Constitution Protection Region of Southern Fujian
The Constitution Protection Region of Southern Fujian was a de facto autonomous region of Republic of China established by the "Guangdong Army to assist Fujian" led by General Chen Jiongming. The regional administration controlled 26 counties of southern and western Fujian, with Zhangzhou as its capital, where it implemented some policies with anarchist characteristics.
The regional administration was established during the Constitutional Protection Movement, when Chen's forces fought to defeat the Northern warlords of the Anhui and Zhili cliques, and reassert constitutionalism in southern China. After moving into Fujian and fighting against the northern forces of, Chen's Guangdong Army established control over the southern part of the region. Zhangzhou subsequently became a centre of the New Culture Movement, which established newspapers to propagate its ideas of "liberty", equality", "fraternity" and "mutual aid". Anarchists and communists were also attracted to the region, where under Chen's protection, they were able to agitate and organize with full freedom of speech and freedom of association.
In the capital of Zhangzhou, the city's defensive walls were demolished in order to make way for carriageways and public parks. The administration also established a comprehensive education system, sending several students to France as part of the work-study program. The reforms carried out were extensive and received popular support, as they improved societal infrastructure and welfare, while also keeping taxes relatively low. The reforms attracted the attention of the Russian Soviet Republic, which dispatched a representative to establish relations with the regional administration. This also drew the attention of American and British intelligence, which were worried by the rise of "Bolshevism" in the region.
With the outbreak of the Guangdong–Guangxi War, the majority of Chen's Guangdong Army left the region in order to fight against the Guangxi clique and retake control of Guangdong. For a few months, a small garrison was left behind in Southern Fujian, which was eventually handed back over to the forces of Li Houji.
History
Capture of Southern Fujian
By 1917, northern warlords had seized control of the Beiyang government. Revolutionaries in southern China responded by launching the Constitutional Protection Movement, calling for the restoration of the constitutional order. In October 1917, Chen Jiongming was appointed as commander-in-chief of the, which was already planning a military expedition against the government.The warlords of the Anhui and Zhili cliques sent their forces south to pacify the rebellion in Guangdong, acting with the assistance of Fujian's military governor. Chen responded by ordering the Guangdong Army to "assist Fujian" and bring it under the rule of the Constitutional Protection Junta. They transferred to Shantou, where Chen began recruiting thousands of people into his army. He established an arsenal in Shanwei, laid out an extensive military logistics network by building new roads and supply stations, and organised local militia to counter banditry and carry out guerrilla warfare against invading forces. He did this with little help from Guangdong's military governor Mo Rongxin, who denied him necessary funding, hoping to limit his growing influence.
Li went ahead with his plans to attack Guangdong, recruiting thousands of people from Northern Fujian into his own army. In May 1918, Li attacked Guangdong, but faced heavy resistance from Chen's Guangdong Army and guerrilla militias. In August, Chen's forces mounted a counteroffensive and quickly advanced into Fujian. By the end of the month, they had captured the province's southern capital of Zhangzhou, which Chen established as his base of operations, while Li's army held onto its territory in Xiamen. In November 1918, the two sides arranged a brief armistice. Although Li received reinforcements from the north, the looting and arbitrary attacks carried out by the northern soldiers against the local population alienated the people of Fujian, who began cooperating with the Guangdong Army. By the end of 1918, Chen's numerically inferior forces had captured more than half of Fujian province.
New Culture Movement
With a new base area in Minnan, Chen Jiongming began putting his ideas for reform into practice, building strong civilian institutions while maintaining his military strength. By this time, members of the New Culture Movement had begun calling for far-reaching modernizing reforms, including democratization, humanitarianism, scientific progress and mutual assistance. Chen's former teacher Zhu Zhixin invited members of the New Culture Movement to Zhangzhou, in order to carry out reforms, educate the populace and transform southern Fujian into a sustainable autonomous region. Chen himself believed that such a region could serve as a model for reforming the entire country, based on his federalist ideology.Some of the new invitees established a semi-weekly magazine, Minxing, which was dedicated to discussion of reformist ideas; they also established a daily newspaper, Minxing rikan, which reported on global and local affairs and criticised existing traditions. Chen Jiongming himself frequently wrote for the magazine, penning critiques of the reform programs of Kang Youwei and Dai Jitao, publishing letters to and from the Chinese Women's Association, and even contributing poems to the publication. Aiming to reach the greatest number of readers, the magazine's editor Chen Qiulin made sure that all its works were published in written vernacular Chinese. The magazine published articles on many different subjects, including articles on sexuality, morality and religion; articles about the Russian Revolution, such as critiques of the Soviet Russian Constitution; and historical reports on Korean and Taiwanese independence struggles against the Empire of Japan. It also included contributions from Zhu Zhixin, Wang Jingwei and Hu Hanmin, who respectively wrote about societal, commercial and environmental reforms. Anarchists such as Liang Bingxian also contributed to the publication.
Chen Jiongming wrote extensively in Minxing about his views on the New Culture movement's philosophy. He believed that China ought to follow a process of sociocultural evolution, based in mutual aid, which he believed would eventually transform the country into a stateless society of social equality. In order to achieve this, he advocated for widespread "thought reform", while cautioning against the use of indoctrination or brainwashing. Chen also argued against individualism and nationalism, the latter of which he considered to be a way for "ambitious politicians" to "fool their people and bully the world", culminating in militarism and imperialism. Influenced by a synthesis of Social Darwinism and anarchism, Chen concluded his anti-nationalist remarks by calling for a "socialism of all mankind", based in fraternity and mutual aid. He believed that China could "work for the benefit of the world", but it had to start with internal reform, specifically thought reform. Chen also wrote the manifesto of Minxing rikan, in which he outlined its aims of liberty, equality and mutual aid.
Anarchist and communist activity
As early as 1918, anarchist followers of Liu Shifu had moved from Guangdong to Fujian, in order to join up with Chen Jiongming. Chen, who was a former comrade of Shifu and sympathetic to anarchism, gave the anarchists his protection to operate with full freedom of association and freedom of the press. By early 1920, Fujian had become a center of the anarchist movement in China. During the May Fourth Movement, anarchist societies were organised in Zhangzhou and other cities, where they published periodicals and organised mass mobilisations.Although some anarchists had turned against Bolshevism by the outbreak of the Red Terror in early 1919, even a year later, other anarchists still supported it, considering it closely comparable to anarchism. Led by Liang Bingxian, the Fujian anarchist movement became a major source for news about the Russian Revolution. The Fujian anarchists were even contacted in March 1920 by the Communist International's official Grigori Voitinsky, who had been sent to China to organise the local communist movement. When Chen Duxiu started transforming New Youth into a nucleus for the foundation of the Chinese Communist Party, he appointed the Fujian anarchist Yuan Zhenying as its editor. With all this anarchist and communist activity, Chen's government became known in some circles as the "Soviet Russia of Southern Fujian".
In April 1920, the United States Department of State requested a report on the rise of "Bolshevism" in the region from the US consulate in Amoy. The report indicated that Bolshevism was gaining influence in Zhangzhou, where schools were teaching socialist doctrine and anarchist communist pamphlets were being circulated, some even by Chen Jiongming himself, who was also reported to have described Jesus as a socialist. At this time, the United States officials considered "Bolshevism" to be synonymous with "anarchism".
Relations with Soviet Russia
In early 1920, the regional education bureau was contacted by a Russian communist, who told them that the government of the Russian Soviet Republic had become interested in the revolutionary movement in southern Fujian and hoped to establish mutually-beneficial relations between the two. Chen agreed to meet with the Soviet representative, after consulting Zhu Zhixin and Liao Zhongkai. On April 29, 1920, Chen, Zhu and Liao met secretly with the Soviet representative, General. Chen was given a letter from Vladimir Lenin, who suggested that Chen engage more with mass politics, particularly the peasant movement, and offered to provide arms to the Guangdong Army. As Zhangzhou lacked a harbor, Chen declined the offer. In his letter to Lenin, Chen expressed support for Lenin and his cause, hoping that "the new China and the new Russia will join hands like intimate friends" and declaring, "I firmly believe that Bolshevism will benefit humanity, and I am willing to do my best to spread the principles of Bolshevism to the world."Potapov subsequently met with Chen Qiyou and members of the Minxing editorial staff, including Liang Bingxian. Liang informed Potapov that, as "freedom socialists", they upheld the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of thought, and were critical of the Russian Soviet Republic for its violations of human rights. When Potapov asked whether they thought that counterrevolutionary tendencies ought to be politically repressed, Liang responded: "we believe in carrying out social revolution to achieve social justice. Once social justice is achieved, the people will support it wholeheartedly; no madman will ever be able to destroy it... But if we used destructive force to interfere with freedom, we ourselves would become the counter-revolutionaries." Despite the secrecy of the meetings, American and British intelligence quickly picked up reports about it and began referring to Chen as a "Bolshevik general". The US consul at Amoy reported an increase in Bolshevik propaganda and described Chen as a socialist, although not a particularly radical one.