Understanding “the Grand Revolution” in modern China

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Notes

1 This is Mao’s definition. As he wrote in 1927, “Revolution is rebellion, referring to the violent overthrow of one class by another.” Mao Zedong, “Hunan nongmin yundong kaocha baogao” [A Report on the Peasant Movement in Hunan], in Mao Zedong xuanji [Selected Works of Mao Zedong], ed., Zhongyang wenxian bianji weiyuanhui [Editorial Committee on Party Literature of the Central Committee], vol. 1 (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1991), 17.

2 Quoted in Felix Gilbert, History: Politics or Culture?—Reflections on Ranke and Burckhardt (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1990). Chinese version, Liu Yaochun, trans., Lishixue: zhengzhi haishi wenhua (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2012), 5.

3 Liang Qichao, “Jinggao guoren zhi wujie xianzheng zhe” [To Those Who Misunderstand Constitutional Reform], in Yin bing shi heji [Selected Works of Liang Qichao], vol. 26 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1989), 62. This essay was originally published in February 1911.

4 For example, the three great historians in the German-speaking world in the nineteenth century, Ranke, Droysen, and Burckhardt, all emphasized modern history. See Gilbert, History: Politics or Culture, 6.

5 For instance, the founding of the Institute of Modern History at the Academia Sinica in Taiwan ran into numerous obstacles. See Chen Sanjing, ed., Zouguo youhuan de suiyue: jinshisuode gushi [Years of Anxieties: The Story of the Institute of Modern History] (Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1995). See also Zhang Pengyuan, Guo Tingyi, Fei Zhengqing, Wei Muting: Taiwan yu meiguo xueshu jiaoliu ge’an chutan [Guo Tingyi, John King Fairbank and C. Martin Wilbur: A Case Study of the Academic Exchange between Taiwan and the United States] (Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica, 1997).

6 Lu Simian, Lu zhu zhongguo tongshi [Chinese History] (Shanghai: Huadong shifan daxue chubanshe, reprinted 1992), 491.

7 Liang Qichao, “Zhongguo lishi yanjiufa” [Methodology in the Study of Chinese History], in Yin bing shi heji, vol. 73, 117.

8 Immanuel Kant, The Conflict of the Faculties, trans. Mary J. Gregor (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992), 152–53.

9 The orthodox interpretation in Chinese Marxist revolutionary discourse is that people participate in revolution because they have been oppressed.

10 See Luo Zhitian, “Shi bian: ershi shiji shangbanye zhongguo dushuren de geming qinghuai” [The Rebellion of Intellectuals: Pro-Revolutionary Sentiment among Educated Chinese in the First Half of the 20th Century], Xin shixue [New History], vol. 18, no. 4 (2007), 189–233.

11 See Zhao Yanjie, “Chong gou shehui de lunli fansi: jindai zhongguo de jiating geming, 1895–1931” [Reconstructing Social Ethics: Family Revolution in Modern China], Ph.D. dissertation, Department of History, Peking University, 2013.

12 My thanks go to Xue Gang from the History Department at Peking University who contributed many ideas to this paragraph.

13 Crane Brinton, The Anatomy of Revolution, rev. and expanded ed. (New York: Vintage Books, 1965), 3–4.