A Study Of Shi Shijie,a Squire Returning From Taiwan

The squires returning from Taiwan after it was ceded to Japan in1895were a special group in terms of history and area. They were a social group which cannot be ignored in the research of relations between Fujian and Taiwan in modern times. After coming to the mainland as an elite group in Taiwan, they proactively involved themselves into local society, closely linked to dramatic change in modern China. They gradually came to make their own change of life and became extraordinary in fields of politics, economy, culture, science and so on. This article makes a study of how the squires changed and involved into the mainland, what facilitated their change, and how much their change influenced those squires within Taiwan. This article also tries to provide answers by analyzing the symbolic figure of Shi Shijie.Shi Shijie was a master of Taiwanese literature at the end of the Qing Dynasty and took an important position in the history of old Taiwan literature. He was well educated from a young age, succeeded in imperial examination and became Jinshi at early time. Because his father Shi Qiongfang was also Jinshi, they were the only Taiwanese family in which both the father and the son were Jinshi. The young Shi Shijie, renowned for his poem and literature and success in imperial examination, was appointed by Tang Jingyan to be head of the Haidong Academy and became a leading celebrity of Taiwan squires with high fame.Apart from being a poetic figure in the history of literature, Shi Shijie was also a renowned official. In the1860’s, Taiwan shifted from an immigrant society to a settled society. A class of squires from imperial examinations formed and grew strong. As a member of the class, Shi Shijie participated in public affaires of Taiwan and made a new dent in managing Peiyuan Council, helping with taxation, organizing civil corps, mediating cases, administering salt affairs and so on.The Japanese occupation of Taiwan interrupted the localization process of Taiwanese social development. The colonial authorities put into practice a social management system centered on police and completely destructed the traditional squire system which had been deeply rooted and budded in Taiwan. The supremacy the squires had taken in the countryside was snatched away by the police and their space for social activities was occupied by relevant colonial institutions. Threatened by systems and stimulated by national morale, the squires, one after another, left Taiwan for the mainland. Shi Shijie, as part of the influx, returned to Sicen, Quanzhou, his ancestral home. He quickly integrated into the society, became a famous local squire in south Quanzhou, and played an active role in religious affairs, mediation of fights, cultural and educational matters.After the Sino-Japanese War of1894-1895, the Chinese society entered into a phase where changes accelerated. Waves of commodity economy brought great impact to the traditional rural mode of operation and the patriarchal system upon which the dominance of squires depended began to dismantle. Shi Shijie was forced to move toward urban economic entity and shift to new profession. After the failures in Quanzhou and Fuzhou, he relocated in Xiamen and worked in the Chamber of Commerce of Xiamen. He succeeded in shifting from a famous squire to a merchant. With the development of the chambers of commerce, the class of merchants became the people who dominated the local economic lifeline and they were the supporters of local finance and economy. The local governments actually depended upon them. In the special transforming period between the end of the Qing Dynasty and the early years of the Republic of China, the Council of Counselors of Xiamen in which the leaders of the Chamber of Commerce of Xiamen played the major part, took on local security and economic affairs and became the leading force in social stabilization and municipal management. With the assistance of the Chamber of Commerce of Xiamen, Shi Shijie became Tongpan in Maxiang, an official position in charge, of affairs around Xiamen. It marked the extension of power of commercial associations toward local political institutions and another effort of the class of merchants to show up on the political stage of modern times.This article, taking Shi Shijie as an example, analyzes the change of those squires returning from Taiwan and makes the following conclusions:Ⅰ. The gradual dismantlement of the traditional system of squires pushed up the continuous change of those squires returning from Taiwan. Meanwhile, the destruction and breakdown of the squire system in Taiwan after the Japanese occupation was also an important systematic element in the withdrawal to the mainland of the squires. Ⅱ. The change of those squires coincided with the dramatic change of modern society of China. It shows the historical progressiveness of those squires.Ⅲ. The political transition between the end of the Qing Dynasty and the early years of the Republic of China provided a wide space for the change of those squires, and facilitated them to take onto the political and economic stage of modern times, bringing about great impact to the squires within Japan-occupied Taiwan for participating in the political and economic activities.Ⅳ. The squires returning from Taiwan held fast to core national culture when making their change. Taking old literature as an carrying instrument, they made cultural exchanges with those squires within Taiwan and jointly carried on the Chinese culture within Japan-occupied Taiwan.