China: From the Opium Wars to the 1911 Republic

Britain fought a war to keep selling opium in China. The Qing court lost, and its authority never fully recovered. Over the next seventy years, foreign pressure, rebellion and failed reform wore the dynasty down. In 1911, it fell.

In this lesson, we follow China from the Opium Wars to the birth of the republic. We see the wars, the Taiping rebellion, the reformers and the end of the old exam system. Then we reach Sun Yat-sen, 1911 and the movements that came after.

1Why did opium come into the story?

British traders wanted Chinese tea. The Chinese court wanted little from Britain except silver. This left Britain with a trade problem. British traders found a product China could not make enough of. It was opium.

Opium grown in India was sold at auctions in Calcutta. The buyers were independent traders. They then smuggled it into China. China had banned the drug. Still, the trade grew.

• Britain wanted tea. China wanted silver.
• Opium from India was auctioned in Calcutta.
• Independent traders smuggled it into China.

2What did the Opium Wars change?

In 1839, China seized British opium stocks at Canton. The British government backed its merchants. The First Opium War ran from 1839 to 1842. The Royal Navy won with better ships and guns.

The Treaty of Nanjing was signed on 29 August 1842. China had to pay an indemnity and cede Hong Kong Island. The old Canton system, which limited trade to one port, mostly ended. Chinese writers later called it one of the “unequal treaties”.

A second war followed. The Second Opium War ran from 1856 to 1860. It was fought by Britain and France against the Qing. It began after Qing officials seized the ship Arrow in October 1856.

• 1839-1842: First Opium War.
• 29 August 1842: Treaty of Nanjing. Hong Kong ceded.
• 1856-1860: Second Opium War, Britain and France.

3What were the Taiping Rebellion and Self-Strengthening?

The Taiping Rebellion began in 1850. Its leader was Hong Xiuquan. He said he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ. The war lasted until Nanjing fell in 1864. Death tolls are estimated at 20 to 30 million, though some estimates go higher.

The court knew it was in crisis. From about 1861, it began the Self-Strengthening Movement. This copied Western arms and industry. It ran until 1895, the year China lost the war with Japan.

• 1850-1864: Taiping Rebellion, led by Hong Xiuquan.
• Deaths: an estimated 20 to 30 million.
• Self-Strengthening: about 1861 to 1895.

4What was the Hundred Days’ Reform?

In 1898, the Guangxu Emperor tried a bigger change. The movement ran from 11 June to 21 September 1898. Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao were its leaders. They wanted a modern state while keeping the emperor.

Conservatives resisted. Empress Dowager Cixi supported some ideas but feared a sudden change. The reform failed. Liang fled to Japan. There he argued for a constitutional monarchy.

• 11 June to 21 September 1898: Hundred Days.
• Leaders: Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao.
• They wanted reform with the monarchy.

5Why was the exam system abolished?

For about 1,300 years, success in the imperial exams opened the way to power. The tests rewarded literary skill. Modern science had no place in them. The system ended in 1905, as part of late Qing reforms.

Other shocks came in between. The Boxer uprising ran from 1899 to 1901. An Eight-Nation Alliance of foreign powers defeated it.

• Exams ran about 1,300 years. Abolished in 1905.
• 1899-1901: Boxer uprising, defeated by the Eight-Nation Alliance.

6How did the Qing fall?

Sun Yat-sen was born to a poor peasant family in Guangdong. He studied in Hawaii and then medicine in Hong Kong. He graduated in 1892. A petition he sent to Li Hongzhang in 1894 was turned down. So he went into exile and led anti-Qing groups from abroad.

His Three Principles of the People were nationalism, democracy and the people’s livelihood.

The flashpoint came on 10 October 1911. Soldiers of the New Army rose up at Wuchang. Revolts spread across the country. On 1 January 1912, the Republic of China was declared, with Sun as president. The six-year-old emperor abdicated on 12 February 1912.

• Sun Yat-sen: trained in medicine, led groups in exile.
• Three Principles: nationalism, democracy, people’s livelihood.
• 10 October 1911: Wuchang. 1 January 1912: republic declared.
• 12 February 1912: emperor abdicates.

7What came after 1911?

The republic was weak. China broke into regions ruled by warlords. On 4 May 1919, students gathered in Beijing. They protested because the Treaty of Versailles let Japan keep German territories in Shandong. That began the May Fourth Movement. It also pushed new ideas about language and culture.

The Chinese Communist Party was founded in 1921. After Sun’s death, Chiang Kai-shek led the Nationalists. From 1926 to 1928, he led the Northern Expedition. It largely unified China under a government in Nanjing. Then he split with the Communists.

• 4 May 1919: May Fourth. Versailles and Shandong.
• 1921: Chinese Communist Party founded.
• 1926-1928: Chiang’s Northern Expedition.

8What are the exam traps?

• Kang and Liang wanted to save the monarchy. Sun wanted to end it.
• The war ended in 1842. The exams ended in 1905. Decades apart.
• 1911 is the uprising. The republic was declared in 1912.
• May Fourth (1919) came before the Nationalist-Communist civil war.
• Sun’s third principle is people’s livelihood.