Yumin zhengce
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Yumin zhengce | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese name | |||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 愚民政策 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Korean name | |||||||||
| Hangul | 우민정책 | ||||||||
| Hanja | 愚民政策 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Japanese name | |||||||||
| Kanji | 愚民政策 | ||||||||
| Kana | ぐみんせいさく | ||||||||
| |||||||||
Yumin zhengce (Chinese: 愚民政策; pinyin: yúmín zhèngcè, lit. 'policy to keep the masses stupid') is a chengyu and concept in Chinese political philosophy.
The term refers to the practice of a government deliberately keeping its population in a state of ignorance in order to make them more obedient to political authority and too incompetent to form effective rebellions against the state, thus rendering them more easily subjugated. A fundamental idea held that by limiting the population's literacy their thoughts could be limited as well.
The systematization of yumin zhengce has been attributed to Shang Yang, a statesman of the State of Qin.[1] The 3rd century BC Book of Lord Shang states that "[when] the masses are kept ignorant, they are thus [made] easy to control" (民愚則易治也).[2]