Abstract

Continued from the previous paper(Cho, 1995) regarding Hsun Tzu's theory of human nature, this article aimed at extracting some psychological lessons from Hsun Tzu's theory of the proper conduct(Li, 禮). Hsun Tzu proposed that because human beings are social and gregarious in nature and gregarious living inevitably bring about conflict and struggle among members, the system of prevention of these struggle (Li) is needed. The first and foremost function of Li is division of human classes and roles. Hsun Tzu viewed that human beings live together peacefully through these division, because it brings each of them contentment with his/her lot. From Hsun Tzu's theory of the proper conduct like this, the author derived two research issues and discussed their psychological implications: the study on the theory of social relation-ships(which is different from the perspective of social exchange theory) and the study on the distributive justice.