The Cambridge History of China. Vol. 12: Republican China, 1912-1949, Part 1
Подождите немного. Документ загружается.
YUAN
S
MONARCHICAL MOVEMENT 253
parts of the province was encouraged by Szechwanese representatives of
the National Protection Army, and was also stimulated by other, poli-
tically unrelated Szechwanese leaders who sought Szechwanese au-
tonomy from Peking. The 'bandit' National Protection Army developed
into a considerable guerrilla movement against the Peiyang occupation.
Its development goes a long way in explaining Ts'ai O's successes.
Then, it turned out that even some of Yuan Shih-k'ai's own representa-
tives in Szechwan - the officers of the occupation - were uncertain how
far they would go in resisting the Yunnanese movement. Ts'ai soon es-
tablished contact both with Yuan's proconsul in Szechwan, Ch'en I,
and with Feng Yii-hsiang, the talented Peiyang commander. An accom-
modation was arrived at in March 1916. Although there had been tight
moments, the National Protection Army prevailed over Yuan's influence
in Szechwan.
From March onwards Yuan's power crumbled rapidly under a com-
bination of foreign and domestic pressures. Externally, after an initial
two months of apparent tolerance of the monarchical movement, the
Japanese government had displayed a growing hostility to Yuan's mon-
archical intentions. The emerging policy of open disapproval was based
less on an awareness of the monarchy's possible use as an impediment to
Japanese aspirations than on a discovery of its enormous unpopularity
among leading Chinese. In October 1915 Japan persuaded Great Britain
and other foreign powers to warn Yuan of the risks. The outbreak of the
Yunnan revolt in December, which justified these and subsequent warn-
ings,
increased Japanese opposition. Then in early March 1916 the
Japanese cabinet formally adopted a policy of seeking Yuan's complete
removal from power. One effect of this decision was a sizeable flow of
Japanese funds to Yuan's opponents.'
1
Kwangsi's military
chief,
Lu Jung-t'ing, whose adherence to the
revolution was expected earlier, finally acted in mid March 1916. Feng
Kuo-chang at Nanking, who had expressed his disagreement with a re-
vived monarchy the previous summer, now joined with other provincial
military chiefs in calling for Yuan's abandonment of his imperial preten-
sions.
On 22 March Yuan announced his return to presidential forms. But
in April more provincial governments declared their break with Peking,
and in May still others. In early June, when the only remaining question
regarding Yuan was the manner of his departure, he died in Peking of
uraemia at
5 6
years of age.
Meanwhile, the country had fallen into a state of the most remarkable
51 Albert A. Altman and Harold Z. Schiffrin, 'Sun Yat-sen and the Japanese: 1914-16',
Modern
Asian
Studies,
6.4 (Oct. 1972) 585-400.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
2J4 THE ERA OF
YUAN
SHIH-K'AI,
I 9 I 2-1 6
confusion. As Yuan's power was visibly fading, the opposition had no
common organization nor any common vision of the post-Yuan order.
Several clusters of power could be discerned. The southern tier of four
provinces never occupied by Peiyang forces - Yunnan, Kweichow,
Kwangsi and Kwangtung - formed for the moment a coordinated block,
with extensions into Szechwan and Hunan as a result of the military cam-
paigns. Some limited success was achieved in translating the cohesiveness
of the Yunnan Army into a common political line, at least to the extent
of holding out for Yuan's full overthrow and the revival of the 1912
constitution, which Yuan had replaced in 1914 by a document ratifying
his dictatorship (see below, page 502). A second cluster centred on Feng
Kuo-chang in the lower Yangtze area, as he summoned provincial chiefs
for strategic discussions in the spring of 1916. He carved out for himself
an intermediary position, generally opposing Yuan and the centralizing
policies of the dictatorship but refusing to join forces with the southern
revolutionaries.
In Peking, Tuan Ch'i-jui returned to office in April as prime minister
and in effect supplanted Yuan as Peiyang leader and inheritor of the
unifying aspirations of the dictatorship. But the aspirations could not be
fulfilled. He represented in practice the centre of only a third cluster of
power. This was dramatically illustrated when he tried to incorporate
Hunan under Peking's administration in 1917. He found himself ob-
structed, not just by local Hunanese leaders, but also by an implicit
coalition of the southern provinces and Feng Kuo-chang's allies along the
Yangtze.
Another power cluster of future importance was beginning to emerge
at the time of Yuan's death in the three north-eastern provinces of
Manchuria under Chang Tso-lin. But Chang Tso-lin had not yet con-
solidated this vast area. None of these power clusters was in fact solid.
They were constellations of military commanders and local officials, who
pursued first of
all
their own survival in an exceedingly turbulent environ-
ment. The stage was set for instability and civil war. The warlord period
had begun.
Another political tendency emerged as Yuan's star set. That was the
resuscitation of the forms of the liberal phase of the republic. Even as
Yuan clung to office, provincial and local assemblies were regathering
beyond the reach of his power. With his death, both the 1912 constitution
and the parliament of 1913 were revived. Perhaps the importance of this
tendency in the late 1910s and the early 1920s has not been sufficiently
appreciated. The linkage of provincial autonomy and self-government
institutions lived on to influence early warlord politics, at least marginally.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
YUAN
S
MONARCHICAL MOVEMENT 255
But the vigour that representative government had had in the immediate
aftermath of the 1911 Revolution never returned.
Retrospectively, it appears that the two failed political experiments of
the early republic - liberal government and dictatorship - contributed to
each other's destruction. Yuan Shih-k'ai found parliament and
self-
governed provinces debilitating to the nation-state, which, he believed,
had to be centralized and strong in the age of imperialism. At his first
opportunity he did away with both, as well as such auxilliary institutions
as competing political parties and an uncensored press. But his own forms
of rule inspired no general enthusiasm, though they were initially sup-
ported by some important independent figures like Liang Ch'i-ch'ao.
Even its early advocates became disillusioned with Peking's authoritarian
mode. Yuan's misguided monarchical gambit provided the occasion for
this disillusionment to be mobilized. The dictatorship collapsed with the
monarchy. But before a liberal consensus could re-emerge and gain an
institutional edge, a decentralized military hegemony intervened. Both
experimental forms of the early republic came to be recalled chiefly as
negative political examples.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
CHAPTER
5
A CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC:
THE PEKING GOVERNMENT, 1916-28
The death
of
Yuan Shih-k'ai
in
June 1916 ushered
in the era of the
warlords
and yet
throughout
the
ensuing decade
or
more
of
militarism,
the Peking government remained
the
symbol
of
China's national sover-
eignty
and
hoped-for unity.
In the
absence
of a
dynasty,
a
dominant
personality
or a
ruling party,
the
government
at
Peking still represented
the idea
of
the state.
In
particular
it
was sustained
by a
widespread faith
in constitutionalism,
a
belief that had grown
up
among Chinese patriots
at the turn
of
the century along with the rise
of
nationalism.
1
When China's newly-trained
and
-equipped navy
was
sunk
by the
Japanese
in
the
war of
1894-5, many politically conscious Chinese con-
cluded that 'self-strengthening' of an essentially technological and military
nature was not enough to save China.
At
the same time, they were struck
by
the
coincidence that
all the
most powerful countries
in the
world,
including Japan,
had
more
or
less recently adopted constitutions.
Fur-
thermore, specialists
in the new
foreign discipline
of
political science
asserted that
a
properly drafted constitution was
the
key
to
stable, effec-
tive government anywhere.
It
seemed clear that only
a
constitution could
make China strong.
Despite disagreement over
the
form
a
Chinese constitution should
take,
most Chinese political thinkers agreed
on
two points. First, despite
a basic unity
of
interests between government
and
people,
the
Chinese
state was weak. This was due
to
the passivity
of
the people, which could
be overcome by granting them a direct stake in government through such
institutions
of
participation
as
study societies, elections
and
legislatures.
As
the
reformer K'ang Yu-wei wrote
in
1898,
'I
have heard that
the
strength
of
nations east and west is due
to
the establishment
of
constitu-
tions
and the
opening
of
parliaments.
. . .
How
can a
state
be
anything
but strong when its ruler and its millions
of
citizens are united
in a
single
body?'
2
1 This chapter draws heavily upon Andrew
J.
Nathan,
Peking
politics, 1918-1^2}: factionalism
and the failure of constitutionalism.
2 K'ang Yu-wei, 'Ch'ing t'ing li-hsien
k'ai
kuo-hui che', reprinted
in
Chien Po-tsan
et al.
comps. Wu-hsupien-fa (1898 reforms),
2.
236.
256
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
ROOTS OF CONSTITUTIONALISM 257
Second, a major source of disorder in Chinese history had been the
ambiguous definition of power relationships, resulting in struggles over
the imperial succession, conflicts among ministers, and the overbearing
behaviour of magistrates, which could be checked only by popular upri-
sings.
But in a constitutional regime, as K'ang's disciple Liang Ch'i-
ch'ao pointed out in 1900, 'the imperial succession is fixed,. . . the
appointment of high ministers accords with legislative procedure and
popular sentiment, . . . and any dissatisfaction among the people can be
expressed to parliament. . . . Thus a constitutional form of government
can never suffer from disorder.''
Monarchists, among them K'ang and Liang, believed a period of tu-
telage was needed before the Chinese people could rule themselves. In
this conception, influenced by the statecraft tradition of Chinese political
thought, statesmen would combine education and sanctions to keep the
public in order while gradually introducing institutions of popular par-
ticipation. Republicans, on the other hand, led by Sun Yat-sen, argued
that 'the future of China is like building a railroad. Thus if we were now
building a railroad, would we use the first locomotive ever invented
[constitutional monarchy] or today's improved and most efficient one
[a republic] ?'
4
The Ch'ing court put a price on the heads of K'ang and
Liang but later accepted their arguments: in 1906 it ordered preparations
for a monarchical constitution. But before the constitution was promul-
gated, the republicans won the day through revolution.
In some ways the edict of 1906 was more definitive than the Revolution
of 1911. The idea of a republic was challenged at least three times by
monarchists after 1911 - by Yuan Shih-k'ai's imperial venture, by Chang
Hsun's 1917 restoration of the Hsuan-t'ung Emperor, and by the resur-
rection of the 'kingly way' in the Manchukuo of the 1930s. But at no
point since 1906, even after 1949, has the necessity of one form or another
of constitution been seriously questioned. Indeed, ever since the late
Ch'ing a constitution has been considered necessary not only for the
nation but for each political party, chamber of commerce and interest-
group association.
Several sub-national units of government also adopted constitutions.
The most important example of this trend was the so-called 'federalist
movement' of the early 1920s
{lien-sheng
tzu-chihyun-tung,
lit., 'movement
for a federation of self-governing provinces'). Its leaders in Hunan,
Szechwan, Kwangtung and several other southern provinces argued that
3 Liang Ch'i-ch'ao, 'Li hsien-fa i', in
Yin-ping shih
wen-chi,
ts'e 2,
chiian
5, pp. 3-4.
4 Quoted in Michael Gasster,
Chinese intellectuals
and
the Revolution
of 19rt:
The
birth of
modern
Chinese
radicalism,
138.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
THE PEKING GOVERNMENT, I 9 I 6-2
8
the nation would
be
stronger
if
each province could separate itself from
the warlord melee
to
pursue stability and growth
on
its own. But when
it
came
to
mechanisms
for
achieving this goal, 'there were interminable
discussions
of the
respective competence
of the
central power
and the
provincial authorities
and of the
structure
of the
latter, there were
re-
ferences
to the
German Bund
of
1815,
to the
Swiss Confederation,
to the
United States
of
America,
to
Canada,
to
Australia,
and
comments
on the
various provincial constitutions promulgated
or
drafted
at
this time
in
China,
but
always from
a
technical, legal point
of
view rather [than] from
that
of
Chinese realities.'' Several provinces drafted constitutions and
one
(Hunan) briefly
put its
into effect.
But the
federalist movement
did not
rescue China from warlordism. Instead, several warlords cheerfully
promulgated federalist constitutions
of
their own
for
tactical use
in
defy-
ing
the
central authorities.
What explains
the
persistence
of
the modern Chinese faith
in
constitu-
tions despite
so
many disappointments
?
In the
modern West, constitu-
tions have been just
as
uncertain
in
their effectiveness
and yet
equally
indispensable as
in
China.
In
both cases the idea draws vitality from basic
national beliefs.
In the
individualist West constitutions
are
seen
as
rules
for protecting personal rights
and
regulating inevitable conflicts
of in-
terest.
In
China, constitutions have been seen
as
basic statements
of
cur-
rent community purpose around which
to
rally collective energies,
as
devices
for
promoting consensus
and
preventing error.
As
such, consti-
tutions
in
China have been regarded
as
susceptible
to
change when com-
munity purpose changed.
There were pragmatic attractions
as
well.
For a
China struggling
to
achieve status
in the
world
of
nations,
a
constitution
was
part
of the
regalia
of a
modern state. Constitutions have afforded rulers
a
basis
for
claiming legitimacy.
The
early republican constitutions allowed
a
narrow
community
of
factions
to
claim that their competition
for
power
was
legitimate while intrusions
by
revolutionary forces (the Kuomintang,
the
Communists, students, unions) were not. The factions could agree
on the
need
for
loyalty
to the
constitution, while permitting themselves
to
feud
over
the
meaning
of
its provisions.
In short,
the
commitment
to
constitutionalism seemed
to
combine
-
in
the
early republic
as
well
as
later
on, and in
China
as
elsewhere
-
faith
in a constitution's ability to strengthen the nation with pragmatic apprecia-
tion
of its
immediate convenience
for the
elite.
The
commitment
was
sufficiently real that
a
great deal
of
effort was devoted,
in the
years
1916
5 Jean Chesneaux,
'The
federalist movement
in
China, 1920-5',
in
Jack Gray,
ed.
Modern
China's search for
a
political
form,
123.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
ROOTS OF CONSTITUTIONALISM 259
to 1928, to writing constitutions, debating their provisions, denouncing
opponents for breaching them, and congratulating allies for restoring
them. On the other hand, with each cycle of factional conflict after 1916
there was a perceptible increase in the mendacity of the politicians' con-
stitutional manoeuvres and a corresponding decline in public support
for the republican regime. The eventual effect was to discredit the idea of
a liberal republic and introduce the first of a series of authoritarian re-
gimes, the national government of the Kuomintang. In a certain sense the
constitutional monarchists of the late Ch'ing had won their point. The
concept of tutelage, rather than monarchy as such, lay at the heart of
their argument; and from 1928 until today Chinese governments have
been supervised by one or another Leninist-style party, aiming to avoid
repetition of the chaos of the early republic.
SOCIAL AND INTELLECTUAL ROOTS
OF CONSTITUTIONALISM
Only a small proportion of the 400 million Chinese around 1920 knew
or cared anything about constitutionalism, and of these a still smaller
group was so placed as to be able to attempt to put the belief into prac-
tice.
The interests and outlooks of the political elite go some way to
explain the appeal of the constitutionalist faith.
The most influential portion of the national political elite were former
Ch'ing bureaucrats. To such men, constitutionalism spelled moderniza-
tion along Western lines. Most of them had not actively favoured the
overthrow of the Manchu court, but they did not balk at it so long as
their administrative predominance was preserved. Their overriding goal
was a strong China, their models the Western nations and Japan, where
constitutions and national power seemed conspicuously linked.
One can discern three roughly-divided age groups among the late
Ch'ing bureaucrats who became leaders of the republic.
6
Men born in the
1860s belonged to the generation of Yuan Shih-k'ai (born 1859). Tutoring
in the Confucian classics in preparation for government examinations
was their normal training, but some of them experienced technical, foreign
or new-style education. Most of
this
age-group accepted constitutionalism
reluctantly after the defeat by Japan in 1895 and the Boxer fiasco of 1900,
or accepted it as a. fait
accompli
in 1911. Their commitment to the consti-
tutional republic remained imperfect (their generation provided the main
support for several Ch'ing-restoration schemes), and their leadership
was autocratic and personalistic.
6 For examples to support the propositions that follow, see Nathan, Peking politics, 8-13.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
260 THE PEKING GOVERNMENT, 1916-28
The experience
of
new-style education became more common
in
the
cohort born in the 1870s. But as with the earlier group, the new learning
came relatively late
in
their lives after considerable classical tutoring.
New-style education in China still had a high traditional content, especially
with regard to fundamental social and political values. And students who
went abroad tended
to
be from wealthy families with stakes
in
the status
quo.
For these reasons many in the 1870s cohort shared the political con-
servatism
of
their seniors. On the other hand, their greater exposure
to
both the technical and the political cultures
of
Japan and the West gave
them greater facility
in
operating
a
republican form
of
government and
providing administrative leadership
in
such fields
as
railway administra-
tion, finance and foreign relations. This age-group was
a
generous sup-
plier
of
cabinet ministers to early republican governments.
For men born
in
the 1880s
a
pure classical education was
no
longer
practical. Those who began their training with classical study aimed
at
the examinations had
to
change course when examinations based on the
classical curriculum were abolished
in
1905. Young men who aspired
to
government service now had to prepare themselves either through new-
style domestic education or by study overseas, or both. Of those who stud-
ied abroad the vast majority went
to
Japan. Transplanted
to a
student
community in
a
foreign country with other students from all over China,
they formed clubs, journals and political parties, and conducted lively
debates with half-understood jargon drawn from a wide range of Western
and Japanese thought. They tended to reject Chinese traditions,
to
copy
foreign intellectual and social fashions, and to adopt the view that 'noth-
ing Chinese was good and everything Western was worth emulating.'
7
Between the cohorts of the 1870s and the 1880s lay
a
major divide
in
elite political culture.
It
was
the
later generation that contributed
the
senior leadership
of
the May Fourth movement and provided the eldest
sizeable group
of
Chinese Communist Party leaders.
Of
course, those
younger men who elected
to
enter
the
Ch'ing bureaucracy under
the
patronage
of
elder bureaucrats were not
so
radical
as
their to-be-com-
munist contemporaries.
But
because they better understood
and
were
more committed than their seniors
to
the republican ideal, they became
the major in-house critics
of
the republic's failings.
If
the 1880s cohort
shared with that of the 1860s an ambivalence about the republic, in their
case
it
came not from
a
feeling that the republic might be going too far
but from
a
sense that
it
often did not go far enough.
The second major component of the early republican national political
7
Y.
C. Wang,
Chinese intellectuals
and
the
West, 1872-1949, 147.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
ROOTS OF CONSTITUTIONALISM 261
elite consisted
of
members
of new
professions
-
educators, lawyers,
engineers, journalists, modern businessmen
and
bankers. Newspapers,
colleges, courts, banks
and
other specialized
new
institutions required
specially trained
staff,
and
new-style
and
overseas education provided
them (see volume
n,
chapter 10). The late Ch'ing reforms gave
a
special
impetus
to the
modernizing trend
by
requiring
the
establishment
of
professional associations (fa-t'uari)
-
chambers
of
commerce, lawyers'
associations, bankers' associations
- for
self-regulation
of the
nascent
professions. Because
the
professional associations were charged with
quasi-governmental functions,
the
professions came
to be
regarded
as a
sector
of
the elite having
a
legitimate voice
in
public affairs. Their rela-
tionship
of
formal
and
informal cooperation with
the
national govern-
ment
was
analogous
to
that traditionally enjoyed
by the
gentry. Indeed,
to some degree they gradually replaced local landholding elites
as the
major recruitment pool
and
source
of
'public opinion'
for
twentieth-
century Chinese national governments. While
arriviste
landholding
and
military elites rivalled
the old
gentry
on the
local level,
the
professionals
succeeded
to its
position
at the
national level.
But
less wealthy
and
less
educated sectors
of the
newly-emerging urban middle classes
-
small
merchants, artisans, students, clerks
-
were excluded from
the
elite's
conception
of
the legitimate public.
Among
the new
professionals,
the
professional politicians played
a
particularly prominent role. From about 1900 onwards the Tokyo Chinese
student community proved
a
rich recruiting ground. Here students read
about nationalism
and
revolution
and met
actual party
men and
revolu-
tionaries. Some chose
to
forgo bureaucratic careers
to
emulate these
new
models
of
political action. They chose between Liang Ch'i-ch'ao's path
of
agitation
and
propaganda
for
establishment
of a
constitution under
the
Ch'ing and Sun Yat-sen's programme
of
secret organization
for a
revolu-
tion
to
establish
a
republic.
The convening
of
the provincial assemblies
in
1909
and of
the national
assembly
in
1910 provided
an
opportunity
for
many politicians
to
pursue
their careers within
the
establishment.
The
typical late Ch'ing provincial
assemblyman was young (average age, 41), wealthy,
of
gentry class origin;
one-third had received modern education
in
China
or
overseas.
8
Although
these assemblies, like those
in the
republic, included bureaucrats,
pro-
fessionals, businessmen, landholders,
and the
like,
the
professional polit-
icians dominated
and set
the tone.
The fact that
the
professional politicians
had not
served
in the bu-
8 Chang P'eng-yuan, 'Ch'ing-chi tzu-i-chii i-yuan
ti
hsuan-chii chi ch'i ch'u-shen chih fen-hsi',
Ssuyuyen
5. 6
(March 1968) 1459-42.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008
262 THE PEKING GOVERNMENT, I 9 I 6-2 8
reaucracy tended
to
relegate them permanently
to
peripheral positions
in
early republican politics. The highest offices
in
the republic were achieved
mainly
by
bureaucrats
and
ex-bureaucrats, often military
men. Few
cabinet ministers
and no
presidents (with
the
brief exception
of Sun
Yat-sen) were professional politicians
in
the sense just described. Between
parliamentary sessions,
the
politicians were forced
to
serve
as
interme-
diaries, brokers
and
allies
of the
major bureaucratic factions. They took
centre-stage only when parliament
was in
session
and the
struggle
to
expand
its
power could
be
pursued.
Constitutionalism served
the
interests
of
ex-bureaucrats
and
profes-
sionals because
it
offered them legitimate political roles without opening
the political arena
to the
groups below them.
But in
addition, constitu-
tionalism made intellectual sense
to
many Chinese
at the
turn
of
the
cen-
tury
and
into
the
1920s.
To
begin with, they were impressed
by the
assurances
of
Western experts.
'The
political troubles with which
the
Chinese have
. . .
been afflicted', wrote
W. W.
Willoughby, professor
of
political science
at
Johns Hopkins
and for
years
a
constitutional adviser
to
the
Chinese government, 'have been due
not so
much
to a
general lack
of capacity
to
maintain
a
self-governing
or
representative scheme
of
political control
as
that they have been attempting
to
govern themselves
under
an
essentially defective constitution.''
This view, characteristic
of
Western political science
in the
1920s, fell
on fertile Chinese intellectual soil.
The
prestige
and
self-confidence
of
the West,
the
desire
in
some Chinese circles
to
achieve world acceptance
by becoming more like
the
Western nations,
and the
evident success
of
constitutional regimes
in
becoming world powers were only
the
more
obvious motives
for
imitation. There was also
the
vogue
of
scientism
in
Chinese thought
- the
belief
in the
efficacy
of a
mechanistic version
of
modern science
to
solve human problems. Just as part
of
the attraction of
'scientific' Marxism
in
both
the
West
and
China
was its
claimed linkage
with the nature-mastering powers
of
science,
so
modern 'political science'
laid claim
to the
same second-hand charisma. Like Marxism
a few
years
later, constitutionalism seemed
to
link what Ch'en Tu-hsiu
was to
call
Mr
Te
(democracy)
and Mr Sai
(science)
by
providing
for
democracy
to
be scientifically engineered.
Even more fundamentally,
the
faith
in
constitutions fell
in
with
a
deep-
seated Chinese belief
in the
dominant role
of the
conscious mind
in the
process
of
action. Confucius
had
argued that
the
ruler who would unify
the empire must first
'be
sincere
in
[his] thoughts';
the
influential Ming
Neo-Confucian Wang Yang-ming
had
stated that 'knowledge
is the
9
W. W.
Willoughby, Constitutional
government
in
China:
present conditions
and prospects,
33.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008