Lots of talk around the office this morning about the big Democratic Party wins in the US elections last night.  As a standard-issue, academic left-liberal, I am happy with the outcome (though I worry about a Democratic Congress pushing anti-China policies, especially on trade issues, that will neither solve US economic problems, nor promote constructive Sino-US relations…but that’s a story for another day).   But let me turn the conversation in another direction: what can ancient Chinese thought contribute to our understanding of electoral politics?

     Obviously, Confucius and Mencius and the Taoists did not conceive of a democratically participatory politics.  Sometimes Mencius is taken to assert a "right to rebel," which could imply an endorsement of a mass-based politics.  But this is a stretch.  The passage that is usually cited in this regard – the one that notes that if a sovereign is making "grave mistakes," he can be replaced (193-194) – is addressed not to the people at large, but to the "royal families."  In other words, the people do not rule, but the educated, enlightened elite rules.  That is pretty much the Confucian presumption.

    Taoism could be taken as a somewhat cynical rejection of elite rule, articulated from outside the political mainstream.  All of the promises made by political leaders are just so much noise, unable, ultimately, to shape the unfolding of Way.  It is hard to extract from this, however, a more positive vision of popular political participation.  At the very least (and maybe this is a bit unfair), Taoists would want to preserve the right to opt-out of the political process.

    So, adapting ancient Chinese thought to modern electoral politics has to be seen as one of those fundamental revisions necessary to make it applicable to contemporary life (rather like the necessity of rejecting the original assumption of patriarchy).  The ancient thinkers themselves were not democrats, not in the manner that democracy is practiced today.  But, I think there may still be something that the old books can contribute.

    Here are some preliminary thoughts.

    Although there may not be a fully developed "right to rebel" in Mencius, there is certainly an understanding that political legitimacy is rooted in broad social and economic circumstances, otherwise known as the "Mandate of Heaven."  There is an element of fate in the Mandate, but there is also an element of performative responsibility.  For example, it is usually understood that a "true emperor" enjoys a Mandate if the people’s material lives are comfortable and inequality is limited.  Thus, policies, and the consequences of policies (what I am calling "performative responsibility") matter.

     The big question is, of course: how do we know when and if political leaders have a Mandate?  Heaven, as Confucius reminds us, does not speak.  So, we must divine it as best we can from our understanding of current circumstances (my rationalism tells me that, Hurricane Katrina notwithstanding, natural disasters do not count).  And that is where elections come in.

    Mass-based elections are a means, a good means I think, of discerning how people feel about current circumstances.  They are a way of perceiving the Mandate of Heaven.  Indeed, regular, free and fair elections are, in general, a better means of channeling the Mandate of Heaven than reliance on an authoritarian "wise" leader.  The latter runs the risk of Maoist hubris that created gigantic disasters like the Great Leap Forward.  Democracy, while certainly less efficient, even messy at times, can produce perverse outcomes but it is self-limiting.  The American people thought that Bush’s war in Iraq promoted their security in 2004; two years later they know better and expressed themselves with their votes.

     So, what did Heaven "say" in this election?  The war in Iraq is a failure and must be ended, one way or another.  Although Democratic leaders are already saying they will not call for an immediate pull out, the likelihood of a phased withdrawal, it seems to me, is high now.  The tragedy, of course, is that we should never have started the war in the first place.  Yet, the kind of failure of political leadership that produced the war is not peculiar to democracy (authoritarian leaders can just as easily, perhaps more easily, make such mistakes); and democracy allows us to push back and begin a process of correcting egregious errors.

    Heaven also said that corruption had gone too far:

Corruption proved to be a more potent issue than it had appeared even
weeks ago. After 12 years in control, the Republicans who took power
with Gingrich promising to sweep out a calcified and ethically bankrupt
Democratic leadership found themselves perceived as becoming what they
had tried to expunge. Exit polls found 41 percent of voters rated
corruption "extremely important" to their decision.

    It might be overly optimistic to believe that we will now enter into an age of unique political virtue, but, at least, various rascals have been chased out and other corrupt politicians will have scale back their activities for a time.

    There is another way, besides the elections-as- signs-of-Mandate-of- Heaven idea, that ancient Chinese thought might have something to say to contemporary electoral politics.  And that is: character matters.  Confucius and Mencius believed that the wise and virtuous should rule.  Democratic elections do not always produce such fine people.  But, in a more modest way, elections do allow for a consideration of a candidates character and Confucians would tell us we should take that seriously. 

    Along these lines, it was nice to see that Don Sherwood lost his House race in Pennsylvania.  He had run an ad in his campaign, admitting that he had cheated on his wife but contending that he had not abused his mistress as had been alleged.  It is good to know that "I didn’t beat my mistress" is a losing message in American politics. 

     Conversely, a Confucian might take some solace in the fact that Alan Hevesi won his New York state comptroller’s race.  He had run into trouble because he used public funds to provide transportation for his ill wife.  He has since apologized and paid back the state for his misappropriations.  But, his crime was taking care of his family; his impulse was to provide for his wife.  And voters in New York did not see that as a transgression that should lead to his being ousted from office, especially after his apology and repayment.  His family-oriented intentions were right, in the eyes of the public, even if his means were wrong.  There is a Confucian ring to this story, no?

    Personally, I think Hevesi should now resign.  He has been vindicated in a sense by re-election, and the voters have signaled a certain sympathy for his duty to his wife.  Misappropriating public funds, however, especially for a comptroller, is wrong.  He should do the right thing and step down.

     In any event, there are two ways that Confucian thought might be adapted to contemporary electoral politics:

     – elections are useful as gauges of the Mandate of Heaven;

     – the personal character of candidates matters and should be weighed by voters.

     I guess then I would disagree with Roland, who said "I hate democracy" (scroll down to comments for 10/20) a couple of weeks ago.  Democracy is far from perfect; it can be frustrating at times.  But it gives us a chance to press back against bad policies and corrupt officials.