1、just hierarchyJust Hierarchywhy social hierarchies matter in china and the rest of the worlddaniela. bell wang peiprince ton university pressp r i nc e t on & oxfordCopyright 2020 by Prince ton University PressRequests for permission to reproduce material from this workshould be sent to pe r mi s si
2、on spr e s s . pr inc e t on . e duPublished by Prince ton University Press41 William Street, Prince ton, New Jersey 08540 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX 20 1 TRpr e s s . pr inc e t on . e duAll Rights ReservedLibrary of Congress Control Number 2019954572 ISBN 978-0-691-20089-7 ISBN (e-
3、 book) 978-0-691-20088-0British Library Cataloging- in- Publication Data is availableEditorial: Rob T empio and Matt RohalProduction Editorial: Jill HarrisJacket Design: Carmina AlvarezProduction: Brigid AckermanPublicity: Alyssa Sanford and Kate Farquhar- ThomsonCopyeditor: Jay BoggisThis book has
4、been composed in Arno ProPrinted on acid- free paper. Printed in the United States of Amer i ca1 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1vcontentsAc kn o w l e d g m en ts vii I n tr oduct ion 1 1. Whats Wrong with Hierarchy? 8 2. In Defense of Hierarchy 133. From China to the World 21 1 Just Hierarchy between Intimates
5、: On the Importance of Shifting Roles 29 1. Relations with Friends 312. Relations with Lovers 363. Relations with Family Members 454. Relations with House keepers 55 2 Just Hierarchy between Citizens: On the Importance of Ser vice 66 1. Justifying Hierarchical Po liti cal Rule in the Chinese Context
6、 682. Is It Pos si ble to Limit Po liti cal Power without Competitive Elections? 783. P o l it i c a l M er it o cr a c y as t h e P r o b lem , P o l it i c a l Meritocracy as the Solution 84vi contents4. Justifying a Hierarchical Po liti cal System to Those Outside the System 93 3 Just Hierarchy b
7、etween States: On the Need for Reciprocity 106 1. Hierarchical Ideals of Global Order in Ancient India 1112. Hierarchical Ideals of Global Order in Ancient China 1173. One World, Two Hierarchical Systems? 129 4 Just Hierarchy between Humans and Animals: Subordination without Cruelty 143 1. Are Anima
8、ls Our Equals? 144 2. Domesticated Animals: Subordination with Care 1543. Eating Animals: Subordination with Humane Exploitation 166 5 Just Hierarchy between Humans and Machines: On the Need for a Master- Slave Relation 177 1. Marx on Machines 1792. The Role of Confucian Role Ethics 1873. Silicon Va
9、lley vs. the Chinese Communist Party 198Notes 207Selected Bibliography 249Index 263viia c k n o w l ed g m e nt sfirst but not least, we would like to thank each other. The ideas in this book evolved via prolonged conversations and ar-guments over the past few years, to the point that we forgot who
10、said what. Daniel wrote most of the En glish version of this book, and Pei wrote most of the Chinese version, but we are jointly responsible for its ideas, whether good or bad. We are most grate-ful to Rob Tempio, our insightful and supportive editor at Prince ton University Press, along with two an
11、onymous referees who allowed us to further refine our ideas. We are also grateful to our research assistant, Sun Qiming, and Daniel would like to thank his assistants at Shandong University Liu Yuhan, Huang Ping, Wang Fuxiang, and Wang Chengchao for help. We would also like to thank Cheng Jiaolong f
12、or writing the beautiful cal-ligraphy on the books back cover.Daniel owes special thanks to family members for emotional and intellectual support. He would also like to thank Kong Ling-dong, Cao Xianqiang, Kong Xinfeng, Liu Lin, and all his other colleagues and leaders at Shandong Universitys School
13、 of Po liti cal Science and Public Administration for providing an intellectually stimulating setting that allowed him to write this book. Daniel is also grateful to Tsing hua University president Qiu Y ong for continued support at T sing hua as well as his co- teacher at Schwarzman College, Wang Hu
14、i, for fascinating dis-cussions on Chinese intellectual history, Bai T ongdong at Fudan viii a c k n o w l e d g m e nt sUniversity for inspiring conversations in po liti cal theory, and EricX. Li for friendship that goes beyond the ordinary meaning of friendship. He would also like to thank his stu
15、dents at Shan-dong University and Tsing hua University for constructive and often well- deserved criticism of the teachers ideas.Daniel also owes special thanks to Nicolas Berggruen. We can-not construct a better world without serious engagement with the world s ideas including ideas from previously
16、 marginalized parts of the world and Nicolas has both the vision and the means to realize this aspiration. The idea for this book emerged when Daniel was director of the Berggruen Institutes Center for Philosophy and Culture. Daniel helped to or ga nize a conference on “Hierarchy and Equality” at St
17、anford Universitys Center for the Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in March2016. The papers were excellent and we have made use of several of them in this book and Daniel realized that theres the need for a full- length book on the topic of “Just Hierarchy. ” Daniel would like to thank the
18、workshops participants as well as co- organizers Margaret Conley and Jennifer Bourne for help and inspiration. He would also like to thank Berggruen Institute leadership in Los Angeles: Nathan Gardels, Dawn Nakagawa, Nils Gilman, and (former) president Craig Calhoun for help over the years. Dan-iel
19、owes special thanks to the Berggruen Institutes China Cen-ter at Peking University which supported several workshops in New Delhi, Qingdao, Beijing, and Bangkok, comparing Chinese and Indian thought, and Daniel is grateful to workshop partici-pants as well as to co- organizers Song Bing, Roger Ames,
20、 Yan Xuetong, Amitav Acharya, Rajeev Bhargava, Shelley Hu, Li Xiao-jiao, and Li He.Pei would like to thank her friends and colleagues at Fudan Universitys China Institute. She is particularly grateful to Zhang Weiwei, EricX. Li, Fan Y ongpeng, Chen Ping, Li Bo, Yu Liang, a c k n o w l e d g m e nt s
21、 ixLin Ling, Meng Weizhan, and Feng Zhun. She would also like to thank visitors to the China Institute, especially Alexander Dugin, Yukon Huang, Martin Jacques, Kishore Mahbubani, and Dominique de Villepin. She is grateful to the institute for pro-viding time and support and an intellectually stimul
22、ating envi-ronment for research.Pei owes much to Wang Hui for constant concern and intel-lectual inspiration. Wang Hui supervised Peis postdoctoral re-search at Tsing hua University and showed the importance of relating philosophy to real politics and social life. Pei would also like to thank her fo
23、rmer colleagues at the T sing hua Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences (TIAS): Kong Yuan, Fu Zheng, Yuan Xianxin, Li Peiyan, and Yang T ao, as well as visitors to TIAS, Michael Dutton, Viren Murthy, and Yu Zhizhong. Pei and Daniel are also grateful to Geir Helgesen, Liu
24、 Chunrong, and Unn Irene Aasdalen for facilitating and modeling the best form of cross- cultural dialogue at Nansen Acad emy in Lillehammer, Norway.Peis friends Cheng Jiaolong, Li Shuzhi, and Wang Hairong have provided unconditional support and have inspired her with new perspectives on real ity. Pe
25、i is deeply indebted to her family members and especially to her mother, who always surprises with her direct and sharp comments, and spoils Pei with all her tenderness. Earlier versions of chapter 2 were published in Philosophy and Public Issues (by Pei) and the Journal of Chinese Humanities / 文史哲
26、(by Daniel), and we are grateful to the publications for permission to draw on those articles, as well as to Aeon for permission to publish the online appendix. Earlier versions of chapter 2 were presented (by Daniel and Pei) at the University of Malayas Institute of China Studies, the Penang Instit
27、ute, the Beijing Thinkers Forum, and the annual Reset conference in x a c k n o w l e d g m e nt sVenice; and (by Daniel) as a keynote speech at the 2019 IPP International Conference on Civilization and National Gover-nance in Guangzhou, at the Po liti cal Meritocracy in Compara-tive Historical Pers
28、pective conference and the China India Meritocracy conference, both at the Harvard Center in Shang-hai, and at the Nansen Acad emy in Lillehammer, Norway. Earlier versions of chapter 3 were presented (by Daniel) at “From a Westcentric to Post- Westcentric World” in Taipei, at the Peking Universitys
29、Berggruen China Center, and at CKGSB in Beijing. Earlier versions of chapter 5 were presented (by Daniel and Pei) at Santa Clara University and (by Daniel) at Pembroke College, Cambridge University (as the annual China Goes Global lecture), at Sun Yat- Sen University (as a Global Justice Lecture), a
30、t Xian Jiaotong Liverpool University (as a keynote speech at the Second Annual Conference of the Jiangnan Research Group on China Studies), at Peking Univer-sitys Berggruen China Center, and at the Nansen Acad emy in Lillehammer, Norway. Formal settings that allow us to refine our arguments are impo
31、r tant, but informal settings that allow for the expression of half- baked ideas even more so. We are grateful to friends who share our love of crazy conversation fueled by fine wine and good food.just hierarchy1 Introductionthe seating arrangements for formal meals in Shan-dong province the home of
32、 Confucian culture, with a popula-tion of nearly 100 million people are rigidly hierarchical. The host with the highest social status sits at the “top” of a round table with a view of the door, the host with the second- highest social status sits at the other end of the table; the guest with the hig
33、h-est social status sits on the right- hand side of the host with the highest social status and next to the host with the third- highest social status; the guest with the second- highest social status sits on left side of the host with the highest social status and next to the host with the fourth-
34、highest social status; the guest with the third- highest social status sits on the right side of the host with the second- highest social status and next to host with the fifth- highest social status; the guest with the fourth- highest social sta-tus sits on the left side of the host with the second
35、- highest social status and next to the host with the sixth- highest social status. The other seats are randomly distributed among those with the least social status, with the number of randomly assigned seats depending on the number of hosts and guests. Sounds complex? The pictorial depiction of th
36、e social hierarchy in figure 1 might be helpful.1 Whats wrong with Shandongs seating arrangements for for-mal meals? Nothing at all! The only thing wrong is the expecta-tion that all social relations are supposed to be equal. As dean 2 Introductionat Shandong Universitys school of po liti cal scienc
37、e and public administration, Daniel has hosted countless meals with such seating arrangements, including hosting of foreign guests, and he has not once received any complaints. Perhaps his guests are too polite to complain. But wed like to think that such seating arrangements are tolerated because t
38、hey do not express and re-inforce unjust hierarchies that rank people according to race or gender. People who are not ethnically Chinese such as Daniel are seated in the same position as ethnically Chinese people with the same social status (i.e., with a title of dean). Men figure1. Seating hierarch
39、y for dinner party.Principal HostSecond Guestof HonorGuestof HonorHost 4 Host 3RandomSeatRandomSeatHost 5 Host 6Guest 3 Guest 4AssistantHostDoorIntroduction 3 and women occupy their seats according to their social roles re-gardless of gender: For example, President Fan of Shandong University is fema
40、le, and she occupies the principal host seat at formal meals, in the same position as previous (male) presidents at Shandong University. This is not to deny that patriarchal ways still inform the seating arrangements in rural parts of Shandong province women often sit at dif er ent and less comforta
41、ble tables but such norms are rejected in university settings.2 The seating arrangements at Shandong University are also tolerated because the hierarchies are nearly invisible to the untrained eye. The tables are round, with the appearance of perfectly equal symmetry,3 and the visiting guests wont k
42、now about the social hierarchies unless they are informed of the norms by local hosts. In contrast, the rectangular “high tables” at traditional Oxford and Cambridge universities are literally higher than tables for students, and students are not allowed to start eating until the teachers formally g
43、et the proceedings under way. What ever the case for special treatment (better food and wine) for teachers and guests in university settings, Oxbridge- style “in your face” social hierarchies often generate a vague sense of unease even for beneficiaries of these arrangements.But wed like to defend a
44、 stronger claim. Its not just a matter of tolerating Shandong- style seating arrangements because they do not express unjust or vis i ble hierarchies. These arrangements are endorsed, and even enjoyed, because they express several of the virtues of what we call “just hierarchies, ” that is, morally
45、jus-tified rankings of people or groups with re spect to valued social dimensions. Consider the distribution of seats for persons of higher social status in Shandong. The usual “fight” among those in the know is to refuse a seat with more social prestige. So there is a toss and strug gle, and fi nal
46、ly the “loser” of the battle will give in and reluctantly take the seat that expresses a higher social 4 Introductionposition. Most often, both sides know the outcome of the strug-gle for example, the dean will take the seat of the principal host if he or she has the highest rank in the university h
47、ierarchy, the guest with the most academic prestige and/or the greatest number of years of physical existence (i.e., the oldest person) will take the seat of the guest of honor, and so on but it would seem immodest to immediately claim ones “rightful” position (the foreigners who are ignorant of suc
48、h rituals often take their assigned seats without putting up a strug gle, but they are for-given for their moral transgressions because they are not ex-pected to know Shandong- style norms of civility). Put difer -ently, the strug gles, however hypocritical they may seem to the critical outsider, ex
49、press Confucian- style virtues of humility and modesty.4 Not only that, but the occupants of the seats with more social prestige have more responsibility. They must foot the bill: T o be more precise, the assistant host must pay for the meal, but the funds come from the university (since the start o
50、f the anticorruption campaign in 2012, funds from public institu -tions do not cover alcohol, and often the principal host must bring the liquor at his or her own expense). The hosts are re -sponsible for treating the guests well, and each host is supposed to take care of a par tic u lar guest corre
