the aged of other families; treat your young in a way beWtting their tender age
and extend this treatment to the young of other families. The whole world
can then be rolled in your palm’’ (Mencius 1984 , 1 A. 7 ). 4 The point here is not
that rulers should treat strangers as they treat family members, but rather that
they learn the dispositions and habits that underpin the benign exercise of
power within the family (Schwartz 1985 , 70 ; de Bary 1989 , 17 ) and that the
exercise of such power is the key to long-term political success.
III. Obligations to the family cannot be overridden by public obligations. In
traditional liberal theory, as noted above, obligations to the family should be
subordinate to public obligations. Contemporary liberals, perhaps due to the
inXuence of feminist theory, typically recognize the importance of special ties
to loved ones and seek to develop theories that allow forbothparticularistic
ties and impartial justice, ideally providing some guidance in cases of conXict.
Brian Barry’s bookJustice as Impartialityis an inXuential recent attempt to
spell out a moral theory that provides support for both particularistic ties and
impartial justice. His argument is that ‘‘justice as impartiality’’ comesWrst, in
the sense that where it applies, it should have priority. Where it does not, then
individuals can fulWll their particularistic duties (Barry 1995 , 250 ).
Confucians would reject any sort of a priori commitment to public obli-
gations, even of the sort Barry endorses. In cases of conXict, the traditional
Confucian view is that family duties should outweigh all other obligations. In
fact, Confucius went so far as to argue that the care owed to elderly parents
might even justify breaking the law:
The Governor of She told Confucius, ‘‘In my country there is a man called Upright
Kung. When his father stole a sheep, he reported him to the authorities.’’ Confucius
said, ‘‘In my country the upright men are diVerent from this. A father covers for
his son, and a son covers for his father. Uprightness lies in this.’’ (Confucius 1998 , bk.
13. 18 )
On the face of it, this sort of idea seems far removed from contemporary
moral outlooks. However, it is diYcult otherwise to make ethical sense of
such practices as immunity that protects spouses from testifying against each
other in court. At some level, it is recognized that public obligations cannot
always override particularist obligations to loved ones.
4 I have modified the quotes from D. C. Lau’s translation of Mencius, as well as the quotes from the
Roger Ames and Henry Rosemont Jr. translation of theAnalectsof Confucius according to my own
understandings of the original text.
274 daniel a. bell