Cambridge History of the Republic of China (1912-1949) (Volume 2)

Author: (USA) John K. Fairbank, (USA) Ramon H. Myers
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-12-01
Features: Cambridge History of Republican China (Volume II) is the translation of Volume 13 of the Cambridge History of China. To preserve the original form, we have made no deletions. For issues related to viewpoints, material selection, and other aspects, readers are encouraged to judge for themselves. Some place names in the original book's maps differ from those used at the time, and some content also does not align with the actual situation then. We have left these unchanged. For the Chinese materials cited in the book, we have made every effort to locate the original texts. For those few that could not be found, we back-translated from English, removing the quotation marks. The content of this book: Text is a rigid and vague tool for dividing and analyzing the past. No matter how carefully it is refined, the characteristics of modern Chinese history cannot be described in a few words. The overused term "revolution" is sometimes less useful than "recovery." As for "modern reforms," their meaning is merely "changes that span the modern period," which still leaves unclear what "period" it refers to. However, the 28 authors of this book, from the 10th to the 13th volumes, each provide an overview of the events and trends in China from 1800 to 1949 in a way that avoids oversimplification. It is undoubtedly the primary duty of a historian to generalize from broader to narrower scopes, but most authors of these four volumes would agree with the following view,