19th century, spread of revolutionary ideas

• Nationalists

  • Get rid of foreign Ching dynasty

  • Get rid of spheres of influence

• Peasants

  • Bring back Chinese tradition

  • Dynasty founded on peasantry

• Commercialists

  • Stood to lose wealth based off of government actions

• Urban intellectuals

  • Advocated modernity + Westernism

    • Government, thinking, social structures, technology, industry, etc

1900, Boxer Rebellion -> government made reforms towards Westernism

• 1901, schools reformed

  • Girls added

  • Curriculum less on classic and confucian studies -> more math, science, engineering, geography

• Civil service exams changed to match school reforms -> abolished 1905

• Youth sent to other countries to study economics, sciences, etc

• New military style under Yuan Shih-kai

  • Western discipline/organization

  • Military became an official job

  • Loyalty to commander, not emperor

1911, revolution begins in Szechwan

• Government planned to nationalize railway

  • Wealth investors didn’t want to lose money

• Sun Yat-sen had been building revolutionary Western ideas

  • Protests started with conservatives + wealthy gents

    • Wanted financial concerns met -> ended up wanting to overthrow the government when they denied

Sun Yat-sen = leader of revolution

• Educated in the West

• Chinese United League (1905) = Sun’s “three-in-one” revolution

  • Nationalist -> expel Manchu dynasty

  • Democratic -> set up democratic Chinese republic

  • Social -> equalize land rights + wealth

End of 1911 reforms

• ⅔ of China seceded from Ching empire

• Declared China republic

  • Sun = provisional president

Imperial government was struggling -> appointed Yuan Shih-kai

• Governor-general of Hunan + Hupeh

  • Two provinces that did not secede

• National Assembly (Beijing) appointed prime minister

• Did not like Manchus -> had terms

  • Inaugurate a national assembly

  • Pardon the revolutionaries

  • Full power of military

  • Lift ban on political parties

1-3-1912, Yuan agrees to abdicate Ching if he would be president of the republic

• Gets over 50 generals on his side -> Ching give in

2-13-1912, official republic with Yuan as the leader

• Immediately betrayed it -> gave cronies important jobs, revolutionaries unimportant jobs

Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) = Sun’s new party

• Won majority of parliament seats

  • Yuan used force to make party support him -> got impeached

“Second Revolution” to leave the new republic -> Yuan kept them in line

Yuan forced parliament to reelect him -> dissolved parliament + became dictator

• Sun fled to Japan, Kuomintang was expelled

Yuan become emperor -> became opposed by anti-monarchist governors and military leaders

• Provinces began to secede -> went back to dictator -> still seceded

  • Yuan dies -> end of imperial China

Period of Warlordism, 1916-1927

• Many independent provinces -> fought over everything

Sun Yat-sen tries to organize theories on unifying China -> Chinese Nationalist Party

• Established republican government in Canton

• Tried to overthrow warlord government -> died before he finished

  • Chiang Kai-shek, devoted follower, finishes it in 1928 -> Nationalist government in Nanking