Philosophy and Civilization: How the Idea of Moral Cultivation Shaped China (East-west Dialogues in Educational Philosophy and Theory)

This book develops a systematic philosophical account of moral cultivation as a foundational principle structuring Chinese civilization. It brings domains often treated in isolation into a unified perspective—cosmology, ethics, subjectivity, education, art, and socio-political order. It argues that the lived practice of moral cultivation, rather than purely rational or religious frameworks, constitutes China’s civilizational orientation. Traversing Confucian, Daoist, Mohist, and Buddhist traditions, and deploying original concepts such as the Taijitu mode of thinking, the generative character of the cosmos and of virtue, the greater self, and a morally grounded form of democratic life, it discloses an internally coherent and evolving whole. The book presents this tradition not only as indispensable for understanding China, but also as a significant resource for cross-cultural philosophical engagement with global challenges.