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 \u2013 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.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Anarchism emerged in China around 1905 when Sun Yat-Sen\u2019s Revolutionary Alliance was established.[1]<\/a> 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 \u201ccultural transformation\u201d.[2]<\/a> The anarchists\u2019 expected \u201ccultural transformation\u201d included almost all aspects of life, such as property, family, nation and race.[3]<\/a> 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 \u201cwasteful\u201d and unhelpful for individuals to be economically independent.[4]<\/a> 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 \u201cWoman Holds Up Half the Sky\u201d and \u201cIron Girls\u201d, which the latter was a well-spread praise word for the \u201cdegendered behavioural patterns\u201d of Chinese women participating in the \u201cbattles\u201d during the Cultural Revolution years.[5]<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n 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]<\/a> This also influenced Chinese anarchists such as Chu\u2019s claim that \u201ca self-interested society is not a fair (gongping<\/em>) society\u201d as it was \u201ccontrary to the very “organic structure”\u201d.[7]<\/a> The anarchists\u2019 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\u2019s Commune (renmin gongshe<\/em>) to create a utopia-like society which the production was done by all and the economic distribution was equal for all, with the slogan \u201cRun into communism\u201d \u2013 which was overly idealistic to be achieved, just as the anarchists\u2019 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.<\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution (University of California Press, 2023), pp. 78 \u2013 79.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Ibid<\/em>, pp. 79 \u2013 80.<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Ibid<\/em>, p. 99.<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Ibid<\/em>.<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> \u201cIron Girl of Dazhai: Once an Icon of an Era\u201d, Shanxi Evening News, accessed 7 October 2025, <https:\/\/www.chinanews.com.cn\/cul\/2014\/03-07\/5926021.shtml>.<\/p>\n [6]<\/a> Arif Dirlik, Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution<\/em> (University of California Press, 2023), pp. 80 \u2013 82.<\/p>\n [7]<\/a> Ibid<\/em>, pp. 96 \u2013 97.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 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 \u2013 1960 and the Cultural Revolution between 1966 … Continue reading “Anarchism in Qing – Republican China and the Maoist Movements”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1541"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1542,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541\/revisions\/1542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/transnationalhistory.net\/world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}