1 Qichao, Liang, “Xin dalu youji jielu” (Excerpts of travel notes from the New World), in Yinbinshi heji (Collected works of Ice-Drinker's Studio) vol. 7 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1989), p. 121.Google Scholar

2 de Tocqueville, Alexis, Democracy in America, ed. Mayer, J. P., trans. Lawrence, George (New York: Doubleday, 1969), p. 63.Google Scholar

3 The work that inspires studies on the subject is Habermas, Jürgen, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. Burger, Thomas (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989)Google Scholar. In Habermas's formulation, the public sphere must facilitate the “public debate” that aims at “the consensus about what was practically necessary in the interest of all” (p. 83, emphasis in original).

4 For an excellent overview and assessment of scholarship on the subject, see the April 1993 special issue of Modern China, titled “Symposium: ‘Public Sphere’/‘Civil Society’ in China.” The issue contains articles by Heath B. Chamberlain, Philip C. C. Huang, Richard Madsen, Mary Backus Rankin, William T. Rowe and Frederic Wakeman Jr.

5 Both have written extensively on the subject. See, for example, Rankin, , Elite Activism and Political Transformation in China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986)Google Scholar; Rowe, , Hankow: Commerce and Society in a Chinese City, 1796–1889 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1984).Google Scholar

6 Rankin, , “The Origins of a Chinese Public Sphere: Local Elites and Community Affairs in the Late Imperial Period,” Études chinoises 9 (Summer 1990): 24.Google Scholar

7 Rankin, , “Some Observations on a Chinese Public Sphere,” Modern China 9 (04 1993): 169.Google Scholar

8 Rankin, , “‘Public Opinion’ and Political Power: Qingyi in Late Nineteenth Century China,” Journal of Asian Studies 41 (1982): 476CrossRefGoogle Scholar; also Elite Activism and Political Transformation in China, p. 303.

9 See Kuhn, , “Local Self-Government Under the Republic: Problems of Control, Autonomy, and Mobilization,” in Conflict and Control in Late Imperial China, ed. Wakeman, Frederic Jr and Grant, Carolyn (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), pp. 261–68Google Scholar; “Late Ch'ing Views of the Polity,” in Political Leadership and Social Change at the Local Level in China from 1850 to the Present, ed. Tang, Tsou (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), pp. 1–5Google Scholar; Tu-ki, Min, “The Theory of Political Feudalism in the Ch'ing Period,” in National Polity and Local Power: The Transformation of Late Imperial China, ed. Kuhn, Philip A. and Brook, Timothy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp. 89–136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Judge, Joan, Print and Politics: ‘Shibao’ and the Culture of Reform in Late Qing China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), p. 1Google Scholar. In this book, Judge provides a superb analysis of the political role played by the press in the period under consideration.

11 Yutang, Lin, A History of the Press and Public Opinion in China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1936), p. 109.Google Scholar

12 In attempting to establish the political significance of “local public spheres,” Rankin goes so far as to claim that while late imperial China was different from “eighteenth-century America, it is perhaps not entirely out of place to remember Tocqueville's comment about the value of associations concerned with small affairs as a barrier to state despotism.” See “Some Observations on a Chinese Public Sphere,” p. 169.

13 Min, , National Polity and Local Power, pp. 89–91.Google Scholar

14 Ibid, p. 95.

15 Yen-wu, Ku (Gu Yanwu), “The Feudal System vs. the Prefectural System,” in Sources of Chinese Tradition, compiled by Wm. de Bary, Theodore, Chan, Wing-tsit, Watson, Burton (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), p. 611.Google Scholar

16 Min, , “The Modernization of the Feng-chien-lun in the Ch'ing Dynasty” (An English Summary), Asea Yongu (Journal of Asiatic Studies) 10 (1967): 83.Google Scholar

17 Ku, , “The Feudal System vs. the Prefectural System,” pp. 611–12 (emphasis added).Google Scholar

18 Ibid, p. 612.

19 Kuhn, , “Late Ch'ing Views of the Polity,” p. 2.Google Scholar

20 Min, , National Polity and Local Power, p. 95.Google Scholar

21 Gu said that he agreed with “six- or seven-tenths” of Huang's view; see Gu, , “Letter from Ku Yen-Wu to Huang Tsung-hsi Concerning the Ming-i tai-fang lu,” in Wm. de Bary, Theodore, Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince (New York: Columbia, 1993), p. 171.Google Scholar

22 De Bary, , “Chinese Despotism and the Confucian Ideals: A Seventeenth-Century View,” in Chinese Thought and Institutions, ed. Fairbank, John K. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957), p. 198.Google Scholar

23 Kung-ch'üan, Hsiao, Zhongguo zhengzhi sixiang shi (A history of Chinese political thoughts), vol.5 (Taipei: Zhonghua wenhua chuban shije weiyuanhui, 1961), p. 606.Google Scholar

24 De Bary, , “Introduction,” in Waiting for the Dawn, pp. 55–57.Google Scholar

25 Kuhn, , “Local Self-Government Under the Republic,” p. 257.Google Scholar

26 Huang, , “Ming-i tai-fang lu,” trans, de Bary, , in Waiting for the Dawn, pp. 104–107Google Scholar. The political role of school is also noted by Min, , National Polity and Local Power, p. 96.Google Scholar

27 De Bary, , The Liberal Tradition in China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), pp. 11–42Google Scholar, passim. As is well known, de Bary notes that the Neo-Confucian approach to education reveals the quintessential liberal faith in the individual's potential for growth and renewal. This claim is at the heart of de Bary's convergence thesis. See also de Bary, , Learning for One's Self: Essays on the Individual in Neo-Confucian Thought (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991).Google Scholar

28 Kuhn, , “Local Self-Govemment Under the Republic,” pp. 270–72.Google Scholar

29 Hsiao, , A Modern China and a New World: K'ang Yu-wei, Reformer and Utopian, 1858–1927 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1975), p. 194.Google Scholar

30 Ibid, p. 285.

31 Ibid, pp. 265–66.

32 Min, , National Polity and Local Power, p. 123.Google Scholar

33 Youwei, Kang, “Gongmin zizhi” (Citizens' self-rule) in Kang Nanhai guanzhi yi (Kang Nanhai on the system of offices) (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1974), p. 103.Google Scholar

34 Ibid, p. 114.

35 Ibid, pp. 115,120–22.

36 Ibid, pp. 107–109.

37 Kuhn, , “Local Self-Government Under the Republic,” p. 273.Google Scholar

38 See Chang, Hao, Liang Ch'i-ch'ao and Intellectual Transition in China, 1890–1907 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 149–219CrossRefGoogle Scholar, passim, for a detailed discussion on Liang's concept of the “new citizen”; also see Huang, Philip, Liang Ch'i-ch'ao and Modern Chinese Liberalism (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1972), pp. 64–67, 160–65.Google Scholar

39 As Chang has pointed out, the trip to the United States convinced Liang even more that China was not yet ready for democracy; see Liang, pp. 238–43. Also see Liang, , “Xin dalu youki jielu,” pp. 134–35.Google Scholar

40 Chang, , Liang, p. 150 n.2.Google Scholar

41 Ibid, p. 205.

42 Liang, , “Lun zizhi” (On self-government), in Xinmin shuo (Taipei: Zhonghua shuju, 1959), pp. 50–51, 54.Google Scholar

43 Ibid, p. 53.

44 Ibid, p. 52.

45 Chang, , Liang, pp. 283–86.Google Scholar

46 Liang, , “Lun zizhi,” p. 54.Google Scholar

47 P'eng-yüan, yyChang, “The Constitutionalists,” in China in Revolution: The First Phase (1900–1913), ed. Wright, Mary Clabaugh (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968), p. 156.Google Scholar

48 Ibid, p. 158.

49 Kuhn, , “Local Self-Government under the Republic,” pp. 276–80Google Scholar. Also see Fincher, John H., Chinese Democracy (Canberra: Australian National University Press, 1981)Google Scholar for a detailed description of local self-government.

50 Kuhn, , “Local Self-Government Under the Republic,” p. 282.Google Scholar

51 “Gu Tinglin rizhilu zhi difang zizhi shuo” (The theory of local self-government in Gu Tinglin's Rizhilu), Zhengyi tongbao, reprinted in Dongfang zazhi 3, no. 5(1906): 101; hereafter the journal will be cited as DFZZ. The importance of this article is also noted by Min, , National Polity and Local Power, p. 134.Google Scholar

52 See, for example, “Zhongguo difang zizhizhi kao” (Studies on China's system of self-government), Jin bao, reprinted in DFZZ 4, no.10 (1907–08): 429–40.

53 “Lun difang zizhi zhi ji” (On the urgency for local self-government), in DFZZ 5, no.3 (1908): 36.Google Scholar

54 “Jieshi difang zizhi zhi yiyi ji fenlei” (Expounding the meaning and the categories of local self-government), Zhongwai ribao, reprinted in DFZZ 4, no.12 (1907–8): 529, 531.

55 Ibid, p. 533.

56 Ibid, p. 534.

57 Ibid, p. 536.

58 Judge, , Print and Politics, pp. 100–101.Google Scholar

59 Shi bao, reprinted in DFZZ1, no.12 (1904–5): 299–300. For a more detailed analysis of the content of Shi bao on the subject of local self-government, see Judge, , Print and Politics, pp. 170–79.Google Scholar

60 Tongwen huibao, reprinted in DFZZ 3, no.6 (1905): 125.

61 Shi bao, reprinted in DFZZ 1, no.9 (1904–05): 109–10. This article is also discussed in Kuhn, , “Late Ch'ing Views of the Polity,” pp. 11–12.Google Scholar

62 Shimin bao, reprinted in DFZZ 1, no.10 (1904–5):254.

63 Lingdong ribao, reprinted in DFZZ 4, no.4 (1907): 71–74.

64 “Lun lixian dangyou yubei” (Constitutionalism ought to require preparation), DFZZ 2, no.3 (1906): 45–46.Google Scholar

65 Shi Bao, reprinted in DFZZ 1, no.6 (1905): 121–23. On the ambivalence of the reformists regarding the readiness of the Chinese people to take on an active political role, see Judge, , Print and Politics, pp. 112–16.Google Scholar

66 Tocqueville, , Democracy in America, pp. 61–98, passim.Google Scholar

67 Ibid, pp. 88–89.

68 Ibid, p. 506.

69 Ibid, p. 10.

70 Ibid, pp. 506 and 525.

71 Ibid, p. 735.

72 Ibid, p. 668.

73 Ibid, p. 69.

74 Ibid, p. 93.

75 Ibid, p. 70.

76 See, for example, Putnam, Robert D., “Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital,” Journal of Democracy 6 (1995): 65–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

77 Tocqueville, , Democracy in America, p. 521.Google Scholar

78 Liang, , “Xin dalu youji jielu,” p. 123Google Scholar. As in the case of many Western writings, Tocqueville's work would have been available to Chinese intellectuals in late imperial China by way of Japanese translation. Although the first Japanese translation of Democracy in America was published between 1881 and 1882, there is no evidence that is suggestive of Liang's knowledge of Tocqueville. The first Chinese translation of Democracy in America was published in 1966.

79 Mitchell, Harvey, Individual Choice and the Structures of History: Alexis de Tocqueville as Historian Reappraised (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 133–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

80 Judge makes the same observation in her analysis of the writings in Shibao, see Print and Politics pp. 83–99.