Katrina Nguyen
Victor Magagna
Political Science 113A
8 December 2012
Lasting Legacies The impact of Confucianism in East Asia continues to mold and shape individuals’ actions so they can lead better lives that will have a positive effect on society. This can be achieved once the individual reaches a better understanding about their mutual obligations – that a proper society is revolved around give and take. It is the individuals who keep the lasting legacies of Confucianism through their patterns of knowledge and belief by understanding how the world actually works. The lasting legacies of Asian political thought and practice are also seen through moral reasoning and moral values, political thought and action, the economy and the
Mutual obligation is the root for moral life. In terms of moral values, it can be seen through justice, harmony, ecological family, and a good life. Justice as reciprocity is the belief that justice is about proper share, which results in equality. Justice doesn’t emphasize equality first. It concentrates on proper shares, which means giving people what they out to get, and reciprocity, which is not just doing something for somebody else, but also about paying of proper shares. There is the idea of shared costs and benefits and it is something that people use in judging government to judge whether it is just or unjust. In terms of harmony, East Asia argues that conflict should be minimized. They believe that optimizing differences should be a moral root in everyday life and that conflict is unproductive. Harmony is the balancing of differences and it also comes from abiding by natural laws. Scholars have emphasized that Heaven did not create harmony but only provided the conditions for humans to be in harmony “and that a harmonious relationship between humans and their environment is conducive to their well-being” (de Bary, 177).
The ecological family is emphasized as the ecology and it is which all civilization value. Family is the core foundation of any institution and it is also where values and morality develop. It is well known that Confucianism places a “great deal of importance on the