Upright: Zheng 正 and the Semantics of Political Legitimacy
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
7-22-2026
Abstract
This article examines the semantic structure of the left-right political binary in contemporary Anglophone discourse. It argues that the fusion of “right” as directional orientation with “right” as moral correctness produces a form of semantic over-determination that complicates the articulation of democratic legitimacy in periods of political crisis. The claim is not that directional metaphors determine political outcomes, but that they furnish a discursive resource that can be mobilized in struggles over authority, order, and rectitude. To illuminate the contingency of this fusion, the article turns to the East Asian concept of zheng 正 (uprightness), whose semantic independence from handedness reveals that the association between direction and correctness is historically specific rather than conceptually necessary. Rather than proposing zheng as a replacement for the left-right political vocabulary, the article develops it as a diagnostic lens through which to distinguish questions of moral correctness, political legitimacy, and political orientation that English tends to conflate. By placing the Confucian doctrine of zhengming (Rectification of Names) into dialogue with contemporary democratic discourse, the article argues that the comparative value of zheng lies less in offering an alternative political language than in exposing the contingency of our own. It concludes that comparative political philosophy can contribute to democratic self-understanding not by replacing existing vocabularies but by making their underlying conceptual architecture newly visible.