| Yuan Shih-Kai is one of the most complicated important figures in the modern history of China, who personally experienced the modern historical transformation in China by going through such significant historical events as the Naval Battle of 1894, Wuxu Reform (1898), the New Policy Reform of Late Qing Dynasty, Xinhai Revolution, the Establishment of the Republic of China, the Second Revolution, Hongxian Monarchy, etc.During his 34-year political life, Yuan Shih-Kai once served as ambassador, commanding general, local governor as well as military minister; he acted not only as the president of the Republic of China but also as the emperor of Hongxian Monarchy. It seemed that he was especially favored by fortune and was given great opportunities to promote new policies and to establish a republic. However, because the ideas of power centralization and feudal morality had already been deeply rooted in his mind after long-term penetration of traditional culture, when facing the historical progress and transformation, he was ultimately unable to resist the temptation and failed on the way to goodness, which was despised by all people, although he was ambitious of making China powerful and attempted to achieve enormous accomplishments. The failure of Yuan Shih-Kai's monarchy led him to the irretrievable failure in politics. Thus his political thoughts and opinions were given the label of reaction for a time.In fact, Yuan Shikan ultimate failure in the change from tradition to modernity and that the failure of the transformation from feudalism to democratic republic in the age that Yuan Shih-Kai lived in were not only the tragedy for Yuan Shih-Kai but also the tragedy for the whole age.As is well known, Xinkai Revolution overthrew the emperor of Qing Dynasty, but had not fundamentally changed Chinese society indeed. At that time, whether bourgeois revolutionaries or constitutionalists, landlord class liberals or conservatives, though people were talking about democracy and republic, people seldom changed in their thinking, knowledge and habits. Both the common people and political elites lacked a profound comprehension of the connotation of democratic politics. Some members of the Parliament did not know how to use democratic procedure and democratic methods to solve problems, to enhance the establishment of national democratic politics and to promote the process from chaos to order of the country. On the contrary, they regarded the Parliament as a vanity fair, and the parties as the tool for personal desires. Under the circumstances that the political environment and foreign aggression and domestic disasters remained unchanged, Yuan Shih-Kai who had been greatly influenced by traditional culture was unable to embark on the course of democratic republic.Yuan Shih-Kai, by choosing the self-proclaimed monarchy, hoped that the open autarchy would enhance the central authority and integrate social resources, which was motivated by his desire for highest power as well as his consideration of solution to political divergences and domestic contradictions, or possibly for other reasons. However, despite what reason it was and how the reason arose, whether the China in late Qing Dynasty and in the early Republic could ultimately take the road to democratic republic, people would not emotionally and rationally accept the political retrogression from democratic republic to dual constitutional monarchy characterized by open autarchy. It seemed that history was not so simple at all. Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts sounded contradictory and were mixed with old and new views, which sometimes advocated revolutionary, or democracy and freedom but sometimes suppo(?)ed open autarchy, which sometimes preached rule by man but sometimes proposed rule by law, which sometimes yielded to comprise but sometimes advocated the protection of rights. Although these thoughts seemed dazzling in a mess, the main line could be found in the political thoughts with the main content that was stable and functional. This paper holds the views that the core of Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts was open autarchy, and its basis was the thought of making China powerful, the thought of power centralization and the thought of feudal morality. The changes of his ideological propositions were subject to his status and interests of the current time and aimed at pursuing for highest power. However, different from common politicians, Yuan Shih-Kai did not entirely neglect the nation's interests nor ignore the national situation and world political trends when taking his own interests into consideration. When choosing monarchy in his old age, it was because that to a great extent he misjudged the situation both at home and abroad. Generally speaking, Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts were changeable but stable, contradictory but unified. Behind such contradictory changes, there are deep economic, cultural and social sources, and such economic, cultural and social sources share a common background, namely the modern transformation in the history of China. Therefore, this paper, by analyzing Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts and their development, attempts at making an interpretation of political transformation of original Chinese society in late Qing Dynasty and in the early Republic as well as the long term, reflection and complexity of the democratic political construction of the Chinese society.This paper consists of eleven parts, including an introduction, nine chapters and a conclusion.The introduction provides a briefly review of the trends of the study on Yuan Shih-Kai at home and abroad as well as an analysis and an answer of people's doubts about whether Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts constituted a system, and indicates that Yuan Shih-Kai had not only political thoughts but also such concrete political thoughts as the thought of making China powerful, the thought of power centralization, the thought of morality, etc., which were relatively stable and functional.The first chapter illustrates the thought of reform. Yuan Shih-Kai's thought of reform originated from national salvation and prosperity, as those of other pioneers of the same age did, but the feature of progressiveness distinguished his thought from other thoughts. The reform strategy based on talents, the reform idea giving priority to soldier training and the reform approach to promote what was beneficial and eliminate what was harmful, which were proposed by him, were much more practical in comparison with those of the innovationists, but generally speaking these thoughts never transcended the traditional political reform.The second chapter illustrates the thought of constitutionalism. This chapter is composed of three sections that elaborate the proposition of constitutional monarchy, the proposition of democratic republic and its reaction, and the thought of president's autocracy respectively, with an emphasis on the analysis of Yuan Shih-Kai's proposition of constitutional monarchy characterized by the idea of influential ministers and its destruction of democratic republic.The third chapter illustrates the thought of rule by law. Although he was famous for rule by man, Yuan Shih-Kai had rich thought of rule by law. For example, he held the views that the constitution as fundamental law, the proposition of ruling the country by virtue with the complement of rule by law, the idea of prudent legislation and strict law abiding, the discipline that freedom shall be confined within the law, etc. This chapter focuses on the analysis of his thoughts of legal system reform and propositions of judicial modernization. It should be said that his judicial propositions and practices such as the differentiation of civil and criminal laws, justice on the basis of domestic situation, the establishment of prosecutors, and the setup of the skill-and-technique-learning office for criminals have shined with the historical brilliance till now.The fourth chapter illustrates the thought of Monarchy. The content of the thought of Hongxian Monarchy is not complicated, but the tricky lies in its nature and why Yuan Shih-Kai chose monarchy. By the elaboration of three sections on the weighing and consideration of monarchy environment, the whole story and nature of Hongxian Monarchy, and the internal defects of monarchy logic respectively, this chapter has analyzed the reasons for Yuan Shih-Kai mounting the throne and the characteristics of open autarchy of Hongxian Monarchy. Hongxian Monarchy actually differs not only from the traditional feudal monarchy but also from the common constitutional monarchy. Yuan Shih-Kai's delusions of implementing open autarchy on the basis of Hongxian Monarchy have fatal defects in these aspects including support of legal principles, grasp of opportunities and choose of forms.The fifth chapter illustrates the thought of military administration. Yuan Shih-Kai was rich in the thought of military administration, which embodied various aspects including military system, military service, military training, army upkeep, military disciplines, army sovereignty, military education, etc. Yuan Shih-Kai's military thoughts and practices directly led to the modernization of the military forces of China. Furthermore, this chapter has analyzed Yuan Shih-Kai's proposition of nationalization of military forces and his consistent view of "soldiers belong to the general" in the early period of the Republic and especially indicated that the harms that the said view of "soldiers belong to the general" has done to the political situation in the early period of the Republic and even to the China in the first half of the (?)wentieth century.The sixth chapter illustrates the thought of diplomacy. Diplomacy is the extension of politics. This chapter contains six sections, which express the thoughts of utilization of foreign countries, supreme sovereignty and utmost financial power, compromise with foreign countries, shimpan, opening-up to the outside world, diplomatic talents, etc., to elaborate the contributions that Yuan Shih-Kai had made to the modernization of the diplomacy of China. Moreover, this chapter intends to correct the misreading of Yuan Shih-Kai's negotiations of "Twenty-One Treaty" in the academic field for a long time via the interpretation of Yuan Shih-Kai's handwriting materials. In fact, Yuan Shih-Kai acted wisely and courageously in the negotiations of "Twenty-One Treaty" and tried his best to protect the sovereignty of the country.The seventh chapter illustrates the thought of personnel selection. The political figure's selection of personnel, appointment of officials and administration of officials are politics in nature. Yuan Shih-Kai had his unique way of personnel selection but could hardly separate from the Chinese tradition of personnel selection. He was equipped with both the thought of varied talent appointment and the faction view; he not only believed that either one submitted to it and prospered or one resisted it at one's own peril but also advocated to make option carefully and to pay attention to education. Depended on his wise thought and means of personnel selection, Yuan Shih-Kai had established the most powerful and influential political and military clique, namely Beiyang Clique, in the modern history of China.The eighth chapter focuses on Yuan Shih-Kai's thought of power struggle and strategies.Although Yuan Shih-Kai's political power struggle was not direct political thought, such power struggle implied his political views and propositions. Yuan Shih-Kai was a figure who integrated all the traditional political means in the modern history of China. With the help of power struggle and strategies, Yuan Shih-Kai mounted on the highest political stage in the early period of the Republic of China. He excessively believed in and abused power struggle, and thus could hardly escape from the fate of failure eventually. Yuan Shih-Kai's thought of power struggle included the strategy of retreating in order to proceed, the plots under the guise of public opinion, the schemes of serving one's own interests through trickery and swindling, the strategies of adapting to the changed circumstances, the tricks of making use of contradictions, etc., among which some still have a wide application today.The ninth chapter illustrates the characteristics and shaping factors of Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts. Although Yuan Shih-Kai held different political orientations, ideological propositions and action attitudes in different periods, even different attitudes and propositions towards the same issue in the same period, he remained stable in his value orientation and behavior all the time. Therefore, Yuan Shih-Kai's political proposition and views were subject to his own status and interests, and were periodic, changeable, complicated, stable, utilitarian, practical, developed circuitously with contradictions. His political thoughts were mainly shaped by the interaction of the factors including the edification of traditional thoughts, gradual influence of western thoughts, internal driving of the thought of making China powerful and external surroundings.The conclusion part mainly offers a reply to the question that why Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts were the reflection of the political transformation of modern China. The author holds the opinions as follows:Yuan Shih-Kai had his own political thoughts and a relatively stable system of political thoughts, and his political thoughts were constantly changed, enriched and adjusted according to the changes of the age, which were periodic and contradictory in the development process.From an advocator of feudal politics to a reformer of feudal orders, from a supporter of the Hundred Days'Reform to a promoter of New Policy Reform in late Qing Dynasty, from a proponent of constitutional monarchy to a pioneer of republic system, from a leader of democratic republic to a returner of monarchy, Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts were changeable and stable. It was his concrete political propositions that were changed in different periods while his claim for open autarchy based on the thought of making China powerful, the thought of power centralization and the thought of morality remained unchanged. Different from feudal emperors, Yuan Shih-Kai was born in the key phrase of political transformation of China, had the access to western cultures and values and had the awareness of making China power from salvation. Therefore, though he went to opposite side of the history by assuming the throne in his later years, for a quite long period of time before he was a current leader of the political reform of modern China, and his life conformed to the trend of the historical development of China in many aspects. The evolution of his political thoughts fairly was just identical with the tough process of the political modernization of China. The characteristics of Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts including modernity and tradition, aggressiveness and conservativeness, democracy and autarchy, power centralization and separation properly reflected the hardship, reflection, complexity and long term of political transformation of modern China. In a sum, Yuan Shih-Kai's political thoughts embodied rich content and ideological enlightenment and were the reflection of the political transformation of modern China. |
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