Comment On Huizhou Merchants To Reform The Traditional Confucian Values

The Chinese traditional society of Ming and Qing Dynasty was fermenting the indication of great changes. Each domain of social life appeared a kind of lively, bright and fresh period atmosphere. Among this, the merchant stratum has played the vital role in economy, culture, political and many aspects. On the one hand they prospered the feudal economy, on the other hand they undoubtedly had the disintegrative function to the Chinese traditional society. And Huizhou merchants were just the typical representative of this community. The course of Huizhou merchants' development just coincides with the stage of the traditional society's reform. Therefore the vicissitude of the management behaviors, psychological conditions and value ideas of Huizhou merchants in this historical period has typicalness and model value to expounding the new history change.This thesis attempts to systematically elaborate on the Huizhou merchants to reform the traditional Confucian values from the angle of values.Distinguished from the traditional value orientation which advocates morality, Huizhou merchants established the dual value orientations of advocating morality and earning one's living. In the later period of the Chinese feudal society, the despotic feudalism further strengthened, and the Confucian values penetrated into populace's marrow, which was in the dominant status. Huizhou merchants came from "the hometown of double Cheng and Zhu Xi". They have not simply denied the traditional values. They still made the value orientation of advocating morality have logical priority. But the feudal government and feudal ruler can not prevent the wheel of history from going ahead. In Ming and Qing Dynasty, the commodity economy developed and the commercial trade prospered. Under the impact of the commodity economy, the traditional morality, social class and social life way all changed. The scholars whose representative was Wang Yangming proposed the new opinions about the "viewpoint of earning one's living" and "viewpoint of four kinds of people". Facing the contradiction of the survival crisis and traditional ideas, Huizhou merchants who grew in the such rich history soil in fact brought the viewpoint of earning one's living into the traditional values system.Under the instruction of the dual value orientation of "advocating morality" and...