Considering, Questioning and Reimagining Harmony

Are harmony and disruption mutually exclusive? This collection critically examines the concept of harmony and its association with perfection.

Harmony is pursued by individuals, families, societies and nations as a fundamental value. Yet it often comes at the cost of freedom, creativity and individuality. This book explores ways in which it may be misleading to regard harmony as opposed to difference or to think that harmony and disruption are independent.

Featuring examples of historically and culturally diverse perspectives of harmony, an international line-up of contributors reflect on ideas from ancient Greek, Chinese, Indian and Japanese thought. They draw on modern and contemporary thinkers and from music and design perspectives. The range of historical and cultural reflections make it possible to re-imagine the concept and practice of harmony, either by incorporating a role for disruption, or by recognising a dynamic in which disruption balances the overreach of harmony.

By including historically and culturally diverse perspectives of harmony to widen the horizons of consideration, this collection present a more inclusive understanding of this major philosophical and political concept.

Karyn Lai is Professor of Philosophy at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. Her research in Chinese philosophy engages Chinese and Western philosophical traditions. She is author of Introduction to Chinese Philosophy (2nd ed., 2017), which has been translated into Chinese, Korean and Portuguese.

Rick Benitez is Emeritus Professor in Philosophy at the University of Sydney. He studied Classics and Philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin. He is an editor (with Karyn Lai and Hyun Jin Kim) of Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy (Bloomsbury, 2019).

Chenyang Li is Professor of philosophy at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, where he founded the philosophy program. He is the author of The Tao Encounters the West: Explorations in Comparative Philosophy (1999), The Confucian Philosophy of Harmony (2013), Reshaping Confucianism: A Progressive Inquiry (2023) and over 100 essays.