Papers on China

Question 1

Wakeman - initial communist ideology

Answer 1

Provided comfort to Mao’s generation, which had been humiliated by Japan and the West and were bereft of a social future

Question 2

Wakeman - modernisation of China effect

Answer 2

As it modernised, China’s sacred community of the past gave way to modern secular communities, divided in labour and spirit (Durkheim)

As the individual lost their sense of belonging, social disintegration seemed inevitable unless basic social values were shared by all

By internalising ideological values, individuals might gain a sense of common identity

Question 3

Wakeman - ideology as the product of modernism

Answer 3

Emerged through the cultural strain as traditional values disappeared along with the sacred society of the past

Charismatic authority arose out of momentary institutional failure

Question 4

Wakeman - connections in Chinese culture

Answer 4

John Israel traces ideological connections between pre-modern and revolutionary China

Connection between the New Culture Movement (1900s) and Cultural Revolution (1960s)

Question 5

Wakeman - intellectual developments 1915-1920

Answer 5

Presaged the adoption of Marxism

There was a distraught sense of cultural alienation during the New Culture period, responded eagerly to ideas fulfilling deep-seated intellectual and emotional needs

Question 6

Wakeman - May Fourth

Answer 6

The May Fourth generation felt political revolution failed in 1913 as traditional cultural and social patterns had survived the overthrow of the dynasty

However it drew a strong link between culture and politics - intellectuals felt that political action would only succeed if carried out in the larger context of cultural change

Question 7

Wakeman - 2 great intellectual crises in early C20

Answer 7

Professor Chen asserts this:

The first was the assault on Confucianism, which was replaced by Social Darwinism

The second was the loss of confidence in Social Darwinism after WW1 - replaced by Marxism-Leninism

Question 8

Lu paper

Answer 8

Waking to Modernity: The Classical Tale in Late Qing China

Question 9

Lu - revision of views on the formation of modern Chinese culture

Answer 9

The view that the May Fourth Movement of 1919 initiated a revolutionary break from tradition that has constituted the mainstream of Chinese modernity ever since should be revised

Question 10

Lu - examination of the Late Qing period uses

Answer 10

Has been fruitful for globalisation studies and literary historiography

In retrospect, China’s earliest globalisation thinkers are found from the moment of encounter with the West

Question 11

Lu - approach to narrative fiction

Answer 11

Should be investigated as the product of dormant, incipient, repressed Chinese modernities

Question 12

Lu - reasons for repressed modernities

Answer 12

Wang argues it occurred as by the time China was recognised as an important part of modern civilisation, it had submitted to a monolithic discourse in which only Western theories and modernity could be spoken

Question 13

Lu - importance of the modernisation of literature

Answer 13

Reformers considered the modernisation of literature to be a important since it was a major constituent of culture

Of all genres, narrative fiction was singled out as the most important and effective tool for the creation of a new culture - imbued with high moral, ideological and social values

Vernacular novel perceived as uniquely equipped for an expose of the old ways and creation of new sensibilities

Question 14

Lu - literary focus of the paper

Answer 14

Wang Tao’s short stories ‘Random Records of a Recluse in Wusong’ (1884-87)

Clear tension between narrative form and ever-globalizing sensibility of the author

Question 15

Lu - aim of the last blooming of the classical tale

Answer 15

As much a response to the modern world as it is a continuation of traditional Chinese motifs and themes

Effort to wrestle profound changes faced by China as it entered the modern world - tried to reposition it on the world map

Question 16

Lu - Tao background

Answer 16

Fled from China in 1862 for alleged relationship with the Taiping

Brought back by Guofan and other officials in 1884; worked tirelessly for the Reform Movement (later started by Guangxu)

Exile in Hong Kong gave him the chance to reflect on his own culture from observations of the west

Used ancient literati mode of storytelling

Question 17

Lu - Tao’s aim

Answer 17

Saw that China’s belief system was in crisis with the introduction of modern science

Advocated the adoption of western rationality, knowledge and institutions; but as a writer he attempts to enchant a disappearing magical world

Contradictory worldview as he was caught in a transitional historical period

Question 18

Lu - context of Chinese worldview

Answer 18

Time when the self-contained, Sino-centric worldview about humanity, nature and the cosmos was being shattered by the gunboats of the West

Question 19

Lu - Biography of May story

Answer 19

About May, who is in love with a British man, travels to China and falls in love with a Chinese man, is hunted by the Brit and they kill each other

May represents western technology, which ultimately finds its home in China rather than Britain

Part of a set of 3 stories which show inclusion, domestication and utility of the foreign in the Chinese world

Question 20

Lu - Tao as a theorist

Answer 20

Seem as China’s first ‘globalisation theorist’, who saw the West not as a threat but a chance for transformation and renewal

Question 21

Lu - storytelling as a vehicle

Answer 21

Tao used it as a vehicle for social reform, however his mode of storytelling was soon replaced by the long vernacular novel at the turn of the century

Question 22

Lu - limit of Tao’s stories

Answer 22

Expansive yet limiting style of his tales could not create an expansive discursive space of dialogism to accommodate the worldview of diverse social strata in Chinese strata in Chinese society in a turbulent period

Question 23

Dessein - western influence on defining religion

Answer 23

Western presence meant that the traditional Chinese spiritual realm started to be redefined in terms of the Western conception of ‘religion’

Traditional division between Confucian ‘civil religion’ and large grey areas of other faiths and ideologies removed

Replaced with ‘European’ division between ‘orthodox religion’ (Christianity) and ‘superstition’ - displaced Confcucianism

Question 24

Dessein - traditional interpretation of Confucian rule

Answer 24

There is an intricate connection between the spiritual and political world

Therefore when C19 + 20 intellectuals strove to create a Chinese nation state after the Western model, this could not but have ramifications for the position of Confucianism (the backbone of traditional elite culture)

Question 25

Dessein - reluctance to abandon Confucianism

Answer 25

Majority of intellectuals did not want to remove it - still had a lingering belief in the values of (a redefined) Confucianism

‘Self-strenghtening movement’ aimed to make China so materially strong it would be better able to defend itself against the west

Question 26

Dessein - Wang Tao

Answer 26

Advocated studying western culture, so that western technology as ‘function’ could be fused with Chinese culture as ‘essence’

Would lead to an era of universal peace with the world ‘one great unity’

Believed that the right to rule ‘all-under-heaven’ would remain a Confucian prerogative

Question 27

Dessein - opinion of Kang Youwei

Answer 27

Advocated redefining Confucianism as a religion in its own right

Wanted to make it a ‘national religion’ that mirrored the ‘orthodox’ religions of the west’

Local cult traditions would be removed, but this would remove division between elite and common people

Seen by republican parliaments as contrary to freedom of religion, and thus rejected in 1913 and 1916

Question 28

Dessein - opinion of Sun Yatsen

Answer 28

Dismissed Confucianism as a vehicle to rally the collective and brought into the KMT the idea of ‘party state’

Thought it necessary to deconstruct the Chinese ‘cultural state’ in order to create a ‘nation state’

Question 29

Dessein - opinion of Mao

Answer 29

Saw religion as ‘opium for the people’ and removed Confucianism

Question 30

Yu - 1911 events

Answer 30

The Manchu dynasty was overthrown and the Republic declared to be a constitutional form of state, with monarchical institutions completely abandoned

Question 31

Yu - reason for failure of republic

Answer 31

With no preparation or consideration of China’s past political experience. it discarded familiar political institutions and adopted a form of government she was neither prepared for nor experienced with

It was not questioned whether an Oriental depotism could be transmuted overnight into a modern democratic state

Question 32

Yu - pre-republican change and values

Answer 32

The dynasty was a long-lived polity in which change came very slowly, if at all

It was dominated by a single powerful ideology which valued family and loyalty and accepted social divisions between the ruler and ruled

Question 33

Yu - Imperial authority

Answer 33

Emperor demanded complete authority - factions and parties were illegal

Political opposition was limited as it required a complete overthrow of the regime, and if this failed, death

This was the environment into which liberal western political institutions and ideas were thrust in 1912

Question 34

Yu - reception of Republicanism

Answer 34

Enthusiastically welcomed - it was felt that China had shrugged off the past and joined the modern world

Soon warlordism dominated, these men having no regard for the Republic

Question 35

Yu - nationalists and the republic

Answer 35

Did little to make the republic work - it was placed second to the needs of gaining or merely holding power

They still fought with the Communists in the early 1930s and after 1941

Question 36

Yu - nature of nationalist modernisation

Answer 36

When it occurred according to the liberal western image, it was organised on the basis of a traditionalist-authoritarian model

Question 37

Yu - negative western powers

Answer 37

Helped make the republican experiment abortive, by taking and usually ignoring Chinese appeals for assistance

Question 38

Importance of Liu Yizeng

Answer 38

Wrote histories of Chinese culture, seeing it as the primary category in envisioning the collective identity of the Chinese

His ‘culturalism as identity’ discourse tried to strike a balance between modernity and China’s particular nature

Question 39

Dirlik - fall of Confucianism

Answer 39

Seemed dead against the teleology of modernisation

Faced crisis before the revolution as the monarchy it legitimated proved unable to cope with Capitalism

When the monarchy fell, it lost the institution that had provided it with a concrete embodiment for millenia

Question 40

Dirlik - May Fourth period (late teens-early twenties)

Answer 40

Saw height of attack on Confucianism, as it was held responsible by a generation of intellectuals for the most basic social and political problems of society

Its role was questioned in sustaining an oppressive family structure, suppressing women and extinguishing youth creativity and independence

Question 41

Dirlik - Marxist view of Confucianism

Answer 41

Saw it as the ideological expression of a ‘feudal’ period that had had lasted for an inordinately long time

Within the period, it had articulated the interests of the ‘feudal’ ruling class, but would then die an inevitable death

Question 42

Dirlik - Weberian diagnosis of Confucianism

Answer 42

Considered ideological factors held China back, since it had most material prerequisites for the emergence of capitalism

Implied the necessity of abandoning Confucianism to develop capitalism

At time attacked by scholars who reconciled ‘western’ and ‘Chinese’ values to form ‘New Confucianism’

Question 43

Elman - exams as a focal point

Answer 43

They were the focal point through which state interests, family strategies and individual aspirations were directed

Achieved a degree of national standardisation and local importance unprecedented in the premodern world

Question 44

Elman - exam system odds

Answer 44

By 1850, they were very slim, with only 0.01% making it to the highest level

Question 45

Elman - exam system exclusion

Answer 45

Due to the great cost of education, although the exams were technically open to all, over 90% of the population was excluded

Also necessitated learning of classical language

Question 46

Elman - aim of system

Answer 46

Recapitulate in the present the classical genres in which the Confucian Classics had been composed

Also supported Qing political aims, as the ‘culturalism’ produced was ideologically supportive of the status quo

Strong piece of educational and social engineering

Question 47

Guofan’s Confucian credentials

Answer 47

Upheld the four principal ideas of the Confucian man - achieving self-perfection, managing the family, governing the empire, and bringing order to all under heaven

Perfect family man - strict but loving with children

Question 48

Qing economic situation

Answer 48

Elgin - China in ‘high-level equilibrium trap’

Growth without development; output high, but no method change

Question 49

Chinese railway example

Answer 49

Example of reluctance to modernise was the purchase by authorities of the 1st railway line in Shanghai in 1877, to rip up the rails and turn the station into the temple because it disrupted the feng shui of the countryside