by Ying-shih Yü
Paperbacks, 1985; also George Allen & Unwin Paperback, 1976, from Charles Scribners’s
Sons, 1958). Page numbers are from this edition. For works discussing Weber’s thesis, one
can see Kurt Samuelsson’s negative and Gordon Marshall’s supportive views. Marshall’s
book also provides a refl ective discussion on vari ous other works on the Weberian thesis.
See Kurt Samuelsson, Religion and Economic Action: A Critique of Max Weber (New York:
Harper Torchbooks, 1964 [1957 in Sweden]). A 1993 University of Toronto Press edition is
further subtitled The Protestant Ethic: The Rise of Capitalism and the Abuses of Scholarship.
Gordon Marshall, In Search of the Spirit of Capitalism: An Essay on Max Weber’s Protestant
Ethic Thesis (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), 82–96.
2. Max
Weber,
Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology, ed. Guenther Roth
and Claus Wittich, trans. Ephraim Fischoff et al. (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1978), 630.
220 c on f uc i a n e t h ic s a nd c a p i ta l is m
3. Max Weber, The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism (New York: Free Press,
1951), 156.
4. See Marshall, In Search of the Spirit of Capitalism; Malcolm H. MacKinnon, “Part I:
Calvinism and the Infallible Assurance of Grace: The Weber Thesis Reconsidered,”
British Journal of Sociology 39, no. 2 (June 1988): 143–177, and “Part II: Weber’s Explora-
tion of Calvinism: The Undiscovered Provenance of Capitalism,” British Journal of Soci-
ology 39, no. 2 (June 1988): 178–210.
5. Weber, The Religion of China, 227, 235
6. Quoted in Kai- wing Chow, On- cho Ng, and John B. Henderson, eds., Imagining Bound-
aries: Changing Confucian Doctrines, Texts, and Hermeneutics (Albany, N.Y.: SUNY
Press, 1999), 231.
7. Thomas A. Metzger, Escape from Predicament: Neo- Confucianism and China’s Evolving
Po liti cal Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977).
8. Weber, The Religion of China, 248.
9. Hartmut Lehmann and G. Roth, eds., Weber’ s Protestant Ethic: Origins, Evidence, Con-
texts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), viii.
10.
Fernand Braudel, Civilization and Capitalism, 15th–18th Century: The Wheels of Commerce
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982), 588.
11. See “Dajian xia sanshi— Huaihai”
—
, in Zecangzhu
, ed., Guzun
suyu lu
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1994), juan 1. See also Michael John Walsh, Sacred
Economies: Buddhist Monasticism and Territoriality in Medieval China (New York: Columbia
University Press, 2010), 56. Further references to Huaihai in notes on pages 169 and 170.
12. For the origin of this saying, see Yü Ying- shih, Zhongguo jinshi zongjiao lunli yu shan-
gren jingshen (hereafter Shangren jingshen)
(Taipei: Lianjing,
1987), 23n26.
13. Li Jingde
, ed., ZYL
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1986 edition), juan 121: 2935.
14. See Su Song, “Tan Xun”
, cited in the appendix to “Su xiansheng Song
,”
in Song Yuan xue-an buyi
, ed. Wang Zicai
and Feng Yunhao
(Taipei: Shijie, 1980), juan 2.
15. This poem is by Shi Jie
, see the appendix to “Culai meiren”
, in Song Yuan
xue-an buyi, juan 2.
16. For Fan Zhongyan’s words, see Shao Bo
, Shaoshi wenjian houlu
(Bei-
jing: Zhonghua, 1983), juan 22.
17. On such manuals for apprentices, see James Hayes, “Specialists and Written Material
in the Village World,” in Pop u lar Culture in Late Imperial China, ed. David Johnson, An-
drew J. Nathan, and Evelyn S. Rawski (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 83,
as noted in Richard John Lufrano, Honorable Merchants: Commerce and Self- Cultivation in
Late Imperial China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997), 19n50.
18. Max Weber, introduction to “Die Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen” (The Economic
Ethic of the World Religions [1913, 1915]), in Gesammelte Aufsaetze zur Religionssoziolgie
(Tubingen: Mohr, 1922–1923), 1:237–268. Translation in H. H. Gerth and C. Wright
Mills, eds., From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology (New York: Oxford University Press,
1946), 267–301; this passage is on page 268.
c on f uc i a n e t h ic s a nd c a p i ta l is m 221
19.
Li Mengyang, Kongtong ji
, SKQS, juan 44: 420. For details, see Yü Ying- shih,
Shangren jingshen, 108.
20. See Wang Daokun, “Yubu Chen Shijun quezheng bei”
, cited in Yü
Ying- shih, Shangren jingshen, 150.
21.
Wang Yangming quanji (Shanghai: Guji, 1992), vol. 1, juan 25: 940–941. For details, see
Yü Ying- shih, Shangren jingshen, 104.
22. Wang Yangming quanji, vol. 2, juan 32: 1171.
23. See He Liangjun
, Siyouzhai congshuo
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1983),
juan 4: 32. See also Yü Ying- shih’s discussion in his Shangren jingshen, 125–126.
24. Tang Shunzhi
, Jingchuan xiansheng wenji
, SBCK, juan 16: 337.
25. Weber, The Protestant Ethic, 52.
26. Ibid., esp. chaps. 4 and 5.
27. Gianfranco Poggi , Calvinism and the Cap i tal ist Spirit: Max Weber’s Protestant Ethic
(London: Macmillan Press, 1983).
28. Shaoshi wenjian houlu, juan 20, as discussed in Yü Ying- shih, Shangren jingshen, 141.
29. Ming- Qing Huishang ziliao xuanbian
(hereafter MQHS), compiled by
Zhang Haipeng
, Wang Tingyuan
, and Tang Lixing
(Hefei:
Huangshan, 1985), 234. It is extremely revealing that in a late Ming popu lar handbook
for merchants, the successful businessman is also described as “in possession of extraor-
dinary qualities endowed by Heaven” as the dynastic founder and the top successful
candidate in metropolitan examinations. See Li Jinde, Keshang yilan xingmi (Taiyuan:
Shanxi renmin, 1992), 312. See also Yü Ying- shih, Shangren jingshen, 148.
30. MQHS, 216.
31. Jingchuan xiansheng wenji, juan 6: 119.
32. Zhang Han, Songchuang mengyu
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1985), juan 7: 141.
33. Hu Shih, “The Concept of Immortality in Chinese Thought,” Harvard Divinity School
Bulletin 122 (1945/1946): 23–46; reprinted in Chou Chih- p’ing, ed., En glish Writings of Hu
Shih, vol. 2, Chinese Philosophy and Intellectual History (Berlin: Springer, 2013), 193–207,
this quote is on p. 207.
34. Weber, The Religion of China, 235.
35. Wilhelm Hennis, “Personality and Life Orders: Max Weber’s Theme,” in Max Weber,
Rationality and Modernity, ed. Scott Lash and Sam Whimster (London: Allen & Unwin,
1987), 52–74.
36. Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, 24–25, 68.
37. See Yü Ying- shih, Shangren jingshen, 1987, 158; also quoted in Terada Takanobu
,
Sansei shonin no kenkyū
(Kyoto: Toyoshi kenkyukai, 1972), 296.
38. Gu Xiancheng
, Xiaoxinzhai zhaji
(Taipei: Guangwen, [1877] 1975),
39. Sun Xingyan
, “Wusong yuan wengao”
, in Sun Yuanru shiwen ji
, SBCK, 112.
40. Jack Goody, The East in the West (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996),
78–81; the Four- Legged Account Book is also discussed here.
11. Business Culture and Chinese Traditions
Toward a Study of the Evolution of Merchant
Culture in Chinese History
As indicated by the title, this chapter will relate “business culture” to “Chi-
nese traditions.” To begin with, let me explain briefl y what sort of things
will be discussed. In the fi rst place, business culture must be distinguished
from business itself. The former may be understood as a way of life grown out
of the ever- evolving business world that involves ideas, beliefs, values, ethical
code, be hav ior patterns, etc. It is mainly to these cultural aspects, not the busi-
ness world itself, that I shall address myself. In the second place, from the very
beginning, business culture has been an integral part of Chinese culture as a
whole and it must not be misconceived as an isolated phenomenon confi ned
only to the business world. As a matter of fact, in the everyday world, business
culture constantly interacts as well as intermingles with cultures arising from
diff er ent realms of life. Special attention, therefore, will be called to the mutual
infl uences between business culture on the one hand and Chinese po liti cal,
intellectual, and religious traditions on the other. In the third place, I shall also
give a brief account of the changing position of the merchant class, particularly
vis- à- vis the intellectual elite over the centuries. Business culture is, after all,
largely the creation of the merchant community. The relative importance (or
unimportance) of business culture in any given period of Chinese history can
be more precisely mea sured by the place of the merchant in the social scale.
What follows is essentially a historical overview divided into three sections.
The fi rst section covers the ancient period to the unifi cation in 221 b.c.e., a
busine s s c ul t ur e a nd c h ine s e t r adi t ions 223
period that witnessed the origins and development of the market as well as the
fi rst remarkable eff ervescence of Chinese business culture. The second section
deals with the long imperial age down to the sixteenth century. It has been
generally believed that during this long period, Chinese society was guided by
the princi ple known as “emphasizing the importance of agriculture at the ex-
pense of commerce” ( zhongnong qingshang
), with the result that mer-
chants were held in extremely low esteem—at the bottom of the social ladder, at
least in theory. Fi nally, in the third section, I shall outline the sustained growth
of business culture with ramifi cations in diff er ent directions from the six-
teenth century on, which may well have reached the limits of the Chinese tradi-
tion with its often strong antimerchant bias.
In his last book, The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism, F. A. Hayek argues
forcefully that our civilization owes its origin and preservation to what he calls
“the extended order of human cooperation,” which, in the fi nal analy sis, may
be shown to have been an outgrowth of the evolution of the market. He further
speculates, on the basis of Old World archaeology and Eu ro pean history, that
not only the market is much older than the state, but the role of the state in the
history of civilization has also been greatly exaggerated.1 One may or may not
agree with Hayek’s central thesis. It is undeniable, however, that the prob lem of
the market vis- à- vis the state is one of fundamental importance common to all
socie ties, ancient or modern. Let us now begin with the idea of the market in
ancient China.
A N C I E N T T I M E S T O T H E 2 2 1 b. c . e . U N I F I C AT I O N
According to tradition, the Chinese state recognized the importance of the mar-
ket at a very early date. An often- quoted passage from the Yijing
(Classic of
Changes) attributes the institutionalization of the market to the legendary em-
peror Shennong or Divine Farmer. It says: “He had markets to be held at midday,
thus bringing together all the people, and assembling in one place all their
wares. They made their exchanges, and retired, every one having got what he
wanted.2 The text in question is generally considered to be of a much later date,
prob ably of the third century b.c.e., and the quoted passage cannot be accepted
as a historical account of the origin of the market in China. Nevertheless, it
clearly shows that in the ancient Chinese mind, the state and the market were
inseparable from the very beginning. This point is also amply borne out by
many other preunifi cation sources including the Zhouli
(Rites of Zhou)
and the chapter on King’s Regulations (“Wangzhi”
) in the Liji
(Classic
of Rites). The Rites of Zhou, in par tic u lar, describes a very complex offi
cial mar-
ket system. Under the General Directorship of the Market ( sishi
), we fi nd
specialized departments in charge, respectively, of price fi xing, security, sales
certifi cates, weights and mea sures, etc. There can be no question that the system
224 busine s s c ul t ur e a nd c h ine s e t r adi t ions
presented in Rites of Zhou is an idealized picture. From Sun Hang’s detailed
annotations, however, it is now clear that the idealization is not wholly devoid of
historical basis. In all likelihood, it can be taken as an indication of the inten-
tions and eff orts on the part of the state to bring under control the ever- growing
market forces from the sixth century b.c.e. onward, if not earlier.3
For illustration, let me give the following in ter est ing example. In 525 b.c.e.,
an envoy from the power ful state of Jin visited the state of Zheng, then under
the administration of the wise statesman Zichan. This envoy wanted Zichan to
use his authority as Chief Minister to force a merchant to sell him a jade ring.
Much as he wished to maintain a good relationship with the state of Jin, Zichan
nevertheless resolutely rejected the envoy’s request. According to Zichan, there
had been in existence for generations a “covenant” between the government
and the merchants of Zheng, which runs as follows:
If you do not revolt from me, I will not violently interfere with your traffi
c.
I will not beg or take anything from you, and you may have your profi t-
able markets, precious things, and substance, without my taking any
knowledge of them.
Zichan therefore said to the envoy:
“Now your Excellency having come to us on a friendly mission, and
asking our State to take away [the ring] from the merchant by force, this
was to request us to violate that covenant.”
Thereupon the envoy withdrew his request.4
A few observations may be made about this extraordinary story. First, the “cov-
enant” between the state of Zheng and the merchant community was, to the
best of my knowledge, an exception rather
than the rule of the time. The his-
torical background of the covenant suggests that when the state of Zheng was
founded two centuries earlier by Duke Huan, who moved eastward with the
royal house of Zhou as a result of barbarian invasions, he was joined and helped
by a group of merchants of Zhou. This perhaps accounts for the privileged posi-
tion of the merchants in this state. It was by no means accidental that during
the Spring and Autumn Period, the merchants of Zheng were much more po-
liti cally active than their counter parts in other states. For instance, in 626
b.c.e., the famous merchant Xiang-ao, upon learning about an imminent sur-
prise attack of the Qin army against his state on his business trip, disguised
himself as an offi
cial representative of Zheng and thereby succeeded in per-
suading the Qin commander to turn back.5 Again in 587 b.c.e., a merchant of
Zheng formed a secret plan to rescue a statesman of Qin imprisoned in the
state of Chu.6 Merchants of other states, so far as I know, were not so po liti cally
involved. Thus, the mutual trust between the government and the merchants
must be understood as unique in the state of Zheng.
busine s s c ul t ur e a nd c h ine s e t r adi t ions 225
Second, by contrast, there is no evidence that merchants in other states
were so respected and well treated by the ruling nobility. The envoy from Jin,
for instance, simply took it for granted that the chief minister of Zheng could
take the jade ring from a merchant by force. This may well have been the way
he dealt with merchants in his own state.
Third, even in the state of Zheng where the merchant community was
allowed greater freedom and autonomy, the state still maintained some kind of
control over the marketplace. According to his biography in the Shiji
(Rec ords
of the Grand Historian) , two years after Zichan had been appointed as chief
minister, “no one overcharged in the markets.”7 This would seem to suggest
the existence of an offi
cial market system in charge of price regulations as men-
tioned in Rites of Zhou. Moreover, around 600 b.c.e., when Sun Shu-ao was
prime minister of Chu, he was reported to have helped the “Master of the Mar-
ketplace” ( shiling
) to restore the order of the market when it ran into confu-
sion due to an erroneous monetary policy whimsically adopted by the king. The