Confucianism and Philosophy of a Shared-Future Global Community in an Inter-civilisational World Order: Comparative Analysis of Their Relationships and Prospects

Abstract

The Western-initiating international relations theoretical framework plays a fairly dominant role in analysing and initiating the prospects and scenarios of international order. However, with the peaceful rise of China, whose civlisation sustains almost 5000 years, China is playing a more proactive role in inter-civilisational international order; thus, in-depth explorations into Confucianism as the core element of Han Chinese Civilisation have been resurgent on the world stage, and it is indispensable for relevant scholars, intellectuals and strategists to closely evaluate unexploited implications and demystify the sustainability and intrinsic dynamism of Confucianism-themed Han Chinese Civilisation, and its implicit ties with a comparable philosophical concept of a global community of shared future. Through historical-studies approaches and comparative methodologies, the primary purpose of this paper seeks to crucially investigate a potential relationship between Confucianism and the philosophical concept of a global community of shared future ranging from the perspectives of historical origin, context, substance and so forth. It can be argued that the philosophical standpoint of a community of shared future for humankind bears historical significance and merits that Confucian thoughts somehow generate. This paper of research findings meanwhile predicts that China’s inter-civlisational international engagement as part of China’s soft-power strategy will proceed beyond classical state-based theoretic framework and the Confucian thoughts of the prevalence of public spirit and harmony without homogeneity will grow as an alternative guiding international norm in better services of rebuilding normative, inter-civilisational international order that a global community demands.