A Study Of The Confucian Political-Social Ideas Of Cao Yishi

As a scholar-officer in the periods of Yongzheng and Qianlong, Cao Yishi, based on the Confucian political theory, put forward his own different ideas against some political policies of the highly centralized absolute monarchy in the early Qing Dynasty. The thesis consists of five parts, which are listed as follows:The first part of this thesis introduces the political culture in Cao Yishi's time and thus points out the background that caused Cao Yishi to put forward his arguments.The second part illustrates Cao Yishi's ideas on the reconstruction of the checking power of the scholar-officers. Yongzheng ordered to merge the power of Jishizhong(给事中)into Duchayuan's(都察院) jurisdiction, which actually deprived the scholar-officers of their checking power. Thus, Cao Yishi put forward his ideas of reconstructing the scholar-officers'checking power.The third part illustrates Cao Yishi's political ideas that the scholar-officers should be treated well and be allowed to express their own opinions. Facing the wide-spread false accusations in the early Qing Dynasty, Cao Yishi put forward that the admission quota of the Central-government Entrance Examination should be enlarged and widened, that the scholar-officers should be treated well and be allowed to express their own opinions, and that the emperor and the scholar-officers should govern the whole country together, which showed his Confucian ideal.The fourth part deals with the conflict between Cao Yishi and Yongzheng on how to use the talented people. This part points out that Cao Yishi severely criticized Yongzheng because Yongzheng put much more emphasis on the officers'talent than on their morals. Cao Yishi stuck to the Confucian idea that the officers'morals should always be put the first place.The fifth part is the conclusion, which summarizes the main content of the thesis. The conclusions are as follows: first, as a scholar-officer, Cao Yishi was still able to reassert the scholar-officer's political ideal in the early Qing dynasty when the absolute monarchy was further strengthened, which reflected the profound conflict between the Confucian political ideal and institutional concept held by the Chinese scholar-bureaucrats and the highly-strengthened monarchic politics in the early Qing dynasty; Second, the fact that this conflict in the political system and culture of the early Qing dynasty tended to vanish showed that the traditional Chinese political culture experienced a profound alienation in the early years of Qing Dynasty.