Month: October 2025

He Zhen, Qiu Jin & Anarchism

Feminism movements emerged in modern China since the lase decades of the Qing dynastic rule. He Zhen (also known as He Yin-Zhen) was among the most famous Chinese feminists during this period, while she was also very well-known for her anarchist ideologies. Qiu Jin, while was not usually recognised as an anarchist as He, was indeed a “feminist warrior” and radical in advocating of anarchism-patterned ideologies, as claimed by Louise Edwards.[1] While if we look into He and Qiu’s positions of thoughts, we could see that both of their feminist thoughts were going side-by-side closely with anarchism (and some communism characteristics) that was also popular in the last decades of Qing dynasty and the early years of Republican China.

 

He Zhen’s speech delivered in 1907 unveiled the connection of her beliefs in both feminism and anarchism, and she further combined these two ideologies together into one to develop a datong-style society. He Zhen in her speech outright rejected the traditional and repressive attitudes against women in Chinese society that existed for thousands of years since the Yellow Emperor until Manchu (Qing government) reign.[2] He Zhen heavily criticised the traditional Confucian and Neo-Confucian led customs in Chinese society such as a woman must remain ‘true’ to one man until death as a cult of purity, and to categorise women struggles in China as a result of the establishment of a patriarchal society which put men over women in social hierarchy.[3] Her solution to eliminate the suppressions against women by men in Chinese society was to remove the old social institutions and rites through radical social transformations, not only in customs and culture, but also to redistribute wealth and to abolish old social classes.[4] Her plan to redistribute social wealth was to transform land and property into communally owned without either a Manchu government or a Han Chinese government, and this was the only way to ensure the existence of “universal equality” and “universal justice” for women and men.[5] In this way, He Zhen’s feminist efforts to approach her “universal” values – absolute equal distribution for everyone without the existence of a state – was very similar to the contemporary anarchist and communists’ scholars in the early 20th century China.

 

Qiu Jin’s approach to feminism was also in line with anarchist ideologies by advocating using violence and assassination to be a “warlike female hero”, which she was even in planning to assassin key officials in the local provinces to seek for social changes before her arrest and execution in 1907.[6] However, Qiu seemed to only apply some but not most of anarchist ideologies to help her develop early feminism in China, as she’s goal of these actions was to save the Chinese state from the Manchurian Qing government reign and to seek for the nation’s survival, rather than to eventually abolish the state system and to achieve economic equality in society to create a datong society as many anarchists and communists planned in early 20th century China.[7]

[1] Louise P. Edwards, Women Warriors and Wartime Spies of China (Cambridge, 2016), p. 40.

[2] ‘On the Revenge of Women’, in Dorothy Ko, Lydia He Liu, Rebecca E. Karl [ed.], The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (New York, 2013), pp. 119 – 120.

[3] Ibid, p. 124.

[4] Ibid, p. 121.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Louise P. Edwards, Women Warriors and Wartime Spies of China (Cambridge, 2016), p. 41.

[7] Ibid, p. 43.

Uchiyama Gudō’s Anarchist Buddhism – The Impact of International Socialism on Japanese Buddhism

Anarchism, described by Fabio Rambelli as part of the international socialist movement, inspired Japanese Buddhist intellectuals to synthesize their respective philosophies for the benefit of the newly emerging working class. The Buddhist priest Uchiyama Gudō sought to utilize the revolutionary concepts of anarchism in order to implement theoretical Buddhist social principles. Gudō believed that both Buddhism and socialism, at their core, ‘aimed to improve the living conditions of the people’.1 Thus, the communication of both Buddhist ideas and socialist anarchism to the working-class villagers were not dissimilar; Gudō understood his Buddhist sermons to be inherently socialist, as well. Uchiyama Gudō’s background in Buddhism inspired his socialist beliefs; therefore, he understood socialism and anarchism not as departures from Buddhism, but as natural expressions of Buddhist egalitarianism. What he failed to grasp, however, were the conflicting natures of Buddhism’s inner liberation and anarchism’s outer revolution.

Rambelli’s Zen Anarchism: The Egalitarian Dharma of Uchiyama Gudō highlights Gudō’s connections between Buddhism and anarchism. In a 1903 serialization of Heimin shinbun, a socialist newspaper, Gudō cites three excerpts from prominent Buddhist sutras as his reasoning for becoming a socialist. However, Rambelli argues that the excerpts were taken ‘out of context and re-signified…in a socialist fashion’, highlighting Gudō’s core Buddhist beliefs, attempting to utilize socialist motivations for societal change.2 Moreover, Gudō established links between the social equality of anarchist communism and that of traditional Buddhist monastic life, still present in China. In doing so, Rambelli claims that Gudō shifted the ‘idealized utopia’ of the Buddhist sangha to a smaller scale to include a ‘self-contained social space’, more in line with the beliefs of socialist utopias.3

Gudō’s belief that social change begins through moral example reveals the Buddhist foundation of his activism. His support of the anarchist concept where the working class follows ruling-class leaders who renounce their property reflects his commitment to a radical, egalitarian ideal of shared equality.4 The working class should not revolt and take down the ruling class, as that would deem the latter as lesser than the former in the new anarchist society, according to Gudō. Furthermore, he firmly believed that the awakening of the masses by the aforementioned examples supports the ‘Zen Buddhist soteriology of…responsibility’; it was the responsibility of the leaders and workers5 Gudō’s ideological stances on these issues reveal his Buddhist core and depict him as a Buddhist involved in the anarchist movement.6

Gudō initially hesitated to support the anarchist violence necessary for a successful revolution, as it fundamentally opposed Buddhist principles. By the time Gudō fully accepted anarchism, however, the anarchist movement had begun to shift toward ‘direct, sometimes violent, action’.7 This shift had a clear impact on Gudō, as a key argument in his work Museifu kyōsan kakumei states that ‘readiness to use violence’ was necessary ‘to achieve’ a ‘revolutionary movement’.8 Despite his reluctance, the deteriorating medical condition of his socialist colleague Kōtoku Shūsui provided the final push toward his acceptance of the violence required to initiate a revolution.9 Gudō’s evident internal difficulty to accept violence revealed itself in his depiction of a god who ‘loves revolutionary martyrs’ in his writings, as no buddhas would love such individuals ‘in a modern Japanese context’.7 This internal difficulty demonstrates his inability to accept the inherent conflicting natures of Buddhism and anarchism.

Uchiyama Gudō’s growing acceptance of a violent revolution led him to distance himself from his original, more Buddhist understanding of anarchism. Gudō originally accepted socialism , and subsequently anarchism, as social methods for change and revolution, as they aligned well with his Buddhist beliefs. However, as he became more involved with socialism, it began to take precedence in his life, molding him into a Buddhist who was involved in the anarchist movement. Furthermore, Gudō came to embrace violence as necessary for a revolution and the success of anarchism in Japan. This acceptance created internal strife, as the anarchist path to outer revolution diverged significantly beyond the Buddhist path to inner liberation.

  1. Fabio Rambelli, Zen Anarchism: The Egalitarian Dharma of Uchiyama Gudō (Berkeley, 2013), p. 15. [↩]
  2. Ibid., p. 13. [↩]
  3. Ibid., pp. 20-21. [↩]
  4. Ibid., p. 16. [↩]
  5. Ibid., pp. 27, 13. [↩]
  6. Ibid., p. 30. [↩]
  7. Ibid., p. 23. [↩] [↩]
  8. Ibid., p. 18. [↩]
  9. Ibid., p. 26. [↩]

Japanese Influence on the Memory of the Tonghak Rebellion

The Tonghak rebellion is remembered as one of the most influential events in modern Korean history. For reference, scholars consider its significance to be on par with the Taiping rebellion in China. The rebellion was led by members of the Tonghak religion. Their doctrine provided poor, rural Korean folk with an outlet for the hardships experienced under a corrupt government. The basic texts of the faith espoused regionalism and anti-foreignism.1 An adherence to these values in the face of foreign threats led to revolution. The Tonghak rebellion would eventually lead to the Sino-Japanese war, as foreign powers fought to quell the conflict and preserve their interests. Since then, the rebellion has become a symbol of Korean national identity, representing resistance to authoritarian power and foreign interference in the nation, as well as a rejection of Japanese interpretations of Koreans.

The Kabo reforms imposed by the Japanese occupants in the wake of the rebellion attempted to restructure the Korean government and social life, receiving much pushback from the Korean people.2  The sweeping reforms eliminated slavery, punishment by association, class distinction, and altered the calendar.3 Anti-Japanese irritation persisted in the wake of these edicts that attempted to ‘modernize’ Korea.

In addition to altering Korea’s structure and identity, Japanese occupation shaped interpretations of the rebellion. Japan’s aggressive foreign policy was validated through portrayals of the conflict in Western facing chronicles. An installment in the February 18, 1903 edition of the Japan Chronicle claimed that ‘the history of Japan’s foreign troubles may be traced almost entirely to her relationships with Korea’.4   This article represents the destruction of the Tonghak ‘disturbance’ as protecting Japanese settlers from danger.5  Blaming Korea for interfering with Japan’s interests in the Far East, the author of this article suggests that Korea must be annexed immediately, or else what is the purpose of the Anglo-Japanese alliance?6

This excerpt reflects Japanese attitudes before stripping Korea of sovereignty and making it a protectorate. It calls into question what is to be done about problems in Japanese foreign policy, and validates feelings of anxiety around the question of Korea. The article clearly shows the connection between the foreign policy of the British empire and Japan’s aggressive policy of expansion. It also provides grounds for Korean nationalism’s use of the rebellion as a source of nationalist pride. 

Another article from the Japan Chronicle in 1907 describes the behavior of the Japanese troops in quelling the rebellion. The author claims ‘the Japanese took excessive pains to see that the Korean troops did not ill treat the people… Unless Japanese soldiers were with them the Koreans committed great excesses’. 7 Japan portrays itself as ‘big brother’ to the selfish, backwards Koreans, seemingly validating its annexation of the nation. 

Japan’s representation of the Korean people as violent, underdeveloped, and in need of paternalistic leadership after the Tonghak rebellion led to the religion’s association with nationalistic zeal. For modern Koreans, the Tonghak rebellion and Cheondogyo have come to represent Korea’s history of resistance to foreign intervention. Subsequently, Tonghak is used to downplay the impact of external forces in shaping Korea, rejecting the idea of history portrayed in the Japanese Chronicle. The political importance of the goals and ideals of the Tonghak rebellion tend to be back-projected by historians looking to find evidence of a uniquely Korean form of anti-authoritarian resistance. As a result of it being co-opted by nationalists the religion has become stuck in the past.8 Perhaps if Koreans had not needed a source of optimism to rally behind after Japanese colonization, followers of Cheondogyo would represent more than 1% of the population, and the Tonghak rebellion might be remembered differently.

 

  1. George L. Kallander, Salvation through Dissent: Tonghak Heterodoxy and Early Modern Korea (Honolulu, 2013), p. 68 [↩]
  2. Peter H. Lee, William Theodore De Bary, and Yongho Ch’oe, eds. Sources of Korean Tradition, (New York, 1997), p. 272. [↩]
  3. Ibid, 274-5. [↩]
  4. ‘Date 18 February 1903’, in Robert Young (ed.) Japan Chronicle Weekly Edition, no. 288–339, 2nd section, (Kobe, 1903) Japan Chronicle Online. p. 146. [↩]
  5. Ibid [↩]
  6. Ibid,. [↩]
  7. ‘Date 24 January 1907’, in Robert Young (ed.) Japan Chronicle Weekly Edition, no. 497–548, 2nd section, (Kobe 1907) Japan Chronicle Online. p. 112-3. [↩]
  8. Kirsten Bell, ‘Cheondogyo and the Donghak Revolution: The (Un)Making of a Religion’, Korea Journal, vol 44: no. 2 (2004), p. 141. [↩]

Anarchism in Qing – Republican China and the Maoist Movements

While not often being discussed in major scholarships, anarchism in China played an important role in shaping the thinkings of Chinese society during the late Qing and early Republican periods and beyond by suggesting radical social changes and emphasising cultural transformations. The Great Leap Forward during 1958 – 1960 and the Cultural Revolution between 1966 and 1976 in China were also major events that reshaped Chinese society by radical transformations and struggles. Interestingly, though anarchism and the revolutionary ideologies (especially by the Red Guards) during the Maoist movements years seemed not to be very relevant, I found some similarities of these movements in different periods of modern China.

 

Anarchism emerged in China around 1905 when Sun Yat-Sen’s Revolutionary Alliance was established.[1] During the time of a weak Qing government and huge rise in anti-Manchu nationalist thinking among the public, anarchists also sought to overthrow the Qing empire and to begin a “cultural transformation”.[2] The anarchists’ expected “cultural transformation” included almost all aspects of life, such as property, family, nation and race.[3] Especially in traditional Chinese society during the imperial dynasties that the Confucianism and Neo-Confucianism-oriented family system has always been the cornerstone of the fundamental structure in terms of social relations, and thus the traditional family system and gender role was under fierce attack of the anarchists as “wasteful” and unhelpful for individuals to be economically independent.[4] Similarly during the Maoist period, traditional gender roles and family concepts were also being rejected, and anti-Confucian style of gender equality was emphasised through the famous slogans such as “Woman Holds Up Half the Sky” and “Iron Girls”, which the latter was a well-spread praise word for the “degendered behavioural patterns” of Chinese women participating in the “battles” during the Cultural Revolution years.[5]

 

Another similar aspect was about the over-idealised economics. From the Paris anarchists that they defined social revolution as aiming to abolish private property and class distinctions, which this radical Western thinking was introduced for Chinese socialists.[6] This also influenced Chinese anarchists such as Chu’s claim that “a self-interested society is not a fair (gongping) society” as it was “contrary to the very “organic structure””.[7] The anarchists’ chase for an absolute economic equality in the society was also in coincidence with the fanaticism of the abolish of all private property and to establish People’s Commune (renmin gongshe) to create a utopia-like society which the production was done by all and the economic distribution was equal for all, with the slogan “Run into communism” – which was overly idealistic to be achieved, just as the anarchists’ beliefs to abolish all economic inequality and social classes by radical transformations during the last Qing decade and early Republican periods when the productive forces of the society were still inadequate to do so.

[1] Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (University of California Press, 2023), pp. 78 – 79.

[2] Ibid, pp. 79 – 80.

[3] Ibid, p. 99.

[4] Ibid.

[5] “Iron Girl of Dazhai: Once an Icon of an Era”, Shanxi Evening News, accessed 7 October 2025, <https://www.chinanews.com.cn/cul/2014/03-07/5926021.shtml>.

[6] Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (University of California Press, 2023), pp. 80 – 82.

[7] Ibid, pp. 96 – 97.

Social Uprising Behind Taiping and Tonghak Religions

The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement in the last decades of Qing dynasty of China and Tonghak Movement in the last decades in the kingdom of Joseon of Korea both had significant influence to the nation, which both brought major social transformations and spread of a religion, but also caused devastating results to the occupied regions’ economy and population during a short period of time. Also, it was coincidently similar that the Taiping rebellion in China and Tonghak rebellion in Korea were both known for their religious-led characteristics, one claimed to be Protestant Christianity, and the latter to be Cheondogyo, developed from Tonghak “Eastern Learning”. However, different with many religious-led reformations, warfare or revolutions in early modern Europe, these two movements in East Asia were more likely to be socioeconomic-led peasant uprisings under the ‘guise’ of religious beliefs.

 

For the Taiping Heavenly kingdom’s case, Christopher Hill’s book The English Bible

and the Seventeenth-Century Revolution provided an insight of the major use of the Bible and Christian religious beliefs in the English Revolution – while his study of an European revolution also provided a comparison between the role of the Bible and Christianity in a more ‘traditional’ sense of religious-oriented revolutions and the Taiping Rebellion.[1] Hong Xiuquan’s Taiping Heavenly Kingdom indeed claimed to uphold Christianity as the only official religion, and thus put much effort in the publishing of the Bible and to spread religious texts to churches and to implement weekly worships, all seemed to be formal Christian practices.[2] However, the Taiping’s version of the Bible was altered to conform to the moral values of Taiping theology, and some text were either deleted or rewrote to fit Hong’s own personal understanding of Christianity.[3] In this way, Taiping’s version of ‘Protestant Christianity’ was somehow far from original Protestant teachings, and was more like a combination of Protestantism and local Chinese customs and ideologies – even with some Confucianism beliefs that Hong was taught to before he established the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.[4]

 

While the Taiping’s use of Christianity as the official religion was not aimed to bring Western-patterned Christian practices to China, but to self-establish legitimacy to start a social uprising against the Qing emperor’s reign. By using Christianity in its name (on the surface), Hong agreed with English missionary Medhurst’s claim that the title of Chinese emperors (huangdi) was blasphemous to the God (shangdi) by using the word di since Qin dynasty, and they needed to overthrow the blasphemous imperial system.[5] This way of applying and interpreting Christian theology provided Hong a new form of legitimacy to start his Taiping rebellion. However, the reason for the Taiping rebellion could be in a deeper level rather than Christianity itself. After the defeat of Qing forces in the First Opium War in 1842, the legitimacy of Qing’s imperial government began to be challenged, as the perceived ever-strong empire was suddenly in threats by more powerful Western forces. The devastating economic compensations from the Qing court to British authorities was in no doubt to put extra burdens on normal Chinese people, while the defeat of Qing forces in the Second Opium War at the mean time of Taiping rebellion only made the economic situation worse for the Chinese public, and therefore the breakout of a peasant rebellion was only a matter of time which eventually broke out in 1851, and Christianity was more like an excuse.

 

Tonghak rebellion in Korea was also in similar situations. The Tonghak believers self-established legitimacy by raising a “Righteous Army” and to resist Japanese and Chinese influences in Korea, and also publicly claimed to carrying patriotic duties in the anti-Japanese and anti-Chinese campaign, which was obviously not oriented from the spread of Catholicism into Korean peninsula in the mid-19th century and the subsequently emerged “Eastern Learning”.[6] From the Twelve Reforms Proclaimed by the Tonghak Overseer’s Office we could also see that the breakout of the Tonghak rebellion was also related to the economic burdens on Korean peasants since the mid-19th century when foreign powers’ influence increased in Korea, as the Tonghak believers aimed to void “all past debts, private or public”, to redistribute farmland, and to reduce sundry taxes as their resorts to reduce Korean people’s economic burden – this was also obviously emerged from the very real socioeconomic difficulties in late 19th century Korea, rather than solely the spread of Catholic beliefs, as Catholicism was rather more irrelevant from this rebellion in Korea.[7]

[1] Thomas H. Reilly, The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom: Rebellion and the Blasphemy of Empire (Seattle, 2011), p. 57.

[2] Ibid, p. 74.

[3] Ibid, p. 75.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid, pp. 87 – 88.

[6] Peter H Lee, William Theodore De Bary and Yŏng-ho Ch’oe, Sources of Korean Tradition (New York, 1997 – 2000), p. 267.

[7] Ibid, pp. 265 – 266.