A Kingdom of Righteousness NeoConfucianism and Political Theory in Traditional Korea

Through an examination of the unfolding of Neo-Confucian politics in traditional Korea, this book explores how the Confucian monarchs and scholar-officials during the Joseon dynasty (1392–1910) struggled to navigate the complex political terrains within the normative parameters set by Neo-Confucian moral principles and ritual norms. It begins with how Neo-Confucianism emerged as a revolutionary political ideology in late Goryeo (918–1392) through the creative reappropriation of righteousness, one of the cardinal Confucian virtues, from a personal moral virtue into a public moral principle that undergirds Joseon's Confucian constitutional structure. It then shows how later Korean Neo-Confucians labored to maintain Joseon's Confucian constitutionality (or the Public Way) against all sorts of contingencies, in both domestic and interstate contexts, often altering the very nature of Joseon's statehood and Confucian identity. Special attention is given to various visions of political realism developed by the Korean Neo-Confucian political actors, who actively used 'expediency.'