Today--May 4, 2019--marks the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the May 4th Movement, an important development in modern Chinese history. On this day a century ago, students from Peking University launched protests in China's capital Beijing against the Treaty of Versailles, which officially brought World War I to an end. The Treaty had awarded control of certain territories in China's Shandong Province, which had previously been controlled by Germany, to Japan. This was despite the fact that China had supported the Allied Powers against Germany during the war.
The protests of May 4, 1919 led to increased radicalism among many Chinese intellectuals. Previously, many of them had been sympathetic to the idea of Western-style liberal democracy. This was especially true in the chaotic period following the collapse of China's last imperial dynasty, the Qing, in 1911. Indeed, Chen Duxiu, a leading Chinese intellectual of the time had declared a year before the protests that only "Mr. Democracy" and "Mr. Science" could "save China from the political, moral, academic, and intellectual darkness in which it finds itself" (as quoted by Eric Fish, "1919 to 2019: A century of youth protest and ideological conflict around May 4," May, 1, 2019, supchina.com). However, the decision to award Japan control of the former German territories in Shandong was seen as a betrayal of China by the West. As a result, many intellectuals turned away from the Western model. In fact, Chen himself began to study Marxism and would a few years later help establish the Chinese Communist Party.
Now, a century later, it seems that China is still searching for a way out of "political, moral, academic, and intellectual darkness." The May 4th Movement may have been a catalyst for the rise of Communism in China, but Communism itself has, arguably, led to more "darkness." Although to some extent China has under Communist rule regained its status as a great power, the cost has been high--political dictatorship, moral decay, and a lack of intellectual and academic freedom. Whether or not democracy and science would have been the solution to China's problems, Communism has certainly not proved to be the answer. However, over the past several decades millions of Chinese have turned to a different answer--one that, I would contend, has much greater potential to disperse the "darkness" the Chinese people face--the Gospel. Perhaps in another century this turn toward Christianity may prove to be of greater significance for the Chinese people than the May 4th Movement.
Image of May 4th protestors in Beijing from Wikipedia