Emergence Of Modern China

1. Emergence Of Modern China By: Alex Granito, Colin Jaros, and Dylan Kinney

2. Early History • The early history of China was deeply rooted in an agricultural way of life. • China in its early history was ruled by emperors called, “The fathers of China.” • The Chinese people didn’t have developed technology like the West did, so they struggled to feed their people. They also didn’t have a lot of military technology, which was a huge disadvantage in the mid-1800s.

3. Imperialism in China • In the early days of China, the Chinese were ruled by emperors. This type of government is called an Imperial. • Later, the Nationalist government overthrew the Imperial government and called it a Republic in 1911.

4. The Republic of China • The nationalists declared China a Republic and declared their president Sun Yat-Sen. • Sun wanted to adopt a western-style democracy. • Sun began to fight with the Chinese warlords. • When Sun died, he was replaced by Chiang Kai-Shek, who made the Chinese a disciplined fighting force. Later, Kai-Shek established himself as the president of China.

5. The Long March • In 1920, the Nationalist Party split when some members of the Party adopted Communism. • The Nationalists however, didn’t want to change their government and killed the Communist supporters. The communists then fled to the north to flee from the Nationalist pursuers. The communists then set up a stronghold to fight back against the Nationalists. Chiang then sent a huge army to destroy the communists.

6. The Long March continued • Chiang’s army destroyed the communists at their stronghold, forcing the communists to leave Jianxi and head further north. When the Long March ended, 8,000 of the 100,000 people who started the march died either on the march itself, or in battle. Mao Zedong then established himself as the leader of the communist party when the march ended.

7. WWII • In the 1930s, the Japanese invaded northern China. This conflict provoked the first time in Chinese history when both communist and nationalist parties both worked together for one cause. When the Japanese were defeated however, the two parties started to fight against each other again.

8. The Great Leap Forward • After China failed to meet Mao Zedong’s goals in 1958, Mao introduced the Great Leap Forward. • Mao created self sufficient communal homes which consisted of farms and industries. Each one of these communes would hold as many as 25,000 people. The businesses were managed by communist officials while citizens had to work on the fields. • In the end, the Great Leap Forward failed because the workers were receiving the same amount of pay as the people who didn’t work.

9. The Cultural Revolution • Most Political leaders criticized Mao Zedong for The Great Leap Forward, by doing too much too fast. • Because of this criticism, he called for The Cultural Revolution to establish a new socialist society and terminate the old order. • The radical Red Guards were created in order to enforce new ideology, thought, habits, and customs. • All who disagreed with Mao were publicly humiliated, beaten and even killed.

10. The Cultural Revolution cont. • Mao called for an end of The Cultural Revolution in 1969 because the production by farms and factories was falling rapidly. In addition, many schools had been closed due to the Red Guards moving through the country. • Mao ordered the army to disband the Red Guards. • The Cultural Revolution was an enormous failure for China. It almost completely ruined the economy and hundreds of thousands of innocent people were in jail or had been driven into remote areas.

11. Four Modernizations • Mao Zedong died in 1976 and Deng Xiaoping took over with four goals in mind, to improve agriculture, industry, science and technology, and defense. These are known as the Four Modernizations. • He also proposed the contract responsibility program for agriculture. In this, the government would rent land for the families not living in cities to grow crops. • Farmers then increased production by a total of 6.5% each year.

12. Four Modernizations • China set up multiple economic zones along the coast to attract business through trade. These ended up to be very successful since the cities were on the coast. • The only downfall was that this made uneven economic growth, with villages suffering. • Now, most people move to the cities for work, which is why the cities are so popular. This has made it very difficult for police to handle because of the increase in crime.

13. Tiananmen Square • In 1989, as many as 100,000 people, many of which were students, began to protest in Beijing for a democratic reform. • The government then imposed a martial law, which is usually administered during strict periods of military control. • On the night of June 3rd , the Chinese army moved in, killing as many as 2,000 and wounding hundreds more. As a result, some leaders were arrested and executed.

14. Works Cited Baerwald, Thomas John., and Celeste Fraser. "Emergence of Modern China." World Geography: Building a Global Perspective. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2009. 651-58. Print.