Is There Such a Thing as Chinese Philosophy? Arguments of an Implicit Debate

"Philosophy" is the showpiece of our university: every freshman student is required to follow a general course on philosophy. But regardless of the ways in which this course may be considered general, the fact is that attention to non-Western cultures is absent throughout. The course is not titled "General Western Philosophy," and yet philosophy is, quite simply, a Western matter. This demands no further explanation; it is taken for granted. It should come as no surprise that China starts from an entirely different presupposition. Several philosophy departments have a branch dealing with Chinese philosophy, analogous to those offering Western and often even Indian philosophy. But not one Chinese university teaches exclusively Chinese philosophy, let alone under the title "General Philosophy."' In the light of such an imposing state of affairs, the question inevitably comes to the fore: is there indeed such a thing as "Chinese philosophy"? However, the degree of certainty with which the conflicting positions are held is not the result of thorough research, painstaking debate, or well-founded reasoning. For these have hardly even begun. In both the West and China, the answer to this question consists mostly of implicit presuppositions. It belongs less to the domain of explicit opinion than to the implicit frame within which we function: the organization of universities, bookshops, journals, and conferences all confirm a vision that, in fact, they have seldom explicitly discussed. The topic is therefore rather sensitive: any explicit rejection of the existence of Chinese philosophy implies not only a painful break with the raison d'etre of more than a thousand Chinese academics but also a blow to China's national pride. On the other hand, the insistence that general introductory courses to philosophy ought to include philosophical traditions laid claim to by other cultures would certainly disturb Western colleagues in the field. From this one might be inclined to conclude that such strong emotions and exaggerated sensitivities-a Western chauvinism on the one hand and an overly sensitive Chinese self-insistence on the other-are obstacles to a mature discussion