Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
THE MAY FOURTH MOVEMENT AND PERIOD
The warlord-dominated regimes were often interested in little more
than the raw exercise of power and seldom took much thought for
matters of public ideology. What mattered to them was not what peo-
plethoughtorbelievedaboutthestate,butthattheywouldobey
rather than defy the state. The lack of an official ideology in China after
the fall of the Qing certainly had its drawbacks, but in one way it
helped the intellectual revolution. The very absence of an ideology fos-
tered much debate and speculation about just what China's guiding
ideology should be. Because the warlord armies cared little for safe-
guarding any particular state orthodoxy or dogma, Chinese students
and intellectuals during the warlord period were freer than ever
before or since to speak their minds and earnestly discuss what
philosophy or guiding system of thought China ought to espouse in
building its future. Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought, which
became China's official state ideology in 1949, had its birth in the
discussions among students and intellectuals during the May Fourth
period.
The May Fourth period is so named because of a large, nationalistic
protest movement against Japanese aggression that was held on
May 4, 1919. Because the protest typified much of the nationalistic
energy and intellectual openness of its time, the entire period between
the late 1910s and early 1920s is now generally referred to as the May
Fourth period. The Chinese of this time knew intuitively that their
nation was at an intellectual and political crossroads, and what they
discussed and wrote still has ramifications for China today.
The epicenter of the May Fourth period in China was Peking Uni-
versity, or Beida, as it is usually abbreviated in Chinese. Beida was
(and still is) the Harvard of China, and it often set trends that other
Chinese universities followed. During World War I, many Chinese
intellectuals who had been studying abroad in Japan, Europe, and
the United States came home to China, and many of the best and
brightest of them were recruited to Beida to become professors or
administrators. Foremost among the promising and talented young
Chinese returning home were Chen Duxiu and Cai Yuanpei from
Europe, Lu Xun from Japan, and Hu Shi from the United States. All
were to emerge as bright stars in Beida's intellectual constellation.
Cai Yuanpei was particularly important. He had earned his Jinshi
degree in the 1880s, but in 1907 he went to Germany to study. He
was appointed China's minister of education after the 1911 revolu-
tion, but Yuan Shikai's subsequent antics so disgusted him that he
