Since the time of Confucius and Mencius, no other work has stood out so clearly as a major critique of Chinese dynastic institutions. In a lucid translation with a helpful introduction by de Bary, this is the most powerful affirmation of a liberal Confucian political vision in premodern times.
Huang's treatise, translated here as Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince, though firmly grounded in classic Confucian teachings emphasizing government based on democratic principles, also incorporates significant elements from alternative schools of thought and reflects the long experience of Chinese dynastic rule subsequent to the great age of classical thinkers in the later Chou period. Huang draws together in a concise manner both his own original ideas and those others had expressed only in scattered form over two millennia. Later reformers and revolutionary leaders such as Liang Ch'i-ch'ao and Sun Yat-sen used Huang's essays on the Prince, Ministership, Law, the Schools, and the Land System to promote their own political aims. Modern scholars have confirmed Huang's stature as the most enduring and influential critic of Chinese despotism and have recognized his Plan as the most powerful affirmation of a liberal Confucian political vision in premodern times.
Since the time of Confucius and Mencius, no other work has stood out so clearly as a major critique of Chinese dynastic institutions. In a lucid translation with a helpful introduction by de Bary, this is the most powerful affirmation of a liberal Confucian political vision in premodern times.
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