About this Book

The Choson state is often cited as one of the rare instances in which a polity was proclaimed on the basis of a specific ideology. But the state's adherence to the doctrines of the Ch'eng-Chu school of Neo-Confucianism did not mean that all members of the ruling elite agreed on doctrinal matters or that non-Confucian worldviews were totally discarded.

The six chapters in this volume investigate the shifting boundaries between the Choson state and the adherents of Confucianism, Buddhism, Christianity, and popular religions from the late sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries. Each of the six chapters seeks to define the meaning and the constitutive elements of the hegemonic group and a particular community -- some of which were part of the mainstream and others of which were marginalized communities -- in the Confucian state. The contributors argue that the power of each group and the space it occupied were determined by a dynamic interaction of ideology, governmental policies, and the group's self-perceptions and that each relationship was continuously recalibrated and adjusted.

Collectively, the papers in the volume counter the static view of the Korean Confucian state, elucidate its relationship to the wider Confucian community and religious groups, and suggest new views of the complex way in which each negotiated and adjusted its ideology and practices in response to the state's activities.