History

When Western traders arrived in the 16th century, China was initially hostile to them. The first Western base was Portugal's colony Macau, near Guangzhou (Canton).

The Emperor imposed various restrictions on trade, allowing Westerns to trade only at Canton (Guangzhou), only with payment in silver,

By the end of the 19th century, various Western powers had taken various pieces of China (Hong Kong, Macau, the left bank of the Amur River, northern Burma and parts of central Asia) and trade was well established. The relationship, however, was fraught with difficulties. Westerners tended to see China as corrupt and decadent. Chinese often viewed the West as greedy and contemptible.

The great issue, however, was opium. For the West, the profitable commodities were "pigs and poison", indentured laborers and opium. Britain's balance of trade — paying for tea and silk in silver and being quite unable to interest Chinese in most British products — would have been disastrous without opium. However, by growing opium in India and exporting vast amounts to China, they were able to have a nice trade surplus. Some Chinese colluded in this, and made fortunes from it, but every Chinese government from the Qing to the present day has been unalterably opposed to the trade.

Several wars were fought in China in that century.

Two Opium Wars (1839-1842 and 1856-1860) pitted China against Western powers. China quickly lost both wars. After the first one, Britain got Hong Kong island, and five "treaty ports" (Guangzhou, Xiamen, Fuzhou, Shanghai and Ningbo) were opened to Western trade; after the second, Britain got Kowloon, and inland cities such as Nanjing and Wuhan were opened to trade.
There were several Muslim rebellions in Western China. The suppression of these rebellions brought what is now Xinjiang firmly under central rule.
The Tai Ping Rebellion (1851-1864) was led by a madman claiming to be Christ's younger brother. It was largely a peasant revolt; its program included land reform and eliminating slavery, concubinage, arranged marriage, opium, footbinding, judicial torture, and idolatry. The Qing government, with some Western help, eventually defeated them, but not before the Taiping had ruled much of China for over ten years. This was one of the bloodiest wars ever fought; only World War II killed more people.
In 1895, China lost the Sino-Japanese war and ceded Taiwan to Japan. In addition, it had to relinquish control of Korea, which had been a tributary state of China for a long time.
Many Chinese resented various things in this period — notably missionaries, opium, grabbing Chinese land, and the extraterritoriality provisions in the "unequal treaties" that made many foreigners immune to Chinese law. To the West trade and missionaries were good things, and extraterritoriality was prudent in view of the corrupt and brutal laws in place.

The 20th century brought revolution. The empire was overthrown in 1911 and Sun Yat Sen, a doctor, nationalist, socialist and democrat, became president. He stepped down shortly thereafter allowing the former Qing general Yuan Shikai to become president. After an abortive attempt at declaring himself emperor, Yuan died in 1916. Central rule then collapsed as China broke into different semi-autonomous warlord regions. In 1926-28 a united front between the Kuomintang (Nationalists) and Communists united much of China proper under Kuomintang rule after the "Northern Expidition." During the Northern Expidition, the Kuomintang turned on the Communists in 1927 killing thousands and driving the movement underground. During this time, Mao Zedong set up a base area in the mountains of Jiangxi Province called the Jiangxi Soviet.

In the 1930s the Kuomintang launched a series of encirclement and extermination campaigns designed to crush the Communists. Pressure on the Jiangxi Soviet forced the Communists and their Chinese Workers and Peasants Red Army to break out and flee west in 1934. The "Long March" led the Red Army from Jiangxi across southern and western China before ending in 1935 in Yan'an in Shaanxi Province.

Meanwhile, after the 1895 war Japan continued its imperial expansion in East Asia, invaded Manchuria in 1931 and conquered much of eastern China by the late 30s. China had other problems as well, such as civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, civil unrest and major famines. In 1937, the Kuomintang and Communists signed a tenuous agreement to form a united front against Japan. However the agreement largely broke down by 1940-41 and the Communists under Mao Zedong and the Kuomintang under Chiang Kai Shek openly fought each other. Throughout the period from 1911 to 1949 various warlords fought challenges to their local power from any outsider, regardless of nationality or ideology.

After World War II, outright civil war resumed. More Chinese were killed in this than in resisting Japan. In 1949, the Communists won, causing the Kuomintang to grab the national gold reserves and imperial treasure, and then flee to Taiwan where it set it up shop and promised to recapture the Mainland.

The Communist government imposed strict controls over everyday life; basically, the Party ran everything. They also indulged in various experiments such as the Great Leap Forward, intended to industrialize China quickly, and the Cultural Revolution, aimed at changing everything by discipline and attention to Mao Zedong Thought. These failed at a disastrous cost and crippled China's economy more than anything else. The effects of the Cultural Revolution in particular can still be seen today; many traditional Chinese customs, such as the celebration of the Hungry Ghost Festival(???), are still thriving in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and overseas Chinese communities such as those in Singapore and Malaysia, but have largely disappeared in mainland China.

Mao Zedong died in 1976 and Deng Xiaoping came to power shortly after. After 1978, Deng gradually introduced market-oriented reforms and decentralized economic decision making. Economic output quadrupled by 2000 and is still rising at 9% a year or so, but there are still problems — serious inflation in the 80s, pollution, rural poverty, and corruption. Political controls remain tight even though economic policy continues to be relaxed,

enough for China to secure admission to the World Trade Organization. October 2007 saw the official guarantees on private property, a clear step away from hardcore communism and in 2003, the Party changed its statutes to accept a new category of members: "good capitalist communists."

The current president, Hu Jintao, has proclaimed a policy for a "Harmonious Society" which promises to restore balanced economic growth and to channel investment and prosperity into China's hinterlands, which have been largely left behind in the economic boom since 1978. This policy involves additional tax breaks for farmers, a rural medical insurance scheme, reduction/elimination of school tuition fees and infrastructure development to encourage investment in underdeveloped areas, e.g. the Beijing/Lhasa railway - a dream first put down on paper by Sun Yat Sen in the early 1900s.