Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-x4r87 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T04:44:28.029Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

‘National Essence’ vs ‘Science’: Chinese Native Physicians' Fight for Legitimacy, 1912–37

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Xiaoqun Xu
Affiliation:
Francis Marion University

Extract

The medical profession in modern China comprised two radically different schools—modern (Western) medicine and native medicine. The difference in philosophy, theory, and technique made a conflict between the two schools almost inevitable, and the conflict was intensified by the modernization process that was quickened during the Republican period. Western-trained or modern doctors advocated national salvation through science and denounced native medicine as superstitious, unscientific, and an impediment to the development of medical science in China. On the other hand, native medical practitioners insisted that what they learned and practiced was part of the national essence (guocui) and should be protected against the cultural invasion of imperialism (diguo zhuyi wenhua qinlue) including Western medicine. To be sure, both sides used such rhetoric to camouflage the business competition between them, but this rivalry and its implications did point to a profound cultural conflict between Chinese tradition and Western influence in China's modernization. It epitomized a burning issue of the day: whether or not China's modernization meant Westernization and whether a respectable position for China in the modern world was to be achieved through Westernization or preservation of what was regarded or claimed as national heritage.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1997

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 In a recent article Lucian Pye has pointed out that the political class in China, by attacking national tradition on the one hand and modernized Chinese associated with treaty ports on the other, deprived a Chinese nationalism of any substance. While the point is well taken, the historical scene was more complicated than suggested by Pye. As we will see, those who attacked ‘modernized Chinese’ were not limited to the political class or people in power. They included people in different social groups who felt threatened by the modernization process. On the other hand, ‘modernized Chinese’ in treaty ports often attacked national tradition in the name of modernization. This in turn caused them to be attacked as unpatriotic. Pye has also argued that one result of the effort to replace Confucian tradition with a new moral order instead of modern nationalism was that as Chinese society became more diversified there was ‘no emergence of pluralistic interests,’ and that ‘China did not develop even the beginnings of a true civil society.’ These sweeping conclusions need to be balanced by cases such as the present study.Google ScholarSee Pye, Lucian W., ‘How China's Nationalism Was Shanghaied,’ The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, No. 29 (01. 1993: 107–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 For some of the complaints in this regard, see ‘Chinese Patients and their Prejudices,’ The China Medical Journal, 31, 6 (11. 1917): 504–10;Google ScholarA Century of Medical Missions in China,’ The China Medical Journal, 39, 7 (07 1925): 636–50.Google Scholar

3 Shehui Yibao [Journal of society and medicine], No. 124 (08. 16, 1930): 1182.Google Scholar

4 Chu, Hsi-Ju and Lai, Daniel G., ‘Survey: Distribution of Modern-trained Physicians in China,’ The Chinese Medical Journal, 49, 6 (06 1935): 542–52.Google Scholar

5 Jingzhou, Pang, Shanghai Jinshi Nianlai Yiyao Niaokan [An overview of Shanghai's medicine in recent ten years] (Shanghai kexue gongsi, 1933), p. 17.Google Scholar

6 Croizier, Ralph C., Traditionial Medcine in Modem China: Science, Nationalism, and the Tensions of Cultural Change (Harvard University Press, 1968), pp. 5968.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 Pingshu, Li, Qishi Zishu [Autobiography at sixty] (Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1989), p. 51;Google ScholarDaojing, Hu, ‘Shanghai de Xueyi Tuanti,’ Shanghai Tongzfiiguan Qikan [The journal of Shanghai general history institute] (1936), p. 842.Google Scholar

8 Pingshu, Li, Qishi Zishu, p. 52.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., pp. 54–5.

10 The first Minister of Education Cai Yuanpei resigned in 07 1912, but the conference had been organized under his leadership.Google Scholar

11 Minguo Yuannian Zhongyang Jiaqyu Huiyi Jueyi An [The resolutions of the central educational conference in the first year of the Republic] (Shanghai: Zhonghua shuju, 1912).Google Scholar

12 Shi Bao [The Eastern Times], 1913: 05 31, p. 8.Google Scholar

13 Buyi, Longxi, ‘Shanghai Qige Zhongyi Xuexiao De Jiaocheng Ji Xiangwang’ [The history and curriculum of seven native medical schools in Shanghai], Yijie Chunqiu [Spring and autumn of the medical world], No. 20 (02. 1928): 1–3; N0.21 (Mar. 1928): 1–4.Google Scholar

14 Wang Daxie was a former official of the Qing dynasty. For most of the time he worked in the field of foreign affairs, which may explain his inclination toward reform and commitment to modernization. He became the Minister of Education in September 1913 and left the cabinet next March. See Minguo Renwu Dacidian [A who's who of the Republic] (Shijiazhuang: Hebei renmin chubanshe, 1991), p. 413.Google Scholar

15 Quansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo Wenhua Shi [A cultural history of the Republic of China] (Changchun: Jilin wenshi chubanshe, 1990), p. 445;Google ScholarCroizier, , Traditional Medicine, pp. 68–9.Google Scholar

16 Longxi Buyi, ‘Shanghai Qige Zhongyi Xuexiao,’; Shi Quansheng, Zhongua Minguo, pp. 440–1.Google Scholar

17 Yunxiu, Yu, Yixue Geming Lun Cuji [On medical revolution: first volume] (Shanghai: Yishi yanjiushi, 1932), pp. 121;Google ScholarQizhang, Wang, Ershi Nianlai Zhongguo Yishi Zouyi [Comments on China's medical work in recent twenty years] (Shanghai: Zhengliao yibaoshe, 1935), p. 151.Google Scholar

18 Zhonghua Jiaoyu Gaijing She Gaiguan [An overview of the Chinese Society for Improving Education] (Shanghai, 1922), pp. 68.Google Scholar

19 Shi Bao, 1925: Dec. 4, p. 4; Dec. 5, p. 5; Dec. 9, p. 4; Quansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo, p. 445.Google Scholar

20 Shi Bao, 1926: Jan. 3, p. 3.Google Scholar

21 The efforts at medical professionalization, including the struggles against excessive government regulation and against the practice of foreign doctors and unqualified modern medical practitioners, were important part of the MPAS's function, which are dealt with elsewhere.Google Scholar

22 Shi Bao, 1926: 02. 23, p. 3.Google Scholar

23 Yu Yunxiu, Yixue Geming, p. 129;Google ScholarShi Quansheng, Zhonghua Minguo, p. 446.Google Scholar

24 Minguo Yiyao Weisheng Fagui Xuanbian, 1912–1948 [Selected compilation of laws and regulations on medicine and health during the Republic, 1912–1948] (Ji'nan: Shangdong daxue chubanshe), pp. 52–5;Google ScholarCroizier, , Traditional Medicine, p. 133.Google Scholar

25 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti Zong Lianhe Hui Huibian [The collected proceedings of the National Federation of (native) Medical and Pharmaceutical Associations] (1931), p. 32;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu, No. 34 (04. 1929): 9.Google Scholar

26 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, pp. 32–3;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu, No. 34: 9–11;Google ScholarQuansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo, p. 856.Google Scholar

27 Jingzhou, Pang, Shanghai Jinshi Nianlai, p. 6.Google Scholar

28 Yunxiu, Yu, Yixue Geming, pp. 121–5.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., p. 127.

30 According to one source, it was Huang Shengbai, a modern doctor, who first invented these two terms. Yiyao Pinglun, No. 14 (02. 1930): 8.Google Scholar

31 For example, Yiyao Pinglun, No. 14 (04. 1930): 6, 9; No. 44 (Apr. 1932): 2–3.Google Scholar

32 Qizhang, Wang, Ershi Nianlai, pp. 234–5.Google Scholar

33 Jingzhou, Pang, Shanghai Jinshi Nianlai, p. 4.Google Scholar

34 Yunxiu, Yu, pp. 135–6;Google ScholarShouyuan, Fan, ‘Zhongguo Jiu Yiyao De Kexuehua Wenti’ [The problem of making native medicine and drugs scientific], Yiyao Pinglun, no. 103 (08. 1933): 4–5.Google Scholar

35 Jingzhou, Pang, Shanghai Jinshi Nianlai, pp. 3–4.Google Scholar

36 Qizhang, Wang, Ershi Nianlai, pp. 151–2.Google Scholar

37 Yiyao Pinglun, no. 106 (11. 1933): 17.Google Scholar

38 Yunxiu, Yu, ‘Preface’ in Wang Qizhang's Ershi Nianlai.Google Scholar

39 Yunxiu, Yu, ‘Yizai Jiuyi Zhi Judong’ [Old physicians' actions are so odd], Yiyao Pinglun, No. 7 (07 1929): 45.Google Scholar

40 Although I have not done any exhaustive statistical study on this, the statement seems to be valid. Among the Ministers of Education and of the Interior during the Beiyang period (1912–27) were a few reform-minded late Qing juren or jingshi such as Wang Daxie, Fu Zengxiang, Zhang Guogan, Qian Nengxun, Gao Linghui, and there were also foreign-educated ones such as Cai Yuanpei, Fan Yuanlian, Huang Yanpei, Yi Peiji, Huang Fu, Peng Yunyi (all studied in Japan), Yan Huiqing (studied in the U.S.), Tang Erhe (studied in Germany), Gong Xingzhan (studied in England). See Shipu, QianBeiyang Zhengfu Zhiguan Nianbiao [A chronology of Beiyang government officials] (Shanghai: Huadong shifan daxue chubanshe, 1991). During the Nanking Decade the Minister of Health was Xue Duobi (a graduate from the Shanxi School of Law and Government), and the head of the Health Administration which succeeded the Health Ministry was Liu Ruihuan (a M.D. from Harvard). The Ministry of Education was headed successively by Jiang Mengling (a Ph.D. from Columbia), Li Shuhua (a Ph.D. from Sorbonne), Zhu Jiaye (a Ph.D. from Berlin), and Wang Shijie (a J.D. from Sorbonne). See Minguo Renwu Dacidian [Who's Who of the Republic of China] (Shijiazhuang: Hebei renmin chubanshe, 1991). In Shanghai Hu Hongji, a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University, became the first chief of the Health Bureau in 1926. After a short interval, he was reappointed to the post by the GMD government in 1928. The chief of the Education Bureau in 1927 was Zhu Jingnong, who had a master's degree from George Washington University. He was succeeded in 1928 by Chen Dezheng, a graduate from Zhijiang University in Hangzhou. Chen was replaced in 1930 by Xu Peihuang, an Americaneducated Ph.D., and then Pan Gongzhan, who graduated from St. John's University in Shanghai. Of twelve Shanghai bureau chiefs in 1927, six were Western-educated and two were graduates from modern schools in China.Google ScholarSee Zhongli, Zhang, Jindai Shanghai Chengshi Yanjiu [An urban study of modern Shanghai] (Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1990), pp. 665–7; Minguo Renwu Dacidian.Google Scholar

41 Although not a health or education official, Fu Sinian, a Western-educated professor of history and language and the managing director (zong tanshi) of the Academia Sinica, is typical of those modernists in their contempt for native medicine. He, as late as 1934, called it the biggest shame that native medicine was still contending with modern medicine, as the former's uselessness was beyond question. He said that the words of ‘improving native medicine’ (gailiang zhongyi) were logically meaningless.Google ScholarSee Mengzheng, Fu, ‘Suowei Guoyi’ [The so-called national medicine], Duli Pinglun [Independent Review], No. 115 (08. 26, 1934): 1720;Google ScholarZailun Suowei Guoyi’ [More on the so-called national medicine], Duli Pinglun, No. 118 (09. 16, 1934): 35.Google Scholar

42 Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 7, p. 6.Google Scholar

43 Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 8, p. 6; Mar. 9, p. 7.Google Scholar

44 Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 11, p. 7; Mar. 12, p. 6.Google Scholar

45 For some of the statements from various organizations supporting native medicine, see Yijie Chunqiu, No. 34 (Apr. 1929): 13–27.Google Scholar

46 Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 25, p. 6.Google Scholar

47 Jingzhou, Pang, Shanghai Jinshi Nianlai, pp. 78–9;Google ScholarQizhang, Wang, Ershi Nianlai, p. 152;Google ScholarMengbai, Zhou, ‘Gao Zhongyaojia’ [To native druggists], Yiyao Pinglun, No. 11 (11. 1929): 12. This would remain a constant theme in modern doctors' debate with native physicians.Google Scholar

48 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti Daibiao Dahui Tekan [The special journal of the national congress of (native) Medical and Pharmaceutical Associations] (1929), p. 3;Google Scholaraccording to another source, delegates numbered 281 representing 242 organizations from fifteen provinces. See Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti Zong Lianhehui Huibian (Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti hereafter), p. 41.Google Scholar

49 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti Daibiao Dahui Tekan, p. 3.Google Scholar

50 Ibid., p. 39.

51 Ibid., p. 40; Shi Boo, 1929: Mar. 19, p. 4.Google Scholar

52 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 41;Google ScholarShi Bao, 1929: Mar. 20, p. 6.Google Scholar

53 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 43;Google Scholarthe report of the delegation's activity and the result appeared in pp. 43–4 and in Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 26, p. 6, upon which the following narrative is based.Google Scholar

54 This break-down in attitudes towards native medicine was largely the result of modern state-building. Committed to modernization, the GMD appointed more experts to the posts in administrative offices than in party offices. These experts tended to be returned students or graduates of modern schools in China.Google Scholar

55 Croizier, , Traditional Medicine, pp. 134–5.Google Scholar

56 Yijie Chunqiu, No. 25 (July 1927): 1–2.Google Scholar

57 Shi'e, Lu, Guqyi Xingyu [New Talk about Native Medicine] (Shanghai: Daxin shuju, 1934), p. 214.Google Scholar

58 Shi Bao, 1929: Mar. 19, p. 4.Google Scholar

59 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, pp. 42–3;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu, No. 15 (Sept. 1927): 1–3.Google Scholar

60 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, pp. 38, 39.Google Scholar

61 Yijie Chunqiu, No. 13 (July 1927): 5; No. 14 (Aug. 1927): 1–3; No. 15 (Sept. 1927): 1–3; No. 25 (Sept. 1928): 1–2; No. 26 (Oct. 1928): 3–8;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu Huixuan Diyiji [Selected collection from Spring and Autumn of the Medical World: the first volume] (08. 1927): pp. 181–2.Google Scholar

62 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 42.Google Scholar

63 Lu Shi'e, Guoyi Xingyu, pp. 213–14, 219–20.Google Scholar

64 Ibid., pp. 225–6.

65 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 49.Google Scholar

66 Ibid., p. 65.

67 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 68;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu, No. 51 (Sept. 1930): 1–3.Google Scholar

68 Shi Bao, 1929: June 7, p. 7.Google Scholar

69 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 66.Google Scholar

70 Shi Bao, 1930: Aug. 1, p. 8.Google Scholar

71 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 69.Google Scholar

72 The texts of the petitions appeared in Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, pp. 52–4.Google Scholar

73 The report of the delegation's activities appeared in ibid.,, pp. 54–6.

74 Ibid., p. 56; Shi Bao, 1929: Dec. 29, p. 6.Google Scholar

75 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, pp. 70–2.Google Scholar

76 See Guangzhi, Jiang, ‘Zhongyi Weihe Jiji Geming’ [Why revolution is urgently needed in native medicine], Yijie Chunqiu, No. 11 (04 1927): 45;Google ScholarYuanlei, Lu, ‘Zhongyi Baoshang Zhixi’ [The key to strengthening native medicine], Zhongyi Xingshengming, No. 31 (06 1937): 28.Google Scholar

77 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 70.Google Scholar

78 Guomin Zhengfu Gongbao [The National Government Bulletin], No. 404 (1930: 03. 4), p. 10.Google Scholar

79 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 73.Google Scholar

80 Ibid., pp. 73–4.

81 Ibid., p. 74.

82 Ibid., pp. 74–5; Shi Bao, 1930: May 16, p. 6.Google Scholar

83 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 86.Google Scholar

85 Ibid.; Croizier, , Traditional Medicine, p. 134.Google Scholar

86 Guomin Zhengfu Gongbao, No. 476 (1930: 05 23), p. 10.Google Scholar

87 It was now the modern doctors' turn to complain that native physicians used cunning tricks (yunyong shouwan) to bring about the INM. See Yiyao Pinglun, No. 105 (10. 1933): 16.Google Scholar

88 Quanguo Yiyao Tuanti, p. 104;Google ScholarQuansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo, 857–8.Google Scholar

89 Yiyao Pinglun [Medical Review], no. 105 (10. 1933): 17.Google Scholar

90 Qizhang, Wang, ‘Dule Zhongyi Tiaoli De Ganyan’ [Reflections after reading the Regulations on Native Medicine], Yiyao Pinglun, No. 109 (01. 1934): 4.Google Scholar

91 Yiyao Pinglun, No. 104 (09. 1933): 5861; No. 105 (Oct. 1933): 1–181; No. 106 (Nov. 1933): 1–9.Google Scholar

92 Two years later, Wang's letter was somehow obtained by Yijie Chunqiu and the original was photocopied and published in the journal. See Yijie Chunqiu, No. 105 (09. 1935), inside of the cover page; No. 107 (Nov. 1935): 1–11. This disclosure brought about sharp criticism of Wang in the native medical circle.Google Scholar

93 Quansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo, p. 858;Google ScholarCroizier, , Traditional Medicine, pp. 135–6.Google Scholar

94 Yijie Chunqiu, No. 106 (10. 1935): 12;Google ScholarMingri Yiyao [Tomorrow's medicine], No. 1 (01. 1936)): 443–5.Google Scholar

95 Shen Bao, 1936: Feb. 9, p. 11;Google ScholarFaling Zhoukan [Weekly Review of Laws and Ordinances], No. 291 (1936: 01. 29), Section of Laws and Ordinances, p. 11;Google ScholarGuomin Zhengfu Gongbao, No. 2233 (1936: 12. 21), pp. 34.Google Scholar

96 Zhongyi Xingshengming [New life of native medicine], No. 25 (10. 1936): 28; No. 26 (Nov. 1936): 1–9; No. 27 (Dec. 1936): 2–3;Google ScholarYijie Chunqiu, No. 111 (03. 1936): 32–4; No. 118 (Oct. 1936): 35–44.Google Scholar

97 Zhongyi Xingshengming, No. 27 (12. 1936): 67.Google Scholar

98 Shen Bao [Shanghai News], 1937: Feb. 6, p. 16.Google Scholar

99 Yijie Chunqiu, No. 120 (06 1937): 14.Google Scholar

100 Ibid., pp. 41–2.

101 Quansheng, Shi, Zhonghua Minguo, pp. 859–60.Google Scholar

102 Rankin, Mary, ‘The Origins of a Chinese Public Sphere’, Etudes Chinoises, 9, 2 (Automne, 1990): 15.Google Scholar

103 Habermas, Jurgen, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society (Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press, 1989), pp. 2756.Google Scholar

104 David Strand, for example, regards Beijing's local elites and their ‘politics of accommodation’ as ‘a natural by-product of the confrontation between “weak state” and “strong society”.’ See Strand, David, ‘Mediation, Representation, and Repression: Local Elites in 1920s' Beijing,’ in Esherick, and Rankin, (eds), Chinese Local Elites and Patterns of Dominance (University of California Press, 1990), p. 218.Google Scholar Similarly, in an effort to prove the rise of a public sphere (which he favors over a ‘civil society’), William Rowe feels compelled to emphasize that commercial activities and communal institutions in late Qing Hankow were largely independent of the state—a rather unconvincing case in Wakeman's judgment. See Rowe, William, Hankow: Commerce and Society in a Chinese City, 1796–1889 (Stanford University, 1984);Google ScholarHankow: Conflict and Community in a Chinese City, 1796–1895 (Stanford University, 1989);Google ScholarWakeman, Fredric, ‘Civil Society and Public Sphere Debate’, Modern China, 19, 2 (04. 1993): 108–38;CrossRefGoogle ScholarRowe, William, ‘The Problem of “Civil Society” in Late Imperial China,’ Modern China, 19, 2: 139–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar