Modern Chinese History
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Late Qing Dynasty Reforms and the Republican Revolution of 1911:
After the series of defeats by Western powers, especially the defeat by eight allied countries in 1900, the Chinese government quickened its reforms, which were no longer confined to the scattered schools that taught Western learning and the factories/shipyards that manufactured Western style weapons and ships in the 19th century, but included a nationwide Western educational system from the primary to the tertiary in 1902. Co-education was also introduced, although its implementation in most parts of China was not realized until the 1920s. China also started to train its army in the Western way, and sent many imperial officials and students to the West to study foreign ways of science, technology, and politics. By 1910, the Chinese government was seriously considering establishing a parliamentary monarchy, although it was not ready to do it yet.
The Qing government’s many practices, however, irritated Chinese in many provinces. One of the things that angered the provinces most was their lack of any decision over who gets what business deals in their provinces. Railroad building was becoming a hotly contested business in central and eastern China. The Qing imperial government wanted to sell railroad rights to Western companies, as it borrowed heavy loans from Western countries.
So the government nationalized all railroads in China. Chinese business people were irate at the loss of their own railroads. There were spontaneous movements in provinces such as Sichuan and Hubei in central China to prevent foreign companies from building railways in these provinces. When an uprising against the Qing government’s policy to nationalize railroads in Sichuan Province started in 1911, troops in Hubei Province were commissioned to go and put down the resistance.
In October 1911, however, the troops in Wuchang, Hubei Province, in alliance with the local residents, rebelled against the Qing government, and were joined by many other Chinese provinces in southern and central China. By December 1911, most of southern China had declared independence from the Qing government. And a delegation from the independent Chinese provinces elected Sun Yat-sen, a long time revolutionary, as the first Chinese president in December 1911. The delegates also decided on January 1, 1912, as the beginning of the new Chinese republic. In March 1912, the first provisional constitution of the Republic of China was implemented, with a division of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches.
The beginning of the republic also saw the beginning of the first modern political party in China, the Nationalist Party (Guomindang). Based on an anti-Manchu political alliance established in the late 19th century, the Nationalist Party, headed by Sun Yat-sen, was founded on three principles: nationalism, the people’s rights, and the people’s livelihood. Sun’s ideal vision was that every farmer in China could have a reasonably good livelihood and each would have his own plot of land to farm on. The Nationalist Party became the majority party in the first Chinese parliament.
The Republic’s Transition to Warlord Rule
In April 1912, however, Yuan Shi-kai, a former imperial minister of the Qing Dynasty, replaced Sun Yat-sen as the president. Yuan was a conservative Han Chinese whose role as president of a modern military academy in northern China won him the support of many military generals in the north who were formerly his students. Yuan thus enjoyed the support in the north that Sun Yat-sen, a Cantonese from Guangdong (Canton) Province in southern China, did not have. Yuan also claimed that he was the only one who could persuade the last Chinese emperor, Puyi, to abdicate, with the condition that Yuan himself had to be the president. Sun Yat-sen agreed to these terms and retired from his provisional presidency, but made one crucial change in the Chinese republican system.
The original plan for the presidency, upon Sun’s insistence, gave the elected president predominant power in the government, with the right to appoint the prime minister. When he was to transfer power to Yuan, Sun decided on the cabinet system, with the prime minister in control of government who would come from the leader of the majority party in the parliament. Yuan’s initial decisions as president, however, shocked Sun and other republicans.
Yuan forced the prime minister Tang Shaoyi to resign in order to better control parliament, and then he tried to intimidate a leading Nationalist Party member, Song Jiaoren, into becoming the next prime minister under his control. A staunch republicanist who believed in the cabinet system, Song refused to obey Yuan. When the Nationalist Party won the majority seats in the 1913 election, Yuan decided he needed to teach the Nationalist Party a lesson in obedience. In March 1913, while waiting for a train at the Shanghai Railway Station, Song Jiaoren was assassinated by a peddler hired by Yuan Shi-kai.
Song’s death led to what was called in Chinese history the “Second Revolution,” this time by the Nationalist Party and its allies against Yuan Shi-kai who tried to undermine the republic. Sun Yat-sen and his followers declared war on Yuan, and various provinces, including Jiangsu, Guangdong, Anhui, Hunan, and Fujian, as well as the city of Shanghai, declared independence from Yuan, but the Second Revolution was quickly suppressed by Yuan because the revolutionaries did not have sufficient support.
Yuan, however, felt his position was not secure and wanted to consolidate his power by restoring imperial rule. To get financial support Yuan relied more heavily on foreign loans than the Qing imperial government, giving rights of Chinese territories to foreign countries, especially to Japan, China’s largest creditor, as a condition to borrowing foreign loans. These practices led to greater condemnation of Yuan by a wide range of people in China. In 1915, Cai E (pronounced er), a military general from Yunnan Province, declared independence from Yuan’s government and declared war on Yuan, starting a nationwide war against Yuan’s imperial rule. In March 1916, three months after becoming the emperor, Yuan had to abdicate the throne. Yuan died in humiliation in June 1916.
Yuan’s death, however, did not lead to the restoration of republican rule. China simply fragmented into domains controlled by warlords. A president still nominally existed, but could no longer control the whole China. In 1917, conflict between president Li Yuanhong and prime minister Duan Qirui over whether China should participate in World War I led to the mediation of a warlord Zhang Xun who tried to restore imperial rule in China but was ousted in no time. Prime Minister Duan was a warlord over Anhui Province and was the one who ousted the warlord that tried to restore imperial rule. Duan attempted to monopolize the government without due parliamentary procedure, however.
Sun Yat-sen, the Nationalist leader, tried to restore the republic by declaring war on Duan but failed in 1918. Warlord rule would continue until 1928, with the country fragmented into regions controlled by various military strongmen.
Remember Pedia Share
Late Qing Dynasty Reforms and the Republican Revolution of 1911:
After the series of defeats by Western powers, especially the defeat by eight allied countries in 1900, the Chinese government quickened its reforms, which were no longer confined to the scattered schools that taught Western learning and the factories/shipyards that manufactured Western style weapons and ships in the 19th century, but included a nationwide Western educational system from the primary to the tertiary in 1902. Co-education was also introduced, although its implementation in most parts of China was not realized until the 1920s. China also started to train its army in the Western way, and sent many imperial officials and students to the West to study foreign ways of science, technology, and politics. By 1910, the Chinese government was seriously considering establishing a parliamentary monarchy, although it was not ready to do it yet.
The Qing government’s many practices, however, irritated Chinese in many provinces. One of the things that angered the provinces most was their lack of any decision over who gets what business deals in their provinces. Railroad building was becoming a hotly contested business in central and eastern China. The Qing imperial government wanted to sell railroad rights to Western companies, as it borrowed heavy loans from Western countries.
So the government nationalized all railroads in China. Chinese business people were irate at the loss of their own railroads. There were spontaneous movements in provinces such as Sichuan and Hubei in central China to prevent foreign companies from building railways in these provinces. When an uprising against the Qing government’s policy to nationalize railroads in Sichuan Province started in 1911, troops in Hubei Province were commissioned to go and put down the resistance.
In October 1911, however, the troops in Wuchang, Hubei Province, in alliance with the local residents, rebelled against the Qing government, and were joined by many other Chinese provinces in southern and central China. By December 1911, most of southern China had declared independence from the Qing government. And a delegation from the independent Chinese provinces elected Sun Yat-sen, a long time revolutionary, as the first Chinese president in December 1911. The delegates also decided on January 1, 1912, as the beginning of the new Chinese republic. In March 1912, the first provisional constitution of the Republic of China was implemented, with a division of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches.
The beginning of the republic also saw the beginning of the first modern political party in China, the Nationalist Party (Guomindang). Based on an anti-Manchu political alliance established in the late 19th century, the Nationalist Party, headed by Sun Yat-sen, was founded on three principles: nationalism, the people’s rights, and the people’s livelihood. Sun’s ideal vision was that every farmer in China could have a reasonably good livelihood and each would have his own plot of land to farm on. The Nationalist Party became the majority party in the first Chinese parliament.
The Republic’s Transition to Warlord Rule
In April 1912, however, Yuan Shi-kai, a former imperial minister of the Qing Dynasty, replaced Sun Yat-sen as the president. Yuan was a conservative Han Chinese whose role as president of a modern military academy in northern China won him the support of many military generals in the north who were formerly his students. Yuan thus enjoyed the support in the north that Sun Yat-sen, a Cantonese from Guangdong (Canton) Province in southern China, did not have. Yuan also claimed that he was the only one who could persuade the last Chinese emperor, Puyi, to abdicate, with the condition that Yuan himself had to be the president. Sun Yat-sen agreed to these terms and retired from his provisional presidency, but made one crucial change in the Chinese republican system.
The original plan for the presidency, upon Sun’s insistence, gave the elected president predominant power in the government, with the right to appoint the prime minister. When he was to transfer power to Yuan, Sun decided on the cabinet system, with the prime minister in control of government who would come from the leader of the majority party in the parliament. Yuan’s initial decisions as president, however, shocked Sun and other republicans.
Yuan forced the prime minister Tang Shaoyi to resign in order to better control parliament, and then he tried to intimidate a leading Nationalist Party member, Song Jiaoren, into becoming the next prime minister under his control. A staunch republicanist who believed in the cabinet system, Song refused to obey Yuan. When the Nationalist Party won the majority seats in the 1913 election, Yuan decided he needed to teach the Nationalist Party a lesson in obedience. In March 1913, while waiting for a train at the Shanghai Railway Station, Song Jiaoren was assassinated by a peddler hired by Yuan Shi-kai.
Song’s death led to what was called in Chinese history the “Second Revolution,” this time by the Nationalist Party and its allies against Yuan Shi-kai who tried to undermine the republic. Sun Yat-sen and his followers declared war on Yuan, and various provinces, including Jiangsu, Guangdong, Anhui, Hunan, and Fujian, as well as the city of Shanghai, declared independence from Yuan, but the Second Revolution was quickly suppressed by Yuan because the revolutionaries did not have sufficient support.
Yuan, however, felt his position was not secure and wanted to consolidate his power by restoring imperial rule. To get financial support Yuan relied more heavily on foreign loans than the Qing imperial government, giving rights of Chinese territories to foreign countries, especially to Japan, China’s largest creditor, as a condition to borrowing foreign loans. These practices led to greater condemnation of Yuan by a wide range of people in China. In 1915, Cai E (pronounced er), a military general from Yunnan Province, declared independence from Yuan’s government and declared war on Yuan, starting a nationwide war against Yuan’s imperial rule. In March 1916, three months after becoming the emperor, Yuan had to abdicate the throne. Yuan died in humiliation in June 1916.
Yuan’s death, however, did not lead to the restoration of republican rule. China simply fragmented into domains controlled by warlords. A president still nominally existed, but could no longer control the whole China. In 1917, conflict between president Li Yuanhong and prime minister Duan Qirui over whether China should participate in World War I led to the mediation of a warlord Zhang Xun who tried to restore imperial rule in China but was ousted in no time. Prime Minister Duan was a warlord over Anhui Province and was the one who ousted the warlord that tried to restore imperial rule. Duan attempted to monopolize the government without due parliamentary procedure, however.
Sun Yat-sen, the Nationalist leader, tried to restore the republic by declaring war on Duan but failed in 1918. Warlord rule would continue until 1928, with the country fragmented into regions controlled by various military strongmen.
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