Part 1 (1/2)
Government in Republican China.
by Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger.
FOREWORD
To the cynic, two nations clasped in murderous embrace yet nominally living in peace with each other might well be one of the miracles of our century. No less miraculous has been for many the tenacity of Chinese resistance to j.a.pan's invasion ever since the first bullets whizzed through the night near the Marco Polo Bridge southwest of Peking early in July, 1937. The undeclared war has spread disaster through an area larger than that immediately affected in Europe's battles from 1914 to 1918; hundreds of thousands have died in action; for months China's capital has been in the hands of the enemy. But China is not on her knees.
The explanation is simple. For the first time in her history, China fights as a nation. More is involved than can be attributed to Generalissimo Chiang K'ai-shek's personal leaders.h.i.+p or the strategic and organizational services rendered, until his recent recall to Germany, by Alexander von Falkenhausen, chief of staff of the Turkish armies during the World War. A people without allegiance to its government and without faith in itself would have been incapable of braving the ordeal of retreat, ma.s.sacre, and occupation as successfully as have the Chinese. That China fights today as a nation is no small tribute to the National Government of the Kuomintang established at Nanking in 1927. How long she will be able to fight as a nation is a question to be answered only by reference to the national mentality and political inst.i.tutions which have emerged since the collapse of the Manchu Empire in 1911-1912. It is the purpose of this volume to appraise the record of China's republican era.
The author was compelled to beat his own path. Only a few books on modern government in China are available in English, and these, written by Chinese, are modeled in their presentation on Western prototypes to an extent of obscuring, though unintentionally, the very substance of Chinese politics. In Dr. Linebarger's pioneer venture the dynamics of internal instability, typical of the earlier phases of the Republic, and the gradual consolidation under the Nanking regime are a.n.a.lyzed with extraordinary penetration. Instead of being confronted with meaningless form and empty legality, the reader is placed in a position to view step by step the evolution of conflicting and merging forces: political movements and their contest for the loyalty of the ma.s.ses, the rough and ready rule of military might, and the official hierarchies representing organized governments. Throughout this work, as in Dr. Linebarger's earlier _Political Doctrines of Sun Yat-sen_, the broad stream of Confucian thought fertilizing age after age of China's social existence and Sun's purposeful ideological adaptations combined in his _San Min Chu I_ are shown in fundamental harmony. One distinction, however, stands out clearly. The Confucian tradition applied itself to a vaguely conceived but essentially unified world order. In the _San Min Chu I_ we encounter the elements of a national credo, self-a.s.sertive and militant.
The role of ideology in modern government has suffered curious neglect among students of politics for a considerable time. In periods of relative ideational saturation or stagnation, the mechanics of const.i.tutional law or the give and take of legislative barter may distract from the basic framework of values and objectives giving shape to the political order. The rise of totalitarian systems relying heavily on ideological appeal and propaganda techniques has laid new stress upon those factors which predetermine political behavior. In China's vast experience we have the supreme example of ideological guidance so firmly established as to reduce to a minimum direct governmental intervention in the affairs of the individual. It is perhaps Sun Yat-sen's tragedy that for years he placed his faith in the magic of democratic verbiage imported from the West; a new orientation came to prevail after 1923, when at Sun's instance tested pract.i.tioners of ma.s.s organization from the Soviet Union began to overhaul and streamline the Kuomintang apparatus.
Government in China has become migratory as a result of j.a.pan's advance.
A mere description of its previous structure and functions would today have little relevance. But Dr. Linebarger has probed deeply enough into the foundations of Chinese political life to distinguish with uncommon discernment between the ephemeral and the durable. His long-range exposition transcends the exigencies of the hour and delineates the issues of China's future.
FRITZ MORSTEIN MARX.
ADAMS HOUSE, HARVARD UNIVERSITY.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am deeply indebted to the five gentlemen who have read the entire ma.n.u.script in some one of its stages. My father, Judge Paul Myron Wentworth Linebarger, has given me tireless help in this as in all my projects, for which I shall never be able to tender sufficient thanks.
My teacher, Professor Harley Farnsworth MacNair of the University of Chicago, supplied numerous addenda and corrigenda of great value from his knowledge of modern Chinese history. Professor Arthur N. Holcombe of Harvard University suggested changes which have made the work more realistic. a.s.sistance offered me by the Sinologue and philosopher, Professor H. H. Dubs of Duke University, was of the utmost value.
Professor Paul H. Clyde, Duke University, provided many useful and significant hints, especially in the field of Sino-foreign relations.
I am also under obligation to Mr. J. C. Yang, Library of Congress, and Professor James R. Ware, Harvard University, for further suggestions; to Professor Charles Sidney Gardner and Dr. John Fairbank, Harvard University, and Professor George Kennedy, Yale University, for aid in the general course of my Chinese studies; to Professor Maria Magdalena Schoch, until recently of the University of Hamburg, Germany, for a critical reading of the revised ma.n.u.script; and to Miss Hazel Foster and Mr. M. F. Nelson for similar a.s.sistance. Mrs. W. M. Gibson, Miss Whitty Daniel, and my wife have helped in the preparation of the ma.n.u.script.
P. M. A. L.
DURHAM, N. C., _August_, 1938.
INTRODUCTION
The origins of Chinese society may reach half a million years into the past. Anthropologists have suggested that Sinanthropus Pekinensis, among the earliest forms of man, resembles the modern Chinese more closely than he does any other modern race. In what specific period the earliest ancestors of the Chinese came to China is not known. It is certain, however, that about 1500 B. C. there existed a well-developed civilized society in the Yellow River valley, and that this same society has lived on--modified by the centuries, but in unbroken continuity--down into the present. China has outlasted Crete, Tyre, Greece, and Rome. The Aztec empire, which arose in Mexico when China was already ancient, has become only a memory, while China is still vital.
How is it that China's inst.i.tutions survive, while those of other nations did not? How real are Chinese inst.i.tutions today? What, precisely, is the Republic of China?
_Duality or Confluence?_
The phrase _Republican China_ indicates an era rather than a system. The preceding ages of China have been known by the names of great dynasties.
T'ang China (620-906 A. D.) overawed and instructed all eastern Asia.
Sung China (A. D. 960-1279) flourished, civilian and tolerant, in a world marked by bigotry and arms. Well into the past century the West remained distant and vague. Republican China struggles in the presence of the modern world and subject to its superior force; her very name is a capitulation to the twentieth century. The problems of the Republican era are not merely the problems of republican government; they involve the broad question of the meeting and interpenetration of civilizations.
How are the Chinese, schooled for thousands of years in the effective operation of their own political system, to adapt themselves fast enough to the Western scheme? What happens when they must and yet cannot effectuate such adaptation? These are not queries to be answered simply in the routine terms of Western politics.