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Introduction:

Ethics explores moral values, principles, and conduct. This chapter examines Confucian ethics, drawing on the work of David Wong, which emphasizes virtue within a relational context (Wong, 2011).

Virtue Ethics in Confucianism:

Confucian ethics is often characterized as a virtue ethic. It’s important to clarify the sense in which virtues are central to Confucian thought. Here, virtues are understood broadly as desirable qualities or traits that individuals can cultivate and that contribute to an ideal of personhood (Wong, 2011).

The controversy arises from narrower, philosophical definitions of “virtue” used in Western theories. Some Western virtue ethics prioritize character traits as explaining right action and good consequences, competing with deontological and consequentialist theories. Classical Confucian texts don’t engage with these specific theoretical questions to the same extent (Tiwald, 2018).

Furthermore, some critics assume virtues are atomistic—qualities existing in isolation from social context. This is a mischaracterization of Confucianism, where virtues are developed and expressed within relationships (Ames, 2011, 2021; Neville, 2016). Confucian ethics emphasizes a life of mutual care and respect within relationships, like those of parent and child. Full personhood is achieved through these relationships, tailored to specific circumstances and interactions. This relational focus is consistent with a broad understanding of virtue.

The Junzi, the Dao, and Ren

The ideal of the junzi is central to Confucian ethics. Originally meaning “prince’s son,” it evolved in the Analects to represent ethical nobility, sometimes translated as “exemplary person” (Ames & Rosemont, 1998). Traits of the junzi include filiality (respect for parents), adherence to traditional rituals, and situational judgment. These are virtues necessary for following the dao, the way humans ought to live, analogous to eudaimonia (flourishing) in Greek ethics (Yu, 2007). The junzi embodies the virtues needed to follow the dao.

Ren is another unifying concept in the Analects. Before Confucius, it referred to aristocratic lineage. In the Analects, it signifies moral excellence attainable by anyone. Ren has been translated in various ways. Some translations emphasize its comprehensive nature, equating it with complete ethical virtue, sometimes even using “Good” or “Goodness” (Waley, 1938, 1989; Slingerland, 2003). In some instances, ren is synonymous with junzi, suggesting comprehensive moral excellence. However, other passages treat ren as one virtue among others, like wisdom and courage. In this narrower sense, ren is explained as caring for others (Analects 12.22), leading some translators to use “benevolence” (Lau, 1970a). It’s possible these senses are related, with care and respect permeating various forms of moral excellence. However, the nature of ren remains complex, and it is here referred to simply as ren.

The Centrality of Li (Ritual):

Analects 1.15 compares character cultivation to crafting fine objects, emphasizing the importance of li (rites, ritual). Li encompasses a wide range of practices, from ancestor worship and family customs to protocols for officials.

Ritual exemplifies the idea that the personal is political. Engaging in ritual, performing it properly with respect and consideration, is a form of self-cultivation. The centrality of ritual is a distinctive mark of Confucian ethics. While Aristotelian habituation is analogous to Confucian cultivation, Aristotle doesn’t emphasize ritual performance. Ritual is also political, as good governance is based on proper conduct in all social relationships, beginning with the family. Li covers both good manners and political civility, requiring interpreting situations and communicating respect (Olberding, 2019).

Ritual is thus a constituent of ren, but not its entirety. Analects 7.30 connects the desire for ren with its achievement. Book 12 offers diverse descriptions of ren. In 12.1, ritual makes for ren. In 12.2, ren involves respectful public conduct. In 12.2, ren is also associated with shu (sympathetic understanding). In 12.3, ren people are hesitant to speak, and in 12.22, ren is caring for people. These diverse characterizations are appropriate if ren is comprehensive excellence encompassing many dimensions, including but not reducible to li.

Ren and Li in Confucian Relational Ethics

Consider ren in its meaning as the particular virtue of caring for others and li in its aspect as the valued human dance. These values are the basis for characterizing Confucian ethics as a relational ethic, meaning that it is in part distinguished by its placement of relationships at the center of a well-lived life (see Ames, 2011, 2021). Confucian ethics are often taken to stand in contrast to ethics that place individual autonomy and freedom to choose how to live. While there is much that is true about this contrast, it must be carefully described so as to differentiate it from some other contrasts. For example, the value of individual autonomy usually includes several different dimensions that do not necessarily accompany one another: (1) prioritizing of individual interests over group or collective interests when these conflict; (2) giving moral permission to the individual to choose from a significantly wide range (within certain moral boundaries) of ways to live; and (3) emphasizing the importance of living according to one’s own understanding of what is right and good even if others do not see it the same way.

Confucian ethics in significant part, though not in all parts, accepts autonomy in the sense of (3) (see Shun, 2004; and Brindley, 2010). Confucius is often depicted in the Analects as emphasizing the importance of cultivating one’s own character even when others do not recognize or appreciate one’s efforts (e.g., 4.14) and of acting independently of what is conventionally approved or disapproved (e.g., 5.1). The texts associated with Mencius (Mengzi, best known in the West under his Latinized name, lived in the 4th century B.C.E.) and Xunzi (4th and 3rd centuries B.C.E.), the most pivotal thinkers in the classical Confucian tradition after Confucius, both articulate the necessity to speak up when one believes the ruler one is serving is on a wrong course of action (e.g., Mencius 1A3 and Xunzi 29.2). On the other hand, none of these classical thinkers argue for the necessity of protecting a frank subordinate from a ruler who is made angry by criticism, and it could be argued that Confucianism does not fully endorse autonomy in sense (3) without endorsing such protection for those who wish to engage in moral criticism of the powerful.

Most interpretations present Confucian ethics as rejecting (2). There is a way for human beings to live, a comprehensive human good to be realized, and there can be no choosing between significantly different ways of life that are equally acceptable from a moral perspective (an important exception to this kind of interpretation is provided by Hall and Ames, 1987, who interpret Confucius’s dao as a human invention, collective and individual). On the other hand, Confucian ethics de-emphasizes legal coercion as a method for guiding people along the way and instead emphasizes moral exhortation and inspiration by way of example (see, most famously, 2.3 of the Analects, which emphasizes the necessity of a ruler’s guiding his people by instilling in them a sense of shame rather than by the threat of external punishment). While a Confucian might believe in a single correct way for human beings, they might endorse a significant degree of latitude for people to learn from their own mistakes and by way of example from others (see Chan, 1999).

Confucian ethics does not accept (1), but not because it subordinates individual interests to group or collective interests (for criticism of the rather common interpretation of Confucianism as prioritizing the group over the individual, see Hall and Ames 1998). Rather, there is a different conception of the relationship between individual and group interests. The best illustration of this different conception is a story to be found in the Mencius that concerns sage-king Shun.