Political Orientations and the Dilemma in the Yangming School

There were various dimensions to Yangmingxue 陽明學, or the Yangming school, as defined not only by Wang Yangming 王陽明 himself but also by his students and followers in the mid-late Ming dynasty. This article will treat Yangmingxue as a whole from the perspective of political culture. It will explore two political orientations in Wang Yangming school, namely dejunxingdao 得君行道 (“carrying out the Way through the support of the emperor”) and jueminxingdao 覺民行道 (“carrying out the Way by enlightening the common people”), analyze the implications of these two orientations and scrutinize their relationship. Also it will examine and evaluate the concept of the “common people as political subjects” implied in Yangmingxue and the political ideal in the Confucian tradition. The core questions that will be discussed are: First, how should we understand the political orientation, jueminxingdao, pioneered by the Yangming school, in addition to dejunxingdao? Second, how should we understand the relationship between jueminxingdao and dejunxingdao in the Yangming school? Third, how should we understand the concept of the “common people as political subjects” implied in Yangmingxue and what is the dilemma it had to face? Last, why the Confucian political subject could not be established and how to establish it.