This paper discusses crisis from the standpoint of philosophical ideas. It argues that philosophy, as a structure of our deep understanding of the world, has been derailed by metaphysics of things for a long time, and claims that a philosophical turn to a metaphysics of facts might be a useful tool to rethink the problems of the world. It considers ‘‘relational rationality’’ as a key theoretical feature to change human coexistence, and conceives coexistence as prior to individual existence. It finally discusses the relations between human duties or obligations and rights.

This paper presents an overall view of the Philosophy of Tian-xia, a particular form of neo-universalism developed by its author and very much debated in the last years. The system of Tian-xia, or ‘all-under-heaven’, is a philosophical re-elaboration of an ancient form of Chinese universalism. The world is constituted as a global unity and a basic concept of political philosophy. It aims at a world institution as a way to rethink all problems in the world as problems of the world. Zhao Tingyang has analytically developed this view in some recent publications in Chinese. This article represents the most recent attempt to provide a synthetic view of his philosophy of ‘all-under-heaven’.