Traditional May Fourth scholarship tends to see the period as a sharp break from the past. Before 1915, China is treated as a pre-modern society while after 1915, China was on the track to becoming a modern state. However, the Late Qing already cultivated a public sphere through newspapers and journals, specifically shenbao and Eastern Miscellany, where different opinions could be expressed.

What is the background of the May 4th Movement?

After the abdication of the Qing Emperor, the Chinese Beiyang government was preoccupied with suppressing internal dissent and did little to counter the influence exerted by imperialist foreign powers. The Beiyang government made various concessions to foreigners in order to gain monetary and military support against their rivals. This, together with the tangled warfare among

warlords which was still continuing led to great suffering among the population. Furthermore, the development of the New Cultural Movement promoted the questioning and re-appraisal of millennia-old Chinese values. In addition, defeats against foreign powers and the presence of spheres of influence only further inflamed the sense of nationalism among the Chinese people, particularly in students.

With the growth and development of new social forces in that period, a powerful camp made its appearance in the bourgeois-democratic revolution, a camp consisting of the working class, the student masses and the new national bourgeoisie. Since 1915, young intellectuals had been inspired by Chen Duxiu began agitating for the reform and strengthening of Chinese society through acceptance of Western science, democracy, and schools of thought, one objective being to make China strong enough to resist Western imperialism.

How has the May Fourth Movement happened?

May Fourth Movement is the first mass movement in modern Chinese history. On May 4, about 5,000 university students in Beijing protested the Versailles Conference awarding Japan the former German leasehold of Jiaozhou, Shandong province.

What is the function of intellectuals?

In the Chinese democratic revolutionary movement, it was the intellectuals who were the first to awaken. This was clearly demonstrated both in the Revolution of 1911 and in the May 4th Movement, and in the days of the May 4th Movement the intellectuals were more numerous and more politically conscious than in the days of the Revolution of 1911. But the intellectuals will accomplish nothing if they fail to integrate themselves with the workers and peasants. In the final analysis, the dividing line between revolutionary intellectuals and non-revolutionary or counter-revolutionary intellectuals is whether or not they are willing to integrate themselves with the workers and peasants and actually do so. Ultimately it is this alone, and not professions of faith in the Three People's Principles or in Marxism, that distinguishes one from the other. A true revolutionary must be one who is willing to integrate himself with the workers and peasants and actually does so.

What are requests of this movement?

1. To abolish all imperialist privileges, such as foreigners' immunity in Chinese courts, in China.
2. To cancel the "Twenty-One Demands" with the Japanese

What is the result of the May 4th Movement?

After more than a month of demonstrations, strikes, and boycotts of Japanese goods, the government gave way and refused to sign the peace treaty with Germany. The movement spurred the successful reorganization of the Nationalist Party and gave birth to the Chinese Communist Party.

What is the influence of May Fourth Movement?

The people in the movement talked about a wide range of different topics and to a wider range of people than ever before. Introducing the Vernacular Chinese, also people with just a little education could read texts, articles and books.

The May Fourth Movement was a thoroughly anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolutionary movement. Young students acted as its pioneers. The Chinese working class went up on the political stage, and functioned as the main force in the later period of the movement.

The May Fourth Movement covered more than 20 provinces and over 100 cities of the country. It had a broader popular foundation than the Revolution of 1911. Its great contribution lay in arousing the people's consciousness and preparing for the unity of the revolutionary forces. It promoted the spreading of Marxism in China, and prepared the ideological foundation for the establishment of the Communist Party of China.

The May Fourth Movement marked the beginning of the New Democratic Revolution in China. It is also a thoroughgoing, uncompromising revolutionary movement against imperialism and feudalism.