The system was designed such that the sovereign would directly allot land to his people (peasants) without any intervention by powerful regional clans, the intermediate rulers between the sovereign and the people; in this, the system came very close to the Confucian ideal.
王が自らの支配する土地を、自らが支配する人民（百姓）へ直接（中間支配者である豪族を介さずに）班給するというものであり、儒教的な理想を多分に含んでいた。