This article focuses on the criteria of "non-quotation, dialogical discourse with a central theme" and "the central theme being the governance measures that rulers should adopt." It selects texts from the Chu bamboo slips, specifically from the collections "Chu Bamboo Slips Preserved in Tsinghua University (Volume 8)" and "Chu Bamboo Slips Preserved in Tsinghua University (Volume 9)." These texts include chapters such as "The Position of the State," "The Way of the World," "The Way of Governing the State," and "The Way of Governance." They all discuss from different perspectives how rulers should govern their countries.
Based on the content, the compilers and many researchers have put forward their views on the affiliation of these texts to different schools of thought. For example, "The Position of the State" is related to the Mohist school, while "The Way of Governance" is related to the Confucian school. After providing interpretations and explanations of the vocabulary in each chapter, this article also presents different perspectives. It aims to discuss the political thoughts and development of this political ideology that once circulated in the Chu region. Additionally, it attempts to compare and analyze the political thoughts and measures of different schools of thought found in the content with those in surviving classical texts. Through these analyses, it seeks to explore viewpoints that differ from those of previous scholars and provide new perspective for the study of pre-Qin political thoughts for future researchers.