In the matter of Confucian plagiarism, which I mentioned a few days ago, it seems that the Confucius Institute Online has apologized for reprinting articles verbatim without attribution and taken down the material from its web site.  That sounds like the right Confucian thing to do.  Mencius tells us that when things go wrong, we must look inside ourselves, take personal responsibility and find a way to rectify the situation.  By not blaming some outside party, the Confucius Institute is doing just that.  Credit where credit is due.

      The apology also suggests that the Confucius Institute’s understanding of plagiarism might be close to my own view: any sense of using someone else’s work for your own profit, especially monetary profit, is wrong.  And educational use might best be guide by the "fair use" doctrine and, especially, full and complete citation.  At the very least, when we quote someone else’s work, we must acknowledge the original source.

      The Confucius Institute also fired someone involved in the case.  That might be going too far.  From a Confucian perspective it is probably enough to accept responsibility and take down the material.  Whoever was personally responsible might learn more from the embarrassment – and worry that they could have lost their job – than from the actual experience of being fired.  Confucianism, after all, believes that we can all improve ourselves morally, that we can learn from our mistakes and do the right thing next time.     Maybe there is a bit of Legalism (i.e. belief in harsh punishments) in the Confucius Institute headquarters….