For Confucius, the key guiding moral principle was to strive towards achieving and maintaining virtuous behaviour on both the individual and collective level. In his understanding the social and political virtues directly reflect personal virtues, and virtuous society can only be composed of virtuous citizens. In this context, Confucius advocated traditional values including ancestor worship, the preservation of rituals, respect for the elders by their descendants, clearly defined filial and gender duties, and strong family loyalties. Moreover, the family was seen as the cornerstone of society and the ideal government was to resemble family relationships of love, responsibility and mutual interdependence. Nevertheless, in addition to his moral prescriptions, Confucius was also an astute social analyst who developed a highly influential social philosophy that centred on the importance of self-cultivation and discipline, topics that dominate the latter-day sociologies of both Weber and Elias. For Confucius, a superior human being is defined by his or her ability to exercise self-restraint and to engage in permanent self-cultivation. In his own words, ‘the gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfected without trial’ (Confucius, 19 in The Analects, 1979).
Discipline and Morality
Self-control is understood to be a precondition of individual and social development. In Confucian teachings the lack of discipline is likely to create conditions leading to corruption, abuse of power, inequity and poverty. The prosperity and well-being of a particular social order are premised on the morality and self-restraint of individuals constituting that social order. Since in this view ‘the perfecting of one’s self is the fundamental base of all progress and all moral development’, there is a great emphasis on education. For Confucius, education involves the acquisition of knowledge which helps develop moral capacity so that individuals can recognise ethical absolutes, and strive towards creating better social order built on such absolutes. Another role of education is to stimulate self-discipline by learning how to observe and enact proper forms of behaviour. In this context, the strict observation of rites (li) is seen as the way to overcome the urge towards self-gratification and fulfilment of one’s self-interest. Hence the performance of particular rituals is not an empty gesture that indicates one’s submission to the rulers or ancestors, but has a specific and functional role: it generates self-restraint and discipline that foster individual and social development. For Confucius, sages are envisaged as the leading lights of moral cultivation. An ideal sage would be someone who constantly aspires towards ethical perfection while also guiding others on the same path towards greater virtuousness. The sage is also understood as a self-critic who espouses the particular ethical principles of Confucianism (which literally means ‘the confession of literati’) and as such articulates high moral standards for the entire society.
Whereas sages are conceptualised as the moral guardians of people and moral supervisors of the rulers, the gentlemen or literati, were understood to be individuals most likely to influence the everyday lives of most people. In contrast to sages who are exceptional but very rare, the gentleman is a more concrete ethical exemplar. For Confucius the gentleman is defined by his moral excellence, self-discipline and a genuine concern for the welfare of others. In this sense the gentleman is a morally superior person who can command and receive obedience on the grounds of his own morality and ability to help others: ‘the nature of the gentleman is like the wind and the nature of the small people is like the grass; when the wind blows over the grass it always bends’ (Confucius, 1979: 12, 19).
In this way the literati provide an indispensable service to both the state and civil society: their teachings help hold the behaviour of rulers in (moral) check while aiding the autonomy and continuous ethical development of the civil society groupings. Confucius distinguishes between the office-holding literati, whose role is to make sure that the state is governed according to high ethical principles, and the ‘backwoods literati’; that is, sages without an office who act as social leaders for specific local communities (Cho, 1996: 113). Nevertheless, the gentlemen are not born as such; instead anyone has the potential to become a gentleman. In Confucian teachings the educational processes that mould individuals into gentlemen are envisaged as open to all regardless of their origin. Hence one’s ability to guide others rests exclusively on one’s capacity and willingness to learn and to achieve self-cultivation and self-control.
The rulers too require self-discipline and humility and are more likely to be trusted and followed if leading virtuous lives. The stability of social and political orders depends on the willingness of all citizens (including the rulers) to obey the ‘rites’ (li) and to act morally. As Confucius (1979: 87) emphasises:
If the people be led by laws, and uniformity sought to be given them by punishments, they will try to avoid the punishment, but have no sense of shame. If they be led by virtue, and uniformity sought to be given them by the rules of propriety, they will have the sense of the shame, and moreover will become good.
Thus, in contrast to Legalism, which highlights the coercive pressure of the laws, Confucianism stresses the emotional and moral sense of responsibility: once duty is internalised, shame is a much more powerful deterrent of vice than the state’s threat of violence. Confucian social philosophy perceives social order through the prism of well-established hierarchies where every individual and social strata fulfil their requisite role to the best of their ability.
For Confucius self-discipline ultimately leads to benevolence. In his own words: ‘To discipline self to fulfil the rites is benevolence. The day when self-discipline fulfils the rites, all under heaven would be with benevolence. Indeed, the practices of benevolence originate from self and not from others!’ (Confucius, 12: 1). Confucian social philosophy prioritises refined and morally superior judgement over knowledge and skill even when that knowledge involves the advanced command of existing rules. Confucius’s ideas give clear primacy to organisational form and group morality over knowledge and individual freedom.
Ibn Khaldun as the First Proto-sociologist
Much premodern social and political thought obsessed over normative questions such as: What constitutes a good life? How can group morals be maintained? Or how can a social harmony be achieved? The tendency was also to provide moralistic, usually religiously inspired, answers to such questions. In sharp contrast to these perspectives, Ibn Khaldun focuses on the causal relations between different social processes. Instead of advocating a particular course of action, Ibn Khaldun is one of the first social thinkers who aims to explain how the social world works. Although his studies contain extensive passages that resemble religious sermons or glorify mysticism and anti-rationalism, his main contributions are uniquely couched in the language of what we would today call social science. Drawing on wide historical, geographical and philosophical knowledge, Ibn Khaldun articulated the first proto-sociological theories of state formation, power, solidarity and urban and rural dynamics. Moreover, The Muqaddimah is often described as the first sustained work of historical science (Lacoste, 1984: 160; Schmidt, 1967).
At the heart of Ibn Khaldun’s project is the ambition to explain long-term social change. In this context, he explores the macro historical processes that impact state development, violent conflicts, urban life, civilisations, religious beliefs, social stratification and power configurations. At the same time he also tackles the micro interactional social world as he assesses the patterns of group solidarity, the role family and kinship play in nomadic and sedentary groups, personality transformations, and the dynamics of sociability.
The Rise and Fall of Civilisations
In The