Peng Chun Chang and the Justification for Human Rights in East Asia

Abstract This paper reviews recent scholarship on P.C. (Peng Chun) Chang’s pivotal roles as a Confucian and diplomat in the drafting of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights to argue that he articulated a pioneering Confucian justification for human rights, distinctive from then-influential Western, Christian justifications. However, it also argues that theorizing the human rights advocacy of mid-20th-century Confucians like Chang does not suffice on its own to advance the compatibilist case for Confucianism and human rights, especially when it is recalled how Chang’s advocacy was forgotten. Relative to the influential human rights advocacy of East Asian churches, Confucianism also suffers from a reputational deficit in East Asian human rights thought due to its lack of civic visibility and its negative associations with developmental authoritarianisms in East Asia. The paper concludes that Confucians aiming for a more authoritative Confucian advocacy of human rights must also acknowledge and confront this reputational deficit.