Development And Evolution Of National Consciousness At The End Of Qing Dynasty And Early Republic Of China

The modern stage(1840-1919) in Chinese history is a critical period transforming China from a traditional country to a modern one. In this period, with the advent of new ideals and forms, traditional economic elements interwove with the emerging ones, and the improved institution replaced the outdated one, all of which add highlights to the process of social evolution. Accordingly, these new ideas and thoughts ignite consciousness of the whole nation. National consciousness includes two meanings, namely, individual freedom and national freedom. To be specific, it consists of consciousness of civil rights, duties and responsibilities, consciousness of freedom and equality, social morality consciousness, adventure and enterprising consciousness and the quality of independence, self-esteem, self-confidence, gregariousness, national thought and other modern ideology. The symbol of the revival of national consciousness is the emergence of the human rights and the sovereign state.Since the First Opium War, Chinese people have been in the dilemma of alien invasions and nation awakening. Relationship between the sovereign and civils changed abruptly especially after the invasions of foreign powers, concession in lands and reparations, the loss of sovereignty. People broke the blind obedient relationship with the monarch and began to doubt the supreme of the king and the tradition of rule of man. Therefore, the political leading role started to transfer from the monarch to the civils. The rising thoughts of public-oriented rights took place the aspiration for the clean official and saints in Qing dynasty. Besides, the wrong understanding of feudal government cannot match with the patriotic passions urgent to protect the nation. The “civil” awareness gradually sprouted in the consciousness of “state” being the body. The awareness of individual liberty and national freedom began to revive. At the same time, they have become supportive for China’s modern national consciousness.In terms of the foundation of “civil consciousness”, elites in the late Qing Dynasty acted as a rational driving force who shouldered the responsibility of saving the country and the Time. From the foundation of the Republic of China in 1912 to the May 4th movement in 1919, disputes between the old thoughts and new ideas was getting sharp; social classes, political schools and diverse proposals pushed the national consciousness towards multiple directions; conflicts and social movements fell and rose. Ethnics, nation, civil rights, sovereignty, individualism, the collectiveness and the foundation and development of the time can perfectly match with the destination of the country and its democratic process. The connotation and denotation of the "national consciousness" gained progress in the dynamic history. At the same time, having adapted, absorbed and integrated the native culture with the western culture, Chinese people eventually got rid of the stale parts of its indigenous culture and began a deeper and wider process of democratization and legalization in China. Since then, Chinese people never stop exploring and improving the “civil consciousness”.This paper targets the development and evolution of national consciousness and uses “Challenge and Response” method in the theory of cyclic history to analyze the historic background against which national consciousness came into being in the end of Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China era. Using multi-thread mode, which shows the vicissitude of the society, instead of linear mode of historic development in the early period of theory of evolution, the thesis discusses the diverse composition of national consciousness, as well as the theory of conflict, to examine the reselection of social values, the status and rights and interests of the nation, the external pressure on the space of living and the fierce struggle in the ideological area faced by China’s intellectuals then. In the end, putting aside contingency and discontinuity emphasized in the theory of vicissitude of society, the paper views national consciousness in a dynamic interdependent social system and examines the tremendous functional influence each and single part of national consciousness exerts on the self-conscious course of development of social and political democratization, ideological rationalization and social civilization, discusses the relationship between national consciousness and the development of national centripetal force in modern era and reflects on the conflict between national and civil rights after an examination of the interaction between internal tensions and imbalances within the Chinese society and pressures without. This paper analyzes topics such as the basic composition, historic and theoretical origins of national consciousness, the social environment and the demands of the time and the influence of Western national consciousness in China and problems thereof, discusses the influence of typical figures in each historic phase on the development of national consciousness and the influence of these constructive explorations on the practice of national consciousness in modern China, and reflects on major issues that occurred as a result of national and civil rights going against each other and hand in hand alternately in modern China, such as the gap between the wish and behavior of the nation mobilizing the people to sacrifice their personal interests to protect the collective rights and interests and the subsequent wake-up of the personal awareness of the civilians. This paper also evaluates the national consciousness that took shape in modern China, thus to discuss the proper way to handle the relationship between the national and civil rights. The thesis strives to view national consciousness as a complete political concept and historic phenomenon, and grasps the overall development, modern meaning, internal imbalance and its dynamic influence on national consciousness. The paper undertakes a comprehensive and systemic research of the development of national consciousness in modern China, and further discusses the conflict of the Chinese and western backgrounds and the bafflement induced and concessions made, so as to clearly demonstrate the composition of national consciousness in modern China, and unfold the influence of the wakening of national consciousness in the process of the modernization of China and its significance for the transition of China into a modern society to enlighten the development of the political system in today’s China.