Modern Asian Studies (2024), 58, 1017–1042 doi:10.1017/S0026749X24000155 RESEARCH ARTICLE Serving All-under-Heaven: Cosmopolitan intellectuals of the Warring States period Yuri Pines Department of Asian Studies, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Email: yuri.pines@mail.huji.ac.il (Received 11 March 2024; revised 16 March 2024; accepted 25 March 2024) Abstract Qin imperial unification in 221 bce is often conceived of as the ‘unification of China’. Although from the long-term perspective of Chinese history this view is surely valid, it obscures some of the major trends of the Warring States period (453–221 bce). Back then, the Zhou (‘Chinese’) world was moving in the direction of the internal consolidation of large territorial states amid increasing political and cultural separation from their neighbours. This process unmistak- ably recalls similar developments in early modern Europe, where, as is well known, these resulted in the formation of nation-states. In China, by contrast, the development trajectory was markedly different. The potential transformation of the competing Warring States into fully fledged separate entities never materialized. The unified empire was eventually accepted as the sole legitimate solution to political turmoil, whereas individual states were denied the right to exist. Why, despite strong parallels, did the Chinese development trajectory ultimately diverge so conspicuously from what happened in modern Europe? In search of an answer, this article focuses on the extraordinary role played by politi- cally active intellectuals of the Warring States period. By prioritizing the common good of ‘All-under-Heaven’ over that of an individual polity, by denigrating local identities, and by rejecting the legitimacy of regional states, these intellectuals paved the way for the political unification of the Zhou world long before it occurred. This article addresses the idealistic and egoistic reasons for this choice and explores the cosmopolitan undertones of the universalist outlook of the Warring States-period intellectuals. Keywords: Chu; cosmopolitanism; identities; intellectuals; Qin; Warring States; Zhou Introduction Speaking of cosmopolitanism in the Zhou 周 era (circa 1046–255 bce) may sound odd to many. All too often it is assumed that the early Xia 夏 or Huaxia 華夏 (‘Chinese’) were self-centred, proud in their tradition, and despised the aliens as culturally and morally deficient. 1 For sure, we do not expect to discover among them the respect 1 For a recent reiteration of this view, see, for example, R. B. Ford, Rome, China, and the barbarians: Ethnographic traditions and the transformation of empires (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020). © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X24000155 Published online by Cambridge University Press