Through a case study on Korea’s Joseon dynasty, the primary purpose of this article is to uncover the Confucian foundation of public sector welfare in the kingdom era of East Asia’s history and to discuss the unlikelihood of realizing Confucian idealism in a pre-industrial country that was experiencing cycles of poverty and natural disasters. To this end, this article answers the following research questions: What are the central philosophical and political ideas of Confucianism? In what ways are the Confucian concepts of wangdao politics and datong society related to public sector welfare? How did Joseon’s minbon (minben in Chinese) ideology influence the establishment of its public welfare system? What were the main attributes and programs of Joseon’s welfare institutions? Finally, why did Confucian idealism fail to materialize in Joseon?