A Study On The Interaction And Comparison Between Scholar-bureaucrats And The Relevant Groups In Song Dynasty

The paper starts with the practice of the joint-governance of the state between the scholars and the emperor, and concentrates on the interaction between the scholars and imperial power, the interaction between the civil and military officers, and interaction between different types of scholars.Remonstrating was the main methods of the interaction between the scholars and the emperor. To achieve their goals better, the traditional scholars passed their fears to the emperor through visible threats such as military officers, mass uprising and foreign enemy, and invisible threats such as the calamity, the ancestral laws, history, public opinion and the support from the scholars. Most of their start point was the concern about the country and the people, but sometimes there was also the consideration towards individuals and the collective profits of the scholars. And sometimes the reason was just their incapability of handling threats out of their fears. Under long-term infiltration, most of the emperors became careful, and the politics was peaceful. But it also made the emperor and decision-makers coward, and almost lost the ability of decision-making. Few people like Wang Anshi encouraged the emperor to be determinative and promising, but under the overall atmosphere of fear, the effect didn't last too much time. As an important party of "joint-governance of the state", scholars had obtained the rights of ruling the nation alone to some extent, but forgot the responsibility of governance.In the discourse system of "the joint-governance of the state between the scholars and the emperor", there was no position for military officers. The scholars often cracked down on military officers by lowering warrior status, denying their achievements, insulting military commanders, depriving the rights or even lives of military commanders. Such behaviors were really helpful for regime stability, but also caused the weakening of military ability. Military officers despised civil servants of low ability, and sometimes they revenged for the dissatisfaction with the inferior treatment. Many military officers felt inferior about their status and tried to join the civil servants or equipped themselves with the characteristics of scholars. Some knowledgeable officials made their efforts to eliminate contradiction between the two sides. Because of fears towards military officials, emperors apparently preferred civilian officials instead of military officials on both civil and military affairs. Civilian officials had a preferential treatment of etiquette, which was acceptable to both sides. The lower moral requirements towards military officials were not compensation, but deeper discrimination, so it turned to be an important reason of the surrender of military officials in late Song dynasty.In the practice of joint-governance of the state, scholar-bureaucrats broke up into different parties. The innovationists have the most comprehensive consideration towards the government affairs which is not only practicable but also sustainable. To some extent, they were agreed by the masters such as Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi. However, after the departure of Wang Anshi, their practice of all-win failed. The traditional Scholar-bureaucrats ware unwilling to work actively and they even objected the efforts of others. The hard work of some officials was often regarded as "make troubles", and even blamed as "villain". So temporization and inaction became the mainstream among the Scholar-bureaucrats. As a result, "joint governance of the state" became hollow because of the lack of practical work for governance.Fu Bi and Wen Yanbo were the important representatives of traditional scholar-bureaucrats. They were also of great significance of Southern Song Dynasty. In comparison, the political views and practice of prior Southern Song Dynasty inherited totally from Yuan You period, and was incompatible with the period of Xi Ning. This conclusion also proves the consistency of political culture and the development of history.Scholar-bureaucrats strengthened their rights of joint-governance of the state by interaction with imperial power and military officers, but they ignored the responsibility of governance of the state. The misplacements of their talents and work finally led to the collapse of Song Dynasty twice.