The Lingering Impact of China’s Century of Humiliation on its Present
China has not always been the economic powerhouse it is today. China has endured what it perceived as a century of humiliation. Long wars with foreign powers, internal wars and catastrophic internal governance led to massive poverty in the country for a long time. The impact of this time, referred to as China’s century of humiliation, still influences society today. This article overviews this part of history and explains how it still affects China.
China’s century of humiliation
Until 1820, China had had the largest GDP in the world for most of its history. The GDP of China and India combined has made up more than 50% of the world’s economy for over 2000 years. Even during Western Europe’s prosperous expansionary times, the Chinese economy was still larger than any European economy. After this long time of prosperity, dark times came for China. The century of humiliation was a period when the country was in ongoing wars, both domestically and with foreign powers. It was the time between the first opium war in 1839 and the end of the civil war in 1949. This time still brings deep wounds to many Chinese nationalist minds. It is one of the causes of a lot of distrust by the Chinese about foreign power and influence.
The Opium Wars
The industrial revolution caused the rise of Western powers during the late 18th century in Britain and the beginning of the 19th century in continental Europe. At this point, the production of consumer goods, materials, and weapons in Europe began to rise explosively, as did the demand for overseas consumer goods.
The Qing dynasty, the ruling Party in China since 1644, had little interest in the industrial revolution in Europe. China at that time already had a vast population and did not have the same need as the West to increase labour productivity. The majority of the Chinese population was uneducated and education was very conservative. Education primarily focused on Chinese philosophy and literature, with very little attention to creativity or innovation needed for a revolution in industrialisation.
The Qing emperors were also reluctant to promote international trade. Their demand for silver had decreased and the demand for European consumer goods was low. The Qing dynasty wanted to protect their market and culture from foreign influences. In 1757, the Chinese government closed almost the entire country to foreign merchants. They only allowed one trade port to trade with foreigners in the south Chinese city of Guangzhou.
It wasn’t the first time in history that China essentially closed down foreign trade. However, it was the first time that it happened while the demand for Chinese goods was rising to substantially high levels. It left Western nations with limited options to buy goods from China.
At the same time, in Europe, with the increasing welfare from the late 18th century, the demand for imported goods from China rose. Especially the demand for tea and products such as silk and porcelain was booming. Especially for the tea-addicted British, there was a strong incentive to find new ways to get their tea from China.
The solution they found was to start selling opium to China and trade it for Chinese tea. In the late 18th century, Britain’s East India Company and other British merchants began to smuggle Indian opium into China illegally. They then exchanged opium for tea and other goods. Opium use and addiction became a growing social problem in southern China in the 19th century. The number of addicts grew to around 12 million, so China’s drug dependence grew. By 1839, opium sales to China could pay for Britain’s entire tea trade.
In May 1839, the ruling Emperor of China declared war on the opium trade. He sent a delegation to Guangdong province, where the business took place. They seized and burned all opium that they could get their hands on. They would execute thousands of Chinese drug dealers and raid the opium stashes of Western traders. Many British politicians and merchants viewed this incident as the perfect opportunity to start a war and force an opening up of China for the (opium) trade. They would begin the first opium war (1839-1842), the start of China’s century of humiliation.
The war consisted of unequal battles. While the Chinese never underwent an industrial revolution, the British brought modern weaponry, like steamships, cannons and firearms. Without much damage or difficulty, the British could seize all major ports and many cities in China in no time. The British forced the Chinese to sign the Treaty of Nanjing. This allowed them to access more ports within China and conclude more agreements in British interests. After 1842, the volume of the opium trade would only grow further. The Brits would force the Chinese to sign more treaties, all to the advantage of their trading abilities.
In 1856, after several incidents between the Chinese and the British and the French, the latter two parties decided to start a new war to control the Chinese Empire even further, the second opium war (1856-1860). The Chinese were again defeated by the technologically superior weaponry of the Europeans. The British and French forces burned down the Imperial Summer Palace (the headquarters of the Qing Dynasty), humiliating the Dynasty. The French and British forced China to open up to more trade and legalise the opium trade.
The fall of China’s last Dynasty
Where China had chosen to defend its isolated position in the world and to hold off post-industrial revolutionary foreign influences as much as possible, Japan had chosen another path. After centuries of isolation from the world, Japan opened up to the world in 1854. The Japanese allowed trade and took advantage of importing technologies from the industrialised world. It developed an industrial economy and a strong army. Japan would become Asia’s first and most industrialised nation and an emerging world power. It would become another imperialist nation as well.
Japan noticed the easy victories of Western forces over China and realised they could control China similarly with their modern military equipment. They sent troops to Korea to gain more influence over the Korean Kingdom, which was under the control of the Qing dynasty. An increasing number of conflicts between China and Japan arose, eventually leading to the first Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895). Japan scored quick and overwhelming victories on land and sea with its modern weaponry. The war resulted in the annexation of Korea and Taiwan by the Japanese Empire.
The war triggered a reform movement in China that attempted to reform the government. China had become a poor and weak nation with a corrupt government. More and more people in China had lost trust that the Qing ruling power could defend the country against foreign powers. It resulted in the beginning of revolutionary activity against the Qing dynasty rulers of China.
In 1899 a drought in Shandong province led to an uprise of many male farmers into the cities seeking food. There was intense anger within the group, blaming the government and foreign powers for their misfortune. The group, generally known as the Boxer Rebellion, attracted militant followers, attacking all foreigners and destroying foreign and Christian influences in the country. Although the government officially opposed the uprising, they could not stop it. Within the government, many officials supported the rebellion.
A coalition of 8 nations (Japan, Russia, the US, Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Austria) decided to cooperate and send troops to take down the rebellion. In 1901 they defeated the rebellion. The joint forces marched to Beijing and executed all government members who supported the Boxer Rebellion. Heavy sanctions imposed on Qing China weakened Qing rule even more.
China’s century of humiliation during the Qing dynasty period by foreign imperialist forces has had an impact up to today. Many Chinese believe their country is peaceful and unfairly treated by Western and Japanese imperialists who didn’t allow them to develop in their own way, free of foreign influence. This is still one of the causes of a certain natural distrust of Chinese when working with Westerners.1.
During the years that followed, more and more people in China joined anti-Qing forces. In 1905, Sun Yat-Sen united various revolutionary factions into one Party. In 1911, his Nationalist Party of China held an uprising in Wuchang, helped by Qing soldiers. Fifteen provinces declared independence from the Empire, ultimately leading to the constitution of the new Republic of China in 1912. China would become a Republic for the first time in its history after Emperors of many Dynasties had ruled the nation for thousands of years.
The Republic of China
China was a newly established Republic in 1912, with Sun Yat-sen as its founder. Sun wanted to make China a developed and prosperous country again. This would be challenging in China’s impoverished and divided country then. The first half of the 20th century would be a period of internal conflicts and the war with the Japanese that would destroy the country.
In 1915, Yuan became the new ruler of the Republic of China. He was a conservative leader during the Qing Dynasty. Yuan controlled the national army at this time. By using this power, he became the general ruler of the country. Instead of reforming, he imposed authoritarian rule. He centralised power and seized control of the provincial governments. Many local governments didn’t accept this and declared independence, resulting in a more than 10-year internal war between the central government and the country’s many “provincial warlords”. This was a continuation of China’s century of humiliation.
In 1925, with the help of both the Soviet Union and domestic communist forces, the provincial warlords got defeated. In 1927, Chiang Kai Chek attempted to reunite the republic from the newly formed capital Nanjing. Chek was the leader of the then-ruling Nationalist KMT party. He was a strong anti-communist. Between 1927-1937, China experienced relative peace and stability, with Nanjing as its capital. It was the first time in China’s history that the country experienced some form of industrialisation. However, new internal conflicts were also rising due to the growing communist influence in the country.
At this time, the Chinese nationalist government allied with the National Socialists in Germany. Since tensions were rising again between China and Japan after Japan annexed Manchuria (Northeast China) in 1931. Germany saw the Japanese Empire as a potential threat. It was a win-win relationship between China and Germany since the German military and industrial technologies greatly interested China. Germany was interested in Chinese mineral resources and wanted to militarise China against Japan, a potential threat to Germany’s expansionary plans.
During this time, the Soviet Marxist ideology gained influence in China. The Leninist-Marxist Communist Party, founded in 1921, started to gain support. Especially in the south of China, a majority began to support Marxism. The Soviets supported the Communist Party and wanted to turn China into a communist state.
The Communists and Nationalists were getting increasingly in conflict with each other. In north China, where the Nationalists formed the majority, massacres took place where communists were executed, while in the south, many Nationalists got killed. A civil war broke out in China, whereby the Nationalist government used relatively modern weapons and the Communist Party of China, mostly used guerrilla tactics from the Chinese countryside.
The civil war continued until 1937. It stopped and collided when the common enemy of the KMT and Communists, Japan, clashed with Chinese troops outside Beijing. In 1937 the second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) broke out. This is often seen as the start of World War II. The Japanese had expected to bring China to its knees within a short time, as they had done several times. The Chinese army had now become much stronger than before. The war would become one of the bloodiest wars in world history, with ongoing bombings and massacres by the Japanese army for over eight years. The most infamous of the many killings was the Nanjing massacre in 1937. The Chinese still commemorate this event yearly. When Japan finally had to surrender after the nuclear bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima in 1945, around 14 million Chinese people lost their lives.
Chinese nationalists have harboured anti-Japanese tensions ever since the war ended. Primarily also because the Japanese have never admitted their wrongdoing during the war. These tensions between China and Japan are still alive today. Ask any Chinese about their feelings about Japan, and they will point this out.
When the war was over in 1945, China was a destroyed country. There were food shortages. The Nationalist government had lost most of its military resources during the war, and support for the communists was growing. Even though the US supported the Nationalist KMT party with funding and weaponry, the Nationalists were not motivated. Part of their army would even join the Communist forces. It would only be a matter of time before the Communists took over the country.
In January 1949, the Communists took control over Beijing without a fight following the capture of Nanjing on 23 April. Now all major cities were under Communist control with minimal resistance. In October 1949, the Communists led by Mao Zedong founded the People’s Republic of China, with Beijing as its capital. Many representatives of the Nationalist Party fled to Taiwan, which was part of the Republic of China, since the end of the Japanese occupation in 1945. The Nationalist KMT party took control of the island and established the Republic of China.
Until today, many nationalists in Taiwan don’t view the Communist Party as the legitimate ruling Party of China and see the China mainland still as part of the Republic of China. Nationalists on the mainland, on the other hand, think that Taiwan should become integrated into China again. The KMT is presently one of the ruling parties in Taiwan. This part of history is still sensitive in China because the communists won the civil war but failed to gain control over Taiwan.
The end of China’s century of humiliation: Mao Zedong’s era
After a lengthy period between 1839 – 1949 of constant internal and external wars and humiliation, the country was now united by one government with Mao Zedong as the leader. There was a sense of unity again for the first time in ages, and its potential was huge. The Soviet Union supported the country’s Communist Party. The main enemies of Japan and the Nationalist KMT Party were largely eliminated. Mao wanted to reform China from an agricultural society to a modern Stalinist industrial country.
In 1953, Mao unveiled his first 5-year plan. China would collectivise its land and capital and massive land reforms took place. All land and wealth would become the possession of the state. The project also included the first large-scale industrialisation program. In the 1950s, agricultural and industrial sectors developed fast while copying the Stalinist development model. At the same time, after the death of Stalin in 1952, China was losing support from the Soviet Union and the cooperation between both countries started to worsen.
In 1958 China chose its own path towards development, losing its close ties to the Soviet Union. Mao developed a plan to develop the country called the “Great Leap Forward”. The idea behind the plans was to accelerate the process of industrialisation. Within a year, almost all Chinese villages had been reformed into working communes of several thousand people in size. In these communes, people would live and work together as envisioned in an ideal communist society. Mao assumed that this collectivisation of agriculture would increase agricultural productivity. In addition, the country could allocate its human and capital resources towards the new heavy industry, especially the steel industry.
The result of the “Great Leap Forward” in the agricultural sector was a disaster. Policies disrupted normal market mechanisms. The communes had to produce according to the targets set by the government, even if those targets were utterly irrational. The government couldn’t plan production, partly because most communities overreported their output for fear of punishment for not reaching the Party’s targets. Resources weren’t allocated efficiently and individuals lacked incentives to work hard in a fully-collectivised system. In addition, millions of former Chinese farmers became state workers in the industrial sector to increase the country’s industrial output. Food production in China collapsed. The result was the Great Chinese Famine between 1959-1961. Within this period, 37 – 55 million people died, primarily due to starvation.
The Great Leap Forward agenda also failed in the industrial sector. While cooperation with the Soviet Union worsened and China became a wholly isolated country, there was no more willingness from the Soviets to share the expertise needed for China’s industrialisation. China had set targets to increase the production of steel rapidly. Therefore lots of steel was being produced. China, however, lacked the knowledge and the organisation to produce high-quality industrial output. Most of the steel was of extremely low quality. Additionally, there was no demand for this steel in the isolated country. In the end, most of the steel produced would never be used.
One can still feel the effects of the Great Leap Forward agenda and the Great Famine in China today. The older generation in China still experienced starvation by themselves. Among many Chinese, there is always some fear of losing everything or even starving to death. The time of extreme poverty in the relatively recent past has made people in China more risk-averse. Therefore, it was also more logical for the Chinese to be highly cautious about Covid than the West. It may also make Chinese individuals more careful about stepping outside their comfort zones and increase their reliance on the collective.
When you visit nature in China, you can still see the scars of starvation. In many forests and rivers in China, no wildlife is left. Everything was hunted and fished to survive. People often grab everything they can when hungry to ensure their families survive. Because of this survival instinct, some Chinese can be more selfish and sometimes take advantage of others. It’s a trait that you need to be careful about when doing business with China, especially when you have less experience dealing with the Chinese.
After the failed projects of the Great Leap Forward, many of his Party members started to criticise Mao’s policies. Between 1961 and 1964, Mao’s influence in the Party decreased. The government undid many of the policies, including the agricultural communes. The economic output of 1964 recovered to the level of 1957 due to these reforms.
To regain control and revive his image among the Chinese people, Mao united with like-minded radicals to start the Cultural Revolution in 1966. In Mao’s view, capitalist and bourgeois ideas had corrupted the intellectual class and government officials. He would encourage the lower classes to stand up against this. Mao closed all schools and mobilised students, even primary school students, into paramilitary units called Red Guards. These Red Guards started to kill intellectuals, teachers, military leaders and even government officials that they suspected of supporting any other than communist ideals. The belief was spread that all remnants of traditional, non-communist ideas, culture, customs and habits must be destroyed to revolutionise the country. The Red Guards burnt literature and destroyed cultural heritage.
Schools didn’t operate during this time, families separated and the country became chaotic. No one could trust anyone anymore during this time since even family members betrayed each other. The cultural revolution would lose its influence and power in the early 1970s, but it would officially last until the death of Mao Zedong in 1976. Around 1,5 million people died in this period. This period can be described as a horrible period of torture, violence and fear.
There is still a whole “lost generation” in China that lost many years of valuable education at that time. Some people have even never learnt to write or read at all. This generation is now around 55-70 years old. Another visible reminder of the Cultural Revolution is the lack of historical buildings in Mainland China nowadays. Where they exist, they are usually renovated or even rebuilt. Most temples, rich people’s properties, and other historical landmarks were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. The cultural revolution changed concepts about truth. In this era, lying to protect one’s family and oneself was crucial. A higher acceptance of not telling the truth to defend oneself is present today.
China was in poverty in 1976 and was underdeveloped. Two hundred years after the Industrial Revolution began in Britain, the industrial revolution in China basically still had to take place. From the end of the Cultural Revolution onward, China began to grow its industry and economy and to build up its entire manufacturing sector from scratch. China eventually became the factory of the world.
