from Daniel A. Bell: Beyond Liberal Democracy

(Description of Dworkin’s trip to China)

Those expressing “enthusiasm for liberal values,” Dworkin noted, did
voice their views: “all the scholars and almost all the students who spoke
about the issue on various occasions insisted that there was no impor­
tant difference between Western values or conceptions of human rights
and their own.” One member of the audience “said of course the funda­
mental situation of human beings is the same everywhere, that there
should be no more talk of distinctive Chinese values, that China must
begin what he called a ‘renaissance’ of liberal individualistic values.
When he finished, the large audience clapped loudly.” Nevertheless,
Dworkin found it peculiar that members of the audience did not seem to
share his desire to discuss specific cases of human rights violations, lead­
ing him to conclude that Chinese academic discourse remains “eerily ab­
stract in a country whose government treats itself as above the law.”
What Dworkin seems to have learned from his trip, in short, is that Chi­
nese academics cannot mount a successful defense of an Asian philoso­
phy even when given the opportunity to do so. The only question that
remains is how to implement liberal individualism in China, which ap­
parently requires greater moral courage and concrete thinking on the
part of Chinese academics.

Not surprisingly, Dworkin’s visit generated less-than-friendly responses.
Professor Liufang Fang, who teaches law at the Chinese University of
Political Science and Law, opens his critique with a sarcastic account of
the college students who attended Dworkin’s lectures because they “did
not want to miss the festival-like event.” They could hardly hear any­
thing, but “being squeezed in the crowd itself was a joy to many of the
students.” Professor Dworkin, meanwhile, “unilaterally believed that
his China tour was a valuable opportunity for China to be privy to his
ideas of liberty.” Ironically, he was taken for a ride by the Chinese gov­
ernment. His visit had been organized to showcase China’s new free­
doms, and the government knew full well that Chinese academics would
not argue publicly about the details of particularly sensitive cases.
Dworkin seemed unaware of the risks that China-based academics would
incur by publicly endorsing his condemnation of the Chinese govern­
ment’s handling of such cases. As Professor Fang puts it, “the truth is
that the degree of freedom of speech is negatively correlated with the
risks borne by the speaker.” Moreover, Dworkin seemed unaware of the
extent to which “general discussions” of legal issues by China-based ac­
ademics have led to substantial improvements of legal practice. Had
Dworkin been better informed, he would not have made facile comments
regarding the “eerily abstract” Chinese discourse. Professor Fang con­
cludes his essay by suggesting that Chinese professors should spend
more time reading, thinking, and writing instead of wasting time on “hot
events.”
Even scholars otherwise sympathetic to Dworkin’s theory reacted with
dismay. The philosopher Jiwei Ci expresses broad agreement with the
two principles of ethical individualism spelled out in Dworkin’s article
“Taking Rights Seriously in Beijing,” and he praises Dworkin for criti­
cally evaluating his own society on the basis of his moral theory in other
works. However, Dworkin’s theory “went out the window” when he ad­
dressed the Chinese audience. Rather than appealing to his radical first
principle (which underpins his critique of economic inequality), he stuck
to American political common sense that equates human rights with civil
and political rights. As a result, Professor Ci notes, “the United States,
and the West as a whole, emerge triumphantly above the threshold, well-
placed to sit in judgment of the human rights record of the rest of the
world. . . . When Dworkin leaves the Euro-American academic context
and takes on the role of observer and critic of China’s human rights
record, he can come pretty close to an uncritical identification with the
mainstream values of the West, at times almost sounding like its moral
and political spokesman.”

How could things have gone so wrong? Yes, Dworkin should have
been better acquainted with the contemporary Chinese political context
and the situation of Chinese academics in particular.

His less-than­modest demeanor and hectoring tone did not help. The deeper problem,
however, is that Dworkin made no serious attempt to learn about Chi­
nese philosophy, to identify aspects worth defending and learning from,
and to relate his own ideas to those of Chinese political traditions such
as Confucianism and Legalism. Whereas earlier luminaries such as
Dewey and Russell had expressed their admiration of Chinese culture
and argued for a synthesis of “East” and “West,”  Dworkin merely put forward
his own ideas and identified fellow “liberals,”
and the “de­bate” rarely moved beyond this starting point.

Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously in Beijing

Fang Liufang,Taking Academic Games Seriously