The Political Public Opinion And Legitimacy Crisis During The Duan's Government

In the 1920 s,China's warlords fought each other seriously.The weak control of central government made it possible for deep political participation by all sectors of society.New intellectuals who had just experienced the "transition era" carried out political activities through various groups and newspapers.Under the influence of the May Fourth Movement,the bottom people began to strive for freedom.Especially during the reign of Duan Qirui between 1924 and1926,the government's every action was concerned by the media.Newspapers often debated political issues and constantly affected the political legitimacy.Ideology,political structure,political leaders and government performance are the core elements of the source of legitimacy in empiricist paradigm.The changes of these elements may result in the consolidation of legitimacy or the legitimacy crisis.Based on the theory of political legitimacy,this paper uses historical comparison method and text analysis method to select the major political issues during the period of Duan's government,and analyzes the contents of those important newspapers,trying to assess the government behavior from the perspective of legitimacy crisis.During the Aftermath Meeting,the government ignored "disarmament and dismissal" advocated by the intellectual class,which damaged the ruling authority at the political structure level."Red and Anti-red" was a conceptual battlefield.the "Anti-red" movement provoked by warlords violated the value norm as well as the ideological leadership.All the popular movements had been enlarged due to the strong concern of the press,and the repression from government caused decline in popular support.Public opinion has expanded from newspapers to public space,and then mobilized the mass and parties.For the government,whether or not to respond to the appeals was determined by the interests of the ruler.The degree of crisis was the key to the intensity of response.For the media,newspapers and magazines have been accumulating effects all the time,which led people distrust the government and turned to the revolution for establishing a new regime.