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Corruption often goes hand in hand with bribery and selling official titles. Corruption is such a common phenomenon of political corruption that when it is mentioned, it is often associated with corruption.
In Han Feizi's view, subordinates often take advantage of their authority to embezzle, steal or illegally occupy public property by other means. He believes that "heavy ministers" are "consuming the country for the sake of the family", that is, spending the country's wealth to enrich their own strength, and finally resulting in the serious result of "the public is empty and the minister is real".
1. Make friends with foreign countries and intimidate the monarch.
In the era when Han Feizi lived, the countries sometimes cooperated, sometimes joined forces, attacked each other, and fought frequently. Therefore, diplomatic relations with the princely states became a matter of caution for the monarchy at that time.
It is precisely this that the subordinates take advantage of, secretly colluding with other vassal states to intimidate their own monarchs, using the power of other vassal states to consolidate their own political position in the country, and not hesitating to sacrifice the interests of the country in exchange for personal self-interest.
Han Feizi called the act of colluding with the princes and states "four sides" in the "Eight Traitors" and listed it as one of the "Eight Traitors". The so-called "quartet", specifically, is that the subordinates collude with the armies of the great powers to gather on the border to hold their monarchs hostage, or repeatedly recruit the envoys of the great powers to intimidate their own monarchs, or provoke wars between countries to threaten their own monarchs.
After provoking troubles, his subordinates often appeared in front of the monarch as a loyal image of solving problems for the monarch, taking the initiative to mediate with foreign countries, resolve diplomatic disputes, and resolve political crises, so as to win the trust of the monarch, make the monarch obey his words, and then make personal interests.
Han Feizi cites examples of Gongsun, Zhai Huang, Dachengniu, Sima Xi, Lü Cang, Song Shi, Bai Gui and others secretly colluding with foreign forces to blackmail their own monarchs to illustrate this point.
In Han Feizi's view, the purpose of colluding with foreign forces by his subordinates was to create the impression that in dealing with the princely states, "I am not close to me, and I am not able to understand my grievances", so as to increase his voice and importance in domestic politics and let the monarch use himself.
Han Feizi believed that the formation of subordinates for personal gain would lead to the formation of a large power among subordinates, which would pose a great threat to the dominance of the monarch, and at the same time, it might trigger large-scale party strife between subordinates and threaten the stability of the existing political order.
He called those ministers who formed parties for personal gain, undermined national law, and had great power as "heavy people", "people who should be painted", and "precious ministers", that is, what is commonly known as powerful ministers. In Han Feizi's view, the reason why Quan Chen was able to form a friend party was that he was good at figuring out the mind of the monarch, gaining the trust of the monarch by observing words, flattering, and catering to the monarch's preferences, so that the monarch could use him with confidence.
Once the courtiers were reused by the monarch, they would use their power to arrange their own families and henchmen to occupy important positions in the imperial court, cultivate private forces loyal to themselves, and win over other officials to join him, so as to establish their own small interest groups.
In order to protect their own selfish interests, powerful ministers often suppressed political forces that opposed them, ostracized loyal and virtuous ministers, and especially brutally persecuted those who were wise and lawful. Moreover, the behavior of powerful ministers to form parties and private interests is often carried out to deceive the monarch.
In order to better form a party for personal gain and prevent the monarch from discovering his schemes, the powerful ministers often formed offensive and defensive alliances with their henchmen, colluding with each other, and deceiving and deceiving the monarch together. Han Feizi believed that there were five situations in which monarchs were deceived, which he called "five dams".
Powerful ministers form parties for personal gain and cover up the monarch, often making them exceed their own authority, and then do whatever they want above the monarch's power, arbitrarily and arbitrarily, so that the monarch's power is sidelined. In the case of the powerful minister, the princes abroad and the people at home will run for the powerful minister.
In "Lonely Anger", Han Feizi analyzes the phenomenon that princes, ministers, left and right, and bachelors all serve the ministers, and refers to these four types of people as "four helpers". In short, in Han Feizi's view, if the power minister is autocratic and covers the sky with one hand, but the monarch does not prohibit it, this will only cause people to turn to the power minister and do things for the power minister, without allegiance to the monarch, which undoubtedly poses a great threat to the monarch's position.
2. Committing disorder and robbing the king and killing the lord.
During the Spring and Autumn Warring States period, incidents of subordinates committing riots and robbing and killing monarchs were relatively frequent. Han Feizi quoted the historical records of the time to describe this situation: "Since King Xuan of Zhou, dozens of countries have perished, and his subjects have killed their kings and taken the country."
According to scholars' statistics, during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, among the 236 monarchs in the 11 states of Zhou, Lu, Qi (Lü, Tian), Jin, Han, Zhao, Wei, Chu, Qin, and Yan, the proportion of monarchs who abdicated abnormally was 28.4%, while the proportion of Qi (Lü), Jin and other countries was almost as high as 50%, and the most important reason for the abnormal abdication of monarchs was the struggle for the throne (65.2%).
It can be seen that the original relationship between monarchs and subjects in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods has been violently impacted and damaged, and at that time, society generally showed the phenomenon that the position of the emperor was not fixed, and incidents such as the killing of the monarch and the death of the monarch occurred frequently, which was not uncommon. Han Feizi quoted a proverb from the time, "Li Mercy King", to describe the dangerous situation of the monarch at that time.
"Li" is a form of leprosy, and here refers to people who are born with this leprosy. "Fierce mercy king" originally meant that the sick person had mercy on the monarch. The implication is that the suffering of the monarch is worse than that of the leprosy, because although the leprosy is painful, it is often much better than the situation in which the monarch is robbed and killed.
The monarch at that time died in many ways, such as being hacked to death, starving to death, etc., which shows that the monarch at that time was a high-risk profession and could be in danger of life at any time. Han Feizi cites historical examples such as Duke Qi Zhuang being hacked and killed by Cui Zhu, King Zhao Wuling being starved to death by Li Dui, and King Qi Yu being cramped by his teeth to illustrate this point.
III. Attempts to Resolve the Conflict between Monarchs and Subjects: Honor the Sovereign
As mentioned earlier, Han Feizi believed that the relationship between monarchs and subjects was complicated, and there were both cooperation and conflict between monarchs and subjects. However, he emphasized the conflict between monarchs and subjects, with a tendency to exaggerate the conflict between monarchs and subjects. Han Feizi saw the monarch's subordinates as a potential threat to the monarch, and they always had motives to usurp the monarch's power.
These subordinates pose a great challenge to the power of the monarch, and the status of the monarch is not static, and the change of position of the monarch will occur under certain conditions. In order to deal with the threat brought by his subordinates to the monarch and ensure that the monarch's power would not be sidelined, Han Feizi put forward the idea of absolute respect for the monarch, advocating the absolute centralization of power by the monarchy and weakening the power of the subordinates.
In his view, there is a prerequisite for the conflict between monarchs and subjects to be coordinated and realize the cooperation of monarchs and subjects, that is, subordinates must "respect the king". Obviously, Han Feizi tried to exalt the monarch's power by respecting the monarch, so that the monarch had supreme authority, and the subjects must obey the monarch, so that the monarch could gain a power advantage over the subordinates, minimize the threat posed by the subordinates to the monarch in the conflict between the monarchs and subjects, and finally achieve the purpose of consolidating the monarch's dominance.
It can be seen that Han Feizi tried to solve the conflict between monarchs and subjects with the idea of respecting the monarch, adopting the strategy of promoting the power of the monarch and suppressing the power of the subject, suppressing the conflict between the monarch and the subject within a certain range, and avoiding the conflict from endangering the rule of the monarch and the normal operation of the political system.
Although there is mutual benefit between monarchs and subjects, Legalists pay more attention to the conflict between monarchs and subjects, focusing on the threat posed by subordinates to the monarch. The reason why Han Feizi focuses on the conflict between monarchs and ministers is inseparable from the historical background of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods in which he lived.
At that time, etiquette collapsed, the patriarchal system tended to disintegrate, the original relationship between monarchs and subjects was violently impacted, the monarch was aggressively threatened and challenged by his subordinates, many monarchs lost power, and even some monarchs could not even protect their own lives, and there were many incidents of subordinate and subordinate killings.
The monarchy was in crisis, which led to a high degree of tension in the relationship between monarchs and subjects at that time. According to scholars' statistics, there were at least 60 incidents of killing monarchs and 22 incidents of expulsion of monarchs in the Spring and Autumn period, while there were eight incidents of killing monarchs during the Warring States period, of which 6 were murdered by courtiers, which was a significant decrease compared with the Spring and Autumn Period.
From the Spring and Autumn to the Warring States, the number of incidents of monarchy murder tended to decrease, which actually reflected the process of the monarchy's power at that time from decline to revival. This is closely related to the legal reforms carried out by the princely states during the Warring States period, including the abolition of the Shiqing Shilu system and the replacement of the sub-sealing system with the county system, which enhanced the political stability of the princely states.
However, although there were fewer incidents of murder of monarchs during the Warring States period, the monarch still faced a serious threat of usurpation by domestic ministers, and some princely states had usurpation incidents.
After the climax of the law change, the phenomenon of the dictatorship of the clan aristocracy appeared successively in the state power of various countries, and among the seven heroes of the Warring States, the phenomenon of long-term dictatorship of the clan aristocracy of Han and Chu was the most prominent, which seriously threatened the rule of the monarch. In Korea, where Han Feizi is located, since King Han Xuanhui, the national affairs of Korea have been in the hands of the nobles of the clan family, among which Gongzhong and Gong Uncle have been in Korea for more than 50 years.
Han Feizi has made fierce criticisms of this phenomenon of the dictatorship of the clan aristocracy, most of which is aimed at the political status quo in Korea, for example, in the chapter "Lonely Anger", he denounced the monarch at that time for "the great sin of the minister and the lord forbidden", so "the people who should be Tu are good at things", resulting in "the lord is humbled, and the private door is respected", but those who know how to govern the country and the state have a tragic fate, "if they are not condemned by the officials, they will die with the private sword".
Han Feizi referred to the authoritarian ministers as "heavy people", believing that these "heavy people" bent the law for personal gain at home, usurped the power of the monarch, colluded with the princes externally, and blackmailed the monarch, making South Korea's politics dark and the country in danger.
As a thinker, Han Feizi tended to stand on the position of the monarch and consider the political issues of the time from the perspective of safeguarding the interests of the monarch. His political theories are based on empirical research, not idealism.
He recognized that the decline of the monarchy's power was the main problem of political stability, so he focused on how to solve the challenges to the monarchical authority in political practice, especially the problem of ministerial dictatorship in Korea.
In order to find out the secret of resolving the conflict between monarchs and subjects, Han Feizi focused on learning from past history, and he delved into various historical examples of courtiers killing kings, sons killing fathers, and monarchs dying and destroying countries.
Through combing and summarizing historical events, Han Feizi believes that the weakening of the monarch's power is the main reason for the monarch's encroachment by his subordinates, and it is also the crux of the country's political instability, social turmoil and national crisis.
In his view, there are certainly many reasons why subordinates can rob the monarch and kill the lord, but the main reason is that the monarch's power is weak, and the power of the subordinates is overexpanded, resulting in the sidelining of the monarch's great power, thus forming a situation in which the monarch is weak and the subjects are strong and the subordinates are doing small branches, so that the subordinates can encroach on the monarch's power. When the opportunity arises, the subordinates will commit chaos, hijack and control the monarch, empty the monarch's power, make him a puppet, and even kill the monarch and usurp the throne.
The content of Han Feizi focuses almost entirely on the need to maintain the authority of the ruler, and repeatedly warns the monarch of the threats he faces.
He used historical events as an example to illustrate this point: the fall of the Shang Dynasty and the decline of the Zhou Dynasty were all because the princes under him were too powerful, and the three families divided into Jin and the Tian clan Daiqi incident occurred because the ministers were too rich. Han Feizi advised the monarch: "The fibula is larger than the shares, and it is difficult to walk interestingly."
In Han Feizi, he repeatedly mentions two historical facts to warn the monarchs of the day: one was the Tian dynasty, and the other was Zihan Song. Tian Chang stole the right to reward and Duke Jian of Qi was killed, Zihan stole the right to punish and Marquis of Song was killed. Because of this, Han Feizi listed the phenomenon of a weak monarch and a strong subject as a sign of the death of a monarch and the destruction of the country, "The kingdom of mortal lords is small but the family is large, and those who have light power and heavy subjects can also die."
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