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Politics of China
WEEK 1: Introduction
LECTURE
Unit themes
• Governance and regime legitimacy
• Economy – prosperity for all?
o World’s second largest economy
o They have moved lots of farmers from countryside to cities ! manufacturing growth
• State strength – internally, externally
• Can the CCP survive?
o Can the current political and economical system keep going the way it has been?
WEEK 2: China’s Revolution – Origins and Comparison
LECTURE
Questions:
• What was the May 4th Movement? Why was it important?
• What were the main factors that caused the Chinese Revolution?
• What themes or issues from pre-1949 Chinese history can be found in China today?
Why study history?
• For possible path-dependence
o Previous events, institutions shape the realm of what is likely to happen (narrowing the
future)
o Misses individuals
• Lessons learned by people in that country
• Formation of collective identity
An ambiguous legacy – modern China emerges
• China’s greatness: cultural legacy, regional influence, economic prosperity, military might, imperial
power
• China’s weakness: imperial decline from mid-19th century, West’s invasion, Japan’s invasion, civil
war
At the centre of the universe
• Self-belief that China was at the centre of the world
• “Under the wide heaven, there is no land that is not the Emperor’s, and within the sea-boundaries of
the land, there is none who is not a subject of the Emperor” – Book of Poetry
Qing dynasty
• The Qianlong Emperor
o 1736-1795
o Presided over this vast land and kept it all going
o Kept the boundaries known as China today
o Most powerful dynasty
• Dynasty lasted from 1616-1911
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Collapsed in 1911
Conflicted by how you feed all these people ! led to demonstrations, social unrest, violence !
restricted ability of Qing dynasty to lead
Internal pressures led to decline
Foreign encroachment
• Foreigners then showed up ! encroach of the west (particularly on the east coast e.g. the Bund in
Shanghai)
• ‘Century of humiliation’
• As the Qing dynasty was getting weaker – they decided to open up to trade with the West
• China then ran a trade surplus – didn’t need too many things from the West, but West needed
Chinese goods
• British started smuggling drugs (opium) into China. They would grow it in India and then bribing
Chinese officials to accept the opium. Chinese more than happy to smoke it, no demand shortage
o This is how British managed to resolve trade deficit with China
• Qing tried to resist British pressures – led to a series of struggles
• Opium Wars – First Opium War was 1839-42
• Resulted in: reform and uprisings
o Self-strengthening (1860s), 100 Days Reform (1898)
o Taiping Uprising (1856-64), Boxer Rebellion (1900)
Birth of Chinese nationalism
• 1911 – fall of Qing
• 1912 – Sun Yatsen proclaims founding of Republic of China (in Nanjing)
• 1914 – WWI begins in Europe
• 1915 – Japan’s 21 Demands made of China
• 1919 – May 4th Movement
• 1921 – Chinese Communist Party formed
Chinese demands in Versailles 1919
• Abolition of all privileges of foreign powers in China (e.g. extraterritoriality)
• Cancelling of 21 Demands made by Japanese
• Return Shandong to China (German concession, taken by Japan in WWI)
• Their rejection sparks May 4th Movement – birth of modern Chinese nationalism
o Protests across China (demonstrations, boycotts, leaders arrested)
o Signals the ‘awakening’ of modern China
Roads to 1949 - origins of the Chinese Revolution
1. Nanjing Decade: 1927-37
2. Japan’s Invasion of China: 1931-45
3. Rise of CCP: 1921-49
4. Chinese Civil War: 1945-49
Establishment of the KMT
• KMT founded in 1912
• Won parliamentary elections in 1912
• Song Jiaoren (KMT parliamentary leader) assassinated in Shanghai in 1913
• Sun Yatsen and other KMT leaders flee China
• Yuan Shikai establishes control over Republic of China
• Organised along Soviet models
Chiang Kai-shek
• 1887-1975
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Began to pursue military career as Qing falls
Served in Japanese Imperial Army until fall of Qing Dynasty
Founding member of KMT in 1912 in Guangzhou
1926 he ceases control of the KMT – military influence
The real challenge of KMT is to unify China
1926 – Northern Expedition in order to do this
o Trying to terrorize the warlords who had ceased power in their local areas when the Qing
dynasty fell
o Doesn’t want to kill them all but wants them to join KMT
Breaking with CCP
• April 1927: purge of communists, 12 000 killed in Shanghai
• Reaching out to capitalists in Shanghai and elsewhere e.g. TV Soong
KMT weaknesses
1. Lack popular base (elite; not populist)
2. Lack effective territorial control (local warlords remain in place)
Influence of Japanese
• Japanese invasion pushed China towards CCP
• 1904-05 – Russian-Japanese war
• Japan won
• Japanese got the Russian concessions – particularly north-eastern China (Manchoukuo)
• Continued to move into north-eastern Asia, took over Korea
KMT: Resisting Japan
• Losses in Northern China, lose Shanghai
• ‘Nanjing Massacre’ December 1937
o 200,000 people were slaughtered
o Rape, murder, overall violence
o Chiang Kai-Shek is forced to relocate
• Wartime capital – Chongqing
The start of the party 1921
• Inspired by:
o Russian Revolution
o May 4th
o Poverty and inequity
o Nationalism
Chased from the cities to the countryside
• Purges by CKS – 1927
• Failed urban insurrections
• Jiangxi Soviet established
• Chiang’s encirclement campaigns
• Before number 5, they break out and go on the Long March – 1934-35
Growing CCP strength
• A rural base
o ‘Fish swimming in the sea of the people’
• Guerrilla warfare
• Mao (re)emerges as leader
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Peasant nationalism
• Gain fighting experience
• Build up organizational capacity
• Establish footholds of support in Northern and Eastern China
• Gain popular support
• Build up nationalist credentials
Land reform
• Seizing land from wealthy landowners: re-distributing it to poor farmers
• Builds popular support
• Enhances credibility as socialists
• Truly a revolutionary party
• Terror was a key part
Chinese civil war 1945-9
1. Japan’s surrender: August 15 1945
2. US non-intervention in China
3. CCP steadily expands their control
4. KMT retreats to Taiwan
5. PRC proclaimed October 1 1949
Lessons learned
• External threat, internal chaos
• Nationalism and social equity as foundations of regime legitimacy
• Vulnerability of the CCP in 1950
TUTORIAL
Rana Mitter, A Bitter Revolution: China’s Struggle with the Modern World
• Focuses on the importance of the May Fourth Movement – symbolic as well as functional
o 4 May 1919
• Closely related to the New Culture Movement, however, they are separate movements
• May Fourth movements did not occur spontaneously, they were greatly planned
• Involved marching and protesting, followed by destroying homes of Chinese government officials
e.g. Zhang Zongxiang, the former Chinese minister to Japan
• Events were: led by students, stimulated by events taking place outside China and were violent
• Students were sick of China being humiliated and defeated by imperial/international powers – this
was encouraged by the Paris Peace Conference and the Versailles Treaty where China was not going
to get back their territories (given to Japan)
• Chinese nationalists were outraged
• May Fourth reflects ideas that were recurrent throughout the development of modern China in the
20th century
• Greatest challenges to Confucianism: Christianity and capitalist modernity
• Represented “a distinct break from the late Qing empire and the era of the Nationalist government in
the 1930s, which was cut short by war”
• Rise of Japan at the same time
• Many see the period of time before Mao’s victory as a time of lost opportunities but really it was also
a period of intellectual and social revolutionary ideas
Theda Skocpol, States and Social Revolutions: A comparative analysis of France, Russia and China
• Like Russia and France, the Chinese Revolution occurred after the breakdown of the autocratic Old
Regime
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Centrality of peasants in China – yet they could not revolutionize on their own, they needed the
help of the communists. Therefore, they were not the sole revolutionary force but were central to the
revolution as without their support, the CCP would not have won in 1949
Post-1911 – military state with Yuan Shihkai
Influence of warlords
China had two parallel revolutionary parties: Guomingdang (GMD) and CCP
GMD = urban, CCP = peasants and rural
They emerged at the same time and became allies against war-lords until Chiang Kai-shek went on
the purges of the CCP with the Shanghai Massacre
B/w 1923-26 the two parties were joint and achieved three things (‘United Front’:
o Effective nationalist government
o Well-armed and well-trained Nationalist Revolutionary Army (politically indoctrinated as
well)
o Built a centrally organised, yet mass-based, anti-imperialist party oriented towards social
reform
Northern Expedition to gain control of provinces held by warlords
Despite success still didn’t have complete control of China and China was still largely disconnected
The failures of the GMD led to the success of the CCP – wasn’t just the CCP all on its own
CCP used guerrilla tactics, unique to China’s peasantry ! they had to get their support and show
them that they had their interests at heart
Cultivation of the Red Army and cadres
Japanese occupation was good for the CCP
When CCP won in 1949 – looked like it would become a model like the Soviet State, yet this did not
happen ! broke ties with USSR after China wanted to develop their own nuclear program
Questions:
1. Why does Mitter refer to a ‘bitter revolution?’ What factors brought about the 1949 Revolution?
• A lot of suffering and turmoil during this time
• There was change but it wasn’t necessarily good e.g. collapse of Qing dynasty but only brought
about Yuan Shikhai’s militaristic dictatorship
2. Why does Skocpol refer to a ‘social revolution?’ How accurate/helpful are the concepts of
bourgeoisie, national and social revolution in relation to China’s revolution?
WEEK 3: China under Mao – 1949-1978
LECTURE
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Questions
o Describe China’s political, economic, and social structures during the Maoist era.
o How did the CCP establish and maintain legitimacy during this era?
o What aspects of China’s political, economic, and social structures have changed in the reform
era? What is similar?
ENDURING THEMES: LEGITIMACY AND CONTINUITY/CHANGE
Legitimacy
• What is it and why does it matter?
o Right to rule
" Regime/government and related institutions accepted as appropriate, with rightful
authority.
• Example: Mubarak (Egypt): loss of legitimacy