conduct and serve as examples of the core virtues of benevolence,
righteousness, conduct propriety, and wisdom.
Assembling the worthy and the competent. To Xunzi, social,
cultural, and legal principles and norms of propriety could not and
would not be effective without those who design, execute, and sustain
them. That is the primary responsibility and privilege of the sage-
kings. But sage-kings are few and far between and by themselves will
not be able to accomplish the task. The sage-king needs a contingent
of well-cultivated people as standard-bearers, pace-setters, and exem-
plars. The key to successful kingship lies therefore in attracting,
employing, and assessing the talents of the worthy and the competent
according to the administrative principles. Xunzi (Book 16: 16.1)
stated that great kingship ‘‘exalts ritual principles and honors worthy
men [and] stresses law and loves the people.’’
Building a culture of conduct propriety. In his system of conduct
propriety, Xunzi put leadership as the source of the system and he
focused on the enculturation of individuals and society through
the establishment and promotion of norms of conduct propriety.
To Xunzi, a society will not survive and prosper without a superior
culture and it is the most critical responsibility of the leader to build
a successful culture. Culture-building involves the enculturation of
core values through models of conduct propriety exemplified in the
leader and the leader’s core contingent and embodied in the systems
ofliof rituals, of laws and regulations, and of administrative and
interpersonal relationships.
Based on moral virtues, the ability to assemble, and success in
enculturation, Xunzi classified rulers into four types: true (sage-)
kings, protector lords, secure lords, and endangered or perished lords.
The first striking distinction is between those who survived and those
who perished. The perished ones had no self-cultivation, no ability to
assemble, and no institutions of enculturation. However, among those
who survived, there are still critical differences between the sage-king
and the other two types of surviving lord. The sage-king governs
through winning the heart and soul of the people by demonstrating
superior virtues, attracting superior talents, and building superior
cultural institutions, in addition to possessing superior military and
material resources; the protector lord had superiority in attracting
talents, building a system of rewards and punishment, and building
up military strength internally and externally through alliances; the
Bridging Confucianism and Legalism 71