#58 The Ways of Governing
Tao Te Ching, Chapter 58: Comparing Lao Tzu’s political thought with Confucianism and Legalism.
Welcome back to The Wisdom of Lao Tzu.
This week, we delve into Chapter 58 of the Tao Te Ching.
In this chapter, Lao Tzu further discusses the dynamics of government-individual relationships in different polities.
Lao Tzu would prefer a lazy government that lacks efficiency over one that is too calculating.
Let’s find out why.
**58**
其政悶悶,其民淳淳;
其政察察,其民缺缺。
禍兮,福之所倚;
福兮,禍之所伏。
孰知其極?其無正也。
正復為奇,善復為妖。
人之迷,其日固久。
是以聖人方而不割,廉而不劌,直而不肆,光而不耀。
Border-crossing: English translations
#1 Lin Yutang’s version
When the government is lazy and dull,
Its people are unspoiled;
When the government is efficient and smart,
Its people are discontented.
Disaster is the avenue of fortune,
(And) fortune is the concealment for disaster.
Who would be able to know its ultimate results?
(As it is), there would never be the normal,
But the normal would (immediately) revert to the deceitful,
And the good revert to the sinister.
Thus long has mankind gone astray!
Therefore the Sage is square (has firm principles),
But not cutting (sharp-cornered),
Has integrity but does not hurt (others),
Is straight, but not high-handed,
Bright, but not dazzling.
#2 Edmund Ryden’s version
Administration bumble-humble; people simple-simon.
Administration nitty-picky; people wheeling-dealing.
Disaster ah! Fortune’s head-rest;
Fortune ah! Disaster’s back-rest.
Who knows their limit? Is there nothing orthodox?
Orthodox reverts to strange; good reverts to monstrous.
Humans being misled is attested from of old.
For this reason,
Be square but do not cut.
Be angular but do not poke.
Be straight but do not force.
Be bright but do not dazzle.1
#3 D. C. Lau’s version
When the government is muddled
The people are simple;
When the government is alert
The people are cunning.
It is on disaster that good fortune perches;
It is beneath good fortune that disaster crouches.
Who knows the limit? Does not the straightforward exist?
The straightforward changes again into the crafty, and the good changes again into the monstrous.
Indeed, it is long since the people were perplexed.
Therefore the sage is square-edged but does not scrape,
Has corners but does not jab,
Extends himself but not at the expense of others,
Shines but does not dazzle.2
Deeper dive
Lao Tzu’s political philosophy, centered around the principles of non-interference and natural harmony, faced significant challenges from the contrasting views of Confucianism and Legalism in traditional China.
These challenges reveal the fundamental differences in their approaches to governance and social order. Each school presents its unique perspective on the relationship between authority and the individual within a particular political order.
Legalism: Draconian and Regulatory Governance
Legalism advocates for a stringent, regulatory state, emphasizing authority, bureaucracy, and strict control.
This school has the conception of a society without social mobility, as it would constitute challenges for bureaucratic monitoring and control.
This ideology classifies people into different yet static roles, such as farmers who contribute through agricultural labor and soldiers through warfare.
Legalist governance does not rule out manipulative practices, as political domination is acceptable as long as order is maintained.
Classic works in this tradition do not shy away from recommending tactics to make use of social dynamics for ruling,
Human beings have likes and dislikes; hence, the people can be ruled. The ruler must investigate likes and dislikes. Likes and dislikes are the root of rewards and penalties. The disposition of the people is to like ranks and emoluments and to dislike punishments and penalties. The ruler sets up the two in order to guide the people’s will and to establish whatever he desires.3
In essence, Legalist political thought suggests that absolute power is reserved for the ruler, who ensures a functioning social and political order through an efficient administrative system.
Confucianism: Ritualistic and Meritocratic Governance
Confucianism promotes governance moderated by rituals and selection-based meritocracy.
It emphasizes a ritual order characterized by hierarchy, formality, and conventional norms.
In this political thinking, order is preserved by able and moral leaders who adhere to a merit-based system, valuing benevolence and righteousness. Confucian scholar-officials were usually required to be proficient with the Confucian classics.
Regarding the government-individual relationship, Confucianism heavily relies on meritocratic excellence and top-down social relations. As in Confucius’ words,
If you try to guide the common people with coercive regulations (zheng 政) and keep them in line with punishments, the common people will become evasive and will have no sense of shame. If, however, you guide them with Virtue, and keep them in line by means of ritual, the people will have a sense of shame and will rectify themselves.4
Therefore, Confucianism stresses cultivating virtue and observing rituals as essential for maintaining societal harmony.
Taoism: Governance of the Natural Order
In contrast, Taoism proposes a governance model guided by the Tao, emphasizing conscious leadership that practices wu-wei and the spiritually awakened individuals being responsible for their transformation.
It also stresses the importance of harmonious coexistence between political order and the individual.
Taoist individualism is based on a unity of the particular and the common in a holistic system. In practice, harm to one constitutes harm to all within a society following the natural order.
On a spiritual level, this natural order is closest to a liberal democratic order, promoting a harmonious balance that appreciates the naturalness of individuals and pluralistic values and ways of doing things.
The Insufficiency of Intellectual Traditions
The three traditional schools could not guide dynastic China to transition into a modern state partly because of their lack of intellectual rigor to cope with abrupt and rapid social, cultural, and political developments in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
They also fail to address the inherent problem with governance: who guards the guardians?
Confucianism, embodied as a ritual order and meritocratic model, can lead to mediocrity, conformity, and hypocrisy when society and the political system resist new changes.
Political structures and social arrangements can degenerate into decay, which becomes self-serving at the expense of the larger whole. In this circumstance, following social norms can become unconscious conformity.
The Legalist order established by Legalism has a built-in tension between the restrictive and domineering authority and individuals in society.
When the political establishment encounters challenges in managing social stability and the functioning of institutions, the entire governance machine could experience a breakdown.
Despite having favorable principles such as wu-wei and naturalness, the Taoist natural order could not be institutionalized within traditional dynastic regimes.
Situated within a dynastic political culture, designing and leveraging government agencies with substantive power to check the arbitrary will of emperors is pure wishful thinking.
While traditional Taoism may not offer a complete political solution, it can provide spiritual resources for China’s reconstruction in a post-totalitarian future.5
This can be demonstrated in Chuang Tzu’s emphasis on the need to flow through transformation, embrace open-mindedness, and practice value pluralism.
The ten thousand things are really one. We look on some as beautiful because they are rare or unearthly; we look on others as ugly because they are foul and rotten. But the foul and rotten may turn into the rare and unearthly, and the rare and unearthly may turn into the foul and rotten. So it is said, You have only to comprehend the one breath that is the world. The sage never ceases to value oneness.6
What one calls right, the other calls wrong; what one calls wrong, the other calls right. But if we want to right their wrongs and wrong their rights, then the best thing to use is clarity.
Everything has its “that,” everything has its “this.” From the point of view of “that,” you cannot see it; but through understanding, you can know it. So I say, “that” comes out of “this,” and “this” depends on “that”—which is to say that “this” and “that” give birth to each other. But where there is birth, there must be death; where there is death, there must be birth. Where there is acceptability, there must be unacceptability; where there is unacceptability, there must be acceptability. Where there is recognition of right, there must be recognition of wrong; where there is recognition of wrong, there must be recognition of right. Therefore the sage does not proceed in such a way but illuminates all in the light of Heaven.7
Apart from lending philosophical support, Taoist thought was widely practiced by the Tang Dynasty (618-907)8, the most powerful and open-minded dynasty in ancient China.
In regard to finding compatibility with new cultural influences and universal values, Taoist tradition, embodied by Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu, played a fundamental role in incorporating Buddhism into China during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE)9.
Cultural legacy can become a burden if we perceive it as a stumbling block to embracing new ways of life and modes of thinking in changing circumstances.
This perception often arises from a lack of creativity and an open heart to connecting things.
Preservation of cultural traditions, which enriches our life and spiritual worlds, comes from the can-do spirit of building upon existing materials instead of destroying them based on whims and specious ideological dogmas.
In this regard, Edmund Burke’s words still bear significance,
Society is indeed a contract…It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.10
Spiritual Taoism
Life is a continuous cycle of change, where fortune and disaster are interdependent, shaping our perceptions and responses to the world.
If we understand the inherent transformations of things, we can cultivate resilience in adversity during distress.
Our circumstances can influence our perceptions of reality.
The perspectives, thoughts, and reactions derived from these perceptions drive our emotions and actions.
With this understanding, we can learn to see the light even in moments of despair and darkness.
To navigate life's journey, it is essential to cultivate inner resilience.
The recurring ups and downs in life’s journey cannot bring us down.
Emotional storms come and go, but we can accept them peacefully.
Various perceptions and attachments arising from changing circumstances do not entangle us.
Observing and flowing with these changes allows us to transform in the process, growing stronger and more adaptable.
Chuang Tzu told a story that illustrates the temporary confusion arising from entanglements.
Lady Li, who was the daughter of the border guard of the state of Jin. The ruler of the country saw her during his trip. She was taken captive and brought to the capital. Initially, she wept until her tears drenched the collar of her robe.
But later, when she lived in the ruler’s palace, shared his couch with him, and ate the delicious meals, she wondered why she had ever wept11.
Disaster is the avenue of fortune,
(And) fortune is the concealment for disaster.
Who would be able to know its ultimate results?
Daodejing, trans. Edmund Ryden, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 121.
Tao Te Ching, trans. D. C. Lau. (London: Penguin Classics, 1963), 65.
Yang, Shang, The Book of Lord Shang, ed. and trans. Yuri Pines, (New York: Columbia University Press, 2017), 178.
Analects, trans. Edward Slingerland, (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 2003), 8.
There has been a widespread misconception of traditional Chinese culture as one of the collectivist types. Professor Yü Ying-shih has explained that the comparison of “Chinese communitarianism” and Western individualism has been vastly overdrawn, which is largely the result of ascribing the 20th-century Communist totalitarianism to the country’s Confucian tradition. See Ying-shih Yü, “Democracy, human rights, and Confucian culture, in Chinese History and Culture: Seventeenth Century Through Twentieth Century, ed. Josephine Chiu-Duke and Michael Duke (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016), 270.
As a product of the Soviet model, the current Chinese political system bears little resemblance to traditional dynasties. Therefore, the crucial task of reforming lies in how the country finds a proper connection between the past and the future that is free and open. On post-totalitarianism and its history in Eastern Europe, See Václav Havel’s penetrative and influential essay, “The Power of the Powerless.”
Burton Watson, “Knowledge Wandered North,” in The Complete Works of Zhuangzi, (New York: Columbia University Press, 2013), 177.
Ibid., “Discussion on making all things equal,” 10.
On Taoism as a state philosophy in the Tang Dynasty, See C. Benn, “Religious Aspects of Emperor Hsuan-tsung’s Taoist Ideology” in Buddhist and Taoist Practice in Medieval Chinese Society, ed. D. W. Chapell (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1987).
Chen Guying, “On Intercultural Dialogue,” in The Humanist Spirit of Daoism, ed. David Jones and Sarah Flavel (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 232.
Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, ed. Frank M. Turner, (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2003), 82.
Burton Watson, “Discussion on Making All Things Equal,” 16. Translation Modified.