NON - WESTERN POLITICAL TRADITIONS AND WORLD FEDERALISM
By Lyndon Storey, Melbourne and San Francisco

When it comes to international co-operation and respect for our fellow human beings there are many great thinkers in other cultures who have lessons for us. World federalism can and must draw upon as many intellectual traditions as possible rather than focusing just those from the West. The West, after all, has given the world racism, political nationalism and imperialism. Having conquered and divided the world, we should consider the thought of a non-Western thinker who advocated world unity. Such a thinker was Mencius ("Meng Zi" c 371-289 BCE), who advocated human unity and is one of the most famous philosophers in Chinese history. This article will introduce his thought and compare it with the more exclusivist thought of famous Western thinkers living at the same time.
Who was Mencius?
Mencius claimed to be interpreting Confucius, who died more than a hundred years earlier. Mencius lived during China’s "Warring States" period when seven powerful states competed for power. He refused to support any one state and instead advocated social justice and peace for all of humanity.

Mencius’ ideas in a nutshell:
Here are some key themes of Mencius’ thought.
1) We all share a common humanity and a "heart of
compassion:"
Mencius believed our common humanity was more important than religious or national differences. The core of this was our sense of compassion towards others, which he viewed as being innate and the source of both human solidarity and ethics.
In a famous passage he argued: “My reason for saying no man is devoid of a heart sensitive to the suffering of others is this. Suppose a man were, all of a sudden, to see a young child on the verge of falling into a well. He would certainly be moved to compassion, not because he wanted to get in the good graces of the parents, not because he wished to win the praise of his fellow villagers and friends, nor yet because he disliked the cry of the child. From this it can be seen that whoever is devoid of the heart of compassion is not human…”
The point here is not that we are all saints but that in the first instant our "heart of compassion" is aroused and only later, depending on how we have developed, do more calculating and cynical motives take over. The moral potential is already there within each of us.
2) Government must be for the welfare of the people to be
legitimate:
Mencius argued that government had to treat people as moral beings who possessed a "heart of compassion." Therefore, government had to take account of the will and needs of the people. "First come the people, last comes the ruler." On one occasion a tyrant was overthrown and Mencius was criticized for not opposing the rebellion. Mencius replied that what had occurred was not the overthrow of a legitimate ruler, but an illegitimate one, as the deposed ruler had relied on force and cruelty. If the people lost faith in the ruler, he lost
heaven’s mandate to rule; "Heaven hears with the people’s ears; Heaven sees with the people’s eyes."
3) As Mencius had based his argument on a human potential for moral behavior, when he speaks of "the people" he was speaking of all humanity, not just one’s own nationals. He was logically compelled to conclude that the only legitimate government was one that governed for all people. He hoped for a new unity of humanity, to be achieved by winning the people’s hearts (i.e., treating them justly), not by putting the interest of one country first. "To win the world, win the people... to win the people, win their hearts."
4) A war not justified by human benefit will only lead to more conflict:
Mencius was well aware that there would be rulers who claimed to be fighting for world justice when in fact they were only concerned for themselves. For Mencius, security could come only from bringing justice to humanity, not by treating it with force.
Qi was one of the great powers of Mencius’ time. After it annexed Yan, it faced rebellion within Yan and attack by a coalition of forces from other states. In a famous passage Mencius explained to the King of Qi why things had gone wrong.
“Now when you went to punish Yan which practiced tyranny over its people, the people thought you were going to rescue them from water and fire, and they came to meet your army. Now you double your territory without practicing benevolent government. This provokes the armies of the whole empire (i.e., the other states now united against Qi). If you…take your army out after setting up a ruler in consultation with the men of Yan, it is still not too late.”
Mencius felt that any war other than one genuinely supporting the human community would be unjust and lead only to further conflict. That is why Qi was welcomed when it was simply opposing tyranny but attacked when it behaved like just another great power.
5) Civilized people should be loyal to civilization, rather than to their country:
Mencius used the word Jun Zi (usually translated as exemplary person or gentleman) to describe someone who was trying to develop his or her heart of compassion and promote civilization. Mencius hoped the Jun Zi would develop into a transnational intellectual class, who put human justice before nationality. The best gentleman of a village is in a position to make friends with the best gentlemen in other villages; the best gentlemen in a state, with the best gentlemen in other states: Thus Mencius believed respecting the people legitimized government, and by “the people” he meant all humans. He urged people to put their conscience as humans before their loyalty as national citizens. Our humanity is more important than our patriotism.

Comparison with Contemporary western thinkers:
Socrates — At his trial Socrates (c470-399 BCE) stated that the "unexamined life is not worth living." He argued that the best thing he could do for Athens was to examine assumptions and try to move closer to truth. He also offered the defense that he had been a loyal Athenian and engaged in military service on Athens’ behalf. Even after being found guilty, one of the reasons he rejected the idea of escaping was that it would be a form of disloyalty to Athens. In other words, his fearless examination of all assumptions did not include the assumption of loyalty to the state. Far from questioning this assumption, he expected praise for upholding it. Socrates fought for his country and expected credit for that, while Mencius repeatedly left his country to campaign against war and for a community of humanity.
Plato — Socrates’ student Plato (c 427-347 BCE) wrote the first major work of western political philosophy, the Republic. Plato gave much thought to the Republic’s internal organization. However, when it came to foreign policy, his main hope was that the Republic would be difficult to defeat in warfare:"Our trained soldiers should easily be a match for two or three times their number." For Plato "the people" still meant only the people of his own country.
Aristotle — Aristotle (384-322 BCE) studied with Plato. Aristotle’s ideal government was not a human community, but an ideal city-state, ready to wage war upon its enemies.
He declared, "It is proper that Greeks should rule non-Greeks,” the implication being that non-Greek and slave are by nature identical. He concluded that, "It is clear then that by nature some are free, others slaves."
Mencius argued that even the crudest barbarian could become part of the moral community of humanity. He illustrated this by pointing to two worthies of the past: "Shun was an eastern barbarian; Wen was a western barbarian. The standards of the two sages, one earlier and one later, were identical."
The great early thinkers of Western civilization pioneered the Western tradition of putting our nation before our common humanity and treated a world of warring states as the norm rather than a crisis of humanity. Mencius helps us appreciate that human divisions are contingent rather than innate and that politics should focus on the human interest rather than the national interest.
Whether we agree with Mencius or not, it is worth our while to note that ideologies such as World Federalism make more sense if they are presented as an outcome of the thought of great human thinkers rather than just the next stage of the Western project. In reality, Western thinkers were amongst the last rather than the first to realize that our common humanity should not stop at national borders. It has been Western ideological frameworks, such as nationalism and racism, that have done more to divide the world than the thought of almost any other civilization. As we attempt to correct the flaws of the Western tradition, we should do so in a manner that acknowledges contributions from other cultures.

Lyndon Storey has a Ph.D. in international relations from Sydney University, Australia, and has taught politics in Australia and China. He is a member of the World Federalists Board of Directors.