Shared historical and cultural narratives have always played a role in foreign policy. Symbols, myths, songs, and epics all define the cultural roots of individuals and societies. Within that realm of memory, episodes of mass trauma play a key role in shaping a nation’s future. For China, the last several hundred years, particularly the Century of Humiliation (1839-1949) have been marked by the large-scale intrusion of Europe and Japan into Chinese affairs.
In his 2019 book Making China Modern: From the Great Qing to Xi Jinping, the German historian and Sinologist Klaus Mühlhahn vividly describes this period as marked by Chinese military defeat, subjugation to foreign powers through unequal treaties, and territorial loss. From 1839–1842 and then 1856–1860, China lost a series of conflicts called the Opium Wars and was forced to cede, recognize foreign control over, or lease valuable territories, including Hong Kong to Britain, Macau to Portugal, Qingdao to Germany, Guangzhouwan near modern Zhanjiang to France, and Port Arthur to Russia (later ceded to Japan after the 1904–5 Russo-Japanese War).
Yet even worse than China’s treatment by Europeans, the author argues, was the aggression it faced from Imperial Japan. The First Sino-Japanese War from 1894–1895 resulted in the annexation of Taiwan, the first of many aggressive acts ultimately culminating in the Second Sino-Japanese War that resulted in the deaths of millions of Chinese, including in the infamous Nanjing Massacre. The suffering and losses overcome by China in this period have come to define much of contemporary Chinese political discourse, particularly its relationship to Japan and the West.
In his book Never Forget National Humiliation: Historical Memory in Chinese Politics and Foreign Relations, the political scientist Zheng Wang highlighted how this period of history came to be foundational to the CCP’s self-understanding. One example of the effort to maintain the relevance of the Century of Humiliation can be seen in China’s school and college education, where textbooks have been consciously developed to maintain the salience of this painful period of Chinese history. Through a concentrated campaign by politicians working within Chinese education, the memory of 1839–1949 has been transformed from a shared set of experiences to almost the raison d’être of the Chinese state: China was weak and humiliated before and therefore needs the Chinese Communist Party to stand up to foreign powers.
The bigger question, however, is why such narratives continue to persist years after the conclusion of such events. A partial answer to this question can be found in the work of American political philosopher and Christian Realist thinker Jean Bethke Elshtain. In her book Who Are We? Critical Reflections and Hopeful Possibilities, Elshtain argued that communities are sustained not merely by institutions, laws, procedures, and rules, but also by cultural markers and shared narratives. Such markers, Elshtain argued, provide shared points of reference across diverse populations, making the bonds of citizenship possible while also informing discourse necessary to arrive at a consensus on contentious issues. For Elshtain, this is what contributes to the development of a coherent civic idea of the nation.
But what happens when the idea of unity and projection of nationalistic self-assertion channeled through traumatic events of a nation’s past is weaponized?
Herbert Butterfield, an English historian and philosopher, warned us about the weaponization of memory. In his book The Whig Interpretation of History, Butterfield argued that history is always a morally contested discipline. He asserted that history doesn’t move in a linear direction but rather is always interpreted by different constituencies in a multiplicity of ways. Bearing in mind the way that nostalgia for a glorious past or anger over past injustice can be weaponized, Butterfield warned against absolutizing historical claims in moral terms. This, he argues, contributes to the growth of moral absolutism, thereby undermining the values of humility, prudence, and ultimately rational introspection in the way communities engage with important events in history. This failure, Butterfield contends, may cause a nation to weaponize the past for the aggrandizement of its so-called ‘national interests’ through the pursuit of policies that may undermine a sense of amity and camaraderie in politics, both domestically and internationally.
Contemporary China provides a useful illustration of these conditions. Under Xi Jinping, the Chinese Communist Party has increasingly used the memory of the Century of Humiliation to position itself as the sole means through which China can be redeemed. This narrative manifests itself in a revisionist foreign policy aimed at projecting a strong image of China—of a country where capitulating to foreign pressure is read not only as the return of past weakness, but that weakness may eventually lead to subjugation. Under Xi, the language of national rejuvenation has manifested in the adoption of a more assertive posture in what Peking considers to be its core national interests, such as Taiwan, the South China Sea, the state of Arunachal Pradesh and parts of the union territory of Ladakh in India.
This ideological agenda must be understood as a broader attempt by the Chinese Communist Party to bolster its legitimacy. The Chinese Communist Party’s political authority now finds its expression through narratives of historical redemption. This means that any criticism of the party, both internally and externally, no matter how constructive or well-intentioned it may be, is regarded as deleterious to the social fabric of China generally and dangerous to the regime in particular. This results in covert and overt crackdowns on individuals and institutions that may appear to be a challenge to the authority of the party.
China’s example demonstrates the perils of collective memory. As Elshtain argued, political communities need narratives and myths in addition to formalized rules and institutions, even as Butterfield warned us that historical narratives become dangerous when they shift from sources of collective introspection to tools of political justification engineered to undermine global peace and stability. The challenge for China, therefore, is whether it chooses to follow the path of prudence and humility or remain a prisoner of its own history.
