The Taiping Movement as Just Another Traditional Rebellion
A traditional rebellion of Chinese history refers to a
rebellion out of出於 peasant discontentä¸æ»¿ and of which the
participantsåƒåŠ 者 were mostly peasants. It is aimed志在 at overthrowing推翻
the existing government but not the established order既有秩åº. The Taiping
Rebellion of 1850-64 was sometimes deemed被視為 to be a peasant rebellion
because the basic cause of the Rebellion was peasant discontent, and
the participants were mostly peasants. Chinese communist共產主義 historian
Luo Ergang羅爾綱 even regards the Taiping Rebellion as an event of class
struggleéšŽç´šé¬¥çˆ between peasants and landlords. The Taiping Rebellion, in
fact, differed有別於 from a traditional peasant rebellion in many
aspectsæ–¹é¢. The most surprising fact was that it was NOT for peasants
indeed, as Franz Michael points out.
Under the circumstances that the government administration施政 at both
the central and local levels was intolerably inefficient無能, and
corruption貪污 prevailedæµè¡Œ among officials, peasants rebelled作亂 for the
sake由於 of economic hardship. Over-concentrationéŽä»½é›†ä¸ of arable landså¯è€•åœ°
in the landlords' hands and exhaustive taxation賦稅ç¹é‡ deprivedå‰å‰Š
peasants of a means to earn a living生計. These were the reasons why
peasants rebelled in the Second Hanæ±æ¼¢ and Tang dynastieså”æœ. Peasants
of the Qing dynastyæ¸…æœ rebelled for similar reasons. Like the
previous以å‰çš„ peasant rebellions, natural disasterså¤©ç½ like flooding氾濫
and droughts乾旱 helped sparked off引起 t...
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People (Sanmin Zhuyi三民主義). Henceå› æ¤, compared to a traditional peasant
rebellion which simply caused economic destruction, the Taiping
Rebellion did much more because it provided with a blueprintè—圖 for the
unprecedented Chinese republican revolution of 1911. The use of the
plain language白話文, punctuations標點符號 and ideas of woman liberation
during the Taiping Movement were advocatedæ倡 again in the New Cultural
Movement新文化é‹å‹• of the early twentieth century.
To sum up, apart from除了 the reasons for peasant discontent, quality of
both the leaders and followers, manipulation of religions and economic
destruction, the other elementså…ƒç´ and impacts of the Taiping Rebellion
were greatly different from a traditional peasant rebellion. It had
its own unprecedented characteristics.
William Hinton, a US born member of a Chinese Communist land reform task force in 1948, noted that the peasants were challenging the landlords and money lenders in regards to overcharges and restoration of lands and property seized in default of debts (Doc 4). This was due to the newly found confidence in themselves through the defeat of the Japanese. Although Hinton was born into the communist party, his recount of the actions he saw concerning the peasants was simply from a look from the outside in. He personally did not experience this sudden upsurge of challenges, which gives the public a view of what the communist party thought of what looked like a move towards social equality. Although Hinton’s recount may not have been thoroughly verified, the communist party did indeed aid in fueling what was known as a struggle meeting, where Chinese peasants humiliated and tortured landlords, as seen in the picture, organized by the Communist Party as part of the land reform process, of a group of peasants at a meeting where in the center a woman is with her former landlord (Doc 7). Alongside the destruction of the landowning infrastructure that was previously followed, the Communist party also aided the peasants in a form of social reform. One important law that granted specifically women more freedom in their social life was the creation of the Marriage Law of the People’s Republic of China in 1950, where it states that the “supremacy of man over woman, and in disregard of the interest of the children, is abolished” (Doc 5). The newly introduced concepts of free choice in partners, abortion, and monogamy that derived from this law changed the societal position on women and peasants which greatly expresses the amount of new social mobility
The Communist revolution in China was loosely based on the revolution in Russia. Russia was able to implement the beginnings of Marxist Communism in the way that it was intended They had a large working class of factory workers, known as the proletariat, that were able to band together and rise up to overthrow the groups of rich property owners, known as the bourgeoisie. The communist party wanted to adopted this same Marxist sense of revolution, but they realized that there were some fatal flaws in the differences between the two countries. The first was that there was not the same sense of class difference between people, yes there were peasants and landowners but there was not a sense of a class struggle. The other difference was that China was not industrialized like Russia so there was no proletariat group, as defined by Marxism, to draw the revolution from. What the Chinese Communists needed to do is re-define the proletariat for their situation, who they looked at were the peasants.
Success, as defined by the Oxford English dictionary, is the prosperous achievement of an objective. (Oed.com 1968) Conferring to this definition, the 1949 Chinese revolution was certainly a successful revolution. The communist party of China (CCP) was incredibly successful in its attempt in replacing the bourgeoisie dominated nationalist government – The Kuomintang (KMT) - with a proletariat class lead communist government. However, whether the achievement of such objective proves to be prosperous for China and its peoples requires further analysis. Ever since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, the legitimacy of the revolution of which it was built upon has perennially been in question. For example, in a 1999 issue of the
Gandhi and Mao Zedong had different ideas when it came to the use of violence. Mao believed that “Force is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one.” (reading packet, 12) What this means is that force is absolutely necessary and the outcome of force is violence. Mao is in total agreement with violence and sees the people opposing the movements he is favoring as “paper tigers”. As in, at first, these rebels might seem terrifying, but in reality, they are helpless and harmless. Mao actually blames the Hunan landlords and the higher, wealthier class for a bloody battle between the peasants and the landlords. He said that for a long time now, the wealthier class ha...
For example, two of the largest peasant rebellions in 1381 and 1549 occurred in Norfolk. Both these struggles were mainly concerned with the growing political power of the Lords in Norfolk and local grievances such as enclosure. He also states continuity from the Medieval and Early Modern period because society was structured in a similar way, which means that there is some cross-over in the causes of the rebellions. It is unclear as to how many of those involved in the Kett’s rebellion understood it’s connection to the Peasant’s Revolt, but a main similarity is that they show that peasants could revolt and form an uprising equal in size to those which had gentry involvement. Furthermore, Wood draws attention to the traditional nature of popular protest and rebellion between the Western Rebellion 1549 and the Pilgrimage of Grace 1536 due to the shared religious grievances. This would suggest that the subordinate groups in Early Modern England had similar grievances which could be found in various rebellions, supporting the belief that rebellion and popular protest was the only way for them to get their voices heard. It also suggests that members of authority did not pass legislation to help deal with grievances such as taxation, enclosure and religious instability which may imply that they did not perceive these issues as being particularly serious
Nobody went unaffected by this movement millions of Chinese citizens were alienated that were attributed with old capitalistic traditions, and aggressively united those who strictly adhered to the communist party’s policies for achieving a solidified country of socialists.
Chinese Revolution is about making the entire country into Communists and killing each and one the people who hates Mao Tse-Tung. Mao Tse-Tung is the leader of China at this time who believes in equality and everyone should have the same rights. The Red Guards is a military group in which includes a group of children that eliminates the Chinese population due to hatred for Mao. If any of these events happen to our generation, most youth are smart enough to know that Mao is a bad leader and killing innocent people by the case of bitterness for Mao is wrong. The Chinese youth got swept up in the Cultural Revolution by Mao because the youth were easy to persuade into doing something. To expand this idea further, the Chinese youth weren’t old enough, not on this specific age, to realize whether Mao’s actions were virtuous or inaccurate. On the other hand, they thought that working for Mao and joining the Red Guards will help their country out, but they never knew the truth behind Mao’s plans. The truth about the Cultural Revolution was to kill anybody that gets in the way of Mao’s plans and destroying all the old buildings so that it would be replaced with new buildings or reconstruct the old buildings to become brand new again. In addition, the Chinese youth had no idea that joining the Red Guards will give a highly chance of getting killed. In other words, the adults were smarter than the youth because joining the Red Guards means the opposite of helping the country out. Mao just made them think that joining will help their country, even though it was the other way around like someone apologizing to their neighbor in which manipulating their minds that they’re now cool, but they were still rude to them afterwards. To repeat this, t...
D’Addese 1 The Qing Dynasty prospered well into the 20th century despite the numerous problems the administration faced. However, during the early days of the 20th century, civil disorders continued to grow in such unmanageable factions that the administration was pushed to do something about it. The high living standards of the previous century had contributed to a sharp increase in China’s population, there was approximately 400 million people living in China around the nineteenth century. This spike increased population density, it also created a surplus of labour shortages, land shortages, inadequate food production and several famines. As an attempt for a solution, Empress Dowager Cixi proclaimed a call for proposals for reform from the generals and governors.
...hinese Seamstress gives an accurate depiction of things that occurred during the Chinese Culture Revolution. It shows that youth were re-educated in villages by poor peasants and that material of western influences that opposed Mao and his ideas were considered bad and were banned. It shows that in order to re-educate them they were to do manual labor and live in communes. They were removed from their families and the things they took for granted. Their lives were no longer under their control, they were told were to go live, where to work and what they can and cannot do. The Chinese Culture Revolution had a profound impact on the people in China from every aspect of life, men, women and children and from every age were affected.
Impeccably true to its definition, the Chinese characters for “revolution” literally mean “elimination of life”, proved by China’s catastrophic cultural revolution. Communist leader Mao Zedong sought to eliminate the past and push for a resurrection only to land China miserably behind. By wiping away years of scientific and literary advancements, China renounced its grandiose history and way of life.
The impact (or lack thereof) of the Chinese Revolution of 1911 is seen throughout Lu Xun’s stories. In particular the works “Diary of a Madman”, “A New Year’s Sacrifice” and “The True Story of Ah Q” provided evidence of changes (or lack thereof) the revolution brought to China. Focus in particular was paid to the topics of filial piety, female chasteness and Chinese conservatism, respectively in each story.
By 1800, China’s Qing dynasty encountered several issues such as a growing population, peasant ...
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, beginning as a campaign targeted at removing Chairman Mao Zedong's political opponents, was a time when practically every aspect of Chinese society was in pandemonium. From 1966 through 1969, Mao encouraged revolutionary committees, including the red guards, to take power from the Chinese Communist party authorities of the state. The Red Guards, the majority being young adults, rose up against their teachers, parents, and neighbors. Following Mao and his ideas, The Red Guard's main goal was to eliminate all remnants of the old culture in China. They were the 'frontline implementers' who produced havoc, used bloody force, punished supposed 'counter revolutionists', and overthrew government officials, all in order to support their 'beloved leader'.
The 1911 Revolution kicked out the Qing Dynasty and broke the barriers to different developments in China. However, the 1911 Revolution has only provided a framework of a republic and made changes in some particular aspects related to immediate problems and difficulties in society. Hence, the relationship between the revolution and the subsequent development of China was very weak. On one hand, I do not agree with the latter part of the statement that the 1911 Revolution brought new problems to China. The conflicts and problems that China suffered in the early/ mid 1910s were mainly due to the weakness of the military force, conflicting political organizations and disorder in society. On the other hand, I agree with the first part of the statement that the 1911 Revolution did not bring peace to China afterwards. In the following paragraphs, I am going to focus on explaining the reasons of emerging new problems in China and also illustrate my points on the factors of the 1911 Revolution which could not bring in peace to China related to the conditions of the country.
rules and laws that applied only to those who were peasants. The laws sort of boosted their lives; he kept the land tax low, and the granaries stocked to guard against famine. During his reign he also attempted and succeeded in building up the class of those of the peasant and working class. Hongwu’s new government did not cause any change for those in other social classes.