiming of lands held by previous empires andsecuring outlying frontiers As noted in the human security theory the military[M] and its deployment is the key force in actualized sovereignty [Sa] Yang Jianinherited the territories of the Northern Zhou (557ndash588) and mobilized his king-domrsquos resources for logistical support of campaigns against the house of Chen(557ndash588) in the lower Yangzi valley He deployed his forces for a thousand milesalong the river crossing at the central section with an eight-pronged amphibiousassault To insure against future rebellion around the defunct Chen dynasty Suidestroyed its capital and forced Chen nobles and officials to move to the north-west He treated the deposed monarch and officials with leniency Taxes were sus-pended in the south for a decade but resentment simmered and boiled into newrevolts with fierce fighting ending with Sui victory

With the defeat of Chen Sui was reluctant to move his forces into the southernmore thinly-populated hinterland that extended to Canton preferring to rule indi-rectly and was helped by one Lady Qiaoguo (Chrsquoiao-kuo) who used her prestigeand influence with her non-Han people to help establish Sui power in the southSui used her as a ldquoformidable instrumentrdquo of indirect rule and peaceful transitionrewarding her family with titles and governorships (Wright 1978 152ndash3)


Family and state were intimately intertwined in the ICS2 ndash family politics wasstate politics Yang Jianrsquos family had leaped from high ranking officials to impe-rial court involving intrigue war and murder As emperor he feared conspiracyfrom his sons who wanted to replace him Only Yang Guang avoided alienatingboth parents To him fell the task of reconciliation with the south and he usedBuddhism as a common link between north and south5 building Buddhist as wellas Daoist temples and patronizing the Confucian literati ndash policies that were suc-cessful insofar as there were no further major rebellions Unlike the ill-fated Qindynasty the Sui founder had a competent successor who carried out his fatherrsquosvision but soon overreached and threw the empire into a war against the Koreans

Yang Jian similar to Qin Shi Huangdi embarked on construction programs tolink the regions by canals making Loyang a second capital as a strategic hub ofland and water transport for grain tribute Construction of the Grand Canal pro-vided reliable shipment of grain to the north although later dramas and operascharacterized the endeavor as allowing the emperor and his concubines a leisurelyroute to view the hibiscus of the south Construction of the canals mobilized overa million men to work and permitted movement of men and supplies to areas ofpotential dissidence What railways were to twentieth-century China canalsserved the same political military and economic purposes in the ICS2 ndash to unifyterritory penetrate remote regions expedite food delivery to the capital or famineareas supply armies move troops and extend the reach of government

Sui began as a dynasty of conquest and imprudently overreached in their pro-ject to dominate East Asia After defeat of the Chen dynasty Sui struck the Turksin the west seized new lands in the south and captured the Liuqiu (Ryukyu)islands The campaigns to conquer the Korean kingdom of Koguryo proved Suirsquosundoing The Sui campaign planned to retake the lands controlled by the greatHan dynasty and was otherwise successful Peaceful relations with Japan wereestablished and in the northwest the Great Wall was extended as protectionagainst the eastern Turks Sui policy was to maintain the Turks in submissionwhen possible and keep them divided against each other to prevent tribalalliances Discovery of secret communications between the Turkish Khan and theKing of Koguryo provoked Sui to attack the latterrsquos capital at Pyongyang in 612Heavy losses forced withdrawal and two more expeditions were sent at greatexpense and also failed Sui Yangdi was obsessed with defeating Koguryo ndash afatal flaw of an autocrat that ruined the dynasty Natural disasters and rebellionsoccurred during the Korean wars while Koguryo proved to have excellent strate-gists and strong defenses despite Sui having convinced the Korean kingdom ofSilla to open a second front (Memories of an earlier obstinate Pyongyang regimethat brought ruin on China no doubt affect contemporary strategy in Beijing ndash eventoday Chinarsquos sway goes as far as the Yalu-Tumen River borders and no further)

Achievements of the Sui dynasty

The relatively short-lived Sui dynasty restored the Han Empirersquos frontiers (exceptfor the Korean peninsula) and many of its institutions The Sui had done more


than forcibly unite the disparate fragments of post-Han China into an empirethrough conquest The two-emperor dynasty had restored a single government tomuch of the far-flung territory once ruled by Qin and Han and had transformeda cultural ecumene into a political state Yang Jian had restored not only territorybut also the Han meta-constitution including hierarchical and centralized divi-sion of political responsibilities primacy of the Son of Heaven a bureaucracy ofmerit the family as the basic unit of society and public works to re-centralize thestate The Sui challenge of state-building differed from the Qin-Han in that thegreat influx of non-Chinese and their establishment of local power centers createdrivals whose warrior abilities were formidable threats to agrarian settlements andthe more effete elites of the south

Religion has often been a force transcending localism and tribalism TheGreeks halted their wars to hold the Olympic Games to honor common gods TheRoman version of Olympian religion plus deified Caesars offered a unifyingforce tolerant of local cults as long as they did not contradict the statersquos preemi-nence Constantinersquos conversion overturned paganism with a less-tolerantChristianity but gave imperial scope to the universal (catholic) church Hinduismpermeated India and gave a common identity to a population remaining culturallyand linguistically diverse to this day In America Protestantism provided a com-mon basis of the American Creed according to Samuel Huntington (Huntington2004) Islam unified the diverse tribes of Arabia and spread across North Africainto southern France before it was stopped by Charles Martel at the battle ofPoitiers The conflict between Islam and Christianity extended over centurieswith historic Crusades and contemporary jihads punctuating occasional periodsof uneasy coexistence

Buddhism spread into China and created a common bond between Chinesearistocrats peasants and Central Asian nomads similar to how Christianity hadintegrated the old and new populations in Europe Buddhism had a further effecton the nomadic warriors from Central Asia ndash domesticating them by buildingtemples giving them loyalties and responsibility to specific places instilling inthem a sedentary philosophy and greater respect for life and offering a pantheonof compassionate deities and an ethics of mercy and compassion ndash antithetical tothe tribal religions of the steppes Buddhism later transformed the ravaging war-riors of Tibet and Mongolia into theocracies over shepherds that facilitated theirabsorption into the Chinese empire over centuries

The Sui conquests and campaigns may also have spared China from theEuropean fate of multi-state evolution ndash which produced centuries of increas-ingly devastating wars that culminated in the two World Wars of the past centuryOnly in recent years have the Europeans become mildly successful in unifyingtheir diverse states into a single tentative entity Perhaps if Charlemagne hadexpanded his Frankish kingdom over all Western Europe had established a gen-uine successor to the Roman Empire and had been succeeded by a long dynastyof able kings Europersquos destiny would have been different For one thing theConstantine legacy had drained considerable sacred authority from any secularstate creating the universal Christian church and leaving regional monarchies


to deal with mundane matters Chinese emperors on the other hand fusedsacred and secular authority in their thrones and acted as pontifical as well asimperial figures No Buddhist pope or bishops existed to challenge Sui Yangdior any ruling emperor

While inter-dynastic imperial China could be characterized as multi-state mostof these states either preserved or aspired to Sinitic culture ndash including writtenlanguage administration techniques and the charisma that accrued to rulers whoimitated the old imperial rituals Christian rulers in Europe who sought to emu-late the emperors of Rome in their quest for expanded power were blocked by theecclesiastical ceiling ndash the Church had appropriated the sacred realm to itself andcould withhold its approval of any monarchy it opposed6 The ProtestantReformation saw the revolt of national monarchies against the papal CatholicChurch and their resistance metastasized into plural nation-states claiming undi-vided sovereignty over subjects and religious orders Spain and the Hapsburgempire fought to preserve the unity of Christendom but national and monarchi-cal Protestantism reinforced by the scientific and geographical discoveries of anew world outflanked old Europe and destroyed whatever unity remained toChristianity In China Sui demonstrated how the unified empire could berestored but not how to maintain it For that lesson the Tang dynasty would serveas the Han to Suirsquos (lighter) Qin-type unification

Compared to other major dynasties of ICS2 the Suirsquos place in history is notstellar Arthur Wright has argued that it should be otherwise From the standpointof actualizing imperial sovereignty and rescuing China from a quasi-Europeanfate of a new millennium of Warring Kingdoms Sui was a remarkable turn-around almost as critical as Qinrsquos unification Wright describes the Sui period asa time of rapid change sweeping away old institutions and bringing new solu-tions to old intractable problems The Sui established institutions that became theframework of the Tang dynasty and would be found in all subsequent dynastiesVast territorial claims of ICS2 as tianxia (ldquoall under heavenrdquo) came under Sui con-trol and were a legacy to the Tang dynasty

The political knowledge [Kp] of Sui was based on history as well as experi-ence The lessons of Qinrsquos overreach tempered Sui not to move too fast and tooruthlessly or risk a vast scope of rebellion although the second emperorignored the advice in Korea The Confucian literati studied and wrote ICS2 his-tory and advised the Sui emperors to follow the state patterns of the WesternHan Wright summarizes the roles played by the short-lived Qin (Chrsquoin) and Suidynasties

But in the case of Chrsquoin and Sui the succeeding great dynasties were the bene-ficiaries of harsh measures taken by their predecessors The Trsquoang built onthe foundations laid by the Sui and the Han on those put down by the ChrsquoinThus the Sui gains in importance by being the ldquoground-clearerrdquo for the greatage of Trsquoang

(Wright 1978 12ndash13)


Tang (618ndash907) actualization of imperial sovereignty

The Tang dynasty restored the Han ICS2 in key areas7 The institutions of government initiated after Han precedent during the Northern and Sui dynastiesreached maturity including the advanced bureaucratic principles of recruitmentand evaluation while accommodating the hereditary claims of landowning fami-lies The Tang founding family (Li) had intermarried with non-Chinese nobilityand traced lineage to a general of the Han dynasty (Hucker 1975 140)

Founding emperor Tang Taizong attacked Korea twice and pushed frontiers asfar as Afghanistan while encouraging Confucian learning and education at homeHis son married Lady Wu Zetian who later took the throne and became Chinarsquosonly female emperor A subsequent heir to the throne Tang Minghuang(Xuanzong) (712ndash756) revived some of Tang glory but fell in love with consortYang Guifei who has been vilified as clouding the emperorrsquos judgment with dis-astrous results for the empire8 Tibetan and Western Turk rebellions and Arabexpansion as well as breakaway kingdoms of Nanchao (in Yunnan) and the AnLushan uprising weakened the central government and caused decline in Tangpower Buddhist dominance was eclipsed by a revival of Confucianism and themerchant-led Huang Chao rebellion (875ndash884) further eroded the dynasty in thelate ninth century (Hucker 1975 146)

The revival of the unitary empire under Sui reinforces validity of the dynasticcycle metaphor Wright dismissed the idea that the cycle could be the ldquoliteral re-enactment of similar sequences of eventsrdquo but nevertheless there are ldquocertain pat-terns of recurrencerdquo The Qin unification of the empire was both a lesson and awarning to Sui ndash it demonstrated that a dynasty founded on harshness mightachieve unity but would not last Indeed its overthrow insured the legitimacy ofthe subsequent Han which could then enjoy the fruits of the predecessorrsquos harshrule Political knowledge [Kp] or more specifically political history was criticalin reassembling a unified China Past actions and their consequences ndash includingorganizing imperial government recruiting officials deploying and commandingarmies planning and executing new transportation grids or reviving old ones andcentralization of power ndash comprised a body of knowledge that informed a newdynasty Compared to the evolution of the European state system with incessantfighting and a multitude of princely succession crises and wars the disorderwhich punctuated transitions between Chinese dynasties was a price paid for the longer periods of (relative) peace unity and prosperity during the majordynasties

The keepers of historical political knowledge were hardly disinterested scho-lars saw themselves as guardians of Confucian moral tradition and thus exercisedconsiderable latitude in writing and selecting history to provide guidance for anew dynasty The Sui founder established his power in the North China plainwhere dynasties had risen and fallen for nearly two millennia Temples ruinstombs and remnants of palaces reminded him of Han glories but also of declineand destruction Ancient rituals and styles of imperial procedure were available to


new rulers and reinforced the continuity of the Sui with the Han ldquoThe past wasknown to the Sui leaders through an ancient and continuous tradition of writtenhistories and works of other kinds classics from the distant past literary collec-tions legal and ritual codes treatises and descriptive works on every subject ofhuman interestrdquo (Wright 1978 14)

The later fragmentation of dynastic empires was often accompanied by war-lordism during periods of imperial decay when central government lacked ade-quate force to impose control (sovereignty) and administration on provinces andregions A strong military establishment [M] was necessary for actualizing sov-ereignty but army formations were also sources of political friction [PF] Militaryrulers emerged to protect their territory from rivals and enemies while declaringnominal allegiance to the center Often aided by geography that allowed defenceof their territory during periods of weak central government warlords exercisednearly sovereign authority With prolonged central weakness a military figure(eg Cao Cao founder of the Wei dynasty (AD 220ndash265)) might declare himselfemperor and proclaim a new dynasty Or he could become protector of the throneand install his own choice

From the viewpoint of imperial subjects it might not matter whether they paidtaxes and corveacutee to a warlord or to an emperor but the Han and Tang establishedhigh-water marks for stability and prosperity as well as expansion of stateterritory Warlordism on the other hand was unstable and illegitimate with more frequent chaotic warfare to the detriment of human security and the ambitiousregional militarist was tempted to expand his realm and establish a new dynastyIndeed the occurrence of warlordism was a symptom of state vulnerability andinsecurity ndash a marker of a high [PF] coefficient ndash and only reunification couldprovide state security and sovereignty that had become the required umbrella forhuman security

The political fragmentation initiated in the Huang Chao rebellion continued asrival strongmen set up power bases with Tang-style imperial institutions ndash the so-called southern Ten Kingdoms which defied the usurper of the Tang dynasty ndashChu Wen a follower of Huang Chao (Hucker 1975 147) In the north fivedynasties rose and fell in fairly rapid succession Their conflicts for supremacywere overshadowed by the rise of the proto-Mongol Khitan which extended controlinto modern Hebei province For the contemporary observer it was clear thatChina had entered a new period of disunity with little prospect of reunification inthe short run

The Ming dynasty (1368ndash1644)

Chinese history did repeat itself in some broad outlines The collapses of the Hanand Tang dynasties opened Chinese territory to external raids invasions andmigrations while short-lived regional dynasties claimed succession to the impe-rial mantle The aesthetically-advanced Song dynasty failed to restore either thelands or the prestige of the Tang and succumbed to Mongolian conquest The


Mongols established a fully-foreign Yuan dynasty and killed off co-opted orexiled the traditional elites with the result that its Ming successor did not have todeal with many remnants of the old aristocracy9 On the other hand as Huckernoted recovery was led by men of the lowest social classes ldquodevoid of roots inthe traditional high culturerdquo (Hucker 1978 1)

Deterioration of Mongol rule has been explained in terms of the dynasticcycle although it was linked to the larger dynamics of the Eurasian empirewhich saw decline after the early great Khans The Chinese histories recordedsymptoms of dynastic corruption and a traditional pattern was imposed ondynastic fates The Mongols were foreign usurpers rather than in the nativeimperial lineage and were thus a special case From a globalist perspective theYuan brought together Europe and Asia under a single dominion for the firsttime since Alexander the Great or Rome and destroyed their respective isolationforever The modern Chinese nationalist perspective emphasizes the oppressionof Chinese under the Yuan their intrigues and incompetence The Qing the lastforeign-imposed dynasty accepted many Chinese values and institutions eventhough they maintained a separate ethnic identity including Manchu as one ofthe two languages of administration and the northeast provinces as an exclusivehomeland

The trigger of anti-Yuan rebellion was the governmentrsquos massive Huai basinflood relief and control project in 1351 involving conscription of millions of Chinese peasants Mongol grip on China was slipping as rebels took control ofthe Yangzi River and in 1368 ousted the last Yuan emperor Full control of Chineseterritory was not complete until 1390 The new dynasty founded by the commoner Zhu Yuanzhang ( ) retained the Mongolian system of governmentand adapted its autocratic network Without participation of the semi-feudallanded class Ming rule faced few internal challenges The civil service merito-cracy could not challenge the emperor since their existence and privilegeincreasingly depended upon patronage and support from the throne They wielded considerable moral authority and were vital in state administration buthad little of the local political and economic power of pre-Yuan elites Followingthe Mongol pattern of choosing a dynasty name based on ideology rather thanfamily name Zhu called his dynasty Ming meaning ldquobrightrdquo

The new emperor styled himself Ming Taizu established the capital at Nanjingand set out to restore the patterns of Tang and Song However ldquothe Ming founderhad little choice but to adapt the Yuan governmental apparatus that was ready athand during the busy years of his rise to power Thereafter he gradually reshapedit into an unprecedented structure that was distinct from both its Yuan and Tang-Sung antecedentsrdquo (Hucker 1978 33) The Ming emperor refined the Mongolhierarchy of surveillance which consisted of a system of censors to watch thecivilian and military personnel at all levels In 1380 the emperor took steps toconcentrate state power in his own hands and executed his senior chief council-lor (Hu Weiyong) on charges of plotting to start a new dynasty A purge of theupper civil service followed and the emperor abolished the upper echelon of


government institutions including the Secretariat Chief Military Commissionand Censorate (Hucker 1978 41)

After Ming Taizursquos government reorganization he was the lone coordinator oftwelve Ministries and his government was structured in a way that no singleappointee could gain control over any of the three major hierarchies administra-tive surveillance or military (Hucker 1978 43) which was also an arrangementof great inefficiency These changes required creation of a new ruling class ndash whatthe Mongols had not destroyed the Ming purges completed A new national uni-versity was established to train administrators but the examination system was amore common route for recruitment of officials though regional quotas wereestablished to prevent favoritism by examiners Recruitment to the civil servicemoved to meritocracy drawing on a broader reservoir of talent than previous gen-try monopolization This increasing equality of opportunity although excludingwomen and certain occupations made the autocratic monarchy more secure byopening royal positions of power and responsibility to more aspirants than timeswhen the landed aristocracy had that exclusive privilege

To insure security of the dynastic throne Ming initiated a thorough-going control of society Maximizing order and possibly reducing social friction byseeking to regularize social status among subjects the Ming set up a hereditaryregistration system for artisans and military garrisons In non-Han areas tribalchiefs were given local authority The emperor also had to manage family relations ndash an area that more than a few times in Chinese history had proven to bea source of state endangerment The empress convinced Ming Taizu to learn thelessons of history and not allow imperial relatives by marriage to play any part ingovernment Imperial princes were ordered to take consorts and concubines fromthe families of relatively low-ranking military officers in order to avoid futuremeddling by powerful families The emperor agreed to separate family and stateldquoAlthough empresses and concubines are patterns of motherhood to the wholeempire they must not be permitted to take part in administrative mattersrdquo(Hucker 1978 53)

Dynastic longevity required strong foundations and Ming Taizu sought toinsure that the social order be stabilized He abolished slavery and established thebaojia system which combined mutual responsibility education and surveil-lance throughout the realm Local communities were also given a measure of self-government and religious groups came under state control Land wasre-registered and tax rates adjusted Rich families were moved to the new capitalat Nanjing in order to improve surveillance against conspiracy Large numbers ofworkers and artisans were impressed for labor on extensive reclamation projects ndashalthough there was always a risk of rebellion when such projects became tooonerous as had happened in the Qin and late Yuan dynasties Supplying militaryreinforcement of the frontiers was resolved by a semi-free-market solution Saltmerchants as beneficiaries of a government monopoly were required to delivergrain to the frontier garrisons and they responded by organizing their shipmentsin an efficient manner According to Hucker ldquoIn general his domestic adminis-tration policies taken all together created a remarkably stable society and


facilitated substantial economic growth by the end of his long reign in 1398rdquo(Hucker 1978 62)

In foreign affairs Ming avoided the costly adventures of Sui Nonethelessthe first Ming emperor attacked and brought Xinjiang under control Hewarned his successors not to wage war without good cause and listed fifteenstates that should not be invaded (Hucker 1978 64) To avoid collaborationwith existing or potential enemies and also to prevent technology or strategicintelligence transfer Chinese were forbidden to go abroad except on officialbusiness

For all the benefits he brought to the ICS2 the Ming founder was a cruel tyrantwho executed hundreds of his own officials and who favored landowners Nodoubt the lessons of history of previous dynasties had refined government anddynastic security By the mid-fifteenth century the Ming state had stabilized andextreme centralization of the monarchy was modified giving the dynasty nearlythree centuries of sovereignty The Ming faced princely rebellions foreign warsand peasant revolts but population increases demonstrated a high degree ofhuman security for hundreds of millions of Chinese and non-Han people TheQing dynasty built on Ming government patterns and continued the ICS2 to itsend in 1911 suggesting that Ming Taizu not only set the pattern for the Ming butthe Qing as well

Lost in the maelstrom of Chinese history are the hundreds of millions of indi-viduals who died violent or famine deaths in the multiple rebellions and inva-sions Disorder was both a cause and a consequence of dynastic change Themiddle of the seventeenth century saw the collapse of the Ming (1644) and thestart of the Qing For most Chinese subjects which family controlled the DragonThrone was of small importance ndash what mattered was that there be a governmentto enforce order and to exercise minimal interference in economic and social lifeHeaven could deliver blessings or destruction and dynastic change was oftenaccompanied by the latter

Jonathan Spence described the Shandong county of Tancheng (Trsquoan-chrsquoeng) asillustrative of violence during dynastic change Earthquakes famines banditsManchus and heavy snows hit the population with a string of disasters In fiftyyears the population dropped from 200000 to 60000 and cultivated landdecreased by two-thirds (Spence 1979 3) To defend against predatory banditsthe local population organized their own security Veteran soldier Wang Ying ledthe operations in Tancheng and was joined by the gentry elite who abandoned thecountryside for the safety of the city But even the wealthiest could not hide fromManchu raiding forces in 1643 which slaughtered up to 80 of gentry killingtens of thousands throughout China The new Manchu dynasty brought littlepeace and the slaughter continued abetted by bandits floods and more famineFor many life became devoid of meaning and many sought suicide to escape suf-fering and loss

The combination of rebellion outlawry and foreign invasion not only violatedhuman security but eroded cooperative relationships within society The oldnoblesse oblige of the gentry who had set up schools no longer motivated


rebuilding after destruction They had their sons tutored at home rather thanshare educational resources with the community Famine was exacerbated by thedestruction of the granary system and interference with the food supply Oneresult was that no Tancheng student passed the imperial examinations 1646ndash1708(Spence 1979 16) Citizens of Tancheng believed that Confucius once visitedtheir town for enlightenment Tan was believed to have been a little principalityin the late Zhou period and in an era of rudimentary transportation and commu-nications the localersquos physiographic layout permitted a modicum of autonomyThe county had fertile land in the south and was crisscrossed by rivers though itwas not as prosperous as its neighbors Tancheng was a microcosmic society withfew protections against the state

Part of Formula Three conveys the relationship between state and citizen [Op]The peasants of China paid for state protection in two forms of taxation ndash landand labor Power of the state came from its population in the form of their contri-butions and was possible only by a thorough structure of mutual responsibilityand supervision that was enforced by landlord families and township headsHowever Tancheng suffered a continuing financial crisis because of its locationon an important imperial road to the south Residents were often subjected toldquoextraordinary demands for road maintenance or transport servicesrdquo Althoughmany of the old corveacutee and service payments were commuted to silver by 1670a number of other service taxes remained including gathering of willow branchesfor flood control construction as well as flood control work on dikes and dredgingTownspeople soldiers and landlords paid less than their fair share of taxes(ibid 46ndash7) Human security from the state always had a cost

Summarizing ICS2 actualization of sovereignty the Qin formation of the QLS1

ended the multi-state system of the Warring Kingdoms and bequeathed a long eraof peace and prosperity to the Han The multi-state system of the pre-Qin oftenunstable and prone to war was also the crucible of ideas about man and the stateas itinerant philosophers traveled from one kingdom to another seeking royalsponsorship and a platform to expound their theories This was the ldquohundredschoolsrdquo ndash the most creative period in Chinese intellectual history

The Legalists were successful in finding a ready audience for their realism andabsolutism in the kingdom of Qin The record of the ICS2 was that peace generallyaccompanied unity stability and prosperity while its decline produced theopposite and allowed introduction of new ideas institutions elites and technologyduring long periods of disunity The paradox was that the shattering of onedynastic ICS2 was necessary for the next stage of dynastic consolidation Despiteeach dynastyrsquos claims that it was re-establishing the patterns of the past innova-tive patterns could be detected The raising of Buddhism to state religion duringthe Sui-Tang period transformed the religious and intellectual life of Chinesesociety and stimulated re-examination and reformulation of classicalConfucianism into Neo-Confucianism On the other hand the succession fromMing to Qing by 1644 was relatively short and the Manchus who had developeda ldquostate-in-waitingrdquo on Ming frontiers became a ruling elite within the pattern ofthe Ming state after they breached the Great Wall and overpowered the demoralized


defenders and further demoralized them by slaughter of the old elites The resultwas continuation of the Ming-modified ICS2 with an absolutist character and afailure to comprehend the nature and threats from Europe ndash the scientific revolu-tion discovery of the New World emergence of the MSNS and overseas coloniesas mercantile ventures and precursors to global capitalism Secure in capturingthe Ming government machinery the Manchus may have seen little need to modifyit in any radical way except to make it submissive to their priorities and sub-ordinating Han people to their sway

The human security of the general population directly benefited from stateunity insofar as centralized administration eliminated regional military and civilconflict State unity ndash as actualized sovereignty ndash facilitated common coinageconstruction and connection of empire-wide transportation infrastructures and aunified system of laws

ICS2 and the theory of human security

From Qin through Qing historians identify about forty dynasties Some weremajor and represented the ICS2 at its height while others were ephemeral andruled only fragments of imperial territory Even when in disarray the fragmentswere coalescing toward a new unity that would reimpose political order All statesare based on force that consolidates order and states which promise and deliverjustice will find voluntary compliance [Op] of citizens more likely Order alonesuch as delivered by the Qin is desirable for relief from frequent internecine warbut if based chiefly on fear cannot be sustained indefinitely Enforced orderbrings a large measure of human security to clients of the state but does not guar-antee equitable distribution of those benefits of peace When there is a distorteddistribution of human security benefits political friction increases reflected inthe peasant and regional rebellions against practically all dynasties Ultimatelythe actualized sovereignty of any dynasty its competence in maintaining orderand how equitably it could insure human security protections including materialnecessities went far in determining the longevity of dynasties although otherfactors (abilities of individual monarchs absence of natural disasters invasionsand external wars) also played a part

Another long-term dynamic of the ICS2 was the refinement of its force mecha-nisms to re-create imperial unity Qin had demonstrated how strategy guile andsingle-minded determination of purpose were critical in bringing down regionalopposition to centralizing authority The Han founder showed how a dynast couldreward his supporters and then take back power from their successors While Suistarted a promising dynasty it was ruined by imperial overreach Mongol ruth-lessness and surveillance of the population instructed the founder of Ming in anew level of absolutism which was further refined by the Qing

The long-term evolution of the ICS2 also saw the decline of the aristocracy ndashthe great families who sometimes traced their ancestries to Zhou times Periodsof fragmentation gave new life to the old aristocrats and approximately up to theYuan dynasty they enjoyed priority in government service The Mongols were


stern levelers of the Chinese feudal elite such as remained to that time andafterwards minor gentry and even commoners had greater access to avenues ofupward mobility

The political order brought by actualized sovereignty represented a major con-tribution of human security to the subject peoples of China and the breakdownof imperial order injected life-threatening uncertainty to all The form of the statewent through trial and error with each dynasty looking for the right formula forsurvival through military economic and administrative efficacy to insure statesecurity for itself and human security for its subjects In this search thereemerged a pattern of institutional reconstruction which gravitated toward theConfucian vision of the just and enlightened state Many of the forty dynastieswith varying intensity claimed that their government conformed to hallowed pat-terns of the Zhou which Confucius celebrated as the golden age of empireRecruiting classically educated sons of gentry to administer dynastic affairswrite its history and oversee the population and military were tasks that re-affirmed conformity to the Confucian mold

We have specified this pattern of claimed sovereignty [Sc] ndash the basis of rule ndashas the ICS2 meta-constitution and will next examine it in greater depth In thischapter we have outlined the dimensions of actualized sovereignty [Sa] Withoutpolitical order some degree of acceptance by domestic elites and other states andactual delivery of human security benefits a state is a shaky mirage with littlechance of surviving as Wang Mangrsquos ephemeral Xin dynasty demonstrated

The broad features of the ICS2 meta-constitution were evolving as well as con-tinuous based on the foundations of actualized sovereignty under unified monar-chies concentrating the powers of the state Sovereignty was expressed throughcontrol of territory often achieved through war public works and control of subjects The shift from multiple centers of power to a single unified state was notfully accomplished until the early Ming and even the Qing had to contend withrivals to the throne The story of the dynasties was that wars could be eliminatedonly through one leader winning wars ndash peace was purchased at high cost inhuman lives and resources Nonetheless progress to stability and peace was evi-dent in the high points of each dynasty and populations generally increased overthe long run Peace and prosperity accompanied the lowered coefficient of con-flict [PF] as subjects of the emperor turned to economic pursuits

The Hobbesian metaphor of a state of nature seems to have little relevance inChinese history However the empire was Chinarsquos Leviathan which periodicallyended the conditions of imperial disunity when lives were on average nastiermore brutish and shorter although the transition to dynastic absolutism alsoentailed high costs in human security Once a ruling dynasty was installed mennever fully surrendered their rights of self-defense through rebellion ndash as the fre-quency of uprisings demonstrates Nor was civil contract an apt metaphor ofdynastic supremacy since the rule of law never reached anything like the status ithas enjoyed in the West since Roman times One is tempted to conclude that thenotion of liberty founded on European philosophersrsquo reading of natural law didnot and could not be discovered in the Chinese view of human nature In place of


natural law the Chinese tradition emphasized the way (dao) of nature where thatwhich is is far more powerful than that which should be In other words the ldquoisrdquoexists on a higher plane than ldquooughtrdquo

In our human security framework the individual seeks self-preservation andas person makes alliances accepts and participates in social institutions takesrisks and engages in conflict out of desperation or to improve his and his familyrsquossurvival ndash the ldquoMoll Flandersrdquo syndrome Family was at the centre of the ICS2with the dynastic family ndash including the wife and heirs projecting a model for therest of society to imitate insofar as it expressed the ideals of filial piety benevo-lence and loyalty Family ndash husband wife and children ndash was the natural unit ofhuman society in Chinese tradition not the individualspersons as HobbesLocke and other liberal thinkers postulated The individualperson in China asphysical being and as person in society derived his initial existence subsequentknowledge and adult humanity from parents and was therefore existentially sub-ordinate to and derived from the family This shifts some of the responsibility forhuman security from the individual to the family or at least requires us to con-sider that Hobbesrsquo autonomous man is more artificial than has been considered

The role of political knowledge [Kp] is another human security element thatemerges from the dynastic record Before the Qin-Han period historical recordscontained observations of political actions and their consequences Rulers andscholars studied the histories for the lessons they contained ndash history was the mir-ror that reflected the past to the present and instructed rulers officials and sub-jects on their duties and the pitfalls of actions or non-action Aiming to avoid thedangers of the past Ming Taizu centralized his government and restricted courtmarriages to prevent usurpation by powerful men or families

Knowledge was also accumulated from the past in the form of geographybotany zoology medicine and agriculture ndash technical knowledge that contributedto increasing the population and their longevity under beneficial conditionsTechnology improved ndash bronze iron wheelbarrows and paper improved the pro-ductivity of peace Social organization benefited from dynastic unity as well Astrong military could repel raiders and invaders from land and sea Family soli-darity helped economic production and maintained social stability Under thebaojia system and its precursors the nuclear and extended families were devicesof mutual responsibility and were co-opted as agencies of the ICS2 for corveacuteetaxes and education

Despite the Qinrsquos short career it established the momentum of Chinese unitywhich was cultivated by subsequent dynasties Qin Shi Huangdi serves as the sinequa non of dynastic unifiers All persons were subordinate to the Qin stateSpecial privilege and status of the aristocracy were reduced and family could notbe a source of autonomy With new standardized Obligation [Op] of mutualresponsibility labor taxes registration obedience to state law and military ser-vice persons in Qin society were transformed into standardized subjects Qinmilitary organization [M] became a major priority of the state first for defenseand then for expansion Expansion of society was accomplished first by defeatingthe Jung tribes and then through the Legalist reforms placing society completely


under the sovereign state With this rudimentary totalitarian centralization of theQin state the social friction coefficient (SF) was eclipsed in large part by thepolitical friction coefficient (PF) Finally as the Qin state consolidated andexpanded its external relations (ER) were the source of opposition and opportu-nities of expansion and annexation Qin ruthlessness and the inability of oppo-nents to form durable alliances contributed to hegemony by 221 BC

During the rise of the Qin a period of inter-state conflict and instability thehuman security of Qin subjectscitizens was probably higher than that of otherstates Rationalization of agricultural production and reduction of the aristocraticleisure class resulted in a greater food surplus While frequent wars increased therisk of death to individual subjects discipline and weapons and professional gen-erals made the Qin risk lower than the risk faced by their enemies Thus bystrengthening the state Qin increased the average human security of its subjects(Formula Four) while ldquoflatteningrdquo distribution by destroying remnants of Zhoufeudalism


The universe is corporeal all that is real is material and what is not material is not real

(Thomas Hobbes Leviathan)

Our present Son of Heaven is a great advocate of filial reverence He regards therespectful attitude of children to their parents as a universal law of nature which isbinding upon the whole human race regardless of difference of class and he con-siders that the maintenance of filial reverence is the most important duty of a wisegovernment because by it human society can be kept in order in the simplestmost natural way

(Dream of the Red Chamber (Tsao 1958 118))

Political order and the two types of sovereignty

The MSNS search for sovereignty amplifies and echoes the individualrsquos pursuitfor longer life Without political order embedded as actualized sovereignty [Sa]the state is but a set of claims on territory and population A state can be takenseriously by its citizens and other states only when it rests on an institutionalfoundation that guarantees a greater and more constant measure of human secu-rity for human units (individualspersons) than is possible in the condition of rawnature or conditions of society As evident from the formation of the QLS1 andseveral dynastic renewals of the ICS2 actualization of sovereignty requires coercionin the form of demonstration and threat of damage to resisters of that sovereigntyWars have historically been the chief vehicles of actualized sovereignty involvinglong-term and short-term losses of human security by significant numbers ofindividualspersonscitizens

This chapter will address application of our theory of human security to theICS2 and focus on the meta-constitution as the outward form of the imperialstate Actualized sovereignty [Sa] as we noted in the previous chapter gave sub-stance to the Chinese state while claimed sovereignty [Sc] provided the form ofthe state expressed in its meta-constitution If states existed only to achieve andpreserve sovereignty as control then dictatorships such as QLS1 should haveenjoyed far greater longevity than they did Qin conquered united and integrated

7 Claiming dynastic sovereigntyunder the imperial meta-constitution

an empire into a single governable unit ndash but had little to offer its subjectsbeyond blood sweat and peace for the law-abiding titles and rewards for theambitious and prison punishment and servitude for the recalcitrant Theemperor and his ministers offered peace and order without a moral reference andwithout a viable social matrix of human relationships that made life more thantolerable

When the Han ICS2 overthrew and replaced QLS1 the latterrsquos lesson that unitywas the best concomitant element for peace was incorporated into the dynasticcyclersquos dynamics But the scope of ICS2rsquos underlying assumptions for [Sc] wasmore ambitious and contributed to its longevity These assumptions wereexpressed as claims to legitimacy by imperial dynasties and are amenable tonotation as summarized in Formula Five To further analyze and clarify the historical character of the traditional Chinese states QLS1 and ICS2 we havereferred to a statersquos pattern of claimed sovereignty as its meta-constitution Thevectors of multiple elements within a meta-constitution will vary dynamicallyover time within limits Once major shift occurs in [Av] (Allocated Values) then anew set of claimed sovereignty elements has emerged and a new meta-constitutioncan be identified

Our working hypothesis is that a broad single meta-constitution existed for theICS2 from 206 BC through AD 1911 It was hardly an ossified arrangement sinceold institutions were unused or abolished and new ones added throughout thosecenturies but there was consistency over time that held the ICS2 to a single yetflexible (within the parameters of [Av]) meta-constitution At least two majorchallenges in the form of rival meta-constitutions confronted the ICS2 The firstwas the Xin dynasty under Wang Mang a radical reformer and usurper whoseinnovations (also based on claims of authentic ancient practices) expired when hewas overthrown The second was the Taiping Tianguo of the Taiping rebel HongXiuquan who sought to create a state based on pseudo-Christian and quasi-Western foundations but was defeated in 1864 While other variations might benoted there was a remarkable continuity of the ICS2 through its long history incontrast to the six Chinese meta-constitutions that emerged in the twentieth cen-tury of which three are still extant and in mutual competition

Another important point on the two types of sovereignty is that to the extentthat we can discern a gap between what is actual and what is claimed we mayalso postulate that there is a direct relationship between the magnitude of thatgap ([Sc] [Sa]) and that statersquos potential for instability and conflict Forexample when Sui attacked Korea as a rebellious vassal there was the explicitclaim [Sc] of imperial sovereignty over Koguryo Failure to subdue the king-dom was a failure of [Sa] Likewise Beijingrsquos claim of sovereignty [Sc] overTaiwan today is belied by actualized sovereignty [Sa] ndash a failure to exercise thatjurisdiction

Claimed sovereignty adds little to the overall expansion of human security Aswe saw from the notations of Formula Five human security is absent from itscomponent elements In stark terms [Sc] promises human security but [Sa] actually delivers its benefits In a modern context international law is a set of

104 Dynastic sovereignty and meta-consititution

claims and promises but cannot deliver without compliance and cooperationfrom sovereign states

In another important respect [Sa] differs from [Sc] and consists of verifiableand perceptible realities Borders are marked and guarded armies and securityforces are deployed invaders are resisted and repelled and governments adminis-ter justice collect revenues and conscript labor and soldiers Human security atthis level occurs in part through state intimidation and in part in recognition thatthe state exercises force for the sake of collective protection Costs and benefitsshould be fairly clear to citizens while subjects are expected to obey withoutquestion In contrast [Sc] is comprised of promises aspirations and ambitionsWhile [Sa] consists of validated state power [Sc] stakes its credibility on plausi-bility ndash past and future may look back to a golden age and forward to a betterworld as defined by state elites social engineers and philosophers The power of[Sc] comes from the modified and guided collective memory of a people and fromtheir hope for a secure future It thus possesses an evocative power to stir citizensto action with the same intensity that occurs in the struggle for survival in rawnature This vital emotional and energizing connection between [Sc] and individualhuman security contributed to the longevity of the ICS2 and also to the volatilityof meta-constitutions in twentieth-century China

Dynamics of the pre-modern imperial meta-constitution

While Chinese historians and writers recognized the social economic and politi-cal dimensions of the dynastic cycle there was also the myth of cosmic inevitabil-ity However wise rulership could postpone decline The Zhou model of sagekingship with the loyal Confucian bureaucracy inspired the dynasties after theQin and was remarkably successful until the late Qing Signals of trouble includedpeasant uprisings famines foreign incursions floods and other natural disastersLoyal Confucian officials were not merely bureaucratic functionaries but moralpreceptors whose duty was to remonstrate with the ruler to maintain the ldquoway ofheavenrdquo and avoid endangering the dynasty Confucian officials were assigned totutor the heir-apparent and when he ascended the throne they quoted classics his-tory and current signs of decay that manifested heavenrsquos displeasure ndash sometimesat grave personal risk to them since even virtuous messengers were executed

The vast majority of the Chinese people was peasant and was denied any voicein government ndash save for desperate and violent protests in rebellion Most knew thefatal consequences for themselves and their leaders yet resorted to dissent by forcebecause they already faced privation starvation and death An emperor had to dis-tinguish between rebellions of protest and uprisings that threatened to overthrow thedynasty although the two often were fused as one The peasantry determined thefate of the traditional Chinese state by providing support however grudging andpassive in the form of taxes labor and candidates for bureaucratic office from therural gentry who depended on local prosperity Massive withdrawal and resistanceendangered a dynasty and weakened its ability to carry out other functions includ-ing defense and infrastructural construction and maintenance

Dynastic sovereignty and meta-consititution 105

An alternative to the contemporary MSNS model existed in imperial China forover twenty-one centuries and when performing well provided human securityfor much of its population as evidenced by population growth figures TheImperial Chinese State (ICS2) evolved over two millenia and exercised actualsovereignty over hundreds of millions of subjects whose numbers grew fromaround 40 million in AD 50 to 423 million in 1910 at the end of ICS2 Before itbecame an empire Qin was one of the many princely states comprising Chineseterritory prior to unification Mountains formed the major natural borders of thekingdom and in 770 BC Qin expanded and offered protection to the King of Zhouwho bestowed lands and title in return The decline of the Zhou empire (more feu-dal than centralized at its height) initiated rivalry to succession and centuries ofwar did not clarify which house was the rightful claimant

The Qin strengthened [Sa] through Legalist reforms while administrative eco-nomic and military organization was tightened These reforms enforced a level-ing of feudal society while establishing a new meritocratic hierarchy based onactions that reinforced a new political order of the state Qin Order [Vo] was pur-sued through strictly enforced laws and equality of punishment while removingany vestiges of political liberty [Vl] which the aristocracy had preserved Strictlegal equality [Ve] among subjects was a radical departure from the hierarchicalpractices of pre-Qin China and was highly corrosive to the feudal structureswhich had characterized the past

Shang Yang a founder of Legalism established his system in the kingdom ofQin as a solution to the problem of disorder The king of Qin gave him a free handand within a few years decreed the breaking up of great families Father and sonwere forbidden to reside in the same household The feudal families were theobstacle to actualizing state sovereignty and reordering of society was the solutionThe core of his doctrine could be summarized ldquoThe means whereby a ruler ofmen encourages the people are office and rank the means whereby a country ismade prosperous are agriculture and warrdquo (Shang 1928 185) By giving the rulerpower to bestow rank and title on deserving men Shang Yang weakened heredi-tary feudalism and offered an alternative to future generations The supremacy ofthe emperor above all subjects according to another Legalist Han Feizi was jus-tified because ldquothe intelligence of the people like that of the infant is useless rdquo1

Fu Zhengyuan comments that ldquothe rulerrsquos monopoly over political power was further justified on the moral ground that he alone knows the true interests of thepeople The herd should unconditionally follow the shepherd because their well-being suffers when they are left to their own devicesrdquo (Fu 1996 53)

Mutual surveillance a tactic of control by autocrats that was refined in mod-ern totalitarianism was enforced by cruelty and terror under the Legalists and thethinking was clearly influenced by analogy with war

Whoever did not denounce a culprit would be cut in two whoever denounceda culprit would receive the same reward as he who decapitated an enemywhoever concealed a culprit would receive the same punishment as he whosurrendered to an enemy

(Rubin 1976 58)


Applying Legalist principles the First Emperor achieved epochal success inuniting the Chinese empire into a form that influenced the state for the nexttwenty-one centuries Qin and the Legalists made war the central principle of theirstate paradoxically to bring peace Wars of unification made an age of peace pos-sible after competing claims to sovereignty over territory [Tc] had been elimi-nated or subdued Consolidation of the empire created a political entity far morepowerful than any neighboring state reducing external relations [ER] to manage-ment of tribute during periods of imperial strength

Although ephemeral compared to subsequent dynasties QLS1 providedChinarsquos first effective and imperial meta-constitution Qin transformed a periph-eral kingdom into the unified empire that gave form to subsequent empires andmodern China The Qin king claimed succession to the house of Zhou and all itsterritory [Tc] The perennial state of war or preparation for war justifiedQinLegalist control [Cc] over subjects as soldiers and farmers The same condi-tion of war oriented Qinrsquos relations with other states [ERc] until all were subduedRegarding allocated values [Av] we note that Order [Vo] was the primary moti-vator of action and Equality [Ve] ndash as the leveling of feudalism ndash an instrumentalvalue in achieving maximum control of a population illustrating that increasingintensity of these two values necessarily reduced Liberty [Vl] of subjects in thestate The QLS1 constructed a meta-constitution suited to state-building but onethat was dysfunctional to state-maintenance With all legal power and practicalcontrol vested in the emperor individual subjects became cogs in the statemachine a metaphor that captivated Mozi the philosopher of ldquouniversal loverdquoThough not a Legalist he may be considered a radical egalitarian who renouncedthe ideal of personality and transferred all his hopes to the ideal state ndash the firstChinese utopia (Rubin 1976 39)

Establishing the imperial Chinese state (ICS2)

Two principles vied for primacy in the ICS2 meta-constitution ndash hierarchy andegalitarianism Hierarchy was subdivided into two forms ndash ascriptive andachievement Ascriptive hierarchy was characteristic of Zhou feudalism ndash witharistocratic birth as the primary criterion of status and rank Achievement wasassociated with later variant models of the Confucian bureaucracy recruitedthrough education and the examination system The Qin state broke the oldfeudal aristocracy but could not prolong [Sa] beyond a few years after itsfounder The enforced egalitarianism based on rigorous law and the destruc-tion of feudalism characterized Qin Legalism and treated all subjects equallyas parts in the state machine Managers and administrators were recruited withrewards and commoners were controlled by punishments and sanctions Thewidespread use of harsh punitive measures condemned an ever-increasingnumber of subjects to slavery and prisons creating a three-tiered hierarchy ofrulers subjects and convicts The parallels with twentieth-century Communistregimes are unmistakable ndash claims of egalitarian society belied by clear delin-eation among three classes The reformer Wang Mang attempted to combinepolicies of leveling and reestablishment of feudal hierarchy but he only exacerbated


the problems of empire though clearing away some aristocratic deadwood ofthe former Han After defeating Qin Han founder Liu Bang (who took thename Han Gaozu upon enthronement) reinstalled a modified feudalism out ofpractical necessity He acknowledged the contributions his generals and sub-ordinates had made to his success (Hucker 1975 122) set up heredity fief-doms in the east and distributed them to his supporters With the Revolt ofSeven Princes in 154 BC Han confiscated some of the lands and extendeddirect imperial rule

Han Gaozu moderated Qin excesses while retaining important elements of for-mer state organization He cut taxes in half moderated punishments and empha-sized that the state exists for the people rather than vice versa The populationgrew the economy expanded and culture flourished (Hucker 1975 123)However the laissez-faire government (a component of [Vl])of the early years ofthe Han led to increasing inequities and arguments for greater state interventionin the economy in the reign of Han Wudi (reigned 141ndash87 BC) who centralizedand reasserted imperial authority in domestic affairs He trimmed the protofeu-dalist lords who had expanded their power at imperial expense through a series ofmeasures including the requirement that aristocratic lands be divided equallyamong sons which resulted in fragmentation of the princedoms This negation ofprimogeniture diffused into agrarian society with the result of increasingfragmentation of farmland among sons over generations Merchants created for-tunes out of dealings in land iron salt and liquor Han Wudi introduced newtaxes forbade merchants to own farmland and established a state monopoly onsalt iron and liquor distribution

The exigencies of establishing the new Han order required either abandonmentor modification of the Qin meta-constitution especially in light of failure to survivemore than two generations of emperors The Legalist principle of a single tran-scendent ruler was replaced by Han Gaozursquos sharing of spoils and power with hisgenerals This entailed a reintroduction of hierarchy (negating Legalist egalitari-anism) and a weakening of central control (increased liberty for the new aristo-crats) which may have contributed to increased prosperity for those who tookadvantage of new opportunities in the absence of domineering state controlduring the Qin However Order [Vo] was disturbed by the liberty of princes andmarquises to expand with resultant rebellions State controls were extended at theexpense of economic liberty for the sake of political order The new administra-tive class which matured in later dynasties under Confucianism and classicallearning was also an expression of modified egalitarianism of opportunitythough mostly limited to sons of gentry

Until the twentieth century China had no written constitution so it is neces-sary to impute the meta-constitution from claims and patterns of government ruleThe premodern meta-constitution summarized the imperial statersquos claims toauthority which lasted only as long as its efficacy Authority consists of theability of a government to minimize the difference between [Sc] and [Sa] overcitizenssubjects and territory Compared to a meta-constitution a written consti-tution is a more historically specific statement of claimed sovereignty is valid


only to the extent of its actualized sovereignty customarily contains a statement ofgeneral principles and addresses three issues

1 the design of government2 the relationship between government and people3 the relationship of people and government to broader transcendent values

From the Western liberal perspective written constitutions have been a positivedevelopment in human history They have served as political contract betweenrulers and ruled and as the foundation of national laws to protect the basic rightsof citizens They generally enunciate basic principles of the state and stipulatepolitical offices their powers and their limitations Constitutions also containmechanisms and procedures for their amendment Since the late eighteenth cen-tury historical constitutions have been the output of delegates at constitutionalconventions as well as the response of monarchs to pressures from below ndash theMeiji constitution of 1889 for example was a ldquogift of the emperor to his peoplerdquoSome constitutions have been symbolic forms ndash liberal in words but ignored inpractice as was the Soviet constitution of 1936 written and promulgated at theheight of the Stalin purges China has had several constitutions in the twentiethcentury that were both practical and symbolic

For Aristotle a constitution meant the form of government though more its actualdistribution of power rather than its specific machinery He classified constitutionsinto three essential forms depending on the number of persons possessing politicalpowers ndash democracy (rule by many) oligarchy (rule by a few) and monarchy (ruleby one) Each form had positive and negative characteristics and could transforminto another type and be corrupted For the purposes of understanding the sweep ofChinarsquos evolution as a state over millennia the Aristotelian approach is more usefulin a comparative sense than the modern liberal view of ldquoconstitutions as progressrdquo

From the Aristotelian standpoint China has had constitutions for three millenniaWe can surmise an early quasi-constitutional framework from the beginning ofthe Zhou period and its dissipation by the eighth century BC The fragmentationthat characterized the Spring and Autumn period was not anarchy but a forcedexperience in multistate politics under a nominal monarch The period of WarringKingdoms was a conflict between conceptual states ndash the centralizingconqueringstate of Qin and the feudal monarchies of the opposition states The victoriousQin state gave way to Han and its synthesis of centralized and delegated author-ity as imperial meta-constitution evolved over the next twenty-one centuries Onecould further analyze individual dynasties and discover discrete forms of govern-ment and even different monarchs within the same dynasty had varying stylesand arrangements but such a fractal approach obscures the larger phenomenon ofthe constitutional continuity that marked imperial China

A new meta-constitution emerges when there is a radical rearrangement of sov-ereignty claims by the state Four notions of constitution help us to distinguish theidentities of historical and contemporary meta-constitutions First theAristotelian approach looks at the form of government its viability and how


much resistance and disturbance it has generated He wrote approvingly of theCarthaginian constitution for example noting its longevity and the loyalty ofthe common people (Aristotle 340 BC) Second we have the criterion of democracyas the standard by which modern progressives and liberals judge the adequacy ofconstitutions But democracy characterized by elections and limited governmentis a relatively recent human development and possesses no guarantee oflongevity in the eyes of many non-Westerners

A third approach described in Formula Three is suggested with the introductionof human security as the criterion of political efficacy Instead of judging a consti-tution by its claims to extend liberty to its population or to implement human rightsand rule by law or to specifying the component elements of a government and theircontribution to the felicity of the citizenry Formula Three allows us to evaluate agovernment in terms of its ability to facilitate the delivery of human security to itsconstituent population while not interfering with the already considerable arsenalof human security knowledge institutions and techniques that humanity (asindividuals and persons) has acquired and accumulated prior to establishment ofthe state After the state is established defence of its territory and population areminimum requirements for its support ndash security of the state above and beyond pro-tection of the population becomes the sine qua non of statehood This descriptionof the actual constitution of a state however tells us little about what Montesquieucalled the ldquospirit of the lawsrdquo ndash the ability of an abstract set of principles andinstitutional specifications to stimulate men to obedience action and sacrifice

This leads to the fourth notion of a constitution ndash as ideology The concept ofclaimed sovereignty [Sc] evokes the long-term viability of a state-form to generatethe voluntarism required of a large political community where lineage links maybe nonexistent among the majority who are strangers to one another Men may berestrained and coerced to a certain range of actions and suppress their individualwills for a time but this restraint cannot be the basis of a state that entertains anambition of permanence The pattern of claimed sovereignty as meta-constitutionmust be based on accomplishment of [Sc] or it has only weak penetration intohuman emotions and behavior which rationally and instinctively recognizearrangements conducive to individual life survival This fourth approach includesthe third as foundation Historically Qinrsquos actualized sovereignty was appropriatedby the Han and subsequent dynasties while the formulations of QLS1 claimed sov-ereignty were largely ignored as the ICS2 evolved its own meta-constitution

To summarize constitutions in terms of human security

First every constitution is security-driven having a set of rules for a statethat protects its constituents territory and government as a sovereign entityWe may consider this component to be the sum of human security and statesecurity claims and protections (The statersquos promise to deliver human secu-rity to its citizens is not absolute The efficacy of this promise rests on thestatersquos need to cancel the human security of some individuals through pun-ishment when necessary or to diminish the human security of all citizens forthe sake of protecting the state)


Second it is allocative in its form of government as expressed in its officesinstitutions and distribution of powers

Third a constitution is justice-seeking ndash a contract between rulers and ruledwith an arrangement of rights obligations and powers with law and customestablishing a framework for justice

The first two points address [Sa] and the third summarizes the objective of [Sc]expressed in the meta-constitution Every state has a meta-constitution whetherexplicit or implicit and security is the key component Constitutions containrules and criteria to implement the security claims of the state Every state hasaccess to force to back up its claims to authority and its promise of securitySince early times a Chinese state has existed though its sovereignty was period-ically muted during times of fragmentation and disorder Its repeated revival asdynastic entity argues that a persistent constitution underlies Chinese civilizationculture and politics Even when no single government prevailed regional andlocal fragments of government modeled themselves after the Zhou and Hanempires

State and government

States and their governments are established by men to enhance their security ndashmore noble aims may be added or deduced later The primacy of order [Vo] wasemphasized by Hobbes as the first defense of life and property Contract law andsovereign ruler protected men from the evils of civil strife The British constitu-tional historian SB Chrimes sums up the ldquoeternal problem of governmentrdquo

The fundamental problems of government like most of the really basic prob-lems of human existence do not change They remain essentially the same inall ages and in all places Since the remote prehistorical times when menfirst sought to improve their hard lot by establishing civil government ofsome kind ndash how when or where no one can say ndash the fundamental prob-lems involved must have been present however dimly realized as they arestill present today These problems then as now are essentially how to reconcileapparently opposite aims and ideals How to reconcile without constantresort to force law with liberty progress with stability the State with theindividual how to bind the government in power to law of some kind howto reconcile government strong enough to be effective with the consent ofat least the majority of the governed these are the fundamental problemsalways existent always in the nature of things demanding solution

(Chrimes 1965 1)

This view of government as rational and based on manrsquos need for peace and stabil-ity reflects the common notion of the state in Western secular and liberal thoughtand has inspired constitution-writers on a global scale In the Machiavelli-Hobbes-Locke tradition of the secular state religion has no vital role to play and is relegated


to the private realm along with family ties Chrimes posits the existence ofgovernment as based on reconciliation ndash a view shared by non-Marxist politicalscholars and observers Marxists tend to view (bourgeois) government asantagonistic to social needs unless there is a socialist group in power Socialistsagree that the state has a role to play but one that intervenes heavily in society andeconomy From most Western persuasions the state assumes the existence of gov-ernment ruling a territorially defined state The eternal problem is addressed by theMSNS and the democratic MSNS is an even better solution from the reconciliationpoint of view A central assumption of the MSNS is that individualspersons relateto government as ldquocitizensrdquo ndash a public role in contrast to their private capacities Inthe totalitarian state the role of citizen is primary while privacy is suspect

The secularization of Western government started in the late Renaissanceaccelerated in the Reformation and was legitimated in the Leviathan By thenineteenth century the European MSNS carried by industrialization commerceand Christian missionaries imposed itself on practically all human societies ndashwhich had to submit or conform Its power impressed the Japanese who observedthe humbling of the magnificent Chinese empire by foreigners Chinese histori-ans see the Opium Wars as the watershed ndash the beginning of the end of the empireand the start of Chinarsquos incorporation into the global system of nation-statesContacts between Europeans and the Chinese court exemplified by theMacartney mission were almost a caricature of the Chinese world view of theircentral place and the Europeans as uncultured barbarians Pride in long-runningcivilization rather than xenophobia defined the Chinese attitude causing themto underestimate the magnitude of the challenge from the West Where the Westhad learned to tap into the human power of self-maximizing individualism andthe material energy of steam and electricity China had seemingly mastered anengine of human peace and order Secularization of ICS2 did not occur until thelatter half of the nineteenth century when Chinese observers nervously watchedEuropean statesrsquo power expand with the realization that Western strength was adanger to the Chinese imperial mystique which underlay its meta-constitution

Democracy was based on individual equality under law ndash a contradiction toConfucian hierarchy and to ldquorule by menrdquo not ldquorule by lawrdquo Men were citi-zens with rights and obligations not subjects under a king or emperor

Industrialization required specialization which contradicted the elite raisedby classical learning who administered the country and were the nationrsquosschoolmasters

Christianity redirected manrsquos gaze to the hereafter proclaimed the eternalsoul and threw out the old gods while reinforcing democracyrsquos claims ofequality and individuality

Nonetheless the ancient yet vigorous Confucian dynastic state had proven to bean equally valid solution to political order The Westphalia establishment of theMSNS occurred four years after the inauguration of the last Chinese dynasty in1644 For the Chinese ICS2 state-building had been rehearsed and achieved


several times always coming up with the same solution ndash an empire an emperora fairly homogeneous culture a corps of administrators less and less based onfamilistic feudalism and a state philosophy founded on Confucianism ndash the ICS2

meta-constitution in a nutshell When fresh with vigorous dynastic founders theempire increased in population expanded territory stimulated cultural renais-sance and supervised economic prosperity As a dynasty grew stale its compe-tence declined local power and interests emerged as dominant and nomads onthe borders contributed to withering Thus the eternal problem for Chinese poli-tics has not been reconciliation of diverse interests (Chrimes) or making bour-geois government serve society (Marx) but establishing and maintaining agovernment to rule the unified empire and to order society by force and througheducation With force the state actualized its sovereignty and with education itdeclared and implemented its claims to sovereignty In the Hobbesian metaphorof law contract and fear of violent death men had reasoned the state into existence In the ICS2 men fought and died in order to seize or create state powerand the victors would proclaim they had the Mandate of Heaven to legitimatetheir rule Whatever cooperation emerged was based on hierarchy that imitatedthe natural structure of the family

The Qin and Han dynasties wrote a script for the Chinese empire with militaryconquest and competent administration the key components The script was followedby the Sui and Tang as well as the Song Yuan Ming and Qing One puzzle isthat if the meta-constitutional script was so well-crafted that inter-dynasticturmoil was progressively diminished why would not this model of governmentbe retained in perpetuity The simplest answer is that the ICS2 meta-constitutionwas incompatible with the globalized MSNS especially in the latterrsquos accommo-dation of liberty [Vl] Also the overwhelming military and technological superi-ority of expansive European imperialism which turned inward in the two WorldWars (Weigel 2005) left China relatively defenseless to aggressive Japan andundercut the security rationale of the ICS2

Chinarsquos imperial meta-constitution (ICS2)

A meta-constitution differs from a normal state constitution in that it grows outof the practice and experience of government and politics accumulated over gen-erations It incorporates citizen respect for history and laws and cannot be notentirely secular since it usually addresses assumptions and beliefs that are essen-tially religious and faith-based The claims of a state over its citizens [Cc] usuallyrest on religious or quasi-religious elements It describes government institutionsand the distribution of powers and defines (explicitly or implicitly) who are thesubjects or citizens and what are their rights and duties It addresses territory andvalues as well as sovereignty and it generally roots its existence in metaphysicaljustification the Chinese emperor formed the link between Heaven and Earthand the well-being of the people proved the effectiveness of his stewardship

A meta-constitution consisting of the basic assumptions about the broad formof a state its governance including the nature of sovereignty the relationship


between government groups and individuals the disposition of territory and thecriteria of citizenship evolves and reflects ndash as well as preserves ndash the values ofthe particular society Its validity depends on its effectiveness and the degree towhich it provides protection for its citizens from external enemies internal disor-der and from its own predatory inclinations Before a meta-constitution can beimplemented or given the opportunity to evolve state sovereignty must be actual-ized (Formula Three) and a high degree of human security achieved Thus a meta-constitution as a pattern of claimed sovereignty requires the factual existence ofan actual state ndash it takes human security to another level and convinces men thattheir survival depends upon the state not upon their autonomous social or indi-vidual efforts The meta-constitution responds to societal values and translatesthem into state-allocated values for the purpose of effective distribution of humansecurity benefits in a way that reorients person obligation [Os] (to society) to citizenobligation [Op] (to nation-state)

Written state constitutions attempt to clarify adapt and apply a meta-constitutionto existing or changed historical circumstances A meta-constitution emerges outof social practices and customary law and finds expression in philosophyreligion law and war For the Western liberal MSNS its meta-constitutionexpressions have included strict delineated territorial sovereignty governmentswith a division of labor rule of law equality of citizens under law individualrights and theoretical equality of sovereign states This model provided the tem-plate for the post-imperial Republic of China

In terms of human security theory a meta-constitution

must base its claimed sovereignty on a foundation of actualized sovereignty unifies a wide scope of human security activities ndash social and economic ndash

into a cohesive set of rules institutions and knowledge adapts the state to changed circumstances and legitimates the maintenance and deployment of military force necessary for

protection of the statersquos territory resources and population

A meta-constitution is characterized by fundamental principles of government thatare applied to widely differing circumstances and provide a mental and administra-tive map of the political universe with aspirations of possible global applicationbecause its universalist claims establish criteria by which all other constitutions arejudged A meta-constitution must have been implemented in large part by a historicalstate and not merely a visionary design by a political philosopher (ie PlatorsquosRepublic or Morersquos Utopia) A meta-constitution must meet the test of actual sover-eignty A meta-constitution must also explicitly express the universal principles uponwhich it makes its claim to establish government

The ICS2 meta-constitution consisted of permanent and evolving componentsincluding

1 an emperor as hereditary ruler dependent upon his and his dynastyrsquos performance


2 the emperor as religious link between cosmos and empire3 a complex military apparatus responsible for frontier security and domestic

tranquillity4 the familyclan as the basic unit of society including a sexual division of

labor5 a complex administrative system requiring both competence and trust6 a universalizing ideology that gave primacy to Chinese written culture and7 racial neutrality ndash absorption of nomadic and aboriginal groups into Han eth-

nicity and the mixed ancestry of several dynastic founders seems to haveplaced severe racial segregation out of bounds in traditional China

Pragmatic elasticity was a critical element in the Chinese meta-constitution Itappeared in small states whose monarchs claimed to be dynastic successors andin the extensive empires from the Han through the Qing The imperial meta-constitution was not codified in strict legal terms it was embodied in govern-ment the classic canon and custom Its efficacy and validity was rendered by theactualization of a dynastyrsquos claims to sovereignty The foundations of the Chinesestate were established much earlier than the Qin-Han but it is only from thisperiod that the twenty-one centuries long empire emerges It emerged not as awritten document like the American constitution or any of the other many con-stitutions that characterized nineteenth-century liberalism (more aimed at limitingas well as empowering the scope of governments) but out of the negative experi-ences of Qin despotism and the organization of government under Han GaozuLater Confucians embellished and rationalized the conduct and institutions ofgovernment in a way that gave it more cosmic connections ndash though without anexplicit and separate state church of the Western experience

The theory of human security posits three levels of human existence individual(biological entity) person (socio-economic member) and citizensubject (politi-cal agent) Each level contributes to survival and security of humans and eachlevel encompasses a specific field of human knowledge that enhances longevityand survival The meta-constitution is the articulated state framework thatexpresses a combination of assumed values and it guides the construction of insti-tutions Societies set rules and establish institutions that reinforce human securityprior to the statersquos meta-constitution The state emerges out of economic andsocial practices demanding and reinforcing cooperation solidarity and sharingof knowledge and material goods

Generally the meta-constitution of the premodern state in China was the summation of socioeconomic practices with the addition of force and governanceinstitutions legitimated by actual and claimed sovereignty The more congruent astatersquos meta-constitution with its socioeconomic infrastructure the more durablethe state proved to be The characteristic difference between the premodern andmodern state is that the formerrsquos institutions of government and law evolved moreout of custom religion and actualized sovereignty It consolidated power throughstatecraft (the practical application of political knowledge which is esoteric bydefinition) and the economical use of force The modern state has been established


on the foundations of traditional states and claimed far broader sovereignty thanforebears had envisioned Value claims and expanded notions of citizenship havereinforced the nationalist component of the modern state The written constitutionof the modern state reflects its meta-constitutional theory which has usually beena concoction of philosophers and ideologues as interpreted by politicians whosometimes may believe they are engineering a new political order Some theorieshave proven more durable ndash the American experiment for example has lasted fortwo and a quarter centuries while the Soviet state succumbed after seven decadesIn this the Soviet failure was in trying to transform the human soul of its citizenswhile the American constitution accepted man for what he was expecting neithermetamorphosis nor angelic behavior

Imperial Chinarsquos meta-constitution

The meta-constitution in the context of the Chinese traditional state (ICS2)refers to

the elements customarily included in modern written constitutions such asan outline of political values the structure of government and some methodof amendment

the unwritten assumptions and values of the state which may be (and oftenare) religious in nature or based on secular ideology as in the French orSoviet post-revolutionary constitutions

Both characteristics base sovereign authority on claims of a governmentrsquos abilityto carry out its policies and to dispense benefits of human security The efficacyof those claims depends in large part upon the credibility established with actual-ized sovereignty Thus we identify the meta-constitution as primarily reflectingthe realm of claimed sovereignty though sequentially only after sovereignty hasbeen actualized In fact formal constitutions are mostly in this same categorysince they claim jurisdiction for government and claim foundation in certain col-lective values Law is a central process of actualizing those claims The notoriousSoviet constitution of 1936 was famous for the huge discrepancy between its arti-cles and actual practice during the height of Stalinrsquos purges and state terrorism Atthe beginning of the twenty-first century Chinarsquos political practices are slowlyapproaching what is claimed in its constitution though there is far to go Beijingrsquoscurrent dilemma is that the Marxist economic assumptions of the past were falsi-fied and have been nearly abandoned though these remain in its meta-constitutionof Marxism-Leninism-Mao Thought In contemporary China we are witnessinga shift in meta-constitutional assumptions as old claims of Communism aredemonstrably falsified and abandoned in the market (though not political)reforms The leadershiprsquos problem is to revise the current constitution to reflectnew realities of global political economy

Every dynastic founder was simultaneously an innovator and a restorer of theICS2 recreating a centralized government from a meta-constitutional ldquoscriptrdquo


Cumulative changes that occurred during the inter-dynastic period ndash such as theexpansion of Buddhism after the Han ndash were addressed and served as new propsfor the empire The history of previous dynasties was a textbook for government ndashlearning what to do what policy was effective under what circumstances whatwere critical danger points and so on Previous dynastic histories were a source-book and guide of political knowledge [Kp] Dynastic founders directed scholarsto write the official history of the previous dynasty in large part to legitimize thenew dynasty as receiving the Mandate of Heaven (tianming) which had beentaken away from the previous regime for failures that the historians amply docu-mented In the agrarian society where technological and intellectual change wasslow those cumulative lessons had much relevance for every new set of rulers asthey pursued policies to expand and preserve the well-ordered state

For traditional China there was a remarkable continuity of meta-constitutioncombined with adaptability and evolution ndash up to the twentieth century Theclaims to sovereignty were based on Confucian political ideas that connectedindividual person and citizen in a hierarchical though fluid society to the monar-chy Underlying the success of Confucianism in dominating the meta-constitutionwas the transmutation of aristocratic principles and claims based on familisticvalues and noblesse oblige into an operational code for literati aspiring to academic degree status and state bureaucracy office rendering that code largelysupportive of the state and monarchy Confucianism vulgarized aristocratic principles in the same way that mass democracy and universal suffrage have low-ered the bar for citizenship ndash broadening it to a wider constituency and removingascribed privilege and prerogative as birthrights A difference is that traditionalChina was pre-democratic and citizenship defined as the right to hold officewas narrowly qualified and filtered through imperial examinations Moderndemocracy on the other hand stressing radical equality tends to bestow citizen-ship liberally while requiring little in return during peacetime except payment oftaxes and obedience to laws

The post-Qin meta-constitution of the Imperial Chinese State responded to thelessons of extreme centralization of Legalist Qin as well as to the crony and aris-tocratic uprisings of the Former Han Confucianism legitimated the shift frommonarchyndashnobility partnership to relative absolutism that reached its apogee dur-ing the Ming relying on the landed gentry to provide officials who governed andunderwrote imperial claims of sovereignty Occasional literati demands foraccountability sparked the demand for reforms during the Ming and Qing butproved too little too late In the process Chinese intellectuals moved toward JohnLockersquos proposition that government rests on popular consent and rebellion ispermissible when government subverts the ends (the protection of life libertyand property) for which it is established ndash an idea which Mencius had enunciatednearly two millennia before

The emperor was high priest and pontifex in the ancestral and Confucian cultcarrying out sacred and secular functions The people acquiesced to governmentso long as lives and livelihood were maintained2 and occasionally revolted in des-peration when their basic human security was endangered For protoliberal


Confucians the people were the expression of the Will of Heaven thoughunaware of their mission It remained for the intellectual elite to interpret theworkings of Heaven

States when not at war must deal with contradictory claims of equality versusthe realities of inequality Wars are exceptional in that they force inequalities inthe form of combatant and civilian and commanders and subordinates In peace-time social organization tends to the task of distributing status power and mate-rial benefits

An additional consideration is that permanent ascription of deprivation andlow-status not only alienates the multitudes who produce the bulk of food andhousing (secondary human security goods) for the population but makes theirabandonment of established authority likely when an opportunity arises Religionoften fills the vacuum of hopelessness Among the low castes of Hinduism ameritorious life will deliver status rewards in the next reincarnation Africanslaves brought to the New World found some relief in Christian promises of deliv-erance in an afterlife

A natural equality of mankind (though excluding womankind) was an earlyfeature of Chinese thought and imbued the three major doctrines ConfucianismDaoism and Legalism Daoism for example denied that inequality was embed-ded in nature seeing it as a human invention Confucians also argued that a naturalequality existed at least at birth What distinguished men in society was their useof the ldquoevaluating mindrdquo (Munro 1969 23)

Legalism was a premodern form of totalitarianism that sought to reduce all per-sons to complete subjects of the state ndash equal but without liberty This requiredelimination of intermediate social institutions especially family and clan thatawarded status to persons and therefore reduced the authority of the state Onlythe emperor had superior status in the Legalist state This theory was imple-mented in the state of Qin and contributed to its military might by making onlytwo occupations legitimate farming and fighting With an armed and productivepopulation plus a strategic location Qin was able to unify the WarringKingdoms but unable to create a ruling regime to rule the empire much beyondthe lifetime of the founder Qin Shi Huangdi

Application of theoryrsquos Formula Five to the imperial state

Formula Five applied to the QLS1 sovereignty claims shows [Sc] was a function of

[Tc] ndash the Qin statersquos internal claims of territorial jurisdiction over its landswaters and inhabitants These included all the lands of conquered andabsorbed kingdoms as well as the frontiers deemed important to defence ofthe empire Establishment of commanderies and settlements plus construc-tion of canals and roads as well as the Great Wall defined and consolidatedthose claims

[ERc] ndash the Qin statersquos claims against other states which included territoryandor rights By 221 BC no other state or kingdom came near matching


Qin power although the vast expanse of the empire inevitably challengednon-Chinese local rulers to resist imperial expansion and held it to theborders which defined Qin and subsequent rule

[Kp] ndash Qin political knowledge was based on historical experience but thefirst emperor believed he was inaugurating an entirely new empire ndash anddecided to set off in new directions He relied heavily on military forceswhich had won him the empire and on conscripted labor drawn from anever-expanding convict population thanks to draconian laws Qin knew howto create an empire but was less competent in establishing precedent for continuing his dynasty In the end prisoners rebelled and destroyed the Qinand one of their numbers became emperor

[Av] ndash Qin stressed [Vo] and [Ve] and minimized [Vl] Reality was that threecategories of ldquocitizenshiprdquo existed eroding the assumption of equality underlaw First was the emperor who was above the law In order to carve out anew supremacy he ordered his officials to search the histories and devise anew title ldquoHuangdirdquo (Bai 1991) The second category consisted of subjectswho served the empire as workers farmers and soldiers And third were theldquocriminalsrdquo ndash those who had violated one or another of the Qinrsquos harsh legalcode were stripped of all liberty and property and were forced to work onimperial construction projects Lacking a class of party apparatchiks to pro-vide information coordination and control over society Qin Shi Huangdicould not prevent mutiny and rebellion in the system he had erected

The Han dynasty broadened and modified [Kp] and [Av] though inheriting [Tc]and [ERc] In the transition from Qin the Han accepted the formerrsquos (Sa) whileconstructing a new meta-constitution in place of the short-lived Qin state frameworkGradually Confucian principles infiltrated the state and a new bureaucracyemerged primarily loyal to the throne The Han meta-constitution evolved throughseveral manifestations as circumstances changed An aristocracy survived severaldynasties through the Song and was practically wiped out by the Mongol Yuan

The ICS2 meta-constitution operated during periods of dynastic unity as wellas during cyclical lapses and fragmentation The number of years between majordynasties progressively decreased after the Han Nearly four centuries elapsedfrom the end of the Han to the start of the Tang but only fifty-three years fromthe Tang to Song The last three dynasties ndash Yuan Ming and Qing ndash quicklyadapted the institutions of their predecessor and consolidated the empire into aunified and functioning state with a minimum of fragmentation that had charac-terized earlier dynasties Presumably there had been cumulative progress in learn-ing how to reconstruct the imperial state Scholars preserved and studied dynastichistory not as a cultural idiosyncrasy but as it became a vital empirical data bankof knowledge which summarized the past and could be applied as lessons to current statecraft

A meta-constitution consensus emerged over the centuries although applica-tions ranged from literal revival of Zhou rituals and terms in Sui to emulatingpublic works and creating a meritocracy civil service inspired by legendary cultural


heroes Yao and Shun3 to practical problems of taxation war and relations withnomadic tribes

The Qin could justify its state-building actions in human security terms ndash toend the chaos and instability of warring states Hanrsquos legitimating ideology aimedat first ending Qin extreme centralization and rule by means of repressive lawand second restoring the legendary balance and prosperity of the Zhou

Confucianism ndash the foundation of claimed sovereignty [Sc] under ICS2

Confucius lived and taught during an age of fragmentation with several kingdomscompeting and fighting for territory and population His simple doctrine was thata better world would come about when men of superior quality ndash aristocrats inmind and character ndash ruled and set the example for all to follow Princes ruled ashereditary aristocrats and needed honest and upright officials to lead armies collect revenue adjudicate disputes and administer their realms For Confuciusthis provided the opportunity to improve the world ndash if men of virtue could be cultivated and encouraged to serve in government then the state would return to anatural harmony (Liu 1988 113) Confucianism emerged as the synthesis offamilistic virtue and obligations of citizenship ndash a fusion that facilitated establish-ment and durability of the imperial meta-constitution Its key features included

The centrality of the nuclear family as the core of human society and as thefirst line of human security for individuals The ideal of filial piety (xiao) withits explicit hierarchy of roles provided the major template for the public order

Confucianism midwifed the intellectual transformation of the old aristocrat(junzi) into competent scholar-officials who would serve the state as a moralduty having primary loyalty to the emperor

A view of history as the record of the past and a mirror for maintaining thestate made restoration of the centralized empire the sole legitimate politicalenterprise when the center collapsed

An agnostic view of religion enabled the state cult of emperor while tolerat-ing other beliefs as long as they did not endanger the supremacy of theemperor The imperial cult assimilated ancestral worshipreverence and rein-forced filial piety

A relatively light managerial approach to the economy ndash generally permis-sive dedicated to insuring adequate revenues building and maintaining thetransportation communication education and monetary systems Variousrulers resorted to measures of state economic interference but never attwentieth-century levels

Confucianism also oversaw and reinforced the status hierarchy for societymoving it from ascription in the Han and Tang to achievement ndash governed bythe Song and Ming Achievement was channeled into formal classical educa-tion and social status assigned by government-sponsored activities ndash theexaminations


Confucianism was fundamentally hierarchical and inegalitarian in the assignment oflearning-based status It took the strong points of feudalism removed aristocraticprivilege and entitlements based on birth and retained a value system increasinglyestranged from its generating origins The Confucians advocated the state as a moralagent ndash through education and example ndash and supported the ICS2 meta-constitutionwith imperial concentration of power as necessary to return the empire to a goldenage of peace and prosperity Confucian economic theory was fundamentally agri-cultural with mild distrust mixed with tolerance toward commerce The Confucianview of race-transcending culture as the central source and vehicle of identity facil-itated integration of non-Chinese peoples into imperial membership and allowed theacceptability of conquest dynasties as long as they governed fairly and well

There was no collectivist rejection of responsible individuality inConfucianism and the individualperson including the emperor was a crucialmoral agent in transforming society and state Nor was there an apotheosis of theindividual as in Christianity where the immortal soul retained individuation in thenext life and tied mortals to the fate of their individual souls after deathBuddhism also fixed merit and guilt in the individualperson but allotted morepower to karma and allowed escape through reincarnation Confucianism envi-sioned the good state not so much as a Platonic place where justice reigns byallotting just deserts to individuals (although both Plato and Confucius wouldagree that wisdom is the cardinal virtue of a ruler) but as a place where all aresafe and have adequate life-sustaining supports through the merits of the wiseruler and his wiser officials In sum the Confucian state vision was one wherehuman security could be maximized through order a degree of equal opportunitybased on merit and application of political knowledge The closest approxima-tion of liberty was contained in Daoist doctrine which validated the humanimpulse to freedom through escape from society and state into nature ndash an ideal-ized view of nature that was far more fanciful and abstract than the raw natureconfronted by Robinson Crusoe or Hobbesian natural man

After more than four centuries of fragmentation the Sui dynasty re-created theICS2 Although there were parallels with the period of Warring Kingdoms prior tounification Sui chose the Han-Confucian meta-constitutional route over the Qin-Legalist path and added Buddhism in an ecumenical gesture to the assimilated non-Han peoples of North China The Sui reinstated a Confucian order with commonstandards of belief of values and of behavior This revival was important for thereintegration of fragments of the old society With a higher degree ofvalueinstitutional unity the Social Friction coefficient [SF] was reduced and sini-fication of non-Han people was facilitated Other elements of ICS2 were also reinstatedincluding

the dynastic imperial throne designated as the Son of Heaven with rulebased on family principles remained the symbol of sovereignty

an administrative system based on recruitment by merit and competencealthough the continuity and prominence of old families preserved a semi-aristocracy which served as a recruitment pool for officials


a centralized system of rule in frequent tension with regional and local powercenters

a military establishment to protect the dynasty the empirersquos population andits territory The main tasks of the army were to guard and maintain frontiersagainst nomadic raiders to expand imperial rule through pacification ofneighbors and to intimidate and defeat any rebellions or mutinies againstimperial authority

a system of public works designed to improve agricultural production com-mercial transportation tax collection and deployment of military forceswhere needed

a system of law to stabilize order and facilitate trade

Key features of the post-Qin imperial meta-constitution

Several themes emerge in the major Confucian texts that connect person to thestate First is how the Confucian notion of knowledge linked state and personldquoLearning is pleasure requires constant perseverance application producesvirtuerdquo (Confucius 1965 137) Learning is the task of an individual maturinghim into a person in society adding qualities to the construction of that personwhich are partially derived from family and immediate social interaction Virtuecan be considered to be the sum of positive qualities which add to survivability of individuals and persons as well as adding to the social capital of a group Thus afundamental element of the Confucian meta-constitution was classics-derivedpolitical knowledge [Kp] which an educated man brought to serve society andstate

The philosopher Yu a disciple of Confucius said that filial piety and fraternalsubmission are the roots of all benevolent actions (Analects I 22) Thus learningalone does not produce virtue nor does a virtuous environment Theindividualperson must actively submit to family values and cultivate habits ofmind that produce the practice of benevolent behavior The family in its best formprovides the school for the virtuous man Properly schooled he can then serve thestate as model and educator The first duty of a youth is the practice of filial pietythen learning which is the practice of virtue

In the Confucian universe becoming a good son and brother were the firststeps in acquiring virtue ndash the family was the school for teaching and learningnot only proper behaviors but habits of the evaluating mind Furthermore teachingand learning were the two fundamental links between individual and society ndash thechannels of socialization transforming the individual into person Teaching andlearning were two sides of completing the person ndash the best teachers in the worldcould accomplish little without a will and talent to learn The content of learningdid not consist of specialized or technical knowledge but rather the experienceand judgments ndash expressed in historical and philosophical records ndash of previousgenerations ldquoConfucius said lsquoThere are three things of which the superior manstands in awe He stands in awe of the ordinances of Heaven of great men andof the words of sagesrsquordquo (Analects VIII 1) Knowledge in the Confucian educational


context is the distillation of human experience and its application to onersquospersonal social and political interactions

Knowledge produces virtue if correctly taught and learned and virtue enlargesobligation Rights in the Western sense are hardly present and in Chinese transla-tion the notion (quanli) has a connotation of ldquopowerrdquo Men may be equal in naturalpowers but they differ in their relationship to knowledge The superior man (zhunzi)can be trusted with political power ndash he is steadfast and has breadth of mind

The political categories produced by Confucian theory have distant resem-blance to those of the Greek polis which so influenced the Western nation-stateFor one thing the continuum of individual-family-state in traditional China wasrelatively unrelieved by the categories of private and public Major Europeantheorists from Aristotle4 through Marx saw family as the realm of the privateand often as a shackle on public altruism Contrast this with Confucius ldquoThere isgovernment when the prince is prince and the minister is minister when thefather is father and the son is sonrdquo(Confucius 1965 256)

The Confucian notion of knowledge directly affected the concept of citizen-ship First only a relatively few men could achieve the knowledge and discern-ment that qualified them to participate in politics and policy ndash the realm ofprincely activity ldquoThe people may be made to follow a path of action but theymay not be made to understand itrdquo(Confucius 1965 256) Knowledge and char-acter determined imperial citizenship except for royalty who claimed preemi-nence in the state by family affiliation In later dynasties Confucian principlesfound expression in the examination system which in theory raised the status ofthose who had pursued knowledge through years of study of the classical canonwhile good character references from notables gave an extra boost to officialappointment Although not without serious operational defects not the least ofwhich was corruption through influence and nepotism the system awardedparticipatory official status to a few thousand aspirants who served in the imperialcourt and at all levels of administration

Aristotlersquos definition of citizenship was a person who has the right (exousia) toparticipate in deliberative or judicial office (Stanford 2002) The Confucian coun-terpart participated in an imperial state ruled by monarchy assisted by a morally-autonomous knowledge elite Full citizenship in the ICS2 was a rarefiedmeritocracy and was achieved through testing of character and mind throughexaminations The men who had passed the examinations formed the recruitmentpool for the imperial bureaucracy Because of their long training in moral andhistorical texts the state considered them best qualified to assist in governingSince they tended to come from similar social backgrounds and had shared theexperience of taking the exams together and acted as patrons or sponsors for eachother they had a strong sense of group identity ldquoWherever they went they couldbe sure that their peers would share not only a moral system based on the textsthey had learned to expound in the examinations but also similar life experiencesand lifestylesrdquo (Harrison 2001 15)

Another associated Confucian ideal was eremitism ndash the moral dictum that high-minded officials (and in theory they were selected because of their


high-mindedness) would retire from imperial service if the monarchy was violatingthe principles of the Way (Dao) Faced with defection and implicit reprimandfrom his officials the emperor would mend his ways Mencius had expressed afurther limitation on imperial hegemony with reference to the right of rebellionbut this was suppressed as too dangerous by rulers and the literati Thus politicalknowledge was a confluence of equal parts of technicalpractical informationmoral prudence and historical wisdom

The centrality of harmony in the Confucian meta-constitution may have loweredpolitical friction [PF] Political order in ICS2 was in theory based on social orderderived from family The Confucian system of political thought begins withvirtue5 ndash the highest quality to be nurtured and it had to be continuously culti-vated through learning and practice Its pure form was attained by only a very fewsages but its seeds are natural in all men Its rare mature appearance is due todistractions and ignorance It is smothered by bad influences but stimulated by agood environment Men who love virtue will serve their princes without insubor-dination or extravagance and with understanding and solicitude They are notfoolhardy in bravery and their devotion to filial piety extends to all human rela-tions Their knowledge comes from the study of history and the observation ofmen Men of learning and virtue may come from any class and they are not mereldquoutensilsrdquo or instruments of political power

This quality of scholar-officials serves the prince by administering the realmThey serve humanity by expanding harmony and benevolence They servethemselves by exercising their benevolence and expanding the neighbourhood ofvirtuous men By employing men of virtue and learning in government the princedemonstrates his own righteousness and confirms the legitimacy of his ruleHowever Qin conquest demonstrated that military power and wile were more farmore effective in uniting the disparate kingdoms and that using rigid authoritar-ian repression of critical thought and learning plus a strict legal code of punish-ments was an efficient path to domination Han dismantled extreme features ofthe Legalist system turned to semi-feudal indirect rule Later the need for admin-istrators unencumbered by feudal family loyalties increased the attractiveness ofConfucianism

The rituals of monarchy proclaimed the majesty of the Son of Heaven (Tianzi) but required dispensing security and justice to all parts of the empire in

order to consolidate imperial authority The emperor was the keystone of theimperial structure Confucius had been the architect and the Confucian scholar-officials were its ldquobricksrdquo and ldquomortarrdquo as well as its ldquobuilderrdquo By projectingaristocratic family structure and values onto the family unit of society Confucianshad to drain its feudal and hereditary elitism which was accomplished by nurtur-ing intellectual and moral achievement above or at the level of bloodlinesFamily roles became the template for persons in society and citizens in the statetransforming feudal hierarchy into the structure that maximized the politicalvalue of order [Vo] Confucianism also introduced a modest measure of equality[Ve] of opportunity by stressing recognition of intellectual and moral achieve-ment not only in status but in official rank for a chosen few The recruitment base


was narrow ndash men only ndash and was in practice further limited to those with accessto long-term education and study Nevertheless the Confucian examinations rep-resented a thawing of aristocratic privilege that encouraged men of talent andambition to strive to serve the established imperial order

Confucian political theory conceived state and society as a seamless contin-uum Private virtue and behavior were little different than what was required ofpublic office-holders Those who held official title rank and office were requiredby Confucian ideals to be strict in their comportment ndash to display and improvetheir virtue because it magnified their influence in society Society was populatedby persons in a subordinate relationship to the rulers who in turn held authorityby their virtue and position and had to remain solicitous of their subjects to retainthe faith of the people ndash without the peoplersquos faith there could be no government

In Western liberal society Adam Smithrsquos ldquoinvisible handrdquo in the economy wasan approximation of secular harmony (low [PF] coefficient) in the sense that personspursued their self-interest with no explicit intent to serve the interest of others yetdid so nonetheless In the Wealth of Nations the natural outcome of commercewas peace and prosperity if left to its natural operation without intervention ofthe state

For Confucius the natural harmony of society was based on hierarchy ndash whereall men maximized virtue from the top down and behaved according to their sta-tion and appropriate to the rank of other persons Unlike Smithrsquos ldquoinvisiblehandrdquo Confucian social and political harmony required constant human effortsand attention Hierarchy was not based on ascription and caste and Confuciusmade it clear that virtue is improved through learning and human influencesthough a few are born with wisdom and virtue Harmony is most nourishedwhere virtue benevolence and wisdom have primacy in a state keeping in mindthat virtue resides in persons ndash not in actual institutions Thus men should beevaluated and given places in government according to their strengths in orderto facilitate harmony

The division of labor has been suggested as another Western source of harmo-nious society Emile Durkheim depicted the division of labor in society as key inthe assignment of roles and status Modernization is the increased specializationof labor that accompanies industrialization Newtonian mechanics spilled overfrom the physical world to social and economic perspectives of Smith Marx andDurkheim Chinese intellectuals in contrast were less interested in discoveringthe laws of nature and society than in understanding the correlation between nat-ural world and human utility While there were significant advances in scienceand technology the discrete and specialized role of ldquoscientistrdquo failed to emerge inChina until the twentieth century

Chinese philosophers were sometimes men of action and politicalndashmilitaryaffairs Wang Yangming (1472ndash1529) believed that universal moral law is innatein man and could be discovered through self-cultivation and self-awareness ndash anapproach which contradicted the orthodox Confucian reliance on classical stud-ies as the means to self-cultivation He emphasized the unity of knowledge andaction Yet he lived a life far from cloistered contemplation As Governor-General


of Guangxi-Guangdong he fought bandits oversaw construction of defenseworks and suppressed rebels (Chang 1940)

Chinese society from the Han dynasty was generally favored by governmentswhich ruled lightly ndash providing security against domestic disorder external inva-sions managing water and transportation and extracting revenues to pay forpomp and expenses Government intervention took the form of monopolies buteconomic liberty was not uncommon and society flourished when they ruledminimally The exception to specialization was the education of the scholar-officials Similar to the education of the British imperial administrative classwhose aspirants studied Latin Greek and the classics Chinese sons of gentrywho aspired to official status set their sights on a long preparation in nonpracti-cal affairs Their studies included the Confucian classics and histories as well ascommentaries which were written in archaic style and often obscure ideographsThere was little practical application of this academic learning except to pass theimperial examinations which were the chief route to official employment Evenfailing at these considerable status was accorded to the highly educated literatiThese Confucian-educated gentlemen prided themselves on their non-specializationldquoThe superior man is not a toolrdquo ( )

Their social roles consisted of performing a semi-sacerdotal function for theimperial cult acting as transmission belt between government and society estab-lishing and maintaining cultural and moral standards for the people providing apool for recruiting government officials and to serving as teachers in their local-ity Over the more than two millennia of Confucian empire the scholar-officialsincreasingly monopolized the status hierarchy Their learning and experience alsoprovided informal governance where government was weak and far away Whena unified dynasty was waning or absent the literati upheld the clan systems tomaintain order and defense as the weaker state gave way to strong family

The literati were transmitters of political knowledge [Kp] which had internalcoherence by virtue of forming the official canon of learning The knowledgeimparted to aspiring scholar-officials was not as esoteric as would first appearFirst a common curriculum ndash the written classics ndash insured that a common linguafranca prevailed not only over the empire or its fragments but over the centuriesThe dynastic histories were a compendium of statecraft descriptions of how rulershad responded to crises and tasks of governance and were lessons in how torule and what to avoid Every political situation was unique but precedents provided guidance ndash if the right men were in positions of power and influence(Anderson 1964 169)

Through the chaos and reclamation of political order in Chinese history therecurrent theme was restoration of unified empire For the Confucians this taskrequired a heroic unifier who would be rewarded by fame and accolades and hisfamily would monopolize the throne for generations ndash the ultimate filial rewardto onersquos ancestors and descendants An emperor needed the Confucian scholar-officials to administer his empire and justify his authority as bestowed by theMandate of Heaven In the late Qing which was distorted by massive corruptionand unaccountability at the highest levels of the state as well as losing imperial


mystique with increasing contacts with the expanding West new currents ofthought emerged Philip Kuhn has described how thinkers proposed a broadercircle of engaged literati to participate in political and policy discussions ndashessentially expanding the definition of citizenship Later Liang Qichaobroadened political participation even further in advocating constitutionalgovernment for China ndash the collective ldquopeoplerdquo or qun enjoying political partici-pation could contribute to ldquothe formation of a cohesive and strong nation-staterdquo(Chang 1971 201) This Rousseauian formulation ndash the bonding of the multitudersquosparticular wills into a single General Will ndash reached its apotheosis in MaoZedongrsquos mass line and modern Chinese ultranationalism

Dynamics of the ICS2 meta-constitution

From Formula Five territorial claims (Tc) and external relations (ERc) had arelatively consistent content in terms of post-Qin developments up to the mid-nineteenth century Various forms of centrifugalism constantly threatened thecentralized state The Confucian bureaucracy evolved into an auxiliary arm ofgovernment to replace an often refractory aristocracy whose local and regionalinterests led to rebellions and secession While that bureaucracy occasionallyexhibited characteristics of a separate arm of government its existence dependedupon a stable and unified monarchy (Zeng 1991 109ndash10)

This political knowledge became the hinge of value transformation fromLegalism to Confucianism (∆Av) Legalism of the QLS1 had stipulated equalityof all subjects of the emperor to the extent of executing dissidents who claimedknowledge as their badge of privilege Nonetheless a single emperor could notrule alone and Qin Shi Huangdi delegated considerable latitude to his PrimeMinister Li Si (Zeng 1991 92)

Exigencies of Han state-building made accommodation with the newemperorrsquos generals necessary and space for aristocratic liberty was created bydefault at the expense of equality Confucianism preserved both order [Vo] and adegree of (mostly economic) liberty [Vl] without the danger of ensconcing aclass of subordinate hereditary rulers who often generated resistance Confucianofficials generally served for life and could not pass on their office to blood rel-atives so avoiding slippage back to feudalism While relationships among politi-cal values were constantly in flux Order [Vo] remained the priority of all Chinesestate regimes since Qin Qinrsquos second priority radical equality [Ve] under an all-powerful emperor was replaced in Han by a mild form of liberty [Vl] in the formof intellectual and moral autonomy that was tested and awarded status ndash makingldquonatural equality of menrdquo more a theoretical and pedagogical hypothesis than anoperational rule or goal of statecraft

The durability of the dynastic meta-constitution lies in its derivation from asocioeconomic and cultural domain that had provided the fertile environment forsettlement prosperity and demographic expansion The agrarian family house-hold hierarchical and industrious was apotheosized by the aristocracy andmonarchy and its values transmuted into the formula for sovereign authority by


Confucianism Each dynasty adapted the Confucian meta-constitution not only tochanged conditions but in light of previous dynastiesrsquo experiences demonstrat-ing flexibility and pragmatism that contributed to dynastic longevity Most impor-tantly successful dynasties rarely failed in seeking to provide for the humansecurity of their subjects and when they did ignore their duties they eroded theirclaims of sovereign authority The kingdom of Qin created a constitution basedon Legalist design rooted in a narrow view of human behavior ndash that is imperialsubjects respond with state-beneficial actions when given choices of reward orpunishment In the short run practice of the theory transformed the peripheralstate into a vigorous ruthless and unified empire However its radical egalitarianismand rigorous system of punishments proved to be a fatal flaw ndash the state was anartificial creation with no means of attracting loyalty It could extract obedienceand subservience using the Legalist theory of two handles of government ndashrewards and punishments But it required an unattainable degree of informationattention and control ndash as if an operator of a powerful machine had to constantlymonitor and adjust the settings and inputs and a momentrsquos distraction wouldresult in breakdown In the case of the QLS1 expansive use of punishmentresulted in increasing numbers of prisoners and convicts and once the founder ofthe Qin labor gulags died his successor could not maintain the same degree ofcontrol The state machinersquos principles of operation created enemies and obstruc-tions that proved its undoing

The Sui suffered dynastic brevity but for different reasons The first emperorwas eminently successful but the son overreached facilitating victory of TangAfter Song the Mongols broke the remaining ethnic barriers and re-centralizedthe post-Tang empire which was then inherited by the Ming The non-HanManchus established the final empire that lasted over two and a half centuries

In this chapter we have examined the traditional claims of sovereignty in theimperial Confucian state Territorial claims (Tc) were based not on legal owner-ship but on occupation exploitation and ability to defend against incursion andrebellion ndash in other words the exercise of actualized sovereignty In external rela-tions (ERc) the Confucian emperor as Son of Heaven claimed to be mediatorbetween Heaven and Earth so that non-Chinese rulers were theoretically subor-dinate to him Political knowledge (Kp) was drawn from the classics popularizedin literature such as novels and plays and even proverbs and applied creativelyto challenges of changing circumstances of state and family affairs Politicalknowledge in the form of disseminated information about national conditions andimperial power formed the basis of individual citizensrsquo evaluations on whether toserve or avoid government careers While Confucian avoidance and eremitismhad little practical effect on government administrative competence they setprecedent and detracted from regime legitimacy Finally the relative priority ofpolitical values ([Vo] [Ve] and [Vl]) were critical to a dynastic claim to sover-eignty State-sponsored Confucianism stabilized order as primary with equalityand liberty in secondary and fluid rivalry

During its long suzerainty the Chinese meta-constitution influenced otherAsian kingdoms and its impact continued through the twentieth century in modified


form The Tokugawa state in Japan based its authority on neo-Confucianism(Maruyama 1974) although there was no conservative mandarinate to maintainorthodox doctrine The fusion of feudal society with the samurai as elite repre-sented a modified Confucian template of governance Meiji modernization waspartly a successful adaptation of Confucian principles to the modern state TheMeiji Restoration stressed social order education and learning as the quickestroute to modernization Western nation-states had demonstrated military expan-sion to be the inevitable companion of industrialization and the samurai warriorethic contributed to the success of the Japanese imperial project Japaneseempire-builders justified that they were faithful Confucians ldquolifting the fallenand helping the weakrdquo by their interventions in the crumbling Chinese empire andagainst Soviet Communism

Korea was another adaptation of the Confucian meta-constitution The variouspeninsular kingdoms had long been independent yet nominal vassals of theChinese empire Rulers of the peninsula styled themselves ldquokingrdquo ( ) signify-ing their subordination to the one Son of Heaven in China Documents were writ-ten in Chinese until the invention of hangul in the fifteenth century Not until theearly twentieth century did the Korean ruler claim to be Emperor ndash declaringKorea independent of the failing Chinese empire but retaining a Confucian meta-constitution From 1909 through 1945 Koreans were subjects of the Japaneseemperor and were then divided into two states by the victorious Russians andAmericans North Korea became a hardline Communist state governed with amix of personality cult extreme ideological orthodoxy and isolation from muchof the globe ndash a mixture of ancient legalism modern nationalism and a Stalinistsyle of leadership

South Korea until the Presidency of Roh Tae-Woo exhibited paternalist fea-tures of the Confucian state and society mediated by Meiji precedents SyngmanRhee and Park Chung-Hee demonstrated a Confucian autocratic style balancedby public solicitude for the country they were rebuilding The deeply-injuredKorean people were not given the freedom and democracy of liberal democracybut rather the human security of order and economic development Only in 1986was full democracy introduced after years of successful economic expansionunder military autocracy Strong components of Confucian hierarchy centralityof family and connections and high motivation to education remain at the core ofSouth Korean society Factionalism and localism remain prominent in party pol-itics making compromise sometimes difficult in the context of moral principles


When the Chinese revolutionists introduced the Western ideas of democracy intoChina their aim was to transplant the whole political system of the West Theythought that if only China were as democratic as the Western countries she wouldhave reached the zenith of success

(Sun Yat-sen (Hsu 1933 370))

A new stage of the nation-state

The European MSNS required centuries to reach democratic maturity By the endof the Cold War looking back at its wars and the tyrannies it had engenderedEuropean elites decided that the old MSNS had become obsolete and soembarked on the grand project of a sovereignty-soft European Union The UnitedStates in some ways resembling a new empire similar to the late RomanRepublic was taking sovereignty national interest and national security to itslimits and has been roundly criticized for refusing to accommodate internationallawrsquos restrictions on sovereignty (the International Criminal Court) or internationalcooperative ventures of environmental action (the Kyoto Protocols) In the Europeancase state sovereignty has been implicitly deemed destructive to human securitywhile for America its maximization was the efficient solution to human security through national interest and preemptive interventions In both cases thegap between actualized sovereignty and claimed sovereignty is far less a concernthan in contemporary China where a perception of incomplete sovereigntyunderlies fundamental issues of state

One reason the United States has not feared state sovereignty is that its insti-tutional structures have rarely gone out of control in contrast to fascist and communist regimes in Europe The US constitution was the exception to KarlPopperrsquos criticism ldquoevery theory of sovereignty omits to face a more funda-mental question ndash the question namely whether we should not strive towardsinstitutional control of the rulers by balancing their powers against other powersrdquo (Miller 1985 321) Moreover the permanent values of the Americanstate were bespoken by the longevity of the American constitution its vitalityand relevance for over two centuries and the quest for citizenship by millionsof immigrants in a continuous affirmation of the spirit of its laws For masses

8 Sovereignty and state-building inlate Qing and Republican China

The state in Qing and Republican China 131

of Americans and those who aspired to become Americans sovereignty wasindivisible and non-problematic For the European establishment ndash includingpolitical academic intellectual and cultural elites ndash sovereignty is a burden ofthe past to be fashioned into a new superstate to balance the United StatesHowever the French and Dutch rejection of a new supersovereignty in 2005indicated that national identities had not disappeared ndash at least in economic andethnic issues

Debates over the modification of existing sovereignty (Europe) or relative sat-isfaction over preserving existing arrangements (the United States) are luxurieswhich twentieth-century China has been denied because completion of sover-eignty has eluded that nation While the PRC possesses many of the major accou-terments of the MSNS it does not exercise jurisdiction over Taiwan Far morethan an administrative irregularity Taiwanrsquos autonomy is a direct challenge toChinese sovereignty Beijing claims Taiwan to be a secessionist province asthough there had been a ldquoperfect unionrdquo in 1949 In actuality the government thatre-formed on Taiwan in 1949 was the continuation of the Republic of China(GRS4) which was the direct heir of the Republic (RNS3) formed immediatelyafter the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1912 China has used force blustertrade and propaganda to de-legitimize the Republic of China on Taiwan(ROCOT) while the scope of Taiwanrsquos external relations has diminished consid-erably with most nations transferring diplomatic recognition to Beijing in its demand for an international One-China policy Yet the ROC from its establish-ment in Nanjing (1928) and through its exile on Taiwan has displayed commitmentto a single set of principles reflecting a relatively unbroken GRS4 meta-constitution

The mainland PRC has undergone three meta-constitutions and has forciblyoccupied and administered most of the territory of the Qin-Han dynastic empiresWithout Taiwan it fails to include Ming and Qing territories so one question iswhether Communist China is successor to the earliest (Qin-Han) or the latest(Ming-Qing) empires A further complication in modern Chinarsquos sovereigntydilemma is the possible emergence of a new meta-constitution on Taiwan (TIS8) ndasha state-form that could be the foundation for Chinarsquos breakup and is thereforestoutly opposed both by the Communist Party of China and Guomindang

This chapter will examine the Chinese Republic RNS3 as successor to ICS2the attempted grafting of the Euro-American liberal state onto the Chinese stateand the convergence of liberal Bolshevik and Confucian patterns onto GRS4The rise and imperial expansion of the Japanese MSNS to the Asian mainlandwas a major factor in preventing GRS4 consolidation and providing theCommunist revolution the opportunity to supplant the movement led initially bySun Yat-sen

Background to the Chinese Republic

The appeals and power of the Euro-American liberal state were undeniable toChinese patriots at the end of the nineteenth century Not only had it expanded

132 The state in Qing and Republican China

globally and subordinated practically all lands and waters of the earth but theJapanese had demonstrated that its forms and values could be adapted and appliedto backward (as the Chinese considered the Japanese) non-Western non-Christiansocieties and transform them into economic and political powerhouses JapanrsquosMeiji Restoration had shown the way with legal modernization administrativecentralization economic industrialization and educational reform As JohnDower wrote

Both the Chrsquoing Dynasty and the Bakufu displayed a deep-seated prejudiceagainst any new learning tainted with Western (read Christian) origin theyboth set their faces sternly against any basic social change which wouldencroach upon the privileges of the ruling bureaucracy ndash civil in China mil-itary in Japan In Japan however the lower samurai with their military out-look their sturdy nationalism and their successful leadership of the MeijiRestoration (1867ndash68) saved Japan from becoming a second China only byadapting to their own use the industrial technique and the necessary institu-tions which had given the Western nations their superior strength in dealingwith ldquobackwardrdquo nations Unlike the samurai-bureaucrat whose loyalty to theBakufu regime had become estranged and whose ambitions were obstructedby the Tokugawa caste-system his Chinese administrative counterpart theConfucian literatus was so committed to the ancien regime and its institu-tions that he shrank from undertaking any far-reaching reforms

(Dower 1975 137ndash8)

Fin-de-siecle China was not Japan which had enjoyed 267 years of peace andeconomic growth since the defeat of the virtual feudal kingdoms in 1600 (deci-sively at the battle of Sekigahara) The Tokugawa Shogunate had ruled under aneo-Confucian meta-constitution and determination to dissolve the remnants offeudalism through centralization Thus restoration of the emperorrsquos power in 1867and dissolution of the shogunate occurred in a relatively short time so that a newdirection of modernization rather than isolation could be pursued China in contrast was an empire coming undone at the very time of Meiji renascence andso when the new Republican regime came into being in 1911 momentum todecentralization may have been unstoppable

Qing autocracy had sought to stem its downward spiral through reforms Thehuge corruption scandal under Ho Shen in 1800 demonstrated the rot permeatingthe imperial government and the concurrent White Lotus Rebellion warned oflarger peasant reactions to a dynasty losing its mandate The massive TaipingRebellion (1850ndash64) led by failed imperial examination candidate HongXiuquan proved internally what the decade-earlier Opium Wars had validatedexternally ndash that the Manchu dynasty was a house in decline The TongzhiEmperor launched a few reforms to restore the prestige of the Qing but regionaland provincial military forces raised during the rebellions would not be dissolvedand became the nuclei of modern warlordism The last set of reforms (theHundred Days Reform) was launched in the wake of defeat in the Sino-Japanese


War (1894ndash95) In 1900 the Boxer uprising and subsequent settlement with theTreaty Powers proved to be another disaster for China with foreign proscriptionof imperial examinations and imposition of heavy indemnities A constitutionwith a limited monarchy was promulgated and a parliament established in the lastdecade of the Qing

The challenge to the Chinese Republic

With failure of the Hundred Days Reform many intellectuals gave up hope thatthe monarchy could adequately protect the state and moved to the revolutionarycamp The Tongmenghui and its affiliates with overseas Chinese comprised aleading network of revolutionaries with Japanese supporters hoping for a pro-gressive partner in a new China to reduce the influence of the West in the regionThe end of the Qing demonstrated that it was not merely intransigence thatblocked Chinarsquos progress but also the twin-pronged dilemma of national sover-eignty The first prong was internal sovereignty ndash from 1911 through 1949 nocentral government could fully control all the provinces and regions of China TheRepublican nation-state (RNS3) as successor to the Qing barely exercisedauthority outside north China and a secessionist south demanded representationat international conferences as the true voice of China The second dilemma ofsovereignty was external China was too big a prize for the various imperialistpowers to ignore and leave to its own dynamics Various European states plusJapan claimed spheres of commercial and railway-building interest although theprinciple of ldquoOpen Doorrdquo was established by British and Americans in the wakeof post-Boxer ldquoscramble for concessionsrdquo in 1900

The Euro-American liberal state ndash the model for the post-Qing ChineseRepublic ndash contained no mechanism for actualizing sovereignty save the univer-sal mechanism of accumulating and deploying military force through war TheJapanese had remedied this shortcoming by adapting to the claimed sovereigntyof the liberal state ndash introducing liberal state institutions in government constitu-tion elections education and even in the media Remnants of Japanese feudalismthe elite of the western han preserved the inequalities of the old society whileintroducing citizenship with a heavy infusion of patriotism and acquiescence tobushido ideals with the emperor as focal point of all loyalty But the Chinese rev-olution of 1911 destroyed the monarchy and though Yuan Shikai tried to revivethe throne as focus of a new China his failure confirmed the futility of that project

So the Republicans soldiered on perhaps hoping that the appearance of theWestern liberal state in China would be sufficient to conjure its reality World War Idisabused most Chinese revolutionary intelligentsia of the Western liberal state asthe road to full sovereignty with tales of murderous trench warfare and mechanized and chemical terrors unleashed on opposing armies More directlythe distraction of Europeans in the war gave license to predatory inclinations1 ofJapan whose government imposed the infamous Twenty-One Demands to furthercurtail Chinese remnants of sovereignty With the end of the war and the Versailles


settlement Japan received Germanyrsquos old territories and privileges despiteWilsonrsquos ideals that had caught the imagination of many Chinese The May FourthMovement sparked a new awakening that led to abandonment of the Western lib-eral state as template for Chinese democracy

Chinese revolutionaries divided on what the future state should be a new typeof Republic that the Guomindang advocated or a radical Soviet-variety state asintroduced by the Bolshevik revolution in Russia In effect RNS3 correlated tothe Western liberal state that had emerged in nineteenth-century Europe but wasa failure when transplanted to China The Guomindang reorganized in 1921 andled by Sun Yat-sen until his death in 1926 projected a meta-constitution based onthe sovereignty claims of the Western liberal state but using Chinese traditionaland Russian revolutionary methods to actualize state sovereignty

The Chinese population experienced wars rebellions and foreign invasions forcenturies and ICS2 dynastic reconstruction had perennially followed collapseBut threats to China were patently different by the mid-nineteenth century Theentire framework of sovereignty claims came under attack Not only the growingindustrial might of the European empires but their rivalries and ability to projecteffective military force thousands of miles from home were formidable threats tothe territorial security of the Chinese empire In addition Christianity scienceand democracy were subverting and dissolving the very fabric of Chinese societythat held the empire together For the throne the Confucian elite aspirants to theelite as well as ordinary families moral culture was eroding and the result was anextended crisis that endangered human security of all Chinese

The 1912 Chinese Republic was a response of those who saw their civilizationin decline Considerable inspiration for the emerging Chinese nation-state camefrom Japan ndash a society previously considered an inferior and backward imitationof China The Meiji Restoration had transformed feudal Japan into a nearly mod-ern industrial expansionist nation-state and by 1900 Britain recognized Japan asa fully sovereign nation abrogating the onerous and humiliating unequal treatiesEngland promoted Japan into an ally with the treaty of 1902 in order to checkRussiarsquos eastward advance The Boxer rebellion and subsequent Nine-Powerintervention demonstrated that the Manchursquos decades-long decline renderedChina a kind of eastern counterpart to the Ottoman Empire ndash the ldquoSick Man ofEast Asiardquo or as Chinese described their country a ldquoripe melonrdquo to be sliced upby the Powers China had been saved from dismemberment at the turn of the cen-tury partly by the Anglo-American iteration of the Open Door policy but couldnot depend on the good intentions of sympathetic powers to postpone inevitablehumiliations Domestically Chinarsquos populace suffered from increasing povertyand civil disorder Gentry bandits and warlords took control of regions andlocales as the central government became less and less effective The monarchywas overthrown in 1911 and replaced by a parliamentary Republic with littlenoticeable change in social or political order

The challenge for China during the twentieth century has been to build a newstate order to provide for the human security its hundreds of millions of citizensTo this end a range of state models has been imitated The meta-constitution of


ICS2 had provided a reasonably consistent framework of political order for premodern China but became obsolete with the emergence of the MSNS and itsglobal expansion

The Qing empire ndash bridge between empire and nation-state

The nineteenth century was a watershed between the ICS2 meta-constitution andseveral new meta-constitutions In terms of authenticity and adaptation to the exi-gencies of retaining institutional intellectual and territorial legacy of the empireGRS4 has been relatively conservative in preserving that heritage RegardingGRS4 claims of sovereignty [Sa] its trajectory first merged with the first ChineseRepublic (RNS3) from 1911 through the Nanjing Republic and then supersededRNS3 to the period of ROCOT The catalyst for replacement of ICS2 by RNS3 andthen GRS4 was the expansion of the European MSNS to East Asia The MSNS isan edifice built on earlier empires and the leading imperial states were thosewhich expanded globally and subsequently industrialized earliest This groupincluded primarily England France and the Netherlands while SpainPortugaldid not sustain their early lead partly through failure to incorporate the scientificand secular culture of the enlightenment A second group consisting of GermanyItaly Russia and Japan emerged later as more authoritarian imperial powersincorporating industrialization and hypernationalism as they struggled to catch upwith the first group triggering arms races and wars in the process In the nineteenth century the United States became an imperial power acquiring distantterritories in easy victories over the moribund Spanish empire in 1898

A third group of nation-states emerged in the twentieth century partly as the resultof wars between the earlier and later empires and partly from the post-World War IIbreakup of remaining empires The microstates of the Pacific the dysfunctionalstates of Africa and the Middle East the ethno-religious melanges of the Indian subcontinent and the wavering democracies of Latin America are all children ofEuropean maritime military religious and industrial expansion and exhibit charac-teristics of modernity struggling for dominance and traditions trying to survive

China was too large and too distant to be absorbed as any single countryrsquoscolony Not only was the Qing Empire a strong regional power through the 1840sbut its continued formal sovereignty preserved an entity that was little threat tothe predatory nation-states of Europe and later Japan Its wealth and weaknessafter the Opium Wars gave the imperialist powers huge opportunity to gain eco-nomic benefits with little corresponding political responsibility The record ofindustrial imperialism in China was one of economic and political opportunismwith Japan the most eager to expand at the expense of the declining Manchus andtheir subsequent nationalist heirs

End of the Qing and human security theory

Formula Five stipulates that the statersquos claims to provide human security are afunction of territorial claims control over citizens claims against other states


the content of political knowledge and combinant political values By the latenineteenth century the Qing dynasty continued its claims to be the legitimatepopulation-protecting regime but was losing credibility as the major agent ofhuman security Recognition of this discrepancy stimulated the foreign powers toaccelerate efforts to gain footholds and positions in the decaying empireDomestically the subunits of empire ndash down to constituent families and newlyemerging associations ndash were assuming human security roles that further reducedpowers of the state

Similar to the Catholic papacy the Chinese imperial state had adapted to cir-cumstances over many centuries yet remained faithful to central dogma PhilipKuhn examined some of the challenges to the empire at the end of the eighteenthcentury (Kuhn 2002) Although the European Industrial Revolution had not yetpropelled Western commercial interests into the Far East with the ferocity to beexperienced half a century later Enlightenment ideas diffused into China andaffected currents of thought As Kuhn notes ldquoPolitical activists of the nineteenthcentury were already dealing with questions of participation competition andcontrol in the context of conditions inherited from the eighteenth century and ear-lierrdquo (Kuhn 2002 1ndash2) Two major thinkers of the late Qing period Wei Yuan andFeng Guifen (1809ndash74) advocated reform of the Confucian system of governmentby making it more accountable and also by broadening the political elites withoutcompounding factionalism Innate conservatism of a system that had workedfairly well and the entrenched interests of office-holders postponed reforms untilthe ending decades of the dynastic empire well after it was too late

Before a new Chinese Republic could become reality as MSNS sovereigntyhad to be realized [Sa] not merely claimed [Sc] As events demonstrated a merechange in the form of government at the center was inadequate Moreover globalevents accelerated faster than the Chinese reformers and revolutionaries couldcope First Japanrsquos transformation and aggressive imperialism demonstrated thatICS2 was stagnating in its final decades Second industrialization and globaliza-tion were creating two Chinas ndash the traditional agricultural gentry-dominatedsocietyndasheconomy embedded in fragmented state remnants dominated by localand regional military and an emerging urban industrialndashcommercial nexus linkedto centers in the advanced industrial world Third World War I and the Russianrevolution forced the Chinese modernizing elites to rethink their assumptions andvision about the future place of China in the international order Parliamentarydemocracy which had seemed the dominant and progressive state-form of thenineteenth century was shown to have fatal contradictions and failed to meet theneeds of China in its disarray World War I emphasized the power of popularnationalism and the ability of states to mobilize their resources for war But thewar itself was based on imperialism according to Lenin and Chinese revolution-aries saw capitalist imperialism as a major source of their own subordination inthe world order

Leninrsquos leadership of the Russian revolution was undoubtedly an inspiration toa segment of the politically active Chinese intelligentsia It provided an analysisof capitalist imperialism and more importantly a method to combat it Thatmethod consisted of a united and disciplined revolutionary party The


Guomindang had been reorganized from a revolutionary conspiratorial Party intoa vote-seeking parliamentary Party for the 1912 elections With Yuanrsquos coup theGuomindang had to flee the capital In the wake of the May Fourth Movement of1919 the party once again reorganized but along lines of Leninrsquos Bolshevism

The sixteen-year span of the RNS3 was a critical stage in the evolution of themeta-constitutions that followed It was an attempt to establish a Chinese versionof the European liberal state and with an eye on the Japanese success in nation-building It marked the beginning of the modern Chinese syndrome of seekingand emulating successful models of state modernization although the GRS4 andthe MCS6 drew inspiration equally from domestic sources ndash the Guomindangeclectically from the ICS2 and RNS3 and the Maoists from a combination of historical peasant rebellions and the Paris commune Modern Chinese state-buildinghas been seven parts eclecticism and three parts pragmatism ndash a slightly more pre-cise formulation of the late Qing motto ldquoChinese learning for essence Westernlearning for practicerdquo (zhongxue wei ti xixue wei yong)

We can translate the key Chinese state-building events into human security elements

Human security of individualspersons

The late Qing period saw increasing institutional vulnerability to foreign ideasand while the failure to adapt to external pressures contributed to ICS2 collapsestate centralization was never so complete that dynastic failure would demolishsociety The cellular nature of Chinese society based on trade and clan networksenabled it to function adequately in the absence of imperial coordination (thoughdecentralization tended to exacerbate local and regional inequalities) increasingthe coefficient of political friction [PF] and reducing the ability of central gov-ernment to protect territory from external penetration

For the Chinese masses the passage of a dynasty had little immediate effect Withimperial decline the connections between the national polity and families furtherweakened and loosened Individuals were more likely to survive and prosper withinthe traditional household than relying on the state Against the devastating rebellionsof the nineteenth century local clans organized for their own self-defenseIntensification of consanguine ties and alliances through marriage no doubt strength-ened orientation and obligation away from the state and in favor of family [F]

Events in late Qing also affected the content and status of social and politicalknowledge For decades knowledge from and about the West had penetratedChina gradually displacing contradicting and occasionally reinforcing Chineseknowledge Missionary schools new universities translations of Western booksand promulgation of cheap publications all had their effect on dispersion of newknowledge Hong Xiuquan the founder of the Taiping sect had been inspired bya Christian biblical tract given him by a foreign missionary The elimination of theimperial examinations removed a key incentive for the study of Confucianismafter the traditional status ladder was removed With the breakdown of imperialorder the natural environment became more dangerous with floods drought andvagaries of weather interfering with food production Imperial coordination of


relief irrigation flood control and food storage was no longer assured andthreats of local famines became more common

The half century to 1949 was a time of political breakdown civil wars andJapanese invasion but still Chinarsquos population growth continued unabated AngusMaddison provides relevant demographic figures (Maddison 1998 169)

Year Population Decade increase (calculated)(in millionsrounded off )

1900 4001910 423 231920 472 491930 489 171940 519 301950 547 28

A preliminary conclusion based on these raw numbers is that the overall humansecurity of China ndash preservation of life ndash did not come to an end with the break-down of the ICS2 nor did failures of the RNS3 and GRS4 halt population growthThe centralized Chinese state was not a primary component of human securityduring the post-imperial period and reflects the genius of Chinese social organi-zation (derived from centuries of Confucian-inspired familism) to maintain thelives of individuals through their social existence as persons If a unified Chinesestate is not critical to human security of Chinese then other rationales must beexplored The most obvious is that a fragmented polity would likely witness rapideconomic progress of some provinces and regions while others would fall behindwithout a strong central government to allocate resources and impose roughequality on all citizens The regions of western China might reclaim their centralAsian character with increasing divergence between coastal and interior Chinaresulting in greater inter-regional conflict (increased [PF])

Human security in society

Chinese society had sustained life and absorbed non-Han trespassers successfullythroughout its history and the period between Han and Sui demonstrated theadaptability of that society despite weak state superstructure However the infil-tration of new ideas and values and the devaluation of the Confucian gentry itsmoral code and its historical mission of sustaining empire combined to militateagainst resurrection of the ICS2 Instead twentieth-century China has searched fora state-form that could provide a higher level of human security than a statelesssociety and could deliver all the benefits of welfare and power of the MSNSUntil the post-1949 meta-constitutions of Chinese Communism the RNS3 andGRS4 had sought to provide the shell of the MSNS with minimum tampering inChinese society The result of Republican minimalism was the failure to strikevery deep roots in that society


Human security under RNS3

Human security in Chinese society under the ineffective RNS3 may be summarizedwithin the scope of Formula Two

Liberty [L]

The breakdown of ICS2 released social elites from previous restraints and wasthus an increase in Liberty [Ls] and [Lp] For women the promise of a liberalMSNS for China was that they would no longer be forced to bind their feet ormarry a husband chosen by parents or relatives They could seek modern educa-tion and travel more freely though they could not vote in RNS3 Men would nolonger be instruments of family could discuss and participate in politics andcould travel abroad Gentry sons would no longer have to spend their youths andadulthood studying Confucian classics and preparing for imperial examinationsThey could seek careers in commerce become wealthy and marry for romanticlove if they chose Far fewer changes had occurred in rural and small-town Chinaand the old-line gentry tried to retain their local power (Spence 1990 279) Infact much of the RNS3 promise was unfulfilled ndash and the GRS4 proved onlyslightly more active in changing social mores

Knowledge [Ks]

The rapid infiltration of Western knowledge began in mid-nineteenth centurycarried by missionaries scientists teachers and publications Industrial technol-ogy accelerated change in Chinese society although it aroused opposition fromthose fearful of structural unemployment ndash porters rickshaw drawers and barge-pullers among others Machines would displace men and social unrest would soarMedical science was a gateway to cures and preventions but a threat to practi-tioners of traditional medicine The baihua (Chinese vernacular) language move-ment was simplifying the written language making literacy more available to themasses and was no longer the preserve of the literati elite

Social economy [Es]

Western trade and diminishing costs of travel and transportation facilitated over-seas markets The passing of the Confucian order lifted the status repression ofmerchants and business became an attractive activity for many sons who earlierwould have aspired to literati-official status The modern corporation penetratedChina as a form of business organization though the family-owned firmremained the dominant pattern

Social friction coefficient [SF]

Growing awareness of class distinctions in part inspired by imported Westernperspectives of democracy and Marxism raised resentments and anxieties over


disparities of wealth and status Urbanndashrural cleavages increased especiallybetween the Western-dominated cities (with Shanghai as the leading prototype)and the interior areas where banditry was often endemic A new modern militaryclass dominated by the Beiyang group had emerged in late Qing and held swayover much of rural China and their subfactions often engaged in wars and mutualmaneuvering

The actual sovereignty of RNS3 while slightly enhanced by positive liberty ofpersons within society was more diminished by the fragmentation of obligation[Oc] to the new state which resulted from redirection of personal inputs to government to local authorities The role of the military [M] which was humansecurity positive when defending territory and security of the state became anegative element in RNS3 sovereignty Political friction [PF] between the consti-tutionalists (led by the Guomindang) and the Beiyang clique was high ExternalRelations [ER] was another Achilles heel of RNS3 and the major powers ndash especiallyJapan ndash created further impediments to full sovereignty The transfer of sovereignty from the Qing monarchy to the constitutional Republic in 1912 trans-formed hundreds of millions of Chinese subjects into citizens In theory loyaltyto the dynasty was transformed into rights and obligations within the new stateIn reality little had changed for the vast majority with tax and labor obligationsrendered to local and provincial authorities ndash usually warlords or foreigners inthe case of concessions In summary the actualized sovereignty of RNS3

remained weak and continued to manifest the decentralization that had started inthe late Qing period

Actualizing sovereignty in GRS4

The Guomindang created its own fighting force with Jiang Jieshi (Chiang Kai-shek) as commander establishing a military academy at Whampoa to train a newofficer corps The nationalist party launched its Northern Expedition fromCanton in 1926 and its armies were joined by friendly militarists from Guangxias well as the Communist Party of China The mission of the military phase of thenationalist revolution was threefold

to defeat or absorb the local and regional military forces nominally loyal toBeijing and the dominant Beiyang clique

to avoid confrontation with foreign troops or damage to foreign interests and to establish Guomindang authority in all captured territory

By the end of December 1926 the Nationalists had controlled seven provinceswith a population of about 170 million Of prime importance in this success inonly six months was the ldquotwo years of training and equipping the originalNational Revolutionary Army with Russian help and the battle-hardening ofcampaigns in Kwangtung (Guangdong) during 1925 Another was the politicalindoctrination of troops and officers giving them the cause for which to fight ndashessentially an ardent spirit of nationalismrdquo (Wilbur 1983 62) Also important was


the fiscal reform carried out in Guangdong Russian advisors played an importantrole in campaigns and each corps had Russian advisors as did some of the divisions

The Northern Expedition consisted of two major phases First the southernbase of the state had to be secured Two armies marched from Guangzhou(Canton) ndash one proceeded to Wuhan which became the seat of the provisionalgovernment Wuhan was important as the gateway to the upper Yangzi valley aswell as a growing industrial commercial communication and transportation cen-ter Its capture by Guangxi General Bai Zhongxi secured the inland seaport andthe southern terminus of the railway connecting to North China and BeijingFrom Wuhan the Nationalist armies proceeded downriver to Nanjing and thegrand prize Shanghai Another army was proceeding along the coast throughFujian and Zhejiang in a pincer movement capturing Shanghai in April 1927 TheChinese Communists who had joined with the Guomindang in a United Front onthe instructions of the Soviets had intended to seize power once the Nationalistscompleted the military unification of the country Jiang Jieshi moved first killedhundreds of Communists and their supporters and brought an end to the alliance

The second phase began shortly afterward with Nationalist columns using thetwo major NorthndashSouth railways to speed their progress The Shanxi warlord YanXishan used his own narrow-gauge railway track to retreat and avoid defeatwhile on the eastern front Nationalist forces sidetracked upstream from Jinan tocross the Yellow River so as to avoid clashing with Japanese forces GeneralZhang Zuolin supported by Japan withdrew from Beijing and was assassinatedin a train explosion while escaping The capture of the national capital marked theend of the second phase of the Northern Expedition With occupation of the majorurban centers by Nationalist troops and the shedding of Communist allies thenew GRS4 was recognized by the major powers The Japanese were most con-cerned at Nanjingrsquos threat to their special interests and as the Chinese governmentbegan plans to develop Manchuria in league with the deceased warlordrsquos sonZhang Xueliang they attacked and set up the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1931

When the Nationalist army entered Beijing the Republic had an opportunityfor a fresh start The government established in Nanjing followed Sun Yat-senrsquosdesign Western-trained bankers and financiers joined the government to establisha new currency and banking system and to build the credit of a state desperatelyin need of foreign investment and loans Unlike the Bolsheviks who repudiatedWestern loans when they came to power the Nationalists accepted RNS3 debtburdens in order to expedite international recognition and avoid the difficultiesMoscow faced in its early years

The impact of the Nationalist Republic on development of the Chinese MSNShas been controversial For critics (Eastman 1990) the Nationalist revolution wasa misguided and failed attempt to seize central power This author (Bedeski 1981)explained the Nanjing state as essentially sound but failing in large part becauseof overwhelming external threats to its tenuous sovereignty ndash including Japaneseexpansionism neglect by the major powers and international economic depres-sion Once momentum of Guomindang state-building was interrupted in


the 1930s and with major loss of territory to Japan the movement suffered severedesiccation and demoralization Before World War II the Nanjing Republic haddefeated or neutralized most of the assorted warlords and gained internationalcredibility during the war In these ways the Guomindang not only initiated a sec-ond modern state-building project of China (after RNS3) but constructed the plat-form of actualized sovereignty upon which the Communists could establish theirmeta-constitution(s) The accomplishments of GRS4 by 1945 were ldquoFirst the ter-ritorial fragments of the Republic were significantly but not totally integratedinto a unified state system Second the Guomindang established the institu-tions and priorities of the modern Chinese state Finally the Nationalists wereable to increase the international stature of China and to secure the removal ofmost of the unequal treatiesrdquo (Bedeski 1992 47ndash8)

Military primacy in GRS4 unification [M]

Jiang Jieshi has been blamed as the man who lost China yet his accomplishmentsunder most difficult circumstances remain underrated His use of railways infighting warlord enemies on several fronts was an innovation in Chinese warfareHis pursuit of Communists on their Long March enabled the Guomindang toimpose authority on the wayward provinces of the southwest (Chang 2005135ndash7) Scorned by patriotic youths for attacking Chinese Communists whileavoiding confrontation with the Japanese armies Jiang Jieshi responded that theJapanese were a ldquodisease of the skin while the Communists were a disease of theheartrdquo ndash a metaphor that proved accurate Succeeding to the mantle of Sun Yat-sen after outmaneuvering two nonmilitary rivals Wang Jingwei and Hu HanminJiang focused on securing the territory of the state ndash pursuing the consolidationof the revolution Sun had termed ldquomilitary governmentrdquo (zhunzheng) ndash a neces-sary transition to increase political order and [Sa] for the next phase ndash politicaltutelage (xunzheng) which would be followed by constitutional government(xianzheng) The promised transition of the Republic began fulfillment after thewar but reached fruition only in Taiwan where democracy has opened thePandorarsquos Box of self-determination

External relations [ER]

On balance the mainland RNS3 was partially successful in transforming the col-lapsed Qing Empire into a proto-MSNS After the false start of 1911 theGuomindang restructured itself along Leninist lines and built a formidable armythat defeated or absorbed warlord armies plaguing the country Shortly after itsestablishment the new Nanjing government embarked on programs of nationalconstruction and planned demobilization of millions of men under armsRegional militarist resistance and the growing threat of Japan postponed the program of domestic disarmament and eclipsed what should have been the periodof ldquoPolitical Tutelagerdquo in preparation for the final period of full constitutionalgovernment


Did the Great Powers fail China By issuing the Open Door notes the UnitedStates and Great Britain prevented other powers from carving up the country intoseparate colonies and gave the empire another decade of reprieve to get its housein order As Europe fell into two great wars their overseas empires and mutualcompetition narrowed their field of vision while Japan took advantage of oppor-tunities presented by events The Twenty-One Demands the transfer of Germanconcessions to Japan after the war and the failure of the League of Nations totake action against Japanrsquos takeover of Manchuria all indicated the demise ofinternationalism and primacy of national interests and nationalism in the twentiethcentury Japan had benefited from the Powersrsquo neglect in the nineteenth centurywhile China suffered from it in the twentieth Japan became one of the GreatPowers and forced concessions from a weak China with its new status Moreoverthe global economic depression the failures of international cooperation and therise of fascism made interventionism on behalf of democracy or against aggres-sion unlikely in that era

Within a year of GRS4 establishment stock markets crashed in the West andthe international depression brought new problems for Nationalist China The oldindustrial states tightened control of their empires and erected tariff barriersagainst other empires and states while the later industrializers built new empires ndashnotably Italy Germany and Japan For Japan China offered the best prospect ofan expanded empire ndash euphemistically termed ldquoGreater East Asia Co-ProsperitySphererdquo Militant fascism and ultranationalism combined to propel the Japanesefrom their colony in Korea into Manchuria and then into north China and finallyall of eastern China and into Southeast Asia Their advance into Mongolia wasrepulsed at the 1939 battle of Halhin Gol (known as Nomonhan in Japan) by com-bined Russian and Mongolian forces By pushing the Nationalist forces intosouthwestern China the Japanese rolled back whatever authority theGuomindang had established in north China and created opportunities for theCommunists to fill the vacuum Moreover the Nationalist revolution was onlypartially completed ndash leaving numerous militarists in power as long as they nom-inally accepted Nanjing authority

Jiang Jieshi had few illusions about Nanjingrsquos ability to defend the Republicagainst Japan and hoped that the Soviet Union would be forced into the fightagainst the anti-Comintern Pact on all fronts Richard Sorge the GermanCommunist spy in Japan2 kept Moscow informed of Japanese conditions andintentions Stalin thought that as long as the Japanese armies were tied down inChina and Southeast Asia they were less of a threat to the Soviet Far East A fewdays before Japan surrendered the Soviet Union sent her troops against theJapanese ndash as promised at Potsdam ndash and reaped immense rewards ndash including theKuriles the Northern Territories North Korea and much industrial equipmentand material from Japanese-occupied Manchuria Jiangrsquos only consolation wasthat Stalin continued to recognize the Nationalists as the legitimate governmentof China after the war

Survival and consolidation of the Republic required diplomacy The GreatPowers had emasculated China in the late Qing and Japan tried to incorporate


whole regions of China into her own empire Although the United States andWestern Europe cautiously welcomed the Chinese Nationalist revolution supportwas largely symbolic When Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931 the League ofNations did little of substance Only the Soviet Union provided aid and support tothe southern revolutionaries largely for their own geostrategic reasons NeitherPresident Roosevelt (FDR) nor his emissaries understood the precariousness ofthe Nationalist revolution and wanted Jiang to wage war on the Japanese invadersto bolster the American efforts ndash a not unreasonable hope but unrealistic giventhe adumbrated authority of the central government after Japan had occupied theeastern population centers With the defeat of Japan in 1945 it was not longbefore civil war broke out between Nationalists and Communists TheGuomindang was unable to regain the eacutelan and momentum of the early 1930s andlost a series of battles evacuating to Taiwan in 1949

While the Communists consolidated their hold on the mainland theGuomindang transformed Taiwan into an island fortress to withstand the antici-pated final assault to destroy the last vestige of the GRS4 Within nine months ofBeijingrsquos occupation by Maorsquos forces the Korean War broke out and China wassoon engaged in war with the United States forcing the postponement of Taiwanrsquosldquoliberationrdquo The Guomindang settled in and after initial harsh measures to secureits base launched a series of economic reforms which transformed the formerJapanese colony into a free market and industrial dynamo Following withdrawalfrom the United Nations in 1971 and de-recognition by the United States (1979)Taiwan began a series of political reforms that have made it one of the mostdemocratic polities in Asia

The Nationalist geostrategy of national unification

Looking backward the Republican interregnum between 1911 and 1949 was aperiod of massive adaptation Chinese losses in the late nineteenth centurydemonstrated that the ICS2 imperial meta-constitution was no longer relevant asblueprint for the Chinese state The experiments in republicanism failed to builda Chinese MSNS that could resume governance in no small part due to height-ened vulnerability to foreign predation natural disaster and new strains ofthought ndash including Communism fascism democracy Christianity and evenanarchism As well new technology tools of commerce modes of associationand markets changed society and economy from below in ways that would nothave been possible had the dynasty been in full control Unlike the OttomanEmpire a multiethnic meacutelange held together by sword and religion the Chineseempirersquos territory coincided with a relatively homogeneous people united by cul-ture and a three thousand year history The problem for a new dynasty or regimewas to identify a new set of commonalities that would unite the population andreplace the shattered imperial meta-constitution

Military unification and conquest of past empires had come from the north orwest By the end of the nineteenth century Chinarsquos economic and political centerof gravity had moved eastward and southward Beijing may have been the cockpit


of warlord politics and foreign embassies but Shanghai Wuhan and Guangzhouemerged as key commercial and population centers where the interface betweenChinese and foreigners was producing new wealth and a core of new politicalpower Landlocked plains of Shanxi and Sichuan where dynastic struggles had set-tled Chinarsquos dynastic history for millennia became backwaters of state formation

The foreign concessions as symbols of foreign humiliation were sanctuariesof law and order from corrupt local officials bandits and warlords as well asnuclei of modernity These capitalist havens represented an emerging new Chinawhere science democracy Christianity and cosmopolitanism beckoned to thosewho were despondent with old China Coastal China and the littoral of the Yangzi(Van Slyke 1988) and West Rivers from Dalian to Guangzhou flourished andnourished seedlings of the new China connected by steam shipping linked tointernational markets and providing entry points for foreign merchants and mis-sionaries Railways linked the interior cities creating a new geography that thenationalist Northern Expedition used to extend the [Sa] of GRS4

Southern China was the primary base of GRS4 The new capital Nanjing com-manded the waters and connecting railways of the Yangzi basin Triangular communication among Shanghai Wuhan and Guangzhou was unreliable Largevessels traveled from Wuhan to Shanghai and to Guangzhou via river and oceanFrom Wuhan to Guangzhou however waterways railway and roads were inade-quate or absent The 1911 revolt against the Qing had been triggered over financ-ing of a railway between the two centers It was the vital third leg of theGuomindang territorial triangle whose interior provided base areas for theCommunists who had been ousted from their urban bases Jiang Jieshirsquos cam-paigns against the Communists in their Jiangxi base and subsequent pursuit ofthem on their Long March thus served the geostrategic purpose of consolidatingvital territory Once the southern interior was controlled by Nanjing a solidsouthern state stretching from Sichuan to Shanghai would contain the wealthiestand most populous and most defensible parts of China Japanese advances from1931 were resisted but the Nationalist armies were little match and the dikes ofthe Yellow River were breached to halt the Japanese and caused vast death andsuffering to millions of Chinese By 1939 much of northern and eastern Chinawas Japanese-occupied forcing the Nationalists to retreat to the southwestGuerrillas in occupied China harassed Japanese forces but the Nationalists werediscredited by quisling Wang Jingwei who used Nationalist symbols and hisassociation with Sun Yat-sen to legitimize a collaborationist regime (Boyle 1972)

Similar to the southern Song dynasty the Nationalist government in exile hadlegitimacy of historical lineage though constitutional rather than dynastic ldquoSungTrsquoai-tsu was a prudent and clever statesman who saw the folly of trying prema-turely to regain territories lost to the Chrsquoitan and the Tanguts His first prioritywas to centralize and stabilize North Chinardquo (Hucker 1975 269) We can note thesimilarity to Jiang Jieshi in the south during the early 1930s Like the Songdynasty the Nationalists lacked capacity to mount a full counterattack against theinvaders could only defend what they occupied and hope for a change in fortunes For the Guomindang this change occurred when the Japanese fatally


overreached themselves at Pearl Harbour and brought the United States into thewar From that time Jiang could devote his energies to rebuilding his nationalarmy undermining the Communists and insuring that Chinarsquos national interestswere promoted at the wartime and post-war conferences despite FDRrsquos pressuresto mount more offensives against the Japanese Jiang calculated that the Japanesedays of glory were numbered and that the real battle for supremacy would beagainst the Communists

In the civil war between the Communists and Nationalists the latter had a num-ber of significant advantages Guomindang military forces remained largelyintact during the war and were augmented by American aid They controlled themajor lines of communication and quickly reoccupied the cities TheCommunists on the other hand received little support from the Soviet Unionwhich had been busy fighting the Germans Before the war Maorsquos partisans hadshifted their strategy from class struggle to patriotic resistance and challenged theNationalists to give up their campaign to exterminate Communism Jiang Jieshireluctantly relented during his captivity in the Xian Incident of 1936 During theanti-Japanese resistance the Communists based their strategy on the countrysidethe rural areas where 80 of Chinarsquos population lived and worked

The failure of the Nationalists to win the civil war could be attributed to sev-eral factors

Using a strategy of controlling railways and cities that had worked in theNorthern Expedition against warlords but was counterproductive againstrural guerrilla tactics of the CCP

Failing to control runaway inflation which ruined many capitalist supportersof the regime and destroyed government fiscal credit and credibility

Failure to win adequate foreign support for the regime The Guomindanglater blamed the Yalta Agreement between Stalin and FDR for theCommunist sanctuary it created in the northeast

Failure to mobilize peasant and intelligentsia support for the Nationalist state

Perhaps the fundamental flaw of Jiang Jieshi was to treat the nation-building taskin 1945 as a continuation of the Northern Expeditionrsquos second phase and not rec-ognize that the Guomindang no longer monopolized the nationalist messageWartime anti-Japanese resistance of the Communists in North China certifiedthem as front-line fighters at one with the peasantry Their ldquohearts and mindrdquomobilization was highly effective while Jiang Jieshi continued his chessboardstrategy of seizing key points to exercise sovereignty For the millions of peasantsunder arms during and after the anti-Japanese war the Communists promiseddirect benefits The Nationalists initially won battles but lost the war The largerhistorical issue was the failure of GRS4 to complete actualization of Chinese sov-ereignty and to create a viable MSNS which can be attributed to several factors

A century of decline and dissipation of ICS2 created a monumental task forthe Guomindang under the best of circumstances The erosion of the Qing


dynasty began in the early 1800s Subsequent developments including theOpium Wars the unequal treaties the Taiping and Nian rebellions and theBoxer uprisings demonstrated the increasing inability of the Manchu gov-ernment to provide basic security to the empire Imperial weakness encour-aged foreign predatory states to seek concessions and advantages at Chinarsquosexpense and became a negative object lesson for the Meiji reformers on thecosts of nonmodernization By 1911 the imperial government was a shadowof the great reigns of emperors Qianlong and Kangxi as it sought an exten-sion of its mandate by approving constitutional changes ndash too little and toolate The RNS3 faced a near-impossible task of constructing a MSNS out ofthe ruins of the monarchy with actual sovereignty dissipated among variousregional warlords

A legacy of foreign intervention limited the freedom of the Guomindangto complete the sovereign state The first unequal treaties3 were imposedon China after the Opium Wars This extraterritoriality meant that for-eigners in China would be tried in courts and under laws of their homecountries for crimes committed in China China was also not allowed toset tariff rates for imports Furthermore a system of concessions ndash virtualcolonies ndash was set up on Chinese territory Not abrogated until the early1940s ndash while China was under occupation by the Japanese ndash these restrictionson Chinese sovereignty belied Wilsonian proclamations of internationalequality

Even before the full Japanese invasions from 1937 the Guomindang wasat war against two military enemies which postponed peaceful reconstruc-tion of the state Although the Northern Expedition had nominally defeatedor absorbed major warlords the continued existence of their provincialpower and armies rendered their support tenuous and undependable Thesecond enemy was the most intractable ndash the Communists had been part-ners of the Guomindang until Jiang Jieshi preemptively (1927) launched acoup against them to prevent a Soviet-backed takeover of the Nationalistrevolution Subsequently the Communists fled to the rural hinterlandslaunched several abortive uprisings and established their own ldquosovietsrdquowith militias and armies Nanjing launched a series of extermination cam-paigns to clear out the Communists Many criticized the Guomindang forits apparent fixation on destroying the remnants of the ldquorural reformersrdquo atthe expense of other more pressing problems of state-building ndash such asresisting the Japanese Jiang had seen their infiltration into theGuomindang labor unions rural institutions and the intelligentsia afterparty formation in 1921 Stalin and Trotsky intended the CCP to be thevehicle for extending the Bolshevik revolution into Asia and continuationof the Guomindang (GMD)ndashCCP united front would have earned furtherhostility and opposition from anti-Communist anti-Russian Britain andJapan In their retreat and exile from the major cities the growingCommunist strength in the rural areas of south-central China interferedwith Nanjing consolidation of territory The core power base was the lower


Yangzi River basin from Wuhan to Shanghai It was relatively wealthy andthe rivers could transport troops to hot spots The second leg of the basewas the coastal connection between Shanghai and Canton (Guangzhou) Toclose this triangle by land required completion of the railway connectingWuhan and Guangzhou ndash through hinterlands infested with bandits andcommunists Similar to the Southern Song dynasty4 the Nanjing govern-ment fought to regain lost lands Jiang Jieshi avoided fighting a hamstrungwar by taking control of the government himself eclipsing his rivals WangJingwei and Hu Han-min

The timing of the Nationalist revolution was not fortuitous in terms of inter-national events Japanese modernization in the late nineteenth century wasconducive to forming a state that mimicked the European counterparts ndashindustrialized and liberal at home (based on law and constitution) expansiveand colonizing abroad In contrast the European blows to ICS2 failed to stim-ulate major reform as in Japan but had the opposite effect of eroding theChinese state during one of its periodic dynastic declines Those injurieseven adding Japan as one of the injuring parties not only undermined theQing Empire but also dissolved much legitimacy remaining to the traditionalsystem A further example of ill-timing was the victory of the Nationalistrevolution just a year prior to the global depression which stimulated theindustrial nations to renounce free trade in favor of high tariffs and to aban-don the gold standard ndash both of which wrought severe damage on Chinarsquosfragile trade and investment picture Finally the initial optimism of imple-menting constitutional democracy in the Guomindang Republic was quicklysuffocated by the rise of international communism and fascism eclipsing theattractions of liberal democracy as desired state-form When conditions for afully sovereign democracy emerged after World War II the Guomindang wassuffering from demoralization in contrast to the energizing effects of peaceon the Communists History was cruel to GRS4 and by 1949 it appeared onthe brink of extinction

Evaluating GRS4 ndash Formula Three

The GRS4 was at its [Sa] high point during the decade 1928ndash37 but never gainedfull control of continental China It continues existence today on Taiwan and hasadapted to new political and social conditions notably democratization and tol-erance of a much more Taiwanese orientation The Nationalist movement intro-duced the GRS4 meta-constitution to China and imposed it until evicted out ofeastern China by Japanese invasion After the Japanese defeat in 1945 theNationalist Republic attempted to resume its control of territory ruled by dynas-ties since Qin but was ousted from the mainland by the Communists in 1949 TheRepublican meta-constitution survives and flourishes in Taiwan today althoughits future may be precarious in the face of a vanishing hope of reinstalling a ThreePeoplersquos Principles-based government on the mainland


Recapitulation of GRS4

The major dimensions of GRS4 actual sovereignty can be inventoried in FormulaThree

[Sa] (HSp Op) Ep M PF ER

Herein [Sa] of GRS4 is a function of

[HSp] the human security of persons The conditions of legal order con-ducive to peaceful commerce and economic production were weak through-out China though more evident in foreign-controlled areas Banditryconfiscation floods and famines plagued many communities Entrepreneursand intellectuals found the foreign enclaves more stable and open than theterritory nominally held by the Guomindang One must conclude that citizenship in GRS4 brought few benefits of security to most persons living inChina during its mainland tenure

[Op] obligation to the state Despite party dictatorship control of the edu-cation system a new taxation apparatus and other institutions of governmentthat were emerging most Chinese had only a tenuous sense of identificationwith GRS4 and thus relatively little commitment to its success Family clanand local institutions were more immediate and durable than the distantNanjing government Patriotic orientation to a national entity called ldquoChinardquoand the concomitant obligations to participate in politics pay taxes obeylaws and serve in the military remained undeveloped Unlike ICS2 whichinterwove religion monarchy the literatibureaucracy and family into acohesive fabric the GRS4 remained completely secular had a President wholacked the mystique of the Son of Heaven recruited a bureaucracy based onconnections or specialized skills and often used family connections in publicaffairs ndash a major source of corruption Political Obligation [Op] for most cit-izens remained tentative or nonexistent while a significant minority led andcontrolled by the Communists actively opposed GRS4 Thus obligation tosupport the GRS4 was a weak though slightly positive vector

[Ep] political economy Optimism and a flurry of major new developmentprojects characterized the early Nanjing government but national defensespending and global depression accompanied by major natural disastersnegated the initial positive outlook Continued foreign control of tariffs andhigh-value industries further decreased the positive effect of the modernnational government Abolition of the likin (internal transit duties) helpedsomewhat but enforcement remained difficult The loss of Manchuria toJapan in 1931 removed a major area of agriculture resources and industryfrom Nanjing control These factors indicate a negative trend of politicaleconomy during GRS4

[M] military force No state can emerge without a unified military forceto protect its territory defend peace and order and enforce decisions of


government The demise of the Qing era of ICS2 had been preceded by persistent weakening of its military capacity and fragmentation of author-ity among provincial militarists The superiority of foreign armies wasdemonstrated several times and in the Qing humiliation of the empire in theSino-Japanese War (1894ndash95) After the ineffective RNS3 the GRS4 wasestablished by force of arms Jiang Jieshi dominated as leader of the GRS4

as commander of the army and led in defeating major warlords and oustingthe Communists from eastern China Overwhelmed by Japanese forces hisarmies lost the momentum gained in the unification period prior to 1937Incomplete military control of Chinese territory by the Nanjing governmentwas the most important element in Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty

PF political friction With weak and diminished government authority inmany parts of the country plus the proliferation of arms and soldiers policyconflicts in Nanjing often erupted into fighting between the center and variousmilitarists Party congresses became the creature of the presidential factionwhile defections exiles and assassinations of dissidents were commonFactions within the military and party demanded a strong man take com-mand though military dictatorship alienated many supporters of theGuomindang Provincial militarists often had their own networks of supportwhich enabled them to resist central command In 1934 Nanjing launched anew campaign against the Communists who had broken out of the encirclementand embarked on the so-called Long March Nationalist armies pursued andinstalled Nanjing officials enroute to bring the wayward provinces under central control Having enjoyed autonomy for more than two decades a num-ber of provinces resisted recentralization Political friction between theprovinces and central government party and army various party factions andlocal gentry and provincial authorities rendered mobilization of Chinarsquospolitical economic and social resources for national survival and modern-ization extremely difficult Political factions have been a common feature ofConfucian and post-Confucian societies of East Asia (Moody 1988 7ndash8) Atthe zenith of GRS4 ideology and interests created cleavages which under-mined the effectiveness of the Nationalist revolution The party dissipatedenergy and resources in factional struggle after the death of Sun and elimi-nation of warlords was one of the few points of agreement among theGuomindang leadership (Tien 1972 8ndash11) One leader Wang Jingwei laterbecame a Japanese puppet during the occupation Another party notable HuHanmin actively opposed Jiang Jieshi up to his death in 1936 Both left andright wings viewed Jiang as a new warlord and feared he would militarize therevolution and fundamentally distort Sun Yat-senrsquos vision for a new China

The Guomindang was modeled after the (CPSU) with its formality of ldquodemoc-ratic centralismrdquo and reality of central dictatorship Jiang wished to accumulatethe power of a Lenin or Mussolini or Japanese shogun (a Japanese term meaningliterally ldquogeneralrdquo) but the reality of foreign concessions warlords Communistbases and dissension within the party made it impossible To neutralize and


overcome the multiple centrifugal forces tearing China apart a supreme dictatorwas needed Jiang identified his ambitions with Chinarsquos national interests and hiscommand of the national army facilitated the emerging authoritarian state inNanjing5 The party held its congresses and established government structures toreflect Sun Yat-senrsquos prescriptions and vowed to move to constitutional govern-ment as early as possible The incompleteness of Chinarsquos actualized sovereigntyhowever meant that Nanjingrsquos enemies ndash including the regional militarists ndash pro-vided sanctuaries for dissidents and rebels Political friction was constant and thecombination of undeveloped democratic institutions national fragmentation andthe suspicion of an agreed effective head of government with concentrated pow-ers exacerbated quarrels within the state The Guomindangrsquos priority of nationalunification could only be accomplished by military means under the existing con-ditions of incomplete sovereignty

[ER] external relations

By the 1920s the foreign powers had possession and control of prime cities ofcoastal and interior China From the Nationalist perspective even foreignChristian missions were spearheads of Western imperialism since protection ofmissionaries was deemed to be a prime responsibility of governments Severalincidents of confrontation between Nationalist armies and foreigners occurred asthe latter claimed virtual sovereignty of territory within their spheres of influence

There was relatively little effort on the part of the foreign powers to facilitateChinarsquos transition to MSNS Diplomatic recognition of the GRS4 was temperedby experience of the Bolshevik revolution where the Soviet state had refused tohonor the debts incurred by the tsarist regime arguing that those moneys hadbeen used to repress the revolution and were thus null and void The Guomindangdeclared that the new government would accept the debts of previous govern-ments although this added considerable burdens to financial obligations Theprice of foreign normalization also included acceptance of the status quo of theforeign concessions although the British granted some minor retrocession of ter-ritories The Japanese were intractable and dominated whole provinces afterNanjing became the capital or they supported local warlords as proxies In exter-nal relations GRS4 was severely restricted from achieving full sovereignty overpeople and territory and suffered major diminution the area under its jurisdiction

Recognition of the Nationalist government in Nanjing required that Chinaaccept inferior status of reduced territory and unequal treaties Moreover itsantiCommunist policy was vital to assure support from Japan Great Britain andthe United States A bolshevized China would undermine the long-standing con-tainment of Russia that Britain had pursued since at least the Crimean War andJiang Jieshi was the most promising leader to continue this policy (Jiang mayhave been restrained from eradicating the Communist Party of China out of con-cern for his son Jiang Jingguo who was a virtual hostage in Moscow)

The GRS4 actualized sovereignty over contiguous territory under severe cir-cumstances The state became the core of the modern Chinese Republic with the


primary characteristics of a MSNS Had the Japanese not invaded and discreditedthe Guomindang giving the Communists a reprieve from destruction in 1936 andyears of opportunity to expand in north China the GRS4 might have reformeditself transforming into an authoritarian lsquothen democraticrsquo polity as it did on asmaller scale in Taiwan after 1949

The GRS4 demonstrated that China could be transformed into a MSNS underfavourable conditions The Guomindang weakened the regional militarists whodominated the country in the first decades of the century demonstrating an ability to prevent alliances and coalitions against the central government and inretrospect probably cleared the way for the rapid conquest of China by theCommunists after the war The Guomindang reestablished the principle of a unifiedChina under one government something that was not self-evident in the chaos ofCommunists warlords and foreign concessions The Communists claimed tolead a revolution but they also seized state power from the Guomindang ndash powerthat had been dearly paid for Had the Communists through a quirk of fate cometo power before the war they would have had to fight and defeat the warlords oneby one resist the invasion of the Japanese face even greater recalcitrance fromthe other major powers and had Stalinrsquos Soviet Union as its sole ally ndash an unlikelyformula for success

Claiming sovereignty [Sc]

The GRS4 claimed to be successor of the RNS3 Thus while actualized sover-eignty of GRS4 begins in 1928 its claimed sovereignty dates back to the begin-ning of RNS3 (1912 remains Year One for the GRS4 calendar on Taiwan) in whichthe earlier version of the Guomindang played a significant role in foundingHowever there were significant differences between the contents of these tworegimes ndash sufficient to distinguish them as meta-constitutions

Human security was the most important output of the traditional Chinese ICS2

meta-constitution which required [Sa] as precondition The fallback position wasthe core family unit of society so the Chinese state required no Hobbesian socialcontract to preserve life when actual sovereignty of the state collapsed or dimin-ished Family ndash not raw nature ndash was the alternative civil society without the stateWith the decline and demise of the Qing dynasty in the nineteenth centurytwenty-one centuries of political order based on imperial [Sc] and [Sa] terminatedIn its place Chinarsquos new elites attempted to graft the Europe-derived MSNS ontoChinese society with disappointing results Part of the problem was the durabil-ity of the old values and institutions which persisted decades after destruction ofthe monarchy Based on family relationships the fragmented social order wit-nessed neodynastic claims and coups by warlords and revolutionaries whileaggressive states fished in troubled waters

The postimperial Republic had to create a new meta-constitution which estab-lished a concept of citizenship and a legal system based on equality if Japanrsquossuccess were to be matched Chinarsquos challenge was to import the democraticlegalistic and individualistic European MSNS structure into a society which had


successfully maintained the human security of its subjects for two or more millenniawithout democracy strict rule of law and individualism There was the new andpowerful attraction of Japanese state-building or the Russian revolution or evenItalian fascism as shortcuts to the nation-state but the Guomindang led by SunYat-sen announced their end-vision as an American-type constitutional democ-racy with some traditional Chinese characteristics From 1926 until his death onTaiwan (April 5 1975) Jiang Jieshi maneuvered and fought to establish Sunrsquosenvisioned Republic as the Chinese MSNS Today it exists as the fragment of astate on Taiwan but also symbolizes the kind of state that might have emerged onthe mainland had the Guomindang been victorious

Pattern of claimed sovereignty The GRS4 meta-constitution

World War I and the Russian revolution were events that changed how Chinesepolitical actors viewed the MSNS The Western liberal state was no longer theapparently monolithic and invincible modern industrial military machine of thepast but had shattered its apparent unity and the component states of the West hadturned on each other thus weakening the Chinese adaptation of the MSNS(RNS3) of its legitimacy as state model The Russian revolution demonstratedhow a determined and disciplined party could seize state power and bend it to itsown vision The model of a revolutionary party with its own army inspired theGuomindang to adapt its organization to follow elements of the Bolshevik strategyand to ally with the CCP in a common goal of establishing a new state The mutualenemy of foreign interventions and native militarists united the Nationalists andCommunists in the unlikely alliance until the 1927 capture of Shanghai

Although Communists in China often claim to be carrying out Sun Yat-senrsquospolitical vision their core program of class struggle and subordination to theSoviet Union was at odds with the umbrella nationalism of the GuomindangMoreover despite undeniable revolutionary credentials Sunrsquos program called forselective restoration of ICS2 institutions ndash notably the civil service examinationsand censorate ndash in his design for a five-power constitution His plans for govern-ment borrowed from the United States with three of the powers being the execu-tive legislative and judicial Yuan or Councils For the sake of revolutionarysuccess the Guomindang was reorganized from a democratic electioneering partyinto a Leninist agitprop organization to seize and manage state power plus theaddition of a revolutionary army

Sunrsquos three-stage plan called for military unification political tutelage andfinally constitutional government Political tutelage was the Guomindangrsquosequivalent of the dictatorship of the proletariat of MarxismndashLeninism But unlikeCommunist states who allegedly await achievement of full Communism beforedissolving their dictatorship the Guomindang moved for abolition in word anddeed and despite incomplete [Sa] introduced democratic government on Taiwanin the 1980s partially forced by rising Taiwanese nationalism

Sun Yat-sen and the Nationalists sought to restore the order unity and stabilitythat had existed under the imperial meta-constitution while trying to import the


institutions that made the Western and more recently the Japanese MSNS pow-erful The Guomindang project was to create a substitute for the imperial meta-constitution not to abandon it totally In this the GRS4 shared a goal withtraditional dynastic founders ndash to reconstruct a unified political order that wouldprovide security for the Chinese people in their territory be strong enough toresist incursions from surrounding neighbors and harmonize with the cosmicorder except that in modern China the ldquocosmic orderrdquo has been replaced by aneverchanging ldquoglobal orderrdquo

Sun Yat-sen accepted social Darwinism as the new natural order ndash and to himChinarsquos (apparently) stagnant population indicated the nation was moving towardextinction as other nations increased their populations In fact Chinarsquos populationincreased from 423 million in 1910 to 546 million in 19506 and this was a periodof major outmigration There was little evidence of a stable population as Sun Yat-sen had claimed The average annual increase of 07 was below replacementgrowth by modern standards and would have led to population decrease As inprevious epochs when the state was weak intense family-based Chinese societyproved capable of providing considerable protection for persons The penetrationof Western science medicine and technology brought in benefits of modernitydespite little state sponsorship

The development of the GRS4 meta-constitution went through five overlappingstages First was the Beijing Republic (RNS3) established to replace the Qingmonarchy Second was the GuomindangNationalist government established inNanjing by revolution and conquest of the Northern Expedition Third was thewartime government in Chongqing while the eastern population centers wereoccupied by the Japanese and northern rural areas infiltrated by the CommunistsFourth from 1945ndash49 the Nationalist Republic reestablished itself in Nanjingbut was forced to fight a civil war against the Communists Fifth is the rump government in exile re-situated in Taiwan while claiming to represent the legiti-mate Republic of China

Having been at the brink of extinction in 1949 GRS4 was given new life in theSino-American hostilities of the Korean War and the Cold War that followedTaiwan became a symbolic bastion of democracy although until 1980s liberal-ization was democratic more in comparison to the Communist mainland than fit-ting the Western standard of democracy Taiwan became a key strategic link in theAmerican chain of allies and bases that stretched from the Aleutians throughJapan Okinawa Taiwan and the Philippines The United States switched torecognition of Beijing from Taipei in 1979 and Congress passed the TRA (TaiwanRelations Act) to provide weaponsrsquo sales and other links The Guomindang statewas forced by circumstances to adapt to international realities and maintained itscore ideas and also adopting authoritarianism as a transitional strategy to reachconstitutional government today Its survival as the ROCOT prevents the PRCfrom completion of [Sa] necessary to be a full MSNS

Multiple meta-constitutions in the twentieth century

Every state ndash notwithstanding the Hobbesian view as rational contract ndash is alegacy passed from one generation to the next and is based on inescapable history Twentieth-century China has witnessed a succession of state-buildingattempts each incorporating lessons and adapting institutions from what wereperceived the dominant and most successful on the global scale RNS3 was avariation of the liberal MSNS while GRS4 drew inspiration from Chinarsquos ownICS2 American democracy and several contemporary authoritarian statesincluding the Soviet Union In 1949 the SCS5 followed the USSR in importantdimensions ndash industrialization strategy Communist dictatorship as govern-ment central planning collectivization of agriculture cult of personality massive repression of ldquoclass enemiesrdquo and foreign policy After NikitaKhrushchevrsquos quasi-repudiation of Stalin Mao Zedong pursued establish-ment of MCS6 ndash an original state-form but one that proved corrosive anddestructive to human security Since the 1978 reforms DMS7 has modified orabandoned central features of its two predecessors with major success in modernization though China remains an incomplete MSNS without inclusionof Taiwan

The Communist victory in 1949 defeated GRS4 but did not destroy it for itestablished new [Sa] on Taiwan following fifty years of Japanese colonialoccupation The continued existence of the GRS4 meta-constitution based onactualized sovereignty over Taiwan territory consigns the PRC [Sa] to stateincompleteness Beijingrsquos unfulfilled claims to the territory occupied by GRS4

are also a continuing source of potential conflict in the region should theCommunists decide to complete Chinese sovereignty by force of armsFurthermore the potential emergence of a new meta-constitution TIS8 threatensthe eventual reconciliation of GRS4 and DMS7 TIS8 existence would be the product of Chinarsquos incomplete territorial sovereignty and almost ironically therealization of GRS4 democratic vision in a subregion of China ndash the culminationof democratic self-determination Despite the opportunities provided by the near-unification of China in 1949 fissures emerged within the Communist movementthat can be described as competing meta-constitutions The history of the

9 Contemporary Chinarsquosincomplete sovereigntyFusion succession and adaptation

Communist state since 1949 has been dominated by dialectic almost Hegelian insimplicity when abbreviated as meta-constitutions

Thesis ndash SCS5 Antithesis ndash MCS6 Synthesis ndash DMS7

Far from resolving this dialectic there is today another state dialogue emergingwith both GRS4 and DMS7 in agreement on a single Chinese MSNS while TIS8

poses a new possibility ndash a Taiwan MSNS and one (or several) Chinese statesIn this first decade of the millennium the transformation of the Communiststate continues to unfold In contrast to the monumental longevity and hege-mony of the ICS2 China today if we include Taiwan manifests three compet-ing meta-constitutions Despite the long civil war between the Communists(CCP) and Nationalists (Guomindang) their respective meta-constitutions arecloser today than they have been in history as the DMS7 continues to self-modify toward a less totalitarian and more property-oriented capitalist systemBoth the GRS4 and the DMS7 are fundamentally opposed to the TIS8 The TIS8

is arguably a unique case applying only to the specific territory of TaiwanEven if it had no wider application than Taiwan sovereignty it would be a seri-ous challenge to the meta-constitutional claims of both GRS4 and DMS7 and isnot be acceptable to either Beyond Taiwan TIS8 projects the possibility ofother regions and provinces seeking autonomy Tibet and Inner Mongoliathough demographically overwhelmed by Han immigration in recent decadesstill contain restive ethnic populations who might welcome autonomy andindependence

The long-term policy of the Communist state has been to actualize sovereigntyover territory by equalizing modernization For decades Shanghai andGuangzhou were held back forced to subsidize the less developed parts of thecountry DMS7 established Special Economic Zones (SEZ) and encouraged for-eign trade with enormous benefits to Shanghai Guangzhou and other seaportswith historical and geographical advantages of access to global commerce Thishas led to the increasing gap between the coastal regions and the interior whichthe SCS5 and MCS6 sought to mitigate A DMS7 thrust for development ofChinarsquos western regions (Lu 2004) seeks to reduce the imbalance but will prob-ably not see the dynamic investment and industrialization that has characterizedthe Pearl River delta for example

Actualizing SCS5 sovereignty

In 1949 the Chinese Communist revolution ushered in a new political orderOfficials and capitalists of the Guomindang state who surrendered were incor-porated in the new structures Not only was their expertise and capital neededto rebuild the country but generous treatment advertised the spirit of the newregime and blunted the resistance of those who continued to oppose The Common

156 Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty

Programme of 1950 and the Constitution of 1954 proclaimed the ldquoNewDemocracyrdquo which the Communists advertised to be in direct lineage to Sun Yat-sen(Bedeski 1977) Reality deviated from propaganda as the two earliest laws of theregime attacked the foundations of the old society The Marriage Law (1950) lib-erated women from ldquofeudal familismrdquo and ended their subordination in law andcustom The Land Reform Law of the same year launched a campaign to take landfrom landlords and distribute it to the landless frequently accomplished byhumiliation torture and execution of the old landowners Subsequent collec-tivization of the land

was far more destructive of old Chinese traditions and institutions than allpreceding policies It had an immediate direct effect on 80 percent of thepopulation and an indirect effect on almost all Chinese through their fami-lies No sooner had land redistribution been completed however than theregime began to adopt a collectivization policy which gathered speed andgrew steadily more radical

(Guillermaz 1976 87ndash88)

The state characteristics of the period 1949ndash55 summarized as SCS5 whileclaiming to have roots in Sun Yat-senrsquos programs were similar to the Soviet stateof Lenin and Stalin

A single-party dictatorship with a faccedilade of ldquodemocratic partiesrdquo in place ofthe Soviet party of the proletariat

Elimination of private property stigmatization and demonization of capitalism Control of all media and associations persecution of religion undermining

of traditional family Thought control through indoctrination ldquostudyrdquo and mutual surveillance Central economic planning and massive confiscation of private property State control of agriculture Establishment of vast gulags massive violations of basic human rights in the

name of historical necessity Apotheosis of single charismatic leader ndash Mao Zedong Modified ethnic enclaves ndash instead of nominal Soviet ldquoRepublicsrdquo China

established province-level ethnic autonomous regions

Up to 1956 Chinese Communists emulated the Soviet state which appeared tobe the most appropriate model for Chinese consolidation and development TheUnion of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) had undertaken forced industrializa-tion before and after the ldquoGreat Patriotic Warrdquo acquired considerable territory inEastern Europe held out and defeated the Nazi war machine stood up to theUnited States and international capitalism since its founding and recovered afterthe war Its brutality was no obstacle to the Chinese Communists who werefamiliar with purges and violence in their own experience and who saw histori-cal necessity as driving all politics and negating any sentiments of natural rights

Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty 157

Moreover the Sino-Soviet alliance of 1950 saw a victorious Communism acrossthe Eurasian land mass and was seemingly unstoppable

Subordinating their revolution to Soviet global aims was not on the agenda ofChinese Communists after they came to power but the alliance had that conse-quence Stalinrsquos encouragement of Kim Il-Sungrsquos invasion of South Korea leddirectly to massive Chinese involvement and confrontation with the United Statesless than a year after ldquoliberationrdquo (Goncharov 1993) The Soviets had strippedmachinery from Manchuriarsquos factories when they ldquoliberatedrdquo the region fromJapan ndash after the Japanese had surrendered The Gao Gang-Rao Shushi affair andPeng Dehuairsquos pro-Soviet declarations at the Sixth Plenum further demonstratedthe risk of intimate cooperation

Under the umbrella of Maorsquos ldquoNew Democracyrdquo in SCS5 the CCP appearedwilling to share (only symbolically) a sliver of power with nonCommunists in theearly 1950s The revival of the United Front was one way to secure cooperationfrom two million former KMT personnel Many in the CCP were of peasantstock poorly educated and unskilled For economic development CCP neededhelp and cooperation from nonCommunists and intellectuals at least until theirvoluntary services were no longer needed (Zheng 1997 42ndash3) The HundredFlowers Movement marked the beginning of their repression under MCS6Behavior of the ldquobourgeois intellectualsrdquo in the Hundred Flowers campaign wastaken as evidence that their thought reform had not taken hold as firmly as theparty had hoped (Moody 1977 59) Although Maoist rhetoric carried a whiff ofliberalization it had the effect of bringing closet dissidence out into the openaccording to MacFarquhar Maorsquos speech ldquoOn Contradictionrdquo

remained a document that promised a new deal whether considered as ldquoby farthe most radical repudiation of Stalinismrdquo produced by any Communist countryor as the embodiment of a ldquovision of a totalitarian society by consentrdquo It stillemphasized persuasion not coercion it still advocated a restrained attitudetowards strikes it still promised the rehabilitation of those who had been wrong-fully treated in the campaigns against counter-revolutionaries it still condemnedbureaucratism It reaffirmed the hundred flowers policy and long-term coexis-tence and mutual supervision between the CCP and the democratic parties

(MacFarquhar 1973 269)

Claims of MCS6 sovereignty

Nikita Khrushchevrsquos denunciation of Stalin1 signalled to Mao that Stalinrsquos suc-cessors were bringing an end to the Bolshevik revolution as they perceived it andthat the alliance was evolving in a dangerous direction Coexistence with theUnited States was one symptom and Mao reacted with a series of campaigns andactions to prevent at home the post-Stalinist revisionism he perceived in theSoviet Union From the close of the Hundred Flowers Movement through theGLF and again in the Cultural Revolution Mao was attempting to establish a new


kind of state that deviated not only from the SCS5 meta-constitution but frompractically any other state-form in Chinese history Mao was attempting to builda new state order based on disorder (ldquocontinuing revolutionrdquo) and to reverse history by starting with ideology using it as the design for new institutions andanticipating that economy and politics would necessarily follow

The MCS6 reversed SCS5 assumptions and values In place of political order[Vo] Mao called for struggle to depose existing authorities who were ldquotaking thecapitalist roadrdquo ndash a revolution against the revolution Instead of party hierarchyMaoists called for egalitarian institutions ndash the peoplersquos communes and the revolutionary committees All knowledge under Mao was political and stronglysubjective The phrase ldquored and expertrdquo captured the spirit of knowledge ndash it wasvalid only if its producers and holders had the proper revolutionary mindset

Control of the military was essential to insure that MCS6 proponents had thehigh ground of [Sa] to carry out their state transformation By purging thePeoplersquos Liberation Army (PLA) installing his ldquoclose comrade-in-armsrdquo Lin Biaoas Minister of Defence and accelerating the politicization of the armed forcesthrough a number of campaigns Mao made it into the backbone of the state andsubordinated the party The breakdown of vital social and economic functionsduring the Cultural Revolution led to near mutiny and the eventual removal of LinBiao Intra-party conflict [PF] intensified in the Maoist state (1956ndash76) and thetwo-line struggle was as much about state-form as it was about policy and personality Maorsquos followers mobilized the youth of China as a corps to carry outcentral instructions and provide the yeast to ferment a new revolutionary genera-tion The heyday of Maoism could be characterized as a postrevolutionary reignof terror when the revolution devoured its own children The extremism of Maorsquosstillborn state-form corroded its own foundations and ended with his death in1976 but not without massive damage to China

The MCS6 was based on political knowledge [Kp ] that tapped into the emotionalbase of revolutionary partisans especially in envy of the urban rich and foreign-tainted anxiety to conform and religious passion to be part of something largerthan oneself Its love-object was channelled into the iconic Mao Zedong who per-sonified wisdom national patriotism and a visionary future for tens of millions ofadolescents and teens who knew few of the hardships of the old society first-handand accepted the educational lessons from schools and state-run organizations Atleast one intellectual saw Maoism as rooted in a strain of Chinese tradition

Li Zehou also was highly critical of Maoist voluntarism with its exaggeratedemphasis on erratic political campaigns and disregard of rational planningand goal-oriented social organization However he traced its origins not toMarxian epistemology but dominant strains within the indigenous traditionparticularly the Wang Yangming school of neo-Confucianism Maorsquos per-sonality traits policy preferences leadership style and their appeal to broadmasses of Chinese people could all be traced to these deep-rooted premisesof the traditional Chinese outlook

(Misra 1998 75ndash6)


Instead of liberating the energy of the Chinese people to pursue accumulationof wealth Mao used the controlling apparatus of the state in an ambitiousattempt to restructure society He recognized the faults of the Soviet state andsaw modern socialism metamorphosing into ossified bureaucratism so he cre-ated a third way ndash mass mobilization and permanent revolution Following thecapitalist road was not an option The Japanese miracle was a decade away andin any event it is unlikely the Chinese Communists would have copied their former enemy

The political economy was a major battlefield between SCS5 and MCS6 Evenbefore the GLF the state had taken over the economy

Through collectivizing agriculture closing the grain markets institutionaliz-ing unified purchase and supply and most important instituting the systemof grain rationing the state separated the peasants from their harvest A peas-antrsquos work effort was no longer sufficient to secure even a subsistence liveli-hood for himself or his family The worth of his labor and his share of theharvest was determined by the state and obtained from the collective A peas-ant depended on the collective for his economic well-being At the sametime these regulations inflated the value of grain making it a currency ofexchange

(Oi 1989)

The GLF originated in the first wave of decentralization in 1955ndash56 with a criti-cal reassessment of the performance of the Soviet economic model (as applied toChina) during the first five-year plan Mao was already impatient with the slowpace of economic modernization and social transformation He judged that theSoviet model had not provided effective incentives for economic effort ldquoToaccelerate economic development China must more effectively mobilize peoplersquosinitiative The higher peoplersquos enthusiasm and initiative the greater faster betterand more economical results production would yieldrdquo (Shirk 1993 159)

During the GLF multiple villages which comprised a local marketing districtwere designated as a single commune Backyard furnaces and unproven schemesof close and deep planting exhausted the peasants and ruined crops Collectivesharing among several villages removed a major incentive to maximize laborefforts since the lax and lazy would share the harvest with the diligent and indus-trious Many farmers let their fields go fallow rather than submit to forced shar-ing resulting nationwide famine exacerbated by poor weather

The few years of reconstruction after the massive GLF-induced famines werecharacterized by Mao as betrayal of the Chinese revolution and his antidote wasthe Cultural Revolution which assured a ldquocontinuing revolutionrdquo This poisonousromantic vision of a state in perpetual ferment was antithetical to the SCS5 andbriefly established itself as the MCS6 ndash the ldquoMaoist Communist Staterdquo It van-ished unlamented with Maorsquos death in 1976 and had damaged Chinese society tothe extent that it remains the current leadershiprsquos implicit negative example ofwhat China must avoid


Nathan rejects classifying Maorsquos China as totalitarian a category which hedescribes as having six characteristics ldquoa totalist ideology a single ruling partyled by a dictator a secret police that carries out political terror a monopoly ofmass communications a monopoly of political organizations and monopolisticstate control of the economyrdquo (Nathan 1997 49ndash50) On several counts heregards the Maoist regime as having departed from the ldquoclassical concept oftotalitarianismrdquo but also having had several totalitarian features including thebroad scope of political control the monolithic nature of the political system thecentrality of ideological belief and terror the aspiration to remake societynature and human nature and the aim to not only control but to mobilize peo-ple When he lists ten features of the Maoist regime he notes the similaritieswith Stalinist dictatorship and Soviet forced industrialization and also the dis-tinctiveness among Socialist states of Mao using the army as a crucial source ofpower His reading of the Communist state sees unity between the SCS5 andMCS6 implying that differences between Mao and the moderates were in therealm of policy

However policy alone does not capture the difference in essence between SCS5

and MCS6 The Stalinist Communist State (SCS5) saw Chinese citizens as eco-nomic animals ndashSocialist economic structures reinforced by state control ofmedia and education would transform men into new citizens drained of moralautonomy of liberty in thought and action and of private loyalties so that theybecame creatures of the state ndash a Chinese adaptation of Stalinist totalitarianismMao differed in that he believed (and acted on the belief) that Soviet-type statepenetration into society and economy was too limited and that the bureaucraticstate under the Communist Party took on a life of its own In his view SCS5 hadbecome alienated from its revolutionary roots and from the people whose histor-ical mission it was to lead to higher forms of existence The SCS5 was a brokerbetween historical necessity and society and the MCS6 was in Maorsquos vision historical necessity itself banishing brokers and intermediaries and impureknowledge from society

However in the history of revolutions Maoism in its hyperactive stages(GLF and Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution) was analogous to the FrenchReign of Terror ndash an extreme leftist turn that was simultaneously paranoidhomicidal and populist Both the French and Maoist terrorism sought to purifytheir respective revolution and establish a totally new order ndash perceiving erst-while comrades as deadly enemies Both claimed supreme authority to set upa new kind of state which transcended all previous forms and carriedRousseaursquos General Will to its logical conclusion Thus Maoism was not an aberration but a heresy that sought to overturn the recently established stateand produced violent conflict and chaos in the process As in the French caseMaorsquos reign of terror was followed by moderation and a Thermidorian reactionModeration was evident in the post-Leap reforms and a couple of years afterMaorsquos death in 1976 Deng launched an implicit repudiation of Maoism thathas carried the country to higher levels of power stability and prosperity thanever in PRC history


Lieberthal postulates the major difference between the MCS6 and DMS7

In a totalitarian system the political sphere becomes coterminous with thesociety itself In almost no other society has the personal been politicized tothe extent it was in urban China at the height of the Cultural Revolution Thecore Maoist priorities were to permeate the public and the private egalitari-anism and frugal living political purity and class struggle sexual prudish-ness and political devotion But the reformers recognized that ldquointensiverdquoeconomic development would require the kind of initiative and independencethat were absent in a caste-ridden ideologically driven society

(Lieberthal 1995 146)

The MCS6 was based on a peculiar vision of political knowledge that distrustedthe accumulated knowledge of bourgeois humanity since it was allegedly derivedfrom oppressive societies of the past Independent intellectuals were a ruthlesstarget of the Cultural Revolution as they were during the Hundred FlowersMovement Maorsquos Cultural Revolution caused untold numbers of deaths and suicides At Zhongshan University (Guangzhou) the entire senior faculty of thehistory department was murdered and found hanging from the trees at the uni-versity entrance (Thurston 1988 133) The deaths of nearly thirty-five thousandpeople were attributed to the notorious Gang of Four who carried out Maorsquosagenda As in Stalinrsquos purges Maorsquos historical necessity required the physical liq-uidation of class enemies to make revolution complete And as in Qin ShiHuangdirsquos murders of scholars and intellectuals nonconformist thought andmemory had to be erased

The traditional family was a target of Cultural Revolution The initial SCS5 hadrestructured society through legal changes enacted by the Marriage Law and theLand Reform Law which were implemented at the basic levels of rural ChinaStill family centered networks remained as the building blocks of society

the result of government induced changes in the 1950s was a new agricul-tural cooperative (later commune) and party structure at the top but at thebase remained brigades and teams structured around kinsmen and neigh-bours living where they always lived and led by natives of each village Notall of the existing solidarities were utilized of course and powerful cor-porate lineages of Kwangtung (Guangdong) had their property confiscatedtheir ritual centres taken over for other uses and their poorer membersmobilized to struggle against and even kill lineage leaders The family asa corporate economic unit generally headed by a male remained the basicbuilding block of rural life and kept many of its old functions (support ofthe aged early child care the organization of consumption and domesticwork animal raising and the provision of housing) even as it lost parts ofother functions (the organization of daily farm labor later socialization ofthe young)

(Parish 1978 321)


Children turned against parents and denounced them as ldquobloodsuckersrdquo andreactionaries (Liang 1983 55ndash60) Peer pressure and ideological fervor demo-nized any trace of filial piety Husbands and wives divorced over class labels andpolitical correctness tore families apart The Maoist version of Marxism trans-muted class status an alleged characteristic derived from the individualrsquos place inthe productive system of a society into an inverted Lysenkoism in which theeconomic phenotype reflected an immutable genotype and was therefore hered-itary The basis for state dissolution of the family anchor of Chinese society hadbeen introduced during SCS5 with invidious labeling of families by class status

Like the agrarian reform in the villages the ldquoThree Antisrdquo and the ldquoFiveAntisrdquo campaigns of 1951 provided the opportunity for carrying out this sys-tematic work of naming and classifying in the cities as well In 1952 practi-cally the whole Chinese population was classified in this manner and thesystem included over sixty designations Every Chinese citizen knew his owncategory In all his papers and in all the files which concerned him his classstatus was inevitably listed Children turned against parents and denouncedthem as ldquobloodsuckersrdquo and reactionaries

(Liang 1983 129ndash30)

The Maoist Communist State (MCS6) was lethal to human security of tens of millions of individuals Even after the disastrous GLF anything that smacked of private property was forbidden

The Party outlawed all carpentry and handicrafts which were not undertakenby state-run units Maorsquos policies stifled recovery from the famine In thename of egalitarianism no one was allowed to be seen to prosper from activ-ities such as raising poultry or selling vegetables even if they were permit-ted without attracting censure and punishment as lsquorich peasantsrsquo Anyonecaught slaughtering a pig without permission would be sentenced to one oreven three years in prison

(Becker 1997 258)

Emergence of the Dengist state DMS7

Until DMS7 MCS6 citizens were barred from exercising fundamental rights Thezigzags between radical leftism and pragmatic socialism were reduced with thedeath of Mao in 1976 In 1978 Deng Xiaoping launched a series of reforms thatbrought rapid economic growth to China after uncertain beginnings in the early1980s By the turn of the millennium China had traveled far from its SCS5 begin-nings of the first decade of the PRC During his lifetime Mao was a powerfulfigure comparable not only to the dynastic founders of the past especially QinShi Huangdi but to contemporaries such as Lenin Stalin and Hitler His visionwas to move the Chinese revolution forward to continue its momentum to avoid


what he reckoned to be the stagnation of the Soviet revolution The new Chinese normalcy was launched by Deng Xiaoping in 1978 in the shape of reformsmostly economic but intimately affecting state society and the legal system Incontrast to the defunct SCS5 and the dysfunctional MCS6 Dengrsquos new order theldquoDengist Market Staterdquo (DMS7) has been eclectic and successful in generatingeconomic growth The DMS7 has neither plagiarized the Soviet example as didthe SCS5 nor is it oblivious to human and organizational limitations as had beenthe ideologically intoxicated MCS6 The DMS7 draws lessons from economic suc-cesses of Taiwan Singapore South Korea and Japan while preserving party dic-tatorship over government and making no promises of democratization Dengrsquossuccessors have been moderately flexible2 and have continued to de-Marxify the state State corporations are allowed to go bankrupt citizens canown property individuals can sue the party and wealthy businessmen can gainmembership in the party but liberty remains a fragile economic ember that canbe extinguished at any time Critics who see a betrayal of fundamental principlesare muted by the apparent success of the post-Mao reforms although economicinequality and corruption may yet resurrect a larger Socialist thrust from the government

The essential structure of SCS5 government remains intact From 1949 to thepresent China has remained a single-party dictatorship There has been littledemocratic reform despite adaptation of the legal system to conform to interna-tional standards for the sake of trade and investment Marxism-Leninism-Maoismremains the central theme of government value-claims and the CCP remainsfirmly in control of all levels of government

Actualizing sovereignty [Sa] in DMS7

Following the chaos generated by MCS6 and after Maorsquos death on September 91976 many of his acolytes were purged and the state realigned to produce theDMS7 with Deng Xiaoping in command The DMS7 meta-constitution returnedthe party to command of the state and oversaw launching of a series of far-reachingreforms in the legal and economic system Some market-type reforms had beeninitiated in the wake of the GLF failures but were aborted by the CulturalRevolution

External relations [ER] A major change had occurred in [ER] with PresidentNixonrsquos visit to China in 1972 Further progress in Sino-American relations washalted by the US Presidentrsquos domestic problems with Watergate and it was notuntil the end of 1978 that normalization occurred when Deng could count onAmerican trade and investment to underwrite his modernization programNixonrsquos Shanghai declaration that the United States regarded Taiwan as part ofChina was a boost to Chinarsquos claimed sovereignty [Sc] and gave the Deng prag-matists further credibility to achieve through rational economic policy and diplo-macy where the Maoists had failed in bluster and intimidation Dengrsquos position asVice-Chairman of the Central Military Commission gave him control over the


PLA and he directed a sweeping program of modernization and professionalizationwhich reversed Maorsquos politicization

Political economy [Ep ] In the two decades between the GLF and Dengrsquosreforms there had been paradigmatic change in leading models of economicdevelopment abroad Mainstream economists had advocated autonomous devel-opment with high tariffs to protect domestic industrialization These theoriesbecame part of developmental orthodoxy and gave Third World governmentsdominant power over trade and investment with equal opportunities for politicalcorruption The Philippines one of the most promising economies of the early1960s sank into kleptocracy and stagnation under Marcos with family andcronies involved in a wide range of state-protected enterprises During the sameperiod Singapore Japan Taiwan and South Korea emerged as economic power-houses by pursuing export-led growth The Soviet Union and its clients sank in amiasma of economic stagnation stifled innovation a trading bloc tied to Sovietsubsidies in energy and central planning

Political friction [PF] The post-Mao leadership in Beijing early recognizedthat the excesses of MCS6 had not only postponed but eroded economic growthand had dissipated central authority of the party and state The Maoist persuasionin the two-line struggle was discredited and many remaining Maoists wereremoved from power The trauma of the twenty-year MCS6 blunted much resis-tance that might have confronted Dengrsquos pragmatic reforms which not onlyappealed to commonsensical Chinese but met with relatively little oppositionwithin the party A few diehard pockets remained and purists lamented the demiseof Maorsquos romantic revolutionary spirit and Deng proclaimed that it was ldquogloriousto be richrdquo

Political Obligation [Op] had a specific character in each of the three post-1949 meta-constitutions

Obligation in SCS5 Under SCS5 in the early 1950s an orthodox Marxistinterpretation of citizenship focused on class solidarity Peasants and work-ers and soldiers had brought about the revolutionrsquos success while thenational bourgeoisie had made some contributions and could participate inthe state by renouncing ties to international capitalism The intelligentsiaalso could certify its class credentials by actively supporting the party Thenational project of creating a socialist China demanded solidarity under partydictatorship

Obligation in MCS6 Mao rooted his state in the Rousseauian vision of redirecting personal loyalties affections and interests from society to thebody politic ndash a condition that could only be sustained in continuous war andrevolution He tapped into a vast reservoir of human emotion to change thenation Maorsquos ldquoobligatory voluntarismrdquo3 had little grounding in economicrealities Many of the public works executed in the euphoria of revolutionaryenthusiasm suffered in quality and planning and often worsened conditionsthey were meant to improve Maoist Communist State (MCS6) traded relativepassivity of multiclass participation for the vision of a new Communist


man ndash one whose selfhood dissolved in service to the state Army soldier LeiFeng became an icon in this campaign Enthusiastic voluntarism became thenew ideal for citizensrsquo relationship to the state

Always ready to help those in need without thinking of himself he treatedthe people as his family members and considered the motherland as hisown parents saying ldquoIt is the people and the government who have givenme a second life I will put my limited life into the unlimited service tothe peoplerdquo

In 1961 while at work Lei Feng was killed in an accident In hishonor the army published his voluminous diary The nation was shockedby his life story and deeply moved by his single-minded dedication andservice to the people His motto ldquoTo live is to serve the people ndash live tomake others happyrdquo greatly inspired the Chinese people especially theyoung generation

On March 5 1962 Mao Zedong wrote an inscription and called onthe entire nation to ldquoLearn from Comrade Lei Fengrdquo Liu ShaoqiPresident of China also wrote an inscription ldquoLearn from Lei Feng hisordinary but great spirit of serving the peoplerdquo Since that day a nation-wide drive of Learning from Lei Feng started all over the country Thispolitical and spiritual movement greatly helped the Chinese governmentand the people to tide over their economic difficulties in the 1960s

(Wei 2005)

Obligation in DMS7 The DMS7 in contrast moved with deliberation in introducing changes that have cumulatively transformed the economy intoone of the most globally dynamic distancing itself from the preceding MCS6

each step of the way The party still controls the government and all theinstruments of coercion to the exclusion of all but the faintest shadow ofdemocracy But economics (the ldquobird in the cagerdquo metaphor) has permittedan unfettered and often corrupt model of economic self-interest with bene-fits to the state treasury and national economic growth in general Servingthe state while enriching oneself and family now regaining some of its traditional visibility has become the fuel of Chinarsquos prosperity Guaranteesagainst a return to MCS6 have been written into the constitution and capi-talists can now join the party A new nationalism has emerged that opposesJapan and rivals the United States The irredentum of Taiwan is also a drivingforce uniting China that has replaced the old slogans of class struggle

Claimed sovereignty in DMS7

As a result of timely reforms that were vital in salvaging the Communist state inChina party dictatorship has survived and a growing portion of the populationhas prospered in contrast to the half-hearted and too-late reforms in GorbachevrsquosSoviet Union Chinarsquos external relations have normalized with most countries


and China has joined many international organizations ndash partly to demonstrate itsacceptance of global order and also to keep Taiwan from gaining membershipThe changes under the reforms have been sufficient to conclude that a newmeta-constitution has emerged in China Compared to SCS5 and MCS6 DMS7

has these characteristics

pragmatism in place of Marxist-Leninist dogma and Maoist doctrine economic guidance rather than command from the state use of international trade and investment to fuel economic growth greater openness in foreign relations in place of a posture of multiple threats

and alliance with the Soviet Union and its clients a growing place for rule of law in place of arbitrary officialdom and strict

party dictatorship and cultural receptivity to foreign science ideas and travel

Officially DMS7 continues to insist on Marxism-Leninism-Maoist Thought asthe basis of its meta-constitutional values [Av] stressing [Vo] and to a lesserextent [Ve] while permitting greater latitude in economic (and a limited incrementof political) liberty [Vl] Nationalist themes are a frequent appeal to insure thateconomic self-interest does not undermine [Op] In 2005 anti-Japanese demon-strations erupted in Chinese cities and were echoed in Chinese communitiesabroad ndash hinting at Beijingrsquos ability to orchestrate overseas Chinese whose affec-tions and interests have not yet synchronized with their countries of residence

Conclusions meta-constitutions and the claims of sovereignty

Chinarsquos eight meta-constitutions have both linear and dialectic relationships TheWestern MSNS can trace its lineage to the Greek polis Roman legal traditionsand Judeo-Christian views of history and humanity One could probably identifyan equal number of meta-constitutions in Euro-America although their occur-rence would be more evenly spaced over time than the proliferation that Chinaexperienced in the twentieth century The Middle Ages forged the philosophicaland political foundations for the separation of church and state while theRenaissance and Enlightenment established the state as rational and secular polit-ical entity Revolutions Industrial Revolution and maritime expansion made theEuropean state universal while two World Wars transformed it into the lethalstate and the Russian Revolution created the modern totalitarian state

Transformation of the Chinese state has taken a different course Whilestrongly affected by the Western MSNS since the mid-nineteenth century itsdynamics have been peculiar to China Of the eight meta-constitutions four canbe considered ldquonormalrdquo or stabilizing in the sense that they provided long-termcontinuity and human security to their citizenry The long-lived ICS2 rivaled theEgyptian dynasties in history but ruled far greater territories and peoples TheGRS4 had major problems of timing design and implementation and has beenin large part the victim of historical circumstances Its rule on the mainland was


disrupted by continued warlordism Japanese invasion and Communist uprisingbut its largely beneficent government on Taiwan has demonstrated essentialviability and commitment to democratic institutions

When the Communists established their SCS5variant of the Soviet system onthe mainland prospects for long-term improvement of human security hadseemed bright in contrast to the preceding chaos The Sino-Soviet alliance wouldprovide defence and the combination of a command economy and forced indus-trialization would propel the country into modernity The hostility of UnitedStates to Communism heightened national solidarity in China but also isolatedChinese economic and political influence abroad Deng Xiaopingrsquos reforms wereintended as a reprise of post-GLF retrenchment and a resumption of SCS5 Butduring the turmoil of Maorsquos Cultural Revolution Japan South Korea Taiwan andSingapore had linked their fortunes to the United States and pursued high-growtheconomic policies based on export markets The Soviets in contrast becamemired in a stagnant economy The SCS5 lost its lustre and the Dengist reformsmorphed it into the DMS7 which remains a market-friendly political dictatorship

A second group of meta-constitutions was short-lived but revolutionary intransforming the state from one form to another Their immediate effect was mas-sive decrease of human security but they also were bridges from one meta-constitution to another

The QLS1 ndash the Qin state brought an end to the period of Warring States andunified the Chinese empire under Legalist philosophy It built an infrastruc-ture linking the far-flung territories to the central government but at hugehuman cost collapsing in 206 BC Sima Qianrsquos Shiji (Historical Records)(Watson B 1971) and subsequent Confucian historians used the Qin as anegative example of unbridled monarchical hegemony with few redeemingvirtues

The RNS3 began with the 1911 downfall of the Qing and ended with the capture of Beijing by the Nationalists in 1928 It also provided a negativemodel of the Chinese state It was dominated by the bourgeoisie subservientto warlord factions and attempted to copy the Western parliamentary government into the Chinese environment The Chinese people were unpre-pared for democracy and the foreign powers exercised a semi-colonial stran-glehold on key cities and areas It was a period resembling interim dynasticChina complete with foreign predation ndash made worse by the superiority offoreign military technology and the bankruptcy of Confucian and dynasticmystique To the extent that the RNS3 was a meta-constitution it had vagueresemblance to confederal federalism with nominal loyalty to the nation-state but power devolved to provinces

The MCS6 enjoyed currency starting from the Hundred Flowers through theGLF to the end of the Cultural Revolution Maorsquos minions fomented classstruggle ndash ersatz and real ndash with the ostensible purpose of avoiding stagnationand the return of capitalist rule causing universities to close governmentagencies to halt operations schools to teach Maoist pseudo-knowledge and


the military to be politicized into an arm of activism The ancient LegalistShang Yang would have approved of Maorsquos militia program

The militia movement facilitated the ldquomilitarization of labourrdquo withinthe communes and thus assisted cadres in arousing patriotic fervour andmobilizing peasant for even greater efforts during the high tide of theleap Within a month tens of millions of Chinese had officially becomemilitia members There were 30 million in Szechwan alone


The results were economic stagnation a terrorized population and alienation frominternational Communism While the CCP has not condemned Mao as NikitaKhrushchev criticized Stalin it has distanced itself from his doctrines implicitly bypursuing markedly un-Marxist policies in economic and social developmentthough much of the Soviet-style security apparatus remains in force

In the past decade developments in Taiwanese democracy have raised themodel of a new state-form based on the TIS8 Taiwanese independence advocateswho are creating a separate Taiwan identity claim there is a Taiwanese nationseparate from mainland China Taiwanese society is multicultural ndash consisting ofHakka Fujianese descendants aborigines and mainlanders Its advanced capital-ist economy multiparty democracy and religious freedom demarcate it from theweak private property Communist dictatorship on the mainland Independenceadvocates could be strengthened by the emergence of other breakaway regionsand provinces in China But even a Chinese commonwealth or confederal systemwould be considered a step backward by Beijing Although China grudginglytolerates Taiwanese autonomy it promises to use force should Taiwan or any otherprovince seek full independence

The first requirement for the sovereign state is security and order In the caseof historical China unification of territory has been the prerequisite to sovereignorder Only in twentieth-century China has the value of citizen liberty [Vl]become an element in [Sc] of the state

The RNS3 promised liberty [Vl] through elections and representative democracy but lacked order and unity [Sa]

The SCS5 denied individual liberty for the sake of order and progress inindustrialization while promising economic and collective liberty in thefuture

The MCS6 claimed to liberate the masses from established authority of partystate and family at the expense of order and for the sake of revolutionaryequality [Ve]

The TIS8 promises liberty in preventing absorption by an unfree PRC andbuilding on the political institutions established by GRS4 After existing as aprovince-level microcosm of GRS4 for fifty-five years the emerging TIS8

anticipates that it can continue a high level of order liberty and human securityas MSNS So far after we discount for unfavorable historical circumstances


only the GRS4 has offered consistent growth and transformation to prosperousdemocracy at a semi-national level For China to embrace TIS8 as a generalmodel could spell breakup of the state as Uigurs Tibetans and Mongolianscould conceivably demand autonomy and self-determination as well

Separating actual sovereignty from human security in China

Actualizing Communist sovereignty in China has involved a fundamentaldilemma Utopian visions and sophisticated designs of ideal society have histor-ically produced more human suffering than occurs in evolved and organic soci-eties Revolutionaries often see old members of society as obstacles to beeliminated if their new vision is to be implemented ndash ldquobreaking some eggs tomake an omeletterdquo The Maoists killed millions in the land reforms and tens ofmillions perished in the GLF and Cultural Revolution Red Terror cleansed Chinaof many opponents and the 1989 Tiananmen massacre renewed the regimersquos res-olution to physically destroy dissidents For three decades the CCP terrorized andexcited the mainland population to obey its will The CCP has been the centralinstrument for implementing state sovereignty within China and the PLA forguarding borders and territory Territorial concessions of the past were part of theWestern imperialist narrative yet under the reforms China has opened newSpecial Economic Zones (SEZ) to provide a conducive environment for foreigninvestment that is capitalism-friendly

Mao followed the dictum of Sunzi and made preparation for war the overridingconsideration of the state ldquoWar is a matter of vital importance to the state theprovince of life and death the road to survival or ruin It is mandatory that it bethoroughly studiedrdquo One result was the PLA became a major prop of his state-building project He gave Leninrsquos ldquowar Communismrdquo a Chinese flavor For Maowar was

a climactic decisive act to shatter the present and shape the future The per-ils of indecisive and therefore protracted wars from which no country everbenefits as advised in Sunzi Bingfa were never quite understood in Indianstrategic thought Even in recent times Mao Zedong emphasised protractedwar as the peoplersquos means to defeat the stronger forces of a state

(Raghvan 1998)

Sunzi Bingfa related power to military strength This special emphasis on the mil-itary as the indicator of national power continues to weigh heavily in Chinesethought in modern times Maorsquos oft-quoted political power growing out of thebarrel of the gun reiterates that emphasis even more tellingly than Sunzi Bingfawhich places a high premium on decisive even deterrent action There is a clearpreference for action directed toward decisive results The story of Sunzi beheadinga favorite concubine of the King of Wu while teaching them drill to show howobedience is to be obtained may be apocryphal but is indicative of ruthlessemphasis on decisive results


Resolving sovereignty

Externally Beijing fought skirmishes and wars to express determination todefend its territory These included armed conflicts with the United States inKorea the USSR on the Ussurii River India in the Himalayas and Vietnam onthe Yunnan border Mao and his successors are not Trotskyists who gave up mil-lions of acres of Russian lands at Brest-Litovsk to gain peace for the revolution ndashChinese territory is inviolable and nonnegotiable Now that Hong Kong andMacao have ldquoreturned to the Motherlandrdquo Taiwan is the last remaining issue ofthe civil war and is central to completing the Peoplersquos Republic territorialintegrity

Sovereignty is also about people With tens of millions of Chinese abroad theirloyalty and Beijingrsquos claims over them have been issues of sovereignty The termldquoOverseas Chineserdquo (huaqiao) refers to Han Chinese and their descendants whoemigrated from China Kinship of race clan ancestral homes and culture hasbeen a strong link between them and their homeland often at odds with their posi-tion and status abroad Chinese territorial claims have been based on imperialextent ndash even down to the South China Sea reefs and islands Disputes continuewith Russia and Japan over previous ICS2 territories These claims [Sc] inheritedfrom past empires juxtapose with actual jurisdiction [Sa] and identify points ofconflict that can erupt into confrontations

Taiwan ndash the other China

Finally the GRS4 on Taiwan has been undergoing transformation and is facing anew challenge to its own principles With democratization in the 1980s the GRS4

legalized non-Guomindang political parties ndash a radical departure from its insis-tence on the single-party dictatorship which had been the hallmark of the stateunder siege The majority of the population was Taiwan-born and many resentedmainlander influx and domination The most important party to oppose theGuomindang was the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) which attracted manynative Taiwanese and won control of the presidency in 2000 with the election ofChen Shui-bian ending over half a century of KMT rule Taiwanese identity andseparateness have increasingly influenced policy as the desire to merge with themainland dissipated Even before the DPP came to power several signs indicatedthat the island of Taiwan was taking on the character of a sovereign stateDiplomatically twenty-six nations4 recognize Taiwan as the Republic of China Ithas its own armed forces and it has the loyalty of its citizens Although there isconsiderable sentiment to declare an independent state the practical difficultiesare immense and reaction from the PRC would stillborn such an attempt

We have postulated the envisioned independent state as the ldquoTaiwan IndependentStaterdquo (TIS8) and its possibility has evoked opposition from both the mainlandDMS7 and the GRS4 on Taiwan Both existent states see the TIS8 as a regressive firststep leading back to the RNS3 of 1911ndash27 when provinces preempted centralauthority issued their own money and maintained their own armies Tibet Inner


Mongolia and Xinjiang have sizable ethnic minorities who may privately regardthemselves as colonies of the Han majority Recognition of a secessionist Taiwanwould be a retrograde precedent for the Chinese state so intent on completing itssovereign claims A strong and prosperous Taiwan is a contemporary fact but therehas been growing dependence on mainland prosperity and resources to maintainthat economic growth A sovereign Taiwan opposed by Beijing might not beattacked but it would need regional support So far the United States has backedunofficial Taiwanese autonomy but would be less inclined to support Taiwan sov-ereignty claims especially as it would be highly provocative to China Internationalpariahhood for Taiwan could be alleviated only if Japan were to display a willing-ness to risk Chinarsquos ire and forge strong links with its breakaway province

Taiwan is the last major unsettled issue of the Chinese civil war and occupiesa fundamental place in the development of the modern Chinese meta-constitutionThe paradox of Taiwan has been that the more its democracy has matured andconsolidated the greater has been the political divergence from the PRC Asidefrom recognizing the constant centrifugal forces of regionalism and provincialismin China Taiwan demonstrates how democracy can erode national sovereignty aspoliticians seeking political office reflect the sentiments of voters

Taiwan is the cause and symbol of contemporary Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty ndashit is the last remaining province of imperial China not to be incorporated into thepost-1949 state Its twenty-three million are Chinese citizens not subject to theCommunist Party and most have little desire to become so The independence tendencies of Taiwan are seen by China as a backward move and a threat to Chinarsquosunity while the Guomindang formula of representing the Republic of China at leastwas an unthreatening stasis A Republic of Taiwan in contrast to the ROCOT wouldstir belligerent moves by Beijing Until the electoral victories of the DPP the sov-ereignty issue had been stabilized under Deng as something to be solved by futuregenerations Now however the backsliding may lead to a constitutional crisis

Taiwan is pulled in two directions One is the common Chinese identity Althoughthe Nationalists failed to achieve their goals on the mainland their Sun Yat-senderived vision has successfully created a modern protonation on Taiwan TheGuomindang has demonstrated that the second meta-constitution of the Republicoffered a lower-cost entry to modernity ndash both in terms of human and resource costs

In summary the past hundred years for China have been a time of pursuingactualized sovereignty of MSNS and leaders have tried variations of its designresulting in several meta-constitutions Chinese sovereignty remains incompleteand ironically the most democratic and prosperous part of China might be theleast likely to survive as an integral part of a completed China where Western-style multiparty democracy is perceived to contradict the achievement and main-tenance of full sovereignty as a MSNS


2 Dimensions of human security foundations in individual human life

1 Use of masculine pronouns and ldquomanrdquo herein should be understood to refer to bothgenders when the subject is understood to be human or humans

2 Kang notes a primary distinction between prisoners who are deemed capable of rehabil-itation and the ldquoirredeemablesrdquo who along with their families were to be exterminated(myulhada) (Kang 2001 79)

3 One implication of this progression and amplification of human security from individ-ual to person to citizen is that a MSNS can be constructed on the basis of fulfilling fun-damental human needs starting with prolonging life A second implication is thatdevelopment and construction of society and polity based on a Western-oriented foun-dation of autonomous individuality is that while the general characteristics of a MSNSwill fit a certain international standard the details and spirit of the state will reflect thecharacter and concept of individuals within the dominant culture Japan for exampleis a thoroughly modern state in terms of international behavior and structure but itsinformal institutions have major earmarks of its past feudal and Confucian culturewith consequent abnegation of Western-type radical individualism

4 State and society have contributed to the secondary survival chances of the individualprior to the life-threat event

5 As Moll Flanders describes mother and child

It is manifest to all that understand anything of children that we are born into theworld helpless and incapable either to supply our own wants or so much as makethem known and that without help we must perish and this help requires not onlyan assisting hand whether of the mother or somebody else but there are two thingsnecessary in that assisting hand that is care and skill without both which half thechildren that are born would die nay thought they were not to be denied food andone half more of those that remained would be cripples or fools lose their limbsand perhaps their sense I question not but that these are partly the reasons whyaffection was placed by nature in the hearts of mothers to their children withoutwhich they would never be able to give themselves up as tis necessary they shouldto the care and waking pains needful to the support of their children

(Defoe 1971 182)

6 In a nineteenth-century shipwreck novel Swiss Family Robinson survive as a familyunit and manage the new environment so successfully that they decide to remain andset up a colony on their island The bourgeois middle class family transplanted in thewilderness overcomes difficulties far more efficiently than Crusoe and repulsesinvaders through cooperation pooled efforts and coordination Collective efforts basedon consanguinity seem to conquer all

Notes

7 In Dream of the Red Chamber the Ancestress of the clan is anxious to arrange the mar-riage of her grandson Pao Yu so she can die peacefully that her responsibilities havebeen completed

8 Women of breeding were sequestered in the home except for special occasionssuch as visits to the temple Even then they traveled in covered sedan chairsOnce married they were supposed to serve their mothers-in-law and help themrun the household After all a wife was chosen not by her husband but by his par-ents Only concubines were chosen by the husband The precedence of the parentsover the husband is reflected in the common Chinese expression that a family islsquotaking a daughter-in-lawrsquo rather than a husband ldquotaking a briderdquo

(Ching 1988 40)

9 For consistency abbreviations which appear in notational formulae of the theory ofhuman security will be identified in the text by enclosure in square brackets [ ] The subscript letter refers to ldquolevel of protectionexistencerdquo When referring to the levels ofexistence individual person and citizen are identified by italics

10 Adventure stories focus on crises and not the full life history of individuals Crusoeprovides some biographical material and we are safe to assume that the existence of the other protagonists was due to contribution of parents not only physically reproducing but also providing nurturing for them as infants and adolescents Theirsurvival to adulthood was certainly due to the protection given them from birth to atime when they could care for themselves Family [F] is offstage but indispensable

11 For a plausible and fictional reconstruction of individual and personal human securityin pre-historic times see the series of novels by Jean Auel Clan of the Cave Bear(1980) and so on

12 After describing his experiences as an inmate of Auschwitz Frankl wrote that the tra-ditions which buttressed manrsquos behavior in the past are

now rapidly diminishing No instinct tells him what he has to do and no traditiontells him what he ought to do sometimes he does not even know what he wishesto do Instead he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or hedoes what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism)

(Frankl 1984 128)

13 The prisoner is naked before the power of the state In a confrontation with a warder inhis prison Jean Pasqualini protests his innocence while the agent of the state declaresldquoThe government never speaks needlessly It always knows what offenses you havecommittedrdquo (Bao 1973 282)


1 Extreme nationalism may fuse the private with the public with terrifying resultsBaines suggests that ldquoHutu extremism was inscribed so violently on the bodies of animagined enemy in order to fuse an lsquoimaginedrsquo Hutu nation in the minds of an other-wise regionally and class-divided Hutu populacerdquo (Baines 2003 2)

2 According to the World Health Organization there were a reported 565 million deathsin 2001 (WHO 2006)

3 ldquo because I am involved in mankind and therefore never send to know for whom thebell tolls it tolls for theerdquo

4 The risk that one party to a contract can change their behavior to the detriment of theother party once the contract has been concluded

5 An example is the US Supreme Court decision (June 23 2005) on Kelo versus NewLondon which ruled that local governments may seize peoplersquos homes and businesses ndasheven against their will ndash for private economic development

174 Notes

6 Nitroglycerin [C3H5(ONO2)3] is the principle explosive ingredient in dynamite It isthree times as powerful as an equal amount of gunpowder is smokeless and its explo-sive wave travels 25 times faster (Pafko 2000)

7 Chalmers Johnson (2004) argues that in the United States the military-industrial complexhas superseded constitutional limitations and is becoming immune to democratic checks

8 William C Kirby (2005 111) has noted the Communist plagiarization of Soviet institutionsbut except for Maoist creativity various Chinese leaders throughout the twentieth century did not hesitate to look abroad for institutional inspiration

9 ldquoFor the savage people in many places of America except the government of smallfamilies the concord whereof dependeth on natural lust have no government at alland live at this day in that brutish manner as I said beforerdquo (Hobbes 1651 92)

10 Since the introduction of the reform and opening-up policy to adapt to changesin the mode of social production and the style of life traditional families of com-plicated structure and big size have been gradually transformed into families ofsimple structure and small size

(Peoplersquos Daily 2005)

11 John Lott (2000) argues that the legal presence of guns in homes is a strong disincen-tive to break-ins and other crimes


1 Specifically unfettered liberty would allow the advantaged the strong and the cleverto amass power and wealth at the expense of the poor the weak and the less cleverStrict equality would require confiscation of ldquoexcess wealthrdquo limitations and quotas ineducation and government positions and an array of multiple government interven-tions not only to keep the playing field level but to assure that games always end inties ndash a moral hazard with obvious disincentives for persons to excel

2 ldquoThe dissolution of marriage breaks the family into successively smaller units that areless able to sustain themselves without state assistancerdquo (Morse 2005)

3 Statistically the number of individuals killed in war has been steadily dropping in thepast 15 years (Easterbrook 2005)

4 Pro-abortionists prefer to characterize the fetus as a type of living tissue without personhood having legal status and rights Anti-abortionists counter that when amajority of expectant mothers view sonograms of their fetus they see ldquoitrdquo more asa child waiting to be born and decide against abortion based on perceived per-sonhood

5 A trend in the MSNS has been toleration of multiple citizenships of persons thoughthis may exacerbate the dilemma of plural loyalties

6 The medieval Crusades are often cited as an example par excellence of religious furyand destruction against innocent populations In actual fact the Crusades were anattempt to retake lands and populations conquered by Islam in its initial expansion several centuries before (Madden 1999)


1 Religion can modify the universal instinct for life Jihadist suicides have become a tac-tic of terrorists in the Middle East for example Catholicism also celebrates martyr-dom but not when it harms and kills innocent bystanders Its doctrine upholds thesacredness of life even to what many consider extremes of forbidding contraceptionabortion and any form of euthanasia or assisted suicide

2 Average is indicated by underlining here

Notes 175

3 A Marxist would argue that the capitalist state in fact bestows far greater security on thecapitalists at the expense of the proletariat Communist states have thus actively deprivedclass enemies of full citizenship as retribution for the alleged inequality of the old order

4 While the French Revolution enshrined Liberty as a supreme national value the Reignof Terror Thermidor Reaction and Napoleonic Empire made a travesty of high ideals

5 In the controversy over gun control the central issue is self-protection versus thosewho believe all weapons are a threat to well-being

6 Actualizing imperial sovereignty in ancient China

1 On the periodic interaction of Central Asian peoples with China (see Mair 2005)2 Pragmatically and universally we may hypothesize that government based on a degree

of actual and apparent equality has a better chance of surviving and the state that allo-cates human security evenly approaching average per citizen (Sa Formula Four) willbetter maintain long term Order [Vo]

3 This was completed around the time of Constantinersquos Edict of Milan (313) whichgranted positive advantages and privileges to the Christian community including exclu-sion of Church lands from taxation elevation of the clergy and state support for build-ing of churches

4 From end of Han to start of Sui number of prefectures increased by a factor of twenty-two and the number of commanderies by six (Wright 1978 99)

5 The northndashsouth divide was not only cultural and ethnic but also geological A broadcentral mountain range not as high as those in the west separated the northern plainsfrom the southern valleys and southern mountains created even more pockets thatcould be resistant to centralizing dynasties

6 Henry IV of Germany famously begged papal forgiveness at Canossa The poperelented and revoked the kingrsquos excommunication in 1076 accepting his humiliationand agreeing to work for Henryrsquos reconciliation with the other German princesCatholic Encyclopedia

7 ldquoAnd if the Sui founder did not think of restoring the ecumenical empire the histori-ans in his entourage were there to urge the example of Han upon himrdquo Rituals andsigns indicated that

the new dynasty had Heavenrsquos mandate to rule that it was taking the steps neces-sary to bring the new political order into consonance with cosmic forces and withthe needs of the people For the Sui founder and his advisors the Chinese past wasalmost palpable an ever-present thing which influenced all decisions attitudesand behavior

(Wright 1978 14)

8 The affair was the subject of Bai Juyirsquos ldquoSong of Unending Sorrowrdquo ( ChangHen Ge)

The Emperorrsquos eyes could never gaze on her enough-Till war-drums booming from Yuyang shocked the whole earth

(Translated by Witter Bynner)

9 The Yuan reestablished the civil service examinations in 1315 but favored non-Chinese (Hucker 1978 6)

7 Claiming dynastic sovereignty under the imperial meta-constitution

1 Han Feizi chapter 50 quoted in (Fu 1996 53)2 Yu Zo answered ldquoIf the people have plenty their prince will not be left to want

alone If the people are in want their prince cannot enjoy plenty alonerdquo (Confucius1975 286)

176 Notes

3 In his study of two books on family life from 590 and 1190 Bol notes how the earlierauthor stresses cultural and classical erudition and learning while the later addressesdirect questions of behaving ethically He writes ldquoIn this period (Song) intellectualsincreasingly forsook the literary-historical perspective of the past for an ethical-philo-sophical perspectiverdquo (Bol 1992 12)

4 Aristotle described individuals within the family having differing roles and abilitiesand the family as training ground for citizenship Politics Book One Part XIIIhttpclassicsmitedu Aristotlepolitics1onehtml

5 ren translated as benevolence the ideograph graphically consists of the elementsfor ldquomanrdquo and the number ldquotwordquo

8 Sovereignty and state-building in late Qing and Republican China

1 Reinforced by equally predatory colony-seeking behavior of the European MSNS2 Sorge supplied Soviets with information about Anti-Comintern Pact the

GermanndashJapanese Pact and warning of Pearl Harbor attack In 1941 Sorge informedStalin of Hitlerrsquos intentions to launch Operation Barbarossa Moscow answered withthanks but little was done Before the battle for Moscow Sorge transmitted informationthat Japan was not going to attack Soviet Union in the East This information allowedZhukov to redeploy Siberian troops for the defence of Moscow Japanese secret servicehad already intercepted many of his messages and begun to close in Sorge was arrestedin Tokyo incarcerated in Sugamo Prison and hanged on October 9 1944 The SovietUnion did not acknowledge Sorge until 1964 httpwwwfact-indexcomrririchard_sorgehtml (see also Johnson 1990)

3 Thus named because certain rights and privileges were accorded to foreign powers inChina while no such reciprocity was given to China in those treaty partners

4 The Song lost their war in part because corrupt officials convinced the emperor torecall and execute the most capable general Yue Fei who had been on the verge of win-ning against the Jin

5 Jiangrsquos rise was due to his ldquoskilful manipulation of political events and his neutralist posi-tions in the severe leftndashright struggle that had developed in the partyrdquo (Tien 1972 12)

6 A 40 year increase of 29

9 Contemporary Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty fusionsuccession and adaptation

1 Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party February 25 19562 Except in the realm of political reform where any move toward democracy is

repressed as evidenced by the Tiananmen massacres in 19893 So obviously contradictory that the juxtaposition of the two terms is almost oxy-

moronic Yet it captures the flavor of Maorsquos ideology and parallels other outrageouspolitical formulations including ldquodemocratic centralismrdquo

4 As of early 2005

Notes 177

Almond G A (ed) (2003) Comparative Politics Today New York LongmanAnderson W (1964) Manrsquos Quest for Political Knowledge Minneapolis MN University

of Minnesota PressApplebaum A (2003) Gulag A History New York DoubledayArendt H (1951) The Origins of Totalitarianism New York World Publishing CompanyAristotle (340 BC) Ancient History Sourcebook On the Constitution of Carthage Online

Available HTTP httpwwwfordhameduhalsallancientaristotle-carthagehtml(accessed May 31 2006)

mdashmdash (350 BC) Politics Online Available HTTP httpclassicsmiteduAristotlepolitics1onehtml (accessed May 31 2006)

Armstrong J D (1977) Revolutionary Diplomacy Berkeley CA University of CaliforniaPress

Auel J M (1980) The Clan of the Cave Bear New York CrownAxworthy L (1997) ldquoCanada and human security the need for leadershiprdquo International

Journal LII 187ndash96Bai G (ed) (1991) Zhongguo zhengzhi zhidu shi (History of Chinarsquos Political System)

Tianjing Renmin ChubansheBai J A Song of Unending Sorrow Online Available HTTP httpwwwafpcassofr

wenguwgwenguphpl Tangshiampno 71 (accessed May 31 2006)Baines E (2003) Rwanda and the Politics of the Body Vancouver University of British

Columbia Centre of International RelationsBajpai K (2000) ldquoThe idea of a human security auditrdquo Report The Joan B Kroc Institute

for International Peace Studies 1ndash4Balazs E (1964) Chinese Civilization and Bureaucracy New Haven CT Yale University

PressBanfield E C (1958) The Moral Basis of a Backward Society Chicago IL Free

PressBao Ruo-Wang (1973) Prisoner of Mao New York Coward McCann amp GeogheganBarnett A D and Clough R N (eds) (1986) Modernizing China Boulder CO Westview

PressBeasley W G (1990) The Rise of Modern Japan Tokyo TuttleBecker J (1997) Hungry Ghosts London John MurrayBedeski R (1977) ldquoThe concept of the state Sun Yat-sen and Mao Tse-tungrdquo China

Quarterly June 1977 338ndash54mdashmdash (1981) State-Building in Modern China Berkeley CA Institute of East Asian

Studies University of California

Bibliography

Bibliography 179

mdashmdash (1992) ldquoChinarsquos wartime staterdquo in Chinarsquos Bitter Victory Hsiung J C and Levine S I(eds) Armonk NY ME Sharpe

mdashmdash (2004) ldquoWestern China human security and national securityrdquo in Chinarsquos West RegionDevelopment Domestic Strategies and Global Implications Lu D and Neilson W A W(eds) Singapore World Scientific

mdashmdash (2005) ldquoTaiwanrsquos cross-straits relations a human security approachrdquo Peace ForumOnline Available HTTP httpwwwpeaceforumorgtwonwebjspwebno 3333333307ampwebitem_no 1138 (accessed May 31 2006)

Behe M J (1996) Darwinrsquos Black Box New York The Free PressBerlin I (1969) Four Essays on Liberty New York Oxford University PressBianco L (1971) Origins of the Chinese Revolution 1915ndash1949 Stanford CA Stanford

University PressBoaz D (1997) Libertarianism New York Free Pressmdashmdash (ed) (1997) The Libertarian Reader New York Free PressBobbitt P (2002) The Shield of Achilles New York Alfred A KnopfBodenhorn T (ed) (2002) Defining Modernity Guomindang Rhetorics of a New China

1920ndash1970 Ann Arbor MI Center for Chinese Studies The University of MichiganBodin J (1992) On Sovereignty (trans and ed) Franklin J H New York Cambridge

University PressBol P K (1992) This Culture of Ours Stanford CA Stanford University PressBonser M (2001) ldquoHumanitarian intervention in the post-cold war world a cautionary

talerdquo Canadian Foreign Policy 8 (3) 57ndash74Booysen F (2002) ldquoThe extent of and explanations for international disparities in human

securityrdquo Journal of Human Development 3 (2) 273ndash300Boyle J H (1972) China and Japan at War 1937ndash1945 Stanford CA Stanford University

PressBrinton C (1965) The Anatomy of Revolution New York Vintage BooksBull H (1979) ldquoThe statersquos positive role in world affairsrdquo in The State Graubard S R

(ed) New York WW Norton and CompanyCahill J F (1964) ldquoConfucian elements in the theory of paintingrdquo in Confucianism and

Chinese Civilization Wright A F (ed) New York AtheneumCannon T and Jenkins A (eds) (1990) The Geography of Contemporary China London

RoutledgeCatholic Encyclopedia Online Available HTTP httpwwwnewadventorgcathen

03298ahtm (accessed May 31 2006)Chang H (1971) Liang Chrsquoi-Chrsquoao and Intellectual Transition in China 1890ndash1907

Cambridge MA Harvard University PressChang J (1992) Wild Swans London Harper CollinsChang J and Halliday J (2005) Mao The Unknown Story New York Alfred A KnopfChang Y (1940) Wang Shou-Jen as a Statesman Peking The Chinese Social and Political

Science AssociationChrsquoen K (1964) Buddhism in China Princeton NJ Princeton University PressChen Z (ed) (2001) Zhongguo Zhengzhi Zhidu Shi (A History of Chinarsquos Political

System) Beijing Gaodeng Jiaoyu ChubansheChesneaux J (1973) Peasant Revolts in China New York WW Norton and CompanyChrsquoi H (1976) Warlord Politics in China 1916ndash1928 Stanford CA Stanford University PressChiang K (1947) Chinarsquos Destiny New York Roy PublishersChrsquoien T (1950) The Government and Politics of China 1912ndash1949 Stanford CA

Stanford University Press

180 Bibliography

Ching F (1988) Ancestors New York Fawcett ColumbineChrimes S B (1965) English Constitutional History New York Oxford University PressChu J (2001) Taiwan at the End of the 20th Century Taipei Tonsan PublicationsChu S (2002) China and Human Security Vancouver University of British Columbia

Institute of Asian ResearchChrsquou T (1962) Local Government in China under the Chrsquoing Stanford CA Stanford

University PressClough R N (1978) Island China Cambridge MA Harvard University PressConfucius (1965) Confucian Analects the Great Learning and the Doctrine of the Mean

trans Legge J New York Dover Publicationsmdashmdash (1975) The Four Books trans Legge J Taipei Culture Book CoConquest R (1987) The Harvest of Sorrow New York Oxford University PressCopper J F (1999) Taiwan Nation State or Province Boulder CO Westview PressCourtois S Werth N Jean-Louis P Andrzej P Karel B and Jean-Louis (eds) (1999) The

Black Book of Communism trans Murphy J and Kramer M Cambridge MA HarvardUniversity Press

Creel H G (1953) Chinese Thought Chicago IL University of Chicago Pressmdashmdash (1970) The Origins of Statecraft in China Chicago IL University of Chicago Pressmdashmdash (1974) Shen Pu-Hai Chicago IL University of Chicago Pressde Bary W T (1991) The Trouble with Confucianism Cambridge MA Harvard

University PressDefoe D (1950) A Journal of the Plague Year New York New American Librarymdashmdash (1971) Moll Flanders New York Oxford University Pressmdashmdash (1995) Robinson Crusoe Great Britain WordsworthDrsquoEntreves A P (1967) The Notion of the State Oxford Oxford University Pressde Ruggiero G (1959) The History of European Liberalism trans Collingwood R G

Boston MA Beacon PressDickson B J (1997) Democratization in China and Taiwan Oxford Oxford University

PressDittmer L (1987) Chinarsquos Continuous Revolution Berkeley CA University of California

PressDower J W (ed) (1975) Origins of the Modern Japanese State New York Pantheon

BooksDreyer J T (2000) Chinarsquos Political System Reading MA Addison Wesley LongmanDuara P (1988) Culture Power and the State Stanford CA Stanford University PressDurkheim E (1960) The Division of Labor in Society trans Simpson G Glencoe Ill

Free PressEasterbrook G (2005) The End of War Online Available HTTP httpwwwtnr

comdocmhtmli 20050530amps easterbrook053005 (accessed May 31 2006)Eastman L E (1984) Seeds of Destruction Stanford CA Stanford University Pressmdashmdash (1990) The Abortive Revolution Cambridge MA Harvard University PressEaston D (1971) The Political System New York KnopfEberhard W (1982) Chinarsquos Minorities Belmont CA Wadsworth Publishing

CompanyEckstein A (1977) Chinarsquos Economic Revolution New York Cambridge University PressEisenstadt S N (1978) Revolution and the Transformation of Societies New York Free

PressElman B (2000) A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China

Berkeley CA University of California Press

Elvin M (1973) The Pattern of the Chinese Past London Eyre MethuenErskine J (c1915) The Moral Obligation to be Intelligent Online Available HTTP

httphomeuchicagoedu~ahkisseleducationerskinehtml (accessed May 31 2006)Fabien N (2004) Disaster and Human Security Montreal International Studies

Association Conference March 18 2004 Online Available HTTP httpwwwafes-pressdepdfNathan_Mont_8pdf (accessed May 31 2006)

Fairbank J K (1987) The Great Chinese Revolution 1800ndash1985 New York Harper amp RowFogel J A (ed) (2005) The Teleology of the Modern Nation-State Philadelphia PA

University of PennsylvaniaFranke W (1967) China and the West trans Wilson R A New York Harper amp RowFrankl V E (1984) Manrsquos Search for Meaning New York Washington Square PressFreyn H (1943) Free Chinarsquos New Deal New York MacmillanFu Z (1996) Chinarsquos Legalists Armonk NY ME SharpeFukuyama F (1992) The End of History and the Last Man New York Free PressFung Y (1952) A History of Chinese Philosophy trans Bodde D Princeton NJ

Princeton University PressGairdner W D (1992) The War Against the Family Toronto Stoddard Publishing

CompanyGallin B (1966) Hsin Hsing Taiwan Berkeley CA University of California PressGarrison J (2004) Americarsquos Empire San Francisco CA Berrett-Koehler PublishersGill B and Henley L (1996) China and the Revolution in Military Affairs Strategic

Studies Institute Online Available HTTP httpwwwcarlislearmymilssipubs1996chinarmachinarmahtm (accessed May 31 2006)

Gold T B (1986) State and Society in the Taiwan Miracle Armonk NY ME SharpeGoldman M (1981) Chinarsquos Intellectuals Cambridge MA Harvard University PressGoldstein A (1991) From Bandwagon to Balance-of-Power Politics Stanford CA

Stanford University PressGoncharov S Lewis J W and Xue L (1993) Uncertain Partners Stanford CA Stanford

University PressGong G W (1984) The Standard of Civilization in International Society Oxford

Clarendon PressGraubard S R (ed) (1979) The State New York WW Norton and CompanyGregor A J (1974) The Fascist Persuasion in Radical Politics Princeton NJ Princeton

University PressGrieder J B (1981) Intellectuals and the State in Modern China New York Free PressGuillermaz J (1976) The Chinese Communist Party in Power 1949ndash1976 Boulder CO

Westview PressHale N Quoted Online Available HTTP httpwwwquotationspagecomquotes

Nathan_Hale (accessed May 31 2006)Hampson F O Daudelin J Hay J B Martin T and Reid H (2002) Madness in the

Multitude Don Mills Ontario Oxford University PressHamrin C L and Cheek T (eds) (1986) Chinarsquos Establishment Intellectuals Armonk

NY ME SharpeHanson V D (2001) Carnage and Culture New York DoubledayHarding H (1987) Chinarsquos Second Revolution Washington DC Brookings InstitutionHarrison H (2001) Inventing the Nation London ArnoldHeath J (2005) Tibet and China in the Twenty-First Century London SAQIHeberer T (1989) China and Its National Minorities Armonk NY ME SharpeHimmelfarb G (1994) The De-Moralization of Society New York Alfred A Knopf

Bibliography 181

Himmelfarb G (2001) One Nation Two Cultures New York Vintage BooksHo P (1962) The Ladder of Success in Imperial China New York John Wiley amp SonsHobbes T (2004 (1651) ) Leviathan New York Barnes amp NobleHoumlsle V (2004) Morals and Politics trans Randall S Notre Dame IN University of

Notre DameHsia C T (1968) The Classic Chinese Novel New York Columbia University PressHsiao K (1979) A History of Chinese Political Thought trans Mote R W Princeton NJ

Princeton University PressHsu L S (1932) The Political Philosophy of Confucianism New York EP Duttonmdashmdash (1933) Sun Yat-Sen His Political and Social Ideals University Park CA University

of Southern California PressHu J (1984) Chinese Economic Thought before the Seventeenth Century Beijing Foreign

Languages PressHua S (1995) Scientism and Humanism Albany NY State University of New York PressHucker C O (1961) The Traditional Chinese State in Ming Times Tucson AZ University

of Arizona Pressmdashmdash (1975) Chinarsquos Imperial Past Stanford CA Stanford University Pressmdashmdash (1978) The Ming Dynasty Ann Arbor MI Center for Chinese Studies The

University of MichiganHuntington S P (2004) Who Are We New York Simon and SchusterJapan Center for International Exchange (2004) Human Security in the United Nations

Tokyo Japan Center for International ExchangeJobs S (2005) Convocation Speech (Stanford University) Online Available HTTP

httpwwwdhocablog327 (accessed May 29 2005)Joffe J (1999) ldquoRethinking the nation-staterdquo Foreign Affairs 78 (6) 122ndash7Johnson C A (1982) Revolutionary Change Stanford CA Stanford University Pressmdashmdash (1990) An Instance of Treason Stanford CA Stanford University Pressmdashmdash (2004) The Sorrows of Empire New York Henry HoltKang C (2001) The Aquariums of Pyongyang New York Basic BooksKennedy P (1987) The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers New York Random HouseKirby W C (2005) ldquoWhen did China become Chinardquo in The Teleology of the Modern

Nation-State Fogel J A (ed) Philadelphia PA University of PennsylvaniaKrasner S D (ed) (2001) Problematic Sovereignty New York Columbia University PressKraus R C (1991) Brushes with Power Berkeley CA University of California PressKuhn P A (2002) Origins of the Modern Chinese State Stanford CA Stanford

University PressLao Tzu (Laozi) (1961) Tao Teh Ching Boston Shambala PublicationsLecky W E H (1955) History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne

New York G BrazillerLevenson J R (1968) Confucian China and its Modern Fate Berkeley CA University of

California PressLevy M J J (1968) The Family Revolution in Modern China New York AtheneumLiang H (1983) Son of the Revolution New York Vintage BooksLieberthal K (1995) Governing China New York WW Norton and CompanyLippit V D (1987) The Economic Development of China Armonk NY ME SharpeLiu X (1970) Chan-kuo tsrsquoe (Zhan Guo Ce) trans Crump J I Jr Oxford Clarendon PressLiu Z and Lin G (1988) Chuantong yu Zhongguo Ren (Tradition and the Chinese

People) Hong Kong Joint Publishing CoLott J R J (2000) More Guns Less Crime Chicago IL University of Chicago Press

182 Bibliography

Bibliography 183

Lu D and Neilson W A W (eds) (2004) Chinarsquos West Region Development SingaporeWorld Scientific

MacFarquhar R (1973) The Origins of the Cultural Revolution 1 London OxfordUniversity Press

mdashmdash (1983) The Origins of the Cultural Revolution 2 Oxford Oxford University PressMadden T F (1999) A Concise History of the Crusades Lanham MD Rowman amp

Littlefield PublishingMaddison A (1998) Chinese Economic Performance in the Long Run Paris OECDMair V (2005) ldquoNorthwestern peoples and recurrent origins of the Chinese staterdquo in The

Teleology of the Modern Nation-State Fogel J A (ed) Philadelphia PA University ofPennsylvania

Maruyama M (1974) Studies in the Intellectual History of Japan trans Hane M TokyoUniversity of Tokyo Press

Maslow A M (1968) Toward a Psychology of Being New York Van Nostrand ReinholdCompany

Meisner M (1970) Li Ta-chao and the Origins of Chinese Marxism Cambridge MAHarvard University Press

Miller D (ed) (1985) Popper Selections Princeton NJ Princeton University PressMilosz C (1953) The Captive Mind trans Zielonko J London Secker amp WarburgMisra K (1998) From Post-Maoism to Post-Marxism New York RoutledgeMoody P R (1977) Opposition and Dissent in Contemporary China Stanford CA

Hoover Institution Pressmdashmdash (1988) Political Opposition in Post-Confucian Society New York PraegerMoore B J (1990) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy Boston MA Beacon

PressMorse J R (2005) ldquoMarriage and the limits of contractrdquo Policy Review (April and May

2005) No 130 Online Available HTTP httpwwwpolicyrevieworgapr05morsehtml(accessed June 6 2006)

Munro D J (1969) The Concept of Man in Early China Stanford CA StanfordUniversity Press

Nathan A J (1985) Chinese Democracy New York Alfred A Knopfmdashmdash (1997) Chinarsquos Transition New York Columbia University PressNivison D S (1964) ldquoProtest against conventions and conventions of protestrdquo in

Confucianism and Chinese Civilization Wright A F (ed) New York AtheneumOakeshott M (1962) Rationalism in Politics and other essays London Methuen and

CompanyOi J (1989) State and Peasant in Contemporary China Berkeley CA University of

California PressOksenberg M (ed) (1973) Chinarsquos Developmental Experience New York PraegerOrsquoRourke P J (1998) Eat the Rich New York Atlantic Monthly PressOrwell G (1945) Animal Farm London Secker amp WarburgPafko W (2000) Nitrogen Food or Flames Online Available HTTP httpwwwpafko

comhistoryh_s_n2html (accessed June 6 2006)Pagden A (2001) Peoples and Empires New York Modern LibraryParish W L and Whyte M K (1978) Village and Family in Contemporary China

Chicago IL University of Chicago PressPeoplersquos Daily (May 05 2005) ldquoChinese family advancing from tradition

to modernityrdquo Online Available HTTP httpenglishpeoplecomcn20050519print20050519_185860html (accessed May 6 2006)

184 Bibliography

Pepper S (1990) Chinarsquos Education Reform in the 1980s Berkeley CA Institute of EastAsian Studies University of California at Berkeley Center for Chinese Studies

Perry E J and Goldman M (eds) (2002) Changing Meanings of Citizenship in ModernChina Cambridge MA Harvard University Press

Perry E J and Wong C (eds) (1985) The Political Economy of Reform in Post-MaoChina Cambridge MA Harvard University Press

Pye L (1968) The Spirit of Chinese Politics Cambridge MA Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology

Raghvan V R (1998) Arthashastra and Sunzi Bingfa Online Available HTTPhttpwwwigncanicinks_41042htm (accessed May 31 2006)

Ralston A (2004) Between a Rock and a Hard Place New York Atria BooksRavina M (2005) ldquoState-making in global context Japan in a world of nation-statesrdquo in

The Teleology of the Modern Nation-State Fogel J A (ed) Philadelphia PAUniversity of Pennsylvania

Rawski T G and Li L M (eds) (1992) Chinese History in Economic PerspectiveBerkeley CA University of California Press

Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty OnlineAvailable HTTP httpwebgccunyeduicissresearchmainhtm (accessed May 31 2006)

Rubin V A (1976) Individual and State in Ancient China trans Levine S I New YorkColumbia University Press

Sabine G H (1961) A History of Political Theory New York Holt Rinehart and WinstonSartre J P (1973) Nausea trans Alexander L London Hamish HamiltonScruton R (2002) The West and the Rest Wilmington DE ISI BooksShang Y (1928) The Book of Lord Shang trans Duyvendak J J Chicago IL University

of Chicago PressShirk S L (1993) The Political Logic of Economic Reform in China Berkeley CA

University of California PressSienkiewicz H (1991) With Fire and Sword New York Hippocrene BooksSmil V (1993) Chinarsquos Environmental Crisis Armonk NY ME SharpeSpence J D (1979) The Death of Woman Wang New York Penguin Booksmdashmdash (1990) The Search for Modern China New York WW Norton and CompanyStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2002) Aristotlersquos Political Theory Online Available

HTTP httpplatostanfordeduentriesaristotle-politicsConCit (accessed May 312006)

Suhrke A (1999) ldquoHuman security and the interests of statesrdquo Security Dialogue 30265ndash76

Sun Tzu (Sunzi) (1994) Art of War trans Sawyer R D Boulder CO Westview PressTeggart F J (1916) The Processes of History New Haven CT Yale University Pressmdashmdash (1962) Theory and Processes of History Berkeley CA University of California

PressThurston A F (1988) Enemies of the People Cambridge MA Harvard University PressTien H (1972) Government and Politics in Kuomintang China 1927ndash1937 Stanford CA

Stanford University PressTsao H (1958) Dream of the Red Chamber trans Kuhn F McHugh F and McHugh I

New York Grosset amp DunlapTsou T (1973) ldquoThe values of the Chinese revolutionrdquo in Chinarsquos Developmental

Experience Oksenberg M (ed) New York PraegerTwitchett D and Loewe M (eds) (1986) The Cambridge History of China Vol 1 the Chrsquoin

and Han Empires 221 BC ndash AD 220 Cambridge UK Cambridge University Press

Van Doren C (1991) A History of Knowledge New York Ballantine BooksVan Slyke L P (1988) Yangtze Reading MA Addison WesleyWatson B (1971) Records of the Grand Historian of China New York Columbia

University PressWeber M (1919) ldquoPolitik als Berufrdquo Gesammelte Politische Schriften (1921) Munich

Duncker amp Humblodt Online Available HTTP httpwww2pfeifferedu~lridenerDSSWeberpolvochtml (accessed October 10 2006)

Wei A (2005) What Is ldquoLei Fengrdquo Online Available HTTP httpwwwglobalvolunteersorg1mainchinaleifenghtm (accessed May 31 2006)

Weigel G (2005) Is Europe Dying Notes on a Crisis of Civilizational Morale OnlineAvailable HTTP httpwwwfpriorgww0602200506weigeleuropedyinghtml(Volume 6 Number 2) (accessed May 31 2006)

Weiner M (1996) ldquoNations without bordersrdquo Foreign Affairs 75 (2) 128ndash34Wilbur C M (1983) The Nationalist Revolution in China 1923ndash1928 Cambridge UK

Cambridge University PressWilson J Q (1993) The Moral Sense New York Free PressWolf M (2001) ldquoWill the nation-state survive globalizationrdquo Foreign Affairs 80 (1)

178ndash90World Health Organization (2006) Online Available HTTP WHOFAO release independent

Expert Report on diet and chronic disease httpwwwwhointmediacentrenewsreleases2003pr20en (accessed June 18 2006)

Wright A F (1964) Confucianism and Chinese Civilization New York Atheneummdashmdash (1978) The Sui Dynasty New York Alfred A KnopfYang C K (1967) Religion in Chinese Society Berkeley CA University of California

PressZeng X (1991) Zhongguo Zhengzhi Zhidu Shilun Jianbian (Outline History of Chinarsquos

Political System) Beijing Zhongguo guangbodianshi chubansheZheng S (1997) Party vs State in Post-1949 China Cambridge UK Cambridge

University PressZhou K X (1996) How the Farmers Changed China Boulder CO Westview Press

Bibliography 185

Alexander the Great 87altruism 4 29 63Anarchy Man 23Anderson William 126aristocracy decline 99Aristotle on constitutions 109ascription 88Authoritarian Man 22

Bai Gang 119Bai Zhongxi 141baihua 139Banfield Edward 59bank as metaphor of the state 70baojia system 96Becker Jasper 63 163Bedeski Robert E 141 142 157Behe Michael J 6Bill of Rights American 51Boaz David 74Bodin Jean 31Bolshevik revolution 49Booysen Frikkie 42Boxer rebellion 134Boyle John H 145Buddhism 85 91Byzantine Empire 86

Cao Cao 94Chang Hao 127Chang Jung 18 142Chang Yu-chuan 126Charlemagne 91Chen dynasty 89Chen Shui-bian 171China social organization human

security role 138Chinese state and human security 37Chrimes SB 111

cinema 14 Cast Away 15 The Edge 1421 The Gods Must Be Crazy 16Touching the Void 5

citizenship 112 Aristotle on 123Confucian notion 123 Republic 140

Civil War American 51class in Communist societies 73collectivization 157Confucianism 121 claimed sovereignty

120 education 19 emphasis on family40 ethics 122 examinations 125human security 121 meta-constitution40 state 99 105

consanguineity 45conservatism 52constitution claims 116 ideology 110

security 110 state 33 written 108corveacutee 98crime rates 73Cultural Revolution 20culture 11

Daoism 17 121Darwin Charles 6death 63Declaration of Independence

American 51Defoe Daniel 12Democratic Man 22depression impact on Guomindang

China 143division of labor 45Donne John 29Dower John W 132Dream of the Red Chamber 12 103Durkheim Emile 125dynastic cycle 20 93dynastic founders 116

Index

Eastman Lloyd E 141economy 66egalitarianism 71egoistic particularism 37Elysium 60environment natural 64equality state value 48eremitism 123European Union 3 60 130external relations 69

family 19 alternative civil society inChina 152 cult of 83 primary security structure 45

family and state 37 Communism 41Cultural Revolution 162 traditionalChina 39

famines 26Feng Guifen 136filial piety 34 120foreign concessions 145Formula One 65 Two 67 Three 69

Four 70 Five 71Fourteenth Amendment

US constitution 58Fu Zhengyuan 106

Gairdner William D 40Garrison Jim 46genocide 25ndash26gentry 89globizen 2 24 59 60Golden Rule 34Goncharov Sergei 158Gong Gerrit W 35Great Leap Forward 20 160Grotius Hugo 27Guillermaz Jacques 157gulag 8gun control 42guo (state) 19 guojia 40Guomindang anti-Communist campaigns

147 geopolitical strategy 148modelled after Communist Party 150reorganization 137 state 53

habeas corpus Lincoln suspension 52Hale Nathan 4Halhin Gol battle 143Han dynasty 82Han Feizi 80Han Gaozu 84Han government and Confucianism 83Himmelfarb Gertrude 47 57

Hobbes Thomas 2 34 37 40 44 60 71 103

Hong Xiuquan 104 137Houmlsle Vittorio 27Hsu Leonard S 130Hu Hanmin 142 150Huang Chao rebellion 93Hucker Charles O 77 79 93ndash97

108 145human life cycle 21human security 2 definitions 4 29 55

failure (HSF) 56 framework ofanalysis 45 individual responsibility10 22 life struggle 8 role of states24 and state 22 theory centralcomponents 53

Hundred Days Reform 132Hundred Flowers campaign 158Huntington Samuel P 91

ideology 64incomplete state China 155individual as organism 57 in extremis 9

human security of 62 survival 21 unitof human security 45 will to live 9

Japan expansion in 1930s 143modernization 148

Jefferson Thomas 48Jiang Jieshi (Chiang Kai-shek) 140 142Jiang Jingguo 151Jobs Steve 4justice as political value 72

Kang Chol-Hwan 8Kennedy Paul 46knowledge accumulation in China 101

Confucian 122 Qing 137 securitycomponent 46

Koguryo 90 104Korea kings 129Krasner Stephen D 68Kuhn Philip A 127 136

Lady Qiaoguo 89League of Nations 144Lecky William EH 44Legalism 74 80Lei Feng 166Lenin Vladimir 50Leviathan universal fear of death 63Li Si 80Li Zehou 159Liang Heng 163

188 Index

Liang Qichao 127libertarianism 42liberty post-imperial China 139 state

value 51Lieberthal Kenneth 162likin 149Lin Biao 159Liu Shaoqi 166Liu Xiang 81Liu Zaifu 120Locke John 117longevity 30loyalty 20Lysenkoism 163

Macartney mission 112MacFarquhar Roderick 58 169Maddison Angus 138Maine Sir Henry 24Mamet David 14Man versus nature in literature 17Manchuria 45Mandate of Heaven 113 117Mao Zedong 155marriage 19Martel Charles 91Maruyama Masao 129Marxism-Leninism-Maoist Thought 167Maslow Abraham 47May Fourth Movement 134Medieval Church liberating agency

against feudalism 39Meiji constitution 109Mencius 117 124Meng Tian 79meritocracy 88 Han dynasty 83meta-constitution 3 33 75 113 167

China 52 competing 156 Han dynasty91 revolutionary 168 sovereignty 109

military primary security structure of state 45

Miller David 130Milosz Czeslaw 1Misra Kalpana 159Modern Sovereign Nation-State (MSNS)

characteristics 31 decline 55 growthto empire 135 lethality 3

Mohism 59Moll Flanders 13Mongol rule 95Moody Peter R 150 158moral hazard 30Mozi 107Munro Donald J 118

Nathan Andrew J 161national liberation 73national security 35nationalism 25 39 146Natural Man 22Nazism 50Nobel Alfred 32Northern Expedition 141

Oakeshott Michael 63 on knowledge 64obligation 66Oi Jean 160Open Door 133Opium Wars 112order state value 48 52OrsquoRourke PJ 4Orwell George 50Ottoman Empire 144Overseas Chinese 171

Parish William L 162Patriotism 59peasantry 105personhood 6 10 16 29 63persons human security 65Plato 48Polanyi Michael 74Political economy 69political friction coefficient 51 68political values 72Popper Karl 130Prisoner Man 23prisoners 8 totalitarian state 11property confiscation 30Protagoras 44Protestant Reformation 92pseudo-knowledge 64

Qin state 1 77 81 101 107 118

Raghvan VR 170raison drsquoetat 47Ralston Aron 9religion 60 91Republic China challenges and

adaptation 144 minimalism 138Revolt of Seven Princes (154 BC)

82 108Robinson Crusoe 13 21Roh Tae-Woo 129Roman Empire 83 84Romance of Three Kingdoms 85Rousseau Jean-Jacques 165Rubin Vitaly A 106ndash7

Index 189

190 Index

St Augustine 86St Paul 58samurai 129 132Sartre Jean-Paul 6scholar-officials Confucian 126Scruton Roger 55 59secularists 60Security workers 70self-knowledge 64sexual bonding 15Shang Yang 78 106Shirk Susan L 160Shuihuzhuan (All Men Are Brothers) 18Sienkiewicz Henryk 62Sima Qian 168Smith Adam 125Social existence 57Social Friction Coefficient of 66social justice 29social knowledge 66Son of Heaven 124Sorge Richard 143soul 25sovereignty 31 actualized 67 54

claimed 3 33 54 concept US andEurope 131 modern state 48

Soviet state 116Special Economic Zones (SEZ) 170Spence Jonathan D 97 98 139Spring and Autumn Period

(770ndash475 BC) 78Stalin Josef 24 50state claims on citizens 75 Communist

50 lethality 25 27 life-cycle 28paradoxes 27 territorial expansion 46

state-building Communist 53 eclecticism 137

statecraft as political knowledge 115Sui dynasty 86 conquests 90

reforms 88Sui Yangdi 88Sun Yat-sen 53 130 153 social

Darwinism 154 three-stage plan forstate-building 153

Sunzi 170 Art of War 81survival biological 57

Taiping Rebellion 104 132Taiwan 35 68 China problem 131 as

irredentum 32 166 post-1949 144sovereignty 172 transformation 171

Tang dynasty 93Teggart FJ 5 36Thurston Anne F 162Tien Hung-mao 150Tokugawa Shogunate 132Tongmenghui 133totalitarianism 161Tsao Hsueh-chin 103tsunami 4Twenty-One Demands 133Twitchett Denis 78 80

UN Charter 59UNDP concept of human security 42uneven development 156

values political 34Van Slyke Lyman P 145

Wang Jingwei 142 150Wang Mang 75 83 84 107Wang Yangming 125warlordism 94Washington George 155Wei An 166Wei Yuan 136Weigel George 113welfare state 42Westphalian state 112White Lotus Rebellion 132Wilbur C Martin 140Wild Swans 18will to live 20Wilson James Q 49Women nomadic 87Wright Arthur F 87ndash89 92 94Wu Zetian 93

Xiang Yu 84

Yan Xishan 141Yang Guang 90Yixian 19Yuan Shikai 133

Zeng Xiaohua 127Zhan Guo Ce 81Zhang Zuolin 141Zheng Shiping 158Zhou state 78Zhu Yuanzhang 95

Book Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Preface

Abbreviations

1 Human survival human institutions and human security

2 Dimensions of human security Foundations in individual human life







9 Contemporary Chinarsquos incomplete sovereignty Fusion succession and adaptation

Notes

Bibliography

Index

The modern state is the dominant ndash but not exclusive ndash provider of human securityChina has attempted to reconstitute itself as a modern sovereign state on severaloccasions in the past century driven by the quest for security and order In additionto the state family and social institutions have extended human longevity byreducing violent and preventable deaths Twenty-two centuries ago the imperialConfucian state increased human security its collapse in 1911 led to severalexperiments in state-building and adaptation This groundbreaking book outlines aworking theory of human security and applies it to an analysis of the dynamics ofthe Chinese state Professor Bedeski demonstrates how sovereignty of the statereflects primary human concerns of survival where the statersquos fundamentalpurpose is to preserve citizensrsquo lives Using his theory of human securityhe describes eight ldquometa-constitutionsrdquo from the Legalist Qin empire to thepotential federal state represented by Taiwanrsquos continued autonomy Theincompleteness of Chinese sovereignty remains a key variable in understandingthe policy and strategy of modernization both within China and amongneighboring East Asian states

His study bridges humanist and social sciences in combining political theorywith historical literary cinematic and sociological materials and ideas HumanSecurity and the Chinese State provides an original approach to the last twothousand years of Chinese political history that will appeal to scholars of Chinesepolitics history human security and political theory

Robert E Bedeski is Professor Emeritus Department of Political Science andProgram Professor Emeritus Centre for Asia-Pacific Initiatives (CAPI) at theUniversity of Victoria British Columbia Canada

Human Security and the Chinese State



















Robert E Bedeski












JQ1510B43 2007320150951ndashdc22 2006024055







For dolce Pamela

Contents












Preface





Preface xi





xii Preface




Abbreviations



xiv Abbreviations


(Milosz 1953 122)

















(Jobs 2005)









(Teggart 1962 272)






















(Kang 2001 143)







































































































































































































(Hobbes 1651 95)










































































(Lecky 1955)



























Level Element


value structure(s)





































































(Scruton 2002 53)





















































[Ks]



exoteric[Kp]






























HSi Wi F Ki Ei















































HSc Sapopulation Sa
















































exploitation




(Hucker 1961 1)























(Twitchett 1986 90)





































































































































































(Rubin 1976 58)































(Chrimes 1965 1)





























































































































































































1900 4001910 423 231920 472 491930 489 171940 519 301950 547 28







Liberty [L]


Knowledge [Ks]


Social economy [Es]
















































































































































(Oi 1989)
















(Parish 1978 321)







(Becker 1997 258)





















(Wei 2005)








































(Raghvan 1998)
























(Defoe 1971 182)


Notes



(Ching 1988 40)






(Frankl 1984 128)








174 Notes


















Notes 175













(Wright 1978 14)








176 Notes















4 As of early 2005

Notes 177

















Bibliography

Bibliography 179



















180 Bibliography


































Bibliography 181















182 Bibliography

Bibliography 183





















184 Bibliography



































Bibliography 185














Index










Hobbes Thomas 2 34 37 40 44 60 71 103













188 Index













Qin state 1 77 81 101 107 118




Index 189

190 Index

















Xiang Yu 84



Book Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Preface

Abbreviations










Notes

Bibliography

Index



















Robert E Bedeski












JQ1510B43 2007320150951ndashdc22 2006024055







For dolce Pamela

Contents












Preface





Preface xi





xii Preface




Abbreviations



xiv Abbreviations


(Milosz 1953 122)

















(Jobs 2005)









(Teggart 1962 272)






















(Kang 2001 143)







































































































































































































(Hobbes 1651 95)










































































(Lecky 1955)



























Level Element


value structure(s)





































































(Scruton 2002 53)





















































[Ks]



exoteric[Kp]






























HSi Wi F Ki Ei















































HSc Sapopulation Sa
















































exploitation




(Hucker 1961 1)























(Twitchett 1986 90)





































































































































































(Rubin 1976 58)































(Chrimes 1965 1)





























































































































































































1900 4001910 423 231920 472 491930 489 171940 519 301950 547 28







Liberty [L]


Knowledge [Ks]


Social economy [Es]
















































































































































(Oi 1989)
















(Parish 1978 321)







(Becker 1997 258)





















(Wei 2005)








































(Raghvan 1998)
























(Defoe 1971 182)


Notes



(Ching 1988 40)






(Frankl 1984 128)








174 Notes


















Notes 175













(Wright 1978 14)








176 Notes















4 As of early 2005

Notes 177

















Bibliography

Bibliography 179



















180 Bibliography


































Bibliography 181















182 Bibliography

Bibliography 183





















184 Bibliography



































Bibliography 185














Index










Hobbes Thomas 2 34 37 40 44 60 71 103













188 Index













Qin state 1 77 81 101 107 118




Index 189

190 Index

















Xiang Yu 84



Book Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Preface

Abbreviations










Notes

Bibliography

Index