<論説>高麗睿宗朝における意思決定の構造

Abstract

In the Koryo state, which was established in the Korean peninsula in 918, the people were ruled by a kind of monarchy, but that monarchy was not necessarily a despotic one. The king respected the opinion of the ruling classes and often called meetings to consult with such aristocratic officials as the councillors 宰臣・樞密, attendants of the fourth grade and upward 侍臣四品以上, and officials of the third grade and upward 文武三品以上. A state in which some fifty or so men guided the decisions of the king in important manners can still of course be called despotic, but considering the respect that the king accorded to the consensus of the ruling classes, this form of monarchy might better be regarded as an aristocratic than a despotic one. This characteristic feature was not peculiar to the Koryo state but was true of all dynasties established on the Korean peninsula. In this paper the writer takes as material a series of wars with the Jurchens in the tweifth century, and with an eye towards the formal bureaucratic strusture intends to formulate an explanation of the structure of decision in the Koryo state.