We often hear nowadays that the West is declining and being overtaken by China. Actually, China is not rising to the top of the ladder, it is returning. For thousands of years the geographically enormous nations of China and India have been the largest economies on the planet. The last 200 years of western dominance by the newly formed USA and the global empires of Great Britain, France, Germany and the Netherlands, are unique. It’s not so much a decline, but rather a return to normalcy.
With 1.4 Billion people occupying the worlds third largest landmass, China is certainly not monolithic. According to Chinese-Australian delegate Jason Yat-sen Li, there are essentially 5 different sides to present day China. These include;
(1) The proud, self-sufficient, 5000 year old civilisation. (2) The new communist republic which seeks to replace the old ways. (3) The temporary status as leader of the developing world, forming diplomatic and economic partnerships with the worlds poorest countries. (4) The wealthy global investor and trader (5) and finally, the good global citizen; which has taken the lead in climate policy, science, technology and peace negotiations in strife torn parts of the world.
However, in the last decade, China has taken a far more aggressive approach to foreign policy, particularly in the Asia/Pacific region. The government of President Xi Jinping makes no secret of the fact that China’s drive and motivation since the cultural revolution, has been fuelled by a desire to erase the painful memories of what has been referred to as the nations “century of embarrassment”.
THE CENTURY OF EMBARRASSMENT
This concerns the period from the 1840s to the 1940s, when an internally fragmenting nation, lost much of its wealth and territory after being conquered by previously smaller opponents. The once proud kingdom in the far east – which had been living off past glories – were hit with the present reality that their technology, commerce and military had fallen way behind the western hemisphere.
How did this happen? The Qing Dynasty, which had ruled China since 1636, had grown completely out of touch. The world around them was changing in terms of commerce, technology, philosophy and the military. Nevertheless, the ruling class would not evolve in their mindset, thus imperial China became unstable with internal revolts, high level corruption, and an economic crisis due to outdated tax systems, which couldn’t cater for the massive population growth, which had now reached 400 million people.
Foreign empires from the West became particularly interested in the large, resource rich Asian kingdom. China did enjoy a reasonably good trading relationship with the European powers in the 1700’s. But by the 1800’s, the British had begun exporting tons of opium from their colonies in India, into the Chinese market – with the help of local smugglers and corrupt officials – in return for Chinese Silver.
THE OPIUM WARS
After about one third of the population became addicted, the Emperor ordered the Chinese authorities to shut down the opium trade. The loss of this cash cow incensed the British Government, and in June 1840 the British Navy moved in, and the Chinese defence forces were obliterated.
What followed was the first of several post war treaties that many refer to as ‘the unfair treaties’. The treaty of Nanking in 1842, after the 1st opium war, forced China to give Hong Kong to Britain, as well as pay the British massive reparations. They also had to hand over control of China’s ports, and grant the British – and others – the right to legally claim Chinese territory, if they so desired. In the following decades, Russia, France, Germany, Sweden-Norway, Portugal and the USA, all took a little chunk of Chinese Territory for their own purposes. And just like before, the Opium trade boomed.
The second Opium war began in 1856. Once again, it was due to the large scale importation of Opium, and the general presence of the European powers in China. This time the British would be joined by the French, and after 4 years of fighting, the Qing Dynasty was handed its second comprehensive defeat by the vastly superior western forces.
At the convention of Peking, which followed the conclusion of the war in 1860, the Chinese were forced to make more concessions and reparations to the British and French. The treaties also resulted in the legalisation of Opium, and a law guaranteeing freedom of religion in China. This was one of many modern reforms that took place in China after 1860. The defeat and humiliation of the Qing Dynasty by the West, signalled the passing of the Old China.
Punitive treaties and an impoverished economy plunged China into chaos. This saw the rise of local war lords, and increasing anger at both the Qing dynasty, and the foreign occupiers. There were many violent rebellions. The most famous being the boxer rebellion of 1900, which was put down by the eight nation alliance (USA, Russia, Britain, France, Italy, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Japan).
Just like before, massive reparations in the form of silver, were paid to the foreign powers involved. Although, by the end of the conflict, the foreign powers no longer had any interest in ruling over China. They were happy to just keep trading under the very generous deals they had with the Qing dynasty. Although, if the Qing dynasty were ever overthrown, the treaties would become defunct.
THE NEW REPUBLIC
Like the Germans after the treaty of versailles, the Chinese people were becoming increasingly desperate, and the nationalist sentiment of revolutionaries like Sun Yat-Sen became incredibly popular. Unlike previous leaders, Sun Yat-Sen had received a westernised education in Hong Kong, and was also a Christian. After uniting several of the rebel movements, he formed a centralised government in Canton, and on the 1st of January 1912, the Republic of China was born.
He stepped down from his new position of Chinese President, just two months later, and handed over to General Yuan Shikai. This was part of a deal struck with the general in return for his army assisting Sun in deposing the royal family. The royals abdicated peacefully and in march 1912, General Yuan Shikai became the President.
Sun Yat-Sen and his nationalist party, the Kuomintang (KMT), would later realise that they had done a deal with the devil. General Yuan Shikai became more and more power hungry, and even proclaimed himself the new Emperor. After his death in 1916, China was once again plunged into chaos. Regional Warlords, rival governments and even a brief comeback by the Qing Dynasty, contaminated the next decade of life in China.
After Sun Yat-Sen died of cancer in 1925, his successor – Chiang Kai-Shek – would go on to reunite the party, purge any troublemakers, and break the KMT’s alliance with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), who were relatively small at this stage. But the CCP grew quickly, and starting fighting with the KMT for control of the country. In 1927 Chiang moved the capital to Nanking, and a year later, China became one nation again, albeit very loosely held together. Chiang would adopt the wonderful title of Generalissimo, and had some success in modernising China, despite all the opposition. But all that came to an end, when War broke out between China and Japan, in 1937.
THE JAPANESE TAKEOVER
The Japanese conquest of China forms the second half of the ‘century of embarrassment’. Starting around the late 19th century, the up and coming island nation – which had been isolated for most of its history – began to take a keen interest in the vast territory of continental Asia. For centuries, the mighty Kingdom of China had looked down upon its small island neighbours to the east, and never considered them a legitimate threat.
But times had changed, and Japan had spent the last fifty years modernising and expanding. It had also become more hubristic, with the Japanese Emperor centralising his power in Tokyo and demanding an adherence to the old warrior and feudal codes. This resulted in Japan’s huge population developing an almost religious devotion to the Emperor, in what became known as the Meiji Restoration. For the first time in history, Japan had grown more powerful than China.
Imperial Japan first made her move in 1895, by violently taking over the territory of Joseon Korea. Known as the first Sino-Japanese War, an ill equipped Chinese Army was once again, soundly beaten in Korea, allowing the Japanese to establish a strong military presence on the Asian mainland.
The demands of a growing economy and population, created the need for more territory. Therefore, in 1931 the Japanese took the large north-eastern Chinese province of Manchuria. The Chinese resistance was limited, and in 1932, the new Japanese colony of Manchukuo was born.
Skirmishes at the new border, between Chinese and Japanese troops, would boil over in 1937, when Japan invaded the cities of Wanping and Beiping, marking the start of the second Sino-Japanese War, and the beginning of World War 2 in Asia.
The Japanese continued to move south, but despite suffering massive casualties and significant loss of territory, the Chinese refused to surrender. They just managed to hold their enemy at bay, until August 1945, when the USA dropped the atomic bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The USSR formally declared war on Japan and easily took Manchuria, resulting in a Japanese surrender on August the 15th.
The Chinese civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communists – which officially began in 1927 – was put on hold during the Japanese invasion. They resumed very quickly after the Japanese surrender, and it lasted from 1945 to 1949, when victory was finally achieved by the Communists.
THE RISE OF CHAIRMAN MAO
On the 1st of October 1949, the leader of the CCP, Mao Zedong, announced the creation of the new People’s Republic of China. The capital was moved to Beiping, which also had its old name restored – Beijing. Chiang Kai-Shek and the KMT retreated to the island of Taiwan, taking a substantial amount of Chinese Gold with them. Right up until his death in 1975, Chiang Kai-Shek never gave up hopes of re-taking China, but none of his plans ever came to fruition.
With the help of Soviet leader Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong went about rapidly reforming China and consolidating Communist control over the whole country. He ruthlessly suppressed opposition and reduced economic inequality by murdering wealthy landowners, and giving their assets to the poor.
In addition, the new leadership provided healthcare and food rations for all, as well as improving education and giving equal rights to women. Opium production was stopped altogether, and labour camps were built to house criminals. China was also declared an ‘Atheist state’ and religious leaders were routinely persecuted.
Chairman Mao’s plan to modernise the Chinese economy was launched in 1958. Called ‘the great leap forward’ it sought to industrialise the nation and increase food production through collective farming. It started well, but soon descended into mayhem – The government focused too much on grain production, farms lied about their quotas, factory workers went untrained, and a series of natural disasters decimated the countryside – leading to a widespread famine that caused the deaths of around 40 million Chinese citizens.
In 1959, a very unpopular Mao Zedong stepped down as Chairman of the Communist Party, and his more moderate deputy Liu Shaoqi, was installed as the new leader. But Mao remained in the government and tried running the show from behind the scenes. In 1961, the catastrophic ‘great leap forward’ was abandoned.
In 1966 Mao staged a comeback, blaming his previously disastrous reign, which killed millions, on a minority of rich capitalists who sought to undermine the new China from within. He claimed that he was, and had always been, on the side of the peasants. His audacious plan worked. In late 1966 he returned to the leadership. Liu Shaoqi was tortured and executed for treason.
By now his cult of personality had reached its peak, as Mao began to reshape China in his own image. This is what historians call “the Cultural Revolution”. Mao’s “Little Red Book” was required reading for all citizens, and he recruited thousands of students into a new enforcement group called the “Red Guard”. This violent group of fanatics would monitor, arrest, murder, and occasionally cannibalise, any citizens deemed disloyal to the dear leader. Mao also had many of China’s historical sites, relics and artworks destroyed because they reminded him of the old nation. At one point he even had part of the Great Wall of China knocked down so that they could re-use the bricks.
He also rejected the brand of communism which governed the USSR and North Korea, and implemented what he saw as a more faithful version of what Karl Marx had in mind. This variation came to be known as “Maoism”. Most notably, this new variation involved opening up the country to the rest of world and encouraging trade.
The legacy of Mao Zedong really depends on who you speak to. Many people celebrate the former Chairman as the founding father of modern China. Whilst others, especially in the west, see him as nothing more than a political tyrant, whose indifference and incompetence sent tens of millions of innocent people to the grave.
MORE MODERATE COMMUNISM
Mao Zedong died in 1976 at the age of 82. After a long period of political manoeuvring, Deng Xiaoping became the new Supreme/Paramount Leader of China in December 1978, after Mao’s successor, Hua Guofeng, was rejected by his own party. Deng, who was more sympathetic to capitalism than Mao, undertook massive social and economic reforms in a plan to improve China in the four main areas of agriculture, industry, science, and the military.
As a result of these reforms, China would enjoy continuous economic growth for the next four decades. In 2005, China overtook Japan to become the second largest economy in the world. Its human rights record however, remained well behind the other developed nations. Whilst the standards of living in China did significantly improve during Deng’s time as leader, he was still an authoritarian. The massacre of pro-democracy demonstrators at Tiananmen Square in 1989, was carried out on his orders.
Deng Xiaoping has been called the architect of modern China. When he died in 1997, at the age of 92, his legacy was praised by many in both China and the international community. In 1992, Deng Xiaoping retired, and was replaced as supreme leader by Jiang Zemin.
As the new Supreme/Paramount Leader, Jiang didn’t wield as much power as his predecessors. Political power in China was now more collective than in previous decades. At the start of his tenure in 1993, Jiang held the positions of General Secretary of the CCP, President of the Republic and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, thus putting him in charge of the party, the state and the military.
During his ten years in power, Jiang continued economic reforms and maintained social stability. Many of the more liberal members of the party were removed after the Tiananmen square protests, thus the CCP was loaded with unimaginative party hardliners.
In his home town of Shanghai, Jiang Zemin was known as ‘the flower pot’ – lots of decoration, no action. He was however, a clever diplomat, who significantly improved China’s relations with the outside world. When Jiang handed over the leadership to Hu Jintao around 2003, China was a global powerhouse.
Hu Jintao held all three offices during his decade in power. He presided over a period of consistent economic growth and prosperity, consolidating China’s position as one half of the most powerful nations on Earth. Hu was also responsible for massive steps forward in science and technology, and devoted China to a more peaceful and neighbourly approach to its development.
Whilst far from perfect (he did clamp down on Tibet), Hu Jintao was probably China’s most level headed Supreme Leader. He voluntarily stepped down from all three of his leadership roles between November 2012 and March 2013, and handed over the reins of power to Xi Jinping.
THE NEW “PRESIDENT FOR LIFE”
Known around the world as the Chinese President, the new Supreme Leader Xi Jinping, has conducted himself very differently to those who have gone before him. When he initially came to power, one of the first things he said was that China needs to learn more about the rest of the world, and the rest of the world needs to find out more about China. Sounds great. But just what information the CCP would share with the rest of the world, was heavily filtered.
When Xi announced a huge crackdown on political corruption – which was very popular – many of those arrested just happened to be his political rivals. In 2018, he proposed the abolition of term limits for the presidency. The entire Chinese parliament (Just under 3000 members) voted in favour, with the exception of 2 representatives. This essentially made him president for life, as he did away with the collective leadership operations of the previous decades, and started to look more and more like another Mao Zedong. Especially after his government added to the constitution, a new doctrine called “Xi Jinping Thought”.
Christian Churches throughout China have been ordered to take down any pictures of Jesus and replace them with pictures of President Xi, whilst Chinese Muslims have been arrested and sent to ‘re-education camps’ to become more acceptable to the CCP. Xi also increased censorship and surveillance, especially regarding the internet, and if any foreign country criticises these human rights abuses, China simply threatens to stop doing business with them.
China’s unprecedented economic growth over the last few decades (around 10% per year), means that the Chinese people are fairly content with the Communist government. As a result of this growth, wages for Chinese workers have quadrupled in the last fifteen years. In the same period, workers wages in the USA have hardly moved. Executive salaries on the other hand, have skyrocketed.
But Xi is still very ambitious. In 2013 he announced the new “Belt and Road Initiative”. A global infrastructure project in which China plans to spend over a trillion dollars on constructing new trade routes (land and sea) across 70 countries. When finished, it will place China at the centre of global trade from 2050 onwards.
CONCLUSION
Despite this immense power and prestige, the Chinese nation, and the president himself, still project a strange fragility and hypersensitivity when confronted with, even the slightest criticism or ridicule from the outside world. Jokes about Xi Jinping on the internet are heavily censored, and at the time of writing, Chinese officials are bitterly complaining about western photographers taking less than flattering pictures of its Olympic athletes.
Could this insecurity be a hangover from the century of embarrassment? Perhaps. But one thing is for certain, China will play a big role in humanities future. Earlier this year, on the 100th anniversary of the CCP, President Xi declared;
“We Chinese are a people who uphold justice and are not intimidated by threats of force. As a nation, we have a strong sense of pride and confidence. We have never bullied, oppressed, or subjugated the people of any other country, and we never will. By the same token, we will never allow any foreign force to bully, oppress, or subjugate us, anyone who would attempt to do so will find themselves on a collision course with a great wall of steel forged by over 1.4 billion Chinese people”.
