Justice – Chinese Moral Leadership 355rather than simply a career path, where both temptation and pitfalls gen-
erate fascination and concerns, let alone formidable uncertainty; thirdly,
moral cultivation of officials in China is closely related to the populous
life and future prospects, hence almost every Chinese citizen would
dream on an official career and place great expectations on the leaders,
with no parallel phenomenon from other nations; fourthly, with Confu-
cius’ teaching of “Officialdom is the natural outlet for good scholars”
and the imperial examination system since the Sui Dynasty, Chinese
intellectuals have obsessively destined their fate and life-long values on
securing an official position. Demands mother’s wisdom, focused minds
cultivate values. Thus, there’s no wonder for such developed theories
and techniques on officialdom in Chinese history.
In short, Chinese traditional moral leadership focuses on principles
of being loyal to the emperor and kind to the subjects. Such kind of
leadership stems from the top-down hierarchical mode of public admin-
istration. However, being a government official is just part of the leader-
ship. From the contemporary perspective, leadership refers to the capa-
bilities of mobilizing various resources to serve the organisational objec-
tives. These capabilities could be in the form of either formal authorities
or informal influences. In a democratic society, the latter assumes in-
creasing popularity in the field of management. Thus, Chinese tradition-
al wisdom on leadership is inadequate, or at least unbalanced.
Authority-based leadership is exercised through a chain of command
relying on control and punishment, while non-authoritative leadership
emphasizes persuasion through communication and coordination. The
presumption of the first type of leadership is that the subordinates are
lazy, silly and selfish, while the latter presumes that they are diligent,
brilliant and ready to share with others including the leader.