| This study examines the development of socialist thought in the writings of specific Guomindang political theorists in China from 1919 to 1931, with particular emphasis on their usage of Marxist theory. The individuals studied are intended to represent different stages in the attempt to create a Guomindang brand of socialism, especially in response to the challenge of the Communist Party.;The study begins with an analysis of the articles on socialism and social theory in the party's theoretical journal Jianshe from 1919 to 1920. The principal writer was Hu Hanmin, who concentrated on studies of historical materialism and its application to the history of Chinese philosophy, with an emphasis on economic determinism. His contemporaries Lin Yungai and Feng Ziyou focused on comparisons of different schools of socialism.;The writings of Liao Zhongkai illustrate the new focus on anti-imperialism during the United Front period (1924-27). As an older leftist Liao's thought was colored by the social reformist orientation of the Jianshe period, and he remained ambivalent about class struggle. However, as Director of the Peasant and Worker Departments, he came to endorse the mass movement.;Gan Naiguang was a leader of younger leftists during this period who refashioned party theory according to Marxist-Leninist concepts. Named "Sunyatsenism," Gan's theory was intended as a Chinese alternative to Leninism, to be used by other non-Western peoples in the process of nationalist/socialist revolutions.;After the collapse of the United Front, Chen Gongbo and Shi Cuntong represented two trends in the Reorganization society. Chen, the Society's ideological leader, sought to eliminate social revolution in favor of modernization. Shi, however, was concerned with preserving the momentum of the mass movement.;Deng Yanda, the leader of the Third Party movement, produced the most thorough analyses of Chinese society and the most original proposals for a social revolution of all the Guomindang socialists. His "common people's revolution" broadened the conception of class struggle and sought to establish socialism in a transitional society in a way distinctly different from the classic Western Marxist model. |
