Toward The Republic

From 1840, Chinese reformist formed the cognition about republicanism during their observation of western political systems. The understanding of western republic became the foundation of Chinese republicanism. After the war of China-Japan in 1894, republicanism was accepted and spread by the revolutionary. From then, on the aim of Chinese modernization , two opposite ideas , constitutional monarchy and republicanism came into being. In 1903-1907, the constitutionalists and revolutionaries held a controversies about the two ideas. Through the controversies, constitutional monarchy and republicanism formed obvious opposition and the republicanism spread widely. In 1912, China founded the republic government and the thought of republicanism was put into practice. But in the trouble of republican government, republicanism encountered the threat of monarchic thought. After two defeats of founding monarchic state, the republicanism was established in China finally.The establishment of republicanism in China was caused by many complicated factors. Firstly, facing up the serious national crisis, the deficiency of governmental efficiency of ch'ing dynasty made monarchy lose the legitimacy. Secondly, the poverty of the thoughts of absolute monarchic powers and the rise of nationalism offered the advantage for the spreading of republicanism. Thirdly, there were contradictions and defects in the thoughts of reformist, which weakened the ideas of monarchy and made for the establishment of republicanism. Finally, in the evolution of political thoughts history from 1840, the thought of revolution replaced the notion of reformism and dominated the ideology. The establishment of republicanism was an inevitable result of the transformation.