[Insight & Opinion] Remembering the History of the Western Zhou Republic in China

[Asia Economy] As expected, the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China decided on President Xi Jinping's third term. In his speech, President Xi warned the United States, stating, "The resolution of the Taiwan issue is an inherent task of the Chinese people and a matter for the people to decide." He also hinted at the possibility of unification by force, saying, "We will never promise to renounce the use of force and will reserve the option to take all necessary measures."

The media, which referred to this party congress as President Xi's 'coronation,' evaluated it as opening the path to Xi's 'one-man rule' and 'lifelong leadership.' In particular, the Washington Post (WP) assessed that "President Xi has concentrated power to a level comparable to that of Mao Zedong (毛澤東)," while the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) pointed out that "this gives clues as to how much power President Xi enjoys and wields."

As reported by Xinhua News Agency, the official explanation from the Communist Party of China was that the personnel principle of the 20th Party Congress was "maintaining a high degree of unity between the Party Central Committee with President Xi as the core." This shows that President Xi decided on personnel matters, forming a one-man system. However, this decision appears to somewhat contradict the Communist Party's system and regulations that define collective leadership. This is because the Communist Party regulates collective leadership through the "Regulations on Intra-Party Political Life" to prevent power concentration and individual arbitrariness. At the 12th Party Congress in December 1982, the Party abolished the position of Party Chairman, which was the highest leader, and replaced it with the General Secretary system, meaning a representative among equal leaders.

In particular, this personnel decision is sufficiently controversial because it contradicts the spirit of a republic, as the official name of the country, the People's Republic of China, includes the term "Republic." Since China has a faster experience with republicanism than the West, this is an opportunity to reflect on and reconsider the Western Zhou Republic, the world's first republic established, as a moment of introspection.

The origin of republicanism we know is the Roman Republic in 509 BCE. However, the Western Zhou Republic existed 331 years earlier, in 841 BCE. Sima Qian, in the "Records of the Grand Historian · Annals of Zhou," named the period of 14 years without a king following the Guoren (國人) Revolution in 841 BCE as "Gonghe (共和)" or republic. Sima Qian emphasized that during these 14 years of republic, after the tyrannical rule of King You (幽王), the 10th king of Zhou, the people (Guoren) rose in rebellion, and the ministers Shao Mugong (召穆公) and Zhou Dinggong (周定公) shared power with the people to govern. Here, Guoren (國人) refers to administrative officials and ministers. However, Sima Qian lamented that after the 14 years of republic, the monarchy was restored, and after Emperor Qin Shi Huang unified the country with a strong centralized system, allowing no decentralization or autonomy of feudal states, the republican era never returned.

Those in power tried to erase the fact that there was a republican era without an absolute monarch in Chinese history. Fortunately, this was revived by Sun Yat-sen in the 20th century. Sun proposed republicanism as an alternative in the 1911 Xinhai Revolution. In a conversation with Miyazaki Toten and others in August 1897, he stated, "Republicanism is the essence of governance in our country and the great achievement of our predecessors. People do not realize that the politicians of the three dynasties of Xia, Shang, and Zhou actually acquired and practiced the essence of republicanism." It is regrettable that before and after Sun Yat-sen, the Western Zhou Republic was never properly debated by those in power and intellectuals.

Why do we focus on the Western Zhou Republic while observing President Xi's third term? It is likely a strong desire not to forget but to remember the spirit of republicanism that arose from the first experience of political freedom guaranteed to the people in human history.

Chae Jinwon, Professor at Kyung Hee University Institute for Public Governance