Liang+Qichao



Liang Ch'i-ch'ao was born on Feb. 23, 1873, in southern China near the city of Canton. In 1890,he became a student and disciple of K'ang Yu-wei. Although Liang also gained ideas about the modern Western world from Timothy Richard, an English missionary who was influential in Chinese reformist circles during the 1890s. Liang's political career began in 1895, when he and K'ang Yu-wei organized nearly 1,300 examination candidates in Peking to protest the humiliating peace terms of the Treaty of Shimonoseki after the Sino-Japanese War, and to memorialize the Emperor, requesting reform of the imperial government. These petitions had no visible effect, and the two young men realized that effective reform could be accomplished only after the concept had been popularized among China's intellectuals. Undeterred, Liang quickly resumed his reform propaganda, serving as editor of a newspaper in Shanghai and subsequently as a dean of Chinese studies in a school established by progressive gentry in the province of Hunan. In 1898 Liang's teacher, K'ang Yu-wei, had gained the confidence of the Emperor, and the famed Hundred Days Reform movement had begun. Liang rushed to Peking to participate in this ill-fated attempt at restructuring much of the Chinese nation. Yuan Shikai and his monarchist movements; he was also persecuted for his reformist ideas and forced to flee to Japan in 1898. He competed with the revolutionary party with a political party of his own. Best known for his promotion of reform ideas, Liang Qichao entered late into the fray but well extended his influence. As a writer of essays and editorials, he was known for his bold ideas that affected his successors even after his return to roots of Confucius. Thus far in his career, Liang had displayed little disagreement with the ideas of K'ang Yu-wei. Now in Japan, however, exposure to the relatively modern society of Japan and to Western writings such as John Stuart Mill's On Liberty and Jean Jacques Rousseau's Social Contract opened for him new and exhilarating vistas. Whereas K'ang considered Confucianism essential for the maintenance of China's cultural and political integrity, Liang now thought that Confucianism was an obstacle to the modernization and strengthening of the nation. Liang's influence declined after 1905. His commitment to gradual, evolutionary change lost its appeal to the Chinese youth, who were becoming increasingly impatient with the Manchu rulers. And his warnings that political violence would provoke the intervention of the foreign powers did not dissuade most Chinese students in Japan from joining the revolutionary movement led by Sun Yat-sen. He believed in reforms, especially educational ones. He rooted for new institutions, such as constitution and a parliament. He supported democracy and notions of individualism. Liang Qichao did not support the concept of emperors. He actually opposed Yuan Shikai in 1916 and 1917 as Shikai attempted to restore monarchy. In 1919 Liang went to Europe as a member of China's unofficial delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. This trip greatly disillusioned him about the West. In 1920 Liang Ch'i-ch'ao became a professor of history at Nankai University in Tientsin. And until his death on Jan. 19, 1929, he devoted himself to teaching and scholarly writings on the intellectual history of China.

He played a significant role in introducing western social and political therories in korea such as social darwinism and international law. He wrote in his well-known manifesto, "New people". “Freedom means Freedom for the Group, not Freedom for the Individual. (…) Men must not be slaves to other men, but they must be slaves to their group. For, if they are not slaves to their own group, they will assuredly become slaves to some other.”

Bibliography

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