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13 Technium Soc. Sci. J. 536 (2020)
The Historical Sources of Nationalism in the Contemporary China

handle is hein.journals/techssj13 and id is 538 raw text is: Technium Social Sciences Journal Vol. 13, 536-550, November 2020 S ISSN: 2668-7798 SOCIAL Ewww.techniumscience.com The Historical Sources of Nationalism in the Contemporary China Mohammad Hussaini Department of History, Social Science School, Balkh University, Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan rhussaini 13yahoo.com Abstract. Chinese nationalism begun to rise as the Cold War ended in 1989. During the first two decades of twenty first century, Chinese nationalism as strong force has impacted Chinese public opinions as well as government decisions to a large extent. In the eyes of Chinese political elites, nationalism is force for unity that can keep China together as the communism has lost its appeal. This study explores the historical factors which best explain the sources of nationalism in contemporary China. For this purpose, I utilize qualitative analysis of nationalist discourse and deeds to gauge nationalist sentiment among the contemporary Chinese people and its political elites. The evidence suggests that nationalism in contemporary China mainly comes from Chinese the perceived injustice and insults done to China when it was dismembered by the imperial powers in nineteenth and the first half of twentieth centuries, the provocative moves against the rising China, the Chinese government's propaganda campaign and the economic miracle in recent years. Keywords. Century of humiliation, China, Chinese Nationalism, Communism, Nationalism, Nationalist sentiment Nationalism is relatively a contemporary discourse in China. Liang Qichao, arguably modern China's most formidable intellectual, was the first to use the term nationalism in 1901 while living in exile in Japan during the dying days of the Qing Dynasty. From Chinese Communist regime's perspective, nationalism turned to be a new force for unity (Zhao 2000, 28). It is not an exaggeration to say that Chinese communist movement in the first half of the twentieth century was just as much a nationalist movement, and the victory of the CCP in 1949 has been described as much a victory for nationalism as it was for communism (Weatherley 2014, 23). The CCP was able to defeat the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) largely due to its ability to appeal to the sentiment of public nationalism. During the first three decades of communist rule, Marxism went side by side with nationalism (Zhao 2014, 3). A series of actions in the last quarter of twentieth century made nationalism much more attractive force for Chinese politicians. On the one hand, in 1978, China moved away from the ideological rigidities of communism when Deng Xiaoping famously pleaded for a pragmatic approach by saying, [i]t does not matter whether a cat is black or white, if it catches mice, it is a good cat. (Mahbubani 2008, 75). On the other hand, one decade later, the communism lost its appeal across the world and communist regime collapsed like dominos in the eastern Europe 536

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