Which Confucianism and How Democracy: On Sungmoon Kim’s Confucian Democratic Theory

Sungmoon Kim is a paradigm case of a Confucian pragmatic democrat whose commitment is to democracy. This paper argues that Kim’s overall Confucian political philosophy project faces the following three challenges. The first challenge is about Kim’s reading of early Confucian texts, such as his reading of Mengzi and Xunzi . The second challenge deals with Kim’s understanding of the relationship between Confucianism and democracy. The third challenge is about the distinctiveness of Kim’s Confucian democracy.