A Pillar of Legitimacy:
China’s nationalism today is shaped by its century of humiliation at the hands of the West and Japan as well as its pride in its history. Gries says the story of victimization in the past and a narrative central to what being Chinese today means are the yearnings for lost glory.
China perceives itself as a victim of Western imperialism during which it suffered humiliating losses of sovereignty. It began with the First Opium War and the British acquisition of Hong Kong in 1842 and lasted until the end of World War II in 1945.
Minxin Pei a senior associate in the China program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace says,“Western imperialism partly helped for the creation of Chinese nationalism."
In 1919 the first surge of Chinese nationalism was seen which is now widely referred to as the May 4th Movement. During this movement Treaty of Versailles’ which saw transfer of Chinese territory to Japan was widely rejected as thousands of students protested against it.
Some of these student leaders two years later in 1921 went on to form the Chinese Communist Party.
Liu Kang, a professor of Chinese cultural studies at Duke University says, “The current Chinese communist government is not a product of ideology like Marxism and Communism rather is more of a product of nationalism.”
Many experts says nationalism was once again revived by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), after many incidents such as the collapse of the Soviet Union, the opening up of the Chinese economy by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, and the pro-democracy protests of 1989.
The emergence of the Internet in the last two decades which was beyond the party's control has given nationalists more power to vent their anger after particular incidents.
Places like Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Europe, and North America were brought hugely under the Chinese diaspora. They came into closer contact with those residing within China’s borders, facilitating an easy flow of information.
Pei says the young, urban, and educated Chinese are the ones using the Internet and are more nationalistic.
“The Internet has democratized opinion compared to before, but this democratization of opinion is not evenly distributed and the fringe elements tend to exploit this new opportunity far more actively than the mainstream,” Pei says.
Anti-West Sentiment:
On May 8, 1999, the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was accidentally bombed by a U.S plane killing three Chinese and injuring several others as the mistaken it for a Serbian arms depot. Protests erupted around China.
The Chinese government demanded an apology from the U.S. government and called it a “gross encroachment upon China’s sovereignty.” “The great People’s Republic of China was not to be bullied,” they asserted.
At the time in the internet there was a huge active flow of Chinese nationalism.
Gries in his book China’s New Nationalism writes: “the White House Web site in Washington, D.C. was temporarily shut down bring deluged by e-mail from China,” and “the U.S. embassy’s website in Beijing was also hacked by cyber-nationalists, as they inserted ‘Down with the Barbarians!’ on the homepage.”
A U.S. EP-3 surveillance plane collided with a Chinese F-8 jet fighter, killing the Chinese pilot, in what China says was a violation of its airspace, in April 2001.
The crew of the U.S. spy plane was taken into custody of Chinese authorities after it made an emergency landing in China and said it would only be released after Washington issued a formal apology.
After U.S. expressed remorse over the loss of the pilot and aircraft the crew eventually got released. Experts say China’s government stoked nationalism during the incident.
In the Chinese view these incidents are not seen as isolated incidents. Experts say in the long series of Western aggressions against China they see them as the latest.
Pei says issues such as sovereignty and integrity of their territory is very strong and emotional issue for the Chinese people because “they still have the historical memory of Western imperialism.”
Conflict with Japan:
Sino-Japanese War in 1895-1895 saw tensions between the two countries and more recently Japan’s abusive conduct during the 1931-1945 occupation of China.
Chinese anger over Japan’s perceived lack of contrition for wartime crimes which is often involving as this Backgrounder points out these animosities surface in recurring cycles.
The annual pilgrimages of former Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to a Tokyo shrine saw outcries over the instances of recent Chinese nationalism against Japan which contains the remains of convicted war criminals from World War II.
An outrage over a 2005 Japanese history textbook that has been criticized as soft-pedaling Japanese wartime atrocities as Japanese businesses in cities across China saw great humiliation and attacks during the textbook incident in 2005.
Experts say the Communist Party would see a great problem with the outbreaks of virulent nationalism. Editor of Newsweek International Fareed Zakaria writes, “in the past only to panic that things were getting out of control and then reverse corset have stoked anti-Japanese and anti-American outbursts.”
Unwarranted Focus?
China is regularly blamed for abuses on a wide range of issues as per what Lieberthal says since the 1989 Tiananmen massacre. “I think almost everything in China that gets more attention let alone the nationalism,” especially if they are negative.
He describes Chinese nationalism as a “very unhappy narratives and a natural outgrowth of (China’s) recent accomplishments.”
Pei says fears from the Western perspective regarding Chinese nationalism spring from the negative feelings toward the communist regime. “Somehow they believe the political system in China is not legitimate,” he says.
A combination of genuine popular outrage and government manipulations to let that protest grow in the main sources of nationalistic protests in China according to Lieberthal. Most of the Times it helps the Chinese government’s bargaining position as that incident is negotiated with the offending party.
A Double-Edged Sword:
Beijing’s top priority today is pursuing development goals and a greater role in global affairs while maintaining peace at home.
Experts say nationalism can harm China's claim of “peaceful rise” globally though it may be an effective tool for the Chinese regime to maintain control at home. According to Pei China’s image as a responsible stakeholder is certainly getting hurdled by nationalism.
The authoritarian government sees problems domestically with the rise of excessive nationalism. Tibetans and Uighurs who are minorities whose ethnic nationalism has been suppressed with great care by the government as they are denied the right to establish separate states.
Nationalism in Taiwan which hopes to unite with the island someday is too seen as a threat by Beijing. The Chinese leaders also fear if they failed to deliver on their nationalistic promises then nationalism could turn against them in the form of criticism.
Nicholas D. Kristof a columnist of New York Times writes: “All this makes nationalism a particularly interesting force in China, given its potential not just for conferring legitimacy on the government but also for taking it away.”
Written by: Gourav Chowdhury
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