By 1900 the prognosis for the Qing Dynasty had deteriorated from poor to critical. It had survived massive peasant revolts, military defeats at the hands of the British, French, and Japanese, and a series of one-sided treaties that made a mockery of China’s self-image as the world’s greatest power. But the government was doing little more than surviving. In 1898, a desperate attempt to revamp government, encourage education, promote agriculture and commerce, and strengthen the armed forces resulted in a flurry of decrees from the Guangxu emperor during the period known as the One Hundred Days’ Reforms. The emperor’s efforts, however, were scuttled by court reactionaries led by the Empress Dowager Cixi. Cixi then lent her support to the anti-foreign secret societies known as the Boxers, who in 1899 went on a rampage against foreigners and Chinese Christians and in 1900 besieged the foreign embassies in Beijing. The Boxer Rebellion was suppressed by a multi-national force, and China was forced to accept another humiliating treaty—one that included an indemnity of $333 million. Support for the government virtually disappeared, and many intellectuals, students, generals, secret society members, and Chinese living abroad began plotting the downfall of the Qing.The leading revolutionary was Sun Yat-sen, a man far different from previous Chinese reformers. Born to a poor rural family near Guangzhou, Sun was educated in Hawaiian and Chinese missionary schools and developed a worldview more Western than Confucian. Galled by China’s military impotence and Qing ineptitude, in 1894 he founded the secret Revive China Society, which in 1895 laid plans to overthrow the government. The plot was uncovered, and Sun was forced into exile. After sixteen years of traveling, planning, writing, and organizing, his hopes for radical change were realized when the revolution that ended the Qing era broke out in 1911.
On his return to China from the United States, he was elected provisional president of the United Provinces of China on December 30, 1911. Sun’s moment of glory was short-lived. Without an armed force or an organized political party to back him up, Sun resigned as president in 1912 in favor of the military strongman Yuan Shikai, who one year later sent Sun into exile as part of his plan to establish a dictatorship. Sun returned to Guangzhou in 1917 and attempted to establish a parliamentary government, but by then China had descended into the chaos of warlord rule. When Sun died in 1925, the prospects of national unity and orderly government for China still seemed dim.
In the document I would like you to read (you can read it by clicking here), Sun presents an early formulation of his “three people’s principles,” which served as the ideology of the United League, and organization he founded in 1905 in Tokyo that combined members of Chinese secret societies, overseas Chinese groups, and Chinese students in Japan. When the United League joined several other groups to form the Guomindang, or Nationalist, party in 1912, Sun’s three principles provided the platform for the new party. Sun presented the following analysis of his three principles in a speech to the United League in Tokyo in 1906 to help celebrate the first anniversary of the League’s publication, Min Pao (The People’s Journal).
After you have read excerpts from Sun’s speech, I would like you to consider and discuss the following: What is meant by Sun’s principle of nationalism? Against whom are his nationalist sentiments directed? How is his principle of nationalism linked to the principle of democracy? What does he mean by the principle of democracy, and why does he feel it is so important to the future of China? What, according to Sun, have been the good and bad effects of “the advances of civilization?” Why have the benefits of these advances been so poorly distributed? Briefly describe Sun’s “land valuation procedure” and its relation to the principle of livelihood. What are its strengths and weaknesses? What is Sun’s attitude toward the West? How and in what ways will the future government and society of China be superior to those of the West? To what extent do they draw on traditional Chinese thought and practice? Your thoughts…
6 comments:
he says that they dont want to discriminate the manchus but they just dont want outsiders ruling their land...
he justifies the change in political structre by using previous chinese dynasties as examples. he says that no matter how much they were liked, each dynasty ended with a weak gov. so it was obvious that they needed a new gov.
there is a lot of nationalism going around!! season 4 is really exciting!!! (wow! i feel like a nerd)
Sun Yat Sen says that it is "extremely bizrre" that one of the largest nations in the world is ruled by foreigners. The nationalist sentiments are directed at the Manchu Qing and spheres of influences do not seem to be mentioned. The Qing and all dynasties are autocratic monarchies, and Sun says that if even if a Han was emperor, it would still be necessary for the dynastic cycle to be abolished. If the dynastic cycle continues, eventually the Han will be overrun by foreigners once again, as this has happened throughout Chinese history. Sun uses the downfall of the Han, Tang, and Ming dynasties and the rise of the Yuan and Qing dynasties as examples. Part one of three principles seems to be the bringing down of the dynastic cycle and intitution of a republic.
Sun realizes and does not ignore the social problems and inequalities created by industrialization and modernizaton. He says that in capitilit nations, the upper and middle class eat the "good fruit civilization" while the labor force and lower class eat the "evil fruits of civilization". Sun proposes in what seems to be the second principle, that social disaster shall be combatted with the controlling of the prices of land by the state. As China becomes more industrialized and modernized, the value of land will rise. When sold, landowners will receive a profit, but the majority of capital accumnulated because of the rise in land value will go to the state, thus benefitting all. This could casue dicontent among the gentry, but it would alleviate social inequality. Sun believes that the West is a double-edged sword. He believes that the principles Western nations are built upon are correct, but in actuality he believes the politicians are corrupt and that the social inequalities created by indusrtialization and modernization are ignored and are problems.
The third principle is a vry interesting 5-branch (gasp!) government. In addition to judicial, legislative, and executive brances, Sun believes that a examinatory branch and supervisory branch are needed in order to fix the problems that Western nations face. The examinotory branch will check the power of parities replacing officials, corruption, and favoritism by mandating civil service exams (not the Confucian kind) to all individuals. the supervisory branch will be a branch for the sole purpose of impeachment. It is not an original idea, as it was utilized by the Ming and Qing in the censorate, but it is refined in that the censors no longer report and serve a monarch. Rather, they serve the nation. The two new branches utilize Chinese ideas and values; it is an odd mix of Western and Eastern ideas.
PS.
I saw To Live. It was really great, and I can't wait to learn more about the events portrayed in the film in class. I was talking with Nelson, and the symbolism was really great. The puppet box was a symbol of Fugui's life; it went through civil war, great leap forward, and cultural revolution. The dialogue was great too. The best quote was, "First the chick, then the rooster, then a sheep, then an ox, and then communism". After losing his children to the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution he changed his mind. "then the ox, then.. Little Bun". I only wish the movie was longer. What happened next to the family? What happened to them during reform? It could have gone on all the way to present day and still be entertaining, educational, and relevant.
*by mandating civil service exams to all officials*
Sun Yat-sen is saying that the people of China need to wake up and see what Britain and the other imperialist countries are doing to their country. He says that unfortunatly even though the British have increased industrially, only few have reaped the actual benefits while many were left in poverty because the man is no competitor to the machine. Because of this he wants to adopt the good things of industrialization and reject the bad, so they are only reaping the benefits.
chinese nationalism isn't thinking they're superior, but just being proud to be chinese. it wasn't about not liking the manchus, but not being ruled by them. the chinese just wanted to be able to rule themselves. also, they wanted to keep china as china. china was an ancient nation, and they didn't want it to fall apart. china had the ability to get better. china also wasn't meant to be ruled over by others as they had the most populous nation on earth. they also had enough land to keep china in china, so that shows how sun yat sen didn't really want to get into imperialism and also meaning not into capitalism.
Sun says that nationality is "not allowing such people to seize our political control, for only when we Han are in control politically do we have a nation...". Sun definitely dislikes the fact that foreigners would control a country of such ancient heritage and tradition. He also stresses that discriminating other cultures, such as the Manchus, or the Westerners, is not the root of nationalism, but having pride in one's nation and in ones heritage. He compares nationalism to not mistaking your parents with a stranger.
He goes one to talk about how African nations and the Philippines would fight for their freedom when they have such a small population, and a country that make sup 1/4 of the world population is a lost nation and would not lash out against their invaders...enormously bizarre is right...(I like this guy)
Sun goes back to reference the Tang, Han, Song, and the Ming, stating how foreign invaders are coming in and taking over because political reforms are not being properly executed because we keep going back to monarchial autocracies, and now, even if it were a Han in control, there must a political reform to create a Democratic China(Too bad Mao Zedong wants a Communist Nation, Sorry Sun Yat-sen!) But he believes Nationalism should spark an outbreak against these autocracies because they will continue to invaded by foreigners like Manchus who demean Chinese, using this to spread Nationalism. Ever seen those TV shows where a guy walks up to the other guy and says "Hey, did you hear what he said about you? He said you're weak, and that he could beat you up easily. You gonna take that? Go get him!" Yeah, that's gonna get you going. That's the idea of using Nationalism to promote reforms in government.
The good of technology is new sources of energy, electricity and steam, and now a single man can farm food for thousands now that machinery has been introduced. No need for limbs unless you're flipping the Switch from Off to On, right? Say, what else did he say, somehting about poor people poorer? While Britain's wealth increased a thousandfold in a single generation, the poor got a thousandfold poorer. Wow, that sounds like advancement, eh? the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Industrialization is lovely, no? He compares the good and bad to good and evil fruits, where the rich get the good fruits and the poor get the evil fruits, and what China should do, like Japan, is select the good and keep out the bad, have Europe serve as a lesson of what NOT to get into...
Sun Yat-sen pulls a page from the Socialist Agenda and picks up on the idea of land evaluation, which I personally find intriguing. He says that if a landowner has land worth 1,000, he can price 1,000 or 2,000, but if the prices goes up to 10,000, the landowner gets his 2,000 and the state gets the other 8,000. This is made to prevent the rich from monopolizing wealth and benefits the state and people's livelihood. He says as they continue to advance and grow in wealth, financial problems will not be a problem to handle and then as excess taxes drop, consumer good prices will drop, and this will increase prosperity among the people. He hopes this will abolish vicious taxation policies that have been implemented for thousands of years. He compares this to Europe, Japan, and America who impose taxes too heavy for their people, and he doesn't want to advance with negative consequences like these. He believes that China will become the richest nation through land revenues and not taxes.
Sun Yat-sen proposes a new "Five Separate Powers" system, holding the original three[executive, judicial, and legislative], and adding two new branches. One is the Examination Power, which checks the power of civil service examinations, making sure even those who passed the exams are qualified(hopefully this will prevent cheaters from getting into high positions?). He hopes to "...eliminate such evils as blind obedience, electoral abuses, and favoritism...".
The next power is the Supervisory Power that is meant to monters impeachment matters. He bases this off the Censorate, but stress and Independent branch, not one under an emperor, which, according to Sun, made the Censorate ineffectual. And he closes out with another Nationalist remark sure to encourage the Han people of China, no?
Loved this guy, loved reading his document, I think he had a good idea going there for a new China, a Han China!
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