礼治与国家建设——将中国元素植入政治秩序理论

Rule of Rituals and State Building:Introducing a Chinese Perspective into the Political Order Theory

费孝通在跨文化比较的视野下基于中国农村社会的特性提出了“礼治秩序”的命题。作者在保留费孝通“礼治秩序”内核的同时对礼的概念外延进行了扩展,在此基础上将礼治引入政治秩序理论。在礼治秩序下,当礼制符合礼义时,所有社会成员应当主动服从礼制。中国早期文明史上的“殷周之变”使中国在经历了殷代神本的自然宗教后走向了西周人本主义的礼治,由此与欧洲、中东和印度在一神教或伦理宗教背景下生长起来的法治形成了文明的分岔。由于西周礼治的出现先于秦代现代国家的出现,现代国家在秦代中国之后的历史发展中受到礼治的约束,从而实现了不同政治制度之间的相对平衡。作为礼治和国家建设相互嵌入的产物,礼治国家在东汉以后的中国走向定型,并逐渐扩散到朝鲜半岛、越南及日本。在经过西方世界和现代化的冲击后,礼治传统以新的形式在东亚延续下来,并且在当代东亚的政治发展中发挥了潜移默化的作用。

From a transcultural comparative perspective,Fei Xiaotong presents the proposition of“a social order based on the rule of rituals”.While keeping the core of this proposition,this paper extends the meaning of rituals and thereupon introduces the“rule of rituals”into the political order theory.In a social order based on the rule of rituals,when ritual institutions conform with the spirit of rituals,every member of the society should abide by these institutions consciously.After the drastic change from the Shang Dynasty to the Zhou Dynasty occurring in the early history of China,the God-centered natural religions gave place to human-oriented rule of rituals,thus leading to the rise of a civilization different from the rule of law developed in the context of monotheism or ethical religions in Europe,India and the Middle East.Since the rule of rituals in the Western Zhou Dynasty appeared prior to the modern state in the Qin Dynasty,the modern state has been subject to the constraint of the rule of rituals in the post-Qin China.Consequently,a balance has been achieved between different political institutions.As an outcome of the mutual embedding between rule of rituals and state building,a“state ruled by rituals”has come to be established since the Eastern Han Dynasty,and gradually spread to the Korean Peninsula,Vietnam and Japan.Despite the shock from the West and modernization,the tradition of the rule of rituals has managed to survive in the East Asia in a new form,and exerted a subtle impact on the contemporary political development in this region.