The Zhuangzi, Anarchism, and the Political Ethics of Failure

• In Event: The Zhuangzi: Efficacy, Vulnerability, Negative Politics, and Anarchy

Abstract

In this paper, I present an anarchist reading of the Zhuangzi. Previous approaches to Daoism and anarchism tend to underscore nonaction (wuwei) of sage-rulers who refrain from coercion and rule lightly. In this paper, I propose a different approach. I argue that while the absence of authoritarian ruler is vital, the anarchist interpretation of the Zhuangzi should not be reduced to the state and its non-coercive rule. In presenting an alternative reading of the Zhuangzi and anarchism, I suggest a non-state centric approach—one that focuses on the outcast rather than the affirmed and the ethics of failure in the Zhuangzi’s celebration of the weak and the useless. Rather than seeking a non-interfering state, failure to comply and satisfy—politically, aesthetically, and ethically—embraces the internal propensity (shi) and virtue (de) of all things in defying established rule and moral indoctrination. I argue that failure in the Zhuangzi is anarchist in nature in that it defies presupposed, externally imposed order under moral/political hierarchies, replacing top-down relations with horizontal, purposeless, and tenuous ones. It enables the outcast—who are deemed as politically unqualified—to recreate space and relation by allowing them to fail, escape, and build communities anew.

Author

• Peng Yu, Earlham College