IB History Domestic Policy During the Nanjing Decade Notes

The Nanjing Decade: Achievements, Limits, and Structural Failures

1. The Nanjing decade ran from the GMD's establishment of a national capital at Nanjing in 1927 to Japan's full-scale invasion in 1937.
2. It was the period in which the Nationalist government had its best opportunity to build a stable, modern China.
3. Its record was mixed: real achievements in finance and infrastructure, but structural failures in land reform and political consolidation.
4. *Economic and financial reform* produced the Nanjing decade's clearest successes.
5. Under Finance Minister H.
6. H.
7. Kong and T.
8. V.
9. Song, the government unified the currency system, established the Central Bank of China, and negotiated reductions in foreign tariffs.
10. Government revenue increased substantially between 1928 and 1936.
11. *Infrastructure expansion* was visible.
12. The GMD built or expanded over 100,000 kilometres of roads between 1927 and 1937.
13. Railways extended from around 12,000 km in 1927 to over 21,000 km by 1937.
14. Telecommunications networks expanded, connecting major cities.
15. *Education* saw growth at the urban level.
16. Universities expanded and technical schools trained engineers and administrators.
17. Literacy campaigns promoted vernacular Chinese writing.
18. But rural education remained underfunded and largely unchanged.

Structural Failures: Warlords, Corruption, and Rural Neglect

1. The Nanjing decade's structural failures were as significant as its achievements.
2. The GMD never achieved genuine control over much of China.
3. Warlords who had nominally submitted to GMD authority continued to govern their regions autonomously, maintaining private armies and resisting central tax collection.
4. Jiang's control was strongest in the Yangtze delta around Nanjing and Shanghai.
5. The further from this core, the weaker his authority.
6. Corruption ran deep at every level of the government.
7. The close connection between the GMD, Shanghai's financial elites, and the criminal syndicate known as the Green Gang (led by Du Yuesheng) compromised the state's ability to govern impartially.
8. Tax revenue leaked through corrupt intermediaries.
9. Public officials supplemented low salaries with bribes.
10. The failure to address rural poverty was the most consequential shortcoming.
11. Over 80% of Chinese people lived in the countryside.
12. Landlord-tenant relationships remained largely unchanged.
13. Rents were high and security of tenure was low.
14. The GMD's social base, urban merchants, professionals, and the officer class, had no strong incentive to push for land reform, and Jiang could not afford to alienate the landlord class that provided local governance.
15. This failure gave the Chinese Communist Party its opening.
16. While the GMD built roads and reformed banks in the cities, the CCP organised peasant associations, reduced rents, and distributed confiscated land in the rural areas it controlled.
17. The contrast defined the final phase of the Civil War.
18. Comparative judgement: The final judgement must weigh political legitimacy, organisation, social policy, military conditions and Japanese intervention.
19. Nationalist and Communist synthesis 2: Compare military power with counterargument to determine which better explains domestic policy during the nanjing decade (1927-1937).
20. Comparative judgement: The final judgement must weigh political legitimacy, organisation, social policy, military conditions and Japanese intervention.
21. Nationalist and Communist synthesis 3: Compare internal tension with political organisation to determine which better explains domestic policy during the nanjing decade (1927-1937).
22. Comparative judgement: The final judgement must weigh political legitimacy, organisation, social policy, military conditions and Japanese intervention.
23. Nationalist and Communist synthesis 4: Compare long-term consequence with social mobilisation to determine which better explains domestic policy during the nanjing decade (1927-1937).
24. Comparative judgement: The final judgement must weigh political legitimacy, organisation, social policy, military conditions and Japanese intervention.
25. Nationalist and Communist synthesis 5: Compare perspectives with turning point to determine which better explains domestic policy during the nanjing decade (1927-1937).
26. Comparative judgement: The final judgement must weigh political legitimacy, organisation, social policy, military conditions and Japanese intervention.

Domestic policy during the Nanjing decade: Evidence, Outcomes, and Limits

1. The Nanjing government claimed national reunification in 1928.
2. Its authority remained strongest in the lower Yangzi region and major cities.
3. The party described the period as political tutelage.
4. Constitutional government was postponed while the Guomindang directed administration and civic education.
5. The five-yuan system structured central government.
6. Executive, legislative, judicial, examination, and control branches reflected Sun Yixian's constitutional ideas.
7. Tariff autonomy increased state revenue.
8. Foreign powers gradually recognised China's right to set customs duties.
9. Financial reform improved central control.
10. The 1935 currency reform replaced silver with a managed national currency and strengthened government banks.
11. Infrastructure projects connected important regions.
12. Roads, railways, telecommunications, ports, and aviation expanded, though coverage remained uneven.
13. Education grew in cities and county centres.
14. Universities, technical training, and state curricula supported professional and national identity.
15. Public-health campaigns targeted disease and sanitation.
16. Their reach remained much greater in cities than in rural communities.
17. Legal reform produced new civil and criminal codes.
18. Implementation varied because courts, police, and local officials lacked equal capacity.
19. The New Life Movement sought moral and social discipline.
20. It promoted hygiene, order, deference, and regulated public behaviour.
21. Rural society received less sustained reform.
22. Land concentration, rent, debt, and local taxation continued to burden peasants.
23. The government opposed independent labour activism.
24. Unions came under party control and strikes faced suppression.
25. Corruption and patronage weakened confidence.
26. Personal networks influenced appointments, contracts, taxation, and military spending.
27. Regional militarists retained substantial autonomy.
28. The centre often governed through negotiated alliances rather than uniform administration.
29. Japanese aggression redirected resources toward defence.
30. Manchuria's loss and growing conflict limited the time and money available for domestic consolidation.

Evaluating the Nanjing Decade

1. Claimed reunification and actual control: The Nanjing government claimed national reunification in 1928.
2. The party described the period as political tutelage.
3. Assess whether revenue reform and new institutions outweighed regional autonomy, weak rural reach, and Japanese pressure.
4. Political organisation: The five-yuan system structured central government.
5. Tariff autonomy increased state revenue.
6. The five-yuan structure and tariff autonomy strengthened the central state, but implementation remained uneven beyond key cities.
7. Military power: Financial reform improved central control.
8. Infrastructure projects connected important regions.
9. Modernisation produced measurable gains without giving Nanjing complete territorial or political control.
10. Social mobilisation: Education grew in cities and county centres.
11. Public-health campaigns targeted disease and sanitation.
12. The Nanjing government achieved real but uneven state-building. Legal reform, infrastructure, fiscal administration, and diplomatic revision strengthened central institutions, especially in major cities and the lower Yangzi region.
13. These gains did not amount to complete national control. Provincial militarists retained armies and tax bases, while much of rural China experienced the state through landlords, local officials, and military extraction.
14. Economic modernisation also had a narrow social base. Industry and banking expanded, but agrarian debt, tenancy, and insecurity limited the government's appeal among the rural majority.
15. Jiang prioritised political control and the defeat of communism. That choice directed resources toward armies and security while postponing deeper reforms that might have widened social support.
16. Japanese pressure exposed the costs of incomplete consolidation. The loss of Manchuria and later invasion forced the government to defend sovereignty with institutions that were still fiscally and militarily fragile.
17. The fairest judgement is mixed. The decade created a more capable national state, but corruption, coercion, rural neglect, and external invasion prevented those gains from becoming secure legitimacy.