Abstract
This article analyzes discourses on agricultural labor in Warring States China, especially views on who should undertake farming and justifications of such designs, arguing that three new socio-economic developments were closely related to the issue of agricultural labor, including the demise of the existing social hierarchy, the increase in livelihood options, and the growing attention of the state to agricultural production. Warring States discourses on agricultural labor thus entail how the individual thinker/text had responded to these developments via his/its intellectual insights. In short, the Mohists not only valued production, but also accepted the existence of different social statuses, among which some people could be justifiably relieved from agricultural labor. Moreover, inheriting the attitudes toward labor and status that prevailed in the Spring and Autumn period, Mencius in the mid-Warring States argued that shi 士 could shirk farming since their major task was to seek political posts and serve the state, a view which was, however, criticized by the Legalists and the Taoists. The Legalists aimed to strengthen the state and thereby emphasized the importance of production, attempting to build a regime in which every individual was expected to be both a farmer and a soldier; to this end, they focused on the elevation of people’s willingness to engage in agricultural labor. Responding to the above contexts, Xunzi in the late Warring States period used the concept of li 禮 (rite) to articulate a synthetic discourse, which can be found in certain chapters of Guanzi 管子, on agricultural labor that not only paid sufficient attention to the issue of production but re-established a social hierarchy. The analysis of discourse on agricultural labor, therefore, may well help us to understand the notion of the division of tasks, the idea of status, the role of “the people” in Chinese political thought, and the varying visions of ideal order in early China.
Keywords
physical labor; division of tasks; status; agricultural production; history of Chinese political thought
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