Legalism (Chinese philosophy)


Fajia, or the School of fa, often translated Legalism, was a bibliographic school of primarily Warring States period classical Chinese philosophy, incorporating more administrative works traditionally said to be rooted in Huang-Lao Daoism. Addressing practical governance challenges of the unstable feudal system, their ideas 'contributed greatly to the formation of the Chinese empire' and bureaucracy, advocating concepts including rule by law, sophisticated administrative technique, and ideas of state and sovereign power. They are often interpreted along realist lines. Though persisting, the Qin to Tang were more characterized by the 'centralizing tendencies' of their traditions.
The school incorporates the more legalistic ideas of Li Kui and Shang Yang, and more administrative Shen Buhai and Shen Dao, with Shen Buhai, Shen Dao, and Han Fei traditionally said by Sima Qian to be rooted in Huang-Lao. Shen Dao may have been a significant early influence for Daoism and administration. These earlier currents were synthesized in the Han Feizi, including some of the earliest commentaries on the Daoist text Daodejing. The later Han dynasty considered Guan Zhong to be a forefather of the school, with the Guanzi added later. Later dynasties regarded Xun Kuang as a teacher of Han Fei and Qin Chancellor Li Si, as attested by Sima Qian, approvingly included during the 1970s along with figures like Zhang Binglin.
With a lasting influence on Chinese law, Shang Yang's reforms transformed Qin from a peripheral power into a strongly centralized, militarily powerful kingdom, ultimately unifying China in 221 BCE. While Chinese administration cannot be traced to a single source, Shen Buhai's ideas significantly contributed to the meritocratic system later adopted by the Han dynasty. Sun Tzu's Art of War recalls the Han Feizi's concepts of power, technique, wu wei inaction, impartiality, punishment, and reward. With an impact beyond the Qin dynasty, despite a harsh reception in later times, succeeding emperors and reformers often recalled the templates set by Han Fei, Shen Buhai and Shang Yang, resurfacing as features of Chinese governance even as later dynasties officially embraced Confucianism.

The Han Feizi's combination

Likely only meaning "law-abiding families" in Mencius's time, It is unlikely anyone ever literally politically identified themselves as a "Fajia" or fa school. As a model prototype of the idea, Xun Kuang criticizes Shen Dao as "obsessed by fa", comparing figures with the School of Confucius. Han Fei named Shang Yang's current as a fa school; combining Shang Yang with Shen Buhai, the Confucian archivists probably decided that Han Fei was Master of the fa school, putting them under Li Kui as preceding Shang Yang.
As chancellors of neighboring states, the doctrines of Shang Yang and Shen Buhai would have intersected before Qin imperial unification, and the Han Feizi is Shang Yang's first preserved reference outside Qin, with the Book of Lord Shang likely going into broad circulation alongside the Guanzi in the late Warring States period. A privileged scion of the Han state, a real Han Fei would been well positioned to acquire information on both his own state's Shen Buhai, and the neighboring Qin state's Shang Yang.
What the Confucians archivists later classed together as the broader fa school is based on this intersection. Later listed together under Fajia in the Hanshu book catalogue, the Han Feizi's chapter 43 contrasts Shen Buhai and Shang Yang as two different schools, with Shang Yang's school focused on fa as including law, ordinances, decrees, reward and punishment, and Shen Buhai fa method, differentiated as Shu technique. Shen Dao is discussed in the Han Feizi's chapter 40 for his views on shi power, depicted as akin to a dragon floating on clouds, much as he is depicted in the Zhuangzi.
Earlier simply identified together under the Han Feizi's doctrine termed Xing-Ming, while Han Fei's predecessors have fa in common, they only become formally identified with the fa school after Sima Tan named schools in the Records of the Grand Historian. As the only other prior evidence for its indirect usage, Han Fei likely contributes to a view of Shang Yang and Han Fei's other predecessors as a Legalist fa school. Seeking to demonstrate superiority, Han Fei elementalizes his predecessors, defining Shang Yang's current as a narrowly "Legalist" "fa school", similarly reducing Shen Dao to a doctrine of shi positional advantage.
Taking Wu Qi as a model reformer of the Chu state, Han Fei actually considers Shang Yang for instance as more comparable with Wu Qi, and these figures not for categorized together in the early Records of the Grand Historian. starting with the Huainanzi Shen Buhai and then Han Fei are gradually paired with Shang Yang over the Han dynasty. Shang Yang, and then Shen Buhai and Han Fei are gradually blamed for the fall of the Qin dynasty.

Posthumous category

While the Book of Lord Shang did have disciples, those the Confucian archivists grouped under Fajia "fa school" in the Hanshu book catalogue probably never formed organized schools to the extent of the Confucians or Mohists, and were not entirely separate from their contemporaries. While the Xunzi and Han Feizi are more advanced as late Warring States period texts, Han Fei's predecessor Chancellor Shen Buhai was not for instance more advanced than other Chinese, just more focused on bureaucracy.
Shang Yang, Shen Buhai and Han Fei were more interested in fa law and administrative method because they were from the ruling class. Though there is not enough information on the Warring States, their development was not that dissimilar to Qin, particularly in terms of economic centralizing tendencies. Qin was mainly unique in the degree of its reform, registering and mobilizing all male adults, and setting Qin on a path to dominance. It wasn't fully differentiated from other "feudal" states until the late Warring States reform of Fan Sui, which centralized power in the throne and adopted a more brutal military policy.
Fa as including laws are not the exclusive domain of the school, and Shang Yang and Han Fei's goal of addressing social chaos is comparable to other major figures of the era, Confucius, Laozi, Mozi, Zhuang Zhou, Mencius, and Xun Kuang. While Shang Yang was more radical and successful, agriculture and conscription concerned most thinkers of the Warring States period, with different solutions. Contemporary to Shen Dao, the Confucian Mencius also considered fa necessary, at least in the sense of measurement, instead arguing that a benevolent ruler would attract dedicated soldiers.
Referring to exemplars, with law as a kind, fa was not an independent general principle in the early period. At "the center of the classical discourse", early Mohist thinkers considered fa an "aid in following the Dao". Ancient Chinese thinkers generally argued that they, their ideal society or ruler follows the Dao. Han Fei would never assent that he was simply a Legalist. Han Fei as presented in the Han Feizi would have insisted that his ruler follows the Way of the Ruler. The Book of Lord Shang instead opens by arguing the necessity of changing with the times. While Sima Qian does not see Shang Yang as a Daoist, Sima Tan sees "changing with the times" as an argument about the Dao.

Monarchism

Including chapters like "Way of the Ruler", Han Fei presents the various techniques of fa as tools of the ruler's power. As "the unifying thread of Warring States period political thought", his ideology is arguably monarchist, a position shared by all of his contemporaries, holding in common the necessity of the ruler as figure changing laws to fit the times. Though Han Fei does argue the benefits of fa, it was only possible to overcome the aristocracy with the support of a powerful monarch. While the Book of Lord Shang is more focused on the state than ruler compared with the Han Feizi, Shang Yang as a figure follows this historical pattern, and the first chapter of the book opens centering around the monarch.
Although noting similarities to rule of law, Chinese scholarship dating back to Liang Qichao considered Han Fei as relying on a combination of both fa as including law, and what they termed "rule by man", including ideas of "techniques of rule" and "positional power". As long as the ruler has the power to abolish laws, "the ideal of the 'rule of fa'" is "ultimately reduced" to a person, or what modern Chinese scholarship explains as "a reflection of the unshakable monarchic form of traditional Chinese government." The contradiction between a rule of monarch and law is not one of logic, but contemporary politic.
Yuri Pines opposes a view of Han Fei as simply an advocate of “monarchic despotism”; recalling A.C. Graham's Legalist interpretation, he questioned whether Han Fei might be an insincere monarchist, advocating fa law and method at the incompetent ruler's expense. With hesitation, Pines eventually concluded Han Fei is an unwavering monarchist, institutionally, even if he ultimately has low expectations of the average monarch. Intelligent average monarchs will restrain themselves and rely on the system. It is "unthinkable" to abolish monarchism itself, even supposing it might benefit the state; Han Fei instead hopes that intellectuals will show respect to a mediocre monarch and rule in his stead, with "men of service of law and techniques" serving as a model for him.

Late introduction

Situated in the then-remote mountainous west, the early Qin were a minor state until Shang Yang’s reforms propelled it to power in the early Warring States period. He arguably becomes the "most famous and influential statesman" from "the Warring States period." But he was most successful and influential as an officeholder contributing to the founding of Imperial China, not a philosopher who generated a school of disciples.
Outside Qin, the classical period likely knows nothing of a Legalist school before Han Fei. Employed as a sociologist at the Jixia Academy, Shen Dao was more evidently broadly well known earlier, in connection with the flourishing academy. Xun Kuang and Han Fei are said to attended later. Xun Kuang demonstrates familiarity with Shen Buhai and Shen Dao, but doesn't seem to know about Shang Yang. What remains of the Zhuangzi is familiar with Shen Dao.
Qin was not considered culturally different until the late period. While its ascent does increase brief discussion of Qin in most texts, such a later major figure as Mencius remained largely indifferent toward it. With late Warring States opinion of the Qin declining to become considered barbarian, the period's major texts produced little about it, despite an increasing interest due to its conquests. Some of Shang Yang's policies continued until later in the Han dynasty, but by the late Warring States period, the Lushi Chunqiu's own internal opinion of him had already declined, and Qin law diverged significantly from the philosophies of works later defined as Legalist.

Imperial Library category

Included in the last chapter of the Shiji Records of the Grand Historian, early Han dynasty historiographer Sima Tan coined Fajia or "fa school" in a manifesto discussing approaches to governance, arguing for "Daojia", or a syncretic political "Daoism", as supposedly adopting the best elements of six schools of thought.
Making no use of the schools, it is questionable whether Sima Qian intended Fajia describe all thinkers later associated with it, simply giving Shang Yang his own chapter. The Shiji lists Shen Dao amongst the Jixia Academy alongside Xun Kuang, which Han Fei is also said to have attended.
Legalism is not a precise translation of Fajia, and as Tan used it, would not seem identical to a concept of Legal positivism, or a "Legalism" of Shang Yang. The influence of the Han Feizi contributes to their synonymization. Pertaining to office divisions, Tan conceived Fajia as philosophically broader than law, like Shen Buhai.
As Tan's schools are intended to include elements for his syncretic Dao school to draw on, he couldn't be expected to write a fa-school exactly like Shang Yang, Han Fei or Qin, since he wouldn't consider all their elements politically useful. Sima Qian's version of Shang Yang's background is instead introduced as an expert having studied Xing-Ming, used in the Han Feizi to distinguish offices. Nothing in Shang Yang's current seems to bear out that he studied the same "names" doctrine as Shen Buhai and Han Fei. He has a "names" doctrine, but it is different.
  • Sima Tan praises Fajia for honoring rulers, and subordinating subjects, clearly distinguishing offices so that no one oversteps . He described the fa school as emphasizing fa administrative protocols that ignore kinship and social status, treating everyone equally and thereby elevating the ruler above humanity. Defining kindness as judging people differently, Tan criticizes Fajia as strict with little kindness, as a temporary policy that could not last..
Han Confucian scholar Liu Xiang used Fajia as a category of Masters Texts when he established the imperial library, becoming a major category in Han dynasty catalogues, namely the Han state's own Book of Han CH30.
Only official reclassified from Daoism in the Sui dynasty, the Guanzi text named for the much earlier Guan Zhong is a late compilation. The late pre-Imperial Qin state's Lushi Chunqiu encyclopedia also included individual chapters on Shang Yang and Shen Buhai.

Identification with penal legalism

Traditional ancient state Confucian bibliographic classifications arguably "do not pretend" to be precise, "imply strict separation", require they all have studied each-other's doctrines, or to have been an actual Warring States period school. At that time, it mainly took them to be related intellectually or by resemblances, in this case categorizing texts under fa referenced by the Han Feizi. Although Shen Buhai is said to have opposed punishment, he does resemble the Han Feizi more than any other text.
Since the Qin knew about Shen Buhai, he likely influenced the Qin dynasty, but would have had a moderating, administrative influence as compared with the earlier Qin state reforms of Shang Yang. Amongst broader arguments, Jia Yi only blamed Shang Yang's doctrine for the faults of Qin under the fifth Emperor Wen of Han; the early Han Huainanzi's discussion the Qin's fall revolves around its own Han dynasty political ploys, and was probably outside their context to blame these figures.
A pairing of Shen Buhai with Shang Yang in the Han Feizi contributes to a conflation of their figures, and subsequent fa school, with a harsh Shang Yangian penal Legalism, and with the Qin dynasty, taking its penal policy as derived of Shang Yang and the Han Feizi. Dong Zhongshu blames the three for a Qin Dynasty policy of failing to punish criminals; recalling Shang Yang and Shen Buhai from the Han Feizi, Sima Qian's Shiji blames Li Si as manipulating the Second Emperor, abusing Shen Buhai's doctrine and restoring the old harsh penal law of Shang Yang.
  • Included in the Book of Han by Ban Gu, Liu Xin adds that Fajia likely originated in an ancient Zhou Dynasty department of prisons "make reward certain and punishment unavoidable, as a support to control by ceremony", reject teaching and benevolence, and concern for others, aiming to perfect government relying only on punishment and law, inflicting corporal punishment even on closest kin, and demeaning mercy and generosity. Feng Youlan's early scholarship considered this a legitimate attempt at history, but not an accurate one.

    Shen Buhai

Although Sima Tan described the 'fa school' as strict, he "clearly" understood that standards were used in the administration, and not just harsh penal law earlier established by Shang Yang. They were not however all always earlier characterized as strict. Later association with Tan's fa school shapes opinion of them. The Han Feizi advocates precisely defined, mechanically strict administration at the end of the Warring States period. More closely resembling Han dynasty level conceptual thinking, the Han Feizi's strict mechanical functioning is not evident earlier, including by Han Fei's predecessor Shen Buhai.
While Shen Dao advocated that punishment and reward be proportionate rather than extreme, Liu Xiang says that Shen Buhai aimed to eliminate punishment relying on supervisory technique. Contrasting him with Shang Yang, while the Han Feizi likely understates Shen Buhai as compared with Sima Qian, it did not regard him as effective or apt a legal reformer, neither consolidating the laws, nor unifying the regulations and ordinances.
Herrlee G. Creel emphatically insisted he was not a harsh penal Legalist. He would have looked penal to people later interpreting him through the terminology of the Zhuangzi, though the "Daoist" Shiji blames Li Si as abusing his doctrine, it regarded Shen Buhai himself as implementing the Way in his own time in defense of the Hann state. Though crediting Shang Yang's achievements, it does not have as high an opinion of him.

Legalists or administrators?

Used in reference to Fajia or "School of fa", it is not known where the term Legalism comes from. Taking Shang Yang as example, Joseph Needham used the term Legalism in reference to a positive law interpretation of fa, specifying such things as regulations for roads. Although the term Legalism has still seen some conventional use in recent years, such as in Adventures in Chinese Realism, apart from its anachronism, scholarship has avoided it for reasons dating back to Herrlee G. Creel's 1961 Legalists or Administrators?.
The Han Feizi presented Shang Yang as focused primarily on fa standards as including law, and Shen Buhai fa in the administration, differentiating it as technique. Creel translated Shen Buhai's fa as method, presenting him as perhaps the "first systematic theorist of organizational and managerial science", with a hierarchical, merit based appointment of ministers, and apart from the Han Feizi, a historical following opposing harsh penal law.
Generally, the use of fa in the administration does not automatically imply punishment. Han Fei and Shen Dao make some use of fa akin to law, and some use of reward and punishment, but often use fa similarly to Shen Buhai: as an administrative technique. Shen Buhai uses fa to compare official's duties and performances, and the Han Feizi often emphasizes fa in this sense. With a particular quotation from the Han Feizi as example:
From a modern viewpoint, Shen Buhai could be argued a Legalist inasmuch as his ruler follows guidelines. Internally, Han Fei could consider this a victory for fa method. They probably did not see it as literal Legalism. Apart from contracts, and what law Shen Buhai did make, the guidelines Shen Buhai's ruler consulted were secret, internal bureaucratic operations, protecting him against the ministers. Externally, the Han Feizi contrasts Shen Buhai and shu technique with Shang Yang's fa as including law, and with law as clear and public.
Fa method, or Shu technique as termed in the Han Feizi, help Shen Buhai and his ruler interpret information, define qualifications and duties, and make it more difficult for ministers to lie. The Han Feizi advocates legal reform as facilitating standardized technical procedure in streamlining ministerial operations. Although seeking more law, Han Fei comes from an environment of dangerous ministers seeking to reward and punish. Like Shen Buhai, this makes him more concerned with managing ministers than the people, and monopolization the key to power.
The Han Feizi's choice to include law is not accidental, and is at least indirectly intended to benefit the people, insomuch as the state is benefited by way of order. It can be compared to a legislative rule of law inasmuch as it develops beyond purposes serving those of simply the ruler, operating separately from him once established. Han Fei says: "The enlightened ruler governs his officials; he does not govern the people." The ruler cannot jointly govern the people in a large state. Nor can his direct subordinates themselves do it. The ruler wields methods to control officials.

Agriculture and war

's 1986 Cambridge History still considered fa law a first principle of the Book of Lord Shang, upholding state power. Relying more on group responsibility in the early period, Shang Yang's fa has both rewards and punishments. But Loewe considered Shang Yang's major aim a "unified, powerful state, based on an industrious peasantry and disciplined army", establishing a hierarchy of military ranks carried over into agriculture in the late period. Agriculture and war may have been Shang Yang's "single most important slogan." Though Xun Kuang is probably accurate in considering Shen Dao to be focused on fa administrative standards, his secondary subject of shi or "situational authority", of which he is spoken in Chapter 40 of the Han Feizi, is incorporated in The Art of War.
By the early Warring States period the kings had become more powerful, recruiting officials with an aim to advance universal census, taxes, agriculture, and finally universal military service as part of mobilization efforts. The only surviving work of its kind, the Book of Lord Shang represents an extreme example of this early mobilization extending to the population. Shaping its overall policy, the Qin organized society on a military basis as familial, mutual responsibility groups of five and ten for military recruitment. Sima Qian considered its reform the first of Shang Yang's accomplishments.
Alongside standardized penal law, Shang Yang and Han Fei's ruler oversee colonization, taxes, the military, and for Han Fei, administration of the bureaucracy inherited from Shen Buhai, allowing accountable ministers to volunteer themselves to office on the basis of proposals. Considering them harmful to such ends, Han Fei opposes traditional privileges, demagoguery, tyranny, and corvée. Yuri Pines takes Shang Yang's "overarching commitment" to be a centralized, "rich state and powerful army", with an to aim "unify all under heaven" and establish the next dynasty. Rule by fa standards and penal punishments are secondary to victory.
Prime ministers Shen Buhai and Zichan were both concerned with the recruitment of ministers and defense. A figure in the Stratagems of the Warring States, although not the primary focus of his administrative treatise, Shen Buhai was both a diplomat and military reformer, at least for defense. Said to have maintained the security of his state, he was noted historically both for bureaucracy and making the Hann state's military strong. Han Fei may criticize Shen Buhai compared with Shang Yang, but the Strategems and Sima Qian considered defense of the Han state a major consequences of, conversely, his foreign policy and administrative reforms.
Loewe considered Shang Yang's economic and political reforms unprecedented, far more significant than his personal military achievements. But he was arguably as much a military reformer, possibly even standardizing the road network for military purposes, and did personally lead Qin to victory over Wei. The Han also recognized him as a military strategist. A work attributed to him, possibly the same, is also listed under the Han Imperial Library's Military Books under Strategists. The Han Feizi contrasts Shang Yang with Shen Buhai, but pairs Shang Yang with general Wu Qi from the Chu state as a model reformer; Wu Qi's reforms were just not as successful as Shang Yang's.
Pines takes the Book of Lord Shang's primary doctrine to be that of connecting people's inborn nature or dispositions with names. With Shang Yang said to have reformed Qin law, the Book of Lord Shang does not believe that fa laws will be successful without "investigating the people's disposition." The work recommends enacting laws that allow people to "pursue the desire for a name", namely fame and high social status, or just wealth if acceptable. Ensuring that these "names" are connected with actual benefits, it was hoped that if people can pursue these, they will be less likely to commit crimes, and more likely to engage in hard work or fight in wars.

"Daoism"

With the rise of Confucianism, what Tan called the Dao school was redefined as rejecting "ritual learning, and abandoning humanity and duty, saying that the employment of purity and vacuity alone can be used to rule." Apart from Shang Yang, the Confucian division of texts into schools mainly sorts works that can be associated with a concept of syncretic political "Daoism" in the Shiji, differing from Daoism as later understood.
Sima Qian would likely have preferred no one be associated with Shang Yang, as he did not like him. He instead attested Shen Buhai, Shen Dao and Han Fei as "rooted" in Huang-Lao or "Yellow Emperor and Laozi ". Though favoring Laozi and Zhuangzi, Tan's "Dao school" bears more resemblance to what they described as Huang-Lao, synonymous with Daojia in the Shiji. Daojia comes to mean Laozi-Zhuangzi Daoism between around a hundred years after Sima Qian, and the third century A.D., when Zhuangzi philosophy was regaining popularity amidst political disintegration.
Though considering Han Fei cruel, Sima Qian discusses him and Shen Buhai alongside Laozi and Zhuangzi, claiming them as originating in dao and de, or "the meaning of" the Way and its virtue . Sima Qian considered Laozi the most profound of them, but places Shen Buhai just below Laozi and the free-spirited Zhuangzi.
As advocates of what they called Daoism, the Simas could expected to argue from its viewpoint, i.e. more for their own position. But the Han Feizi's Chapter 5 also relates ideas from Shen Buhai and Laozi, albeit as part of the Han Feizi's own critique.
Later termed Daoist, A.C. Graham takes the Zhuangzi as preferring a private life, while the Daodejing contains an art of rule. Xun Kuang does not perceive the two as belonging to one school in his time, listing them separately. Placing Shen Dao before Laozi and Zhuang Zhou in Chapter 33, the Zhuangzi does not associate Shen Dao with a literal Daoist or Legalist school, and he was probably not familiar with the idea. If he preceded them, he may well have influenced them.

Works of Rule

Along with founding Han dynasty figures, Sima Qian claimed Shen Buhai, Han Fei and Shen Dao as "rooted" in Huang-Lao or "Yellow Emperor and Laozi ". While the term might be retrospective, differentiating it as a "ruling fǎjiā cult", Sinologist Hansen still took something akin to a Huang-Lao "Yellow Emperor Daoism" as theoretically growing to dominance among the Chinese officialdom by the Qin dynasty, recalling the Mawangdui Silk Texts. Representing more of a tendency than a unified doctrine, Huang-Lao administrators named by Sima Qian like Cao Shen took a more "hands off" approach. Though the Huangdi Sijing can be compared with the Daodejing or Han Feizi, it moreover bares more resemblance to the Guanzi.
With Daoist or Legalist school distinctions not existing before the Han dynasty, those who included Laozi commentaries in the Han Feizi, at least, probably did not see two separate schools; they probably saw works of rule. Sima Qian and Ban Gu describe Huang-Lao as works of rule. While it is a question how much such content might have been extant in Shen Buhai's time, the Sijing's Jingfa and Guanzi regard fa administrative standards as generated by the Dao, theoretically placing them, and some of those the Confucians later called Legalists, within a "loosely Daoist" context focused on rule.
While The Sijing has a more "naturalist" conception of the Way that might restrain the ruler, Shen Buhai and Shen Dao were still also more naturalist, with Shen Dao moving away from an older naturalism towards a concept of Dao. The Han Feizi and Later Mohists were moving away from the earlier naturalism of Shen Dao, and Laozi. While Shen Dao and the Huangdi Sijing earlier still referred to a Way of Heaven, the Han Feizi more directly refers to a Way of the ruler. The late Han Feizi, Guanzi and Sijing all have similar conceptions of principles and the Way as an art of rule, with the Han Feizi devoting three chapters to the subject.
The Han Feizi's Laozi commentaries could theoretically precede the Xunzi, while being late additions to the work itself, isolated to a few chapters. But it does make a "sustained effort" to integrate a Daoistic context. Roughly contemporary to the Mawangdui silk texts and Huangdi Sijing, they would together theoretically indicate the kind of syncretism that was becoming dominant by the late Warring States to Qin dynasty. While the Han Feizi itself may not the most effective example of Daoistic sycnretism, translator W.K. Liao considered the Han Feizi's Chapter 20 "Commentaries on Lao Tzŭ's Teachings" academically thorough.
Some scholars argued a post-Han Fei dating for the Mawangdui Silk Texts, and can be argued to have been compiled in the early Han, when they would have still been appealing. But almost all scholars placed them Pre-han. Michael Loewe placed its Jingfa text before Qin unification. The Yellow Emperor is a major figure in one of its texts. Amongst other strains of thought, the more metaphysical, but still politically oriented Boshu text has arguments more comparable to natural law, but includes contents baring resemblance to Shen Buhai, Shen Dao and Han Fei, with some identical to Shen Dao.
Taking Shen Dao as an early theoretical representative of what would later be termed "Daoism", Hansen interpreted those works later termed legalist as works of rule. Shen Dao has administrative ideas, but a follower of his theory of positional power has authority because they have power or charisma; not because they are an expert at legal language. The Han Feizi presents administrative technique and fa to the ruler as tools for governing the state, with the administrative technique of Shen Buhai especially a tool in the ruler's hands.
Though not characterized as Huang-Lao, and only more focused on regulating ministers later in the work, the Han Feizi credits Shang Yang with developing standards as a general way of rule; not just criminal law. Its standards regulate ministers amongst other desired programs, most prominently including mobilizations for agriculture and war. Despite a more general orientation aimed at enhancing state power, Duke Xiao had likely called for ministers like Shang Yang partly to strengthen his own personal rule against that of "unruly aristocrats" of the 'Qin ruling lineage', aiming to expand the elite by employing men of service at their expense.

Wu wei

Traditionally taken as Daoist rooted via Sima Qian, some earlier modern Chinese scholars especially would take Sima Qian's account as factual, based on comparison. Unanimously accepted as Daoist-rooted in early scholarship, Sinologist Herrlee G. Creel did not believe that Shen Buhai was a Daoist in his own time, questioning their chronology. Somewhat Confucianistic, Shen Buhai most resembles the Han Feizi, and may have preceded the Daodejing. But if so, he does bear a "striking" resemblance to Laozi.
Though scholar Pei Wang primarily treats the similarities and differences of Laozi, the Huangdi Sijing and Han Feizi, at least in review with Pei Wang, Yuri Pines Dao Companion to China's fa tradition modernly expresses openness that that early thinkers like were "indebted" Shen Buhai to Laozi. If he was, he is significantly more administrative, emphasizing "inactivity" as "holding the levers of power", while delegating routine managerial functions. He emphasizes the internal tranquility of the ruler, but advocates a system of tallies with reliable ministers as its aid.
Zhuangzi typically refrains from actions more generally, but Laozi and Shen Buhai do share a similar idea of wu-wei in the sense of using it as a governmental technique. 'Underlying' the management of ministers, Shen Buhai and Han Fei have ideas of wu wei differing from Laozi and Zhuangzi, inasmuch as Chancellor Shen Buhai and his ruler only "demonstrate" non-action, rather than actually being inactive.
Creel elaborated a similar relationship with Confucius, and Shen Buhai may well have been influenced by Confucius. Shen Buhai and Confucius both emphasize selecting able ministers, but Shen Buhai "drastically" revises the idea by vigilantly overseeing their performance. Not involving in details, or ministers' duties or functions, Shen Buhai's wu-wei "inactivity" benefits the ruler by allowing him to supervise the government in the first place.
Shen Buhai's ruler does try to selectively reduce activity in the sense of relying on ministers and technique. A parable from the Lushi Chunqiu encourages the ruler to rely on technique and ministers rather than use his own judgement for such affairs as livestock. If the ruler has to stoop to using his own judgement, reliance on his personal judgement will cause quarreling with the ministers.
The contradictory distinction is more pronounced in parts of the Han Feizi, which express disbelief that the ruler can actually relax from his own regulatory functions, particularly the mechanical checking of ministerial performance. But the work does prominently try to get the ruler out of politics, leaving duties to ministers. If the ruler has an able minister like the one presenting the Han Feizi, perhaps he should occupy himself with paperwork.

Laozi

More political than a typical reading of the Daodejing, rather than "using" the work for politics, the Han Feizi's authors may be reading from an older, more political version. An interpretation of the Daodejing as simply cynically political would be flawed. Still, together with qigong, it can be viewed as a manual for politics and military strategy. In contrast to its modern representation, the Mawangdui, and two of the three earlier Guodian Chu Slips, swap the two halves of the text, placing political commentaries, or "ruling the state", first. Although not necessarily its sole "original" version, the Han Feizi's political contemporaries likely read them in the same order.
Arguably lacking in metaphysics, associated content instead possesses mythologies. Nonetheless, in contrast to all prior Ways, the Daodejing emphasizes quietude and lack as wu wei. A central concept of what was later termed Daoism, together especially with the early Daodejing, Shen Buhai, Han Fei, Zhuangzi, and so-called Huang-Lao Daoism all have wu wei as a governmental function, emphasizing the political usages and advantages of reduced activity as a method of control for survival, social stability, long life, and rule, refraining from action in-order to take advantage of favorable developments in affairs. If the authors of the Han Feizi were not all sincere in their Laoist beliefs, the work would still have served as a suitable critique of Confucianism and Mohism, and for impartial laws and techniques as purportedly bolstering the authority of a less active ruler.
The Daodejing regards the Way as nameless, but the establishment "names" like titles as inevitable with the establishment of regulations, advising that they not be carried too far. Cautioning against implementing too many laws, it has an idea which says that "Man models himself on Earth, Earth models itself on Heaven, Heaven models itself on the Way, and the Way models on what is so by itself", which may still have contributed to an idea that laws should follow an impartial Way, with the way "generating" laws.
While not a direct example of Xing-Ming, the more general idea of a less active ruler can be compared with the Daodejing's passage 17. J. J. L. Duyvendak interpreted ihe passage as valuing people's words, "arousing wide interest" but which Creel took as "quite old in Chinese literature" as that of a form of Daoism "leaning heavily toward Legalism". Creel takes the Wenzi as example, which draws on the Daodejing, Han Feizi and Huainanzi. The Laozi's 'enigmatic' passage does not directly mention rulers, but would seem to discuss the ruler as one who "does everything without acting". In the Guodian and Mawangdui versions, the passage is combined with passage 18.
Rather than words, some translators like John Ching Hsiung Wu have a more general translation of valuing people's faith, in line with the prior sentence. Shen Dao's "Understanding Loyalty" includes a "concern that a focus on loyalty arises only when things have already begun to go wrong." While placing some value in public opinion, the Book of Lord Shang instead believed that people should trust the ruler's rewards and punishments. The Han Feizi opposes trusting ministers. More in line with Confucianism and others parts of the Laozi, trust was an important Daoistic value in the early Han dynasty going into the era of Confucianism, in the time of Gongsun Hong.
The Han Feizi's late Daodejing commentaries are comparable with the Daoism of the Guanzi Neiye, and with its "Seven Standards" chapter, connecting the Way with patterns and principles. It uses the Laozi more as a theme for methods of rule. Although the Han Feizi has Daoistic conceptions of objective viewpoints, if its sources had them, it lacks a conclusive belief in universal moralities or natural laws, sharing with Shang Yang and Shen Dao a view of man as self-interested. Advocating against manipulation of the mechanisms of government, despite an advocacy of passive mindfulness, noninterference, and quiescence, the ability to prescribe and command is still built into the Han Feizi's Xing-ming administrative method.
Although these early Daoist association do not include Shang Yang, the Shang Yangian figure Sang Hongyang in the Han dynasty does also quote Laozi. Chao Cuo may have been similarly influenced. But this would have been more part of a broader cultural context. Many Confucian scholars were also influenced by the Daodejing.

Syncretism

While Shen Buhai may still not entirely align with Laozi or Zhuangzi, he fits alongside the "Daoism" of the Jixia Academy's era as a "practical political thinker". As another alternative model of wu wei from the period, the Huangdi Sijing switches to an active posture at "the right moment". Though emphasizing appearances, if Shen Buhai had been quoted from the Zhuangzi, he would have early been accepted as a kind of "Daoist" as the category came into formation, except by preferential Zhuangzi experts, overcoming the strong with a practice of wu wei "inactivity" that Creel compared with Judo.
SchooSima Qian does characterize Shen Buhai and Han Fei as rooted in a -Laozi, and does recall them alongside Zhuangzi. Shen Buhai or Huang-Lao may emphasize ideas like fa or xing-ming more, but such demarcations are a later Confucian concern. Along with the Zhuangzi, the Daodejing arguably does hold a negative of view law; but the Zhuangzi goes on to accept a place for administrative technique within government, i.e. Xing-Ming. Though more obvious for the early Han, something akin to what Sima Qian called "Huang-Lao Daoism" may well already have become more dominant in the late period.
Sima Tan criticized fa where "strict or unkind" as he defined it, but claimed the Dao-school to incorporate the good or essential elements of all the schools. This syncretism marks the late Warring States period, characterizing "Huang-Lao". According with Laozi and Zhuangzi's idea of wu wei, at least by its own words, Sima Tan's Daoism primarily opposes Confucianism as exhausting the ruler. It also stresses changing with the times, according with the Han Feizi and parts of the Zhuangzi. Sima Tan's ruler should "do what is appropriate to circumstances."
Sinologist Hansen argued China's officialdom as becoming more Huang-Lao "Daoistic", lacking in Zhuangzi influences in the late period. While the Confucians classify the Lushi Chunqiu as Zajia rather than Daojia or Fajia, in the terms of older older scholarship, it contains a "Daoist-Legalist" fusion comparable to Shen Buhai, Shen Dao, Han Fei, Guanzi and the Mawangdui Huangdi sijing. Though incorporated under the military regime of the late Warring State's Qin state, it includes a selection from Shen Buhai's doctrine, with additional content from its "Ren shu" chapter demonstrating that a philosophy promoting the wu wei reduced activity of the ruler goes back to the Warring States period.

Changing with the times

The early work of Feng Youlan took the statesmen as fully understanding that needs change with the times and material circumstances; admitting that people may have been more virtuous anciently, Han Fei believes that new problems require new solutions. Earlier thought to be rare, in fact, a changing with times paradigm, or one of timeliness, "dominated" the age.
Yuri Pines takes Shang Yang and Han Fei's more specific view of history as an evolutionary process as contrasting. It might have influenced an end of history view expressed by the Qin dynasty, but would be a radical departure from earlier ideas. The Qin idea of an eternal dynasty would seem more connected with that of relying on law rather than the ruler.
In what A. C. Graham took to be a "highly literary fiction", as Pines recalls, the Book of Lord Shang's chapter 1, "Revising the laws," opens with a debate held by Duke Xiao of Qin, seeking to "consider the changes in the affairs of the age, inquire into the basis for correcting standards, and seek the Way to employ the people." Gongsun attempts to persuade the Duke to change with the times, with the Shangjunshu citing him as saying: "Orderly generations did not a single way; to benefit the state, one need not imitate antiquity."
Graham compared Han Fei in particular with the Malthusians, as "unique in seeking a historical cause of changing conditions", namely population growth, acknowledging that an underpopulated society only need moral ties. The Guanzi sees punishment as unnecessary in ancient times with an abundance of resources, making it a question of poverty rather than human nature. Human nature is a Confucian issue. Graham otherwise considered the customs current of the time as having no significance to the statesmen, even if they may be willing to conform the government to them. Han Fei "objects to ancient authority" not only because the times have changed, but because the past is uncertain.
Taking Shang Yang as inheriting from Li Kui and Wu Qi, despite anti-Confucianism in the Shangjunshu, professor Ch'ien Mu still considered that "People say merely that Legalist origins are in Dao and De , apparently not aware that their origins in fact are in Confucianism. Their observance of law and sense of public justice are wholly in the spirit of Confucius' rectification of names and return to propriety, but transformed in accordance with the conditions of the age." In the ancient society, punishment by law would typically only apply to the people, while the nobles are only punished by ritual. But needs change with the times. Making use of the term, Shen Buhai and the Guanzi do have administrative ideas that go back to the Confucian rectification of names, or cheng ming.
Sinologist Hansen viewed the morally neutral naturalism of Shen Dao as a development of the type of thinking seen in Mencius and early Mohists, beginning to emphasize a concept of Dao over nature. Shen Dao promotes a "Way of Heaven", but the concept doesn't appear to have been as developed in his time, or focus on it as much as later texts. Hansen took Shen Dao and Han Fei as aiming at what they took to be the "'actual' course of history", with Han Fei concretizing Shen Dao's ideas on circumstantial authority, and a changing with the times paradigm introduced in its first chapters, under the Dao or "Way" of Laozi, combined with Shen Buhai in Chapter 5.
Devoting large sections to drawing practical guidelines as applied directly to politics, the Huangdi Sijing attempts to apply "concrete" politics to theorizing public policy. The work does not argue the origins of society, human nature, or their relations, but it does draw broad lessons from Chinese history. Characterizing humanity and politics as constantly shifting, it treats rulership as a practical art responding to shifting events and personalities. While reflecting on failures and successes, it does not consider their situations and solutions ever exactly repeatable. It offers guidance rather than aiming at "watertight techniques", which would be more akin to the aspirations of the "great progenitors of Rationalism", Descartes or Francis Bacon.
Advocating the practice of wu wei non-action mainly for rulers, the Han Feizi contrasts with later or more spiritual forms of Daoism as a practical state philosophy not accepting a 'permanent way of statecraft'. The Huang-Lao boshu developed a more metaphysical naturalist view, promoting a "predetermined natural order" for humanity. The Han Feizi only hints at such a view, affirming the Dao as "the standard of right and wrong". The Later Mohists and Han Fei moved away from an emphasis on heaven or nature, towards one of a man-made Sovereignty, a view affirmed by the Han Feizi's discussion of Shen Dao. Although Han Fei recalls Laozi, in this regard, Graham took them as moving in "parallel directions". Where Laozi sought to adapt to uncontrollable natural forces, the Han Feizi seeks the establishment of an "automatic" social order, with illustrations of scales, compasses and squares for "precise unimpugnable decisions."
Though not "completely endorsing" their methods, after "two millennia of narrating the past to harm the present, and adorning empty words to harm the substance," Hu Shih took Han Fei and Li Si as the "greatest statesmen in Chinese history", with a "brave spirit opposing those who 'do not make the present into their teacher but learn from the past, and a political dictatorship less frightening than one adoring the past. Hu shih took Xun Kuang, Han Fei and Li Si as "champions of the idea of progress through conscious human effort", with Li Si abolishing the feudal system, unifying the empire, law, language, thought and belief, presenting a memorial to the throne in which he condemns all those who "refused to study the present and believed only in the ancients on whose authority they dared to criticize". With a quotation from Xun Kuang:
Stressing timeliness, Sima Tan's description of the 'Dao school' says: "It shifts with the times and changes in response to things", a view earlier found in Han Fei and Xun Kuang. Hong Kong professor Liu Xiaogan takes the Zhuangzi and Laozi as more focused on "according with nature" than timeliness. Sima Tan's description better fits with what he called Huang-Lao, with followers theoretically defining the former according to the latter.
In contrast to Xun Kuang as the classically purported teacher of Han Fei and Li Si, Han Fei does not believe that a tendency to disorder demonstrates that people are evil or unruly. As a counterpoint, the Han Feizi and Shen Dao do still employ argumentative reference to 'sage kings'; the Han Feizi claims the distinction between the ruler's interests and private interests as said to date back to Cangjie, while government by Fa is said to date back to time immemorial, considering the demarcation between public and private a "key element" in the "enlightened governance" of the purported former kings.

Doctrines of names

Following the Han Feizi, Shang Yang, Shen Buhai and Han Fei were often identified under the Han Feizi's "Xing-Ming" doctrine of "forms and names" as a subset of shu technique. including by Sima Qian. It would serve as a secondary moniker for them. Combined with Shang Yang, the meaning of Xing "performance" is gradually lost as punishment, so that Shen Buhai would look more like Shang Yang. Popular in the Han dynasty, the Xunzi preceding the Han Feizi likely had a distortive effect. With a "Way of the Ruler" chapter like the Han Feizi, its introduction was the only work to use the term as "the names of punishments". Recalling Liu Xiang, Pei Yin's commentaries demonstrate some understanding of Shen Buhai again in the fifth century.
Though considering shu a later term, Creel largely reflects a traditional understanding of him, with shu techniques like controlling the levers of power, appearing inactive but acting decisively when needed, hiding motivations, power and intelligence to avoid exploitation, appointing by merit, thwarting ministerial power, and only giving orders that would likely be obeyed. The broader techniques contribute to a view of Shen Buhai as based in deception, present throughout the Han Feizi, but was focused on administration.
Recalling Shen Buhai, chapter 43 considered administrative standards or method necessary, differentiating it under the term shu 术 technique. Shu is defined here as examining or testing the abilities of ministers, appointing candidates in accordance with their capabilities, holding ministerial achievements or "performance" accountable to their proposals or "titles" as becoming offices, and grasping fast the handles of life and death in his own hands. Chapter 5 links the idea to the Way, while Xing-Ming as connected to reward and punishment is a doctrine of the Han Feizi's Chapter 7.
Though its later term is the Han Feizi's, retrospectively, Xing-Ming may be considered Shen Buhai "most important administrative contribution", in the sense referring to his line of practice. Arguably a central concept in the Han Feizi, it is at minimum a "crucial element". Sinologist Goldin compared it to a "bid for contracts", allowing ministers to appoint themselves to "titles", or offices. The Han Feizi's Chapters 5 "Way of the Ruler" and Chapter 7 "Two Handles" have examples of its doctrine, included under shu technique in chapter 43.
Creel argued: Han Fei from the late Hann state probably knows about his predecessor Shen Buhai, and past prime minister Shang Yang from the neighboring Qin. But the Han Feizi's Shang Yangian legal component is arguably more theoretical. The Han Feizi's chapter 5 introduction to its own version of Xing-Ming administration includes specific practical recommendations, and is not just theoretical. However, Han Fei likely would have considered its "impersonal governance" a suitable foundation for legal reform, as the Han Feizi says, once order is established.
Monopolizing the Two Handles of reward and punishment to prevent usurpation, chapter 7's reward and punishment are dispensed based on the performance of bureaucratic roles. Their "most detailed application" is in connection with fa standards as promises ministers propose themselves. In older scholarship, this would make it an argument against older, primarily legal positivist interpretations of the work, developing out of a non-penal practice that would not have required law.
Sima Qian's inclusion of Shang Yang gives the impression he was familiar with the same doctrine; while there is no evidence Shang Yang literally studied Shen Buhai, the Book of Lord Shang does have "doctrines of names".
Sima Qian's Shiji attests the First Emperor as proclaiming Xing-Mings's practice. Though it is questionable that Xing-Ming was an integrated part of a legal system in Shen Buhai's time, it arguably is in Sima Qian's model of the Qin empire.

Xing-Ming

Often recalled under it following the Han Feizi, Sima Qian lists Shen Buhai, Han Fei and Shang Yang under the doctrine of Xing-Ming, or "form" and "name". Sima Qian attests Shen Buhai and Han Fei as favoring it, but rooted in Huang-Lao or "Yellow Emperor Daoism". Listing them under the Fa school, Liu Xiang still considered Shen Buhai's doctrine to be that of Xing-Ming, described as holding outcomes accountable to claims. Though later combined with Shang Yang, Han Fei names Shen Buhai as progenitor for his doctrine of Xing-Ming.
The term Xing is an example of a model or standard, prominently dating back to Zhou texts taking King Wen of Zhou as a model. It still referred to models when Zichan used the term in his penal reforms. However, the Han Feizi states than Shen Buhai actually uses the earlier, more common philosophical equivalent, the Mohist "ming-shi", or name and reality, so that it likely originates in the name and reality debates of the Later Mohists and school of names. Before this, it likely goes back to the Confucian rectification of names, or cheng ming, a term Shen Buhai's fragments still used even if the later Han Feizi contrasts with it.
Liu Xiang recounts Shen Buhai's book as advocating Method rather than punishment. An early bureaucratic pioneer, Shen Buhai was not so much more advanced as he was more focused on bureaucracy. Though not its only example, the Han Feizi's discussion of Method in Chapter 43 provides a basic explanation for Shu, saying: "Method is to confer office in accordance with a candidate's capabilities; to hold achievement accountable to claim ; and to examine the ability of the assembled ministers." Though having a meritocratic goal, and at least potentially filtering ministers meritocratically, as presented by Han Fei Shu's central principle may have been Xing-Ming as accountability "more than anything else".
The Han Feizi's Xing-Ming method was likely the most 'mechanically' complex example of its kind for the period. Xun Kuang often has more specific criteria for the appointment of officials, but the Han Feizi's methods are "quite detailed." In this regard, the late Warring States theories of Xun Kuang and the Mohists were still far more generalized. Compared with Shen Buhai and the earlier Confucians, accountability is much more developed in the Han Feizi at the end of the Warring States period. Holding ministers accountable for their proposals, actions and performance, the Han Feizi ultimately names individual ministers to roles, forming into explicit roles to be performed by the ministers.
While Shen Buhai's has ideas corresponding more with matching proposals with duties, the late Guanzi has an example which A.C. Graham took as becoming closer to Han Fei's doctrine, ultimately matching office titles and duties.
With their doctrines scarcely visible in the early Han outside the Mawangdui silk texts, according to the Shiji, the practice emerged again under the Daoistic Emperor Wen of Han and his trusted ministers, but "cautious, unobtrusive and firm", more akin to Shen Buhai than Han Fei. Attributed back to Shen Buhai, it becomes the term for secretaries who had charge of records in penal decisions by the Han dynasty. With an early meaning of form, model or regulation, and fewer words in the Warring States period, the meaning of Xing is gradually lost as punishment.
By the later Han, scholars less knowledgeable than Liu Xiang were not always aware that Shen Buhai and Shang Yang differed. Early connected with Shen Buhai and school of names type figures as Method, Xing-Ming is sometimes used to refer to a combination of Shang Yang and Han Fei by the Han dynasty. Despite a potential contribution of its meritocratic ideas to the founding of the Imperial Examination, the meaning of Xing would ultimately be confused and lost in conflation with punishment by the time of the Western Qin, sometimes as early as the third century's Eastern Han. Likely unable to interpret the term, they become "the school of punishments" after the fall of the Han dynasty. Jin Zhuo would take it as a combination, and split it, assigning the Xingmingjia School of Forms and Names as the Mingjia School of Names, and those already classified as Fajia legalists as the Xingjia or school of punishments.

Xing-Ming (Daoism)

Informally associated by the Han Feizi with Laozi, the Han Feizi traces its specific idea of Xing-Ming back to Shen Buhai, likely going back to the name and reality debates of the Later Mohists, Xingming school of forms and names, and Confucian rectification of names, whose terms Shen Buhai still used even if the Han Fei contrasts with them. With the Qin's Book of Lord Shang only visibly intersecting central Chinese tradition with the Han Feizi, something akin to what Sima Qian termed a Huang-Lao "Daoism" would theoretically grow to dominance among the Chinese officialdom by the time of the Qin dynasty.
Sima Qian pairs the two, saying "Shenzi was rooted in Huang-Lao and prioritized xingming." Sima Tan criticizes strict administrative practices in favor of his Daoism, but Han Fei does not develop mechanically strict Xing-Ming until the end of the Warring States period. Sima Tan clearly includes Xing-Ming as part of his Dao school, in less technical terms.
Contrasting with Laozi, Han Fei and Qin break from a Huang-Lao Daoist Xing-Ming focusing on a Way of Heaven based on an inner reason of laws, inasmuch they are more concerned with law as a means of control than whether it accords with a Way of Heaven. Han Fei refers to a Way of the Ruler or Sovereign. Shen Dao, the Huangdi Sijing, and Laozi still referred to a more conceptually "naturalist" Way of Heaven, and Shen Buhai's doctrine, with the Huainanzi it likely influenced, still believed in "not interfering with the natural tendency of names and affairs to manage themselves."
Together with a Huang-Lao tradition placing greater emphasis on fa, Sima Qian may have paired Laozi and Zhuangzi with Shen Buhai and Han Fei because the latter two "prioritized xingming", important in the recovered texts. The Sijing considering matching realities with speech and the "names" of things an important part of "implementing the Way of Heaven", both in administrative and more general terms. While the Han Feizi's Way of the Ruler may not as directly emphasize concepts of Yin Yang, the Huangdi Sijing does. Analyzing Yin and Yang to ensure reliable results, it similarly matches "names" and "realities" as a practical way to appoint, monitor, and assess ministers.
Though by its own statements the Zhuangzi generally favors self cultivation, differing "dramatically" from prior chapters, the Outer Zhuangzi's Chapter 13 "Way of Heaven" gives secondary places to Xing-Ming administrative ideas akin to Shen Buhai. Emphasizing priorities in-order of wu wei, dao, de, benevolence, appointment and investigation, and finally reward and punishment, A.C. Graham interpreted its hierarchy as emphasizing the wu wei reduced activity of the ruler, mainly criticizing those who reverse its priorities. Not fully "Daoist" as later later understood, it would generally be taken as reflecting early Huang-Lao or "syncretist" thought.
The Huainanzi's Zhushu, which Goldin translates as "Taking Shu as One's Ruler" or "Esteeming Technique", conveys naturalistic ideas akin to Shen Buhai in the same sense Liu Xiang recalled him, as "to follow and comply, and delegate responsibilities to one's subordinates."

Way of the Ruler

While the Han Feizi includes ideas of law, Laozi's fa is usually translated as still referring to general standards or models. Laozi and Zhuangzi generally lacked and even opposed law because they did not regard words and names as "sufficient to express the Way", Laozi saying that "the name that can be named is not the constant name." However, A.C. Graham sees this as meaning not that words are useless, but only that they are imperfect descriptors. The work balances inadequacies using opposites.
The Han Feizi's commentaries on Laozi are a critique. For Han Fei, "names" refer to things like ministerial proposals, or "titles", so that Shen Buhai's concept of "names" can critique Laozi, at least for the Han Feizi's purposes. The Han Feizi's chapter 5 Zhudao or "Way of the Ruler" follows up Laozi, recalling Shen Buhai in parallel style with an idea of names "rectifying themselves". Pairing "names" or proposals with "forms" or results, results serve as a standard of comparison for claims, forming bureaucratic functions of opposing processes. Though not included amongst Sima Qian's short list of chapters, he may have considered Han Fei to be "rooted" in Huang-Lao based on Chapter 5's conception of the Way, including ideas of the Way as a standard and hints of metaphysics.
Though the Han Feizi's chapters five or eight are not as academic as later commentaries in trying to illustrate the Daodejing's actual meaning, using Laozi for its own purposes is similar to other early commentaries like the Xiang'er. Compared with Laozi, the Han Feizi's "Way of the Ruler" has much less ambiguous language, promoting "the ruler's quiescence", "practical recommendations" and the management of ministers rather than a Daoist way of life or metaphysics. But it "affirms the primacy of the dao", recalling a passage from Laozi with the Way as the origin of the world. It follows recalling Shen Buhai, whose ruler followed the 'natural order' or Way, responding rather than acting himself, or wu wei.
In "strictly practical" terms, Shen Buhai, Shen Dao or Han Fei might loosely be thought of as originating in a Daoistic 'way in thought' in the sense of governmental models "derived from Dao", which Han Fei ultimately supplants with law. Laozi, Zhuangzi, Shen Buhai or Sima Qian did not generally advocate laws, but the recovered Mawangdui Silk Texts Huangdi Sijing did emphasizes standards as including law. As the first sentence of the work, its Jingfa text regards the Dao as generating standards, with arguments more comparable to natural law. "Huang-Lao" would theoretically differ in still seeking more to conform law with the Way.
Shen Buhai, Han Fei, and Sima Tan' preferably 'inactive' ruler contracts an assembly of ministers, correlating Ming such as job proposals with the Xing "forms", "shapes" or results that they take. With early examples in Shen Buhai, several of the Mawangdui silk texts bear resemblance to Han Fei's Chapter 5 discussion of Xing-Ming and its "brilliant ruler", as do other eclectic Huang-Lao typified works, like the Guanzi, Huainanzi, and Sima Qian's Shiji.

Eradicating punishments

In the period preceding unification, Qin laws diverged significantly from ideas espoused in Book of Lord Shang : while retaining Shang Yang's reforms, the Qin abandoned his anti-Confucianism and strict, harsh penal policy, and ultimately his heavy emphasis on agriculture. After Shang Yang, King Huiwen of Qin is attested as having pardoned the death penalty in a case involving murder, based on Confucian ethics. Sima Qian depicts Qin Shi Huang as emphasising law and order, praising himself as a "sage ruler of benevolence and righteousness ... who cares for and pities the common people". A major reform of the primarily administrative Qin dynasty focuses on restraining ministers, instituting office divisions that cannot punish at will.
Translator Yuri Pines takes the final chapter of the Shangjunshu as reflecting the administrative practices of the late pre-imperial and Imperial Qin dynasty, aligning with knowledge of Qin governance. Although written as an interview with Shang Yang, its recommendations would have been too sophisticated for his time. The chapter proposes setting up offices of strictly trained legal experts at the central, provincial, and local levels, tasked with answering all questions posed by the people and officials. With the degrees of minor officials kept simpler, responses would be strictly controlled through double-entry registration, with one half given to the inquirer, and the other filed in sealed archives for retrieval. Cases would have to be judged in accordance with the previous responses.
Though intended more to promulgate the law and governance of the sovereign than safeguard the rights of citizens in a modern sense, it requires their cooperation. Protecting the people from ministerial abuse becomes more important than punishing them. Taken as universally beneficial, in an attempt to achieve the "blessed eradication of punishments through punishments", clear laws are taught that the people can use against ministers abusing the statutes. Punishing the ministers according to the penalties of the statute abused, archival corruption by the legal experts could be punishable up to the death penalty. Han Fei makes similar recommendations, but compared with the late part of the Shangjunshu he may not yet have developed the idea or concern of legal mechanisms for protecting people from the bureaucrats, he is more focused on accomplishing order through the administrative power of the ruler.
If, as depicted, at least part of the Han Feizi dates to the late Warring States period, the Shangjunshu could have circulated on the eve of unification. The work's adoption by the Han Feizi can give the appearance of a living current for the old harsh punishments of Shang Yang that can mistakenly be imposed backward. Een if the Shangjunshu only passingly suggests that a need for punishment would pass away, the Qin nonetheless abandoned Shang Yang's heavy punishments. The Book of Lord Shang itself is not a homogeneous ideology, but shifts substantially over its development. As the work's first reference, the Han Feizi recalls its earlier Chapter 4, saying:
Despite what might be assumed from associated texts, the Qin "were not extraordinarily severe for their time", and form a continuity with the early Han dynasty, abolishing mutilations in 167 BCE. In the heavy degrees of punishment, the Qin's mutilating punishments include tattooing, nose cutting, and foot cutting, but the latter two are only mentioned infrequently, decreasing over time. Heavy labor is most common. After sentence, mutilating punishments in the Qin and early Han were then commonly pardoned or redeemed in exchange for fines, labor or one to several aristocratic ranks, even up to the death penalty. Depending on severity and circumstances, sentencing may skip over mutilating punishment directly to a mutually preferential sentence of labor, thereafter potentially pardoning them into a period of borderlands military defense service.
Not the most common punishments, the Qin's mutilating punishment likely exist in part to create labor in agriculture, husbandry, workshops, and wall building. Replacing mutilation at lower level heavy punishment, labor from one to five years becomes the common heavy punishment in early Imperial China, generally in building roads and canals, with only a minority going to build the Great Wall. As a component of general colonization, the most common heavier punishment becomes expulsion to the new colonies, with exile considered a heavy punishment. The Han engage in the same practice, transferring criminals to the frontiers for military service, with Emperor Wu and later emperors recruiting men sentenced to death for expeditionary armies. Dong Zhongshu criticizes the Qin for failing to punish criminals, but exile itself as a heavy punishment in ancient China dates back to at least the Spring and Autumn period.
Han-era writer Dong Zhongshu considered Qin officials and taxes severe, but did not characterise punishments as such; in fact, Dong criticized the Qin system for its inability to punish criminals. Aiming to reduce punishment to a minimum, the idea of redemption can be found in the Analects of Confucius, attempting to ensure a correct application of the rectification of names.

Han Feizi

For Han Fei, the power structure is unable to tolerate an autonomous ministerial practice of reward and punishment. Han Fei mainly targets ministerial infringements. A main argument by the Han Feizi's for punishment by standards, Chapter 7's The Two Handles, is that delegating reward and punishment to ministers has led to an erosion of power and collapse of states in his era, and should be monopolized, using severe punishment in an attempt to abolish ministerial infringements, and therefore punishment. Monopolization can be considered a core of Han Fei's practice of fa laws and methods, aiming to prevent usurpation.
Mostly concerned with the ministers, Han Fei does not regard the people as an enemy, as the earlier part of the Book of Lord Shang did. The Han Feizi occasionally even has ideas of public good. "Preventing the strong from exploiting the weak" will benefit the sage ruler Han Fei addresses, but also the elderly and the orphan. While Han Fei believes that a benevolent government that does not punish will harm the law, and create confusion, he also believes that a violent and tyrannical ruler will create an irrational government, with conflict and rebellion. For this reason, the Han Feizi also opposes corvée, with hardship turning the people toward powerful ministers to the detriment of the ruler and state.
Shen Dao, the first member of Han Fei's triad between the figures in the later chapters, never suggests kinds of punishments, as that was not the point. The point in Shen Dao's framework was that it would involve the ruler too much to decide them personally, exposing him to resentment. The ruler should decide punishments using fa standards. Han Fei does not suggest kinds of punishments either, and would not seem to care about punishment as retribution itself. He only cares whether they work, and therefore end punishments.
Although "benevolence and righteousness" may simply be "glittering words", other means can potentially be included. While recalling Shang Yang, Han Fei places a more equal emphasis on reward to encourage people and produce good results; punishment for him was secondary to simply controlling ministers through techniques. Although these could be expected to include espionage in his time, they consisted primarily simply in written agreements.

Justice

Emphasizing a dichotomy between the people and state, the Book of Lord Shang in particular has been regarded as anti-people, with alienating statements that a weak people makes a strong military. But, such statements are concentrated in a few chapters, and the work does still vacillate against ministerial abuses. Michael Loewe still regarded the laws as primarily concerned with peace and order. They were harsh in Shang Yang's time, mainly out of hope that people will no longer dare to break them.
Sima Qian argues the Qin dynasty, relying on rigorous laws, as nonetheless insufficiently rigorous for a completely consistent practice, suggesting them as not having always delivered justice as others understood it. From a modern perspective, it is "impossible" to deny at least the "'basic' justice of Qin laws". Rejecting the whims of individual ministers in favor of clear protocols, and insisting on forensic examinations, for an ancient society they are ultimately more definable by fairness than cruelty.
With contradicting evidences, as a last resort, officials could rely on beatings, but had to be reported and compared with evidence, and cannot actually punish without confession. With administration and judiciary not separated in ancient societies, the Qin develop the idea of the judge magistrate as a detective, emerging in the culture of early Han dynasty theater with judges as detectives aspiring to truth as justice.
Inasmuch as Han Fei has modernly been related with the idea of justice, he opposes the early Confucian idea that ministers should be immune to penal law. With an at least incidental concern for the people, the Han Feizi is "adamant that blatant manipulation and subversion of law to the detriment of the state and ruler should never be tolerated":

Legacy

Chapters 43 and 40 of the Han Feizi shaped an early modern elementalizing view of Shen Buhai as focused on Shu, Shen Dao on Shi, and Shang Yang on law, uncritically taking the Han Feizi as superseding the others. But Shen Dao's fragments suggest he was also focused more on fa.
Legalism has been cited by scholars and commentators as having ideological influence on the current governance of the People's [Republic of China |People's Republic of China]. Deng Xiaoping's slogan "a cat is a good cat if it can catch rats, no matter it is a white or a black cat" can at least be compared with the Han Feizi.