[KS] Yu Kilchun

Vladimir Tikhonov vladimir.tikhonov at ikos.uio.no
Tue May 9 05:15:26 EDT 2006


The question of a (possibly underconscious) Neo-Confucian framework in 
which Social Darwinism was understood in East Asia and particularly in 
Korea, is really intriquing, although the guesswork on this seems to be 
highly speculative. What I wrote myself about in <UsUng yOlp'ae Ui 
sinhwa> (Myth of the Survival of the Fittest, Hangyoreh Publishers, 
2005), was the possibility that the Neo-Confucian belief in the "unity 
between the principle ("sodangyOn" in the Neo-Confucian texts - isn't it 
Das Sollen in German?) and the actual reality ("soiyOn" - isn't it Das 
Sein?)" might have been a factor in seeking Social Darwinist 
explanations for the consistently predatory behaviour of the states and 
individuals in the "civilized world". In a classical example loved by 
Zhu Xi and T'oegye in good old days, the boat sails and the cart moves 
in actual reality because such as their innate principle, and people 
tend to honour their seniors and behave loyally in realtions to their 
father and kingds, because that is how our innately good nature - 
happily - works. And in the new Spencerian world as depicted by, say, 
Pak Unsik or HyOn Sangyun, the strong devours the weak and the weak 
sacrifices everything on the way to self-strengthening just because it 
is a part of a certain objective principle common for both nature and 
humanity. So, the "new intellectuals" seemingly were professing their 
believe in the new "sodangyOn" in order to fit themselves into what they 
considered to be the new "soiyOn". In Liang Qichao's case, it all came 
simultaneously with reappreciation of those in ancient Chinese 
philosophy, who were sceptical of human nature - Xunzi and Hanfeizi. Of 
course, from my good Marxist point of view, this "unconsciously 
Hegelian" position - that the existing Spencerian jungles are all 
reasonable, and should be taken as they are - was also part of the 
ideological legitimization of East Asia's early capitalism, and an 
important underpinning for the capitalist nation-states' mobilization 
ideology. After all, if you cannot legitimize the capitalist barbarity 
by the mythoi of "democracy", "human rights" or "social justice" - if 
the sort of capitalism you practice is visibly undemocratic and unjust - 
  the belief in the worldwide state-level "struggle for survival" is the 
best available ideology, I guess?

Vladimir (Pak Noja)

On 09.05.2006 02:36, Frank Hoffmann wrote:
> 
> Thanks Vladimir:
> 
> *Most certainly* isn't Social Darwinism the highlight of Korea's modern 
> intellectual history. I very much hope I did not write anything giving 
> such impression. It played, however, a very important role before and 
> after 1900 -- and that is the period I was trying to talk about.
> 
> By the way, when looking into the history of translations during the 
> early colonial period (mostly 1910s and early 20s) I was astonished by 
> the unexpected number of works translated from French and Russian -- not 
> just via Japanese but also from directly from these languages. One 
> really should not underestimate what was available to Korean 
> intellectuals at that time.
> 
> Quote:
> 
>> So, the question has to be formulated in a bit other way, I guess - 
>> while the quest for secrets of "wealth and power" led Katoo Hiroyuki, 
>> Tokutomi Soohoo, Liang Qichao, and their Korean followers - that is, a 
>> large, almost dominant group of East Asia's early modern intellectuals 
>> - to embrace the belief that the life is a zero sum game, and to eat 
>> up the others in order not to be eaten up yourself is a right thing to 
>> do ?
> 
> 
> Okay, but this is a bit over my head. The right thing to do? Isn't this 
> a moral question, maybe a religious question, and maybe a question about 
> political effectivity if extended somewhat. Right or wrong? How would 
> this get us any further when looking at how societies advanced? The 
> question I was trying to address earlier is how Social Darwinism in 
> Korea is being depicted today? And why it is depicted the way it is.
> 
> When referring to the inevitability in which histories have recorded 
> Korea's embracing of such ideology, what I really had in mind is the 
> question of power, legitimacy, and historical truth. One of the first 
> things we learn in East Asian History 101 is that one of the first tasks 
> of each new dynasty was the rewrite of dynastic history, creating a 
> legacy. Isn't that what happened (the U.S. and Japan being the winners)?
> 
> Aidan wonders "how Weberians can be Darwinists" -- well, is America not 
> fundamentally Darwinist? Whatever else you add to this, it is not going 
> to go away. In that sense I am not speaking of Social Darwinism as 
> something that can be separated into some school of thought but as an 
> inherit part of the country's ideological foundation and lifestyle.
> 
> In the U.S. the popular interpretation and utilization of Weber's 
> capitalism theory had been dominated by Talcott Parsons who was also the 
> translater of/ The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism/ 
> (1904-05, 2nd rev. ed. 1920, first English edition 1930). His reading of 
> Weber is very well Social Darwinist in its roots. By directing all your 
> attention on certain aspects of a work with the depth of that of Weber's 
> it is easy enough to serve existing ideologies rather than challenging 
> them. Then again, both Weber and Parsons are so complex that I do not 
> see how to discuss this topic on a message board without simplifying to 
> a degree where nothing is accurate anymore....  Weber works with what 
> sociologists call ITM (Ideal Type Model). Weber's 'community' is such 
> ITM, and in his terms it equals Protestant ethic. His conceptualization 
> is not about "real type" history but about "ideal type" community in a 
> sociological sense. Other than Marx, for example, he does not understand 
> capitalism as a system per se but focuses on the/ Geist/, the spirit of 
> a community in a certain historic time and a certain historic setting 
> that drives capitalism. That's the theory he develops in/ The Protestant 
> Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism/, where he explains how northwestern 
> Europe enabled itself to go ahead with its modern economic revolution, 
> leaving behind the formerly rich Catholic South that had dominated 
> Europe culturally and economically for so many centuries. It is 
> noteworthy here that this is indeed the book that made Weber famous in 
> the United States while his main work,/ Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft/, 
> and other important works never really got that much attention -- quite 
> the opposite to the perception in continental Europe. As a personal 
> note, to illustrate this a little: the first time I heard about Weber's 
> capitalism theory was in Carter Eckert's class at Harvard. It was a real 
> eye-opener (thanks!). We did read quite a bit of Weber in the three 
> years of Sociology at my neo-Marxist dominated high school, nicely 
> packaged into bite-sized digestable 5 or 10 page portions ... Weber 
> served a minority non-Marxist teacher as a tool to oppose the hard core 
> stuff brought in by his colleagues, everything from Marx to Adorno and 
> Habermas, from Rudi Dutschke to texts about city guerilla tactics. But 
> that was a different Weber, a whole different context, a different 
> reality. It took me till last year to actually read/ The Protestant 
> Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism/ rather than just summaries of it. In 
> Germany it's now being sold by 2001, that's a very successful discount 
> bookseller, a Barnes & Noble kind of chain store, mostly feeding the 
> needs of high school kids and university students. Weber for 5 bucks. 
> The book is getting popular here for the same reason Walter Benjamin's 
> works have seen a revival -- because American students read them. In the 
> 80s we would read Benjamin in art history and say "so what? -- anything 
> new under the sun?" Cult wasn't yet his middle name at the time. While 
> Benjamin is popular the postmodern packaging in which he was redelivered 
> back to Germany is not really that hot. The icon travels, the wider 
> intellectual context does not, not necessarily. In the case of Weber the 
> same is true. In British and the U.S. academia we see that the somewhat 
> technicist neo-Weberian view of social class seems to predominate in the 
> social sciences. In Germany, I think, that aspect had always been 
> replaced my Marxist analysis, even within conservative circles.
> 
> Quote:
> 
>> Other thing is that (Neo)-Darwinist explanations of the workings of 
>> the world and society looked almost as holistic and all-encompassing 
>> as Neo-Confucian ones, but that is another story...
> 
> 
> That "other story" is what I think is really interesting! "Holistic and 
> all-encompassing as Neo-Confucian" -- this seems a wonderful observation 
> and almost convincing.
> 
> Frank
> 
> -- 
> 
> --------------------------------------
> Frank Hoffmann
> http://koreaweb.ws


-- 
Vladimir Tikhonov,
Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages,
Faculty of Humanities,
University of Oslo,
P.b. 1010, Blindern, 0315, Oslo, Norway.
Fax: 47-22854828; Tel: 47-22857118
Personal web page: http://folk.uio.no/vladimit/
 
http://www.geocities.com/volodyatikhonov/volodyatikhonov.html
Electronic classrooms: East Asian/Korean Society and Politics:
                        http://folk.uio.no/vladimit/eastasianstudies.htm
                        http://www.geocities.com/uioeastasia2002/main.html
                        East Asian/Korean Religion and Philosophy:
 
http://www.geocities.com/uioeastasia2003/classroom.html




More information about the Koreanstudies mailing list