3. WHAT IS HAPPENING IN CHINA AT PRESENT
We see China’s name in the headlines every now and then. This is because
China is at loggerheads with about 18 countries. It has territorial and border
disputes with the following
1. Japan - over parts of East China Sea
2. Vietnam - China claims large parts of Vietnam on historical precedent
(Ming Dynasty, 1368-1644)
3. India - It has already illegally occupied Akai Chin (J&K). At the heart of
Sino-Indian dispute is Arunachal Pradesh which China describes as
"Southern Tibet". Beijing is demanding that at least the Tawang Tract of
Arunachal Pradesh, if not the whole of the state, be transferred to China.
4. Nepal - China claims parts of Nepal dating back to the Sino-Nepalese War
in 1788-1792. China claims they are part of Tibet, therefore part of China.
5. North Korea and South Korea – It claims they are a part of Tibet on
historic grounds.
6. Taiwan – it claims all of it
It claims parts of many other countries like Laos, Cambodia on historical
precedent.
4. On November 15, 2012, the day Xi Jinping became general secretary of the
Chinese Communist Party, he reflected back on his country’s 5,000 years of history.
After citing China’s “indelible contribution” to world civilization, Xi called for
“the great revival of the Chinese nation.”
He is not the first leader to be calling for national revival, but his efforts have
surpassed his predecessors.
We have all heard about the One Belt One Road Initiative. This was put in motion
by him and is designed to revive the ancient Silk Road and the maritime spice routes
that flourished as early as the Han dynasty, thus reinforcing the claim of Chinese
centrality.
He revived the country’s centuries-old claims to the South China Sea and
other disputed areas.
There is something common in all these measures. They are China’s attempt to
reclaim a proper place in the global order, like the erstwhile China had.
In the past, China received tribute from the rest of the world, was a source of world-
class innovation, and was a fearless seafaring power. And it implies that in the past,
China did not need to use force, its virtue alone engendered deference from others.
5. The present of every country is influenced by its past. They learn from their
past to not repeat the same errors. But when talking about a country like
China, which is so drenched in its past and wants to revive it, it becomes all
the more important to study its history.
Chinese Communist Party looks at the past to justify as well as support some
of its decisions and actions it sees necessary in its rise to become a Global
Power. Every move of the Chinese government takes roots in its glorious past.
This gives rise to questions, what was so glorious about China? And why is
there a need to “revive”, i.e. why did the country ever fall weak?
6. INTRODUCTION
• By the beginning of the nineteenth century, East Asia was
dominated by China.
• The Chinese economy was one of the most sophisticated and
productive in the world, and the Chinese enjoyed a higher
standard of living.
• The Qing (Ch'ing) Dynasty (1644-1912), founded by the
invading Manchus, continued this splendor. Contemporary
Chinese called the 18th century "unparalleled in history",
when all aspects of culture flourished.
• China was a prosperous state with abundant natural
resources.
7. While discussing the modern history of China, we will focus on the following
main points :
1. China's conflict with an aggressively expanding West in the 1800s. -
Imperial powers like Britain were keen on opening up trade with China.
2. Internal crises that were occurring in China at this time: the rebellions,
famines, and explosive population growth. These problems weren't new to
the empire, but they were crucial since they coincided with foreign
encroachments.
3. The dialogue within China about how best to respond to these combined
challenges and the extent and nature of the changes that were required.
The dialogue wavered between the progressive combination of
elements from the West with the best of Chinese traditions, to the
outright rejection of the Chinese past. Finally, by the 1920s, some
reformers turned revolutionary, discussing the relevance of Marxism for
China.
China's relative isolation from the rest of the world made possible the
flowering of Chinese culture. However, it also made it ill prepared to face
the world when confronted by technologically superior nations. There was a
period of decline, and this challenge then became the catalyst for a
revolution that began in 20th century.
8. RISE OF THE MANCHUS
o China had a dynastic framework, having been ruled by dynasties
like Xia, Shang, Qin, Ming etc. The last imperial dynasty was the
Manchu dynasty or the Qing dynasty (1644-1911).
o Although the Manchus were not Han Chinese and were strongly
resisted, they had assimilated a great deal of Chinese culture. The
Qing regime was determined to protect itself not only from
internal rebellion but also from foreign invasion.
o Under Manchu rule the empire grew to include a larger area than
before or since.
o The chief threat to China's integrity did not come overland, as it
had so often in the past, but by sea, reaching the southern coastal
area first. Western traders, missionaries, and soldiers of fortune
began to arrive in large numbers even before the Qing, in the
sixteenth century.
o The empire's inability to evaluate correctly the nature of the new
challenge or to respond flexibly to it resulted in the demise of the
Qing and the collapse of the entire millennia-old framework of
dynastic rule.
9. THE PROBLEM BEGINS
o We tend to think of "drug problem" as a modern phenomenon. But a
century ago, illegal drugs brought an end an empire that had lasted for
thousands of years.
o In the 18th century, the demand for tea grew in the European and American
markets.
o Additionally, the demand for Chinese silk and porcelain was also growing.
o It was decided that China would sell Europe their silk, tea and porcelain, but
would buy nothing in return.
o Since Chinese goods were so sought-after in Europe, a chronic imbalance of
trade developed. European gold and silver went to China to import goods,
but none returned because there was no possibility of export. This was
unacceptable to the British and they desperately looked for a solution.
o The solution was the opium grown in West Bengal, India. This became the
staple import of the British to China.
o This was done in spite of the fact that opium was banned by an imperial
edict as an illegal drug.
o Opium was becoming a major cause of concern for the government, it
couldn’t stop the smuggling. Levels of opium addiction grew so high that it
began to affect the imperial troops and the official classes.
10. The efforts of the Qing dynasty to enforce the opium restrictions resulted in two
armed conflicts between China and the West, known as the Opium Wars, both of
which China lost and which resulted in various measures that contributed to the
decline of the Qing. The wars displayed China’s military weakness. The first war,
between Britain and China (1839–42), did not legalize the trade, but it did halt
Chinese efforts to stop it. In the second Opium War (1856–60)—fought between a
British-French alliance and China—the Chinese government was forced to legalize
the trade, though it did levy a small import tax on opium.
Also, it is worth noting that the result of the first
Opium War was the Treaty of Nanjing. By its
provisions, China was required to pay Britain
a large indemnity and cede Hong Kong
Island to the British.
Chinese man smoking opium
11. IMPACT OF THE OPIUM WARS
From the 1860s, the Chinese realized that their country couldn’t continue to
be so isolationist. Intellectuals realized that they must try and understand
the western culture, especially if they were to beat the west.
The Chinese attempted reforms to meet the military and political challenge
from the west.
They searched for ways to adapt western learning and technology while
preserving the Chinese values. They struggled to find the right formula to
strengthen China.
In the decades that followed, other scholars went further, calling for the
establishment of institutions where students could study Western
languages and mathematics in addition to Chinese classics.
This approach came to be known as "self strengthening" its principle goal
was to maintain the strong essence of Chinese civilization while adding
superior technology from abroad.
12. “ It’s hard to over-emphasize the impact of the Opium Wars on
modern China. Domestically, it’s led to the ultimate collapse of
the centuries-old Qing Dynasty, and with it more than two
millennia of dynastic rule. It convinced China that it had to
modernize and industrialize.
Today, the First Opium War is taught in Chinese schools as being the
beginning of the “Century of Humiliation” — the end of that “century”
coming in 1949 with the reunification of China under Mao. While
Americans are routinely assured they are exceptional and the greatest
country on Earth by their politicians, Chinese schools teach students that their
country was humiliated by greedy and technologically superior Western
imperialists.
The Opium Wars made it clear China had fallen gravely behind
the West — not just militarily, but economically and politically. Every
Chinese government since — even the ill-fated Qing Dynasty, which
began the “Self-Strengthening Movement” after the Second Opium
War — has made modernization an explicit goal, citing the need to
catch up with the West. “
13. REVERSAL OF RELATIONSHIP - JAPAN
• In 1894-5, Japan challenged and defeated China in a war over influence in
Korea, thereby upsetting the traditional international order in East Asia,
where China was the supreme power and Japan a tribute-bearing
subordinate power.
• China found its traditional power relationship with Japan reversed. (The
Japanese, after witnessing the treatment of China by the West and its own
experience of near-colonialism in 1853, successfully established Japan as a
competitor with Western powers for colonial rights in Asia and special
privileges in China.)
• Now, Japan was the country China looked up to, rather than the other way
around.
• China was also impressed by Japan’s defeat of Russia, a Western power, in
the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05.
14. CARVING UP THE CHINESE MELON
The weaknesses of China were displayed during the First Sino-Japanese
War (1894-1895). European powers answered with an order they called,
carving up the Chinese melon. Following the division of Africa among
European powers, they turned their sights to what they saw as an
extremely weak Chinese government. European powers and America
began to scramble for what was called spheres of interest.
15. Thus, reasons which led the Chinese to introspect and improve their
political, social, economic systems were:
1. Humiliating defeat in the opium wars and unequal treaties.
2. Weak and inefficient government which gave foreign countries an
edge over china.
3. Fear of the west and colonization, it stimulated the rise of
nationalism.
4. Defeat at the hands of a country which used to be their subordinate
(losing Taiwan and Korea to it)
5. Military factors – even though the military was developed under the
self strengthening movement, it was destroyed in the Sino-Japanese
war.
6. Cutting of chinese territories into different spheres of influence-
Qing dynasty was helpless in resisting such a pressure.
7. Reversal of traditional relationship with Japan. - students were sent
there, their script was adopted.
8. Students being sent to study abroad- their horizons broadened.
Dissatisfaction with the dynasty increased.
16. FROM REFORM TO REVOLUTION
We know that the Qing Dynasty of the Manchus was
seen as a “foreign” dynasty by the Chinese. Internal
strains and foreign activity in china led to rebellions
and ultimately revolt of the provinces against the
Qing imperial authority.
This happened in 1911, in the name of a Republican
Revolution and the Guomindang Party was formed
in 1912. Sun Yat Sen was named the provisional
president.
17. MAY 4TH MOVEMENT
At the end of the First World War, in 1918, China was convinced it would be able to
reclaim the territories occupied by the Germans in present-day Shandong Province.
After all, it had fought along with the Allies. However, it was not to be. Yuan Shikai’s
government had supported the Allies in the war, on the condition that foreign
spheres of influence in China be abolished. But by 1919 China had no effective
national government, offering the German colonies in return for financial support.
The Allies, on the other hand, acknowledged Japan's territorial claims in China.
When it became known in China in April 1919 that the negotiations over the Treaty
of Versailles would not honor China's claims, it gave rise to a movement that might
be considered even more revolutionary than the one that ended the Empire.
18. Students from universities hit the streets to demonstrate against the Versailles
Treaty. But more was at stake than Japan's grabbing of land. When one considers
the 1911 Revolution as a mere regime change, it becomes clear that the numerous
popular demands for modernization had not been satisfied yet.
The May Fourth Movement was part cultural revolution, part social movement. On
the cultural side, the students had been inspired in the preceding two decades by
Western thought, creating a feeling of frustration and dissatisfaction with Chinese
tradition. In the intellectual ferment that resulted from this, answers were sought
for the questions why and how China had lagged behind the West. The negative
influences of traditional morality, the clan system and Confucianism were seen as
the main causes.
The social aspects of May Fourth consisted of attempts to emancipate the Chinese
woman, although this was often limited to movements to bring foot binding to a
halt.
May Fourth is seen as a catalyst for the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.
Before 1919, there was hardly any interest in what was happening in Russia. After
May Fourth, Marxism was seen as a workable revolutionary ideology for a
predominantly agrarian society such as China still was.
20. The Actual Struggle Just Began.
The PRC was established in 1949, on a land that was ravaged by a century of
foreign invasion and civil wars. "The Chinese people have stood up!"
declared Mao as he announced the creation of a "people's democratic
dictatorship.“ The new leadership was highly disciplined and, having a
decade of wartime administrative experience to draw on, was able to
embark on a program of national integration and reform. In the first few
years of Communist administration, moderate social and economic policies
were implemented with skill and effectiveness. Many achievements were
made during the First Five-Year Plan period, from 1953 to 1957.
21. THE GREAT LEAP FORWARD -1957 onwards
During this period an economic and social campaign was launched by
The Communist Party – to rapidly transform the country from an
agrarian economy to a socialist society through rapid industrialization
and collectivization. Between 1958 and 1960, millions of Chinese
citizens were moved to communes to work on farms or in
manufacturing. Private farming was prohibited.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlbB3cmgPmo
22. Was it indeed a great leap forward?
The Great Leap Forward, intended to be a five-year effort, was halted
in 1960 after three brutal years. The initiative is said to have cost an
estimated 20 to 48 million lives as a result of catastrophic economic
policy, compounded by adverse weather conditions including a flood
that killed 2 million people and the subsequent crop failures that led
to starvation. In addition to the fatalities, the Great Leap Forward had
negative environmental impacts as communes were encouraged to
set up "backyard" production plants for needed supplies such as
steel, timber and cement.
Historian Frank Dikötter asserts that "coercion, terror, and systematic
violence were the foundation of the Great Leap Forward" and it
"motivated one of the most deadly mass killings of human history"
23. Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution
• In subsequent conferences in March 1960 and May 1962, the negative
effects of the Great Leap Forward were studied by the CPC, and Mao was
criticized in the party conferences. Moderate Party members like
President Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping rose to power, and Chairman Mao
was marginalized within the party, leading him to initiate the Cultural
Revolution in 1966.
Cultural Revolution propaganda poster. It depicts Mao Zedong,
above a group of soldiers from the People's Liberation Army.
The caption says, "The Chinese People's Liberation Army is the
great school of Mao Zedong Thought."
24. It was Mao’s attempt reassert his authority over the Chinese government.
Believing that current Communist leaders were taking the party, and China
itself, in the wrong direction, Mao called on the nation’s youth to purge the
“impure” elements of Chinese society and revive the revolutionary spirit that
had led to victory in the civil war 20 decades earlier and the formation of the
People’s Republic of China.
He shut down the nation’s schools, calling for a massive youth mobilization to
take current party leaders to task for their embrace of bourgeois values and
lack of revolutionary spirit.
This student movement was called the Red Guards, groups of militant students
who were encouraged by Mao to attack all traditional values and to publicly
criticize party officials.
The Cultural Revolution continued in various phases until Mao’s death in 1976,
and its tormented and violent legacy would resonate in Chinese politics and
society for decades to come.
25. Teachers, officials, intellectuals, and cadres were persecuted, humiliated in
public, beaten, and tortured. The development of the society stagnated for
around a decade, particularly in the fields of art, literature, science,
research, and education. Industrial production, already weakened by the
Great Leap Forward, continued to decline and so did China’s economy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7G0UXnXpABw
26. Post Mao Era
After Mao's death, reformers led by Deng Xiaoping gradually began to
dismantle the Maoist policies associated with the Cultural Revolution.
1978, Deng Xiaoping emerged as China's de facto leader. Deng launched a
comprehensive program to reform the Chinese economy. Within the span
of several years, the direction of the country had shifted in its entirety. The
focus on ideological purity was gone, replaced by a full-on drive to achieve
material prosperity.
In 1981, the Party declared that the Cultural Revolution was "responsible for
the most severe setback and the heaviest losses suffered by the Party, the
country, and the people since the founding of the People's Republic".
27. 1840-42
•Opium War
•Treaty of Nanjing
•Establishment of Treaty Ports and cession of Honk Kong.
1864-94
•Era of self strengthening.
1894-95
•Sino – Japanese War
1905
• End of Confucian examination system
• Russo- Japanese War
1911
• Republican Revolution
1912
• Guomindang Party
• Republic of China established
• Yuan Shikai is the first president
28. 1914-18
•World War I
•Increased Japanese influence in China
1916
•Yuan Shikai dies
1917-27
•Government in Beijing in the hands of warlords
•Warlord era
1919
• Treaty of Versailles
• May 4th Movement
1921
• Chinese Communist Party formed
• Mao Zedong is the founding member
1923
• GMD- CCP alliance established
1925
• Sun Yat Sen dies
1927-37
• GMD in control
29. 1927-34
• CCP in Jiangxi
1934-35
•GMD’s campaign against the CCP lead to the Long March
1936-46
•CCP in Yan'an
•Maoist ideology developing
1937-45
•War against Japan where the 2 parties initiated a united front
•World War II
1946-49
•GMD vs CCP – Civil war
1949
•GMD forces retreat to Taiwan
•Republic of China established
1958-59
•Great Leap Forward
1966-70
•Cultural Revolution
1989
•Tiananmen Square Massacre
