section_path: East Asian philosophies/Chinese/Legalism
section_name: Legalism
paragraph_text: Legalism
  
  Legalism (法家， pinyin: Fǎjiā; school of "methods" or "standards") was a philosophical tradition which focused on laws, realpolitik, and bureaucratic management. Largely ignoring morality or idealized views of how society should be, they focused on the pragmatic government through the power of the autocrat and state. Their goal was to achieve increased order, security, and stability. They were initially influenced by Mohist ideas. A key figure of this school was administrator and political philosopher Shen Buhai (c. 400–337 BCE). Another central figure, Shang Yang (390–338 BCE), was a leading statesman and reformer who transformed the Qin state into the dominant power that conquered the rest of China in 221 BCE. Shen's successor Han Fei (c. 280–233 BCE) synthesized the thought of the other Legalists in his eponymous text, the Han Feizi, one of the most influential Legalist texts which was used by successive Chinese statesmen and rulers as a guide for statesmanship and bureaucratic organization of the imperial state.