New Book Launch — Tianxia and Its Discontents: Confucian Political Theology, Coloniality, and the Global Order
Author: Joyce C.H. Liu | Routledge, June 2026
Time | September 16, 2026 (Wednesday) 14:00–16:00
(Please join the meeting on time at 14:00.)
Language | Mandarin Chinese
Speaker | Joyce C.H. Liu
Researcher and Director, International Center for Cultural Studies, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU)
Professor, International Master's Program in Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, NYCU
Professor Emeritus, NYCU
Moderator | Allen Chun
Former Research Fellow, Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica
Professor, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Program, NYCU
Researcher, International Center for Cultural Studies, NYCU
Discussant | Chih-Ming Wang
Research Fellow and Deputy Director, Institute of European and American Studies, Academia Sinica
Jointly Appointed Associate Professor, Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies, NYCU
Is "Tianxia" (All-Under-Heaven) ultimately a civilizational ideal, or a colonial vision?
In recent years, the "Tianxia System" has been widely advocated as a Confucian cosmopolitan alternative to the Western international order. Tianxia and Its Discontents offers a critical response to this premise. Author Joyce C.H. Liu argues that "Tianxia" is not about civilizational inclusiveness, but rather a political theological mechanism that legitimizes imperial order through the "Mandate of Heaven." The dual operation of the Confucian-Legalist disposition—Confucian moralizing discourse and Legalist disciplinary techniques—collectively forms the governance core of the imperial Tianxia: cosmicization, moralization, universalization, hierarchical differentiation, disciplinization, and "exterior-less-ness" (wu-wai, having no outside). While having no outside superficially implies universal inclusion, it comes at the cost of erasing differences and dissent.
This book further traces the historical transformation of "Tianxia": from the imperial ritual and tributary system, through the turn of colonial modernity, to the digital Tianxia of the 21st century. Algorithmic surveillance, the governance interfaces of super-platforms, and the global expansion of digital infrastructure have allowed the governance logic of the imperial Tianxia to reassemble in technological forms, perpetuating coloniality under a new guise.
Confronting this structure, the book opens up a different intellectual position through the concept of "Yu" (the remainder/surplus) from Fang Yizhi's Yi Yu (The Remainder of the I Ching). "Yu" is not a fixed, unchanging surplus outside the established order. Instead, it constantly manifests itself in places that the central vision cannot encompass, emerging through processes of mutation, interaction, and intricate entanglement. Fang Yizhi’s philosophy of "knowing principles through things" (yin wu zhi ze) identifies the invisible propensities and rationales at the intersections of things, thereby unsettling the singular, universalized vision of Tianxia.
The final part of the book turns to artistic decolonization: Xu Bing redeploys waste materials and traces of labor; Wu Tien-chang brings the shame and trauma internalized from colonial history to the surface; and Chen Chieh-jen uses the figures of female factory workers and migrant workers to summon back the lives excluded by the global capitalist order. All three artists remobilize materiality, memory, and perception from the position of "Yu," rendering the life experiences suppressed by colonial structures visible once again.
Situated at the intersection of Confucian political philosophy, postcolonial theory, political theology, and cultural studies, this book proposes a highly original conceptual framework. It holds profound academic significance for understanding contemporary China's global discourse and the future direction of Asian critical theory.
About the Author
Joyce C.H. Liu holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is currently a Researcher and the Director of the International Center for Cultural Studies at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU). Her research fields encompass political philosophy, psychoanalysis, visual culture, and Chinese political thought. She has long been dedicated to integrating critical theory with intellectual history analysis, exploring the formation of East Asian modernity, the historical transformation of Chinese political thought, and its connections to the contemporary global order, digital governance, and infrastructural politics.
She has received the Outstanding Research Award from the National Science and Technology Council (formerly the Ministry of Science and Technology) along with multiple academic publishing awards. In recent years, she has directed the Ministry of Education's Higher Education Sprout Project "Conflict, Justice, Decolonization," the CHCI-Mellon Global Humanities Institute "Migration, Logistics and Unequal Citizens in Contemporary Global Context," and has promoted the Transit Asia Research Network (TARN). Her major publications include Orphan, Goddess, and Negative Writing (2000), The Topology of the Psyche (2011), One Divides Into Two (2020), Topology of Mentalités (2023), and Tianxia and Its Discontents (Routledge, 2026).
Organizers and Funding
Organizer | International Center for Cultural Studies (ICCS) Sub-project I: "Geopolitics and Cultural Economy among Social Regions in the Greater China System" & Sub-project V: "Contemporary China: Psychiatric Issues, Affective Education, and Historical Narratives"
Funding Source | Higher Education Sprout Project, Ministry of Education
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