In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Meeting of Minds: Intellectual and Religious Interaction in East Asian Traditions of ThoughtDeborah SommerMeeting of Minds: Intellectual and Religious Interaction in East Asian Traditions of Thought. Edited by Irene Bloom and Joshua A. Fogel. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997. Pp. 391.Meeting of Minds: Intellectual and Religious Interaction in East Asian Traditions of Thought, a volume of eleven essays written in honor of Wing-tsit Chan and William Theodore (...) de Bary, proposes to explore how Confucian and Neo-Confucian traditions have responded to and have influenced other traditions (Buddhist, Taoist, folk, Japanese nativist, and so on) in China and Japan. The essays are arranged first geographically (seven articles on China precede four on Japan) and then roughly chronologically. All essays, save one, describe Sung or post-Sung developments. A few sentences per essay must suffice in this review.Irene Bloom's "Three Visions of Jen" is the only essay on the classical period. Informed especially by Wing-tsit Chan's work on jen and shaped by Sung and later notions of the transmission of the way, the essay examines the notion of jen in the Analects, the Mencius, and Chu Hsi's "Jen shuo" (Discussion of jen), succinctly [End Page 318] emphasizing the significant differences of perspective therein. Nodding to the book's larger intent of examining intellectual interactions with other traditions, some attention is given in the conclusion to comparisons with the Mohist, Yangist, and Ch'an traditions. Rodney Taylor's "Chu Hsi on Meditation" is also deeply indebted to Wing-tsit Chan and starts by resurveying much terrain already explored in Chan's 1989 "Chu Hsi and Quiet-Sitting" (in Chu Hsi: New Studies, published by University of Hawai'i Press). Taylor enlarges upon Chan's work especially in his discussion of Chu Hsi's practices of breath-control techniques to improve health. In keeping with the larger direction of the book, Taylor contrasts Chu's emphasis on quiet sitting as a support for study with the different spiritual goals of Ch'an Buddhism.Patricia Ebrey's "Sung Neo-Confucian Views on Geomancy" examines a topic that is seldom encountered in American scholarship: the attitudes of such figures as Ssu-ma Kuang, Ch'eng I, Chu Hsi, and Ts'ai Yan-ting toward popular practices governing the placement of graves. Ebrey outlines the views of those who, as it were, are "for" or "against" geomancy (Chu and Ts'ai took geomancy seriously, although Ssu-ma and Ch'eng viewed it with apprehension) but also provides textual evidence that allows one to see the grayer areas between support for, and condemnation of, feng shui and other arts. Julia Ching's "Chu Hsi and Taoism" considers Chu's interpretations of such classical texts as the I ching, Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, and Ch'u tzu and also assays his commentaries on such later texts as the Ts'an-t'ung-ch'i (an alchemical text Chu commented on with the assistance of Ts'ai Yan-ting) and the Yin-fu-ching (a commentary that Ching concludes is most likely not Chu's work). She also explores in some detail the specifics of Chu's regimen of breathing practices.Moving from specific thinkers of the Sung to general developments in the Ming and Ch'ing dynasties, Chn-fang Y's "The Cult of Kuan-yin in Ming-Ch'ing China: A Case of Confucianization of Buddhism?" describes how the cult of Kuan-yin served the aims of Confucian family values and facilitated the realization of women's domestic expectations of filiality and fertility. Y explores the little-studied practice of ke-ku, or the cutting off of one's flesh to feed another, and relates Kuan-yin's role as a protector of those who engage in such filial excisions.Koichi Shinohara's "Ta-hui's Instructions to Tseng K'ai: Buddhist 'Freedom' in the Neo-Confucian Context" returns to the Sung but continues the focus on Buddhism, finding an example of Buddhist-Confucian interaction in the religious instruction given by the monk Ta-hui to a vice minister of rites. But what is particularly Confucian about minister Tseng K'ai's interest in Buddhism? The... (shrink)

In ancient times in our country, Wang Ch'ung was an eminent materialist and a brilliant atheist, a progressive thinker who opposed the orthodox feudal thought. This has gone basically unquestioned. This year the February 21 issue of Kuang-ming jih-pao printed in its philosophy section an article by Comrade T'ung Mo-an, "Is Wang Ch'ung a Peasant Class Thinker?" The article is an evaluation completely denying this. T'ung believes that the purpose of Wang Ch'ung's works was "to uphold the rule of (...) the Han," "ardently and unconditionally to sing the praises of the Han ruler and court," "to make sacred the rule of the Han," "to get the populace to live quietly, forever in a servile position," and "to view inimically and to slander peasant uprisings." "Wang Ch'ung was an orthodox thinker of the landlord class," "a thinker produced in the interests of the rule of the landlord class who confirmed the feudal orthodoxy." Although I myself am not praising Wang Ch'ung as a peasant class thinker or denying that in Wang Ch'ung's thought there are negative elements, I am completely unable to agree with the basic viewpoint that the author puts forward. (shrink)

One of the interpretive devices that Ch'eng-kuan (澄 觀) is famous for having employed to distill the essence of the vast Mahāvaipulya Buddhāvataṃsaka Sūtra (Tafang-kuang fo-hua-yen ching 《大方廣佛華嚴經》 was a series of variations on the contemplative theme (kuan-men 觀門) of the complete interfusion (yüan-jung 圓融) of the scripture's three chief protagonists (san-sheng 三聖) ── the Buddha Vairocana (Pi-lu-che-na 毘盧遮那) and the bodhisattvas Mañjuśrī (Wen-shu-shih-li 文殊師利) and Samantabhadra (P'u-hsien 普賢). By aligning these three powerful sacred persons (...) with a number of philosophical categories that he believed to be central to the sūtra ── categories like "cause" (yin 因 ), "fruition" (kuo 果 ), "faith" (hsin 信 ), "understanding" (chieh 解), "insight" (chih 智), "practice" (hsing 行), "principle" (li 理), etc. ── he provided a focal point at which the rich and vivid meditative and liturgical lives of Hua-yen devotees could be made to converge with their philosophical reflections. -/- Although Ch'eng-kuan invoked this device in several of his writings, his most concerted development of it is a short essay entitled San-sheng yüan-jung kuan-men, which appears to have been written relatively late in his long career. Like many important Hua-yen texts, this essay seems to have been lost in China not long after its author's death. However, it was preserved in Korea and Japan and from the latter country was reintroduced to China in the last years of nineteenth century. Neither in China nor in the West has it yet been adequately studied. -/- The core of the present article is a critical edition of the Chinese text of the essay based on a careful comparison of all available versions and presented together with a copiously annotated English translation. The edition translation are preceded by a brief interpretive introduction and followed by an appendix in which are given: a detailed discussion of the work's textual history, detailed accounts of its various editions, and descriptions of its several surviving paraphrases and commentaries. (shrink)

Comrade Huang Yüeh-mien's article, "A Discussion of the Aesthetics of the Wealthy" [Lun shih-li che ti mei-hsüeh], which criticized my point of view in aesthetics, was published later than my self-criticism. Before he published it, he had presented it at a discussion meeting at Peking Teachers College. He let me read it only after he had submitted it to Literature [Wen-i pao] for publication. I wrote to the editor of Literature, Comrade K'ang Cho, saying that basically I accepted his (...) criticisms but that I wished to raise a number of points. I pointed out that the author's method of dealing with the problems of "empathy emotion," "forgetting self," and "inspiration" was not very different from the method that I had used before. I pointed out that "association of ideas" occupied an important position in his aesthetics — he seems to substitute "association of ideas of form" for "intuition of form." Furthermore, I stated that I did not think he had answered clearly the questions of whether "beauty exists in the mind or in the thing," of the relationship between beauty and sense of beauty, and of the difference between formal thought and abstract thought; and I said that I hoped he would give me more assistance with these questions. However, Comrade Huang Yüeh-mien for the most part ignored the points that I had raised and the questions to which I had sought answers, and he published in Literature the paper that he had presented at Peking Teachers College almost unaltered. Consequently, the questions that I raised concerning Comrade Huang Yüeh-mien's point of view in aesthetics remain unanswered. At that time I still felt that his point of view in aesthetics basically was materialistic, although there were some tendencies in it that raised doubts in my mind. This explains the fact that my judgments on idealist aesthetics remain to be improved. (shrink)

This study traces the impact of Ch'en Pei-hsi's Hsing-li tzu-i on the rise of philosophical lexicography in Tokugawa Japan . It suggests that the appearance of copies of the 1553 Korean edition of Pei-hsi's Tzu-i, brought to Japan in the wake of Toyotomi Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea , crucially influenced both understandings of and reactions to Neo-Confucianism in Tokugawa Japan. Pei-hsi's Tzu-i, the study relates, served as the literary template for several early Tokugawa works, including Fujiwara Seika's Kana seiri , (...) and Hayashi Razan's Shunkansho and Santokusho . The Tzu-i also went through several Japanese editions, beginning with the 1632 Sino-Japanese edition, based on Razan's kambun rendition of the Tzu-i, a vernacular explication of the text by Razan, the Seiri jigi genkai, published in 1659, an annotated edition of the 1632 Sino-Japanese edition, printed in 1670, and the 1668 publication of a later, significantly variant, Chinese edition of Pei-hsi's Tzu-i. ;Razan's Seiri jigi genkai promoted Neo-Confucian learning as expounded in the Tzu-i, but also called attention to etymologically problematic terms of that learning. The dissertation suggests that Razan's Genkai influenced both the literary form and the philosophical content of Yamaga Soko's Seikyo yoroku , Ito Jinsai's Gomo jigi , and Ogyu Sorai's Benmei , thus linking Razan's critical promotion of Pei-hsi's Tzu-i to a series of conceptually based "School of Ancient Learning" critiques of Neo-Confucianism. (shrink)

Introduction: Confucianism as humanism. Confucianism as a religion. The spirit of Confucianism.--Confucius.--Mencius.--Hsün Tzu.--Ta hsüeh (The great learning)--Chung yung (The doctrine of the mean)--Hsiao ching (The classic of filial piety)--Li chi (The book of rites)--Tung chung-shu.

Background: Moral distress occurs when nurses experience ethical dilemmas. Issues related to these dilemmas are addressed in some nursing education courses. Nurses’ reaction to dilemma such as moral distress is relatively less noticed. Objective: This study aimed to identify and describe the various types of perceptions of moral distress exhibited by nurses. Research design: This study applied Q methodology to explore the perspectives of nurses regarding moral distress. Data were collected in two stages. First, in-depth interviews were conducted to collect (...) nurses’ opinions. Sentences that best fit the concepts of moral distress were extracted for the construction of Q statements. Second, nurses subjectively ranked these Q statements so that the relevant severity of moral distress could be determined using Q sorts. The study participants were nurses at a regional teaching hospital in northeast Taiwan. A total of 60 participants were invited to rank 40 moral distress Q statements. Ethical considerations: The study protocol was approved by the institutional review board of National Yang-Ming University Hospital. Only the participants who signed an informed consent form participated in the study. The respondents’ right to withdraw from the study was respected. Findings: Five types of responses were identified regarding the nurses’ perspectives. These types were “conflict with personal values,” “excessive of workload,” “curbing of autonomy,” “constraint engendered by organizational norms,” and “self-expectation frustration.” Conclusion: The findings regarding nurses’ experiences of moral distress can be used to construct multifaceted policies and solutions and to incorporate ethical education in training programs. (shrink)

This study adopts a stakeholder theory framework to examine determinants of social reporting quality and empirically test the ability of the theory to explain disclosure quality in an emerging economy. Using a sample of 246 listed companies and a hand-collected dataset that included 2 years of data based on survey questions reflecting international disclosure trends, we apply an aggregate measure of quality with five facets to a variety of corporate social responsibility areas. The results support the application and demonstrate that (...) measures of stakeholder power, strategic posture, economic resources, firm size, and media visibility are related to social disclosure quality. This paper adds to the scarce evidence on social reporting in Taiwan and provides a useful method for evaluating disclosure quality. It also illustrates the impact of two dominant foreign stakeholder groups on social disclosures in Taiwan: organizational buyers in the global supply chain and listing and social rating agencies in international capital markets. (shrink)

This paper develops an ethical framework for responsible finance and then applies it to Citigroup (Citi), a major financial actor in the microfinance sector, to see whether it meets with such obligations. The framework consists of two categories of responsibility. The first category is the special social responsibility of financial institutions; and the second is the fundamental principles of ethical behavior in financial services. From Citigroup’s microfinance model, scope of business, and multiple roles in the market, the company seems to (...) be fulfilling its responsibility in inclusive finance. However, judged in term of the principles of integrity, objectivity, fairness, professionalism, and diligence, it falls short of its ethical responsibility. In view of this shortcoming, Citigroup should recall its obligation to avoid conflicts of interest, to provide responsible advice, to protect clients from over-indebtedness, and most importantly, to act with integrity. (shrink)

The commercialization of microfinance brings formal financial institutions into the microfinance landscape, yet little is known about the forces that lead to this phenomenon. This paper is the first dedicated to this topic using a hand-collected dataset of 112 institutions from 34 countries covering the period from 2008 to 2012. Based on institutional theory and resource-based argument, we empirically assess the effects of institutional environment factors, including regulative, normative, and cognitive elements, as well as resource-based factors, including practice model and (...) multinational diversity, on the intensity of engagements. To do so, we define the roles as capital-related, product-related, and service delivery, and calculate engagement intensity using a scoring method which reflects an organization’s extent of presence in the microfinance value chain. The analysis takes the engaging location and engaging model into account. We find that the two logics together can explain such involvement. Legal compliance is identified as most relevant for domestic players, while resource-based factors are more relevant for overseas players. In addition to regression analysis, many cases are identified to support the arguments. (shrink)

When making decisions, governments can and should strive consciously to balance the demands of the present with the needs of future generations. Various advocates for greater governmental foresight have created new processes or institutions within existing systems of democratic government. These include long-range planning departments, futures commissions, impact statements on proposed legislation, environmental protection agencies, and formal technology assessment. But, much more remains to be done. Based on their extensive scholarly and practical experience, the contributors to this volume propose a (...) variety of techniques that will enable foresight to be effectively incorporated into governmental institutions and practices. (shrink)