Meaning and purpose of the word 遣

Question

1. 老闆派李先生去代表公司談判

The boss dispatches Mr. lee to represent the company in negotiations.

2. 老闆派遣李先生去代表公司談判

The boss dispatches Mr. lee to represent the company in negotiations.

Both sentences mean exactly the same thing and are grammatically correct, except of course the second sentence adds 遣. So what exactly is the purpose of this word? The dictionary says it means dispatch, 派遣 as a phrase means dispatch, but from my vantage point the first sentence conveys the exact same meaning and to me is 100% understandable. When I see the second sentence, I don't really get the function of the word 遣.

Answer 1

派 means "designate(指定)".

遣 means "send(送)".

派遣 - designate and send someone somewhere for a mission.

Answer 2

I think that the two sentences can be used in almost the same context, but can have a slightly different emphasis.

The word 派 seems not to include any real idea of movement by itself, so to get the meaning "send to represent," you have to pair it with 去 or some other movement verb. For example, to say "send a delegation to the conference," you can say 派代表团出席大会, because 出席 will give the meaning of movement.

If you just want to say, "send a delegation," then 派代表团 doesn't work as well, since 派 gives only the meaning of "appointing" or "assigning (a task)" and not the meaning of sending. Here it might be better to say 派遣代表团 to cover both the meaning of "forming" a delegation and of "sending it off."

If you use both 遣 and another verb of motion, I think this really brings out the qualitative aspects of 遣 which seems to be used in this meaning mostly for the acts of commanders and governments and not so much for simply sending a company representative somewhere.

Answer 3

遣 means "send" in the sense of "commanding someone to go somewhere to do something", e.g. send an army or send a messenger.

Send a human under order to go on a mission somewhere else is called 遣(sent) or 派 (sent). You cannot 遣 or 派 a cow anywhere because a cow would not understand your command

Answer 4

It is hard to tell, without further context, whether this sentence refers to an event in the past or an event which has not yet happened, an event in the future. Therefore, use either sent or is sending.

dispatch has a sense of urgency, I think send is sufficient here.

I would only use dispatches if I were reporting an event in the past:

So, the boss dispatches Li, but Li gets drunk ....

老闆派李先生去代表公司談判。
(The) boss sent / is sending 李先生 to negotiate on behalf of the company.

A friend said: 就是感觉（派遣）不对， 派遣 feels wrong. She could not exactly say why. Maybe what Mou said, a sense of urgency and force is associated with 派遣

老闆派遣李先生去代表公司談判。