China's Good War by Rana Mitter

Author:Rana Mitter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harvard University Press

The Guofen Phenomenon

The skeptical viewpoint expressed by Cui Yongyuan is easier to find online than onscreen. One particular manifestation is the phenomenon known as the Guofen, or “Guomindang [Nationalist Party] fans” (the character fen 粉 is meant to be an approximation of the English word “fan”). Guofen are online, somewhat gonzo, supporters of the former Nationalist government. In 2015, Radio Free Asia interviewed one such figure, a woman named Wang Xueli, whose online name was Air (Kongqi) and who styled herself the leader of the Chinese mainland “Republican constitution faction.” Wang was one example of a phenomenon of the Minguo re (Republican craze), which had become fashionable particularly among well-educated urban types who wanted to find an expressive way to communicate their skepticism of the government.23 Air (a pseudonym she chose because she believed that air is the freest material that exists) was clearly at the more active end of this phenomenon, much of which was played out on social media. She claimed to be an advocate not only of Sun Yat-sen’s Three People’s Principles but also of the 1946 constitution—the troubled, only partially democratic constitution instituted by the Nationalists in the midst of China’s civil war—arguing that “ ‘the Republican Chinese constitution’ means the constitutional government of the Republic of China,” which she regarded as “democratic” in contrast with that of the CCP. Wang’s group had emerged in 2003 after online clashes with a rival group, whom they called “Maofen” (i.e., “Mao fans”). Wang claimed that her group had been boosted by a visit to the mainland in 2005 by Lien Chan, who at the time was chairman of the Nationalist Party based on Taiwan. During that visit, Wang said, Guofen came to Nanjing from all around China to visit Zijinshan, the site of the tomb of Sun Yat-sen, the founder of the Republic, as well as the Republican-era presidential palace, and “there was a second high tide in 2006, when we rethought the history of the War of Resistance.” “At the same time,” she noted, “we found more and more smart folks to propagandize for Republican history, even including more and more sympathizers within the system joining us.”24 Their main “battlefield” was on the QQ SMS system, but in 2011–2012 more material went up on the Chinese weblog system Weibo.

The Guofen did not emerge from thin air, so to speak. In the early 2000s there was increasing attention to the fenqing (“angry youth”; the fen is a different character from that in Guofen), young Chinese nationalists who spoke out strongly on patriotic issues and even criticized their own government for being overly soft on Japan.25 One such youth, Guo Quan, began his activism by investigating the Nanjing Massacre and obtained an academic position to pursue this work. Within a few years, he had become a full-blown critic of the government, and in 2008 he was arrested for advocating multi-party democracy.26

The Guofen exist in uneasy opposition to the government. While gauging overall numbers is impossible in the restrictive environment

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