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Abstract

This thesis examines the question of regional independence in China under the Kuomintang rule and takes as a case study the Kwangsi Clique, which ruled the province of Kwangsi from 1925 to 1949, and whose leaders periodically played important roles in Kuomintang politics. The Introduction describes the development of regionalism and militarism in the late 19th century and their further growth in the early years of the Republic. Chapter I gives a historical account of the province of Kwangsi gind sets out the career of Lu Yung-t'ing, who ruled the province from 1911 to 1921. Chapter II deals with the background, education and early careers of the men who were to lead the Kwangsi Clique. Chapter III describes the rise of these men within Kwangsi during the long period of civil war which racked the province after 1921 and ended with the alliance of Kwangsi with the Kwangtung of the Kuomintang in 1926. Chapter IV is an account of the activities of the Kwangsi leaders in 1926 and 1927 and of the evolution of the Kwangsi Clique as a force in Kuomintang politics. Chapter V describes events within Kwangsi between 1926 and 1929, when a strong regional base was consolidated for the Clique. Chapter VI examines the role of the Clique in national politics in 1928 and 1929, when its great regional power holding threatened the authority of the Kuomintang government at Nanking, and relates the Clique's defeat by the National Government in 1929. Chapter VII gives an account of the Clique's reduced independence, within one province, between 1930 and 1936 and of its Reconstruction Movement, which attempted to develop an alternative form of government to that practised from Nanking. The Conclusion attempts to assess the effect of independent regional power holding on the fortunes of the Kuomintang; it also gives a brief description of the careers of the leaders of the Kwangsi Cliuqe after 1936, when its autonomy was finally shattered.