Review THE Book of Lord Shang

BOOK REVIEW – SHANG YANG – THE BOOK OF LORD SHANG c. 338 BCE 1998 Wordsworth Classics edition 

One of history’s truly most horrible works of political statecraft, written by a Chinese Machiavelli, who lacked the Italian’s subtlety, wit or recognition of the need for some gentility and balance to counter-weight the ruthlessness of control. Essentially, Shang teaches that people will not do well unless forced to by the State. All are selfish. All are ignorant and must be kept so by restrictive education.

Shang’s work is about domination and control of the people, through legal papers, and a powerful policing network. This was a time when the Legalists, (lawyer class) were becoming extremely powerful in feudal towns and villages that had operated largely autonomously, if without set documented legal papers. The legalists demanded papers are carried as proof of identity, and ownership of properties, a right to employment, education, etc. Their literalist use of legislation was used with cold ruthlessness to draw control of distant villages under the rule of powerful, wealthy figures that often lived and operated from leagues away – men like Shang.

Success in battle could secure a soldier good land and real estate, so soldiers fought with great mercenary dedication, and peasants were often evicted to give their farms to the returning heroes. He also paid highly for imported labour, which meant people left surrounding towns to come to him, weakening his neighbours ready for conquest when desired.

The legalists were often corrupt, and capable of blackmail. To Shang, the masses were merely necessary to provide two things – Agriculture, so that the people and especially by the ruling classes could be fed, and the soldiers, for he was all for using the army as a conquering imperial force.

Shang studied The Art Of War of Sun Tzu, but used it badly, getting into wards for conquest and domination. Inevitably, his power was not respected but feared and eventually he was overthrown, and put to death, along with his family. Shang, overthrown by a rival Duke whose lands he had taken on a whim, found himself a desperate outlaw. His own all embracing legal system was played against him. He sought refuge from his pursuers in a hotel, but the owner refused to let him stay without the right identification papers. Captured, he was tied to five chariots, which were then drawn off by five horses, in different directions.

There is something depressing and chilling about book-advising rulers to weaken the physical well being and moral fibre of their own people.  His chapter on the unification of words is disturbingly prophetic of the Newspeak of Orwell’s Totalitarianism warning novel 1984. The Legalists made minor offences punishable by death. The ruled by terror. Such a way can mercifully never endure for long.

It is suspected that the work is not actually by Shang Yang, but by later advisors and admirers he influenced.

Arthur Chappell