The Discourse of Rights in Late Qing and Republican China

Abstract

The idea of rights in China first emerged during the mid-to-late nineteenth century (Qing dynasty) as part of a desperate search for national survival in reaction to the impact of the West. The forced opening of China by the Western military powers had highlighted an alarming disparity in national strength between the Chinese and the West, and in the debate that followed on how best to resist further foreign intrusion, late Qing reformers from the Self-strengthening Movement (ziqiang) argued that Western methods, particularly of a military and industrial nature, could be usefully employed while simultaneously preserving traditional Confucian ‘Essence’ (ti).1 However, as China continued to suffer humiliation at the hands of foreign powers, the virtue of remaining loyal to Confucian ti was cast into serious doubt. Confronted with the possible colonisation of the Chinese nation, the more radical thinkers of the late Qing period, such as Yan Fu and Liang Qichao, insisted that national survival should be attained at any cost by adopting whatever means necessary. As such, they argued that only replicating Western military and industrial techniques was insufficient. If the Chinese nation was to survive, Western values and ideas and the political and legal structures that encompassed them, had to be wholeheartedly embraced. It was in this context that the concept of rights became an important feature of Chinese political discourse. Yet, while Chinese scholars were adamant about the need to adoptKeywordsChinese PeopleQing DynastyCollective InterestChinese NationNational SurvivalThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.