Rebels And Revolutionaries In North China 1845 1945

Why do peasants rebel? In particular, why do some peasants rebel and not others? Starting from the fact that only in certain geographical areas does rebellion seem to recur persistently, the author examines three notable rebel movements in one such area in China: Huaipei, a region of poor soil and unstable weather bounded by the Huai and Yellow (Huang He) rivers. The Nien rebels of the 1850s and 1860s and the Red Spear Society of the Republican era are described as representing traditional forms of violent competition for scarce economic resources. The Nien were essentially "predatory," using violence as a way of obtaining food and other necessities; the Red Spears essentially "protective," concerned to defend peasant homes and property against bandits, warlord armies, and state efforts at taxation. The communist movement of the 1930s and 1940s, by contrast, looked beyond these traditional patterns to a national social revolution that would render local rebellions unnecessary. The author throws new light on the role of secret societies in peasant protest, and offers a new interpretation of the relationship between rebellion and revolution.

This groundbreaking volume draws on newly available documentary sources to explore key facets of the move to power of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the War of Resistance to Japan from 1937 to 1945. Leading scholars from China and the West compare the varied experiences of the CCP_and its interactions with local society_in all the border regions and base areas of resistance to the Japanese invasion on the North China battlefront. Eschewing grand theory, the authors develop a Osocial ecology of revolutionO that traces the relationship between local conditions and patterns of social and political change.

Social science theories of contentious politics have been based almost exclusively on evidence drawn from the European and American experience, and classic texts in the field make no mention of either the Chinese Communist revolution or the Cultural Revolution -- surely two of the most momentous social movements of the twentieth century. Moreover, China's record of popular upheaval stretches back well beyond this century, indeed all the way back to the third century B.C. This book, by bringing together studies of protest that span the imperial, Republican, and Communist eras, introduces Chinese patterns and provides a forum to consider ways in which contentious politics in China might serve to reinforce, refine or reshape theories derived from Western cases.

Our understanding of Chinese warfare has suffered from misconstrued contrasts between Chinese and Western ways in warfare. This is one of the arguments convincingly set forth in this important volume on an important subject. It also discusses the essentialising interpretations of Chinese culture focussing on the avoidance of warfare and the civil ethic of its officials. Based on original sources, and dealing with the subject from the earliest dynasty up to modernity, it uniquely combines chapters on strategy and tactics. Both scope and approach make it a must for historians of China. And, with a view to its conclusions on the place of China in the context of global military history, it also provides essential reading for historians of (comparative) warfare in general. The book’s primary goal – to provide a fuller interpretation of the role of the military in Chinese history – has been achieved with ease.

This in-depth study examines the influence of the Chinese Communist Party’s effective organizing in Shanxi Province during the War of Resistance. Shanxi Province was on the frontlines of the 1937–1945 War of Resistance against Japan—the war that launched the Chinese Communist Party. During that time, the Taihang Base Area of Southwest Shanxi was one of the Party’s most important strongholds. David Goodman provides the first county-level analysis of social and political change in the Taihang Base Area during those crucial years. Goodman explores revolution as process, arguing that the Party was successful because of its management of revolutionary incrementalism. He examines the roles of various groups, highlighting the activities of urban intellectuals, teachers, and peasant small-holders as agents of change. Based on newly available sources, including recently republished materials from the Taihang Base Area, restricted documentation from the Taiyuan Archive, and interviews with veterans of the Taihang Base Area this meticulously researched work deepens our understanding of the social and political origins of the Chinese revolution.

This book explores rural political change in China from 1850 to 1949 to help us understand China’s transformation from a weak, decaying agrarian empire to a unified, strong nation-state during this period. Based on local gazetteers, contemporary field studies, government archives, personal memoirs and other primary sources, it systematically compares two key macro-regions of rural China – the North China plain and the Yangzi delta – to demonstrate the ways in which the forces of political change, shaped by different local conditions, operated to transform the country. It shows that on the North China plain, the village community composed mainly of owner-cultivators was the focal point for political mobilization, whilst in the Yangzi delta absentee landlordism was exploited by the state for local control and tax extraction. However, these both set the stage, in different ways, for the communist mobilization in the first half of the twentieth century. Peasants and Revolution in Rural China is an important addition to the literature on the history of the Chinese Revolution, and will be of interest to anyone seeking to understand the course of Chinese social and political development.

Revolution and Its Past is a comprehensive study of China from the last quarter of the eighteenth century through to 2018. A fascinating and dramatic narrative, the book compels interest both as a history of an ancient civilization developing into a modern nation-state and as an account of how the Chinese as a people have struggled and continue to work to find their identity in the modern world. Beginning in the last two decades of the reign of the Qianlong emperor (1736–1795), the book provides a baseline that allows readers to understand China’s rapid decline in the nineteenth and part of the twentieth century, and extends into the present day, a time when China has the second largest economy in the world and aims to become a leading global power by 2050. The vast changes that have swept over China between these times are probed through the lens of the broad and important theme of "identities." This fourth edition has been updated throughout, providing a more thorough examination of recent history since 1960, and increasing coverage of such topics as "new Qing history," frontier and ethnicity, women and their roles, environmental concerns and issues, and globalization. Supported by maps, images, tables, online eResources and suggestions for further reading, and written in an engaging, concise, and authoritative style, Revolution and Its Past is the ideal textbook for all students of the history of modern China.