What was to be the nature of the society which would arise from the knowledge and application of the new ideology? Sun planned to introduce the idea of a race-nation into the Chinese ideology, to replace the definite but formless we-you outlook which the Chinese of old China had had toward outsiders almost indiscriminately.[106] The old anti-barbarian sentiment had from time to time in the past been very powerful; Sun Yat-sen called this nationalism also, not distinguishing it from the new kind of nationalism which he advocated—a modern nationalism [pg 087] necessarily connoting a plurality of equal nations. The self-consciousness of the Chinese he wished to restore, although on a basis of justice and the mutual recognition by the nations of each other's right to exist. But this nationalism was not to be a complete break with the past, for the new China was to continue the traditional function of old China—of being the teacher and protectress of Eastern Asia. It was the duty of China to defend the oppressed among the nations, and to smite down the Great Powers in their oppressiveness. We may suppose that this benevolence of the Chinese race-nation would benefit the neighbors of China only so long as those neighbors, quickened themselves by nationalist resurgences, did not see something sinister in the benevolent manifest destiny of the Chinese.
It was a matter of policy, rather than of ideology, as to what the Chinese nation was to include. There were possibilities of a conflict with the Communists over the question of Outer Mongolia. Physically, Sun saw the Mongols as one of the five component peoples of the Great Chung-hua Republic. At another time he suggested that they might become assimilated. He never urged the Mongols to separate from China and join the Soviet Union, or even continue as a completely independent state.[107] There was always the possibility of uncertainty in the case of persons who were—by the five principle elements of race (according to Sun Yat-sen, blood, livelihood, language, religion, and mores)[108]—members of the Chinese race-nation but did not consider themselves such.
Chinese nationalism was to lead to cosmopolitanism. Any attempt to foster cosmopolitanism before solving the [pg 088] national problem was not only Utopian but perverse. The weakness of the Chinese had in great part been derived from their delusions of world-order in a world that was greater than they imagined, and the true solution to the Chinese question was to be found, not in any vain theory for the immediate salvation of the world as a whole, but in the diligent and patriotic activities of the Chinese in their own country. China was to help the oppressed nations of the earth, not the oppressed classes. China was to help all Asia, and especially the countries which had depended upon China for protection, and had been failed in their hour of need by the impotent Manchu Dynasty. China was, indeed, to seek the coöperation of the whole world, and the promotion of universal peace. But China was to do all this only when she was in a position to be able to do so, and not in the meantime venture forth on any splendid fantasies which would profit no people.
The survival of China was the supreme aim of Sun Yat-sen. How did he propose that China, once conscious of itself, should control itself to survive and go onwards to the liberation and enrichment of mankind? These are questions that he answered in his ideology of democracy and of min shêng.
Chapter III. The Theory of Democracy.
Democracy in the Old World-Society.
In describing a few of the characteristics of the old ideology and the old society which may assist the clarification of the principle of democracy, it may prove useful to enter into a brief examination of what the word may mean in the West, to refer to some of the ideas and institutions of old China that were or were not in accord with the Western notion of democracy, and, finally, to see what connection Sun Yat-sen's theory of democracy may have either with the Western term or with elements in the Chinese background. Did Sun Yat-sen propound an entirely new theory as the foundation of his theory of democracy for the Chinese race-nation, or did he associate several hitherto unrelated ideas and systems to make a new whole?