Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Hegel, the Tiananmen Incident and Falun Gong

Hegel, the Tiananmen Incident and Falun Gong <jats:sec><jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>This paper explores Chinese people's pursuit of human rights through the Hegelian lenses of abstract rights and the master–slave dialectic. By juxtaposing the 1989 Tiananmen Incident and the Falun Gong movement, it illuminates how Chinese people's struggles for human rights have been informed by Confucianism and other Chinese philosophies, although they have also looked to the West for inspiration and endorsement. Moreover, Hegel's very own dialectic reassures us that Chinese people do not need to have an affirmative, conscious knowledge of 'rights' before they pursue them. While the student protests in 1989 were fuelled by a nationwide economic crisis, the Falun Gong movement was the result of an increasingly prosperous but spiritually blighted society. In both cases, the people, like slaves, struggled against their master, the Chinese government, for freedom and recognition so as to attain a full self-consciousness. Thus, this paper appropriates Hegelian concepts and his dialectical view of history to add to the existing criticisms of his Orientalist views, namely his belief that China is a stagnant nation and its people have no independent personality but only a servile consciousness.</jats:p> </jats:sec> http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png European Journal of East Asian Studies Brill

Hegel, the Tiananmen Incident and Falun Gong

Lai, Amy
European Journal of East Asian Studies , Volume 9 (1): 119 – Jan 1, 2010
Download PDF
16 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/brill/hegel-the-tiananmen-incident-and-falun-gong-PsiSERNw4J

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© 2010 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
ISSN
1568-0584
eISSN
1570-0615
DOI
10.1163/156805810X517698
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

<jats:sec><jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>This paper explores Chinese people's pursuit of human rights through the Hegelian lenses of abstract rights and the master–slave dialectic. By juxtaposing the 1989 Tiananmen Incident and the Falun Gong movement, it illuminates how Chinese people's struggles for human rights have been informed by Confucianism and other Chinese philosophies, although they have also looked to the West for inspiration and endorsement. Moreover, Hegel's very own dialectic reassures us that Chinese people do not need to have an affirmative, conscious knowledge of 'rights' before they pursue them. While the student protests in 1989 were fuelled by a nationwide economic crisis, the Falun Gong movement was the result of an increasingly prosperous but spiritually blighted society. In both cases, the people, like slaves, struggled against their master, the Chinese government, for freedom and recognition so as to attain a full self-consciousness. Thus, this paper appropriates Hegelian concepts and his dialectical view of history to add to the existing criticisms of his Orientalist views, namely his belief that China is a stagnant nation and its people have no independent personality but only a servile consciousness.</jats:p> </jats:sec>

Journal

European Journal of East Asian Studies – Brill

Published: Jan 1, 2010

Keywords: HUMAN RIGHTS; MASTER–SLAVE DIALECTIC; HEGEL; FREEDOM; RECOGNITION

There are no references for this article.