The China Beat · China’s Lincolnophilia

Alan Wachtman, a Fletcher School alumnus, notes and critiques China’s embracing of Lincolnian unity rhetoric

In the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Abraham Lincoln’s stance on national unity during the U.S. Civil War and his opposition to the institution of slavery have been summoned up by PRC officials, media, and elites in efforts to explain and legitimate their own response to those they disparage as “separatists” in Taiwan and Tibet.

To Beijing, vigorously opposing separatism and preserving Chinese territorial integrity is a cause no less noble than was Abraham Lincoln’s resort to war as a way of preventing the secession of southern states. In its quest for moral authority, Beijing has recalled the rhetoric and posture of Abraham Lincoln toward the Confederacy, apparently unaware that it has misconstrued Lincoln’s sentiments by citing his words out of context, drawing erroneous lessons from the example of the U.S. Civil War.

PRC statesmen who cite Lincoln seem to imply that American citizens should appreciate the plight of the PRC and identify with it as analogous to that of the Union during the Civil War. They implore their audience to see them as responding no differently to the issue of China’s unity than did President Lincoln when he confronted the secession of southern states. Unfortunately, a shallow understanding of both American politics leading to the Civil War and of the opening chapter of that war make the recitation of Lincoln’s pledge to unity little more than a cheap parlor trick.

via The China Beat · China’s Lincolnophilia.

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