The SenseMaker

Klaus Mühlhahn is a German historian and sinologist specializing in modern Chinese history and culture. He has served as President of Zeppelin University and as Professor and Vice President at the Free University of Berlin. He is the author of Criminal Justice in China: A History, which won the John K. Fairbank Prize in 2009. His research explores China’s political, social, and cultural transformations.

Amogh Rai
Welcome to Sense Maker, a platform where we try to understand complicated issues and have conversations that shape perspectives. Today we are joined by a noted historian of China, speaking to us from Berlin early in the morning. Thank you, Professor Klaus Mühlhahn, president of Zeppelin University and a leading authority on Chinese history and culture, author of several works.

The one we’ll focus on today is Making China Modern: From the Great Qing to Xi Jinping. Professor Mühlhahn, welcome.

Amogh Rai
Before we dive in, tell me as a historian of China: why this time period and why this book?

Klaus Mühlhahn
That’s a great question. The main reason I wrote the book was to understand contemporary China. I believed it required a historical approach. Of course, disciplines like political science and economics contribute, but to grasp China’s unique position in the world and its development, we need to look at history.
China has thousands of years of history, but to be precise, I felt we must go back to the 16th century, when many of the institutions and structures we see today first emerged.

Amogh Rai
One of the striking features of your book is its non-linearity. While there’s a chronology, the narrative also tracks institutions, not just individuals. It’s less about leaders and more about how institutions rise.

For instance, you make an interesting comment about the gaokao—China’s university entrance exam. You argue that this wasn’t borrowed but rather drawn from historical precedent. Yet, despite centuries of upheaval, such mechanisms persist. How have Chinese institutions managed to stay true to form?

Klaus Mühlhahn
The institutions I discuss include the keju examination system for selecting officials, family businesses, state-related bodies, and mechanisms of economic policy, infrastructure planning, and investment.

When I say “institutions,” I mean the rules that allow people to collaborate. An institution is not an organisation itself, but the underlying framework that enables cooperation and collective achievement. For them to endure, institutions need legitimacy, fairness, and some degree of transparency.

What is often overlooked in the West is how China’s institutions have not only evolved and adapted but also demonstrated remarkable continuity. To understand China, one must grasp the weight of these institutions. They represent the ways China has confronted problems—often successfully, which explains their survival.
These institutions remain because they combine tradition with flexibility. They were accepted as fair and effective, giving them both durability and legitimacy.

Amogh Rai
Thank you for setting out that perspective—it opens up the discussion. Martin Jacques, one of the prominent commentators sympathetic to the Chinese system, has made a point you also reflect, though you approach it through history.

When we talk about the Industrial Revolution in Europe, we often overlook that China was also experiencing its own version. It was not machine-driven but powered by human labour and cheap technology, leading to remarkable progress in GDP and resource use.

Around 1751, under the Qianlong Emperor, China was at its zenith. Elites were well represented in the examination system, everything seemed stable, yet soon afterwards came institutional breakdown. How did a system that appeared so well-organised collapse? You suggest an alternative explanation in your book, which I hope will prompt listeners to read it in full.

Klaus Mühlhahn
Yes, this is a fascinating part of the story. As you say, the system worked very well then declined. Traditionally, Western scholars explained this as cultural essentialism: that the Chinese, bound by Confucian tradition, could not comprehend the modern world. I challenge that view.

Many in late 18th and 19th century China recognised that times had changed. They understood they now faced a West that was technologically equal, if not superior. There was a vibrant and sophisticated debate about how China might catch up.

So, it was not cultural stubbornness or blindness. The ideas were there, the proposals were on the table. What failed was politics. Elites were too concerned with defending their privileges, wealth, and power to embrace reforms. That unwillingness to risk their social position prevented meaningful change.

In other words, China had the cultural, economic, and scientific preconditions to thrive in the 19th century, but political failure caused decline.

And this is not just history. Even today, we see that many global problems stem from political structures and leaders unable to address challenges. For too long we assumed economic growth and modernisation would automatically create a better world. But in the end, it depends on politics.

Amogh Rai
Thank you. Let me take this in a different direction. I’m speaking from India, and both India and China share the legacy of colonialism. A key takeaway from your book is the “century of humiliation” in the 19th century.

China’s experience of colonialism differed from other regions. Western powers—Britain, France and others—viewed China in contradictory ways, and Chinese elites responded differently as well. I’d like to hear your thoughts on the Jesuits, who had a longer presence in China than in many other parts of the world. How did they respond to the Chinese state?

Because when you read the accounts, China appears either as a wonderland or as the most miserable place on earth. Did that shape how the Chinese came to view themselves?

Klaus Mühlhahn
Absolutely. The Jesuits are an excellent example. They arrived in China early, during the Ming dynasty, in the 16th century. As you know, the first missionaries were not warmly welcomed by the Chinese Empire…

Klaus Mühlhahn
Remarkably, the Jesuits were not only welcomed but appointed to significant positions at court in Beijing and earlier in Nanjing. It is hard to imagine, for example, a European royal family at the time appointing an Arab or Muslim to government. China thus entered into intensive interaction with Christian culture very early, and initially the missionaries were relatively successful. Their strategy was to convert the elite first, later expanding to ordinary people.

Yet difficulties soon emerged. As Chinese scholars examined Christian doctrines more closely, they found contradictions with native traditions. From that point the emperors began restricting Christianity, even as it spread.

This exchange influenced Chinese self-perception. China saw itself engaging with Christianity on equal terms, not as inferior. This shaped a long-standing desire: to be part of the modern world and taken seriously, while remaining selective in adopting outside ideas. China never embraced wholesale imitation; it chose what suited its own needs.

Amogh Rai
That competitive perspective comes across clearly. Before we fast-forward to the 20th century and the Chinese Communist Party, one last question about this earlier period.

In your book you discuss religion: the rediscovery of Confucius, but also the growing interest in Christianity. There’s an old saying that “the mountains are high and the emperor is far away.” Without strong central control, Christianity found space to spread. At the same time, Confucius was being reinterpreted, with new meanings ascribed to him.

What, though, was the everyday hold of religion on ordinary Chinese people at this point? Historians often treat religion in China as an antithesis to the state. But your book suggests something different that religion was part of daily life, even if not the subject of the kind of great public debates seen in 19th-century Europe or South Asia.

Klaus Mühlhahn
That’s an excellent question. Religion in China during the period I examine was extraordinarily complex. There were many popular traditions such as Daoism, and Buddhism, which had entered from India and Central Asia and gained a vast following. Confucianism, while perhaps not a religion in the strict sense, contained religious elements. Central too was the idea of tian, or Heaven, with cosmological beliefs about the universe, earth, and humanity.

This was not a coherent system but a mosaic of overlapping practices and beliefs. At times, religious movements even fuelled uprisings that challenged imperial authority. Into this already complicated landscape, Christianity was added, further layering the religious experience.

What I try to show in the book is that religion in China was not marginal, nor simply opposed to the state. It was interwoven with everyday life, shaping worldviews and communities, even if it lacked the central role that organised religion held in Europe or India.

Klaus Mühlhahn
What I argue is that traditions in China were never simply continued; they were constantly reinvented. Encounters with Christianity, colonialism, and other outside influences gave new meaning to old ideas. Certain strands of Confucianism or Daoism, for instance, became redefined as distinctly “Chinese,” while Christianity, originally European, was adapted into the Chinese religious landscape.

This shows that traditions are not static. They change in response to new contexts and influences. Chinese intellectuals often mobilised cultural resources by revisiting their own heritage, reviving elements they considered vital in order to defend themselves against Western superiority.

Amogh Rai
You emphasise in your book that the Chinese never import ideas wholesale. They adapt and transform them. Staying with this theme, let’s talk about how elites viewed industrialisation. By the late Qing, moving into the Sun Yat-sen era and the 1911 revolution, China had long been central to global commerce. Yet, as you note, there was a certain comic misunderstanding of modern industry.

What did you see in the archives about how industrialisation was perceived? Did it make sense to Chinese elites, or was it something they resisted?

Klaus Mühlhahn
That’s a very interesting question. When we talk about “China” we must remember it was never homogeneous. Even in the early 20th century it had 500–600 million people, with very diverse experiences.

Responses to industrialisation varied by group. Those in traditional occupations often resisted. The transportation sector, for example, was vast and sophisticated: canals full of boats, urban carriers moving heavy loads, tricycles and bicycles everywhere. When railways and steamships arrived, these groups saw them as threats to their livelihoods. Protests against railway construction were common.

Merchants, however, viewed industrialisation as an opportunity. They explored importing and even building machines themselves. They experimented with producing electricity, investing in new ventures, and adapting Western technology for local use. Many were extremely successful, both in business and in driving industrial development.

The state also had its own motives. The government recognised military inferiority and saw Western technology as vital to strengthening national defence. Industrialisation was thus pursued not just for commerce, but for survival as a modern power.

So, the reactions ranged from resistance to enthusiastic adoption. The merchants, in particular, proved adept at seizing opportunities, learning from the West while reshaping technologies for the Chinese context.

Amogh Rai
In 2019, I first read your work in ChinaFile, where you wrote about the unfulfilled promise of the May Fourth Revolution. Five years on, after Covid lockdowns and the White Paper protests, your point remains relevant. You noted that 1989 was, in many ways, a continuation of 1919—that ideas of liberty and equality were never forgotten.

By 1919, the Qing dynasty had collapsed, Sun Yat-sen had come and gone, and instability prevailed. What did modernity mean to students, workers, and elites at that time?

Klaus Mühlhahn
Excellent question. Industrialisation was, of course, part of what Chinese intellectuals understood as modernity. In the 1910s and 1920s, the first science fiction stories appeared, reflecting fascination with technological progress.
For many, modernity meant joining the modern world on equal terms. The May Fourth Movement signalled that students and thinkers wanted to participate in shaping this new order. They refused to accept exclusion.

But there was another layer: the political promise of the French Revolution—liberty, equality, solidarity, and self-determination. This was about building a more egalitarian society where people had a greater say in national affairs.
So, modernity meant two things: industrial and technological progress, and political transformation. These aspects were not identical, but both animated young people, including the Tiananmen protesters of 1919.

Amogh Rai
That also challenges the claim that China was isolated from global currents. As you write, 1919 was a period when ideas flowed in from across the world, reshaping Chinese thought. You argue that Chinese identity and traditions evolved in their own rhythm rather than being passively imposed from outside.

This brings me to the question of elites. Colonised countries often saw the creation of new elites who bridged vernacular traditions with colonial languages. In India, for example, after 1858 a new elite emerged fluent both in English and local languages.

In China, something similar happened but on a much smaller scale. What fascinates me is how the Chinese language survived repeated colonial pressures. Despite interventions from five different foreign powers, the language remained resilient. Newspapers and new stories could rise or fall, but the language itself followed its own trajectory.

You’ve written on this—how did the language endure so strongly?

Klaus Mühlhahn
I agree, this is remarkable. Compared with Africa, India, or Latin America, China was never fully colonised. That difference is crucial.

Klaus Mühlhahn
Colonial influence in China was mostly limited to the coastal cities such as Shanghai, Canton, or Tianjin. The vast rural hinterland, where the majority of people lived, was largely untouched. Some estimates suggest that 80–85% of Chinese never had any direct contact with Westerners.

This partial colonisation mattered. Mao Zedong described China as a “semi-colonial” country. That status allowed China to preserve traditions—its language, family structures, and rural culture—which might otherwise have been eroded.

Amogh Rai
Yes, and the archives must be fascinating for tracing this story. One fact from your book surprised me. In the 1920s and 1930s, under Chiang Kai-shek, there was real co-development with Western organisations like the Rockefeller Foundation. There was steady growth, even as Japan became aggressive.

Why do we rarely hear about this? Until reading your book, I assumed 1911 to 1949 was simply decades of chaos and desolation. Yet you describe flights, air travel, roads, and cars appearing. Why does this period get erased in much contemporary writing?

Klaus Mühlhahn
Partly because after 1949 the Communist government had no interest in giving credit to its predecessor. Official historiography painted the 1920s, 30s, and 40s as a dark age. But that is misleading.

The Nationalist regime under Chiang Kai-shek did achieve a great deal. Their initiatives created foundations on which the Communists later built. This was a remarkable period of transformation. It is important to recognise that the outcome of the civil war was not inevitable. The Nationalists had successes, but they made critical mistakes on the battlefield, which cost them victory. Their defeat was military, not proof that their policies were doomed from the outset.

Many of their economic and social reforms were later continued by the Communists.

Amogh Rai
That is striking, both because this growth occurred, and because it has been largely forgotten. If we turn to the civil war: between 1939 and 1945 the Communists and Nationalists united to fight Japan. Before and after, however, the Communists controlled the countryside while the Nationalists held the cities.

One question: Mao Zedong was not always the natural leader of the Communist Party. His rise came through the Long March and later consolidation. Who were the other figures in Communist history who deserve attention, but who have since been lost in Mao’s shadow?

And, linked to this, how do we understand Sun Yat-sen’s influence—not just on the Communists and Chiang Kai-shek, but also on today’s Taiwanese politics?

Klaus Mühlhahn
Sun Yat-sen’s influence was immense. His ideas, particularly around industrialisation, the economy, and what he called “people’s livelihood”—raising living standards, ensuring fairness, ending poverty and exploitation—resonated deeply. These principles shaped both Communist and Nationalist policies, leaving a legacy still visible in Taiwan today.

Klaus Mühlhahn
There are clear similarities between the Nationalists and the Communists. Their ideologies differed, but in practice some policies overlapped.

As to your question—who really made up the Communist Party? We all know Mao, but the story is more complicated. From the beginning, Mao argued that Marxism had to be adapted to Chinese conditions. His great contribution was the insight that Western revolutionary strategy—relying on an industrial working class—would not work in China. There was no sizeable proletariat. Instead, he mobilised peasants.

This was transformative. By shifting the revolutionary base from workers to peasants, Mao changed the nature of communism in China. The Red Army was not a disciplined industrial force but a rough coalition of landless peasants, impoverished farmers, and outcasts who saw the movement as a path out of misery. This made the Chinese revolution far messier than its European counterparts.

Beyond Mao, there were many others leaders who played vital roles but are often forgotten in official histories. They were the driving force of the movement, even if today their names rarely appear outside archival lists.

Amogh Rai
That leads me to combine two questions about the Mao era, from 1949 to his death in 1976. Mao became China’s supreme leader, initially looking to Stalin as a mentor, but later building a cult of his own. Yet there were others in the Party—better educated, some trained in Paris—who might have led. Why was Mao never successfully opposed?

Klaus Mühlhahn
We shouldn’t assume there was no opposition. There was, and quite a lot. But in China’s political system such conflicts were hidden. Access to archives from the 1950s is limited, yet evidence suggests there were constant debates and challenges to Mao’s authority. He reacted fiercely to these, which contributed to the launch of the Cultural Revolution—his attempt to purge rivals and reassert dominance.

So while Mao appears unchallenged in retrospect, the reality was a continual back-and-forth, with disputes and rival visions within the leadership.

Amogh Rai
Yes, and as you show, each time opposition arose, Mao reached out dramatically to the people, almost like the emperors you describe earlier in your book.

Let me ask about the state. China has always had a powerful central state. Under Mao, this was reinforced through state-owned enterprises (SOEs). These were not a Communist invention—you note they existed under Chiang Kai-shek too. But Mao’s SOEs, along with the “iron rice bowl,” provided stability and control: guaranteed jobs, housing, and welfare in exchange for loyalty and productivity.
This compact was shattered in the 1980s, but under Xi Jinping there is an effort to restore aspects of it, reviving the state’s role in the economy.

Amogh Rai
But Xi Jinping does not have the promise or aura that Mao carried. Where do you see the modern Chinese state headed, based on history? I know it’s a speculative question, but I must ask.

Klaus Mühlhahn
Indeed. The modern Chinese state is torn between two imperatives. On one hand, it seeks to guarantee citizens a decent living eliminating poverty and ensuring everyone enjoys a minimum standard of life. On the other, it must succeed in a global capitalist system to generate the wealth needed to fulfil that promise.

This was where Mao failed. Under him, the “iron rice bowl” provided guarantees, but the bowl was empty. When I first travelled to China in the early 1980s, people still used ration coupons for rice and meat, but portions were so small they could barely survive.

So the dilemma remains: to provide social welfare, China must thrive in the global market. But these are two different logics—equality versus growth. The unresolved question is which takes priority: welfare and equality, or continued economic expansion.

Amogh Rai
Professor, it has been a fascinating discussion. This is a book I’ve read once, but I know I’ll return to. It’s well-thumbed—my first edition from India. Before we end, one final question.

When I began studying China around 2012, I saw a country that had risen to middle-income status and looked confident. Yet inside China, the conversation was surprisingly negative. Bestseller titles proclaimed “China Stands Up,” but by the 2010s, gloom had set in.

Is this pessimism rooted in the “century of humiliation,” or is it cultivated by the Communist Party to remind people it alone safeguards national security? Where does this sense of doom come from, and how do you see the next decade?

Klaus Mühlhahn
Your question has many layers. Globally, we are in a time of shifts. Countries like India and China rightly demand greater access to resources and influence. For centuries, the West consumed the lion’s share and enjoyed the highest living standards. That arrangement cannot continue.

China’s recent confidence is grounded in its economic success, and it will continue to demand a greater voice. But history suggests such transitions are rarely peaceful. Established powers seldom make space voluntarily for new players. Unfortunately, I foresee more conflicts as competition for limited resources—water, clean air, sustainable growth—intensifies.

The coming decade will be marked by instability. The rules of the global order are uncertain, and China will persist in asserting what it considers its rights. Its growing weight makes this unavoidable.

Amogh Rai
Thank you very much, Professor. That was my final question.