Stephen C Angle
Biographic Data
| ID | 444876 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Stephen C Angle |
| GIVEN NAMES | Stephen C |
| FAMILY NAME | Angle |
| SIGNATURE | ANGLE S C |
| AFFILIATIONS | Wesleyan University |
| ORCID | 0009-0009-8371-1812 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 31 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 32 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 31 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
My Progressive Confucian Journey
This essay examines the engagement between Progressive Confucianism and Mainland China in three steps. I begin with a narrative of how I came to be someone who identifies as Confucian and advocates Progressive Confucianism. Part II examines an especially important phase in this evolution: the series of ten dialogues I held with Mainland Chinese Confucians in the Spring of 2017. I give an overview of the topics we debated, themes that cut across i…
Confucian Leadership Meets Confucian Democracy
Confucian democrats hold that the roles of Confucian political leaders must be rethought, just as the modern Confucian polity must shift from a monarchy to a constitutional democracy. This does not mean that modern Confucians must turn their backs on traditional Confucian views of leadership, however: the key traditional insights are still important, although to some degree they take on new significance in the new context of modern democratic Con…
Growing Moral: A Confucian Guide to Life
Growing Moral engages its readers to reflect on and to practice the teachings of Confucianism in the contemporary world. It draws on the whole history of Confucianism, focusing on three thinkers from the classical era (Kongzi or Confucius, Mengzi, and Xunzi) and two from the Neo-Confucian era (Zhu Xi and Wang Yangming). In addition to laying out the fundamental teachings of Confucianism, it highlights the enduring and strikingly relevant lessons …
[Scholar’s Corner: [Confucianism in and for the Modern World] The Need for Confucianism
Replacing Liberal Confucianism with Progressive Confucianism
The core thesis of this essay is that "progressive Confucianism" is a clear and viable category, a label for many though not all contemporary Confucians, which succeeds in capturing what is useful about so-called "liberal" Confucianism without suffering from various problems to which I show "liberal Confucianism" falls prey. The essay begins with examples of progressive Confucians being labeled as "liberal" in ways that are misleading. I next tur…
Buddhism and Zhu Xi’s Epistemology of Discernment
This chapter focuses on Zhu Xi’s theory of knowing in order to show how Zhu consciously appropriated Buddhist ideas to develop his own thought. Zhu repurposed the Buddhist term zhijue (perceptual awareness) to become a general term for the mind’s various kinds of knowing activity. Zhu’s epistemology was a conscious rejection of radical approach associated with the Song dynasty Chan master Dahui Zonggao (1089–1163). Two parallel lines of argument …
The Future of Confucian Political Philosophy
On February 14, 2017, Joseph Chan and Stephen Angle convened a Roundtable on the Future of Confucian Political Philosophy at the University of Hong Kong. Eight invited speakers each offered thoughts on the main topic, followed by discussion among the panelists and responses to questions from the audience. This transcript has been reviewed and edited by the main participants. Much of the discussion revolves around the relations and tensions betwee…
The Adolescence of Mainland New Confucianism
This issue of Contemporary Chinese Thought is devoted to recent mainland Chinese Confucian philosophizing, and especially to arguments about what “Mainland New Confucianism” signifies that were prompted by somewhat dismissive remarks about Mainland New Confucianism by the noted Taiwanese scholar Li Minghui in early 2015. This introduction begins by summarizing some of the challenges Confucianism has encountered in the twentieth century and also t…
Neo-Confucianism: A Philosophical Introduction
The Chinese Human Rights Reader: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000
Western, Chinese, and Universal Values
Efforts to resist â Western valuesâ and to promote â Chinese valuesâ are often based on a crude cultural relativism which is implausible on both historical and philosophical grounds. Admittedly, worries about a facile equation of â Westâ with â universalâ are sometimes well-founded, but the answer is not to retreat to a relativism that would limit all partiesâ abilities to seek self-improvement. Rather, building on examples like Chinese new cosmo…
The Analects and Moral Theory
Virtue Ethics and Confucianism
Part One: Debating the Scope and Applicability of Virtue and Virtue Ethics 1.1 Chen Lai Virtue Ethics and Confucian Ethics 1.2 Philip J. Ivanhoe Virtue Ethics and the Chinese Confucian Tradition 1.3 Lee Ming-huei Confucianism, Kant, and Virtue Ethics 1.4 Bryan Van Norden Toward a Synthesis of Confucianism and Aristotelianism 1.5 Liu Liangjian Virtue Ethics and Confucianism: A Methdological Reflection 1.6 Wong Wai-ying Confucian Ethics and Virtue …
Confucianism: Contemporary Expressions
This chapter contains sections titled: Background to Contemporary Confucianism Confucianism and Social Justice in the Twentieth Century Contemporary Views Conclusion References
Contemporary Confucian Political Philosophy
A Productive Dialogue: Contemporary Moral Education and Zhu Xi’s Neo-Confucian Ethics
A Productive Dialogue: Contemporary Moral Education and Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucian Ethics: A Productive Dialogue
The essay asks whether contemporary Western empirical studies of moral education, as exemplified in the distinctive research programs of Lawrence Kohlberg and Martin Hoffman, can enter into productive dialogue with the Neo-Confucian theories of Zhu Xi (1130-1200). The proposed dialogue proceeds in two stages. I begin with Zhu's notion of "lesser learning" and the role therein of ritual, and consider their relations to Kohlberg's ideas about the c…
Sagehood: The Contemporary Significance of Neo-Confucian Philosophy
This book explores what happens when we take Neo-Confucianism and its ideal of sagehood seriously as contemporary philosophy. It develops an interpretation of the Neo-Confucian tradition that, while historically grounded in detailed readings of Zhu Xi, Wang Yangming, and others, is open to further development and critique; and also reflects on ways that Neo-Confucian perspectives challenge or enhance issues of concern to contemporary Western phil…
No Supreme Principle: Confucianism’s Harmonization of Multiple Values
Human Rights and Harmony
There are a number of reasons for thinking that human rights and harmony, two values much discussed with regard to contemporary China, make poor bedfellows. They emerge from different traditions and may apply in different ways: human rights setting a minimal standard and harmony articulating an elusive ideal. In addition, might not harmony demand the sacrifice of one person’s rights in order to achieve some larger objective? Does not individual s…
Must we choose our leaders? human rights and political participation in China
The essay begins from Alan Gewirth's influential account of human rights, and specifically with his argument that the human right to political participation can only be fulfilled by competitive, liberal democracy. I show that his argument rests on empirical, rather than conceptual grounds, which opens the possibility that in China, alternative forms of participation may be legitimate or even superior. An examination of the theory and contemporary…
Sagely ease and moral perception
Decent Democratic Centralism
Are there any coherent and defensible alternatives to liberal democracy? The author examines the possibility that a reformed democratic centralism—the principle around which China’s current polity is officially organized—might be legitimate, according to both an inside and an outside perspective. The inside perspective builds on contemporary Chinese political theory; the outside perspective critically deploys Rawls’s notion of a “decent society” …
New Confucianism: A Critical Examination
Journal of Chinese PhilosophyVolume 31, Issue 4 p. 535-540 New Confucianism: A Critical Examination Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 15 November 2004 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6253.2004.00170_1.xCitations: 1Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd t…
Dao' as a Nickname
Few would deny that the Dao De Jing is a puzzling text.One puzzle that has particularly vexed interpreters in recent years is how to understand the central term of the text, ‘dao.’ The difficulty can be brought out by considering the first lines of two consecutive chapters: [41] When the highest type of men hear the way, with diligence they are able to practice it.... [42] The way gives birth to the one....‘Way’—the ubiquitous and appropriate tra…
Decent Democratic Centralism
Are there any coherent and defensible alternatives to liberal democracy? The author examines the possibility that a reformed democratic centralism—the principle around which China’s current polity is officially organized—might be legitimate, according to both an inside and an outside perspective. The inside perspective builds on contemporary Chinese political theory; the outside perspective critically deploys Rawls’s notion of a “decent society” …
Sagehood: The Contemporary Significance of Neo-Confucian Philosophy
This book explores what happens when we take Neo-Confucianism and its ideal of sagehood seriously as contemporary philosophy. It develops an interpretation of the Neo-Confucian tradition that, while historically grounded in detailed readings of Zhu Xi, Wang Yangming, and others, is open to further development and critique; and also reflects on ways that Neo-Confucian perspectives challenge or enhance issues of concern to contemporary Western phil…
My Progressive Confucian Journey
This essay examines the engagement between Progressive Confucianism and Mainland China in three steps. I begin with a narrative of how I came to be someone who identifies as Confucian and advocates Progressive Confucianism. Part II examines an especially important phase in this evolution: the series of ten dialogues I held with Mainland Chinese Confucians in the Spring of 2017. I give an overview of the topics we debated, themes that cut across i…
Sagely ease and moral perception
New Confucianism: A Critical Examination
Journal of Chinese PhilosophyVolume 31, Issue 4 p. 535-540 New Confucianism: A Critical Examination Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 15 November 2004 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6253.2004.00170_1.xCitations: 1Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd t…
The Possibility of Sagehood: Reverence and Ethical Perfection in Zhu Xi’s Thought
The Possibility of Sagehood: Reverence and Ethical Perfection in Zhu Xi's Thought
L'A. interroge la possibilite meme d'un lien entre la realite ultime et l'experience concrete qui sous-tend le programme confuceen d'education ethique vers la sagesse. Examinant la theorie daoiste de l'esprit de Zhu Xi, fondee sur la distinction entre l'actualisation de l'activite et la non-actualisation de la tranquillite, l'A. presente les deux modeles de la veneration etablis par Zhu Xi en vue de la perfection morale: 1) la version pure qui re…
Did Someone Say "Rights"? Liu Shipei's Concept of Quanli
Should We All Be More English? Liang Qichao, Rudolf von Jhering, and Rights
Rudolf von Jhering (1818-92) published Der Kampf ums Recht (The Struggle for Law) in 1872. He was already regarded as one of Germany's most important legal philosophers, and Der Kampf helped to ensure a world-wide reputation. His argument that people should be less like the "adult children" of China and more like the English found audiences everywhere, including China, where Der Kampf was translated between 1900 and 1901. Jhering's doctrines stim…
Human Rights in Chinese Thought: A Cross-Cultural Inquiry
What should we make of claims by members of other groups to have moralities different from our own? Human Rights in Chinese Thought gives an extended answer to this question in the first study of its kind. It integrates a full account of the development of Chinese rights discourse - reaching back to important, though neglected, origins of that discourse in 17th and 18th century Confucianism - with philosophical consideration of how various commun…
The Chinese Human Rights Reader: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000
Dao' as a Nickname
Few would deny that the Dao De Jing is a puzzling text.One puzzle that has particularly vexed interpreters in recent years is how to understand the central term of the text, ‘dao.’ The difficulty can be brought out by considering the first lines of two consecutive chapters: [41] When the highest type of men hear the way, with diligence they are able to practice it.... [42] The way gives birth to the one....‘Way’—the ubiquitous and appropriate tra…
New Confucianism: A Critical Examination
Journal of Chinese PhilosophyVolume 31, Issue 4 p. 535-540 New Confucianism: A Critical Examination Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Stephen C. Angle, Stephen C. Angle Wesleyan UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 15 November 2004 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6253.2004.00170_1.xCitations: 1Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd t…
Must we choose our leaders? human rights and political participation in China
The essay begins from Alan Gewirth's influential account of human rights, and specifically with his argument that the human right to political participation can only be fulfilled by competitive, liberal democracy. I show that his argument rests on empirical, rather than conceptual grounds, which opens the possibility that in China, alternative forms of participation may be legitimate or even superior. An examination of the theory and contemporary…
Sagely ease and moral perception
Decent Democratic Centralism
Are there any coherent and defensible alternatives to liberal democracy? The author examines the possibility that a reformed democratic centralism—the principle around which China’s current polity is officially organized—might be legitimate, according to both an inside and an outside perspective. The inside perspective builds on contemporary Chinese political theory; the outside perspective critically deploys Rawls’s notion of a “decent society” …
No Supreme Principle: Confucianism’s Harmonization of Multiple Values
Human Rights and Harmony
There are a number of reasons for thinking that human rights and harmony, two values much discussed with regard to contemporary China, make poor bedfellows. They emerge from different traditions and may apply in different ways: human rights setting a minimal standard and harmony articulating an elusive ideal. In addition, might not harmony demand the sacrifice of one person’s rights in order to achieve some larger objective? Does not individual s…
Sagehood: The Contemporary Significance of Neo-Confucian Philosophy
This book explores what happens when we take Neo-Confucianism and its ideal of sagehood seriously as contemporary philosophy. It develops an interpretation of the Neo-Confucian tradition that, while historically grounded in detailed readings of Zhu Xi, Wang Yangming, and others, is open to further development and critique; and also reflects on ways that Neo-Confucian perspectives challenge or enhance issues of concern to contemporary Western phil…
A Productive Dialogue: Contemporary Moral Education and Zhu Xi’s Neo-Confucian Ethics
A Productive Dialogue: Contemporary Moral Education and Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucian Ethics: A Productive Dialogue
The essay asks whether contemporary Western empirical studies of moral education, as exemplified in the distinctive research programs of Lawrence Kohlberg and Martin Hoffman, can enter into productive dialogue with the Neo-Confucian theories of Zhu Xi (1130-1200). The proposed dialogue proceeds in two stages. I begin with Zhu's notion of "lesser learning" and the role therein of ritual, and consider their relations to Kohlberg's ideas about the c…
Confucianism: Contemporary Expressions
This chapter contains sections titled: Background to Contemporary Confucianism Confucianism and Social Justice in the Twentieth Century Contemporary Views Conclusion References
Contemporary Confucian Political Philosophy
Virtue Ethics and Confucianism
Part One: Debating the Scope and Applicability of Virtue and Virtue Ethics 1.1 Chen Lai Virtue Ethics and Confucian Ethics 1.2 Philip J. Ivanhoe Virtue Ethics and the Chinese Confucian Tradition 1.3 Lee Ming-huei Confucianism, Kant, and Virtue Ethics 1.4 Bryan Van Norden Toward a Synthesis of Confucianism and Aristotelianism 1.5 Liu Liangjian Virtue Ethics and Confucianism: A Methdological Reflection 1.6 Wong Wai-ying Confucian Ethics and Virtue …
The Analects and Moral Theory
The Chinese Human Rights Reader: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000
Western, Chinese, and Universal Values
Efforts to resist â Western valuesâ and to promote â Chinese valuesâ are often based on a crude cultural relativism which is implausible on both historical and philosophical grounds. Admittedly, worries about a facile equation of â Westâ with â universalâ are sometimes well-founded, but the answer is not to retreat to a relativism that would limit all partiesâ abilities to seek self-improvement. Rather, building on examples like Chinese new cosmo…
Neo-Confucianism: A Philosophical Introduction
Buddhism and Zhu Xi’s Epistemology of Discernment
This chapter focuses on Zhu Xi’s theory of knowing in order to show how Zhu consciously appropriated Buddhist ideas to develop his own thought. Zhu repurposed the Buddhist term zhijue (perceptual awareness) to become a general term for the mind’s various kinds of knowing activity. Zhu’s epistemology was a conscious rejection of radical approach associated with the Song dynasty Chan master Dahui Zonggao (1089–1163). Two parallel lines of argument …
The Future of Confucian Political Philosophy
On February 14, 2017, Joseph Chan and Stephen Angle convened a Roundtable on the Future of Confucian Political Philosophy at the University of Hong Kong. Eight invited speakers each offered thoughts on the main topic, followed by discussion among the panelists and responses to questions from the audience. This transcript has been reviewed and edited by the main participants. Much of the discussion revolves around the relations and tensions betwee…
Chinese history and philosophy (26 works) · Philosophy (24 works) · Epistemology (20 works) · Political science (19 works) · Sociology (19 works) · Law (17 works) · Environmental ethics (14 works) · China (10 works) · Neo-Confucianism (10 works) · Politics (8 works)