| Due to the corruption and inability of the Qing government, the Revolution of 1911, initiated by a group of revolutionaries and led by Sun Yat-Sen, was motivated. With the flag “for the republic” over the whole revolution, the imperial dynasties over two thousand years were ended and a new republic was established in China thereafter. The Republic of China, as a republic, appeared in Asian countries for the first time, however, it did exist only for a short time and collapsed soon in the history. From historical experiences and intellectual contributions yielded by Hannah Arendt, constitutional republic is mostly interactive with modern revolutions. As far as the Revolution of 1911 is concerned, it is successful in terms of the revolution itself. On the one hand, the revolution successfully incorporated the element of republic in its process, such as “the new beginning”, “to break from the past”, “violence”, etc. On the other hand, the republic is also a key initiative for modern revolutions against feudal autocracy.After the Revolution of 1911, however, the construction of the Republic of China did not capture the key elements of the republic and derailed. Even many historians of China have mentioned that the main reason is lacking the knowledge of the republic, but no more intellectual details are given. As such, this paper explores the exact reason from comparative perspective. Meanwhile, accompanying with the rehabilitation of modern republicanism, many key features of the republic are examined from historical perspective. Many substances of the republic, such as the principle of people’s sovereign and the constitutional textualism, have been criticized and modified by some proponents of the modern republicanism, such as Frank Michelman and Cass Sunstein, as historical experiences have demonstrated the limits of these substances in modern states. Rather, the rule of law over the power and the dynamic institutions of the constitutionalism gradually gain much more significance for modern republic. |
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