History of East Asia (China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam) Seven Confucian Values: education, family loyalty, work ethic, value of traditions, conformity to traditional standards, honoring of ancestors, and obedience to superiors. Five Students of Confucius: China Japan Korea Taiwan Vietnam GPP PPP and Population in 2050 China: $80.00 trillion, 1400 million Japan: $7.00 trillion, 95 million Korea: $6.00 trillion, 70 million Taiwan: $2.00 trillion, 20 million Vietnam: $5.00 trillion, 117 million ______________________________ Total: $100 trillion, 1700 million http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2011/02/2050-ad-india1-japan-9/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRIC Confucianism and Its Spread to Vietnam By: James A. Crites http://www.angelfire.com/ca/beekeeper/cf.html What we now today as the northern part of Vietnam was first annexed by the Chinese in 207 BCE.(fig.1) This was the beginning of more than one thousand years of Chinese rule and Vietnamese rebellion. During this long period Vietnam was influenced by China's technology as well as its culture. Vietnam never lost her self identity but she did absorb many things from China, some more than others and one of the things that she did readily accept and implement was Confucianism and the examination system. In 939 the Vietnamese rebel forces were able to push the Chinese out in one of many battles between the two, but this time Vietnam became an independent state. More than eleven hundred years of Chinese rule was finally over. At this time Confucianism shared a place at the royal court along with Taoism and Buddhism. By the fifteenth century Confucianism dominated the Vietnamese court. Since Confucianism wasn't a religion per se, many people chose to adopt Taoism and Buddhism to fulfill their religious needs. Confucianism became the foundation of Vietnam's educational system. It set the structure for family organization; it was the authority for and the confirmation of an entire way of life. Confucianism helped Vietnam to form its worldview. Once when a steam ship came into the harbor the residents ran to tell the local Mandarin. After listening to their description the Mandarin studied his Confucian books and after sometime came to the conclusion that it was a dragon and dismissed it. In Vietnam, those that passed the first level of examinations were rewarded with being exempt from corvee labor for five years. The few that passed all levels of the exams were known as Mandarins and became civil officials in the bureaucracy. There were about 3500 mandarins in Northern Vietnam in the 1700's. In 1663 the Le court in Vietnam published a document called "The Forty-Seven Rules for Teaching and Changing". This was an effort to spread Confucian values to all the people in the country. This document called for families to regulate themselves by setting a good example for their children. Children were to obey parents. Wives were to be submissive to their husbands. Younger brothers were to show the proper respect to their older brothers. Children were to take care of their parents when they grew old and were to perform the proper rituals after they died. These were all Confucian ideas revisited. One of the best examples of Vietnamese law codes superseding those learned from the Chinese was in the rights of women. Under the Confucian system in China wives were subservient to their husbands. Any property owned by a family belonged to the husband since he was the patriarch of the family unit. Women were treated much better under the Vietnamese legal system than that of the Chinese. In Vietnam women were allowed to inherit property along with their brothers. This was unheard of in China where all of a familys inheritance was dived between the sons only. Vietnamese laws also ruled that the property of a husband and wife be managed equally between them and not just by the husband as it was in China. This shows the greater respect given to the role of women in Vietnamese society which is more similar to the way women are treated in other Southeast Asian countries. Confucianisms promotion of self-cultivation, especially the study of history, particularly interested the Vietnamese Mandarins. They were careful to keep detailed records of all past Chinese invasions. They were determined to not let this happen again and hoped that these records would help to keep them from repeating history. In present times we have seen different political ideologies come and go through China and Vietnam. However the foundation of Confucianism remains.

• published: 17 Jan 2010
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