Observation On The Current Affairs Of The “Middle Force”:a Study On The Opinion Edition Of The China Times During The National Revolution

For a long time,the history of the National Revolution has been written from the perspective of revolutionaries,which objectively simplified the historical significance of this political movement as the process of modern China state construction.In fact,there was a “middle force” between the northern warlords and the KMT & CPC.This force is the general intelligentsia composed of professional groups such as the cultural and educational circles and the press.They gathered into ideological communities under the banner of “ism”,constructed public opinion and influenced politics through newspapers and periodicals.Among them,Shanghai newspaper the China Times was a representative force of public opinion: it was one of the two dailies sponsored by the Research Clique headed by Liang Qichao,and it has formed a trend of echoing with the Morning Post in Beijing.After the May 4th Movement,it’s opinion edition gradually gathered a group of intellectual elites mainly from Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions.Different from the young intellectuals who followed the National Revolution,these writers generally had the experience of studying in Britain and the United States,and had stable occupation and social status,which to a considerable extent represented the general intellectual circle’s understanding of the political situation.This paper is divided into four chapters,taking the opinion edition of the China Times during the period of National Revolution as a public forum for intellectual public criticism,and analyzed in three aspects: the group representation of opinion,the agenda and keynote of the opinion,the political opinion and the social trend of thought.The first chapter,based on the group representation of opinion,points out that the China Times during the National Revolution was not a political party organ in a complete sense,but the duality of political mouthpiece and public forum.On one hand,under the background of the research department transforming from a political organization to a cultural community during May 4th Movement,the China Times declared to build a "national cultural movement organ",and revised the supplement,news,opinion and other edition successively,no longer being a political party organ in a complete sense.On another hand,since the revision of the opinion edition of the China Times in June 1922,a group of writers mainly composed of intellectual elites has gradually gathered.Politically,they agreed with Liang Qichao’s "backbone politics" and advocated the formation of the ruling group by intellectuals.They were not satisfied with the military separation of the Northern warlords,but also lacked identification with the National Revolution.The second chapter,based on the edition’s agenda and tone of opinion,aims to reveal the perspective of the China Times.Through content analysis,edition’s agenda was divided into six categories,including "Chinese and foreign diplomacy and mass movement","northern political","national construction plan","the south revolution" which represented a significant proportion.While "professional group" and "local news" constituted the rest proportion.Such characters reflected the intellectual elites strong political responsibility and the professional community they served.With the development of the revolutionary situation,the China Times gradually reduced its space for opinion,which was reflected in the obvious reduction of the number of opinions during the Northern Expedition.Before the northern Expedition army’s marched into Shanghai,the newspaper simply stopped publishing opinions,and secretly bought by Shen Pao,so it ceased to be a public forum.In terms of tone of speech,the newspaper was generally opposed to warlord infighting and interference in domestic and foreign affairs,and worried about the prospect of democratic constitutionalism after the National Revolution.The third chapter defines the political reform of the China Times as a liberal scheme,from the perspective of internal affairs.After Cao Kun bribe-bought the election,the issue of the congress and national unity became a hot public opinion.Against the backdrop of the current trend of abolishing the congress,the China Times insisted on temporarily shutting down the congress and putting the constitution to a referendum.In the context of the increasingly divided northern warlord system and the gathering of the national revolutionary forces,the China Times called for the development of local autonomy and the improvement of the political literacy of the people.On the whole,these propositions reflect the belief of intellectual elites in constitution and representative government,lacking real class basis and possessing a considerable degree of utopianism.The fourth chapter defines the anti-imperialist proposal of the China Times as a nationalistic scheme,from the perspective of diplomacy.Regarding the resumption of diplomatic relations between China and Russia and the May 30 Movement,the China Times and the KMT & CPC have different views and consensus.In response to the question "what is imperialism",the newspaper argued that the Soviet Union and Britain,Japan and other powers should be compared,and opposed to using The Soviet Union’s power to launch a revolution.Regarding "how to abolish the unequal treaties",the newspaper advocated focusing on attacking the British and Japanese forces in China,calling for abolishing the treaties through political negotiations and opposing the expansion of mass movements.On the whole,the China Times was prescient about the Soviet Union’s China policy,and its plan to abolish the treaty was compromise,but it also reflected the intellectual elites’ concern about the mass politics out of control.In conclusion,the China Times’ s opinion edition was not just partisan propaganda,but reflect the observations of the wider intellectual elites.Their criticism of warlord secession and their call for democratic politics are not only compromising and utopian,but also showing their insight into the realistic factors such as the great disparity between Chinese and foreign forces and the contradictions within the revolution,thus becoming the epitome of the participation of "middle forces" in China’s political metabolism.