To understand Xi Jinping’s China, one must look back at Liang Qichao, the “Godfather of Chinese Nationalism”

This week, Xi Jinping took to the center of the stage to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, but there was another figure hanging over the country.

Liang Qichao may not be familiar to most people like Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping or Xi himself, but Liang is known as the “Godfather of Chinese Nationalism” and is the whispering voice in the ears of Chinese leaders in the past century.

Without going back to the fall of the Qing empire at the beginning of the 20th century, and one person’s writings triggered a dark night in the soul of the Chinese people, it would be impossible to understand China today.

The concept of modern China, the identity of the Chinese, can be directly traced back to Liang He, a turbulent period of war, revolution, massacre and political turmoil.

When Xi Jinping talked about “national rejuvenation” and “sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he was guiding Liang Qichao.

When he warned any foreign forces “will not bully, oppress or conquer us”, he is echoing Liang’s words.

It was Liang Qichao who helped popularize the concept of “humiliation,” and Xi Jinping now uses it as a mantra to connect the Chinese with radical identities and make China confront the world.

Who is Liang Qichao?

He is a writer and activist, and one of the most important thinkers in China in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His reform movement for the Qing Empire made him a target and fled overseas to live in Japan and Canada. He visited Australia and met our first Prime Minister Edmund Button.

Liang embraced the West and absorbed new ideas. But this only strengthens his view that China is morally corrupt. Liang looked at his own nation and saw failure, humiliation and weakness.

He coined the term “Asian Sick Man” to describe China’s depraved state.

Defeated by Japan in 1895, Liang said, “wake up our nation from four thousand years of dreams.”

Liang started to create a new country. He advocated the unification of the “yellow race”. He coined a term “minzu” to describe the people of this country. He began to talk about what he called “new people” and “new people.”

Chinese historian Charlotte Furth said that this was the birth of “a new definition of the Chinese people as a nation based on the common bond of region, blood, customs and culture.”

In today’s words, we can call it “make China great again”.

But Liang’s vision for this new China does not include democracy. As he wrote after visiting the United States:

“We can only accept autocracy, not freedom… If we adopt a democratic government now, it would be tantamount to national suicide.”

Liang prefers what he calls “enlightened autocracy.”

When China lost its place in the world

The widely traveled thinker began to turn to the West.

After the First World War, he was sent to the Paris Peace Conference by China as an observer. He was shocked by the destruction of the war and returned angrily when the European powers handed over control of the former German territories occupied by China to Japan.

Chinese dissatisfaction with the West will only deepen. As the historian Chen Zhelun wrote, “From 1842 to 1942, China was distrusted, ridiculed and despised by the West, with pity and charity from time to time, and sympathy and friendliness from time to time.”

Liang Qichao now believes that following Western beliefs in science and progress will lead China to disaster. He no longer had illusions about Chinese politics, and retreated to study and write. But he may be the person who had the greatest influence on the young emerging revolutionary Mao Zedong.

In 1949, Mao Zedong crowned the victory of the communist revolution with “the Chinese people have stood up”.

When Xi Jinping wore a Mao Zedong-style suit this week and warned anyone who dared to oppose China “will find their head hit on the Great Wall of Steel”, we should know where it came from.

It comes from an era of failure, when China lost its place in the world.

Troubled by weak memories

This is not a display of power, but a reminder of humiliation. It reveals the paradox of China: both powerful and fragile.

Xi Jinping talked about the extraordinary achievements of the Communist Party and the unbreakable bond between the party and the people. However, despite its undoubted success, the party does not believe in its people.

Like Liang Qichao, Xi believes that people need to be transformed.

Liang believes that the Chinese do not have the ability to be democratic; Mao Zedong believes that the Chinese people are a “white paper” that can write a new future.

Xi Jinping said, “Without the Communist Party, there would be no New China.”

Yes, the party has brought China to a strong position, but it is still haunted by weak memories.

Stan Grant introduces China tonight on ABC News Channel at 8pm and 10:30pm on ABC TV every Tuesday.