Social harmony in Chinese philosophy

This paper is devoted to the problem of social harmony. Although we believe that from this study comparative conclusions can be easily made. The focus of the study is China, one of the most rapidly developing countries today. Fast economic development of East Asian countries, the appearance of the East Asian model of modernization on its own basis revealed some advantages of eastern culture which is based on the teachings of Confucius. In the 13th century Western thinkers were delighted by the organically holistic worldview of eastern teachings. This paper presents a historical-philosophical analysis of the "harmony" concept as a social ideal in Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and its interpretation in the modern Chinese philosophy. In Buddhism, the question of social harmony is not distinguished as an abstracted system, but implicitly contains original ways to resolve social contradictions through awareness of not-existence of the single "I" and of correlation of all phenomena. According to the tenets of Taoism, harmony is a mechanism by which all things through struggle come to the correlation and unity. From the view of Confucianism, harmony is the highest value and the most important law of life. Harmony appears in concord of all the inhomogeneous, in achieving through this of a new harmonious unity, in the birth of something new in the process of interaction of the opposites. In modern Chinese science, the notions of social harmony, harmonious society are studied, first, in the context of the concept of building a harmonious society proposed in the early 20th century by former President of China Hu Jintao; second, from the view of the so-called Chinesized Marxism. On this basis, the author defines social harmony as a form of resolving social conflicts, achievement of the unity or coherence between the parties to conflict. An essential issue of social harmony is the issue of social equity. The legal aspects of social equity in China are also examined. The institutional features of the modern period in the development of Chinese society hindering the achievement of social justice are considered. The author also makes an attempt to analyze social justice in the political and economic dimension. In conclusion, the important role of the state in the ideological and moral education of the people in order to harmonize social relations is emphasized.

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