The Factional Function of Print: Liang Qichao, Shibao, and the Fissures in the Late Qing Reform Movement

THE FACTIONAL FUNCTION OF PRINT: LIANG QICHAO, SHIBAO, AND THE FISSURES IN THE LATE QING REFORM MOVEMENT Joan Judge Shibao ("The Eastern Times"), the Shanghai daily which would become the most influential reform organ of its day, was one of the seventeen newspapers created or actively supported by Liang Qichao throughout his career as a publicist.1 Its history began by dictate from the group of reformists exiled to Tokyo after the 1898 coup. In the early spring of 1904, Kang Youwei instructed Di Baoxian and Luo Xiaogao, who were both living in Japan, to return to Shanghai and prepare for the establishment of the new daily.2 In April of that year, Liang Qichao risked visiting Shanghai in order to guide these preparations. Forced to remain under cover, he changed his name and took up residence on the third floor of the Japanese Tigers' Den hotel in the Hongkou Section of the city. During his approximately three week stay, Liang acted as Kang Youwei's emissary in laying the groundwork for the establishment of Shibao, meeting frequently with Di, who was to become the newspaper's future publisher, and Luo, who was to serve as general editor. It was Liang who chose the newspaper's name, wrote the Inaugural Statement for its first edition, and outlined its general regulations.3 Kang and Liang's role in founding Shibao, combined with the historicgraphical tendancy to view reform elites in this period as part of a single monolithic force, has led to the characterization of Shibao as either the propaganda organ of the exiled reformists, or as the mouthpiece of the constitutional movement.4 These representations fail, however, to reflect the complexity of the newspaper's network of affiliations, the distinctiveness of its own political positions, and the fissures that existed in the late Qing reform movement. 1Li 1985:85. 2Fang 1981:276. Luo Xiaogao was one of Kang Youwei's thirteen close disciples. Others included Liang Qichao, Ou Jujia, Luo Boya, Zhang Zhiru, Li Jingtong, and Tang Caichang. See Koseki 1985:21. 3Liang 1983:336-37. 4See for example Chang 1973:243-85; Min 1982:243-85. Late Imperial China. Vol. 16, No. 1 (June 1995): 120-140 120 The Factional Function of Print121 While the Shibao journalists were influenced by the same political events and cultural encounters that determined Liang Qichao's reformist stance—the 1898 coup, exile in Japan, exposure to foreign political theories in Tokyo— their experience diverged when they returned to China. As they took on new cultural roles in the realms of publicity and education, they undertook important innovations in the style and content of the press, establishing Shibao as the most widely circulated daily in the Jiangsu-Zhejiang region surrounding Shanghai. And while the Shibao writers were increasingly drawn into the complex of institutions and associations that constituted the Jiang-Zhe constitutionalist movement, they maintained their political and editorial independence . Answering to the newly awakened public opinion in the region rather than to the dictates of any one faction or party, they introduced an element of pluralism into the the early twentieth century reform agenda. Setting their own course in response to the rapidly developing events in the mainland, they defied Liang's efforts to control the activities and define the political meaning of the late Qing constitutionalist movement. Liang Qichao's Theory of Dangbao (Factional Newspapers) Liang Qichao, who was not only one of the most prolific journalists and masterful editors in the late-Qing period but also a theorist of the press, envisioned Shibao as a dangbao, or factional organ. It was not until Liang was exiled in Japan that he had begun to view the role of the press in this way. He had originally described the function of newspapers in more general terms, as a source of social and political cohesion. In his first and anonymous essay on the press in 1895, Liang stated that, whereas the ancients had collected the poetry of the common people in order to observe popular customs (caishi yiguan minfeng), it was newspapers that would now serve as the eyes, the ears, and the mouthpiece of society.5 A year later, in his essay entitled...