Confucianism

Confucianism

Confucianism is the ancient Chinese philosophy created by Confucius. This philosophy had affected the culture of numerous other civilizations in Asia. These countries include India, Vietnam, Korea, Japan and many more. Recently, numerous companies have tried to expand into China and many Chinese companies into the West. Numerous amounts of them have failed. Knowledge of this philosophy will definitely help in understanding the reason behind these failures.

Confucianism believes in ‘ren’, in other words, benevolence. For me, this is very significant. This reminds me that moral education was a huge part of Confucianism. They believed that character was important. This is relevant for companies that want to do business in China. One company that did not have a successful expansion into China because of this was Google. They had been charged by the Chinese government for taken information from Chinese users and giving it to the Americans. They had crossed the line and had exploited the benevolence.  This is very interesting as they are apparently being accused of doing the same thing overseas. Although Mao had done away with these ideas as they were deemed as ideologies of an imperial era, it can still be seen in China’s education system where respect and honestly are taught from a young age through stories. Have the Chinese violated its own principle? Or has this become a political issue?

Previously, I had thought that these companies fail only because they are unwilling to adapt to its surroundings.  Turns out, this could actually be due to the fact that the West adopts a different belief to that of the East and vice versa. American companies like Google are seen as dishonest and doing unethical things. Same goes for the Chinese. The reason Confucianism does not promote innovation could be because it was created in the imperialistic times and different psychology was commonly seen as a rebellion. Without innovation, the capacity for improvement is quite limited in a short period of time. This can be seen when the ancient China took thousands of years to come up with a more democratic system where people with skills were used rather than descendants of current officials.

In a nutshell, what the Chinese need to start improving on the original ideology of Confucianism. They need to learn to improvise and adapt to conditions. They are currently at a bottleneck. If they can bypass this problem, I believe, together with their hard work, that they can become a powerful economy once again. For American companies, they need to start to understand what the Chinese psychology is all about so that they can remain one step ahead of the Chinese.

After analyzing about what Confucianism is all about, I believe that it is the glue that holds China together. This loyalty that it instilled means that the Chinese will listen to its leaders and work towards a common goal. Through this, I have also developed the ability to go deep into a topic.

Thoughts and Reflection on CDE

CDE, Cultural Differentiation Elective, is a lesson that teaches us about the difference between cultures in fields such as business culture and cultural intelligence. This lesson is held on every Monday and Tuesday.

Before I went for the first CDE class, I was a bit unhappy that I was unable to take a normal IHE subject which I like (History the Best!). I did not even know what it stood for. I honestly thought it was going to something like literature.

On the day itself, I was actually shocked that I may actually like it. I personally like to learn more about human psychology. I like the feeling of knowing why certain people behave a certain way, and from there on predict what they will do next. I think I have picked this up from reading numerous mystery books( mostly Sherlock Holmes). Now I tend to observe and come to a prediction before the person even makes the move. Surprisingly, I am correct nearly half the time.

However, I can only predict the moves of those whom are close to me. Now, with the help of CDE, I think I may start to even predict what people that come from a different cultural background and therefore prevent misunderstandings.

Of course, like most other students, I would definitely hope that CDE will be a subject that will not have a huge amount of homework unlike Mathematics which I am almost certain from years of experience that the work load will be massive. I also believe and wish that CDE will be a subject that I will be able to ace without trouble since it is just like reading a mystery novel. They both require you to be very careful so as to notice details. They both require a skill of analyse. I really hope I can do well for CDE, I mean, who doesn't?

What i think CDE will be teaching us is the minor differences between cultures that could help us get one step ahead of others by getting to their hearts faster and making people with a different cultural background feel more at home.