Chinese Civil War: Causes of War Notes

Key Questions

1. What were the long term and short term causes of the Chinese Civil War?
2. How can these be categorized into economic, political, ideological, and territorial causes?

Long Term Causes

1. Socio-Economic Factors

1. At the start of the 20th century, China was still ruled by the Manchu (Qing) dynasty, but its society and economy were under great strain.
   1. Peasant hardship: The overwhelming majority of Chinese people were peasants who lived at subsistence level.
   2. They worked small plots of land, often renting from landlords who demanded up to 80% of their harvest. During floods, droughts, or poor harvests, many peasants faced starvation.
   3. Population growth vs. limited land: Between 1850 and 1900, China’s population grew by about 8%, while cultivated land increased by only 1%. This imbalance led to mounting food shortages and recurring famines.
   4. Taxation: Peasants bore the burden of high taxation, which supported the extravagant imperial court but provided little relief to ordinary people.
   5. Urban pressures: Many impoverished peasants migrated to the cities in search of work. However, urban unemployment was already high because modern machinery and cheap Western imports were undermining traditional industries.
2. This widespread poverty and inequality created a volatile social base that made China increasingly unstable.

2. Political Weakness and the Impact of Foreign Powers

1. China’s political system under the Qing dynasty was weakened both from within and by foreign intervention.
   1. Defeat by Western powers: In the 19th century, China suffered a series of humiliating defeats in the Opium Wars against Britain, which forced China into unequal treaties.
   2. These treaties gave Western powers control over trade, territory, and even their own courts in Chinese cities, undermining Chinese sovereignty.
   3. Loss of sovereignty: Foreigners were not subject to Chinese law, missionaries flooded the country, and foreign businesses dominated trade.
   4. China was effectively carved into “spheres of influence” controlled by Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and later Japan.
   5. Corruption and inefficiency: Local officials pocketed much of the tax revenue, leaving the central government weak and financially unstable.
   6. Rebellions: Internal uprisings reflected the anger of the people. The Taiping Rebellion (1850–1864), a mix of religious and political revolt, caused millions of deaths and exposed the inability of the Qing to control the country.
   7. The Boxer Rebellion (1899–1900) showed deep anti-foreign resentment but was brutally crushed by Western and Japanese forces.
2. China’s defeats and foreign domination deepened the sense of national humiliation, which later became a driving force for both nationalist (GMD) and communist (CCP) movements.

3. The Overthrow of the Qing Dynasty (1911 Revolution)

1. By the early 20th century, China’s ruling dynasty was widely seen as incapable of reform.
2. Weak leadership: After the death of the Guangxu Emperor in 1908, a 2-year-old boy, Pu Yi, inherited the throne. His father, Prince Chun, ruled as regent but lacked the vision and ability to introduce meaningful reform.
3. Growing discontent: Intellectuals, business elites, and radicals all criticized the dynasty. Prince Chun’s decision to raise taxes while failing to modernize deepened resentment.
4. The 1911 Double Tenth Revolution: Sparked in Wuchang by mutinous soldiers, the revolution spread rapidly across the provinces. Within weeks, most declared independence from Beijing.
5. Sun Yixian’s return: From exile in the USA, Dr. Sun Yixian was invited to become the first president of the new Republic of China, founded in Nanjing.
6. On 12 February 1912, Emperor Pu Yi abdicated, ending over 2,000 years of imperial rule. However, the revolution was incomplete:
   1. Democracy was not established.
   2. The middle classes played little role.
   3. Many imperial officials kept their positions.

4. The Rule of Yuan Shikai (1912–1916)

1. The new Republic soon fell under the control of Yuan Shikai, a former Qing general, who became president in 1912.
2. Military dictatorship: Yuan ruled as a strongman rather than building a democratic republic. He relied heavily on the army to maintain power.
3. Failure of democracy: Sun Yixian’s Guomindang (GMD), formed in 1912 as a parliamentary party, lacked the strength to challenge Yuan. When Sun attempted a “Second Revolution” in 1913, it failed, forcing him into exile in Japan.
4. Centralization attempts: Yuan abolished regional assemblies and tried to strengthen central government control of tax revenues, angering provincial leaders.
5. Final mistake: In 1915, Yuan declared himself emperor. This alienated almost everyone, including the military, and he was forced to step down. He died in 1916.
6. Yuan’s death left China without strong central leadership, ushering in the Warlord Era, where regional military leaders carved the country into rival fiefdoms.
   1. This fragmentation directly contributed to the eventual outbreak of the Chinese Civil War.

Short Term Causes

1. Political weakness: regionalism – the warlords 1916–1928

1. A key cause of the civil war in China was the increasing lack of unity in the country by the second decade of the 20th century.
   1. Regionalism or provincialism was to play a significant role not only in causing the war, but also in its course and outcome.
   2. With the abdication and death of Yuan, China lost the only figure that had maintained some degree of unity.
2. China broke up into small states and provinces, each controlled by a warlord and his private army.
   1. These warlords ran their territories independently, organizing and taxing the people in their domains.
   2. They had their own laws and even their own currencies.
   3. As warlords extended their power and wealth by expanding their territories, it was the peasants who suffered in their continuous wars.
   4. None of the warlords was willing to relinquish his armies or power to the central government.
   5. The warlord period increased the sense of humiliation felt by many Chinese and, coupled with their desire to get rid of foreign influence, led to an increase in nationalism during the decade of warlord rule.
3. China had all but ceased to exist, it was in a state of internal anarchy.
4. If the warlords remained, China would remain divided.

2. The May Fourth Movement

1. During this period, two political movements developed in response to both the warlords and foreign influence in China.
2. The May Fourth Movement began in 1919.
   1. Students led a mass demonstration in Beijing against the warlords, traditional Chinese culture, and the Japanese.