ABSTRACT
Sound has a long history in political theory and practice. Starting with three thinkers from Ancient China, Confucius, Mencius, and Lu Buwei, “Prelude” examines the role of hearing in assessing the governance of a state and the well-being of its people, and in forming relationships between a ruler and their subjects. Using one of Lu’s admonitions, auditory theorist Pierre Schafer pronounces the danger that rulers face by not listening and ignoring crucial auditory socio-political cues. Following these Chinese theorists, Jacques Attali’s theory of noise – that noise becoming music presages changes in social formations – is applied to ask: what can be said of a nation that sonically communicates through noise?
