Individual Autonomy and Responsibility in Late Imperial China By ...

Part I

Tension Toward
Personal Autonomy in
the Confucian Tradition

There is not one Way, as the Way is just one of the paths
夫道者，路也，不止一途

This section seeks to contribute to the understanding of a few of the rich, multifarious representations of the self within the Confucian tradition.¹ Among the values cultivated in Chinese culture the ideal of harmony is considered the foundation of the Confucian structure of society, but harmony cannot be conceived without taking into account its tension with personal autonomy. This tension manifests in several different opinions and behaviors in search of an “individual autonomy” in a debate about the priority of reaching self-perfection through individual experience or self-interest for life. The search and assertion of the self followed different but not necessarily excluding paths, sometimes opposed directions, from the moral self to its vitalistic dimensions. Thus the individual construct was variously represented in the course of Chinese history.