Lei Haizong And The Nationalistic Historiography In The Period Of The Republic Of China

The connotation of nationalism is a process of accumulation. During the period of Republic of China, it means the love and identity towards Chinese long history and its splendid culture, rebellion against alien oppression, against imperialist invasion and to construct an independent multi-ethnic country for national independence, as well as advocating force fascist tendencies. All in all, it has "two sides", "double edges" features. The "two sides" refers to both sides domestically and abroad, the internal one is constructive while the external one is against resistance. The "double edges" means not only have positive meaning but also have negative meaning, the positive meaning means to encourage people's national self-confidence and their determination in persevering resistance, the negative meaning refers to the ultra nationalism tendencies of nationalism in the late Republic, advocating force and personal dictatorship.The development procession of nationalism during the Republic can be divided into four stages:1912-1919; 1919-1931; 1931-1945; 1945-1949. Followed the development of nationalism, the historian also showed the four fluctuations of nationalism.The nationalism thought of Lei Haizong show as "against aggression" in its external side, while its internal side performance is "nation building". The Morphology of History shows the side of resistance of nationalism, that is the out side. "Soldier" "family" "head of state" relating to the transformation of nation, military system, social grass-roots organizations, heads of state system, which is the "inner dimension" of nationalism. The nationalism thought of Lei Haizong has "double-edges" feature, he encouraged national self-confidence, but caught in the cultural superiority; He advocated using "soldier" culture to reform the national character, but he also support authoritarian system. Lei Haizong's nationalistic thought displays an obvious "two sides" and "double edges", which is related to the historical background and theory basis of his nationalistic thought, the historical background is the "war with the academic national salvation", and the theoretical basis is "repetition of the Warring States Period".The nationalism thoughts on history during the Republic is essentially practical historiography, on the research about the history of "Chunqiu" period and "Warring states" period, Lei Haizong has obviously practical purpose, which is to find a way out for Chinese culture and to service for war. Nationalism and the practical historiography is a natural ally, the practical historiography of nationalism is not normal state and has its drawbacks. In applying the historiography we should grasp the "degree" of the nationalism, and we can only go to resort to "historical truth" to offset the nationalism disadvantage in the "historical use".