What do you think?
Rate this book
Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution
Arif Dirlik's latest offering is a revisionist perspective on Chinese radicalism in the twentieth century. He argues that the history of anarchism is indispensable to understanding crucial themes in Chinese radicalism. And anarchism is particularly significant now as a source of democratic ideals within the history of the socialist movement in China.
Dirlik draws on the most recent scholarship and on materials available only in the last decade to compile the first comprehensive history of his subject available in a Western language. He emphasizes the anarchist contribution to revolutionary discourse and elucidates this theme through detailed analysis of both anarchist polemics and social practice. The changing circumstances of the Chinese revolution provide the immediate context, but throughout his writing the author views Chinese anarchism in relation to anarchism worldwide.
Dirlik draws on the most recent scholarship and on materials available only in the last decade to compile the first comprehensive history of his subject available in a Western language. He emphasizes the anarchist contribution to revolutionary discourse and elucidates this theme through detailed analysis of both anarchist polemics and social practice. The changing circumstances of the Chinese revolution provide the immediate context, but throughout his writing the author views Chinese anarchism in relation to anarchism worldwide.
340 pages, Paperback
First published May 20, 1991
5 people are currently reading
355 people want to read
About the author
Arif Dirlik
44 books21 followers(d: 1940, Mersin), 20. yüzyıl Çin toplumsal ve politik tarihi üzerine çalışmalarıyla tanınmasına karşın küreselleşme ve modernite konularında dünyanın önde gelen düşünürlerindendir. 1964 yılında Robert Kolej (bugünkü Boğaziçi Üniversitesi) Elektrik Mühendisliği Bölümü’nü bitirdi. Nükleer fizik eğitimi için gittiği Rochester Üniversitesi’nde Çin tarihçisi oldu. Özellikle “Çin anarşizmi” tarihçiliğinin önde gelen temsilcilerindendir. 2001 yılına kadar, otuz yıl Duke Üniversitesi’nde antropoloji ve tarih hocalığı yaptı. Sonra Oregon Üniversitesi’ne geçti, 2006’da emekli oldu. Halen, başta Pekin, Amsterdam ve Hong Kong olmak üzere, çeşitli akademik kurumlarda misafir öğretim üyesi olarak görev yapmaktadır. Gelecek üç yıl için, Malezya’da “yetkin araştırmacı” olarak bulunacaktır. Elliye yakın kitabı ve yüzlerce makalesi bulunan Profesör Dirlik’in Türkçe’ye dört kitabı ve dergilerde yayımlanmış on beş kadar makalesi çevrilmiştir. Askerlik yapmadığından Türkiye’ye giremiyor ve “ölüm makinelerine para ödemek istemediği için ‘bedelli’den” yararlanmıyor.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
March 20, 2011
Without knowing it you would not conclude Anarchism was much to be reckoned with in early 20th century China, but you would be wrong. Arif Dirlik demonstrates using primary Chinese source material that while committed anarchists were never more than thousands in number, they outnumbered the Communists until this was reversed in the early to mid 20's after Guomintang-Communist Party united front work, anarchists setup the Communist Party (which Moscow was at pains to purge ideologically), quite a number of recognisable names passed through the anarchists political work (including Chen Duxiu and Deng Xiaopeng!), their ideas were key to the May Fourth movement and the New Culture Movement, between 1922-28 there were more than 90 active anarchist groups across China (mainly Guangzhou and Shanghai), anarchists organised the first labour unions in China and had a national university dedicated to labour organising.
The book operates less as an historical overview of the period in question, but more as a source for analysing the political debates within anarchism (particularly as there were two main schools of thought from the outset) from its inception in the late 1800's to the movements nose dive when the Communist party becomes an independent force. For this reason its slightly lacking as things like the May Fourth Movement and Sun Yat-Sen's 'Three Principles' need to be discussed and placed within a much wider context. And it would have also helped if an appendix could have summarised the groups, individuals involved, influences and publications as it was hard to retain this information as the book went on.
That said the debates and themes the book covers are highly relevant and give a good flavour of the times. Whether were talking Liu Shifu's turn from nilihist terrorism to becoming the leading most articulate theoritician of revolutionary anarchism or Ou Shengbai's grand sweeping criticism of Bolshevism and the nasty turns within the Guomintang. As the debates persist you can see a number of flaws reoccur (errorneous attitude towards the Guomintang and being unabble to organise nationally) and then events take their course, and the rest is then history as they say. As an introduction to an under-researched topic this was both rewarding and informative.
The book operates less as an historical overview of the period in question, but more as a source for analysing the political debates within anarchism (particularly as there were two main schools of thought from the outset) from its inception in the late 1800's to the movements nose dive when the Communist party becomes an independent force. For this reason its slightly lacking as things like the May Fourth Movement and Sun Yat-Sen's 'Three Principles' need to be discussed and placed within a much wider context. And it would have also helped if an appendix could have summarised the groups, individuals involved, influences and publications as it was hard to retain this information as the book went on.
That said the debates and themes the book covers are highly relevant and give a good flavour of the times. Whether were talking Liu Shifu's turn from nilihist terrorism to becoming the leading most articulate theoritician of revolutionary anarchism or Ou Shengbai's grand sweeping criticism of Bolshevism and the nasty turns within the Guomintang. As the debates persist you can see a number of flaws reoccur (errorneous attitude towards the Guomintang and being unabble to organise nationally) and then events take their course, and the rest is then history as they say. As an introduction to an under-researched topic this was both rewarding and informative.
February 26, 2016
Brilliant book on how anarchist ideas develop in a non-Western context and how they affect various modernization discourses, even while the anarchist movement itself disappeared. The analysis of various anarchist theories and of their similarities and differences with Marxist theories is particularly insightful.
October 2, 2008
This is one of the best books on anarchism that I have ever read.
July 11, 2021
"Anarchists were probably more aware than many of their contemporaries about the complexities of democracy and responded to it with considerable complexity"
Informative, dry (like a history book I guess). The book ends in 1929, mentions Mao almost zero times (I had heard a rumor that Mao was an anarchist at one point in his life; if true, it surely would have come up in this book, right?), and I had to wikipedia that the official date 1911 that the Qin dynasty got pushed out in something called the Xinhai revolution. The book takes place entirely between somewhere 1900-1905 and 1929. You see the roots of the communist party and the guomindang, but you dont see them in their mature forms for their eventual civil war in the 40s, you dont see them fracturing into cultural revolution china and modern Taiwan. It looks like the titular revolution is this xinhai revolution, not the more popular civil war and cultural revolution-- something I wasnt thinking about when I started the book.
The book is mostly about intellectual currents, moreso than events. Debates about prioritization of restructuring the family vs seizing institutions, about the mental/manual labor distinction, or about the role of power in social progress were familiar to me as someone who hung out in the BLM churches and community centers years ago: communists and anarchists have been having the same debates for over a hundred years. Anarchists tend to favor the social over the political (e.g. are more likely to worry about gender than legislation), are nervous about power corrupting, and are optimistic about something called "human nature"-- all of which are tendencies which see their opposite in communists.
The overall point of the book is that anarchism had a lasting intellectual influence on both chinese communism and chinese nationalism. Anarchists lost, of course, as usual, but the claims and ethics live on in distorted or diluted ways.
It's fun to see debates about the legacy of bolshevism/1917 as early as 1920- if you think about how we interpret Russia's 1917 with the hindsight of 100 years, it's fun how similar the interpretation is with only 3 years of hindsight.
One fun, potent detail is that the guomindang had marxists in it, even tho it would eventually be contrasted against the communist party in a civil war. Also, perhaps a surprise to some when you look at the two parties from the 30s on thru cultural revolution and the founding of modern taiwan, anarchists preferred to coalition with and attempt to infect the guomindang over the communists, in the 20s. This is counterintuitive to me, since e.g. the landlord question offers a lot of synergy between anarchists and communists. But moreover, its potent like other things in this book because, for god sake, if you're an intellectual and you think you can pull some levers to steer fast social change, remember that you're in a nonlinear effing system and you dont necessarily have any idea what's gonna happen. You dont know the legacy and impact of your ideas, because revolutions are as a rule a shitshow. That's to me the takeaway of studying revolutions.
Three cheers for the dude who said that anarchism would take 3000 years, but if more anarchists were like Shifu it would only take 500 years. I like that kind of longterm consideration, consideration for future generations, naturally.
Informative, dry (like a history book I guess). The book ends in 1929, mentions Mao almost zero times (I had heard a rumor that Mao was an anarchist at one point in his life; if true, it surely would have come up in this book, right?), and I had to wikipedia that the official date 1911 that the Qin dynasty got pushed out in something called the Xinhai revolution. The book takes place entirely between somewhere 1900-1905 and 1929. You see the roots of the communist party and the guomindang, but you dont see them in their mature forms for their eventual civil war in the 40s, you dont see them fracturing into cultural revolution china and modern Taiwan. It looks like the titular revolution is this xinhai revolution, not the more popular civil war and cultural revolution-- something I wasnt thinking about when I started the book.
The book is mostly about intellectual currents, moreso than events. Debates about prioritization of restructuring the family vs seizing institutions, about the mental/manual labor distinction, or about the role of power in social progress were familiar to me as someone who hung out in the BLM churches and community centers years ago: communists and anarchists have been having the same debates for over a hundred years. Anarchists tend to favor the social over the political (e.g. are more likely to worry about gender than legislation), are nervous about power corrupting, and are optimistic about something called "human nature"-- all of which are tendencies which see their opposite in communists.
The overall point of the book is that anarchism had a lasting intellectual influence on both chinese communism and chinese nationalism. Anarchists lost, of course, as usual, but the claims and ethics live on in distorted or diluted ways.
It's fun to see debates about the legacy of bolshevism/1917 as early as 1920- if you think about how we interpret Russia's 1917 with the hindsight of 100 years, it's fun how similar the interpretation is with only 3 years of hindsight.
One fun, potent detail is that the guomindang had marxists in it, even tho it would eventually be contrasted against the communist party in a civil war. Also, perhaps a surprise to some when you look at the two parties from the 30s on thru cultural revolution and the founding of modern taiwan, anarchists preferred to coalition with and attempt to infect the guomindang over the communists, in the 20s. This is counterintuitive to me, since e.g. the landlord question offers a lot of synergy between anarchists and communists. But moreover, its potent like other things in this book because, for god sake, if you're an intellectual and you think you can pull some levers to steer fast social change, remember that you're in a nonlinear effing system and you dont necessarily have any idea what's gonna happen. You dont know the legacy and impact of your ideas, because revolutions are as a rule a shitshow. That's to me the takeaway of studying revolutions.
Three cheers for the dude who said that anarchism would take 3000 years, but if more anarchists were like Shifu it would only take 500 years. I like that kind of longterm consideration, consideration for future generations, naturally.
February 4, 2020
damn good Marxist analysis of anarchist historical influences on Chinese revolutionary theory👌
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews