A CHINESE LIBERAL SPEAKS UP ON CHINA
MacNair, Harley Fransworth
A Chinese Liberal Speaks Up On China CHINA LOOKS FORWARD, by Sun Fo. With an introduction by Lin Yutang. The John Day Company. $3. Reviewed by Harley Farnsworrh MacNair SEVERAL questions of...
...The conditions set forth so cogently by Dr...
...It is to be remembered that Dr...
...Sun Fo's position is unique...
...Does it not mean that the representatives of the Kuomintang National Congress elect themselves...
...Sun Yat-sen's widow, the at least equally distinguished sister, in the estimation of China's millions, of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's wife, has had so markedly little to do with the government headed by her brother-in-law since 1928...
...It is true that, as the son of his father and as president of the Legislative Yuan in the Chungking-Kuo-mintang government of Unoccupied China, Dr...
...The National Congress of the Kuomintang should have been formed by the representatives elected by the party members throughout the country...
...To transfer the sovereignty to the people, the Kuomintang and the present government must make some changes in their practice...
...Reviewed by Harley Farnsworrh MacNair SEVERAL questions of extreme importance are asked on the front flap of the dust jacket of this volume: "What do the Chinese expect, what do they want, what do they insist upon, what are their dreams for the future, their aim and the world's...
...This is but one of several important topics discussed by Dr...
...In the course of this address he declared: "Min-Ch'uan-Chu-I f second of the "Three People's Principles"] is to build up a genuinely democratic China, the sovereignty of which shall be vested in the Chinese people...
...Sun Fo answers with authority, for he holds a unique position, and can speak with full knowledge and fearless candor...
...Sun Fo make clear at least part of the reason why Dr...
...It is true, moreover, that Sun Fo's is one of the very few voices within his government and in Chungking that nowadays speaks boldly on behalf of liberalism and democracy...
...The practice of the revolutionary party has consequently become the same as that of a bureaucratic regime [reviewer's italics...
...On Feb...
...DR...
...We must frankly admit the fact that in these 20 years the machinery and practice of the Kuomintang have turned in a wrong direction, inconsistent with the Party Constitution drafted by Dr...
...Time and again, in the 24 essays and addresses (and in one of the four appendices) which make up this volume, frank and, at times, almost defiant criticism is made of those individuals, conditions, and institutions in China that have prevented the implementation of the San Min Chu I and others of his father's basic principles and teachings...
...The practice of the Kuomintang, in particular, must first of all be readjusted thoroughly...
...If the responsible personalities of the provincial and municipal party headquarters were appointed by the central party headquarters, how could the provincial and municipal party headquarters in turn send out to the National Congress of the Kuomintang representatives who really would speak for the individual party members in the areas under their leadership...
...Sun Fo addressed the Political and Party Affairs Section of the Central Training Institute in Chungking...
...23, 1944, almost 19 years after his father's passing, Dr...
...And determined aspiration is expressed for the liberalization and democratization in law and in practice of the social and political institutions of China...
...Sun Yat-sen in 1925 and contrary to the spirit of democracy...
...Lin Yutang's assertion that Sun is "quite possibly the most outstanding social thinker of China today and certainly the best read man in China on the social and economic problems of the West") that he "answers with authority" for more than himself—for the Chinese as a whole, including especially his colleagues in Chungking...
...With due respect for Dr...
...But is it true (granting the correctness of Dr...
...SUN FO is as idealistic and perennially hopeful as was his father for a long generation (1895-1925) before him...
...It is also true that he can speak with knowledge and with candor...
...Sun's character and ability honest doubt may be felt as to the degree of unity prevailing in China as a whole, including its wartime capital, with reference to the ideas and ideals set forth in his intensely interesting volume...
...Equally interesting are his thoughts (regardless of whether they are, or are not, identical with those, for example, of the Generalissimo, the "C.C.Clique," and the Communists of China) concerning the too little discussed topics in the United States of Korean independence, the disposition of the Mikado on the conclusion of the Pacific War, Manchuria after the war, and the future of American-Chinese relations...
...Sun Yat-sen was widely read, a social thinker, and fairly well informed "on the social and economic problems of the West" '(some held that he was better informed concerning conditions in the West than he was with those prevailing in his native land)—but that it was not until death in 1925 stilled his voice and stopped his pen, to the relief of many of the "powers" then nourishing in China, that his canonization took place and his immobilization as a hero forever occurred...
...And declaration is made that "Dr...
Vol. 8 • October 1944 • No. 43
