Cold War Cities; The Politics of Space in Europe and Asia during the 1950s 2021009878, 9780367179823, 9781032061306, 9780429058844

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Cold War Cities

This book is a dynamic study of the range of experiences of the Cold War in Europe, East Asia, and Southeast Asia in the 20th century. Comprised of ten chapters from a diverse team of scholars from Europe, East Asia, and North America, this edited volume furthers the study of the Cold War in two ways. First, it underscores the global scope of the Cold War. Beginning from Europe and extending to East and Southeast Asia, it focuses attention on the overlapping local, national, regional, and international rivalries that ultimately divided the world into two opposing camps. Second, it shows that the Cold War had different impacts in different places. Although not all continents are included, this volume demonstrates that the bipolar system was not monolithic and uniform. By comparing experiences in various cities, this book critically examines the ways in which the bipolar system was circumvented or transformed – particularly in places where the line between the Free World and the Communist World was unclear. Cold War Cities will appeal to students and scholars of history and Cold War studies, cultural geography, and material cultures, as well as East and Southeast Asian studies. Tze-ki Hon is Professor at Research Centre for History and Culture, Beijing Normal University at Zhuhai, China, and BNU-HKBU United International College. Previously, he taught at City University of Hong Kong, State University of New York at Geneseo, and Hanover College, Indiana. He wrote three books: The Yijing and Chinese Politics, The Allure of the Nation, and Revolution as Restoration. He co-edited four volumes: The Politics of Historical Production in Late Qing and Republican China, Beyond the May 4th Paradigm, The Decade of the Great War, and Confucianism for the Contemporary World. And he co-authored Teaching the I Ching (Book of Changes) with Geoffrey Redmond.

Routledge Studies in the Modern History of Asia

158  Britain, Japan and China, 1876–1895 East Asian International Relations before the First Sino-Japanese War Yu Suzuki 159  A History of the Modern Chinese Navy, 1840–2020 Bruce A. Elleman 160  Planting Parliaments in Eurasia, 1850–1950 Concepts, Practices, and Mythologies Edited by Ivan Sablin and Egas Moniz Bandeira 161  Chinese Theatre Troupes in Southeast Asia Touring Diaspora 1900s – 1970s Zhang Beiyu 162  Memories of the Japanese Empire Comparison of the Colonial and Decolonisation Experiences in Taiwan and Nan’yō Guntō Edited by Yuko Mio 163  P  rostitutes, Hostesses, and Actresses at the Edge of the Japanese Empire Nobuko Yamasaki 164  Cold War Cities The Politics of Space in Europe and Asia during the 1950s Edited by Tze-ki Hon 165  Chineseness and the Cold War Contested Cultures and Diaspora in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong Edited by Jeremy E. Taylor and Lanjun Xu For a full list of available titles please visit: www.routledge.com/RoutledgeStudies-in-the-Modern-History-of-Asia/book-series/MODHISTASIA

Cold War Cities

The Politics of Space in Europe and Asia during the 1950s Edited by Tze-ki Hon

First published 2022 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2022 selection and editorial matter, Tze-ki Hon; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Tze-ki Hon to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Hon, Tze-Ki, 1958– editor. Title: Cold War cities : the politics of space in Europe and Asia during the 1950s / edited by Tze-ki Hon. Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2022. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Subjects: LCSH: Cold War—Social aspects—Europe. | Cold War—Social aspects—Asia. | Cities and towns—Europe—History—20th century. | Cities and towns—Asia—History—20th century. | Sociology, Urban— Europe—History—20th century. | Sociology, Urban—Asia—History— 20th century. | Europe—Social conditions—20th century. | Asia—Social conditions—20th century. Classification: LCC D842.5 .C65 2022 | DDC 320.8095/09045—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021009878 ISBN: 978-0-367-17982-3 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-06130-6 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-05884-4 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844 Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC

This book is dedicated to global travellers who make the world full of colours, creativity, and vitality.

Contents

List of figuresix Acknowledgementsx List of authorsxi

Introduction: the Cold War from a socio-geographical perspective

1

TZE-KI HON

PART 1

Cityscape as a signifying system7   1 Space, sexuality, and social rebuilding in post-World War II Berlin

9

JENNIFER V. EVANS

  2 Modern architecture as ideological representations: East Berlin, West Berlin, and Hong Kong

19

LIZA WING MAN KAM

  3 “Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?: the state, city administration, and scales of reconstruction in post-war Paris, 1944–1977

38

STEPHEN W. SAWYER

  4 Protesting in Paris: public space and the politics of urban appropriation, 1944–1990 ALAIN CHATRIOT

52

viii  Contents PART 2

Cityscape as a site of multiple memories65   5 Beyond spatial liminality: “Chinese” student returnees in 1950s’ Guangzhou

67

ELS VAN DONGEN

  6 The question of people: cultural Cold War in 1950s’ Hong Kong

88

TZE-KI HON AND HOK-YIN CHAN

  7 Honouring revolutionary heroes: the political uses of Martyrs’ Shrines in Taiwan

101

VLADIMIR STOLOJAN-FILIPESCO

PART 3

Cityscape as a front line of physical and mental warfare119   8 Cities and fears of biological warfare during the early Cold War

121

ALBERT WU

  9 Class, gender, and the charismatic female subject: Hong Kong cinema during the Cold War era

135

VIVIAN P.Y. LEE

10 “Let Raffles stand where he stands today”: a symbol of the colonial in Singapore during the Cold War

148

YING-KIT CHAN

Index171

Figures

2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 6.1 6.2 6.3 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4

Karl-Marx-Allee Laubengangshäuser Close-Up of Karl-Marx-Allee The Edinburgh Place Complex The Central Axis of Edinburgh Place Complex The Memorial Garden of Song Emperor’s Terrace The Song Emperor’s Terrace Road The Song Emperor’s Terrace Memorial Tablet The Taoyuan City Martyrs’ Shrine The Arch of the National Revolutionary Army Martyrs’ Shrine The National Revolutionary Army Martyrs’ Shrine The Taichung City Martyrs’ Shrine

26 27 28 32 33 92 93 95 105 107 108 109

Acknowledgements

Most of the chapters of this volume are drawn from papers presented at the conference “Global Cities: The Networks of Connectivity in East Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific Region, 1850–1950” held at City University of Hong Kong on April 13–14, 2018. I would like to thank the organizer – the Department of Chinese and History, City University of Hong Kong – for providing a lively and amicable environment for academic discussion. I would also like to thank Kristin Stapleton and Marie Thynell for their participation in the conference and their valuable suggestions for the edited volume. By a stroke of fate, the preparation for this volume took place during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. As the world came to a standstill and people were forced to self-isolate, I was grateful that the authors of this volume reached out to one another to bring this collaborative project to completion. Scattered around the world and separated by thousands of miles, we proved that we had the will to overcome obstacles and adversity. We showed that the world is indeed round if we put our hearts and minds together. Tze-ki Hon Hong Kong, December 30, 2020

List of authors

Hok-yin Chan is Associate Professor at the Department of Chinese and History in the City University of Hong Kong. He is the author of May Fourth in Hong Kong: Colonialism, Nationalism, and Localism (in Chinese) (2014). Ying-kit Chan is Research Fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies, Leiden University. He received his PhD in East Asian Studies from Princeton University and his BA and MA in Chinese Studies from the National University of Singapore. He serves on the editorial board of the Malaysian Journal of Chinese Studies and is the editorial assistant of Nan Nü: Men, Women and Gender in China. His articles have appeared in journals such as Asian Studies Review, Asian Survey, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Modern Asian Studies, South East Asia Research, and Southeast Asian Studies. Alain Chatriot is Professor at Département d’Histoire in Sciences-Po, Paris, France. His publications include Pierre Mendès France. Pour une République moderne, (2015), La politique du blé. Crises et régulations d’un marché dans la France de l’entre-deux-guerres (2016), co-editor (with M.E. Chessel and M. Hilton), The Expert Consumer: Associations and Professionals in Consumer Society (2006). Jennifer V. Evans is Professor of History at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. Publications: Life Among the Ruins: Cityscape and Sexuality in Cold War Berlin (2011); co-editor of Global Encyclopedia of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer History (2019); The Ethics of Seeing; Photography and Twentieth-Century German History (2018); Was ist Homosexualität? Foschungsgeschichte, gesellschaftliche Entwicklungen und Perspektiven (2014); Queer Cities, Queer Cultures: Europe Since 1945 (2013). Tze-ki Hon is Professor at Research Centre for History and Culture, Beijing Normal University at Zhuhai 519087, China, and BNU-HKBU United International College. Previously, he taught at City University of Hong Kong, State University of New York at Geneseo, and Hanover College, Indiana. He wrote three books: The Yijing and Chinese Politics, The Allure of the Nation, and Revolution as Restoration. He co-edited four volumes: The Politics of Historical Production in Late Qing and Republican China, Beyond the May 4th

xii  List of authors Paradigm, The Decade of the Great War, and Confucianism for the Contemporary World. And he co-authored Teaching the I Ching (Book of Changes) with Geoffrey Redmond. Liza Wing Man Kam is Assistant Professor at the Department of East Asian Studies in Georg-August University of Göttingen. Formerly she was Research Fellow at the Max-Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Germany. She has published works on the material and symbolic transformation of colonial urban heritage in the neo-/post-colonial Hong Kong and Taiwan. Her research interest includes and goes beyond: relation between architecture, historiography, identity and civic awareness, and the intellectual trajectories of design and culinary culture with empire expansions. Vivian P.Y. Lee is Associate Professor at the Department of Chinese and History in the City University of Hong Kong. She teaches and researches on Hong Kong and East Asian cinemas, Hong Kong culture, and heritage policy and practices in Hong Kong. She is the author of Hong Kong Cinema Since 1997: The Post-nostalgic Imagination (2009) and editor of East Asian Cinemas: Regional Flows and Global Transformations (2011). Her work has been published in collected volumes and academic journals, including Journal of Chinese Cinemas, Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, Chinese Films in Focus 2 (2008), and International Journal of Heritage Studies. Her latest book is The Other Side of Glamour: The Left-Wwing Studio Network in Hong Kong Cinema in the Cold War Era and Beyond (2020). Stephen W. Sawyer is Professor of History and Political Science at the American University of Paris and Chair of the History and Politics Department. He is the author of Demos Assembled: Democracy and the International Origins of the Modern State, 1840–1880 (2018) and Adolphe Thiers, La contingence et le pouvoir (Armand Colin, 2018) and has co-edited numerous volumes, including In Search of the Liberal Moment: Democracy, Antitotalitarianism and Intellectual Politics in France since 1950 (2016); Pierre Rosanvallon’s Political Thought (2018); Michel Foucault, Neoliberalism and Beyond (2019); and Boundaries of the State in US History (2015). Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco is Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Institute of Sociology, Academia Sinica, Associate Member, CESSMA, Université de Paris. Els van Dongen is Assistant Professor at the History Programme in Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She is the author of Realistic Revolution: Contesting Chinese History, Culture, and Politics after 1989 (2019). Albert Wu is Associate Research Fellow at the Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan. His first book, From Christ to Confucius: German Missionaries, Chinese Christians, and the Globalization of Christianity, 1860–1950, appeared in 2016. He is currently working on a second book project related to histories of global health.

Introduction The Cold War from a sociogeographical perspective Tze-ki Hon

Global Cold War In recent years, based on new insights and newly discovered sources, we have gained a deeper understanding of the enormous scope and scale of the Cold War (1947–1991). Rather than purely an ideological and military confrontation between the USA and the USSR, the Western and Eastern Blocs, the NATO and the Warsaw Pact, we now know that the Cold War was a global balance of power that involved large numbers of players around the world, especially the Third World nations (Westad 2007, 1–7). While it created a nuclear arms race that threatened to destroy the world at one stroke, we now know that the Cold War developed in fits and starts, mixing moments of danger and tension with moments of hope and joy (O’Mara 2004, 17–97). In addition to intense meetings among top diplomats that led to a détente between the USA and the USSR, we now know that the Cold War affected the daily life of millions of people around the world in the name of development and progress, including how they lived and relaxed, where they studied and worked, what they saw on silver screen and television, and where to buy food and groceries (Lorenzini 2019, 1–7). In short, as much as the Cold War was global in scope, it was local in practice. While its overarching theme was a battle between “good” and “evil,” “freedom” and “collectivism,” “market economy,” and “planned economy,” the Cold War was full of variations, complexity, and idiosyncrasy in each and every place it touched. With ten chapters written by a team of scholars based in continental Europe, East Asia, and North America, this edited volume furthers the study of the Cold War in two ways. First, it underscores the global scope of the Cold War. Beginning from Europe and extending to East and Southeast Asia, it focuses attention on the overlapping local, national, regional, and international rivalries that ultimately divided the world into two opposing camps. Second, it shows that the Cold War had different impacts in different places. Although not all continents are included, this volume demonstrates that the bipolar system was not monolithic and uniform. There were ways to circumvent or transform the bipolar system, particularly in places where the line between the Free World and the Communist World was unclear.

DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-1

2  Tze-ki Hon In this volume, we pay special attention to cities. By focusing on cities – or cityscapes, the landscapes of cities – we show how space can be used as a signifier in demarcating the two rival camps and in registering local differences and nuances. To us, space is not only concrete or fixed like land, place, and territory. It is also a symbol of power that conditions human thinking and behaviour by identifying frontlines, the zones of contact, and the spheres of influence (Lefebvre 1991, 1–67; Brenner and Edlen 2009, 365–67; Harvey 1991, 429–31). Viewing the Cold War through the lens of spatial configuration – such as turning bunkers into shelters, expanding roads into boulevards, placing monuments in strategic locations, creating new education institutions to project an image of openness, transforming temples into martyr shrines – this volume offers a unique perspective on how cities were the sites of inclusion and exclusion, delineation and negotiation, transition and transgression in the global confrontation between the Free World and the Communist World.

Cold War cities In examining the symbolism of cityscape, we draw on the recent theories of cultural geography. We are particularly interested in the complex relationship between landscape and collective identity. We consider landscape as “an object of human perception and practice” (Miles-Watson 2015, 2; see also Mitchell [1994] 2002, ii–xii; Alderman and Inwood 2013). More importantly, we see landscape as “a signifying system” that communicates ideas, conveys meanings, and expresses emotions of the people who live there (Duncan 1990, 3–7, 11–24). As a form of cultural production, landscape not only links “site” with “sight” (Mitchell [1994] 2002, 2) but also serves as a tool in establishing order, including cultural order, economic order, political order, and social order (Legg 2007, 210–20). In this volume, we emphasize the local variations in the Cold War by comparing European and Asian cities. The goal of this transcontinental comparison is twofold. First, it fills a lacuna in the current scholarship of the Cold War that tends to exclude Asian experiences (Szony and Liu 2010, 1–7). Second, it highlights the different impacts of the Cold War in different places. As shown in the ten chapters, the differences between the European and Asian cities were not just historical and cultural but also geopolitical; that is, the differences pertained to where the cities were located on the map of global rivalry. The irony – and hence, the complexity – of “Cold War cities” was that their landscapes must fit their roles in the bipolar scheme, even though in many cases the global geopolitics did not match the reality on the ground. Of course, the most spectacular Cold War city was Berlin. Its division into two halves symbolized, physically and ideologically, the division of the world into two rival camps. But there were many other examples of “Cold War cities” that were equally important to justify the new global order, such as transforming Hong Kong into the “Berlin of the East,” converting Taipei into a frontier that contained communist expansion, and expanding Guangzhou (also known as Canton) into a hub for exporting communist revolution to Southeast Asia. To assume their

Introduction  3 new roles in the bipolar system, “Cold War cities” must undergo massive urban renewal to create new landmarks and new landscapes. Consequently, their people must adjust to the new order of life shaped by a new set of geographical designs.

Fluidity and liminality The 1950s was a period of time when the bipolar system was not yet fully solidified, hence the line between the Eastern and Western Blocs was not fixed (Komska 2011, 155–63). This lack of clarity allowed people, products, and even propaganda materials to travel back and forth, creating a confusing but lively atmosphere. For this reason, how to create a physical landscape to project a mental landscape was a deciding factor in winning hearts and minds (Alderman and Inwood 2013, 235– 48; Johnson 2004, 320–25). To highlight the importance of this battle of hearts and minds, we pay special attention to Cold War outposts such as Berlin, Paris, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taipei. We see these outposts as liminal spaces because they were the zones of negotiation and contestation among different forces or groups of players. They were betwixt and between the Free World and the Communist World, the local and the regional, and the domestic and the foreign. Yet they were the crucial nodes in the bipolar system, announcing to the world that the globe was indeed divided into two halves. In this volume, we focus primarily on the 1950s because the Cold War was still “cold” during this period of time. Despite the intensification in rivalry between the Free World and the Communist World (such as the Korean War, 1950–1953), the rivalry had not yet reached the point of potential catastrophic destruction (e.g., the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962). Throughout the 1950s, there was widespread anxiety around the world about an imminent nuclear war between the two superpowers, but there was optimism that the nuclear war could be avoided if political leaders were careful and patient. People in East Asia and Southeast Asia felt a bit safer because they believed they were far from the battleground of a nuclear war, even though any nuclear war would cause widespread damage. And they were a bit optimistic about the future after witnessing the surge of the Third World power (as shown in the Bandung Conference in 1955) and the rise of national liberation movements (as shown in the French debacle in Dien Bien Phu in 1954). Their hope and optimism might prove to be premature or overly rosy. Yet they showed that the Cold War was never monolithic and uniform. While it was a global saga covering millions of people around the world, it was also a series of local events that varied from city to city, community to community, and person to person. In retrospect, a major characteristic of the Cold War was that it was essentially a global-local event.

Threefold analysis of cityscape This volume consists of three parts. Each part is devoted to one aspect of cityscape. Taking a bird’s-eye view, the first part compares two European cities: Berlin and Paris. Although much has been written on these two storied cities, the four

4  Tze-ki Hon authors in this part (Evans, Kam, Sawyer, and Chatriot) offer a new perspective by emphasizing the different fates of these two cities. In their chapters, they do not focus on any particular place in these two cities. They look instead at the landscapes of the two cities as “a signifying system” denoting a clear message to the world. The four authors together point out a paradox. Being a “city of ruins” at the end of World War II, Berlin was split in half and was aggressively rebuilt to demarcate the boundary between the Free World and the Communist World. The line on the ground separating the Eastern and Western Blocs was re-drawn on the streets of Berlin as if the city was now a metaphor for the global rivalry. Yet, whether through the rubble of “a ruined city” (Evans) or through the glory of modernism architecture (Kam), Berlin continued to display its charm as a city of contradictions. Conversely, having escaped massive destruction in World War II, Paris was transformed into a “city of protests,” where spirited (and sometimes violent) urban demonstrations took place in front of shops and restaurants that served wealthy patrons. For Sawyer and Chatriot, there was a self-generating momentum in these street protests. As Paris acquired more complexity by assuming new roles as a European city of the Western Bloc and a global centre of anti-colonialist movement, the spatial organization of Paris became increasingly fluid and volatile. The streets were turned into battlegrounds to sort out local, municipal, national, and international differences. In this first part of the book, the different fates of Berlin and Paris show the different impacts of the Cold War on different people, including people who were supposedly on the same side of the global rivalry. Although the Cold War in East Asia was less intense compared to Europe, the authors in part two of the book (van Dongen, Hon and H.Y. Chan, and Stolojanfilipesco) argue that East Asian cities underwent the same degree of change due to the bipolar system. Representing the Eastern Bloc, cities in mainland China (known as the People’s Republic of China, PRC) were rebuilt to express the Communist leaders’ ambition to push the country forward in completing the socialist revolution. Guangzhou (an ancient port city) was remade to fit the new global order. As van Dongen points out, the remaking of Guangzhou was full of tension as the city was given a new mission to absorb and re-educate the returnees from Southeast Asia who were capitalists by Marxist classification. In contrast, representing the Western Bloc, cities in Kuomintang-controlled Taiwan (known as the Republic of China, ROC) were rebuilt to promote cultural nationalism as an antidote to Communism. In this contestation, chronology was a key factor. Whereas the cities on the mainland were symbols of the Communist utopia, an ideal that must be reached, cities in Taiwan (as Stolojan-filipesco points out) were signs of the past, denoting an unbroken tradition that would thrive in the modern days. In both cases, new landscapes were created to transform the old memories for the Cold War rivalry. They support Pierre Nora’s argument that collective memory is multiple and conflictual (Nora 1989). Between these two forms of city – the city of the future and the city of the past – Hong Kong stood out as the “Berlin of the East.” Paradoxically, it was geographically located at the doorstep of Communist China, but it was ideologically

Introduction  5 part of the Western Bloc. As large numbers of refugees crossed the border to settle in the colony during the 1950s, how to differentiate “good Chinese” from “bad Chinese” or “Red Chinese” from “Chinese of Free China” became a pressing issue. As Hon and H.Y. Chan find out, the Hong Kong government must change the identities of the refugees by changing their memories – their links to the past. The third part of the book focuses on how a cityscape could contribute to creating a mental landscape. The three authors in this part (Wu, Lee, and Y.K. Chan) discuss fear as a recurring theme in the Cold War. In the divided world, fear arose from different sources. It might come from a biological warfare that began in World War II and was dramatically escalated during the Cold War (Wu). It might come from unstable political situations or a lack of economic development due to wars, blockages, and economic sanctions (Lee). It might come from a drastic reconfiguration of the political landscape due to the departure of a colonial power (Y.K. Chan). But the three authors also see glimmers of hope in the darkest hour. Two cases are particularly poignant: Hong Kong remained a neutral zone after it became “the Berlin of the East”, and Singapore was reinvented as a meeting point between the two giants in the region: India and China. Echoing what has been discussed in the second part of the book, the three authors in this part acknowledge that a new collective identity must be built. On this score, whether it was the international report on biological warfare (Wu), the female figures on the silver screen (Lee), or the statue of Raffles on the waterfront of Singapore’s downtown (Y.K. Chan), the past still had a strong hold upon the present. Indeed, “the past is never dead,” as William Faulkner told us long ago. The three parts of the book together show a variety of roles that cities played in the 1950s. In addition to symbolizing modernity and urbanity, cities were sites of inclusion and exclusion, coercion and oppression, transition and transgression in a divided world. They were also arenas where political protests, mass movements, and transnational networking took place in response to the competition between the Free World and the Communist World. More importantly, they were the liminal spaces where local, national, regional, and international forces converged to cope with, or to undermine, the bipolar system. When we look back to the history of the 1950s, we see cities as signifiers of both the bipolar confrontation and the human quest for connection and partnership. As always, cities are complex, dynamic, and multifaceted.

Bibliography Alderman, Derek H., and Joshua F. J. Inwood. 2013. “Landscape of Memory and Socially Just Futures.” In Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Cultural Geography, edited by Nuala C. Johnson, Richard H. Schein, and Jamie Winders, 235–48. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons. Brenner, Neil, and Stuart Edlen. 2009. “Henri Lefebvre on State, Space, Territory.” International Political Sociology 3: 353–77. Duncan, James S. 1990. The City as Text: The Politics of Landscape Interpretation in the Kandyan Kingdom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

6  Tze-ki Hon Harvey, David. 1991. “Afterword.” In The Production of Space, edited by Henri Lefebvre and translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith, 425–32. Oxford: Blackwell. Johnson, Nuala. 2004. “Public Memory.” In A Companion to Cultural Geography, edited by James S. Duncan, Nuala C. Johnson, and Richard H. Schein, 316–27. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. Komska, Yuliya. 2011. “Ruins of the Cold War.” New German Critique 112: 155–80, Winter. Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith. Oxford: Blackwell. Legg, Stephen. 2007. Spaces of Colonialism: Delhi’s Urban Governmentalities. Maiden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. Lorenzini, Sara. 2019. Global Development: A Cold War History. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Miles-Watson, Jonathan. 2015. “Introduction: Ruptured Landscapes.” In Ruptured Landscapes: Landscape, Identities and Social Change, edited by Helen Sooväli-Sepping, Hugo Reinert, and Jonathan Miles-Watson, 1–8. Dordrecht: Springer. Mitchell, W. J. T. [1994] 2002. “Preface to the Second Edition of Landscape and Power: Space, Place, and Landscape.” In Landscape and Power, edited by W. J. T. Mitchell, 2nd ed. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. O’Mara, Margaret Pugh. 2004. Cities of Knowledge: Cold War Science and the Search for the Next Silicon Valley. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Szonyi, Michael, and Hong Liu. 2010, “Introduction: New Approaches to the Study of the Cold War in Asia.” In The Cold War in Asia: The Battle for Hearts and Minds, edited by Zheng Yangwen, Hong Liu, and Michael Szonyi, 1–11. Leiden: Brill. Westad, Odd Arne. 2007. The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Part 1

Cityscape as a signifying system

1 Space, sexuality, and social rebuilding in post-World War II Berlin Jennifer V. Evans

Upon returning to his apartment in the once-tony district of Charlottenburg, British observer Lieutenant Colonel W. Byford-Jones described what he had witnessed in a recent tour of the city centre: I saw the Kurfurstendamm, a miserable colourless heap of ruins . . . the Dom . . . its broken ribs spiking the sky . . . the Tiergarten, littered with wreckage, its elms and firs blasted and shattered, its gardens churned up, its pool grey and smeared with oil. . . . My room, from which I could look out north, east and west over the grey ruins of the city and watch, among them, the troglodytes creeping over piles of rubble or burrowing their way into cellars, was on the Kurfurstendamm, Berlin’s Piccadilly . . . from beneath it, rising on the heat of the day to my bedroom, came a hideous smell of dampness, of charred remains, of thousands of putrefying bodies. (Byford-Jones 1947, 19) With little doubt, area bombing, street fighting, mass rape, and occupation put a violent end to Berlin’s metropolitan trappings. In the central districts, those most heavily affected by the two-year bombing campaign, very little remained of Berlin’s former glory. Over 350 air attacks dropped more than 45,000 tonnes of explosives on the waiting city. With over 28 square kilometres of its pre-war surface area destroyed, generating anywhere between 55 and 100 cubic metres of rubble – one-sixth of all the rubble in Germany proper (Hellwig 1967, 5) – Berlin was a debris field, “the greatest pile of rubble” the world had ever seen (Howley 1950, 8). Nightly bombing completely transformed the physical geography of the city, levelling buildings, leaving behind mounds of rebar, concrete, and sand. The hustle and bustle of Potsdamer Platz, once the symbol of the city’s modernity, with its automobiles and six-sided traffic light had been completely devastated, creating a pre-industrial steppe inside the city limits that would remain undeveloped until unification (Roth 2003). The Tiergarten’s ponds, lined with sunbathers in seasonable summers, were choked with oil (Byford-Jones 1947, 19); craters and cesspools existed where parkland and canals once beckoned flaneurs in search of urban escape. Of the city’s inhabitable space, a full third of all pre-war apartment DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-2

10  Jennifer V. Evans houses lay crumbled, with even more tenements damaged beyond repair (Bohleber 1990, 15; Rürup 2005, 59–60). Berlin had survived the last days, but its infrastructure, its housing, and its spirit were broken. What remained was a shattered cityscape pockmarked with bullet holes, charred and rotting. To many, like journalist Curt Riess, it was “a dying city” (Riess 1952 72), a veritable necropolis that historians Monica Black and Brian Ladd have described as inhabited by phantoms of the fallen and the felled (Black 2007; Ladd 1998). As Berliners crawled out from their hiding places, emerged from their cellar communities, or returned from the front or exile, they encountered the physical ravages of war everywhere they turned (Mierendorf in Martin and Schoppmann 1996, 139). Seizing on the corrupting influence of the destroyed landscape, police, welfare workers, city planners, and architects worked quickly to develop strategies to deal with what they saw as “the criminality of the ruins” (von Hentig 1947, 338). The urgency was great, as critics feared Germany was not simply a “rubble heap in a material sense but had reached an exceptional low point in a moral sense as well” (Weingartner 1951). Drawing on strands of research in historical geography, this essay examines the overlapping place of Berlin’s rubblescape as a highly gendered and sexualized contact zone (Bell and Valentine 1995; Hubbard 1998, 2000; Mort and Nead 2000). Relished by teen gangs, frequented by rent boys, and sought out by prostitutes, Berlin’s ruined bunkers and bomb cellars served as emblems of the chaos and lawlessness of defeat. But they also played host to the reflowering of Berlin in terms of irregular sexuality and transgressive identities. In analyzing the shifting meaning of Berlin’s subterranean world, first as a hybrid military and civilian space designed to engender support for the war, then as a site of chaos and disorder, and finally as part of an underground economy of cruising and the sex trade, I will show how the quest to control these sites resulted in multiple struggles and contradictions, shedding light on the role of danger and desire in the process of rebuilding. Trumpeted as a symbol of the capital’s resistance to its enemies, the 1940–42 bunker building campaign was designed on Hitler’s order to create between 700 and 1,000 large- and small-scale concrete facilities with sleeping arrangements for over 160,000 Berliners (Arnold et al. 2003, 13). In addition to over 40 large vertical bunkers commissioned in 1942, plans were made to integrate civilians into existing flak towers, build bunkers adjacent to major transit arteries and train stations, and reinforce neighbourhood shelters in both the city centre and the Stadtrande or outer-lying districts. Rarely was the building of bunkers framed in terms of the state’s moral obligation to protect its civilian population in times of attack. Instead, the bunker building programme formed part of a preservationist agenda to rationalize the war effort on the home front. Even in the case of increasing vulnerability, the Nazis construed what was essentially a defensive endeavour as a safeguard for future success and a sign of the regime’s power, organizational acumen, and strength. The network of dedicated bunkers and shelters was engineered to deliver a sense of refuge from the hail of bombs, just as they served to further align essential

Social rebuilding in post-WWII Berlin  11 social services to the Nazi cause. Monitored by undercover Wehrmacht officers working in tandem with the Propaganda Ministry and staffed by party members and Hitler Youth volunteers, the bunkers extended the reach of the state into the nightly rhythms of Berliners at a time when they were most vulnerable. Indeed, many Berliners preferred to leave the confines of their makeshift apartment cellars for the city bunkers. Hildegard Knef, then just a teenager alternating between her grandfather’s cottage in Zossen and her mother’s apartment in Schöneberg, recalled an obvious preference for the safety of the large flak tower at the Bahnhof Zoo over the “wobbly cellar in Nr. 6.” Then just another face in the anxious crowd, she made her way to the bunker, pass in hand, and waited for the Hitler Youth detachment to open up the doors (Knef 1971, 34). As the population of entire city blocks huddled around makeshift stoves and lanterns, they forged subterranean communities, each with their own “quirks and regulations” and rituals of belonging. These coordinated steps, re-enacted nightly, communicated a sense of common experience, of local identity, and of dwelling in these extraordinary times (Seamon 1979). Although the atmosphere in some bunkers could be plagued by nervousness and anxiety, some Berliners recalled with fondness the times spent in the company of select neighbours. Manfred Woge remembered how children seized the opportunity to form playgroups with neighbourhood buddies, while others forged lasting friendships with the lady across the way (Arnold et al. 2003, 86). They even provided a context for women to imagine their future fate, as people in the final days of the war discussed the propaganda that circulated in escalating tones about the “Mongol” hunger for retribution. Soldiers, police, and Hitler Youth led Berliners in orderly fashion to their respective underground cabins. Shelter wardens, usually elderly men or women in uniform, ensured people followed the house rules, including keeping silent and refraining from smoking while spray-painted signs (along with the occasional elbow, groan, or nudge) helped reinforce order and precision. In the larger facilities, select rooms were reserved for the infirm, while some were outfitted with electric lighting so people might read or sew (von Kardorff 1962, 95). The goal was to replicate life above ground as accurately as possible. The Charité Hospital had a particularly well-apportioned bunker complete with operating facilities and aftercare chambers, and the national welfare service or NSV maintained a birthing unit in the neighbouring Chausseestrasse while many of the larger compounds, like the bunker at the Gesundbrunnen train station, boasted midwifery services. Infants born behind concrete walls received certificates of live birth indicating their first breath was taken “under the protection of the tower in Humboldthain,” as one woman recalled, “in a difficult but grand time” (Arnold et al. 2003, 87). Indeed, for Berlin youths like Knef, the bunkers could be sites of excitement and adventure, especially when looking back through the lens of memory and recollection. Some Berliners even felt smug in the comfort of their concrete dwelling, like the well-heeled guests in the Hotel Adlon who could savour their cognac under the protection of its famed three metre thick concrete wall. Despite the extravagance of the rich, most Berliners languished in what turned out to be ­less-than-stellar accommodations, their bedding sullied with flies and bedbugs,

12  Jennifer V. Evans rooms overcrowded, short on oxygen and air flow, and infected with hysteria in the final years of the war about Berlin’s pending defeat (McGee 2002, 158). By the spring of 1945, most of the watch staff and Wehrmacht had been rerouted to the defence of the city only to be replaced by ill-prepared Volksturmists who manned the flak gunnery, leaving the task of organizing nightly entry to the ad hoc efforts of the civilians (Foedrowitz 1998, 106). The loss of regular housing meant more people competed for long-term shelter in the already overcrowded facilities and authorities lost all ability to stifle the swell of gossip that had overwhelmed efforts to clamp down on public opinion (Schäfer 1985, 311). Designed as an emblem of Nazi war preparedness through the regulation of space and emotion, by the end of the war the bunker evolved into a caricature of itself as these same spaces heralded the absolute collapse of state authority. These “catacombs of fear,” designed to embody the principles and ideals of the Männerstaat (masculinist state) were transformed into feminized spaces, inhabited nightly by a hodgepodge of women, the elderly, the underage, and the discarded – those men and boys to whom the anonymous diarist of A Woman in Berlin suggests were “unwanted at the front, rejected by the Volkssturm.” The bombast of Nazi Germany – “ruled by men, glorifying the strong man – (was) beginning to crumble, and with it the myth of the ‘Man’ ” (itself) (Anonymous 2006, 9–10, 43). Perhaps the bitterest irony of all was the fact that these protective havens turned into the deadliest of sanctuaries given the concentration of people seeking shelter, the incendiary effect of a Volltreffer (direct hit), and the ubiquitous calls of “Frau komm” (“woman come”) once the Russians arrived. As “bedrooms, living rooms, and reception rooms for the first to enter Berlin,” the shelters became host to private degradations carried out in plain sight. In the extreme, the wave of rapes that gripped the city transformed the spatial meaning of the bunker from one of protection and community to danger and depravity (Menzel 1946, 177). The violence of bodily assault underscored not just the feminization of the space through defeat but a particular vision of femininity as well, as some desperate women attempted to exert control over their environment by selecting which of their fellow bunker dwellers might placate Russian desires (Schrade 1977). Others attempted to transcend their own sexuality, donning men’s pants and waistcoats and cutting their daughters’ faces while darkening their own with coal. While the raping was often indiscriminate, some accounts suggest the Russians gravitated toward a particular vision of womanhood in choosing, for example, the robust over the skeletal (Ryan 1966, 337). While the very old, the very young, and even the infirm did not always escape unharmed, the bespectacled and mannish lesbian in the Woman’s shelter managed to avoid their attention, as did some pregnant women. Recasting the space according to a culturally bound sense of sexual preference, the Russians were, in her words, “horribly normal” (Anonymous 2006, 77). How do Berlin’s cellars, bunkers, and ruins become transformed from places of sexual violence to sites of sexual subversion? Turning to a discussion of the ways in which police and social services regulated sexual delinquency, I will demonstrate how a particular segment of Berlin’s population, street youth, used the

Social rebuilding in post-WWII Berlin  13 opportunities provided by the broken physical landscape to harness the spaces opened up by defeat to suit their own purposes. While city architects designed plans for Berlin’s future, MPs, Kriminalpolizei (criminal police), railroad police, and public health and welfare workers combed through the rubble day and night to provide a sense of order and rule of law. The bombed-out bunker was no longer simply a symbol of Nazi war bluster; it was now a tangible sign of the perceived immorality of the victor’s justice and the depths to which Germany had sunk in defeat. In the weeks after capitulation, it began to take on new meaning as well, as a site of communal identity for the legions of children and youths left orphaned, homeless, or in the care of psychically damaged parents. More than a physical shelter for Berlin’s towering number of street youth, the bunkers provided emotional relief from the quotidian challenges of life after Hitler with black marketeers, rent boys, and fallen women camping out together in subterranean cliques and gangs. Just as the rapes solidified in public consciousness the danger and immorality of these underground spaces as sites of racial mixing and bodily assault, the bunkers posed unique challenges to German sensibilities. When in November 1946 Officer Behr of the women’s police detachment was called to investigate the clique that had barricaded itself in an abandoned bunker near the Schlesischer Bahnhof station, what she found there flew in the face of German mores on a number of fronts. Six youths, two girls and four boys, ranging in age from 11 to 15, had been living in the bunker for the better part of a year (Raid Report, C Rep. 303/9 Polizeipräsident in Berlin, Nr. 259. Landesarchiv Berlin 1947). The youths did not possess proper identification. Without any form of ID, they sidestepped Allied denazification strategies and shirked enrollment in school, two important sites of ideological reorientation for the Americans and Russians, respectively (Blessing 2006). More tangibly, they would be unable to take part in the rebuilding of Berlin through the clearing of rubble or industrial employment. In living beyond the boundaries of the family or the state, these youths created their own nascent community, stealing to survive, prostituting themselves if necessary, and confirming in the minds of police and welfare authorities that the ruins had become a “hotbed of asocial elements” (Raid Report, C Rep. 303/9 Polizeipräsident in Berlin, 1945–48, Nr. 259, 1948). Living in underground clusters of 10 to 15 teens, street youth created a world unto themselves with their own distinctive hierarchies, ranks, and rules. Although forged out of necessity, when parents could no longer provide for their children, these cliques provided some of their members with a sense of adventure and romanticism, if tempered by the recent experience of war. As one chain-smoking, teenaged “gangster’s moll” remarked to a journalist in the underground hideaway she shared with other street youth, “You know, we haven’t forgotten what the Russians did when they came in” (Riess 1952, 110). Ever mindful of the space’s dark history, one boy reminded the journalist, “For Christ’s sake, where do you think you are? This is Berlin.” What may have seemed like a carefree existence without parental control was far from Rossellini’s image of bonfires and camaraderie in Germania Anno Zero; for the legions of youths raised “in a world of slogans, of

14  Jennifer V. Evans resounding phrases, of wild curses and promises” (and many of them were former members of the Volkssturm and League of German Girls), this hunger “for life, for love, even for vice” came at a cost, with prostitution and stealing the only ways to earn a semblance of a living (Riess 1952, 111). While public streets, bars, and clubs gained the scrutiny of MPs and health authorities on the lookout for girls “on the make,” the rubble provided shelter for another underground activity – the male sex trade. In this regard, the city’s semidestroyed train stations were a natural draw for Berlin’s bombed-out youth. Bustling with life at a time when entire city blocks remained idle and deserted, train stations served as important nodes of activity. An engineering marvel given the Mark Brandenburg’s sandy plane, the turn-of-the-century construction of these stations formed part of the modernist project to aid with the flow of human traffic, streamlining how people moved from domestic to commercial space. In addition to lending shape to traffic and travel, these stations were urban stages not unlike the street or boulevard, where the flow of people forced the creation of a new language to better organize, standardize, and regulate which actions, styles of clothing, postures, gaits, or facial expressions would be countenanced as suitable to that particular space (Benjamin 1999, 2006). While transit police and Kripo (criminal detachments) might try to dictate the pace of circulation and proper behaviour, these spaces did not always lend themselves to control and management (de Certeau in Edensor 2007, 82). The sheer number of the dislocated compounded the problem and in a sense democratized deviance, as even wait staff at train station restaurants could not help but notice the throngs of soiled youths loitering around the waiting rooms, accosting would-be passengers with knowing glances and sideways looks, and heading out among the rubble in search of a private site of exchange (e.g., case against Klaus S. in C Rep. 341 Stadtbezirksgericht Mitte, Nr. 5635 Landesarchiv Berlin 1949). Beat cops were well versed in how to spot male prostitutes (Evans 2003; Pretzel 2002). They also had access to Nazi-era investigation files and a photo album of rent boys. Despite this arsenal of knowledge, they still struggled to contain the problem due to the fluidity of the internal boundary, the general level of debasement in German society, and differing notions of deviant masculinity. Without a clearly coded gender map, they turned their attention to the spaces of contact: the ruins themselves. Focusing on suspects in station waiting rooms, watching how they (using their terminology) gadded about (“sich umhertrieben”), with whom they shared glances, if they winked and motioned hither, police tagged them ­perpetrators-in-the-making and surreptitiously followed them as they ambled out on to the street. When beat cops followed Enrico P. and Gunter M. into a bunker ruin along the Reichstagsufer, it did not matter that they had yet to have sex. Boldly, Enrico declared at the scene that he “leaned towards homosexuality,” and the boy had been observed leaving the station with another man earlier in the night (Operation Report 1948. C Rep. 303/9 Polizeipräsident in Berlin, 1945–48, Landesarchiv Berlin). Although the police tried hard to find physical evidence of transgression to substantiate charges, sometimes leading to cooperation between East and West police forces, this was not a prerequisite for questioning or even arrest.

Social rebuilding in post-WWII Berlin 15 Where it mattered most was in sentencing. While men and boys served time and paid heavy fines for sex in the rubble, sometimes judges evoked the shadowy character of the ruins themselves as spaces that at least fell outside of the public eye as in the 1950 case against Gerhard P (B Rep. 069 Jugendstrafanstalt Plötzensee, Landesarchiv Berlin 1950). For off-duty Volkpolizist Werner W., his case before the central Berlin district court was dismissed for lack of evidence since the holes in the ceiling of the ruin he had sought out allowed rain to wash away any evidence of wrongdoing (C Rep. 341 Stadtbezirksgericht Mitte, Nr. 4433, case 98 Ds 34/50, June 23, 1950). Given the haphazard application of the law against homosexuality, it is not difficult to understand why rent boys and their johns believed there was at least shelter if not protection in the cavernous insides of the city’s bombed-out bunkers and ruins. If forced into a detention facility to await further investigation by child protective services, since youths under the age of 21 were considered minors, in the Eastern sector boys could be sent to the Dircksenstrasse police station’s youth wing at Alexanderplatz, itself a ruin, chronically overcrowded and outfitted with beds and bedding from a neighbouring bunker. In the West, they were often channelled into a detention facility that had been built into the Fichtebunker in Kreuzberg, a former Gasometer (gas works) measuring 26 metres in diameter and 12 metres in height. Constructed as part of the Nazi programme to create three Riesenbunker (giant bunkers) to house up to 6,000 people, its basement had been converted during the war so police could house inmates without fear that they might flee. “Liberated” by the Soviets on 27 April 1945, its official post-war function was to provide temporary shelter to displaced persons. But it also jailed delinquents like “Freddy,” whose case was documented in Der Telegraf in 1948. “Seventeen years old, small, undernourished, mentally slow – a mixture of feeble-mindedness and smarts” – Freddy had spent time in the Fichtebunker youth jail for avoiding work, burglary, and “stealing anything that wasn’t nailed down.” When he began “socializing with known homosexuals,” he acquired money to buy cigarettes and chocolate. “The best thing for him,” the reporter suggested, “would be a stint in the countryside,” where ostensibly he would learn the error of his ways while regaining his physical and mental strength (Der Telegraf January 17, 1948). While the Fichtebunker or the Dircksenstrasse facilities might provide temporary holding for what Der Tagesspiegel called the “Besprisornies of Berlin” (a term that emerged out of the Russian Revolution for the street children of Moscow and Petrograd), as Freddy’s example shows, many youth advocates believed longterm rehabilitation was best achieved outside the city’s corrupting spaces, in one of the neighbouring youth remand homes and institutional facilities resurrected in 1946 – like Struveshof in Brandenburg – as a means to neutralize youth itinerancy by enforcing the values of hard work and healthy living (Der Tagesspiegel August 7, 1947; Evans 2011). Despite attempts by the divided city administration to reclaim the ruins, by positioning them to serve productive purposes as prisons and detention centres, the administrators could not yet fully rehabilitate the fallen. In a sense, only a limited order could be imposed on these physical spaces

16  Jennifer V. Evans through social welfare, policing, and the law. The desires of the ruins could not be redeemed within the ruins themselves. Only hard labour in an industrial or agricultural setting outside the city offered true reformation and a connection to healthful and productive manhood. In other words, although Berlin’s underground was built as a testimony to a “rationalizing” state, the physical transformation of the bombing campaigns and the experience of occupation transformed these same sites into spaces of irrationality and confusion. In the events leading up to capitulation, the Nazi state lost its ability to rationalize the space, to organize it, the behaviours it inspired, and the memories it engendered. In the immediate post-war period, attempts to regulate the comings and goings in the ruins likewise proved challenging, as Berlin youth chose their subcultural identification over official attempts at buttressing the family and channelling ideological renewal. Also, in thinking about the place of gender in these spaces of conflict and desire, here too we see evidence of shift in orientation. While the underground “caves” as the Woman of Berlin calls them were feminized hosts of male violence, they remained highly charged places of sexual exchange albeit of a different kind. In the post-war orbit, these spaces continued to play host to shifting notions of femininity (in this case effeminacy) and masculine desire as well as an evolving homosexual subculture. Inextricably linked to the recent terror of war’s end, the ruins of Berlin were host to predation, crisis, death, and decay. As spaces of disorder, however, they emerged as much more than a passive backdrop to post-war rebuilding. Certainly, they represented the breakdown of traditional authority (Fisher 2005). But they also helped shape the dynamics of a wide range of human sexualities, reflecting a host of concerns about the way in which sex, gender, and immorality were represented, perceived, and remembered at war’s end. In some instances, those memories gained expression through official channels, in diaries and memorial projects. In other instances, the ruins foregrounded experiences that remained truly subterranean, buried in archived police ledgers and dusty court dockets. This onion-skin effect shows quite clearly that geographer Doreen Massey’s claims for contemporary Berlin also hold true for the immediate post-war period: that the city’s story is a product of “intersections of multiple narratives” (Massey 1999, 22). Hidden in plain sight, fragmented, decaying, pointing to a lost, invisible world, yet heralding something still to be articulated, Berlin’s ruins were, in the words of Lieutenant Byford-Jones, much more than a “fossilized region where life no longer existed.” In the face of death and decay, Berlin’s “troglodytes” (as Byford-Jones calls them) used these spaces to map out their desires, connecting the ruins’ shadows with those of the pre-war city. In other words, the city’s ruins were not only spaces of violence and death; they were also sites of subversion, nonconformity, and visibility for a host of sexual subcultures, proving that the rupture of war’s end was also accompanied by continuities as well. Byford-Jones conceded as much when after scrutinizing the city below his apartment window, he turned and “went down amid its ruins” since “there was much to learn from its secrets” (Byford-Jones 1947, 19).

Social rebuilding in post-WWII Berlin 17

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18  Jennifer V. Evans Martin, Angela, and Claudia Schoppmann. 1996. “Ich fürchte die Menschen mehr als die Bomben.” In Aus den Tagebüchern von drei Berliner Frauen 1938–1946. Berlin: Metropol Verlag. Massey, Doreen. 1999. “Imagining Globalisation: Power Geometries of Time – Space.” In Future Worlds: Migration, Environment and Globalization, edited by A. Brah, M. Hickman, and M. Mac an Ghaill, 27–44. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. McGee, Mark R. 2002. A Visual and Historical Documentation from 1925 to the Present. Woodstock and New York: The Overlook Press. Menzel, Mathias. 1946. Die Stadt Ohne Tod. Berlin: Carl Habel Verlagsbuchhandlung. Mort, Frank, and Lynda Nead. 2000. “Sexual Geographies.” New Formations 37. Pretzel, Andreas. 2002. NS-Opfer unter Vorbehalt: Homosexuelle Männer in Berlin nach 1945. Berlin: LIT Verlag. Riess, Curt. 1952. The Berlin Story. New York: The Dial Press. Roth, Nadine. 2003. “Metamorphoses. Urban Space and Modern Identity. Berlin 1870–1933”. PhD diss., University of Toronto. Rürup, Reinhard. 2005. Berlin 1945: A Documentation. Berlin: Verlag Willmuth Arenhövel. Ryan, Cornilius. 1966. Der letzte Kampf. München: Droemer, Knaur. Schäfer, Hans-Dieter. 1985. Berlin im Zweiten Weltkrieg: Der Untergang des Reichhauptstadts in Augenzeugenberichte. Munich: Piper. Schrade is in Landesarchiv Berlin Rep. 240 Kleinschriftgut Zietgeschichtliche Sammlung. 1977. Erlebnisberichte aus der Berliner Bevölkerung über die Zeit des Zweiten Weltkrieges und danach. Acc. 2651, No. 419. Seamon, David. 1979. The Geography of the Lifeworld. London: Croom Helm. Statistisches Landesamt Berlin. 1951. “Berlin in Zahlen.” https://digital.zlb.de/viewer/ metadata/16320524_1951/8/-/. Tagesspiegel August 7, 1947. Von Hentig, Hans. 1947. “Kriminalität des Zusammenbruchs.” Schweizer Zeitschrift für Strafrecht LXII. Weingartner, Egon. 1951. “Die Notzucht. Eine kriminologische Untersuchung unter besonderer Berucksichtigung des Erscheinungsbildes der Notzuchtskriminalität in der heutigen Nachkriegszeit.” PhD diss., Jura, Freiburg.

2 Modern architecture as ideological representations East Berlin, West Berlin, and Hong Kong Liza Wing Man Kam Modernism: the universal architecture In the 1950s, one of the most influential architectural historians and theorists in his time, Sigfried Giedion, wrote in the introductory chapter of his work, Space, Time and Architecture, A universal civilization is in the making but it is by no means developing in every country at the same pace. (Giedion 2008, xxxvi) What he refers to as the ‘universal civilization’ here, pertaining to the worldwide gradual resurrection after the Second World War, to be precise, is the blossoming of ‘Modern Architecture.’ Accompanying the Industrial Revolution was a continual pursuit of standardization in production processes. For example, the invention of reinforced concrete in the second half of the 19th century (Moussard, Garibaldi, and Curbach 2018) not only responded to the high demand for rapid housing construction by the high population growth since the start of that century but also changed the architectural history in stylistic trendsetting. The Modernist typology is defined, in general, as ‘International Style’ for some theorists, or ‘universal architecture’ as defined by Giedion himself. Giedion strongly disapproved the superficiality of interpreting architecture solely as ‘styles’ as he believed that it limits one’s observations to visual and material interpretations (Giedion 2008). Despite Giedion’s criticism, a broader discussion on the notion of ‘Modernism’ in architecture which goes beyond ‘style’ is, however, still lacking. The key figures in the Modernist architecture movement include, for example, the Belgian architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who advocated the legendary aphorism ‘Less is More’ as his signature idea in Modernist Architecture. The quintessence of such ideal, in a visual sense, refers to the pursuit of minimalism, which predicates a nominal implementation of ornaments. Frampton maintains that van der Rohe’s ideal of ‘beinahe nichts’ (almost nothing) ‘seeks to reduce the building task to the status of industrial design on an enormous scale’ (Frampton 1992, 10). The Swiss-French architect Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, more widely known as Le Corbusier, promoted his belief in standardization in urban planning and DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-3

20  Liza Wing Man Kam modularization in constructing housing. For him, a house is a dwelling machine. The Bauhaus movement, which emerged in Weimar, Germany, in 1919 dealt with more than buildings’ outward presentation and functions. With its original idea to amalgamate craftsmanship, architecture and art, and thus to present the excellency of each, the Bauhaus movement also aspired to diminish the class stratification between bourgeoisies and workmen, hence to embrace an ‘Utopian’ ideal. The pioneers of the Bauhaus movement, for example, Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, were devotees of standardization and rationalism in architecture. The design school Bauhaus – promoting a standardization and the ‘International Style’ – which detached building design from any traditional roots, trends and ornamentation, was detested by the Third Reich officials. The ambitious ­fascist regime did not tolerate and compromise with a building form which could be situated anywhere in the world. To them, an architectural style should manifest the Germanic superiority in all respects. Embracing the Avant-Garde style to advocate a utopianism ideal, the Bauhaus school was compelled to leave Weimar and relocate to Dessau, then from Dessau to Berlin and finally to the United States – which shaped the present-day Harvard Graduate School of Design. Whether Giedion approves or not, most architectural theories indeed emphasize to interpret the ‘style’ of architecture. Indeed, such stylistic emphasis limits the discussions to appearance, technical aspects or, to the furthest, materiality. Giedion insists on the usage of the term ‘universal architecture’ rather than adopting the terminology of ‘Modernist style’ (Giedion 2008, xxxiii). Indeed, Giedion’s interpretation of the concept is beyond a mere visual investigation or the shallow understanding of the temporal economic and technological history. As noted by Deckker, Giedion believes that ‘each country made its own contribution’ to realize their own version of Modernist architecture. How? Deckker exemplifies with Brasilia and Finland, and maintains that local knowledge, traditions and situations were inevitably incorporated, even built with, the most prominent Modernist languages such as ferro-concrete and skeleton structure. Believing that Giedion was linking the concept of ‘regional architecture’ to its political and social context (Deckker 2001, 167), Deckker speculated that Giedion would not agree to call such ‘regionalized’ modernist architecture ‘national’ due to Giedion’s belief in the ‘internationality’ of the new architecture. Undoubtedly, ‘regionalism’ needs a temporal reference – in other words, it is inevitably confined in an individual socio-political framework within a particular time frame. Both Giedion’s and Deckker’s observations on the Modernist architecture, its adoption to local conditions and its regionalization, affirm Pugh’s idea on the role of Modernist architecture in Germany during the Cold War. Pugh states, ‘Modernism is both an instrument and a product of the Cold War, shaped by the forces that deployed it. . . . [I]t is furthermore regarded as an ongoing and shifting discourse, rather than a style of approach that can be defined singularly or absolutely.’ (Pugh 2014, 9). It is certainly relevant to conceptualize Modernism – as Pugh refers to Goldhagen – not as the result of a discourse but as itself that discourse (ibid., 9). For Pugh, architecture is useful in organizing and even ‘advancing society for either a “more humanized present” or a “future in a better world.” ’ An instrument

Modern architecture as ideology  21 and product of the Cold War, for Pugh, Modernist architecture could even be interpreted as a ‘crucial weapon’ (ibid.). It was a process of spatial production which per se is continually contested, verified and interacting with the regional and local conditions. This process is simultaneously the tools that encompass and infiltrate the aspired political (and philosophical) ideologies into the quotidian spatial settings. Such settings compose or even consolidate particular local settings to form a completed and running cycle, as preferred by political authorities. This verifies the role of architectural and urban design in the cultural Cold War. This chapter hence probes into the rationales and processes which resulted in the spatial forms and the political ideologies embedded in East Berlin, West Berlin and Hong Kong. Architectural/urban design processes were the tools; and the resultant built forms became the concerned ideologies’ visual/spatial display and symbolism.1 From the design process to the material existence, all the building/ spatial forms exemplified in the three case studies (East Berlin, West Berlin and Hong Kong) can be hinged upon the notion of Modernist architecture: be it adhering, opposing or being twisted from the notion. The prominent design movement originated in the end of 19th century in Europe and continually sweeping through the world, the Modernist notion was repudiated but then later on adopted (in East Berlin), embraced and glorified (in West Berlin) or adopted in disguise (in colonial Hong Kong). In every case, the respective authority commandeered its own version of ‘Modernist notion’ as their ‘weapon’ in the cultural Cold War, according to particular political agendas. In the Eastern Bloc’s East Berlin, the socialist authority denounced the Modernist style at the beginning. Later on, it historicized the style and adopted it as the ‘German national style’. As standardization of construction methods and materials later became the priority due to economic reasons, Modernist-styled social housing blocks flooded the city. In the Western Bloc’s West Berlin, the authority advocated Modernist architecture and decentralization in planning as the design paradigm to portray an image of internationalism and anti-fascism. In Hong Kong, one could see a mélange of design elements and spatial prototypes of the two Berlins ubiquitously. At times, these elements and ideals were even subtly entangled in individual examples. This chapter hence consists of three parts. Following and departing from the first part, which contains general interpretation of the notion of Modernist architectural style, the second part showcases the typologies of urban/architectural forms that existed or are existing in East Berlin, West Berlin and Hong Kong. I then observe how the same stylistic notion was repudiated, embraced and disguised during the process of space productions in the three different polities during the Cold War era. The chapter observes how each authority manifested their respective political agendas through various spatial typologies and concludes to substantiate the claim of spatial design/architecture being a significant part of the cultural Cold War. Drawing on the observations of Giedion, Deckker and Pugh, the next section unfolds what they would probably refer to as the various interpretations, hence the ‘regionalized’ forms of Modernist architecture in the three polities of our interest: East Berlin, West Berlin and Hong Kong during the Cold War era.

22  Liza Wing Man Kam

Housing the people and winning their hearts and minds The concept of ‘Heimat,’ as noted by Pugh, carries a connotation which “goes beyond its translations in English as the ‘home’ or ‘domesticity.’ It implies the abstract notions of attaching to a place, such as ‘the homeland’ and ‘the place of origin.’ ” The concept is independent from specific political and social developments and is also timeless (Pugh 2014, 9). In the post-war era, different authorities faced the common urgent challenge to accommodate the vast number of people who lost their homes during the war. After years of bombing and fighting, three quarters of the housing in Berlin (ibid., 31) had been destroyed. In Cold War Berlin where the Eastern and Western Blocs confronted and competed with each other, the ideas of ‘home’ and ‘belonging’ were manipulated, extended and infiltrated to different levels, which became especially apparent in architecture and urban planning. Authorities from both the East and the West ‘sought to prove (what) they could provide for the citizens in the sphere of new housing’ (ibid.10). Through presenting a ‘representational image’ with model homes or cityscapes, authorities attempted to shape the ‘prosperous present and future’ that they could create for their people (ibid.). These acts for ‘winning the hearts and minds’ became feasible for the population who were desperately in need of inhabitable shelter. During the post-war era, when both East and West Germany were competing to be recognized as the legitimized Germany after the Third Reich, to ‘win’ the Cold War, a popular recognition to their success in consolidating a prospect became significant. Housing projects became, therefore, the backbone of reconstruction in all the cases of our interest, including Hong Kong, considering its post-war status wherein reconstruction was crucial. Since the ‘housing task’ consisted of ‘housing the hearts and the minds’ – in an attempt to consolidate a sense of community/ sense of (national) belonging – public buildings came into authorities’ perspective soon after the burgeoning of housing developments. In both realms of housing and public buildings, the same underlying intention applies ultimately: to gain a popular recognition and hence their approval – from a private, individual domain which expanded to a broader public one.

One ravaged Berlin, two reconstructed Berlins From the 1930s to the 1960s, the design and planning paradigm among architects and planners in Berlin was to correct the mistakes from the Mietkasernen (Pugh 2014, 22; Ladd 1998, 177) (also known as the ‘rental barrack) (Ladd 1998, 100). The Mietkasernen was regarded as an unavailing urban typology which provided appalling living conditions. It was built nationwide back in the late 19th century. While Berlin gradually approached division after 1948 (Ladd 1998),2 the two emerging antagonistic sides pursued the common goals to relinquish the Mietkasernen, but with different approaches. ‘Die Stunde Null’ – marking the end of World War II in the summer of 1945 as well as the commencement of ‘reconstructing’ Germany – portrayed a sense of hope to planning reformers who conceived the timing as a precious opportunity to reconstruct Berlin as tabula

Modern architecture as ideology  23 rasa. On top of the previously mentioned attempt to correct the Mietkasernen’s errors, planning exercises were also determined to make a clear cut to all ideological associations to the former capital of the Third Reich (Ladd 1998, 177). Such common determination to dissociate with any Nazi ideologies in urban and architectural forms was executed by the two Berlins, but in different methodological approaches with different justifications, which all composed part of the cultural Cold War. Before the Third Reich took control in the 1930s, Berlin was the capital of a newly unified Germany. Compared with many other German cities where strong regional identities existed, a broad scepticism on whether Berlin could represent a single German identity overflowed (Pugh 2014, 23). During the Nazi period, Albert Speer was the ‘master-planner’ who conceptualized Berlin as the capital of the empire. He intended to ‘visually and spatially cleanse the city by building monumental, historicized structures situated on a classically symmetrical plan’ (Pugh 2014, 26). His primary ambition was to bring emotional and psychological impact to visitors and dwellers in Berlin through urban and architectural design. Such ambition became the driving force for conceptualizing the design steps, which was successfully executed in building projects. As noted by Pugh (ibid.), Speer believed that ‘impressive public buildings, like monuments, must be planned to be freely visible from all sides.’ Size and visual impact were emphasized by Hitler and Speer repeatedly in conceptualizing building plans. They served as the outline of their ‘Germania,’ where the urban scene and power of the Reich should overwhelm and stun the beholders (ibid.). Despite the common intention to dissociate thoroughly from the Third Reich, immediately after the division, the two Berlins embraced, however, much discrepant architectural and urban design languages in their conceptualizations for reconstructing Berlin. According to Pugh, each government (East and West Berlin) intended to ‘articulate a national identity that distanced it from the Nazi regime and proved it was the true and rightful Germany’ (Pugh 2014, 31). Already with its great reputation of being Avant-Garde since the Bauhaus movement in the 1920s, Modernist architecture, also known as the ‘Neuen Bauen’ in Germany, became the centre of discussion as to whether it should be adopted by architects and planners (Pugh 2014, 28). In the next section, I will discuss how the different authorities adopted or rejected (but re-adopted later on) the notion of Modernist architecture and how they presented the idea in different ways.

East Berlin: shift from the historicized socialist classicism to de-Stalinization and standardization Since 1946, the newly established German Socialist Unity Party (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED) had played an essential role in designating the urban-scape in East Berlin. Before 1956, in the years after the separation of East and West Berlin, the leadership of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) advocated the ‘socialist classicism’ as the so-called national German style. This style, according to Pugh, ‘typified’ construction in Eastern Germany

24  Liza Wing Man Kam in the early 1950s (Pugh 2015). Architects recruited historical architectural styles from the era around 1800 as the representative ‘national German style,’ since they conceived such style as derivation from the greatest masters of Germany’s building history (Pugh 2014, 38). Extensive ornaments were considered essential in creating the luxurious ‘dwelling palaces’ (Wohnpalaeste) for the working class (ibid.). Such act to emphasize the luxurious ornamental style as ‘the’ national German style, Pugh notes, was SED’s intention to connect the GDR ‘literally and symbolically with the historic traditions of Germany in its national capital’ (ibid. 39). To adopt the historicized socialist classicism and claim that as ‘the’ national German style, the GDR could ‘symbolically make the claim that it, and not the Federal Republic (West Germany), was the more legitimate Germany’ (ibid.). Incorporation of a nationalistic design language was extended to the urban scale. Extensive use of grand axes was emphasized as the means to order and arrange spatial clusters to achieve a sense of monumentality. Such design approach of pursuing grandiosity demonstrated resemblance and even continuity to the Third Reich (Ladd 1998, 181). The East-West axis was extended eastward from the Brandenburg Gate, whose housing blocks were developed alongside such axis. The East-West boulevard, Frankfurter Allee in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg was then subsequently renamed as Stalinallee in 1949 (ibid.) as an obvious gesture to pay tribute to Stalin. The adoption of axial arrangement in spatial design has been a widely adopted practice over the centuries, with an extensive geographical coverage worldwide. A prominent example would be the Imperial Palace in Beijing in the ‘Middle Kingdom’ of present-day China. Designed and realized back in the 15th century, the symmetrical spatial arrangement along a grand axis was to emphasize the monumentality of the place where the ‘son of heaven’ dwelt and executed his power. Such absolute power also translates to the grandiosity of the spatial complex, with the visual and emotional impact one could experience while beholding the space. Another example in modern times, during the period when the Japanese colonizers seized Taiwan, between 1895 to 1945, grand axis was frequently implemented as the tool to arrange the perceivably essential infrastructures in the colony, such as Shinto shrines, colonial municipal offices, hospitals and schools. These colonial infrastructures were built to modernize and supervise the otherwise ‘barbaric’ colonized populace. In various cities such as Taipei, Taichung, Hualien and many others in colonial Taiwan, the grand axes served to create visual impact for the colonized urban dwellers. These axes played a prominent role in guiding and simultaneously intimidating the colonized population when they proceeded their ways approaching the space of authority or sacredness. Axes also served as connectors which bind, visually and physically, the aforementioned four infrastructures (schools, Shinto shrines, hospitals and municipal offices). Together with the axes, they defined the colonial cities and enveloped the colonial populations who are to be supervised and educated (Kam 2021). Another authoritarian exemplification would be Albert Speer’s (mostly unrealized) plans for Berlin’s new centre in 1939, which incorporated two axes: the north-south and east-west

Modern architecture as ideology  25 axes. The prominent spaces in the Third Reich’s capital were to be realized along these two five-kilometre boulevards. Authoritarian regimes adore grand boulevards, as they are ideal for aligning spatial nodes for ceremonial events. Grand boulevards connect, on the one hand, the neighbourhood spaces, and on the other hand, serve as great circulating spaces by themselves. For example, such a setting is impeccable for military parades as well as for the top governmental officials to enunciate their power. The annual parade held on the 1st of October surrounding Tian’anmen Square in Beijing is a classic example. In another much-celebrated city, Paris, the ‘crowned’ area (le couronne) earned its fame for being orderly and elegant, credited to Haussmann, who conceptualized the construction of the grand boulevards.3 Abundant exemplifications apply here for us to attain a basic understanding: grand boulevards and axial arrangements have been design tools for authoritarian regimes to stage their power display. Through adopting these design tools, spatial interventions are created to achieve grandiosity. Sets of scenarios are realized which intensify and eventuate continual infiltration of political ideologies. This conveys a message of how grand, majestic, intimidating and powerful the authority is. Grand axes were, much to our expectations, not at all absent in East Berlin’s planning (see Figure 2.1). Stalinallee, serving as the East-West axis, hosts one of the representational housing projects in East Berlin. Hinted by its name, Ladd noted that one could speculate Stalin’s prominent influence on the architecture (Ladd 1998, 182). One can see Stalin’s affection for ornaments and monumentality through the most grandiose skyscrapers and subway stations in Moscow, which he appropriated already back in the 1930s. The Modernist architectural style, demonstrating neither any regional characteristics/identity nor the power of Stalin, was despised at this point. Since the official lines in the 1950s’ East Germany (GDR) should follow the one in Moscow, urban design of GDR predicated display of ‘centralization, hierarchy and monumentality’ – as in Moscow (Ladd 1998, 182). In addition, brimmed over with the aspiration to reunify Germany in the early years in the GDR, officials conceptualized the capital city to reflect ‘national traditions’ to prepare for the anticipated reunion in the conceivably near future (ibid.). The East German communist leader Walter Ulbricht did not approve of Modernist architecture. He criticized the municipal architects for their attempts to diminish Berlin’s significance as Germany’s capital with their ideas of reconstructing the city with low-rise buildings (Ladd 1998, 182). For Ulbricht, the Modernists’ approach made the architecture ‘identity-less,’ and he believed it could be built anywhere without creating any impact to the surrounding environment (ibid.) – although later on, Giedion proved him wrong by addressing the regional quality of Modernist architecture, as mentioned earlier. Rudolf Herrnstadt, the editor of the Communist Party newspaper Neues Deutschland, compared the lowrise Modernist housing projects to an ‘egg-carton’4 and condemned such massproduced boxes as ‘being the natural products of the greed for profit and ­contempt for humanity of the dying capitalist system’ (Ladd 1998, 182) – quintessentially ‘American’ (Pugh 2014, 42). Reconstructing Germany with such ‘American

26  Liza Wing Man Kam

Figure 2.1 Karl-Marx-Allee Stalinallee in 2004 (renamed to be Karl-Marx-Allee, seen from TV Tower). Source: Sansculotte (user); Date: 2004; Source: German Wikipedia; License: Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike Version 2.0 (cc-by-sa-2.0).

boxes/Hitleresque barracks/formalism of the Bauhaus Style’ (ibid.) would result in the GDR being ‘colonized by the imperialist forces of the United States’ (ibid.) (see Figure 2.2). As part of their claim as the legitimized new Germany while anticipating the wished reunification to happen in the near future, the Communist Party perceived an urgency to rescue German culture. Architecture was one of the many forms of

Modern architecture as ideology  27

Figure 2.2 Laubengangshäuser Laubengangshäuser. According to Ladd (1998, 182), it was the first building on Stalinallee (currently known as Karl-Marx-Allee) designed by Herzenstein with the German Bauhaus Modernist style from the 1920s. Unornamented five-storey blocks and rectangular in shape, such style was not adopted by the East planning authorities as a prototype for a decade after its realization in 1950. Source: Gryffindor (user); Date: 2006; Source: Wikipedia; License: Public Domain on Wikimedia Commons.

expression for such culture. As noted by Ladd (183), a German tradition which simultaneously implies progressiveness was the urge. This resulted in the reinterpretations and revival of a national style and local styles represented by a neoclassicism of Karl Friedrich Schinkel’s work. By 1951, a new architectural trend represented by hybridity of Stalinist and Schinkel’s works had emerged. A representation of such style would be the seven-to-ten-storey tall housing blocks on the Stalinallee. Well-proportioned with vertical and horizontal elements decorated with classical details and stone-cladded bases, the storeys above are cladded with ceramics made in Meissen (Ladd 1998, 183), an East German town in Saxony renowned for its ceramics production (see Figure 2.3). Such practice was a deliberate resonance to the pre–World War I era as national style (hence a national pride) which glorified local/national identity. The planning paradigm also shifted away from Modernism – for about a decade. The 16 principles of city planning were issued.5 The political and visual impact of the city centre was emphasized (Ladd 1998, 183). Such emphasis was fundamentally antagonistic to the Modernists’ planning idea of decentralizing the cities. As Ladd

28  Liza Wing Man Kam

Figure 2.3  Close-Up of Karl-Marx-Allee View of a block on the southern side of Karl-Marx-Allee in Berlin-Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg Source: Manfred Brückels (photographer); Date: 2005; License: Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.

observed, the Stalinallee demonstrated the return to the classical and baroque traditions of planning practice (ibid.). Planned with grand axes, the city was orderly arranged along an immensely wide, tree-lined boulevard – resembling its counterparts to certain qualities in imperial and authoritarian Beijing, colonial Taiwan, Napoleon III’s Paris and Berlin during the Nazi period. Despite its moderate achievement in providing affordable housing to a fair number of working-class dwellers, construction of Stalinist architecture eventuated lots of drawbacks. The meticulous pursuit of ornament and material was a lavish process and hence barely sustainable. Nikita Khrushchev criticized Stalinist architecture as inefficient to house the masses and promoted the industrially manufactured prefabricated building units to construct apartment buildings (Ladd 1998, 186). Standardization became the paradigm again, which reminds us of a core idea of Modernism: accessibility. The gradual awareness among the East German authorities of the fact that unification with the West was merely a wishful thought, together with Khrushchev’s instructions, led to the relinquishment of the ‘German national style’ and the resumption of the ‘International Style’

Modern architecture as ideology  29 (ibid.). Modern architecture returned as part of Khrushchev’s de-Stalinization programme. Stalinallee was also renamed to Karl-Marx-Allee in 1961 (ibid.). Architects and planners from the West heavily criticized the Stalinallee as being horrendous in both aesthetic and political senses. As noted by Ladd (Ladd 1998, 187), the strong influence from Schinkel to adopt, for example, the classical embellishments, the axial/grand boulevard design and the monumental scale of buildings and streets greatly resembled Albert Speer’s design ideas for Nazi Berlin. The spatial characteristics of totalitarian systems such as Hitler’s, Stalin’s and Ulbricht’s are all found on the single Stalinallee (ibid.). Since many East German architects actually perceived the Modernist architecture as anti-fascist and much more proximate to the socialist ideals, they thus granted their endorsement (Pugh 2014, 45). The Modernist approach gradually became the design paradigm again for its practicality and its perceived dissociation from fascism.

West Berlin planning approach: modernist ideologies To prevent any association with the Nazi period and its design elements, designers avoided a direct incorporation of a grand axis but instead deformed it by undertaking a decentralized approach. Doing this, on the one hand, retained an axis’s function to organize spatial clusters to create a preferred sense of spatial experience. On the other hand, it omits the authoritarian gestures (the Hansa Quartier Planning Project is a good example). With the economic and military support from the US and other Western powers which benefited Berlin’s Western area, the economic values and the ‘miracle’ created were useful ‘to forge national identity’ (Pugh 2014, 51). The city gradually transformed into a capitalist showcase. The city centre of West Berlin, for example, the Charlottenburg area, developed with a gradual increase of crowds of tourists and retail shops selling luxurious commodities. The Europa Centre Building was the tallest landmark with the Mercedes-Benz logo on the top rotating all night long. In contrast to the East Berlin revival of a national style, and its emphasis on political power displayed through incorporation of a grand axis, the planning approach in the West intended to present the ‘free’ Berlin – as a clear alternative to Communism, or submission to a single strong authority such as the Nazis. In West Germany, Germans were ‘re-educated’ to switch the ‘national character’ by adopting ‘capitalist and democratic institutions’ (Pugh 2014, 47). On the other hand, with this ‘re-education,’ a ‘bottom-up’ planning approach from the US planning methodology was ‘imported’ into West Germany (Castillo 2004). A representative project would be the International Building Exhibition (iBA) in 1957 that reconstructed the Hansa Quartier, located in the north-west of the Tiergarten. In this project, the City commissioned the internationally prominent architects such as Le Corbusier, Gropius, Scharoun, Aalto, Niemeyer and many others to design individual low-rise and high-rise buildings scattered across the neighbourhood. The resultant architecture was relatable to the Modernist notion. In contrast to the Stalinallee, the design of the Hansa Quartier reflected a deliberate renunciation of axial organization, centralized order or any symbolism of totalitarianism.

30  Liza Wing Man Kam Politicians and architectural critics credited the Hansa Quartier as embodying the Western liberal principles of freedom, individuality and the non-authoritarian order and democracy. With the Modernist aesthetics perceived as ‘International Style’ which complemented the official narrative, the Hansa Quartier facilitated West Berlin’s advertisement of its broad and global character. Given that the top mission was to free the city’s urban landscape from Germany’s authoritarian past, adopting the Modernist design language was appropriate, considering the Nazis’ disapproval of ‘internationalism.’ On the one hand, such architectural approach reconnected the city to the post–World War I Modernism/Bauhaus paradigm – as being innovative and Avant-Garde; on the other hand, it reconnected Berlin as a historical city related to the Golden past but simultaneously washed away the fascist image of it (Pugh 2014, 52). Simultaneously, practical refugee camps were constructed for housing the East Germans who fled to the West. Three refugee transit camps were set up in the former Federal Republic (West Germany) in West Berlin, Giessen and Uelzen. The one in West Berlin was known as the Marienfeld Refugee transit camp, which still exists today as museum and education centre. The transitional living spaces, set up in 1953, served as the reception point for the political and economic refugees who fled from East Germany and Eastern European countries. Appropriated by the then-West German President Theodor Heuss, the centre ‘enjoyed a high degree of symbolic importance as a “gateway to freedom,” ’ as stated on the centre’s website today (Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum 2020). While an exhibition from the present-day museum revealed that the living situation was rather appalling6 (Kiesel 2011), the centre played a significant role in history in receiving and administering the refugees. In fact, judging by the archival images, the camps in the former West Germany were equipped with decent, although minimal, facilities (they soon became overcrowded). Such minimal decency was, however, not in the case for the Hong Kong counterparts, where the refugees from the Chinese Nationalist (Republican) camp fled from mainland China stayed temporarily on their flight to Taiwan or the rest of the world in the 1950s. We will explore these spatial settlements in the later part of this chapter.

Hong Kong: reconstructing “the Berlin of the East” in the 1950s Administered with a northern border adjacent to mainland China and concurrently as a British colony during the Cold War era, Hong Kong has allowed exchanges between the two antagonistic ideological systems to occur during the Cold War (Roberts and Carroll 2016). The colonial governor, Sir Alexander Graham, proclaimed Hong Kong as ‘the Berlin of the East’ to gain international support as the Cold War tension escalated (Carroll 2007, 142). To some, the statement was more an outcry for international attention by emphasizing the problem of Hong Kong being at the centre of conflict. Such an act of seeking attention from international society does, to a high degree, resemble the situation with the Cold War in West Berlin – in which a

Modern architecture as ideology  31 conscious construction of the image of being international, capitalist, free, democratic and anti-hierarchical was prevailing. Such an image was also presented in the Modernist architecture during the process of post-WWII reconstruction. In order to secure financial support from the US, the iBA and the Hansa Quartier served as stages to display the envisioned urban-scape in the future West Berlin as embodiment of all the ‘Western values.’ A similar approach in reconstructing the post-war city can be, in fact, observed in Hong Kong. Some scholars, such as Xue, hold that the planning and architecture strategy in post-war Hong Kong was about practicality, efficiency and mass production and that such an approach ‘coincided with the design principles of modern architecture’ (Xue 2016, xvii). Indeed, there was urgent need for a tremendous amount of housing units to accommodate the post-war population and the influx of refugees from the Communist mainland China. Adopting the Modernists’ standardization approach to mass-produce social housing might prove Xue’s point on ‘practicality.’ However, scrutinizing the public building architecture genre and analyzing how the Modernist architectural design approach was adopted in Cold War Hong Kong urges a closer investigation of the motives behind using that approach, which certainly goes beyond the claim of a sole ‘practicality.’ What Xue proclaimed as coincidental – commissioning Modernist architecture in the post-WWII Hong Kong, however, should not be interpreted as lack of political intention. The Edinburgh Place Complex, consisting of the Queen’s Pier (demolished in 2007), the Star Ferry Pier (demolished in 2006), the City Hall and the Edinburgh Place, was commissioned as a significant colonial infrastructure during the 1950s. Designed by the architect Ron Philips in 1952–57, the Modernist architectural design language composed a clear and strong statement to dissociate Hong Kong from any historical burdens and to state the ’international’ characteristic of the city during the Cold War. The use of reinforced concrete, structure-free building facades with an elevation composed of glazing areas, the spatial complex incorporates all the representative Modernist architectural design languages. The colonial authorities were determined to bring Hong Kong onto the international stage: the significant colonial spatial complex, hosting the colonial ceremonial rituals such as inauguration ceremonies of the colonial governors, was conceptualized and constructed with the Modernist architectural approach. Such an approach is detached from any regional or local stylistic references. One could witness zero traces of either traditional Chinese or classical English design languages while reading the materiality of such an architectural complex.7 This observation, however, should be restrained to the material level. Modernist architecture embraces not only, in its epistemology, the visual interpretation as a result, but a broader and deeper extent to the production of space as a process. A process which produced the Edinburgh Place as such, akin to many other colonial administration processes, involved no public participation – was a thorough top-down approach. This is not, as Castillo implies, a spirit of how Modern architecture should be produced according to the standard in the US (Castillo 2004). While the architects from West Berlin who were sent to the US for ‘re-education’ during the Cold War era had their training emphasized on the process of spatial

32  Liza Wing Man Kam production to involve the community with democratic procedures, such process was not observed in the colonial Hong Kong during the Cold War era. The commission of a cultural space for the colony was designated with respect to the Abercrombie Plan created by the metropolitan grandmaster, Sir Patrick Abercrombie, the urban planner based in London, after his one month visit to the colony in 1947 (Lai 1999, 65). A visual expression of the public building, adopting the design language of Modernist architecture, is of the Modernist ‘style’ as how Giedion would affirm, in the visual and material level. But the philosophy in it and how much, or simply how it is Modernist in terms of its production process is – much negotiable. It might be more appropriate if we interpret the complex as a ‘regionalized Modernist’ architecture in this case through scrutinizing how (much of) the traces of colonial authoritative practices were incorporated in it. Departing from the production process, one could also note the not-so-subtle hierarchy and monumentality expressed by the colonial infrastructure. One can observe the carefully manipulated and incorporated political ideals of British colonialism in the colonial spatial complex (see Figure 2.4). From Figure 2.5, we can observe a central axis in the original design of the spatial complex, along which spatial clusters were arranged (see Figure 2.5). Through the axial organization of the spatial clusters of the complex, monumentality is achieved. Imagine a ceremonial setting during the colonial era. The axis serves as a physical walking path guiding the inaugurating colonial governors to enter the colony and assume their governorship. While the colonial architect did not adopt a strong regional reference in terms of materiality, a different design approach, which was ultimately causal to the space’s regionalism, was at play.

Figure 2.4  The Edinburgh Place Complex Edinburgh Place Complex, comprising the Star Ferry Pier, the Edinburgh Place, the City Hall, the Cenotaph, and the Queen’s Pier, was a spatial complex which was meticulously planned for both civic purposes as well as hosting official ceremonies such as governors’ inaugurations and welcoming to visiting Royalty. Six generations of Hong Kong governors disembarked from their royal yachts at the pier before stepping into the colony. Photographer: Mr Tse Pak Chai 2006.

Modern architecture as ideology  33

Figure 2.5  The Central Axis of Edinburgh Place Complex Spatial arrangements of the Edinburgh Complex. Due to copyright limitations, I could not include the preferred screenshots here. Please refer to the YouTube channel, ‘TPB TV News – 香港新聞紀錄片庫’ (香港新聞紀錄片庫 2012) at 0:42 and 1:15, where you can see when former Governor of Hong Kong Sir McLehose arriving in the colony in 1971, assuming the governorship and setting his first step on the colony on the Queen’s Pier to proceed to the inauguration ceremony at Edinburgh Place. With the axial arrangement of the pier, Edinburgh Place and City Hall, colonial governors disembarked from their royal yachts onto the Queen’s Pier, proceeded onto the path guided by the grand axis, reviewed the colonial soldiers all dressed in their colonial costumes performing their colonial power display, and finally proceeded to City Hall where their inauguration ceremony took place. Source: Author’s diagram.

On one hand, through adopting the Modernist architectural approach, it expressed the colonial authority’s persistence to place Hong Kong on the international stage while proclaiming Hong Kong as ‘Berlin in the East’ and attempting to call for international attention, hence pragmatic assistances such as finance. On the other hand, incorporating an axial arrangement to facilitate the European colonizers’ ‘theatrical display’ – as what Bernard Cohn refers to (1996) – was a common practice seen in their colonies as an act of power enunciation. The ambition to demonstrate the colonial authority was precipitated, articulated and spatialized through architectural design. Such authoritative practice in spatiality disguised in its Modernist outfit accompanied the colonial administration in different realms such as education, language policies and democracy (the lack thereof). Despite the liberal market economy, the complementary framework of colonial governance in the post-war era has softly cultivated generations of Hongkongers who never take part in policymaking. It is essentially a form of authoritarianism which the East Germans faced during the Cold War era. Such authoritarianism crept in

34  Liza Wing Man Kam the spatial form – although carefully disguised in the material expression of Modernist architecture – erected in the city which exercises liberal market economy. Resembling the Cold War West Berlin, shanty towns were also developed for political refugees. Tiu Keng Leng, formerly known as Rennie’s Mill, was a designated refuge area for the Chinese Nationalists fleeing from mainland China after losing the civil war to the Communists at the end of the 1940s. The original plan of the colonial government was to let these nationalists take the area only as a stepping stone before they fled to Taiwan or anywhere in the world. According to Lung (Lung 2009), the colonial government provided over 1,000 A-shaped oilpaper tents at the beginning for accommodating these refugees. It then developed the area by constructing grass huts, then wooden ones and alter stone huts, as recalled by Chik, an interviewee who shared his memory of the refuge area to the South China Morning Post reporter (Lau 2012). With the colonial government’s attitude being silent or laissez-faire, and the simultaneously aids provided by proKuomintang (Nationalist) charities and foreign missionaries, the community got stabilized and flourished (Lan 2006). Nine schools in the area were operated by 1963 (Lau 2012). In comparison to the aforementioned refugee camps in West Berlin, the refuge area at Tiu Keng Leng in Hong Kong was more primitive in terms of its facilities. However, the spirit of these political (and economic) refugees and their solidarity was enunciated by the sea of flags fluttering on the hill of Tiu Keng Leng on the National Day of the Republic of China, the 10th of October, or better known as the Double Ten Festival every year. This ritual lasted until the retrocession of Hong Kong to mainland China in 1997, with the post-colonial authority’s deliberate actions to disperse the residents to different areas of Hong Kong through relocation. The Tiu Keng Leng area, according to Lau, was ‘an area of the Taiwan-sympathizing community’ (Lau 2012).

Cityscape as a signifying system: an interplay between authoritarianism and modernism For Giedion, space, architecture or even buildings are not to be defined solely with ‘a style.’ While convenient predication of architecture’s materiality helps observers to categorize them as whichever ‘style’, essentially it is beyond the visual presentation and material expressions that architecture should be interpreted. Process of space production, political ideologies implied and infiltrated into the spatial design languages, as well as the specific socio-political settings should all contribute to our interpretations – of both the architecture/urban setting per se – and the spatial and temporal framework that stages such space. The Modernist architecture is with a bottom-up approach as the mechanism for space production. Thus, its materiality, spatial organization and hence its spirit would have been much more compatible to the ‘socialist’ and ‘community-building’ ideal. Yet a neoclassical Stalinist architectural style was adopted in socialist East Berlin in the first decade of the Cold War era. The Stalinist architecture shares to an extent a similar political connotation with its counterpart during the Nazi-regime, with its grand axis and monumental grandiose structures as design elements. Such a

Modern architecture as ideology  35 resultant package of spatial experience, as well as the visual expressions, was, however, what the East Berlin authorities proclaimed to dissociate the city from. Abandoned by the GDR soon after Khrushchev’s criticism of it being impractical and expensive, the Stalinist architecture was renounced from its previous status of ‘the German national architectural style’. Reinforced concrete, prefabricated construction units – hence the standardization – characteristics of Modernist architecture became the paradigm in reconstructing East Berlin again. As in the cases in West Berlin and the post-war Hong Kong, desperately longing for the financial support from the US, a set of ‘Western values’ such as free-market, liberalism and metropolitanism ought to be displayed in spatial and material expressions in the city – hence Modernist architecture was adopted as paradigm to reconstruct public buildings and housing in both cities. Architectural and spatial design became an essential tool for both the Eastern and Western Blocs to infiltrate their political messages through the quotidian space and composed a significant part in the cultural Cold War. While Giedion was convinced that even ‘the most Modernist architecture’ has been incorporated with local/regional contributions, through observing the two seemingly repellent concepts in architecture – the use of an absolute grand axis and Modernist architecture – and how they were coexisting/twisted/disguised in the three investigated polities, we see the three different presentations of Modernist Architecture proclaimed/rejected/executed by each polity according to the individual political agenda. The Modernist approach was the hinge in all three investigated polities to start with during the post-war era, but the style unfolded/ diverted into different directions in each case. The East Berlin’s grand axis and monumentality could be observed in the colonial Hong Kong infrastructure despite the material variation; the standardization approach in constructing housing could be observed in all three polities for economic concerns; refuge areas for emigrants who fled from authoritarian regimes existed in both West Berlin and Hong Kong due to the two polities’ similar role of being at the doorstep of/to the Free World. There is no one absolute definition of Modernist or authoritarian architecture. We could only approach a better understanding by exploring the epistemology of each ideal and interpret the produced space with the surrounding temporal framework. The particularity of each presentation ought to be considered with the individual socio-political situation: The two Berlins’ eagerness to be the ‘orthodox Germany’ but yet the different approaches in envisioning and sculpting the future for their people; East Berlin’s Stalinist architecture that amalgamate Schinkel’s Prussian golden era and Stalin’s work as to sculpt a new ‘German’ national style; West Berlin’s choice to adopt the Avant-Garde Neuen Bauen (Bauhaus) architecture to reconstruct itself as a city for capitalist-ideological display and finally, Hong Kong, as a capitalist liberal market, but in any case, a British colony. Authorities commissioned architects who meticulously embedded the respective political ideologies through architectural and spatial design languages in the material construction to achieve a desired sense of the space. Such conceptualized and constructed physical environment worked together with the characters

36  Liza Wing Man Kam (citizens) who actually interacted with/within these spaces and played a role on the plotted/un-plotted stage. Such a stage – the architecture and space – visualized and at the same time contributed to the cultural Cold War between the antagonistic political ideologies. The hybridity of spatial typologies and the underlying political agendas in Hong Kong substantiates Graham’s claim in a spatial sense: Hong Kong was “the Berlin of the East” and it was indeed a significant liminal space. The three cities: East Berlin, West Berlin, and Hong Kong and their urban settings do not only showcase each authority’s practical solutions to house the desperate post-war populations. The various spatial typologies also represent the result of the various coincided and interplayed political ideologies. Architecture in the cultural Cold War plays a significant role: It was the tool to embed political ideologies into material forms, and simultaneously it was the result: to sustain these political ideologies through providing the stage to host interactions between the authorities and the ruled.

Notes 1 To a great extent, design process contributes to manipulating activities and human interactions hosted within the built forms, but this goes beyond the realm of discussion in this chapter. 2 According to Ladd, the city was already on its way to separation in 1948. First it was due to the Russian Blockade and Western airlift of 1948–49. Berlin gradually split into two. In 1952 the East German government sealed the border between East and West Germany – electrical grids were set up on the border and the telephone lines were cut. In 1961, when the Berlin Wall was built, it became the division which completely divided the city at ground level and left the public transit systems entirely separated. 3 The outcomes of the design of Haussmann’s boulevards are extremely interesting. Originally designated to be the broad and elegant streets to stage authority’s power display and facilitate mobility control, the monumental streets become backfire to the authority, when the public can also use the space to enunciate their power in protests. 4 Rudolf Herrnstadt in Neues Deutschland, July 29, 1951, quoted in Ladd (Ladd 1998, 253). 5 For more details, please refer to Pugh (Pugh 2014, 37). 6 The camps were severely overcrowded; kitchen facilities and food conditions were not satisfactory; most of the time refugees could only take cold showers; bunk beds were packed in the rooms, according to the interview with Wolf Rothe, who was the deputy director of the Volkmarstrasse camp in Tempelhof, West Berlin (one of the biggest camps with nearly 4,000 refugees). See http://www.dw.com/en/ exhibit-explores-west-berlin-camps-for-east-german-refugees/a-15304581. 7 For more information about examinations on the colonial piers in Hong Kong, please refer to Kam (Kam 2015).

Bibliography Carroll, J. M. 2007. A Concise History of Hong Kong. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Castillo, G. 2004. “Design Pedagogy Enters the Cold War: The Reeducation of Eleven West German Architects.” Journal of Architectural Education 57(4): 10–18. Cohn, B. S. 1996. Colonialism and Its Form of Knowledge: The British in India. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Modern architecture as ideology  37 Deckker, Z. Q. 2001. Brazil Built: The Architecture of the Modern Movement in Brazil. London: Taylor & Francis. Frampton, K. 1992. Modern Architecture. London: Thames and Hudson. Giedion, S. 2008. Space, Time and Architecture, 5th ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Kam, Wing Man Liza. 2015. Reconfiguration of ‘the Stars and the Queen’: A Quest for the Interrelationship Between Architecture and Civic Awareness in Post-colonial Hong Kong. Baden-Baden: Nomos. ———. 2021. “Liberating Architecture from ‘Chineseness’: Colonial Shinto Shrines and Post-Colonial Martyrs’ Shrines in Post-War Taiwan.” In Contesting Chineseness: Ethnicity, Identity, and Nation in China and Southeast Asia, edited by Y. K. Chan and C. Y. Hoon. Cham: Springer. Kiesel, H. 2011. Exhibit Explores West Berlin Camps for East German Refugees. Edited by M. Kuebler. Deutsche Welle. Accessed August 15, 2019. www.dw.com/en/exhibitexplores-west-berlin-camps-for-east-german refugees/a-15304581. Ladd, B. 1998. The Ghost of Berlin: Confronting German History in the Urban Landscape. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Lai, Lawrence Wai-Chung. 1999. “Reflections on the Abercrombie Report 1948: A Strategic Plan for Colonial Hong Kong.” The Town Planning Review 70(1): 61–87. Lan, O. K. 藍安偉. 2006. “Rennie’s Mill: The Origin and Evolution of a Special Enclave in Hong Kong.” Thesis, HKU Scholars Hub. Accessed May 1, 2019. http://dx.doi. org/10.5353/th_b3677776. Lau, Stuart. 2012. “Memories of a Haven for Nationalists.” South China Morning Post. Accessed May 1, 2019. www.scmp.com/print/news/hong-kong/article/1088478/memorieshaven-nationalists. Lung, Ying-tai 龍應台. 2009. Big River, Big Sea: Untold Stories of 1949 (大江大海). Hong Kong: MassINC. Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum. 2020. “Marienfelde Refugee Center Museum.” www.notaufnahmelager-berlin.de/en/. Moussard, M., P. Garibaldi, and M. Curbach. 2018. “The Invention of Reinforced Concrete (1848–1906).” In High Tech Concrete: Where Technology and Engineering Meet, edited by D. A. Hordijk and M. Luković, 2785–94. Cham: Springer. Pugh, E. 2014. Architecture, Politics, and Identity in Divided Berlin. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press. ———. 2015. “From ‘National Style’ to ‘Rationalized Construction’: Mass-Produced Housing, Style, and Architectural Discourse in the East German Journal Deutsche Architektur, 1956–1964.” Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 74(1): 87–108. Roberts, Priscilla, and John M. Carroll, eds. 2016. Hong Kong in the Cold War. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. TPB TV News 香港新聞紀錄片庫. 2012. “[新聞](2007–08–01)皇后碼頭歷史半世紀.” March 23. Accessed May 10, 2019. www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xj1eJAkFDc&featur e=youtu.be. Tse, Pak Chai. 2006. The Edinburgh Place Complex. Xue, Charlie Q. L. 2016. Hong Kong Architecture 1945–2015. Singapore: Springer.

3 “Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”? The state, city administration, and scales of reconstruction in post-war Paris, 1944–1977 Stephen W. Sawyer In 1944, Charles de Gaulle famously announced that Paris had been broken but finally freed. As true as this statement may have been in the immediate context of war, it proved only half true in the decades that followed. For Paris was indeed “broken” but not just by war. This post-war global city also faced massive problems of insufficient and outdated infrastructure, vast housing needs, a lack of financial resources and a “symbolic urban crisis,” as its place in the larger metropolitan region, the empire, Europe and the world changed radically during the Cold War. Confronted with the need to rebuild the capital of a country that sat at the centre of these multiple scales, discussions on Paris’s reconstruction and its local government thus became debates on multilevel state-building and in particular the place of Paris in France, Europe, the Western empire and the world. What ultimately emerged was a set of questions over the significance of democratizing urban governance in the capital city: a municipal democracy that played an essential role in defining the nature of French democracy and its relationship to the place of France in a world divided by the Cold War.

Crisis of infrastructure, crisis of governance Tensions between the local government and the state had been growing since before the war, in particular because of the laws of April 21 and June 13, 1939, that limited the power of the municipal council vis-à-vis the national government. In spite of municipal resistance, the laws limiting Parisian autonomy were passed and the war broke out soon after, preventing any further organized resistance on the part of members of the local administration. In turn, the war brought further centralization of urban power at the same time that it left the city almost entirely without initiative for solving its own problems. The law of October 16, 1941, for example, went further in the same direction, removing municipal elections in favour of appointments. And while the law of June 15, 1943 under the Vichy regime established that every town must have a development plan, including street and zoning maps, it also provided for a complex process for choosing local officials in Paris that required the input of multiple state ministries.1 DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-4

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  39 In the wake of the war, the city had suffered relatively little damage, especially compared to London or Berlin.2 Paris had seen much worse in the past.3 But the relative lack of destruction covered over a much larger crisis that came to full light in the years to come. The crisis evolved as a problem of urban needs and the difficulty of finding the means necessary to meet them: it was a crisis of governance piled on to the challenge of insufficient infrastructure. Indeed, had the city been further destroyed, national resources might have been necessary and immediately deployed toward the city’s reconstruction, as they were in other French cities, especially in the north-west. But the apparent lack of damage meant that the city was largely left to its own meagre resources and at the same time had very little independence of initiative for solving key local issues. As the immediate post-war years progressed, the city’s needs continued to grow at an alarming rate. Most importantly, there was a massive housing shortage. There were still entire blocks that had been declared unfit for habitation in 1918 that continued to house Parisians. More than 100,000 housing units in the city were considered outdated and in need of replacement by the end of the war, and another 90,000 were considered uninhabitable. Moreover, inequalities across the city were tremendous. According to Philippe Nivet and Yann Combeau, for the 100,000 people who had contracted tuberculosis in the post-war years, only 33 on average were in the area of the Champs-Élysées while 877 per year suffered in the condemned areas.4 Coming to grips with these problems required at once a robust city administration and the financial means to act. Unfortunately, the city had neither. Moreover, in the years immediately following the war, the few resources the national government had to spend on rebuilding urban infrastructure went to cities in the provinces. This was part of a broader trend that sought to decentralize means away from the capital, a trend that began under Vichy and gained steam in the 1940s and 1950s. The tendency was perhaps best captured by the tremendously influential Paris and the French Desert,5 a book which convinced many in France and in the government that Paris had concentrated far too many of the country’s resources for centuries in the capital. A truly modern France would invest elsewhere, they argued. In such a context, the government was reluctant to pour money into Paris at precisely the moment when public opinion seemed convinced that it should be decentralizing material, cultural and social resources. Nonetheless, in the early 1950s, a new awareness of Paris’s needs began to grow, especially among Parisian and national government officials. The first responses to this situation in the early 1950s were best captured by André Thirion’s report on urbanism presented to the city council in 1951.6 This report focused primarily on adapting the city to automobile usage through the construction of new thoroughfares and the destruction of some of the denser central neighbourhoods of the city, especially around les Halles. While it fell far short of Le Corbusier’s radical plan for reconstructing Paris,7 Thirion’s ambitious proposal focused on the right bank with three north-south arteries, a widening of the old Rue Saint-Denis, an underground tunnel that would have passed under the Seine connecting la rue Rambuteau to Saint-Germain, a widening of the major north-south artery on the

40  Stephen W. Sawyer right bank with the rue Montmartre and a massive rebuilding of the area that had been the central Parisian market. Thirion’s plan, however, met with significant resistance, especially around questions of financing and oversight. Within the local government the finance committee was favourable, but only in the form of a general scheme for guiding future plans. The council remained reluctant to commit financial resources and create planning restrictions for such a vague scheme. It ultimately agreed that some aspects of the plan should be considered more thoroughly, but the general plan remained a dead letter. So ultimately the Thirion plan was rejected, considered too ambitious, too destructive, unrealistic and ultimately not in keeping with the city’s needs. A new plan quickly followed as early as 1952 (which was also rejected). However, in 1953, the city council finally approved a far more modest rebuilding project. But even here, resistance to the plan was revealing. For the concerns that were presented turned almost entirely around a lack of sufficient resources and the need to wait for the central government to act upon the city’s recommendations.8 When, in 1953 a new plan designed to solve the housing crisis did actually take form, it should not be surprising that it did not come from the municipality but from the central government under the action of the Reconstruction Ministry. With this plan, the central government intended to encourage the construction of affordable, publicly subsidized housing projects, which came to be known as HLM, wherever land was available in Paris and the Paris metropolitan region. In particular, the plan focused on the formerly non-building zones around the old wall constructed under the leadership of Adolphe Thiers in the 1840s. In other words, these housing projects were to be built from the outside-in, so to speak, starting from the national government and the outskirts of the city along the urban periphery and then slowly moving toward the inner arrondissements of the city with the cooperation of the city government. This plan, and others like it, did finally come to fruition and Paris, the capital city, did ultimately undergo a massive transformation in the 1960s. But even if the city acquired some budgetary autonomy in 1961, including the right to contract loans, and the municipal council acquired some executive power with the decree of November 30, 1970, much of the reconstruction of Paris was pursued almost entirely at the expense of any local autonomy until the election of the Paris mayor in 1976–77.9 Moreover, the period following the creation of an elected mayor of Paris paradoxically marked a slowing in the substantial rebuilding of the city. In other words, in spite of its massive infrastructural needs, the city was denied the ability to solve them according to the interests of its own inhabitants. That the construction which took place during this key period (especially the grands ensembles of the 13th arrondissement, for example) has continued to meet with some resistance by Parisians suggests that for all the major construction that took place, the city was being governed with thumbs (that is the central government) rather than fingers (the local municipal magistrates). Of equal importance, it is clear that during these years, Paris suffered as much from state centralization as some of France’s most distant cities.

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  41

Scales of urban crisis Arguments for why Paris was governed by the central government during this period have overwhelmingly emphasized one key aspect of Parisian history: the competitive and fraught relationship between the capital city and the central state. As Jean Favier writes, for centuries there had been the constant fear that “French history is written in Paris.”10 Philippe Nivet has similarly highlighted this relationship in the introduction to his Histoire Politique de Paris.11 The tradition of Parisian domination by the central government going back over six centuries when the king Charles V stripped Paris of much of its municipal autonomy, is undeniable. But while it is no doubt true that there was a long tradition of fearing the power of the capital city both during the Old Regime and across the modern era, this explanation is insufficient in itself to explain why the city remained so directly under the control of the national government in the postwar years. Moreover, it does not allow us to understand why similar transformations in municipal governance took place across Europe and the Americas in these decades as well. For example, it is noteworthy that Washington, DC, enjoyed its first mayor in over a century in the 1970s just as London municipal governance underwent a massive shift in the same period. While the distrust between the national government and the capital city, and especially its revolutionary potential no doubt played a role, reducing the problem of municipal governance to this local-national relationship falls prey to what Saskia Sassen has referred to as “the endogeneity trap”: the endogeneity trap suggests that to understand what happens in a city, one must look entirely within the city itself.12 By extension, avoiding the endogeneity trap means that to understand Paris and its relationship to the national government during this critical period, one must avoid limiting one’s analysis to the city and its relationship to the national government without looking at the other essential scales involved in Parisian development. What follows therefore suggests a different, multi-scalar approach to understanding the crisis of Parisian governance in the post-war era. It suggests that as important as the local-national relationship was, it must be understood within an increasing set of scales that also profoundly shaped the state’s unwillingness to allow the city to self-govern. What follows explores the complexity of Paris’s municipal governance during this period. It does so by moving out in concentric circles from the metropolitan to the geopolitical in order to suggest that the reason the city was unable to assert its autonomy and govern itself effectively was not solely due to its relationship to the traditional tensions with the national government, but to an overlapping set of processes that operated at multiple scales, each of which challenged the city’s ability to assert its own interests and to solve the essential urban problems at a local scale.

Building a post-war metropolis One of the essential challenges in developing a robust local government within Paris in the post-war years was its relationship to its suburban hinterland. From

42  Stephen W. Sawyer 1945 to the mid-1970s, Paris’s role as a global city – a status it had enjoyed in different ways for centuries – was once again being transformed. Most importantly, it was pushing many of the urban processes that had previously operated on the scale of the city as it had been defined by Haussmann to a much larger area.13 From roads to housing and demographics, by the 1940s and 1950s, the Paris scale was simply insufficient to rationally and effectively plan for its needs. And yet the municipal council had little if any jurisdiction over the suburban areas.14 Thus, all attempts to create a more efficient and effective planning scheme required the inclusion of areas that necessarily undermined the city’s ability to self-govern. When in 1959–60 a new planning agency was created – the SARP (Service d’aménagmenet de la region parisienne) – which produced the PADOG (Plan d’aménagement et d’organisation générale), it was designed to solve problems on the metropolitan level, but it necessarily came at the impetus of the central government. Similarly, the law of August 2, 1961, saw the creation of the “District de la region de Paris” which was a unique planning authority for the entire Paris region. This was part of de Gaulle’s efforts to overcome the urban challenges of the immediate post-war period described earlier. But instead of giving increased power to the city, he placed at the head of the new administrative body Paul Delouvrier (who had made a name for himself in particular during the Algerian War). This meant that the city itself would be consulted, but not responsible, for the most important changes it was confronting. Delouvrier said of the new administrative body: The district itself was a public power managed by an administrative council . . . half of whom were designated by the government. . . . I demanded of Michel Debré that my function be not only that of an executive for a few elected officials with a small set of funds at our disposal, but it represents the State itself. . . . I acquired what I asked for by drafting myself with the help of Jean Poincaré, the decree of October 31 that determined my responsibilities.15 Thus, while Delouvrier did have some elected members of the Parisian municipality alongside him, he insisted that he be granted executive power and that he acted as a “representative of the state.” In 1964 the administrative map of the Paris metropolitan region was redesigned, replacing the department of the Seine with four departments. This gave new powers to the municipal council of Paris, but it also divided the influence of the metropolitan scale across multiple elected bodies. Only the state and the various planning authorities that acted in its name had responsibility for the whole. In conference proceedings published in 1964 – including many of the key figures of metropolitan planning of the period, André Chastel, Pierre George, Pierre Viot, André Aymard, and Paul Delouvrier, published as Paris Présent et Avenir d’une Capitale (1964)16 – Pierre George insisted on the uneven and heterogeneous and at the same time ineluctable development of the suburbs. As a review in the Annales ESC highlighted on the urgent problems being addressed: “He

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  43 poses the question of emergency, he shows the necessity of inserting the major public housing projects into the life of the agglomeration.”17 Delouvrier continued to give greater coherency and consistency to metropolitan planning, as the PADOG, which was later referred to as the Schéma directeur, became the essential planning instrument on the metropolitan scale, including Paris proper. While its focus was on integrating the metropolitan region, its efforts necessarily transformed the city itself. For example, the creation of a ring-road highway around Paris on the site of the former fortifications was combined with a massive new ambition to create highways along the Seine and to create a highway interchange at Montparnasse.18 Other highways reaching out into the metropolitan area and the creation of the regional rail system would necessarily push and pull populations and economic opportunities from the city into the suburbs. As a result, during this period, from the mid-1950s through the mid-1970s, more than 200,000 new dwellings were built inside Paris and in the metropolitan region. The history of Paris during these key years of the post-war era and the Cold War may thus be characterized by its overwhelming need for infrastructural development and renovation and the vast insufficiency of attempting to do so on a local scale. As Alain Griotterray, Gaullist and elected member of the Parisian administration, suggested, it was not just a problem of resources but a problem of reorganizing the municipality and the unsatisfactory structure of the Parisian administration in its relationship to the surrounding metropolitan region. Paris was of course not alone in this capacity. It was precisely such pressures that had already led to the London Government Act of 1963. At the level of the greater Paris region, the problem that presented itself could thus be stated in the following terms: the incapacity to generate a powerful form of self-government in Paris was also the result of an incapacity to construct a democratic relationship between the city and its surrounding suburbs. Only magistrates appointed by the central government had the power to plan on a metropolitan scale. And yet many of the most essential issues facing the Paris municipality were actually metropolitan questions. The incapacity to negotiate a democratic solution between the city and the metropolis meant that it was ultimately representatives of the national government that oversaw and pursued many of the most important transformations.

Administering a former imperial capital One of the most extraordinary and radical transformations for Paris during the Cold War was the loss of its status as an imperial capital. For centuries, first for the colonies of the Old Regime and then for the French imperial possessions in the modern era, Paris sat at the centre of a vast global empire. As a result, the city was in many ways shaped in its very form and self-conception as an imperial metropolis. The traces of Paris as an imperial capital could be seen in its buildings, infrastructure, its goods and services, the people who lived and did business there and also in its governance.19 Paradoxically, the importance of Paris as an imperial centre had also contributed, since the first half of the 19th century, to making it a capital of anti-imperialism.20

44  Stephen W. Sawyer Leading proponents of African and Asian decolonization came to Paris for their education and organized their networks through the communication and travel infrastructures provided by the capital. This meant that there was a politics of contestation taking place in the imperial capital with immediate implications that far exceeded the geographic city itself and pushed out onto an imperial and global scale. These contentious politics were perhaps best represented in the post-war era when Paris served as a site for resistance and sometimes brutal repression within the city itself, generally managed by the Paris Prefect – who was an officer of the central government – and the national police. The 1951 demonstrations in favour of an independent Algeria took place in Paris, soon followed by those of 1952 and then the tragic events of the “Algerian bridge.” Thus, the place of Paris in the process of decolonization that accelerated in the 1950s and 1960s was both symbolically and structurally significant. From a symbolic perspective, the city was an extension of the battlegrounds of decolonization at the same time that it lost its role as the cultural centre of one of the vastest informal and formal global networks in the world. From a structural perspective, the rapid demise of the French empire in the post-war period necessarily had a deep impact on the shape and demographics of the city. First, from the southeastern Asian colonies and then from the North African and sub-Saharan colonies, the period witnessed a return of many former colonial residents to the metropole, many of whom chose, or hoped to choose, to return to Paris and the surrounding areas.21 The impact at the level of local governance was no less important. The Algerian crisis and the return of de Gaulle brought the Gaullists to power within the National Assembly. However, the competing positions on the decolonization of Algeria also divided the opposition to the Gaullists at the municipal level and thus generated the possibility that the Gaullists would dominate the Parisian municipality as well. It is not overstating the case to suggest that if Gaullists had a majority in the municipal council throughout the 1960s, it was partially because the municipal opposition had been divided by the Algerian War. The consequences of the fact that Gaullists controlled the municipal assembly under de Gaulle’s presidency should not be underestimated. For during this period, the result was that, far from refusing to grant Paris municipal autonomy due to mistrust, quite the opposite was true. The city council and the government were largely in agreement on how to act. So when de Gaulle, Pompidou and Delouvrier developed ambitious plans for the capital city, they were almost systematically supported by the majority in the municipal council. They also shared a common vision of how to “modernize” the city. Thus, if Paris was largely rebuilt from the late 1950s through the early 1970s, it was thanks at least in part to its status as what we might refer to as a “post-colonial capital.”

Capital of a new Europe When Jean Monnet led the office of Le Plan, founded in 1946, a new emphasis on the rebuilding the French economy came alive. In combination with the creation

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  45 of the Iron and Steel union in 1950, this rebuilding of the economy generated an extensive interest in thinking about France in a European context and Paris as an economic European capital. When the European Economic Community (EEC) was created in 1957, it remained humble by 21st century standards, including only France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. However, it also represented a new age for the European economy as growth rates soared and the old continent thrived economically. The relatively humble geographical scope of the project in these early days also ensured that France, and especially its capital city, had a preponderant place in the European organization. A divided Germany and the relative size and prestige of the other European capitals ensured that Paris would have a privileged role to play in European development. Histories of de Gaulle and his foreign policy in particular have had a tendency to overemphasize the scale of the national. This is not to say that the national scale did not have a predominance in de Gaulle’s conception of governance, of the state or in his thought. But a multi-scalar approach also forces us to recognize that without a colonial empire, de Gaulle quickly became convinced that Paris could shift from serving as an imperial capital to a European centre. As a capital of Europe, Paris could contribute to what De Gaulle referred to as a “European Europe.”22 Paris could play a fundamental role in the resistance to Americanization and to the consolidation of a European idea around the ideals captured by the cultural and political history within the French capital. Although Paris sat far from the country’s European land borders, in the 1950s and 1960s, it could claim to have a strong European dimension. From this perspective, the problem with leaving Parisian affairs to Parisians was that it could also potentially threaten France’s European ambitions. Again, it was not so much that the national government feared the power of the capital, as that it hoped to leverage the city in its European policy. Indeed, this scale provided new opportunities for the French capital and for France. Paul Delouvrier himself insisted upon what he called “la nouvelle dimension européenne de Paris.”23 While he set out to rebuild Paris on a metropolitan scale, he kept an eye out for placing the city more directly at the centre of European economic development. As Sutcliffe argues, the government converted to a more liberal attitude towards the growth of Paris: This change had been brought about by two fundamental changes in the national-politico-economic situation since 1958. France’s participation in the Common Market gave a fillip to its economy and a north-eastward orientation to its industry. Paris, it seemed, could not only grasp the role of capital of Europe to which it had long laid claim, but would benefit directly from its proximity to the centre of gravity of the Common Market, the industrial areas of Belgium and northern Germany.24 While at the head of the District de la region parisienne, Delouvrier explicitly called for making Paris the capital of Europe as an industrial and economic distribution point.25 The idea was that if Paris was the industrial and economic capital

46  Stephen W. Sawyer of Europe, the rest of France would obviously draw economic advantage. In such a context, Paris played a key role in European affairs. Granting autonomy to Parisians in a moment when the redevelopment of the city required considerations at the European level remained a challenge, especially in an age when the networks and relationships between municipalities was almost entirely structured on the national scale. Today, the mayors of major European cities gather regularly to tackle common problems, but in the post-war period, such connections did not yet exist. An autonomous Parisian municipality would therefore need to await new European urban networks.

Geo-politics and the Cold War During this post-war period, Paris maintained its status as a world centre of diplomacy and international relations. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was signed there in 1948 and in 1958 the first high modern buildings of UNESCO were inaugurated. These measures served to strengthen the symbolic place of Paris in the new world order established after the war at the same time that it gave it more symbolic weight in the battle between the two victorious forces of World War II. The strength of the Communists in the local committees and in the different mayoral districts of Paris in the post-war era should not be underestimated. It ensured that the larger set of tensions, between liberal democratic and capitalist nationalists on the one hand and communists on the other, which characterized the Cold War would play themselves out on the municipal scale as well. Indeed, communists could be heard declaring that the “municipal elections must offer the masses the opportunity to express their anger.”26 Though the elections for the municipal council in the early Fourth Republic brought a right-leaning majority, the communists remained strong. When the brother of Charles de Gaulle, Pierre de Gaulle, was voted president of the municipal council four years in a row in the late 1940s, the municipal council thus became a symbol of Gaullist power and was also to serve as a model for how the Gaullists would govern. The return of Charles de Gaulle and his election to the presidency in 1958 reconfirmed the place of Paris within the Gaullist geopolitical vision: de Gaulle placed the myth of Paris’s glorious past at the centre of his own conception of France’s place in the world – and his role as well – just as he withdrew from NATO and attempted to assert a more independent world diplomacy. As discussed earlier, since the Gaullists dominated the Paris city government throughout the 1960s and the Fifth Republic, the municipal majority and the central government tended to find common ground in local administrative debates. But the fact that the city and the state were controlled by the same political majority also raised the stakes of the debates between the communists and the Gaullists within the municipal council. Most importantly, it meant that the larger set of tensions within the Cold War would find a home within the local administration. One might even suggest that there emerged a kind of municipal Cold War within the local council with the communists arguing about the corruption of the Gaullists and the Gaullists accusing communists of having insufficiently supported the

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  47 resistance. In the immediate post-war period, one could hear the leader of the communist majority criticizing the Gaullists: “Vichyists, collaborators, former Topazists, 6-of-Februaryists, joined together with apprentices of dictatorship, the destroyers of the constitution, the sworn enemies of the working class, enemies who dream of applying the Work Charter established by Vichy under Hitler and Mussolini’s inspiration.” And in 1947, the communists within the municipal council questioned the prefect of police as follows: [We are calling] upon the responsibilities of the public authorities in the murder of the railman Puzzuoli, former combatant of the FTP, who died from his wounds . . . during a counter-demonstration of the people of Paris against the heinous occupation of USSR, friend and ally of France. On another occasion, Raymond Bossus, one of the communist leaders within the municipality, declared in 1947: “If the workers and republicans of Bulgaria considered it useful for the forward progress of democracy in the popular interest of Bulgaria to punish traitors of the Republic, they were justified.” Likewise, in March 1948, Bossus made a similarly globally charged Cold War declaration when he proposed a text which read: The Municipal Council addresses its profound congratulations to the Republican population of Prague that played such a decisive role in the reinforcement and respect of popular will and undermined the plans of disorder and civil war elaborated by a few ministries acting in the name of and under the orders of American imperialists.27 The examples could be multiplied, but suffice it to say that the municipal debates provided an extraordinary stage for communist rhetoric against the reigning Gaullists. In such a climate, there was little doubt that the very idea that a communist or at the very least a united left-wing majority might ultimately gain control ensured the Gaullists were not anxious to give more authority to the municipal council. It is thus no mere coincidence that it was not until the brief period of Cold War thaw that began in the mid-1970s – the same period when the Communists’ strength weakened in the French political landscape and they joined the Union of the Left with the more moderate socialists – that an elected mayor for Paris was finally granted. Moreover, the elements of international and geopolitical intervention within a body that was, in theory at least, to be focused on local affairs, ensured that the politics of municipal development remained caught between local and global concerns.

Conclusion: scales of municipal governance It is therefore possible to draw out three broad conclusions on the governance of the Parisian municipality in the post-war era. First, the crisis of governance and

48  Stephen W. Sawyer the state’s response to the massive infrastructural needs of the capital city were only partially bound to the traditional tensions between the city and the national government. An understanding of the crisis of Paris city government requires a multi-scalar approach that takes into consideration Paris’s place as a Cold War global city. Second, considerations of global cities must not remain confined to one scale but must attempt to understand how multiple urban scalar processes operate in shaping the power of the local state. Paris thus confronted challenges of asserting its municipal autonomy at multiple scales: in its relationship to the metropolitan region; on the imperial scale and the massive shock waves and political realignments generated by decolonization; the push for a new European capital; and the place of Paris in the geopolitics of the Cold War. Each of these scales challenged the city’s capacity to govern itself and to assert its autonomy. Finally, and by extension, this study suggests that global city governance takes place through the constant negotiation between the multiple scales of administrative, political and symbolic power. If we are to properly understand how we arrived at the current situation of many of our most dynamic global cities, we must place these problems in multiple contexts, removing them from a reduced relationship between local and central national state power.

Notes 1 Anthony Sutcliffe, Autumn of Central Paris: The Defeat of Town Planning, 1850– 1970 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1971), 223. See also Bernard Lafay, Solutions aux problèmes de Paris: la Circulation (Paris: Comité du nouveau Paris, 1954). 2 On the massive destruction of Berlin and London, see, for example, John R. Bruning, Bombs Away!: The World War II Bombing Campaigns Over Europe (Minneapolis: Zenith, 2011); Jeffry M. Diefendorf, In the Wake of War: The Reconstruction of German Cities After World War II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993); Richard Overy, The Bombers and the Bombed: Allied Air War Over Europe 1940–1945 (London: Penguin, 2013). For a more general discussion of building after urban destruction, see Gastón R. Gordillo, Rubble: The Afterlife of Destruction (Durham: Duke University Press, 2014). 3 On past conflicts and the destruction of Paris, especially in 1871, see Robert Tombs, The War Against Paris, 1871 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981). 4 Philippe Nivet, Yvan Combeau, Histoire politique de Paris au XXe siècle. Une histoire locale et nationale (Paris: PUF, 2000), 198. 5 Jean Gravier, Paris et le désert français: décentralisation, équipement, population (Paris: Le Portulan, 1947). 6 Bulletin municipal official, Rapports et Documents: Rapport d’André Thirion, n 1, 1er décembre 1951 “sur les operations générales et locales de voirie.” 7 Between 1922 and 1925, Le Corbusier developed a plan, Le Plan Voisin, for the right bank of Paris which consisted largely of towers surrounded by green spaces. See Le Corbusier, Urbanisme (Paris: Vincent, Fréal et Cie, 1994). 8 “Considerable delay was expected before the Government approved the plan and the financial resources to carry any of it out were still lacking.” (Sutcliff, Autumn of Central Paris, 225). 9 There had been mayors at the three other moments in the history of modern Paris: during the early phases of the revolutionary period, for a brief six-month period in 1848

“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  49 and in the early moments of the Third Republic. The election of a Paris mayor in 1977 was in fact the first lasting municipal autonomy in over six centuries. 10 Jean Favier, Paris, 2000 ans d’histoire (Paris: Fayard, 1997). 11 Nivet, Histoire politique, Introduction. 12 In her discussion on the relationship between global cities and their national contexts, Sassen writes: A particular challenge in the work of identifying these types of processes and actors as part of globalization is the need to decode at least some of what continues to be experienced and represented as national. The practices and dynamics listed above are not usually seen within global scalings. . . . A key proposition that has long guided my research is that we cannot understand the x – in this case globalization – confining our study to the characteristics of x – i.e. global processes and institutions. This is type of confinement is a kind of endogeneity trap, one all too common in the social sciences and spectacularly so in the globalization literature.   Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 3–5. 13 Elsa Martayan, “Moderniser la capital ou contenir la region: les propositions et débats des années cinquante,” Les Annales de la recherché urbaine 50 (1991). 14 See, for example, Annie Fourcaut, ed., Banlieu rouge 1920–1960. Années Thorez, années Gabin: archetype du populaire, banc d’essaie des modernités (Paris: Autrement, 1992). 15 “Le district lui-même était un établissement public géré par un conseil d’administration composé de vingt-huit élus – plutôt de droite et désignés pour moitié par le gouvernement, pour moitié par les conseils généraux, le conseil municipal de Paris et les collèges des maires de la “région de Paris”, laquelle était composée des trois départements de la Seine, la Seine et-Oise et la Seine-et-Marne (à ne pas confondre avec la “région parisienne” qui comprenait en plus cinq cantons de l’Oise). J’ai exigé auprès de Michel Debré que ma fonction ne fût pas simplement l’exécutif de quelques élus rassemblés autour d’un peu d’argent, mais qu’elle représentât l’Etat avec deux outils: la possibilité de rassembler pour les besoins de la tâches fonctionnaires et experts; ma présence aux conseils interministériels traitant de la région de Paris. J’obtins satisfaction en rédigeant moi-même, avec l’aide de Jean Poincaré, le décret du 31 octobre, qui allait fixer mes attributions Paul Delouvrier, “Le schéma directeur de la région parisienne,” Espoir 159 (2009–2010), hiver [L’intégralité de cet entretien figure dans l’ouvrage de Roselyne Chenu: “Paul Delouvrier ou la passion d’agir”, paru aux Editions du Seuil en 1994]. 16 Paul Delouvrier, “L’Avenir de Paris: Avenir spontané ou avenir concerté,” in Paris: Présent et Avenir d’une Capitale (Paris: Institut Pédagogique National, 1964). 17 Chatelain Abel, André Chastel, Pierre George, Pierre Viot, André Aymard, and Paul Delouvrier, “Paris Présent et Avenir d’une Capitale,” Annales: Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations 21ᵉ année 4 (1966): 941–42. 18 Jean-Louis Cohen and André Lortie, Des fortifs au périf (Paris: Picard, 1992). 19 It is surprising that a major historical study of Paris as a capital of empire across the early modern and modern age has not been written. A few studies have been produced. See, for example: Pascal Blanchard and Éric Deroo, “Contrôler: Paris, capitale coloniale,” in Culture impériale 1931–1961: Les colonies au coeur de la République (Paris: Autrement, 2004), 107–22. This question has been far more developed for London. John Eade, Placing London: From Imperial Capital to Global City (London: Bergahn, 2000); Nuala Zahedieh, The Capital and the Colonies: London and the Atlantic Economy 1660–1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 20 Michael Goebel, Paris, capitale du tiers monde: Comment est née la révolution anticoloniale, 1919–1939 (Paris: La découverte, 2017).

50  Stephen W. Sawyer 21 Abdellai Hajjat, Immigration postcoloniale et mémoire (Paris: Harmattan, 2005); Daniel Gordon, “ ‘A Nanterre, ça bouge’: Immigrés et gauchistes en banlieu, 1968 à 1971,” Historiens et géographes 383 (2003): 75–86; Patrick Weil, La France et ses étrangers (Paris: Gallimard, 1991); Yves Lequin, Histoire des étrangers et de l’immigration en France (Paris: Larousse, 1992). 22 See, for example, Antonio Nuñez García Sanco, “Voici que l’alternative se pose en réalité entre une Europe européenne et une Europe atlantique, mais aussi entre une Europe européenne ou rien du tout,” in La Conception européenne du Général de Gaulle d’après ses discours (Centre européen universitaire, 1966), 52. 23 Delouvrier, “L’Avenir de Paris: Avenir spontané ou avenir concerté.” 24 Sutcliffe, Autumn of Central Paris, 232. 25 On Paul Delouvrier’s vision of the place of Paris and France in Europe, see Alessandro Giacone, Paul Delouvrier: un demi-siècle au service de la France et de l’Europe (Paris: Descartes, 2004). 26 Cited by Philippe Nivet, Le Conseil municipal de Paris de 1944 à 1977 (Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne, 2016), chapitre IV. 27 Municipal debates, 1948.

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“Paris Broken, but Paris Liberated”?  51 Lafay, Bernard. 1954. Solutions aux problèmes de Paris: la circulation. Paris: Comité du nouveau Paris. Le Corbusier. 1966. Urbanisme. Paris: Vincent, Fréal et Cie. Lequin, Yves. 1992. Histoire des étrangers et de l’immigration en France. Paris: Larousse. Martayan, Elsa. 1991. “Moderniser la capital ou contenir la region: les propositions et débats des années cinquante.” Les Annales de la recherché urbaine 50. Nivet, Philippe. 2016. Le Conseil municipal de Paris de 1944 à 1977. Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne. Overy, Richard. 2013. The Bombers and the Bombed: Allied Air War Over Europe 1940– 1945. London: Penguin. Sanco, Antonio Nuñez García. 1966. “Voici que l’alternative se pose en réalité entre une Europe européenne et une Europe atlantique, mais aussi entre une Europe européenne ou rien du tout.” In La Conception européenne du Général de Gaulle d’après ses discours. Centre européen universitaire. Sassen, Saskia. 2008. Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Sawyer, Stephen. 2008. “Locating Paris: The Parisian Municipality in Revolutionary France, 1789–1852.” PhD diss., University of Chicago. Sutcliffe, Anthony. 1971. Autumn of Central Paris: The Defeat of Town Planning, 1850– 1970. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Tombs, Robert. 1981. The War Against Paris, 1871. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Weil, Patrick. 1991. La France et ses étrangers: l’aventure d’une politique de l’immigration de 1938 à nos jours. Paris: Gallimard. Zahedieh, Nuala. 2010. The Capital and the Colonies: London and the Atlantic Economy 1660–1700. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

4 Protesting in Paris Public space and the politics of urban appropriation, 1944–1990 Alain Chatriot

Introduction Major popular demonstrations in Paris have marked its history since the French Revolution. Their political importance explains social science researchers’ longstanding interest in their forms, causes and consequences (Fillieule 1997; El Gammal 2001; Tartakowsky 2010). It is not easy to give a straightforward definition for this form of political mobilization, but it may be useful to be attentive to the clarifications offered by Favre: An event is a collective movement organized on the public street in order to produce a political effect through the peaceful expression of an opinion or claim. Thus characterized, demonstrations are distinguished from gatherings which are static (a demonstration implies a march from one point to another), or a procession which has religious purposes, as well as the riot which uses the urban space as a battlefield and not just a place of passage. These distinctions are only suggestive since there are not always clear differences between one form and the other. (Favre 1990, 15) These events can be organized by political parties, professional unions and students or associations. They may be related to specific requests or serve as challenges to the government, including democratic ones, and therefore always raise the question of maintaining public order. The numbers of protesters mobilized are always one aspect of the struggle; those who march amplify their numbers, while those in power often seek to reduce the quantity of protesters. An inquiry into street demonstrations in Paris between 1944 and 1990, that is, during the period of the Cold War (slightly prolonged to be adapted to French political history) allows us to explore how the history of the Cold War was constructed from below (Buton, Olivier, and Michel 2014). At the same time, one must always keep in mind that this practice is also part of a long-standing political tradition in France and particularly in Paris. After the main episodes of the French Revolution, which from 1789 were most often played out in Paris, the capital experienced “revolutionary days” throughout DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-5

Protesting in Paris  53 the 19th century that both made and broke political regimes: the “three glorious days” of July 1830, the days of February and June in 1848 during the European “springtime of peoples” and the Commune of 1871. Once the Third Republic was well established, from the 1880s onwards, the occupation of public space remained a key issue for political legitimization in Paris and in the provinces (Robert 1996). Huge Republican processions were organized for the burial of the writer Victor Hugo in the Pantheon in 1885 (Ben Amos 1984) and the inauguration of the statue by Jules Dalou The Triumph of the Republic on the Place de la Nation in 1899. July 14 became the occasion for an important parade as did November 11 following the victory of the First World War. But these demonstrations of celebration and acclamation also served as responses to more contentious protests, whether it be for workers’ and trade union mobilizations on May 1 or during the political crisis of the 1930s. There was also the direct challenge to the Republic during the Paris riot of February 6, 1934 (Berstein 1975), which was met with a response as early as February 12 through the massive mobilization of parties from the left. Moreover, it was in this context (Bouchenot 2017) that a decree was passed in October 1935 establishing the legal provisions for demonstrations (Hubrecht 1990). It was determined that “meetings on public streets are and remain prohibited.” Tolerance was granted on one condition: they “are subject to the obligation of a prior declaration, all processions, marches and meetings of persons, and, in a general way, all demonstrations on the public roads” (Journal officiel 1935). According to this declaration, the events and their routes were either authorized or prohibited. It was left to the local mayors and, in Paris, to the préfet de police, to determine, case by case, whether planned demonstrations should be allowed or not. The itineraries in Paris have revealed quite specific political choices since the 1930s. For practical reasons, it is of course necessary to march on major roads and to have large public squares for the beginnings and ends of the event. Most marches of the French left are organized between the squares of République, Bastille and Nation (Tartakowsky 2011), events related to the right are located more often on the Champs-Élysées between the place de la Concorde and the Arc de Triomphe. But this distribution is not entirely rigid, and some political crises have changed the ways different groups occupy the Paris area. During a first period stretching from 1944 to 1962, the occupation of the Parisian streets was determined by three elements: the figure of General de Gaulle, the struggles of the Cold War and the consequences of the war in Algeria. During a second phase, the demonstrations were more marked by social and political concerns with the importance of the crisis of May 1968 and then the subsequent changes in the forms of social struggle.

Cold War Paris After four years of occupation by Nazi troops, the liberation of Paris was a moment of collective mobilization in the streets marked by the insurrection of the

54  Alain Chatriot city and the construction of barricades (Riondet 2014). The arrival of Allied military troops allowed for a quick victory, symbolized by the march of August 26, 1944, on the Champs-Élysées during which General de Gaulle walked from the Arc de Triomphe to the Concorde before reaching the Hotel de Ville and then Notre-Dame. The pages devoted by General de Gaulle to this event in his war memoirs testify to national jubilation: Ahead stretched the Champs-Élysées! Rather the sea! A tremendous crowd was jammed together on both sides of the roadway. Perhaps two million people. The roofs too were black with many more. At every window were crowded other groups waving flags. Human clusters were clinging to ladders, flagpoles, lampposts. As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but this living tide of humanity in the sunshine, beneath the tricolor. . . . I went on, then, touched and yet tranquil, amid the inexpressible exultation of the crowd, beneath the storm of voices echoing my name, trying, as I advanced, to look at every person in all that multitude in order that every eye might register my presence, raising and lowering my arms to reply to the acclamations: this was one of those miracles of national consciousness, one of those gestures which sometimes, in the course of centuries, illuminate the history of France. (De Gaulle 1998, 653–54). This parade in the context of the political struggles of liberated France served as a stage for a newly reasserted national sovereignty. It also replayed the symbolism, which was still present for many people, of the victory parade of July 16, 1919, following the First World War. De Gaulle marched once again on November 11, 1944, with the British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill alongside him. On May 8 and 13, 1945, demonstrations celebrated the end of the war in Paris, but they were not of the magnitude of August 26, 1944. Following his departure from the government in January 1946, General de Gaulle kept his distance from public ceremonies that were organized by a political regime which he condemned (Hazareesingh 2012). The Cold War invaded the streets of Paris several times in the early 1950s. The most famous episode was the demonstration organized by the French Communist Party on May 28, 1952, against the arrival in Paris of the American General Ridgway (Pigenet 1992). The communist mobilization hoped to make this event a strong symbol, but the organization was insufficient and the situation in the streets degenerated into fighting, with many injured militants and the death of a communist municipal worker from Aubervilliers, Belaid Hocine. The secretary general of the French Communist Party (PCF), Jacques Duclos, was then arrested before being released a month later. The French Communist Party saluted its protesters as the “worthy sons of the Communards of 1871.” But since the mobilization was ultimately a failure for the party, the memory of the event gradually faded. The quasi-military response of the government to the demonstration of 1952 was repeated the following year during a demonstration on July 14, 1953. This was notable because at the end of the demonstration the police fired on a

Protesting in Paris  55 procession of the Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Liberties (MTLD) and killed seven people while seriously wounding 50 others. After this demonstration and until 1966, the authorization to demonstrate in Paris was greatly reduced. The mobilizations in the streets of Paris were therefore often linked to colonial conflicts. A quasi-official demonstration was held in April 1954 at the request of the French expeditionary force of the Far East in the context of the end of the war in Indochina. The beginning of the Algerian War forced the political power to give itself a new mode of legal and judicial action with the vote in 1955 and the application of a law on the state of emergency (Thénault 2007). Despite these new legal means, attempts to challenge the political regime were visible in the Parisian streets. Thus, on March 13, 1958, police protested in the direction of the National Assembly by chanting anti-parliamentary slogans (Blanchard 2011). The prefect of police was punished and replaced but the situation remained very tense and a few days later a demonstration of veterans and paratroopers in uniform stood in front of Hotel Matignon, seat of the prime minister, to the cries of “down with the system.” The historian Danielle Tartakowsky summarizes the logic of these manifestations: “They did not inherently represent any danger but were a clear symptom of the crisis of the state” (Tartakowsky 2013, 123).

Demonstrations under General de Gaulle in the context of the Algerian War The demonstrations were a good indicator of the change of political regime that played itself out in 1958. On May 13, after a government crisis, Pierre Pflimlin was present in the National Assembly in order to be invested with the presidency of the Council (head of the government). But demonstrations in Paris and especially in Algiers challenged the regime. Two days later, General de Gaulle declared himself ready to “assume the powers of the Republic” and at a press conference on May 19, he replied ironically to the accusations of a coup d’état with the following phrase: “Do you think that at sixty-seven I am looking to begin a career as dictator?” But the origins of his return, bound to the Algiers riot, meant that he was strongly criticized by the majority of the French left. On May 28, a general strike took place as well as an imposing march from Republique to Nation. At the head of the demonstration was Pierre Mendès France (Chatriot 2015), François Mitterrand, André Philip, Edouard Daladier and the heads of the Communist Party, all marching behind a banner that read “Long live the Republic.” To this demonstration, which was built on the memory of the French left, General de Gaulle responded with a symbolically charged parade down the ChampsÉlysées on June 18, 1958 (date commemorating the call made from London in 1940). Above all, entirely aware of the criticisms addressed to the new text of the constitution prepared during the summer, he chose before submitting it for referendum to stage a referendum campaign with a large demonstration at the square of République on 4 September (anniversary date of the Proclamation of the Republic in 1870). In the square and next to the statue was a 40-metre gilt bronze “V”, reminiscent of the “V” of victory during the Second World War, and alluding

56  Alain Chatriot to the new Republic, the fifth (“V” serving as the Roman numeric symbol). A historian accurately noted in this regard: “[B]by investing and marking in this way a terrain that the adversary considered its own, de Gaulle established himself as a legitimate holder of a relationship with the people, which was usually incarnated in these places by processions of popular sovereignty and those of the communist left.”(Tartakowsky 2013, 130). Once the Fifth Republic was established, General de Gaulle became the Republic’s first President. The war in Algeria was not completed yet, and these years in Paris experienced several bloody repressions of demonstrations. De Gaulle sought at all costs to maintain public order in the context of negotiations conducted discreetly with the Algerian separatists (Andrieu, Philippe, and Guillaume 2006). On October 17–18, 1961, a demonstration organized by the FLN (Algerian National Liberation Front) was held in Paris. The repression was massive and protesters were thrown into the Seine (Brunet 1999). We do not know the exact number of deaths, but estimates range from fifty to several hundred people. Uncertainties about the end of the Algerian War led to the will of a voluntary display of political firmness but also a radicalization of the police with heavy consequences (Gaïti 1994). Long forgotten, this bloody repression is now better known following the charges brought against Maurice Papon, then prefect of police, for other crimes (his activities during the Second World War, which led to his conviction in 1998 for complicity in crimes against humanity). The other symbol of police violence was the repression of the demonstration in February 1962 which led to the Charonne deaths. This tragic event provided the material for one of the most remarkable books in contemporary French history, that of the historian Alain Dewerpe (Dewerpe 2006). Dewerpe begins with a precise description of the demonstration of February 8, 1962. Building on numerous studies of the demonstration by historians and political scientists, he puts together its preparation, its legal status and the actual demonstration itself. Born from a trade union initiative (on the part of the Confédération générale des travailleurs, the Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens and Union nationale des étudiants de France as well as the Communist and Socialist Parties), the demonstration was a reaction against attacks launched by the far-right Organisation armée secrète (OAS). The interior minister (Roger Frey) and the prefect of police (Maurice Papon) decided to ban the demonstration, thus preventing a gathering at the place de la Bastille, and resulting in several columns of marchers meeting in different parts of working-class Paris. Police baton-charges led to the deaths of nine people at the entrance to the Charonne metro station on boulevard Voltaire. Contrary to a tenacious legend that has grown up exonerating the forces of the state, Dewerpe reminds us that the gates of the station were open until a quarter past eight in the evening and that the deaths were not simply caused by a rush of persons crushed against the closed entrance. To understand this “state violence,” Alain Dewerpe has focused on the police work, insisting that “Charonne was also a massacre of paperwork” (Dewerpe 2006, 86). He presents the way in which the police attempted to control the Parisian demonstrations in order to show that orders explicitly required police leaders to

Protesting in Paris  57 “ show force ” in dispersing banned demonstrations. Although they were present, neither gendarmes nor Compagnie républicaine de sécurité intervened directly; it was, rather, the municipality’s “compagnies d’intervention” that charged with “bidules” (strong clubs that had been adopted after the Second World War). Analyzing previous uses of violence in earlier demonstrations, Dewerpe describes how an “exacerbated violence” erupted at the Charonne metro station. Using the archives of the prefecture of police (especially notes from radio traffic and minute books), he delivers a precise and impressive account of the charge that was launched against a procession that was in the process of breaking up, the beatings and the piling up of bodies. He shows that the interpretation that has sometimes been advanced, that the police authorities had lost control of their agents on the ground, does not stand up; he underlines the fact that if the demonstrators had resorted to violence themselves, this was purely in response to the police violence and was totally improvised – here, once more, the legend that lets off the hook the armed groups who were more or less linked to the OAS is dismissed. But the event did not end with the massacre. The following days saw a powerful mobilization of the trades-unionists and political left, with a well-supported strike and new demonstrations. Dewerpe first interrogates the extraordinary “funeral theatre” that was set up for the victim-martyrs. A procession was permitted and this drew together one of the most important demonstrations of 20th-century Paris. The silent cortège marched to the Père Lachaise cemetery, where a number of the victims were buried in the 97th division, near the “Mur des Fédérés” (Rebérioux 2017). Dominated by communists – the party of most of those who died – these funerals were nonetheless a demonstration of unanimity, with a strong presence from unions and a sense of left-wing unity. To understand the spirit of the times and the stakes of these struggles in the context of the Cold War and the wars of decolonization, we have the testimony of a historian, then a young activist, André Burguière, who explains in the following terms: Up to the Evian accords in March 1962, it was with great fear that I went to the many demonstrations against the war in Algeria. For several reasons 1) most of these events were prohibited. When we arrived at the meeting place, we were in front of a deployment of CRS and mobile guards heavily equipped. 2) these demonstrations were violent. But the violence was still coming from the police who advanced on the protesters, beating them with batons or rifle butts and pursuing them into the corridors of buildings. I learned much about the escape routes, which consisted first of all in knowing the neighbourhoods where we were demonstrating in order to escape to the adjacent streets without fear of being blocked by the police who were chasing us. (Burguière 2009, 136).

Social and political mobilizations The end of the Algerian War also marked the end of these harshly repressed demonstrations. New violent demonstrations took place in the provinces, led by

58  Alain Chatriot farmers, but did not affect Paris. Some traditional protest demonstrations took place, as in May 1966, with a procession going from the Bastille to the République led by the major trade union confederations. But a major change occurred in May 1968. The events that took place in May 1968 in France did not only concern the capital of France, but it is true that Paris had a central role to play. The month of May was marked by a triple crisis: first student, then social and finally political. Throughout the month, the occupation of public space played a major role in the desire to legitimize the various mobilizations. The forms and scale of the demonstrations also marked the political memory of the different parties in France. Born of a student uprising, the situation changed at the beginning of the month when on May 10 a “night of barricades” took place in the Latin Quarter. Blocking streets with barricades was certainly reminiscent of the liberation of Paris in 1944 but also a whole romantic imagination of students from the 19th century (Corbin and Mayeur 1997). On May 13, as part of a general strike, a massive demonstration at the call of the left moved through large parts of the city along a north-south axis. Faced with the hesitations of the government, as the crisis became political, the left showed itself to be deeply divided, best demonstrated by the separate initiatives during the meeting of the Charléty stadium on May 27 and the communist demonstrations of May 29. The PCF was waiting and refused any strategy that might serve Pierre Mendès France or François Mitterrand. It is worth noting that during this period, the prefect of police, Maurice Grimaud, succeeded in maintaining order with tactics that did not entirely avoid police violence but did avoid the dramatic events that could have taken place (Diaz 2017). But in 1968, the street was not only occupied by the left (students, trade unions and political leaders). Following the outcome of the crisis (with the choice of early parliamentary elections), a strong Gaullist mobilization set up for a demonstration on May 30. Though the event was prepared in a hurry, it was carefully thought out, and the logistics were well-managed in an effort to bring together as many people as possible. Demonstrating support for the power in place and General de Gaulle, the march chose to go up the Champs-Élysées from the Place de la Concorde, echoing the demonstration of August 26, 1944. The historian Maurice Agulhon notes in this regard: “[T]he idea of a demonstration, on the Champs-Élysées, was suitable for those whose social and symbolic affinities were associated with the west-side of Paris”(Agulhon 1990, 452). One may note the presence of the ministers in the front of the march (Debré, Malraux, Joxe, Michelet, Peyrefitte) and veterans of war. The procession, organized to be as silent as possible, was actually very noisy. Among the shouted slogans, some were linked to the extreme right, in opposition to the image of the Resistance promoted elsewhere in the parade. At the back of the massive demonstration, a historian has noted the “heterogeneous character of the ‘Gaullist’ gathering and its power of attraction which stretched far beyond the traditional support system” (Georgi 1995, 54). Whatever General de Gaulle said afterwards, it is certain that he was not at first partial to this form of mobilization but that he agreed to it in order to show that he still enjoyed popular support as well as to symbolize an exit from the political crisis.

Protesting in Paris  59 For Parisian demonstrations, the period following May 1968 remained marked by this original experience even if the political regime as such was no longer disputed as it had been several times after the Second World War. It was above all social struggles that were expressed in the streets of Paris, though they did not only concern the world of workers. There were legal debates during these years on the forms of policing. A law of June 8, 1970, known as “anti-casseurs” was aimed especially at groups on the far left. The political change of May 1981 that inaugurated the arrival of the left in power led to its abrogation by a law of December 23, 1981. The extent of the economic crisis explains some of the mobilizations such as those on March 23, 1979, when the CGT, then the main trade union, launched a demonstration in Paris rooted in the crisis of the French steel industry. The end of the demonstration degenerated and the union accused the political power of having deliberately attempted to discredit the workers’ mobilization. The 1980s also witnessed other events in the French capital in different contexts and forms. It was primarily around issues of schools and universities that things crystallized. The Left government was planning to reform the entire education system by changing the status of private schools. This project generated a strong mobilization on the right, supported by the Catholic Church, and a massive demonstration was held in Paris on June 24, 1984, resulting shortly after in the withdrawal of the bill and the resignation of the Minister of Education Alain Savary and the change of prime minister. A few years later, when the right was in power, they tried to further promote private education, and the secular camp responded with an equally massive demonstration on January 16, 1994 and also succeeded in defeating the measure. The student mobilizations did not disappear after May 1968 either. They found a new political importance in 1986 during the period of cohabitation (the President of the Republic was on the left while his government and the legislative majority in the National Assembly was on the right). Alain Devaquet, minister for higher education, introduced a bill that gave greater autonomy to universities, particularly to set their conditions for student recruitment. Many students feared the development of a selective admissions procedure, an increase in registration fees and the end of national diplomas. Strikes and demonstrations in Paris and in the provinces led to the withdrawal of the project and the resignation of the minister for higher education. A student (Malik Oussekine) was killed during the crackdown on the Paris demonstrations. The 1980s ended in Paris with two more festive forms of occupation of public space. The bicentennial of the French Revolution in 1989 was widely commemorated and marked by the success of the parade-spectacle orchestrated by JeanPaul Goude on the Champs-Élysées. Finally, the following year, farmers chose an original mobilization strategy. The majority union of the agricultural world, the FNSEA (National Federation of Farmers’ Unions) was accustomed to mass mobilizations during its disagreements with the government (in Paris, there were massive demonstrations on March 23, 1982, and September 29, 1991). But in the summer of 1990, the CNJA (National Centre for Young Farmers), an organization

60  Alain Chatriot linked to the FNSEA, wanted to give a positive image of French agriculture. In the context of international negotiations on the GATT and with the approval of the public authorities, it was decided to organize “a harvest” on the Champs-Élysées. A political scientist has justly noted in this regard: “The ‘Great Harvest’ of the Champs-Élysées, deliberately produced a festive spectacle, illustrating how Paris could constitute an ideal space for the construction of an image” (Duclos 2011, 138).

Conclusion This Parisian journey over almost half a century is a reminder of how much the street has been a political space in France, revealing the weight of a long history of symbols and representations (Tartakowsky 2002). Different registers of demonstrations have been identified by political scientists, distinguishing between those that initiate, those of crisis and those that are routine (Favre 1990, 34). The harshness of the repression of demonstrations during the Cold War, and in particular those related to the wars of decolonization, has also been noted. A greater control in maintaining public order slowly emerged, and the deaths of demonstrators became more rare, even in May 1968 when the scale of the crisis and the violence of the militants led many to fear the worst. We have chosen to keep the focus in this chapter on Paris, but the phenomenon also concerns the provinces (Pigenet and Tartakowsky 2003) and of course the rest of the world. This suggests the possibility of comparisons and makes it possible to reflect both on modalities of occupation of public space and the different modes of control and repression (Reiss 2007; Blanchard and Droit 2015). The sociologist Charles Tilly, reflecting in the early 1980s over the long-term forms and practices of contestation practiced in France, noted the following: Yet an observer has a strong feeling of déjà vu. By 1983 the essential forms of action used by Parisian students, workers, and other groups to make their claims had very long histories. The routines of forming associations and committees, meeting, demonstrating, striking, braving the police had changed relatively little in a century. All the actors – organizers, participants, police, government officials, labor unions, others – knew routines well and had worked out standard rules for their own involvement. (Tilly 1986, 349) Behind this “routinization” of practices, it is interesting to conclude by identifying certain phenomena. It may be noted first of all that the legal status of demonstrations is still not fully clarified. Admittedly, the influence of the European Court of Human Rights has strengthened the right to demonstrate, and a decision of the Constitutional Council explicitly cites “individual freedom, the freedom to come and go and the right of collective expression of ideas and opinions” as “constitutionally guaranteed freedoms”(Conseil Constitutionnel 1995). But decisions in 2010 and 2016 also recalled the requirements of public order. Moreover,

Protesting in Paris  61 the context of the state of emergency after the terrorist attacks of 2015 did not improve the situation. If one observes the demonstrations since 1990 in Paris, five distinct phenomena continue the trends analyzed since 1944. First, there are still demonstrations related to social demands, often associated with strikes that have led to more or less positive results for the demonstrators: the strikes of December 1995 were partially successfully, those against the Fillon law on pensions in 2003 were a failure, those against the law Woerth on pensions 2010 were a failure and those against the law El Khomri reforming the labour code 2016 also failed. In 2003, the French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin dismissed street protest against proposed pension reforms with the words “ the street does not rule ” (Reiss 2007, 15). The student and student mobilizations remained numerous and also met with varied results (the movement “anti-CPE” obtained the withdrawal of the bill on “first hiring contracts” in 2006). A massive political demonstration in Paris also merits mention, that of May 1, 2002, even if its meaning is not easily determined. It took place between the two rounds of the presidential election as a protest called by the left against the presence of Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the far-right party in the second round of the election. In 2013–2014, a large part of the French right, again supported by the Catholic Church, managed to mobilize massively in opposition to the Taubira Bill (named after the minister of justice) opening marriage and the adoption to same-sex couples. But the law was promulgated, and the Left government did not yield on this campaign promise. In the fall of 2018, the movement of yellow vests born from a protest against the increase of fuel taxes also wanted to occupy the Parisian street and in particular the avenue des Champs-Élysées. A level of violence rarely attained has led to an impressive response in terms of maintaining public order (Fillieule and Jobard 2020). Less politicized forms of occupation of the Parisian streets have also been noticeable in recent years, such as the massive crowds gathered on the ChampsÉlysées during the World Cup Football victories on July 12, 1998 and July 16, 2018 or more recently for the funeral of a famous singer in December 2017. Finally, we must consider that the street also remains a place of expression of national unity and solemnity. On January 11, 2015, “Republican marches” paid tribute everywhere in France to the victims of the attacks of January 7, 8 and 9 of that year and mobilized to defend freedom of expression. An impressive crowd gathered in Paris at the Place de la République and attempted once again to deliver a political message.

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62  Alain Chatriot Berstein, Serge. 1975. Le 6 février 1934. Paris: Gallimard-Julliard. Blanchard, Emmanuel. 2011. “Quand les forces de l’ordre défient le palais Bourbon (13 mars 1958): Les policiers manifestants, l’arène parlementaire et la transition de régime.” Genèses 83: 55–73. Blanchard, Emmanuel, and Droit Emmanuel. 2015. “Forces de l’ordre et crises politiques au 20e siècle.” Vingtième siècle, revue d’histoire 128: 3–14. Bouchenot, Matthias. 2017. “La SFIO et la police dans les rues du Paris des années 1930.” Mouvements 92: 170–78, hiver. Brunet, Jean-Paul. 1999. Police contre FLN: Le drame d’octobre 1961. Paris: Flammarion. Burguière, André. 2009. “D’une barricade à l’autre: Paris août 1944 – Paris mai 1968.” The Tocqueville Review/La revue Tocqueville 30(2): 131–61. Buton, Philippe, Buttner Olivier, and Hastings Michel, eds. 2014. La guerre froide vue d’en bas. Paris: CNRS Éditions. Chatriot, Alain. 2015. Pierre Mendès France: Pour une République moderne. Paris: Armand Colin. Conseil constitutionnel. 1995. www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/conseil-constitutionnel/ francais/les-decisions/acces-par-date/decisions-depuis-1959/1995/94-352-dc/decisionn-94-352-dc-du-18-janvier-1995.10612.html. Corbin, Alain, and Mayeur Jean-Marie, eds. 1997. La barricade. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne. Dewerpe, Alain. 2006. Charonne 8 février 1962: Anthropologie historique d’un massacre d’Etat. Paris: Gallimard. Diaz, Charles. 2017. Mémoires de police dans la tourmente de mai 68. Paris: Textuel. Duclos, Nathalie. 2011. “Les manifestations paysannes à Paris: des mobilisations sous contrôle.” In Paris manif’: Les manifestations de rue à Paris de 1880 à nos jours, edited by Tartakowsky Danielle, 128–41. Paris: Rennes, Comité d’histoire de la Ville de Paris, Presses universitaires de Rennes. El Gammal, Jean. 2001. Parcourir Paris du Second Empire à nos jours. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne. Favre, Pierre, ed. 1990. La Manifestation. Paris: Presses de la FNSP. Fillieule, Olivier. 1997. Stratégies de la rue: Les manifestations en France. Paris: Presses de Sciences Po. Fillieule, Olivier, and Jobard Fabien. 2020. Politiques du désordre: La police des manifestations en France. Paris: Le Seuil. Gaïti, Brigitte. 1994. “Les ratés de l’histoire: Une manifestation sans suites: le 17 octobre 1961 à Paris.” Sociétés contemporaines 20: 11–37. Gaulle, Charles de. [1960] 1998. The Complete War Memoirs, vol. III, Salvation 1944– 1946. Translated by Richard Howard. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers. Georgi, Frank. 1995. ““Le pouvoir est dans la rue”. 30 Mai 1968 la “ manifestation gaulliste ” des Champs-Élysées.” Vingtième siècle, revue d’histoire 48: 46–60, octobre–décembre. Hazareesingh, Sudhir. 2012. In the Shadow of the General: Modern France and the Myth of De Gaulle. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hubrecht, Hubert G. 1990. “Le droit français de la manifestation.” In La Manifestation, edited by Favre Pierre, 181. Paris: Presses de la FNSP. Journal officiel de la République française, Lois et décrets. 1935. “portant réglementation des mesures relatives au renforcement du maintien de l’ordre public.” 11203–4, octobre 24. Décret-loi du, octobre 23. Pigenet, Michel. 1992. Au cœur de l’activisme communiste des années de guerre froide: La manifestation Ridgway”. Paris: L’Harmattan.

Protesting in Paris  63 Pigenet, Michel, and Tartakowsky Danielle. 2003. “ Les marches en France aux XIXe et XXe siècles: récurrence et métamorphose d’une démonstration collective.” Le Mouvement social 202: 69–94, janvier–mars. Rebérioux, Madeleine. [1981] 2017. “Le Mur des fédérés.” In Pour que vive l’histoire, edited by Rebérioux Madeleine, 1ère ed., 479–500. Paris: Belin. Reiss, Matthias, ed. 2007. The Street as Stage: Protest Marches and Public Rallies since the Nineteenth Century. Oxford and London: Oxford University Press, German Historical Institute. Riondet, Charles. 2014. “Août 1944: l’insurrection contrôlée?” In Paris, l’insurrection capitale, edited by Caron Jean-Claude, 237–46. Seyssel: Champ Vallon. Robert, Vincent. 1996. Les chemins de la manifestation, 1848–1914. Lyon: Presses universitaires de Lyon. Tartakowsky, Danielle. 2002. “Manifester.” In Dictionnaire critique de la République, edited by Duclert Vincent and Prochasson Christophe, 1065–71. Paris: Flammaron. ———. 2010. Manifester à Paris: 1880–2010. Seyssel: Champ Vallon. ———, ed. 2011. Paris manif’: Les manifestations de rue à Paris de 1880 à nos jours. Paris and Rennes: Comité d’histoire de la Ville de Paris, Presses universitaires de Rennes. ———. 2013. Les droites et la rue: histoire d’une ambivalence, de 1880 à nos jours. Paris: La Découverte. Thénault, Sylvie. 2007. “L’état d’urgence (1955–2005). De l’Algérie coloniale à la France contemporaine: destin d’une loi.” Le Mouvement social 218: 63–78, janvier–mars. Tilly, Charles. 1986. The contentious French. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.

Part 2

Cityscape as a site of multiple memories

5 Beyond spatial liminality “Chinese” student returnees in 1950s’ Guangzhou Els van Dongen

Introduction Spurred by socialist propaganda and mounting maltreatment in their countries of residence, hundreds of thousands of ethnic Chinese, mostly from Southeast Asia, returned to the newly founded People’s Republic of China (PRC) in the 1950s and 1960s. The Chinese Communist victory of 1949 had signified a new turning point regarding the status of the millions of ethnic Chinese across Southeast Asia. Amidst Cold War anxieties, their presence became a diplomatic hurdle for both the recently established PRC and the newly independent countries in which they resided. Suspected of political identification with the Communist regime, they were subjected to oppression and persecution in the countries in which they lived. This discrimination also had historical roots: their trading successes had made them visible and vulnerable targets, and purges against ethnic Chinese went back centuries (Zhu 2008). Although the reasons behind their return to the PRC during the 1950s were multifarious and complex, their unfavourable treatment, combined with Chinese propaganda and return policies, were notable identifiable factors behind this return. Historically, the ethnic Chinese had long been present in Southeast Asia as traders. Under colonial rule, they had furthermore filled niches as intermediaries between colonizers, Chinese communities, and local populations. After the abolishment of slavery, they had also worked across Southeast Asia as indentured labourers on plantations, in mines, or in sectors such as construction and shipping (Kuhn 2008). Whereas colonial powers in Southeast Asia had perceived of the Chinese as colonial subjects, the Qing (1644–1911) government had considered Chinese working abroad to be Chinese subjects. According to the 1909 Nationality Law, being Chinese meant being born to a Chinese father (and, in rare cases, to a Chinese mother), regardless of location. After the fall of the Qing, the notion that Chinese emigrants were Chinese by blood continued to exist and was reiterated in the 1929 Nationality Law, which remained based on jus sanguinis or “blood right” (van Dongen 2017). After 1949, the idea that being Chinese was based on descent came under increasing pressure as host societies required political loyalty from their residents under soaring ideological frictions. The 1955 Sino-Indonesian Dual National Treaty, signed at the Bandung Conference, signified an end to the DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-6

68  Els van Dongen earlier jus sanguinis nationality law; it encouraged ethnic Chinese to take up local nationality. A distinction between Chinese nationals and ethnic Chinese of foreign nationality was henceforth upheld (Guowuyuan qiaoban 2006, 12, 26). Against this background, this chapter discusses a subgroup of these “returnees,” namely, the “student returnees” (guiqiao xuesheng) in relation to the re-founding of Jinan University in Guangzhou as a “special” university for returned overseas Chinese and returnees from Hong Kong and Macao. Whereas the notion of “liminal space” has been used to analyze “frontier” areas such as Hong Kong during the Cold War, this chapter applies the notion of “liminality” beyond its association with physical space alone (Duara 2016). Returning to its ethnographic use, here, it does not only refer to spatial liminality as a zone of interaction and negotiation, but also to the aspects of status and situation. The adjective “liminal” can be defined as “relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process,” and “occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.” Etymologically, the word derives from the Latin limen or threshold (Oxford Dictionary Online). This “threshold” can be interpreted in ways that transcend the spatial. The anthropologist van Gennep employed the term “liminality” in his study of “rites of passage” (rites de passage) in “primitive” small-scale societies. He discerned “patterns” (schéma) in these rites ceremonies, consisting of the stages of separation (séparation), transition (marge), and incorporation (agrégation) (Kimball 1960, vii; van Gennep 1960). Liminality in this sense is also associated with temporal transition; it is useful for our analysis precisely because of the centrality of the notion of transition. This chapter argues that the concept of liminality is applicable to the plight of the student returnees in 1950s Guangzhou in three ways. Firstly, analogous to other Cold War “frontier zones,” Guangzhou is itself a liminal space between the Communist World and the Free World during the Cold War. As will be explained later, it also had specific significance as an emigration area with strong historical ties to the ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia. Secondly, the status of the returnees was liminal in that they were being transformed from “capitalists” into “socialists” through education. They were subjected to processes that would enable this transformation, like rites of passage. Thirdly, their situation was liminal in that they were always “in-waiting” for the next ritual, with time limits on paper not corresponding to the reality in which the “transition” remained forever incomplete. To make this argument, the chapter’s first section sketches the background of the return policies during the 1950s and what this implied for education. In the second section, the chapter analyzes liminality in connection with the city of Guangzhou and the re-founding of Jinan University from two angles. The first is that of economic development and cultural exchange as tied to Guangzhou’s history of trading and interactions with Southeast Asia. The second is that of ideological and political control. In the third and final section, the chapter delves deeper into the convergence of liminalities within the borders of the PRC, namely, through problems pertaining to the allocation of graduates and the urban-rural divide. The main primary sources on which this chapter is based consist of publications by Jinan University and archival documents from the Guangdong Provincial Archives in

Beyond spatial liminality  69 Guangzhou. Firstly, the chapter reveals the regional dimensions of the Cold War through Sino-Southeast Asian interactions, where the latter intersected with local concerns such as nation-building, revolution, and independence (Szonyi and Liu 2010, 1). The chapter also highlights the role both China and ideology played in the Cold War as the rise of revolutionary China shifted the focus from Europe to East Asia. China was, in other words, not merely a side theatre (Chen 2001, 2–3). Thirdly, the chapter exposes the fluidity and permeability of Cold War borders as imagined socialist futures remained tied to capitalist pasts. Finally, it shows how space went far beyond the physical, as its ordering also contained social, mental, temporal and ritual dimensions.

Liminality as transition and “return” during the 1950s Several scholars have analyzed the plight of the “returnees” in the PRC during the 1950s and 1960s and have highlighted the problematic notion of “return” in this context (Godley 1989; Wang 2009; Ho 2012; Peterson 2012; Ford 2014). During this period, the seemingly paradoxical legal category and identity of “domestic overseas Chinese” (guonei huaqiao) came to denote returnees and their relatives. According to Glen Peterson, by the end of the 1950s, there were 11 million “domestic overseas Chinese,” out of which 10 million were qiaojuan (relatives) and up to 600,000 were guiqiao (returnees) (Peterson 2012, 2–3). Of these “returnees,” a minority came to the People’s Republic of China to study: Peterson mentions that there were 60,000 returned students (guiguo huaqiao xuesheng) in the PRC by 1960. He further notes how these labels obscured fluidities in status and identities and how they shifted in tandem with political priorities. Studies on the “student returnees” are less numerous than those on the returnees generally, but here, scholars have also argued that conceptual categorizations were in fact sites of contestation. For example, in a 2014 article, Shelly Chan writes about how qiaosheng (returned students) were represented as “disobedient,” as “capitalists” during the Great Leap Forward, and later as a “two-faced threat” during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). She puts forward that the overseas Chinese, who were also valued for their resources, constituted a site of struggle between socialism and capitalism (Chan 2014). This already reveals the porous nature of the physical borders of the PRC: centuries of migration had created a large ethnic Chinese population scattered throughout the region. Policies at the time reflect efforts to “incorporate” the scores of returnees through various means. In 1949, the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission was set up to handle matters of overseas Chinese work. “Huaqiao” (overseas Chinese) received special privileges after having suffered great losses during the period of land reform. For Guangzhou, the Guangzhou Overseas Chinese Affairs Bureau (Guangzhou qiaowuju) was set up in 1954 to handle matters related to overseas Chinese, but it would soon be overwhelmed by issues pertaining to the resettlement of returnees (Chan 2018, 150). As noted earlier, hundreds of thousands returned to the PRC during the 1950s, which led not only to logistical but also political, social, and economic challenges. It is estimated that between 1949 and

70  Els van Dongen 1957, over 43,000 Chinese from Southeast Asia returned to the newly founded People’s Republic of China for education purposes (Jinan daxue xiaoshi bianxiezu 1996, 117; hereafter Jinan xiaoshi). According to Peterson, more than 60.000 returned during the 1950s for education, out of which more than half came from Indonesia. Most of this group consisted of middle school students. Furthermore, during the early 1950s, most were male returnees (Peterson 2012, 125). A 1955 report from the provincial Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission mentions that 70,000 “overseas Chinese students and youth” (huaqiao xuesheng yu qingnian) had in recent years returned to China, with 50,000 of them being “overseas Chinese students” (GDPA 209-1-27-154-156 [1955]). In this context, guiqiao policies were set up during the early 1950s, and they were based on the principle of “equal treatment, with appropriate preferential treatment” (yishi tongren, shidang zhaogu), which meant that socialist incorporation paradoxically meant bestowing material favours (Wang 2009, 7). As Peterson notes, these tensions would also increase after the Anti-Rightist Campaign of 1957, which was followed by more restrictive policies (Peterson 2012, 129–30). In addition, the Great Leap Forward (1958–1960) signified a turning point. During this time, considerable inner conflicts would emerge as wealthy guiqiao were treated differently from guiqiao from poor socio-economic backgrounds, as discussed further later (Chan 2018, 160). Ezra Vogel lists the Third Plenum from September to October 1957 as a decisive moment for the Great Leap Forward because it “initiated a concerted and ultimately utopian effort to cut short the process of modernization by moral suasion, sacrifice, and physical labour.” Internationally, Maoists felt empowered by some successes, such as the nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956 and Russia’s launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile in 1957, and they turned attention to Taiwan, “the living symbol of ‘imperialist interference’ ” in 1958 (Vogel 1980, 218–19). In addition to these domestic and international factors, the presence of millions of ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia became a liability for the PRC in the face of Cold War hostilities. In 1958, in response to these issues, the so-called “three good policy” was established. This included the 1955 Sino-Indonesian Treaty on Dual Nationality to settle the issue of the nationality of the ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia; discouraging political action in overseas Chinese communities; and emphasizing return policies for the overseas Chinese. Overseas Chinese were hence encouraged to keep a low profile and to follow local regulations (Fitzgerald 1972, 105). The 1955 Treaty stipulated that no dual nationality was henceforth allowed for the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia and, per extension, for those in Southeast Asia. Return policies were continued, but they did become more restrictive with the Great Leap Forward. Whereas those who had returned to the PRC before had been considered “overseas Chinese” (huaqiao), a separate category for “returnees” (guiqiao), including a reference to “student returnees” (guiqiao xuesheng), was mentioned in a 1957 document released by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission. The document was titled “Explanations about the Statuses of Overseas Chinese, Families of Overseas Chinese, Returned Overseas Chinese and Returned Overseas Chinese

Beyond spatial liminality  71 Students” (Guanyu huaqiao, qiaojuan, guiqiao, guiqiao xuesheng shenfen de jieshi) (Wang 2009, 7). As Chan notes, policies towards these guiqiao were based on three general rules: to encourage those who had ancestral homes or relatives in China to return to these homes or relatives; to be self-sufficient by taking part in production efforts; and to encourage participation in agricultural production (Chan 2018, 151). “Student returnees” were driven not only by nationalism and conditions in the host societies but by the limits of higher education there: the Chinese schools established in Southeast Asia were mostly primary and middle schools. Hence, especially after having graduated from middle school, many returned to the PRC to further their studies. A document from July 1951, entitled “Provisional Measures on Attending to Returned Overseas Chinese Students Entering Schools” (Guanyu zhaogu guiguo huaqiao xuesheng ruxue de zanxing banfa) indicates the weight of the matter of the returnees entering schools for “overseas political influence” and “the overseas Chinese United Front.” The document further outlines some measures for this purpose, including setting up remedial institutions for language training at existing universities such as Guangzhou Southern University (Guangzhou Nanfang Daxue) and Xiamen University. Furthermore, in 1953, long-term measures were outlined to disperse student returnees across institutions in the country after having completed education at remedial schools in Beijing, Guangzhou, Jimei, and Shantou (Liu 2006, 62–63). The PRC was also in competition with the Nationalist regime in Taiwan on this matter, with the latter making attempts to combat Communism. In addition, the United States prevented students from returning to China as part of a containment policy that also supported the regime in Taiwan. For example, in 1953, amidst fears of the ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia being a “fifth column,” Nixon recommended that Taiwan creates more higher education opportunities to avoid their return to the PRC. In 1955, the United States government made several recommendations, which included supporting Taiwan in becoming more attractive to returnees and setting up an Asian university in the region. During the 1950s and 1960s, Taiwanese universities were set up with American support. Between 1951 and 1965, around 20,000 students reportedly went to Taiwan to study, with around 7,000 on United States scholarships (Liu 2006, 62–66). In this highly ideologized context, space was, as Lefebvre has argued, as much about “physical” space as it was about “social” and “mental” space (Lefebvre 1991, 27). Space was produced and reproduced and reflected webs of social relations and ideological struggles. Other authors have already noted that space in the context of “return” during the Cold War was more than a physical concept. For example, Peterson discusses the “fluid” category of “domestic overseas Chinese” and the notion of “return” (gui) to establish what he calls a “moral geography” in which “origin became destination” and in which return was a form of “salvation” (Peterson 2012, 131–32). Similarly, Wang notes that “return” in this context had both ethnic and class connotations as well as connotations of a “reconversion of allegiance and renewed pledge of obedience,” especially for groups that had “previously deviated from the norm, but then came back to comply.” Wang also points

72  Els van Dongen out that the word “qiao” (sojourner) in “guiqiao” also had negative undertones, given that emigration had long been forbidden and had been associated with the “outcast” (Wang 2009, 7). Return was hence a renewed pledge to the motherland and the socialist cause. Return in this sense was also a form of utopia in that many ethnic Chinese had been born in Southeast Asia and only knew the “homeland” as an ideal, a “eu-topos” (good place). In the socialist rhetoric, moreover, the “homeland” was also a “ou-topos” (no(t)-place), a place that had yet to be created. Building on this notion of space as extending beyond geography, the next section discusses liminality through the site of Jinan University.

Guangzhou and the re-establishment of Jinan University That Guangzhou became the place where Jinan University was re-established as a “special” university for returnees was not a coincidence. As noted, 1950s Guangzhou was a liminal place, a “frontier” zone situated at the border between the capitalist and socialist worlds. Like van Gennep’s frontiers or “zones” as both spatial and symbolic “areas of transition,” Guangzhou was both a spatial and an ideological transition zone. Crossing the “threshold” of this transition space would mean becoming part of a “new world.” In the world that van Gennep describes, “magicoreligious” differences prevented believers of one faith from entering the area inhabited by adherents to another (van Gennep 1960, 15, 18, 20). During the Cold War, these religious barriers and “transition zones” were ideological ones instead. For van Gennep, the spatial entering of the new “zones” was accompanied by “liminal (or threshold) rites,” followed by “post-liminal” rites or “ceremonies of incorporation” (van Gennep 1960, 21). In 1950s China, these “rites” consisted of the screening, categorization, allocation, and re-education of students and other returnees. Cities at “the frontier,” whether during the Cold War or other periods, were not merely “peripheries” in the territorial sense, as Prasenjit Duara (2016, 211) notes. In addition to representing “geographical limits,” as “liminal spaces,” they also represented “a zone of openness, indeterminacy, and absence of a relatively fixed identity.” They were also “contact zones” that allowed for multiple forms of interactions (ibid.). Duara uses the term “liminal spaces” to discuss Hong Kong, the liminality of which was obviously different from that of Guangzhou, given that it was a British colony. Despite being situated in proximity to the Communist PRC, Hong Kong was ideologically affiliated with the Western Bloc (Hon, “Introduction” herein). However, Guangzhou can be said to also share some things in common with Cold War Hong Kong, namely, its history of being a commercial centre and port; its location at the margins; its strong local history and identity; and its historical ties with the Chinese in Southeast Asia, given that it was a centre of emigration. At the same time, Guangzhou was also marked by efforts to combat the very fluidity that came with this history of interactions, as will be discussed further later. Despite Cold War realities, Guangzhou did partially remain a liminal open space. The cityscape of 1950s Guangzhou contained many traces of its history

Beyond spatial liminality  73 as a trading and later treaty port strategically located in the Pearl River Delta. This delta was shaped by three rivers from the north, east, and west that merge in Guangzhou. Hence, Guangzhou did not only link nearby cities; it also linked the Guangdong coastline. In addition, both Macao and Hong Kong were nearby, and the strategic location of Guangzhou had made it a relevant political hub historically (Vogel 1980, 14). After the arrival of Europeans in Asia, all external trade was conducted through Guangzhou, also known as Canton, a system referred to as the Canton system (1757–1842). Chinese merchants ran the trade from the so-called Thirteen Factories that were situated along the Pearl River. After the First Opium War (1839–1842), Canton became one of five treaty ports for foreign trade, together with Shanghai, Ningbo, Fuzhou, and Amoy (Xiamen). Guangzhou was also a nexus in emigration from South China, which mostly occurred from the Southern provinces of Fujian and Guangdong. These interactions with foreigners and the entanglement with overseas Chinese through emigration meant that, in the words of Ezra Vogel: “The Cantonese were in the forefront of virtually every major reform and revolutionary movement from 1839 to 1927” (Vogel 1980, 18–19, 32–33). In the early 20th century, Guangzhou came to contain all the traits of a modern city. In 1912, the East and Great North Gate city walls were demolished as military defence made room for economic development. This modernization of the city continued with the foundation of the Municipal Department in 1918. In 1930s’ Guangzhou, modern buildings stretched along the Pearl River. The global character of the city was reflected in the Great Clock Tower, which played the same tune as the British Observatory. Foreign gadgets further graced the recreational centre of the Daxin Company (Guangdong sheng li Zhongshan tushuguan 2009, 5, 7; Ye 2012, 12). Xidi Street was home to the first department store and the tallest concrete building in Guangzhou. Hotels, universities, schools, libraries, and movie theatres were also built. Public buses emerged from 1920 onward and trains connected Guangzhou to Kowloon and Hankou (Wuhan) (Guangdong sheng li Zhongshan tushuguan 2009, 162–63, 165, 253, 259). Traces of Guangzhou’s distant and more recent cosmopolitan past were still present after 1949. Based on a map in Ezra Vogel’s study of Canton between 1949 and 1968, in 1958, the city hosted a Western restaurant and guest house in the Aiqun Mansion, a Culture Park, the East Station (the train station that connected Canton to Kowloon), the Export Products Exhibit Museum or International Trade Fair, an International Sports Centre and International Station for trains, a large department store, and a foreign consulate area, among others. Concurrently, however, the city contained traces of the forward-looking socialist revolution that came with its position of being at the border of Communist China. Also on Vogel’s map, we see that Canton hosted the Municipal and Provincial Committees of the CCP, the Sino-Soviet Friendship Building, the Military District Headquarters of Guangdong Province, and revolutionary symbols such as the former site of the Peasant Movement Training School or the Revolutionary Uprising Martyr’s Park, which included the Communist Martyr’s Tomb (Vogel 1980, xvi–xvii). Stylistically, construction of new buildings during this period

74  Els van Dongen was modelled after those in the Soviet Union. We can interpret these symbols as playing a role similar to what van Gennep has referred to as “guardians of the threshold,” through which the “spatial passage” also became a “spiritual passage” (van Gennep 1960, 21–22). In this case, the “threshold” was an ideological one: the world of socialism. In addition to these cosmopolitan and socialist markers, the city also contained traces of the history of interactions with overseas Chinese. During the period of modernization in the early 20th century as described earlier, overseas Chinese investment had been crucial to some of these early commercial ventures. During the 1920s and 1930s, hotels and modern buildings had been constructed with overseas Chinese investment. The first taxi companies had also been set up by overseas Chinese and returnees from Malaya. Similarly, as the city walls were demolished, the first bus company had been established by overseas Chinese during the 1920s, with others also returning to invest in bus companies as the city evolved (Ye 2012, 140–41). Hence, Guangzhou, like Hong Kong, was not merely a liminal space in that it connected socialist and capitalist worlds; it had also been a crucial historical node in an emigration network that still connected ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia to mainland China. Traces of these interactions reveal the ambiguity in the relations between China and the huaqiao as well as the tensions in some of the policies as discussed earlier. For example, Guangzhou was home to the Huaqiao Mansion, which was a centre for visiting overseas Chinese and which contained hotel-restaurants and a travel agency. At the same time, however, there was also a separate residential area for “returnees,” called Huaqiao New Village. According to policies, wealthy overseas Chinese were encouraged to buy property. In Guangzhou, this took the form of encouragement of investment in the Huaqiao New Village. The presence of this “village” reveals that different treatments were accorded to wealthy and poor returnees, revealing de facto class differentiations between the lines. Whereas the wealthy returnees were encouraged to invest in property, those of lower socio-economic backgrounds were sent to state farms to take part in agricultural production, as will be discussed further below (Chan 2018, 160–61). The double sense of liminality as openness and closedness was hence also reflected in these places pertaining to overseas Chinese, which included both places of hospitality and places that served to segregate them from other residents. Because of these historical entanglements, Guangzhou was a suitable place to address issues pertaining to the education of returnees. During the 1950s, the Chinese Ministry of Education had undertaken several measures to emphasize the importance of the education of the returned overseas Chinese, but the emphasis had been on primary and secondary schools. This included the guiding of returned students, which involved first sending them to remedial schools (buxi xuexiao) for Chinese language training and political investigation and re-education. These schools were in cities across the country, including Beijing, Guangzhou, Kunming, and Wuhan. Mao Zedong also stated that policies should be about “protecting the interests of the overseas Chinese” and to “assist those who returned to

Beyond spatial liminality  75 China.” Some universities were assigned returned overseas Chinese during this period, but there was no full-time university for returnees. Hence, in 1958, Jinan University was re-established in Guangzhou as the major tertiary institution for returned ethnic Chinese (Jinan xiaoshi, 118). Jinan University had first been founded in 1907 in Nanjing as Jinan Academy, after which it became National Jinan University in Shanghai in 1927. After 1949, because of the decline in students and funding issues, it was closed. With the influx of student returnees during the 1950s, remedial, industrial, and agricultural secondary schools were gradually set up, as well as foreign language specialist schools. In addition, in 1951, an overseas Chinese institute was established at Guangzhou Southern University. In Beijing, Yenching University had set up an overseas beginner class, followed by an overseas correspondence unit at Xiamen University in 1956. These were, however, remedial training schools that could not meet the needs of the rise in returnees. It was hence decided to re-establish Jinan University. Guangzhou was considered a strategic location because of its longterm historical ties with overseas Chinese and its role in nationalist movements (Xia and Qian 2008, 99). According to Jinan University’s own history (xiaoshi), it was established in Guangzhou specifically because there was much interaction with the haiwai gang’ao diqu (overseas areas and Hong Kong and Macao) (Jinan xiaoshi, 119). The setting up of the university hence also targeted those from Hong Kong and Macau and grouped them together with the overseas Chinese, even though they were categorized differently. As Peterson notes, those from Hong Kong and Macao were officially referred to as tongbao (compatriots), but they were sometimes included in the category of overseas Chinese. Attracting students from Hong Kong and Macao was furthermore part of the overall agenda of overseas Chinese education in Guangdong province in the early 1950s (Peterson 2012, 3, 128). These areas were suspect during the Cold War, with especially Hong Kong being a node in an information and intellectual network from which mainland China was cut off. The United States used Hong Kong as a basis for anti-Communist propaganda and to target the overseas Chinese. In addition, the United States was involved in setting up Chinese-language colleges in Hong Kong for both local and overseas Chinese students, such as the famous New Asia College (Chou 2011; Roberts 2016, 32, 42, 46–47). The matter of the founding of a university for returned overseas Chinese and those from Hong Kong and Macao was discussed at the Third Meeting of the First Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) of Guangdong province in Guangzhou in May 1957. Tao Zhu, the secretary of the Guangdong provincial committee and later the first president of Jinan University, expressed support for the plan. Because the overseas Chinese and those from Hong Kong and Macao were represented in the CPPCC, they reportedly took part in the discussion about the foundation of the university and provided funding (Jinan xiaoshi, 119–120). Important in the re-founding of Jinan University was also Liao Chengzhi, the then-head of the Central Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, which also allocated a special fund for this purpose. Liao noted that

76  Els van Dongen overseas Chinese returnees and those from Hong Kong and Macao were “differ­ ent” from mainland Chinese students in many respects and that overseas Chinese work should hence consider their respective situations. Liao Chengzhi also became chairman of the board of directors of Jinan University in 1963 (Xia and Qian 2008, 99–100). Jinan University was to be an “Overseas Chinese university with special characteristics,” namely, it was to be both a comprehensive university and a university that focused on those areas relevant for overseas Chinese, such as economics, the history of Southeast Asia, and Chinese language (Jinan xiaoshi, 121–22, 138). Strategically located in South China, with a long trading history and history of emigration, Guangzhou was a place of economic and cultural contact and people and ideas in transit. At the same time, as a locus of emigration and hence a place with strong ties to overseas Chinese, it was also a “frontier zone” during the Cold War. The foundation of Jinan University was to serve the two sides of this coin, namely, the socialist re-education of those exposed to capitalist vices, and the support of economic and cultural exchange under the new socialist system. The next sections outline these two sides in more detail.

Guangzhou as a site of economic and cultural exchange After 1949, the CCP had engaged in state-led economic construction, with industrial and agricultural development based on the Soviet model and rural reform centring on organizing people into cooperatives. Trade and industry were subjected to “socialist transformation,” with smaller enterprises being organized into cooperatives and larger enterprises being taken over by the government. The plan was to finalize this “socialist transformation” of trade and industry by December 1957. It was believed that after “transformation,” those involved would not be “capitalists” (zibenjia) but “people engaged in industry and commerce” (gongshang yezhe) (Vogel 1980, 157, 166, 169). As Priscilla Roberts notes, the Chinese economy was nationalized, but Chinese commodities and goods produced in China continued to be sold abroad. Hong Kong played a crucial part in this process, as it did in channelling remittances that were sent from abroad to mainland China, which mostly happened through Hong Kong (Roberts 2016, 30). Even though trading continued during the Cold War, this was justified ideologically as being consistent with the goals of socialism. Relevant in this respect is a 1959 document behind which are both the Economics Department of Jinan University and the Guangdong Foreign Trade Office. The document outlines Guangdong’s foreign trade since the foundation of the PRC. This trade, the document states, was “independent and autonomous” (duli zizhu de). In the socialist foreign trade system (shehui zhuyi de duiwai maoyi tixi), trade was not a tool of foreign imperialism; it benefited the construction of socialism. In the past, on the contrary, Canton’s trade had taken part under “European capitalism,” the “bureaucratic capitalism” of the early 20th century under the imperialists and compradores, and finally, under American capitalism after the Second World War. The report further noted that Guangdong province had a dominant position in foreign trade

Beyond spatial liminality  77 for foodstuffs, local products, tea leaves, grain and oil, and silk. It also noted the emphasis on developing a national economy, industry and agriculture, and trade with “socialist brother countries.” Regarding the latter, exports from Guangdong province to the Soviet Union had increased by more than twenty times between 1951 and 1958, whereas exports from Guangdong province to socialist countries had increased from 5% to 46% during this period. The PRC had helped its “socialist brothers” through, for example, rice exports to India in 1951 and to Indonesia in 1957. The strategy to follow was to further develop trade with the Soviet Union and socialist countries and to trade with countries in Asia and Africa that were friendly to China (GDPA 302-1-101-36-45 [1959]). The same report however also noted that exports to capitalist countries had increased by 491.3% between 1955 and 1958. In this context, it also mentioned the development of export commodity fairs held in Guangzhou to promote trade, which developed into a national export product trade fair with “capitalist” traders gathering in Guangzhou twice a year. The report also discussed the relation with the “compatriots” (tongbao) from Hong Kong and elsewhere, who had increasingly relied on mainland products in recent years. Socialist trade also involved reforming private trade completely and placing it under the guidance of state-run enterprises (GDPA 302-1-101-36-45 [1959]). The re-establishment and development of Jinan University was also entwined with this agenda of how to support trade under socialism. A document issued by those in the Provincial Party Committee responsible for finance and trade dating from July 1959 refers to an earlier report from October 1958 regarding the foundation of either a new foreign trade institute or the creation of a department at Jinan University for this purpose. In December 1958, it had been decided to set up a major in foreign trade (waimao zhuanye) at Jinan University, but the matter had not been taken further. The 1959 document hence urged for the establishment of a major in foreign trade at Jinan University from 1959 onwards with 40 to 50 students in the first batch. At the same time, it urged for increased training for cadres in trade through the foundation of a specialized institute comparable to foreign trade institutes in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and elsewhere. The document suggested to “set up a preliminary plan for the training of Guangzhou port cadres,” starting with 200–250 undergraduates from 1959 onwards (GDPA 222-1-71-028-037 [1959]). In addition to serving trade under socialism, aligned with its history of cultural interactions with Southeast Asia, Jinan University also served the agenda of cultural exchange. The rationale of cultural exchange can still be glimpsed in the logo of the university today, as explained on the university website: Guangzhou is the “Southern Gate” of China with more than 2,000 years of overseas trade. The logo contains a vessel that symbolizes the university as a carrier of cultural heritage and a bridge for cultural exchange. The name “Jinan” is taken from the “Tribute of Yu” (Yugong) chapter in the Book of Documents (Shangshu) and stands for “Reaching Eastward to the sea, Westbound to the desert, and to the North and South, we shall spread the culture far and wide.” Corresponding to this self-perception of being oriented towards South China, Southeast Asia, and the

78  Els van Dongen maritime world, the university also offered majors in, for example, English (Jinan xiaoshi, 152; Jinan University website). In the early days of Jinan University in Guangzhou, being oriented towards South China, Southeast Asia, and the maritime world was reflected in, for example, cultural diplomacy activities such as “singing diplomacy”: student art troupes performed Southeast Asian dances and songs, not just on campus but also in the qiaoxiang (emigration) areas and in the nongchang or farms where overseas Chinese had been resettled (Jinan xiaoshi, 137). They exposed mainland Chinese to Southeast Asian cultural practices, but the purpose was also to boost morale and to reconnect the resettled overseas Chinese with their own cultural heritage. Sports teams would engage in similar sporting activities. In addition, the Southeast Asia Research Institute hosted foreign scholars and foreign cultural representatives, such as those from the Vietnam Cultural Institute (Jinan xiaoshi, 156). One side of the early history of Jinan University hence reflects how its development occurred in tandem with the history of economic openness and cultural exchange that marked Guangzhou, which in turn reveals the porous nature of Cold War divisions.

Guangzhou as a site of ideological re-education and political control After 1949, Guangzhou was, however, also a “frontier zone” between socialism and capitalism, and this spatial liminality required the remaking of subjects whose status was one of “in-betweenness.” Liminality in the case of Guangzhou hence did not only involve “openness,” but also involved efforts at preventing fluidity through the promotion of the superiority of socialism. Canton was one of the so-called “later liberated areas,” and the organization of trade, industry, education, and culture remained a challenge (Vogel 1980, 41–42). Socialist construction, which commenced after 1956, required the re-education of these “returnees” and those from Hong Kong and Macao. In addition, Canton was particularly challenging because KMT roots were strong here and defectors and infiltrators remained present. It had been the location of both the Kuomintang’s capital and its Whampoa Academy, as well as the capital before the Kuomintang’s withdrawal in 1949 (Vogel 1980, 54). As such, Guangzhou’s liminal geographical and political position meant that it was also a site of ideological re-education and political control. In The Rites of Passage, van Gennep refers to the belief among many peoples that rites can make the “stranger” “neutral and benevolent” and “remove the special qualities attributed to him.” Often, strangers were placed in a “communal house” in which they became members of a group that resembled their own character (van Gennep 1960, 26–27). For our purposes, van Gennep’s “rites of passage” are hence useful in that group membership in the Chinese nation also involved a stage of “transition” or liminality that served to “neutralize” the returnees. This also happened by means of placing the “returnees” together at first rather than integrating them directly into society. In addition, van Gennep also discusses the connection between spatial passages and changes in social position.

Beyond spatial liminality  79 In the case of the returnees, the “transitional” or liminal status was open-ended, as their moral transformation was always in progress; becoming a good socialist had no end date. To be “incorporated” into the Chinese socialist nation, returnees were subjected to a series of practices similar to “rites of passage.” Being categorized as returnees meant that they were per definition part of a group that required special attention. For example, a 1955 report from the Guangdong provincial Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission mentions that the overseas Chinese students who had in recent years returned to China had caused trouble and that this was due to their former exposure to capitalist ideas. The report posited that, among others, these returnees “feared hardship” and “feared eating bitterness” (pa kunnan, pa chiku) and expected the government to take care of them. Some of them, it noted, had even resorted to lavish eating and drinking, dancing, and prostitution. The report hence urged for the increase in political thought education that was oriented towards their specific situation and characteristics (tamen de juti qingkuang yu tedian) (GDPA 209-1-27-154-156 [1955]). A 1958 document by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission and Ministry of Education further sheds light on some guidelines and policies for the education of returned overseas Chinese students based on their liminal status. It notes that this group required re-education because they had resided abroad for long periods of time, had taken part in its economic and cultural life, and had studied the local language, history, and geography of their places of residence. Given their backgrounds, they had to be educated into “labourers with a socialist consciousness, a cultural upbringing, and a good health.” Their exposure to “capitalist education,” however, meant that they generally lacked a “revolutionary outlook” (geming rensheng guan) and moral education and that their thought consciousness (sixiang juewu) was rather low. Hence, political thought education (zhengzhi sixiang jiaoyu) should serve to resolve these issues. The report also highlighted that most middle school graduates were obliged to take part in rural work and other types of production work. It also noted that the returned overseas students were no different from mainland students and should take part in rural production work “on their own initiative” (zijuede). However, should they not be able to engage in this or other work immediately, those with relatives or homes in China could take part in production work in their hometowns or study there at community-run schools, whereas those without relatives or homes should be assigned to one of the staterun farms (guoying nongchang) or other types of work (GDPA 232-2-177-21-23 [1958]). The situation in which the returnees found themselves was no less liminal. They had to go through a series of practices, but even after having completed these “rituals,” “incorporation” was partial at best. Their perennial “transitional” or liminal situation is reflected in guidelines on the process through which they had to go in the same 1958 report. For those who could continue their education, they had to attend the so-called buxi xuexiao (remedial schools) that had been set up across China, including in Guangzhou. The students would be assigned per level and would spend maximum two years there, but ideally a period of one year

80  Els van Dongen to “transition” from returnees to students. However, some had to retake the examinations after another year, whereas others would not be able to enrol in tertiary education institutions at all. An important emphasis of the schools was language education, but the document stated that the remedial schools should also familiarize students with all aspects of the “motherland” (zuguo) and strengthen political thought education. The report also mentioned the case of the Taishan school branch, which had mainly received returnees from Thailand whose “cultural basis was rather poor” (wenhua jichu bijiao cha) and which suggested providing them with cultural knowledge and knowledge regarding production (GDPA 232-2-17721-23 [1958]). Liminality of both status and situation hence required the returnees to go through a process of reintegration. Student returnees, most of whom were from secondary schools, were first investigated and had to undergo Chinese language education. If successful and passing a qualification exam, they could attend university education. The “remedial schools” for returned students were not only for overseas Chinese but also for those from Hong Kong and Macao given that “return” involved elements other than ethnic elements and categorized different groups based on their alleged “bourgeois” backgrounds. In a 1955 document, it was reported that in that year, 790 senior high school graduates from Hong Kong and Macao had returned to Guangzhou for tertiary education purposes, out of which 303 had passed the qualification examination. According to the report, those who had not qualified had failed not only because their results were not satisfactory but also because their “political conditions” (zhengzhi tiaojian) or “health conditions” (shenti tiaojian) were not up to standard. It was suggested that one year at a remedial school would increase their “political thought and cultural level,” after which they could retake the examination (GDPA 204-3-306-013-015 [1955]). Once they had entered the university, the liminal situation of the returnees might have been suspended, but their status of capitalist subjects in need of socialist reeducation remained. In the curriculum as outlined in Jinan University’s history, this education followed overseas Chinese policies and was congruent with the domestic concerns of economic and cultural construction, which included “socialist and patriotic education.” The university also combined study with work (five days of study, one day of work, and one day of rest), and students were engaged in, for example, the construction of the “Bright Lake” (minghu) on campus in 1959 (Jinan xiaoshi, 121, 124, 129, 133–34). Part of the policy of re-education consisted of interaction between the returnees and mainland students. Most of the students at Jinan University were returned overseas Chinese and students from Hong Kong and Macao, with the largest groups of the initial batches being from Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam. The university was, however, also intended for mainland Chinese students because policies served to integrate the returnees through interaction with mainland students. Initially, regulations stipulated that around 50% of the Jinan students should be overseas Chinese and those from Hong Kong and Macao, but in 1962, this was increased to 80%, with the other 20% being mainland students. During the first year of its operation, the first batch of 1,304 students contained 550 overseas

Beyond spatial liminality  81 Chinese and students from Hong Kong and Macao and 128 “dependents” of overseas Chinese, which made up 55% of the total batch (Jinan xiaoshi, 126–27). The number of overseas Chinese also increased as compared to the number of students from Hong Kong and Macao during this period (Jinan xiaoshi, 144–45). In addition to students from these groups, there were, however, also students from South Africa, India, Australia, Cuba, Canada, Portugal, Mexico, Japan, and the United States. The interaction between mainland students and returnees was listed as one of the aspects of education work after 1957. Based on documents from the Guangdong Provincial Archives, many of whom were issued by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, Luo Qiaoli divides this educational work for returnees into five main aspects. First, it was advised that Guangdong schools should engage in “uniting education work” (tuanjie jiaoyu gongzuo) (Luo 2014, 18). This “uniting” of mainland students and student returnees was, however, not without obstacles. Mainland students reportedly considered returnees to be “capitalists” who were concerned with their indulgent lifestyles rather than work. Returnees, meanwhile, thought of mainland students as uncouth, badly dressed, lacking hygiene, and impolite. Policies that would address these issues and that would “unite” the two groups would include mobilizing mainland Chinese students to help the returnees adjust to local life and providing financial support to those returnees who were less well off. Second, returnees should be educated on the policies regarding agricultural work and education. Apart from Jinan University and various middle schools specially set up for overseas Chinese returnees and returnees from Hong Kong and Macao, other universities and middle schools also had quotas for these groups. Those who did not pass the examinations could stay on in their original remedial school or be assigned to another school and retake the examination. However, those returnees who had graduated from mainland Chinese middle schools and who did not pass this exam were obliged to take part in agricultural work. Those with family in mainland China could return to their ancestral homes and work or study there. Those without relatives or home to return to, however, were to be assigned to state farms (Luo 2014, 19). Third, the student returnees should be educated in the legal system and understand that they were subjected to certain rules, but it was added that this should be done based on a case-by-case basis. Fourth, patriotic and socialist education had to be strengthened through, for example, conferences featuring representatives of returnees or small discussion groups at the various schools. Finally, policies were created that involved praising exemplary students to set standards for the other students. At Jinan University, for example, in the Biology Department, broadcasting and wall posters were used for this purpose (Luo 2014, 19–20).

Converging liminalities: outer and inner borders The preceding discussion reveals how elements of geography (space), morality (status), and temporality (situation) converged in the re-education of student

82  Els van Dongen returnees in Guangzhou. This section discusses how the three liminalities of space, status, and situation intersected not only at China’s external borders but also within China. From the side of the government, space was relevant in that, as already briefly discussed, those who returned were to adhere to regulations and policies regarding allocation to urban or rural areas. For the wealthy huaqiao, this meant that they could remain in the cities, either to invest, conduct business, or to study, whereas the less well-off were allocated to rural areas to assist in agricultural production. Since Guangzhou was the quintessential urban area, with its history of trading and exchange, this made it an attractive place to remain after graduation for student returnees from Southeast Asia and Hong Kong and Macao. However, to their dismay, many graduates of Jinan University were allocated to areas far outside Guangzhou, leading to friction and sometimes resistance. In the scheme that connected socio-economic background, and by consequence morality, to the physical localities of the urban and the rural, not adhering to the allocation rules meant challenging the social order. The arrival of returnees and their resistance to being allocated to the countryside reinforced existing challenges to this division between the urban and the rural in the form of mass migration to the cities and urban unemployment. In 1957, Mao Zedong gave a talk on the handling of “contradictions” entitled “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions among the People.” Similarly, Tao Zhu, whose power base was in Guangdong, outlined the contradictions existing in Guangdong. Among the main contradictions listed were the discontent of peasants because of differences with urban life. Also, many students could not find employment in better institutions and it was recommended that they be employed in the countryside as teachers instead (Vogel 1980, 187–88). This was not without challenges. A 1955 report listed an especially problematic group of student returnees in this context, namely, those who were “going from place to place” (gedi liudong) and who had no stable position, had not started school yet, or who did not adhere to protocol. Their thought was considered “rather complicated” (bijiao fuza) and they were perceived to easily crowd together with “harmful elements” (buliang fenzi). This “mobile” and unstable group was said to mostly concentrate in cities, and particularly in Guangzhou, where they negatively impacted social order (shehui zhi’an) and social virtue (shehui daode) (GDPA 209-1-27-154-156 [1955]). From this, we can see the importance of space in ideological work: mobility was perceived to be a threat to stability, and especially so in urban areas. This also illustrates the fact that movement was not just conceived of as a threat to stability in terms of external borders; it could also threaten stability if it occurred within China. In 1958, the household registration (hukou) system further controlled mobility as residential status was divided between urban and rural areas. The division between rural and urban space and populations and the connection between space and status was also manifest in the assignment of returnees, with poor returnees and those who did not qualify to study being allocated to the countryside. Often, they were assigned to work on one of the state farms. Based on archival sources, Shelly Chan notes that the fiercest resistance in return policies was that pertaining to the directive that returnees be allocated to the countryside

Beyond spatial liminality  83 to take part in agricultural production. The state farms to which returnees were sent for agricultural work had initially been set up for alleged “communists” from British Malaya, but also to deal with unwanted elements in the cities, such as “demobilized soldiers, convicted criminals, and unemployed urban residents” (Chan 2018, 152, 156–57). Whereas efforts were made to resolve the issue of unemployment in the city by sending people to the countryside, simultaneously, there was the challenge of those from the countryside migrating to the cities to find employment. The issue of the returnees and student returnees was hence tied up with that of the rural-urban divide and the challenges regarding employment. Other reports also reflect this division between cities and the countryside, and especially between the border city of Guangzhou and poor rural areas in the form of allocation issues. For example, a Jinan University report discusses a “political thought education work plan” (zhengzhi sixiang jiaoyu gongzuo jihua) to tackle allocation problems for the batch of 1963 graduates. The report notes that their “thought consciousness” (sixiang juewu) had much increased, but about a quarter of these students resisted allocation plans (GDPA 232-2-297-26 [1963]). Out of the 208 graduates, 175, or 85%, chose Guangzhou as their first place of allocation. When the students were asked to list five choices for places for allocation, three students from Hong Kong and Macao wrote “Guangzhou” in each of the five boxes and added an extra “Guangzhou” in the blank space. The reporter added: “We could say this is to express determination.” Other students expressed unwillingness to be sent to places not of their liking because that would be akin to “being an army deserter” (dang taobing). Overall, the report noted on the students: “Towards the current daily improvement of the economic situation, their knowledge is insufficient. They manifest the thinking of being afraid of going to arduous places and of being afraid of going to grassroots-level units, rural, and peripheral places.” Especially students from Guangzhou, returned overseas Chinese students, and students from Hong Kong and Macao were said to prefer to stay in Guangzhou or neighbouring areas (GDPA 232-2-297-26 [1963]). Liminality of space was hence also connected to liminality of status and situation within China. Those who were not “fixed” in terms of work or allocation were also considered morally problematic, associated with the disturbance of moral order, and with health concerns. The latter was also specifically discussed in documents regarding the admission of returnees. A 1955 document mentioned that those who had health issues could not be admitted. A 1957 document by the provincial health department further listed diseases found among the returnees, such as leprosy (mafeng), pulmonary tuberculosis (fei jiehe), and mental disorders (shenjing bing). The document urged for the localization of the resolution of these “problems.” It was suggested that those with mild disease could continue their studies while getting treated. For those suffering from leprosy, they were to liaise with the Guangdong provincial health department. For those suffering from mental illness, local hospitalization was recommended (GDPA 317-1-71-48-48 [1957]). The establishment of public order after 1949 required the eradication of unemployment and “loose elements” associated with moral degradation and disease.

84  Els van Dongen The strategy to deal with “vagrants” was to pay for the return to their hometowns (Vogel 1980, 65–66). Alternatively, the government would assist with finding basic work, setting up businesses, or offer temporary welfare. In this context, Vogel mentions the distinction between those unemployed who were treated as still belonging to the working class and those “rootless remnants (you min) of capitalism and feudalism,” who were considered “criminals” in need of being reformed (Vogel 1980, 66). Hence, when returnees arrived in the PRC during the 1950s, issues pertaining to their allocation built on already existing liminalities of space, status, and situation within China that were expressed in the urban-rural divide. Guangzhou, urban area par excellence, led many student returnees to prefer to remain in the city, with the countryside representing poverty and backwardness.

Concluding remarks This chapter has exposed some of the regional dimensions of the Cold War, the fluid nature of Cold War borders, and the various aspects of liminality that transcend those of space through the site of Guangzhou and the re-establishment of Jinan University. Guangzhou, historically a trading port and emigration area, had a long history of interaction with the overseas Chinese and Southeast Asia. However, Guangzhou was also a “frontier zone,” a liminal space between the capitalist and socialist worlds, which meant that both agendas of economic and cultural exchange and ideological education were reflected in the foundation and early development of Jinan University. Liminality, or “transition” in van Gennep’s three “patterns” of “rites of passage,” namely, “separation,” “transition,” and “incorporation,” marked not only the space that was Guangzhou but also the status and situation of the returnees. Their status was liminal in that they were caught in between socialist and capitalist worlds, and the transition to becoming a good socialist was never truly completed. Education at Jinan University was to support this process of re-education through interaction with mainland students, political thought education, and study-work practices. Their situation, finally, was no less liminal in that they had to go through several ritual practices to be re-educated, hence spending considerable time “inbetween” and being “prepared” for consequent stages. In addition, although there were temporal limits to this situation on paper, in practice, re-education was never completed. The problems with the allocation of graduates also reflect the convergence of these three types of liminality within the borders of the PRC through the urban-rural divide. Hence, for the “Chinese” student returnees, liminality transcended the liminality of space – it also contained ideological, moral, ritual, and temporal dimensions that preserved their place at the threshold of socialist China.

Acknowledgements The author thanks the editors for their valuable comments to an earlier version of this chapter. She also extends thanks to the participants of the conference “Global Cities: The Networks of Connectivity in East Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific

Beyond spatial liminality  85 Region, 1850–1950” held at City University of Hong Kong on April 13–14, 2018, for stimulating discussions. Thanks are also due to the organizer of this conference, namely, the Department of Chinese and History at City University of Hong Kong. The staff at the Jinan University Library and the Guangdong Provincial Archives, Guangzhou, assisted with data collection. Dai Fan, Sabrina Yuan Hao, and Song Wanzhen facilitated research in Guangzhou. This work was supported by a Tier 1 Grant, Singapore Ministry of Education/Nanyang Technological University (AcFR Grant number RG 78/16).

Bibliography Primary sources “Fu youguan huanan huaqiao xuesheng yu qingnian gongzuo wenti [Again on the Issue of Overseas Chinese Students and Youth Work in South China].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 209-1-27-154-156 (1955). “Guanyu kaiban Gang’Ao xuesheng buxi xuexiao wenti de baogao [Report on the Issue of Setting Up Remedial Schools for Students from Hong Kong and Macao].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 204-3-306-013-015 (1955). “Guanyu zai Jinan daxue sheli waimaoxi ji zhaosheng wenti de hanfu [Reply Letter on the Issue of Establishing a Foreign Trade Department at Jinan University and Recruiting Students].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 222-1-71-028-037 (1959). “Guiguo huaqiao xuesheng jiaoyu gongzuo fangzhen zhengce ruogan wenti [Some Issues Regarding the Guidelines and Policies on Education Work of Returned Overseas Chinese Students].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 232-2-177-21-23 (1958). Jinan daxue xiaoshi bianxiezu, ed. 1996. Jinan xiaoshi, 1906–1996 [History of Jinan University, 1906–1996]. Guangzhou: Jinan daxue chubanshe. “Jinan daxue yingjie biyesheng zhengzhi sixiang jiaoyu gongzuo jihua (cao’an) [Political Thought Education Work Plan for This Year’s Graduates of Jinan University (draft)].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 232-2-297-26 (1963). Jinan University website. www.jnu.edu.cn/. “Shinianlai Guangdongsheng de duiwai maoyi (chugao) [Foreign Trade of Guangdong Province in the Last Ten Years (First Draft)].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 302-1-101-36-45 (1959). “Zhuanzhi guanyu jiejue huaqiao xuesheng jibing zhiliao de han [Letter Informing About How to Resolve Overseas Chinese Students’ Illness and Treatment].” Guangdong Provincial Archives (GDPA) 317-1-71-48-48 (1957).

Secondary sources Chan, Shelly. 2014. “The Disobedient Diaspora: Chinese Students in Mao’s China, 1958– 1966.” Journal of Chinese Overseas 10(2): 220–38. ———. 2018. Diaspora’s Homeland: Modern China in the Age of Global Migration. Durham and London: Duke University Press. Chen, Jian. 2001. Mao’s China and the Cold War. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press. Chou, Grace Ai-Ling. 2011. Confucianism, Colonialism, and the Cold War: Chinese Cultural Education at Hong Kong’s New Asia College, 1949–63. Leiden: Brill.

86  Els van Dongen Duara, Prasenjit. 2016. “Hong Kong as a Global Frontier: Interface of China, Asia, and the World.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 211–30. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Fitzgerald, Stephen. 1972. China and the Overseas Chinese: A Study of Peking’s Changing Policy, 1949–1970. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ford, Caleb. 2014. “Guiqiao (Returned Overseas Chinese) Identity in the PRC.” Journal of Chinese Overseas 10(2): 239–62. Godley, Michael R. 1989. “The Sojourners: Returned Overseas Chinese in the People’s Republic of China.” Pacific Affairs 62(3): 330–52. Guangdong sheng li Zhongshan tushuguan [Sun Yat-sen Library of Guangdong Province], ed. 2009. Lao Guangzhou [Old Guangzhou]. Guangzhou: Lingnan meishu chubanshe. Guowuyuan qiaoban qiaowu ganbu xuexiao [Overseas Chinese Work Cadre School of the OCAO], ed. 2006. Qiaowu gongzuo gailun [Outline of Overseas Chinese Work]. Beijing: Zhongguo zhigong chubanshe. Ho, Elaine Lynn-Ee. 2012. “Refugee or Returnee? The Ethnic Geopolitics of Diasporic Resettlement in China and Intergenerational Change.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 38(4): 599–611. Kimball, Solon. 1960. “Introduction.” In The Rites of Passage, edited by Arnold van Gennep and translated by Monika B. Vizedom and Gabrielle L. Caffee, v–xx. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Kuhn, Philip. 2008. Chinese Among Others: Emigration in Modern Times. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield. Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith, 1–30. Oxford and Cambridge: Blackwell. “Liminal.” Oxford Dictionary Online. Accessed April 15, 2019. https://en.oxforddictionaries. com/definition/liminal. Liu, Xiong. 2006. “Jianguo chuqi Meiguo zunao huaqiao xuesheng huiguo shengxue neimu [An Inside Story of How the United States Obstructed Overseas Chinese Students from Returning and Entering Higher Education During the 1950s].” Huaqiao huaren lishi yanjiu [Overseas Chinese History Studies] 1: 62–66. Luo, Qiaoli. 2014. “Guangdong guiqiao xuesheng sixiang zhengzhi jiaoyu gongzuo fenxi (1957–1966) [Analysis of Political Thought Education Work of Returned Students in Guangdong].” Hong Guangjiao [Red Angle] 12: 18–21. Peterson, Glen. 2012. Overseas Chinese in the People’s Republic of China. London: Routledge. Roberts, Priscilla. 2016. “Cold War Hong Kong: Juggling Opposing Forces and Identities.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 26–59. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Szonyi, Michael, and Hong Liu. 2010. “Introduction: New Approaches to the Study of the Cold War in Asia.” In The Cold War in Asia: The Battle for Hearts and Minds, edited by Zheng Yangwen, Hong Liu, and Michael Szonyi, 1–11. Leiden and Boston: Brill. van Dongen, Els. 2017. “Behind the Ties That Bind: Diaspora-Making and Nation-Building in China and India in Historical Perspective, 1850s–2010s.” Asian Studies Review 41(1): 117–35. van Gennep, Arnold. 1960. The Rites of Passage. Translated by Monika B. Vizedom and Gabrielle L. Caffee. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Vogel, Ezra F. [1980] 1969. Canton under Communism: Programs and Politics in a Provincial Capital, 1949–1968. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Beyond spatial liminality  87 Wang, Cangbai. 2009. “Guiqiao: Returnees as a Policy Subject in China.” Newsletter of the International Institute of Asian Studies 50: 7. Xia, Quan, and Guangfu Qian. 2008. “Shilun xin Zhongguo huaqiao gaodeng jiaoyu de xingban: Liao Chengzhi yu Jinan daxue de liangdu fuxiao [On the Initiation of Overseas Chinese Education in the PRC: Liao Chengzhi and the re-Establishment of Jinan University].” Gaodeng Jiaoyu Yanjiu [Research on Higher Education] 29(11): 98–102. Ye, Shiguang. 2012. Xincheng jiuying [New City, Old Images]. Guangzhou: Lingnan meishu chubanshe. Zhu, Jieqin. 2008. Dongnanya huaqiao shi [A History of Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia]. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

6 The question of people Cultural Cold War in 1950s’ Hong Kong Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan

The Berlin of the East In the 150 years under the British rule, Hong Kong had always been a contact zone between East and West, the local and the global. Yet, as Priscilla Roberts points out, the Cold War was “a distinct and critical period” during which the colony was fundamentally transformed (Roberts 2016A, 15). Instead of an “imperial outpost” of the British Empire in the Far East, Cold War Hong Kong became a frontier in the global battle of ideologies (Roberts 2016b, 25–59). At the height of the Cold War in East Asia – marked by the founding of the PRC in 1949, the Korean War (1950–1953), and the US involvement in Vietnam (1965–1975) – Hong Kong was a “liminal space” for the contestation of power between the Eastern and Western Blocs. Being “a liminal space,” Prasenjit Duara suggests, Cold War Hong Kong served as “a zone of openness, indeterminacy, and absence of a relatively fixed identity” (Duara 2016, 211). Its liminality arose not from chaos and lawlessness, but from the coexistence of opposing forces and competing claims, providing a space for negotiation and contestation, domination and resistance. In this sense, Cold War Hong Kong was indeed the “Berlin of the East” – a term coined in 1949 by British diplomats at the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, DC. Popularized by the Hong Kong governor, Sir Alexander Grantham, during his six-week lecture tour to the United States in 1954 (Mark 2000, 839; Grantham [1965] 2010, 170–73), the “Berlin of the East” became a collective identity of the Hong Kong people who saw themselves at the front line of the Cold War. While it might not be accurate empirically to compare Hong Kong with the divided Berlin in the Cold War (Roberts 2016b, 28), the “Berlin of the East” encapsulated allegorically the new status of Hong Kong as “the zone of interaction between socialism and capitalism, a space where the otherwise forbidden traffic between these two opposing ideological systems could take place” (Duara 2016, 211–12).1 In addition to geopolitics, Cold War Hong Kong was also distinctive in an economic sense. The PRC’s “leaning to one side” and the US embargoes created an environment where Hong Kong must respond by restructuring its economy. Rather than being an entrepôt for Chinese exports and imports, Cold War Hong Kong aligned with the Western Bloc in the hopes of expanding into the huge US DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-7

The question of people  89 market. This reorientation led to a fundamental shift in the Hong Kong economy. In the span of ten years – roughly coinciding with the governorship of Sir Alexander Grantham (1947–1957) – Hong Kong was transformed into a centre of export industry, a site of regional banking, and a hub of trans-Pacific goods and services.2 The centrepiece of this economic reorientation was the expansion of the Kai Tak Airport with a long runway extended into Kowloon Bay. Ready to serve jet aircraft, the “aerodrome” positioned Hong Kong as a crossroads of the world (Pigott, 77–80; Wu 2015, 120–21, 132–33). Serving as a showcase of free enterprise and transnational commerce at the doorstep of Communist China, Hong Kong was especially successful in attracting US investment, so much so that its foreign exchange was based on a two-currency system – the British sterling and the US dollar – even though the colony was a member of the Commonwealth (Schenk 2001, 9–10). Being part of the dollar zone, US companies were able to invest in Hong Kong easily. A case in point was the aviation industry. Using long-distance and large-capacity aircrafts that could take off from the extended runway of the Kai Tak Airport, US trans-Pacific airline companies (such as Pan American World and Northwest Orient) offered regular passenger and freight services between Hong Kong and the continental US (Mark 2010, 1–28, 2016, 164–65). This expansion of trans-Pacific traffic helped to transform Hong Kong into an “international tourism space” in the 1960s, when large numbers of American tourists – civilians as well as military servicemen – spent time in the “Pearl of the Orient” (Mark 2016, 160–82). Together, these political and economic changes made Hong Kong vulnerable but full of possibilities. It was vulnerable due to external threat and internal subversion. Externally, its long border with Guangdong and its accessibility to the ocean from all sides rendered Hong Kong “indefensible” (Mark 2004, 1–11; National Security Council 1957, 3). The indefensible Hong Kong became even more hopeless when Britain, due to the constraints of its resources, had to cut back on its military presence in the colony.3 The threat externally was compounded by the threat internally. The continuation of the “civil war” between the supporters of Beijing and Taipei, and the intensification of the cultural Cold War by US spies and special agents, created a highly combustible environment where an aggressive move on one side would lead to violent confrontations in the streets of the colony. Indeed, the 1956 Tsuen Wan riot over the October 10 celebration clearly indicated the danger of aggressive political activism (Mark 2007, 1145–81). Nevertheless, Hong Kong’s vulnerability was also a source of creativity. Caught in the middle of two wars – the continuation of the Chinese civil war between the Communists and the Nationalists, and the intensification of the Cold War between the Eastern and Western Blocs – the Hong Kong government exercised “levelheaded pragmatism” in managing the competition of power and influence among various political groups.4 Steve Tsang compares this pragmatism to “walking on a tightrope,” meaning that “one’s real concern is not to maintain balance per se, but rather not to fall” (Tsang 2004, 158). What this balancing act required was flexibility and ingenuity from the Hong Kong officials in dealing with three interlocking factors: Britain’s imperial decline, the Communist threat, and the US’s agenda

90  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan in the Cold War. And no other issue of the 1950s required more flexibility and ingenuity than the refugee problem. Described by Chi-kwan Mark as the “question of people,” the refugee problem encapsulated Hong Kong’s uniqueness in the Cold War (Mark 2007, 1146–47).5 For Sir Alexander Grantham, the governor of Hong Kong, the “question of people” was a blessing in disguise (Grantham [1965] 2010, 155, 167). In his lecture tour to the United States in 1954, he stressed two themes: “Hong Kong, the Berlin of the East” and “Hong Kong, the bastion of Freedom” (Grantham [1965] 2010, 171). In both themes, the presence of tens of thousands of refugees in Hong Kong was implied. They were there because of the proximity of Hong Kong to Communist China (hence, the Berlin of the East), and they were there because of the social well-being and economic prosperity of an industrializing Hong Kong (hence, the bastion of Freedom). Thus, the refugees in Hong Kong vividly demonstrated the paramount importance of Hong Kong as “a Cold War outpost” which must be defended “to resist the advance of the Chinese Communists in South East Asia” (Grantham [1965] 2010, 171).

Remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace It is from this perspective of resolving the “question of people” that we can under­ stand why huge resources were poured into reviving the memory of the Song Emperor’s Terrace (Sung Wong Toi in Cantonese, and Song Wang Tai in Putonghua) in the 1950s. From its earliest form as a rock on the Sacred Hill, the Song Emperor’s Terrace was a symbol of political resistance. Bearing three big Chinese characters Song Wang Tai 宋王臺, the rock served as a memorial of the Song loyalists’ resistance against the Mongol invaders in the 13th century. In the 1920s, it became a site of the Qing loyalism to remember the “benevolent rule” of the Manchu dynasty (1644–1911) and to protest the Republican government for causing political chaos in China (Zhong Baoxian 2001; Ko Chia-Cian 2013). In the 1950s, the terrace was turned into a marker of cultural nationalism at the high noon of the Cold War (Hon 2012, 133–66). The archival documents from the Colonial Office and the Hong Kong Chief Secretariat indicate that the remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace was an unintended result of expanding the Kai Tak Airport.6 To expand the airport to serve large-capacity commercial aircraft, the Hong Kong government decided to level the Sacred Hill and use the quarry to extend the runway. Then, the issue arose as to what to do about the Song Emperor’s Terrace sitting on the top of the hill. Should it be destroyed? Or should it be preserved? After months of deliberation, the Hong Kong government decided to relocate the remainder of the terrace – a small tablet bearing the three characters, Song Wang Tai – to a newly built garden next to the expanded Kai Tak Airport. While the new location of the tablet would be a short distance away from the original site of the terrace, it was still within the Kowloon Bay District and was close enough to where the Sacred Hill was once located.7 Archival materials do not tell us why top Hong Kong officials decided to build a garden to house the remainder of the terrace. But evidence shows that building

The question of people  91 the garden was a top priority of the colonial government and was directly supervised by the Chief Executive. More importantly, the building of the garden was intended to be a collective, consultative enterprise – a rare exception to the topdown ruling style of the colonial government. To make sure that the plan had local support, the Hong Kong government invited the Zhao Clansmen Association (Xianggang Zhaoshi zongqin hui 香港趙氏宗親會) to help move the historical site.8 The clansmen association was chosen because of its members’ claim to be distant descendants of the Song royal family who, by virtue of bloodline, were believed to have a say in choosing the new location of the historical site. For the Zhaos, many of whom were local businessmen, the government’s invitation was an opportunity that they could not afford to miss. The invitation gave them access to the colonial regime and boosted their social prestige in the Chinese business community of Hong Kong. In addition to an alliance between the colonial government and the local clansmen association, the Cold War environment also helped make the relocation of the terrace a welcoming event. Whatever their political persuasions, refugees who came to Hong Kong after 1949 saw the event as a battle in the global war against Communism. Led by the British (a leader of the Western Bloc), the relocation of the terrace could be interpreted as a political act of reinvigorating the memory of political resistance in time of “Chinese Communist imperialism.” To the refugees who had strong ties with Chiang Kai-shek’s government in Taiwan, the memory of the Southern Song resistance reminded them of their loyalty to the defeated Guomindang, which led the Nationalist Revolution since 1911. In this charged political environment, Song loyalism took on a different meaning. It became a stand-in for loyalty to the Taiwan government, and by extension, the Free World. This confluence of political, social, and ideological factors made the relocation of the Song Emperor’s Terrace a resounding success. Within three years (1956–1959), a new garden was built to house the remains of the original rock. Known as the Memorial Garden of the Song Emperor’s Terrace (Song Huangtai jinian gongyuan 宋皇臺紀念公園) (see Figure 6.1), the garden was built next to the expanded Kai Tak Airport and between three major thoroughfares. Inside the garden, there were three tablets marking the place as a lieu de mémoire: a tablet bearing the three Chinese characters “Song Wang Tai” from the original huge rock, and a pair of memorial tablets – one in English and the other in ­Chinese – explaining the historical significance of the terrace and the process of relocation.9 Both in form and in content, the new home of the Song Emperor’s Terrace was a shadow of its former self. Gone was the serenity and solemnity of the old terrace that encouraged visitors to rid their minds of the humdrum of daily life. The huge rock that used to be the centre of the terrace disappeared forever. For multifunctional purposes, the memorial garden was not only the new site of the lieu de mémoire but also a playground for children and a refuge for pedestrians. Contrary to the old Sacred Hill in the early 20th century, the new garden displayed no sign of a sacred place. The only marker of its sacredness – and the only link to history – was the tablet bearing the characters “Song Wang Tai.”

92  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan

Figure 6.1  The Memorial Garden of Song Emperor’s Terrace (Photo by Hok-yin Chan)

Nevertheless, what was lost in serenity and solemnity was fully compensated for by the publicity and social impact triggered by the relocation. Forty years ago, it was a small group of Qing loyalists who, for their own interest, revived the memory of Song loyalism. In the 1950s, it was the colonial government that, due to necessity, mobilized the political machine to relocate the Song Emperor’s Terrace. Furthermore, the colonial government had access to advanced modes of mass communication that were unavailable to the Qing loyalists. In addition to printed publications (the only form of mass communication used by the Qing loyalists), in the 1950s the Hong Kong government could inform tens of thousands of people via newspapers and radio. In fact, in an act of demonstrating the power of the new forms of mass media, the government arranged an interview with the author of the two memorial tablets, Jian Youwen 簡又文 (1896–1978), to be broadcasted on Radio Hong Kong.10 No record is available on how many people listened to the interview. But there is no doubt that a lot of people – including the Zhaos, the spectators at the opening ceremony, the radio audience, and the daily visitors to the memorial garden – knew about the Song Emperor’s Terrace. And by a stroke of political genius, the Hong Kong government named a thoroughfare outside the garden “Song Emperor’s Terrace Road” (Song Huangtai dao 宋皇臺道) (see Figure 6.2). The name of the

The question of people  93

Figure 6.2  The Song Emperor’s Terrace Road (Photo by Hok-yin Chan)

thoroughfare ensured that thousands of pedestrians who passed through Kowloon City would remember the terrace.

Winning hearts and minds Although more balanced in memory production and reception, the 1950s revival was based on the memory structure established by the Qing loyalists. A prime example of the Qing loyalists’ influence was the name change of the Song Emperor’s Terrace. Forty years ago, the Qing loyalist Chen Botao 陳伯陶 (1955–1930) suggested changing the name of the terrace from Song Wang Tai (宋王臺, Song King’s Terrace) to Song Huang Tai (宋皇臺, Song Emperor’s Terrace) to honour the two Song royal members in the resistance movement. In the 1950s, the Hong Kong government adopted Chen’s view and officially renamed the terrace as Song Huang Tai (Song Emperor’s Terrace). To this day, the garden and the thoroughfare still bear the new name of the terrace. To Chen Botao, the name change was intended to be a double subversion – ­subverting the traditional historiography on Song loyalism and subverting the political view of the revolutionaries. In changing the name of the terrace, it is

94  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan unclear whether the Hong Kong government fully understood the significance of Chen’s double subversion. Regardless of its motive, the Hong Kong government was quick to win political favours by supporting Song loyalism. The name change secured the support of the Zhao Clansmen Association in honouring the Song emperors and removed hurdles in relocating the terrace. It also established the newly built garden as a Cold War landscape, reminding visitors and pedestrians of the significance of Hong Kong in the bipolar rivalry. On the other hand, the Hong Kong government had trouble separating Chen’s historical reinterpretation from his Qing loyalism, thereby creating a confusion in the meaning of the Song political resistance. This ambivalence regarding Chen Botao (and by extension, Qing loyalism) is clearly shown in the Memorial Tablet of the Song Emperor’s Terrace (Song Huangtai jinian bei 宋皇臺紀念碑), when the author attempted to explain why the name of the garden was called Song Huang Tai (the Song Emperor’s Terrace) rather than Song Wang Tai (the Song King’s Terrace) as had been written on the rock (see Figure 6.3). The character “wong” on the great rock should be that for “Emperor” (huang 皇) and not the character for “king” (wang 王). This mistake was first made in the Yuan (Mongol) official history of the Sung dynasty where it was recorded that there were two kings. Now this park is called the “Garden of the Sung Emperor’s Terrace” and the road before it is named the “Sung Emperor’s Terrace Road.” This use of the title “Emperor” is correct. It is said that to the south-west of the Sung Wong Toi, there was once a village called “The Two Kings’ Palace,” which was so named because the emperor Tuen Chung and his brother, Wai Wong Ping, who succeeded him, visited that village together. To the north there was the Tomb of the Lady Kam. It is recorded that the princess of Chun, daughter of the Queen Mother Yeung, was drowned nearby and a golden image of her was buried in that tomb. To the north-west is the Temple of Hau-Wong. A tablet erected by Mr. Chan Pak-to [Chen Botao] of Tung Kwun district puts forward the theory that Yeung Leung-chit, brother of the Queen Mother was buried at this spot and that local people built the temple in memory of his loyalty. There is also a stone called the “Armchair Stone” near Yau Sin Ngam on the White Crane Mountain. A study tells how the emperor occasionally established his court there using the stone as his temporary throne. All these legends connected with the history of the Sung Wong Toi are recorded here to facilitate future research.11 From the name of the terrace to the “system of signs” of Kowloon Bay, the Hong Kong government was in lockstep with Chen Botao. The trouble was that Chen had cleverly drawn a parallel between Song loyalism and Qing loyalism. The challenge was how to transform the memory of the Song Emperor’s Terrace from supporting Qing loyalism to supporting a war against Communism. On the memorial tablet, the Hong Kong government gave no answer to this challenge. The task of reinterpreting the Song Emperor’s Terrace fell on the shoulders of a recent émigré, Jian Youwen. A professional historian, Jian had worked

The question of people  95

Figure 6.3  The Song Emperor’s Terrace Memorial Tablet (Photo by Hok-yin Chan)

as the head of the Guangdong Historical Archives before he moved to Hong Kong in 1949. He was a specialist on the Taiping movement (1850–1864) and was a member of the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Hong Kong. Jian’s main contribution to the remaking the memory of the Song Emperor’s Terrace was editing the Memorial Collection of the Song Emperor’s Terrace (Song Huang Tai Jinianji 宋皇臺紀念集). Published in 1960, a year after the opening of the Garden of the Song Emperor’s Terrace, the collection was part of the ceremony

96  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan for the relocation of the terrace. Funded by the Zhao Clansmen Association, the collection was a comprehensive assemblage of historical documents, historical writings, visual images, and personal recollections about the terrace. The collection was comprehensive not only in the large numbers of documents it included but also in the time periods that the documents covered. The collection brought together writings from the 13th century to the 1950s, including recent writings by historians, archaeologists, and poets. As the editor of the Memorial Collection, Jian wrote a long introduction to explain the terrace’s history. In the introduction, Jian guided readers to a different memory of the terrace by casting it through the lens of nationalist history. First, he provided a long historical view of 5,000 years of Chinese history. He observed that the country succumbed to “foreign occupation” only twice – those occasions being the Mongol occupation and the Manchu occupation. Harking back to the historical view of the 1911 Revolution, Jian highlighted the “racial” battles between the foreign (the Mongols) and the native (the Song dynasty). Thus, to him, the Song Emperor’s Terrace was “the great memorial of the first occasion of losing the nation”. As such, the Song Emperor’s Terrace stood for the “national spirit” that did not give up fighting even in defeat and occupation. It symbolized the “national soul” that continued to resist until justice was served. Above all, it represented the collective will of the Chinese to strengthen and unify the country.12 As mentioned earlier, Chen Botao’s attempt to rename the Song Emperor’s Terrace was to subvert the 1911 revolution. In calling the historical site “Song Emperor’s Terrace,” Chen underscored Song loyalism as a struggle to uphold moral principles rather than as a battle against foreign aggressors. It was this understanding of Song loyalism that turned the historical event into a metaphor for Qing loyalism, especially loyalty to the imperial system and the Qing’s political legitimacy. And it was this understanding of Song loyalism that turned the historical event into a critique of the Nationalist Revolution, drawing attention to its destruction of the Confucian social hierarchy, family structure, and code of behaviours. Contrary to Chen, Jian reinserted the native/foreign dichotomy into the memory of the terrace, making it a symbol of the native’s triumph over the foreign. In the context of the Cold War, the native/foreign dichotomy was not just a separation between “us” and “them” but also a metaphor for the battle between the Eastern and Western Blocs, Communism and the Free World – or in Jian’s terms, “the righteous” (zhengyi 正義) and “the barbaric” (manbao 蠻暴).13 This analogy between the remembrance of Song loyalism and the remembrance of the Cold War was vividly on display at the front of the Memorial Collection. As custom dictated, Jian asked well-known political and cultural leaders to endorse the collection by contributing short scripts (such as a four-character sentence or a poem), all handwritten in elegant and ornate fashion. Among those who contributed their beautiful calligraphy was the top Guomindang leader, Yu Youren 于右任 (1879–1964), whose presence put the collection squarely in the camp of the Nationalists. Also included was a poem penned by Liang Hancao 梁寒操

The question of people  97 (1898–1975) from Taipei, who not only linked the remembrance of Song loyalism to the 1950s, but also identified the Song Emperor’s Terrace as the lieu de mémoire for the 1950s refugees. Set in a mournful tone full of melancholy and sadness, Liang’s poem reads as follows: Kowloon has been a place of sorrow since ancient times, Its lesson is even harder to forget today; The original Song Emperor’s Terrace is gone forever, But its memory will continue for thousands of years. . . . Many changes took place in the last four decades, Kowloon is again the home of the displaced; Unwillingly we turn our eyes to the broken country, Distressfully we come to face the unknown future.14 In the poem, Liang framed the remembrance of Song loyalism in the context of the vicissitudes of the Nationalist Revolution over the last 40 years. Just as the 13th-century loyalists were resisting the Mongol invaders, so too the presentday refugees were resisting the Communists. Just as the loyalist base in the 13th century gave hope to reviving the Song dynasty, so too the temporary refuge in British Hong Kong in the 1950s breathed new life into the global war against Communism. For Liang, these parallels were so compelling that it did not matter that the original Song Emperor’s Terrace was reduced to an inconspicuous tablet placed in a small garden. The symbol was powerful in and of itself, summoning the Hong Kong Chinese to continue their fight against Communism to their last breath.

Conclusion From today’s perspectives, some of the forces that shaped the remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace may seem accidental and serendipitous. But the fluidity proves the point that the development of 1950s Hong Kong was driven by an array of factors from different directions. In retrospect, there were at least three major forces responsible for the remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace. At the local level, it involved government officials, community leaders, businessmen, educators, and skilled workers who were mobilized to create an image of a stable and prosperous Hong Kong vis-à-vis a chaotic and ruthless Communist China. At the regional level, the new Song Emperor’s Terrace was adamantly pro-Guomindang, evoking the memory of the Nationalist Revolution and espousing cultural nationalism to contain the spread of Communism. At the global level, the new Song Emperor’s Terrace projected an image of Hong Kong being firmly in the Free World as the “Berlin of the East” and a “bastion of Freedom.” This confluence of local, regional, and global forces reminds us that the development of 1950s Hong Kong was multifaceted and multifarious. As such, we should be sceptical of both the colonial narrative that emphasizes the stability and

98  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan prosperity under the British rule from the Opium War to 1997, and the nationalistic narrative that stresses the paramount influence of mainland China (especially Guangdong) on Hong Kong from time immemorial to the present day. Instead of identifying one factor – be it the PRC, UK, or US – as the primary agent of change, we would be better off if we look for a multitude of factors that made Cold War Hong Kong a “liminal space” in the global contestation of power and ideology.

Notes 1 To the US policy makers, the term “the Berlin of the East” evoked a special meaning. It reminded them of the significance of Hong Kong as a borderland in the global competition of power. For instance, in a 1957 report of the National Security Council of the American government, the value of Hong Kong as a Cold War borderland was eloquently stated: “In former colonial areas of Asia and Africa, overt American identification with British rule in Hong Kong would be a political liability. This would be balanced at least in part by growing awareness in some Asian areas of Chinese Communist imperialism” (National Security Council 1957, 5). 2 For the economic changes in 1950s Hong Kong, see (Tsang 2004, 161–79). The American policy makers were acutely sensitive to Hong Kong’s economic restructuring. See (National Security Council 1960, 3). 3 As Hong Kong governor, Sir Alexander Grantham was acutely aware of the impact of the British withdrawal of defense forces from East Asia. He lamented, for instance, on the closure of the Royal dockyard in Hong Kong in 1957 (see Grantham [1965] 2010, 193–94). Chi-Kwan Mark identifies 1957 as the cut-off year when the British government decided to withdraw militarily from east of the Suez Canal. See Mark (2009, 45–71). 4 Steve Tsang described the leadership style of Hong Kong government as “level-headed pragmatism” (Tsang 2004, 158). Priscilla Roberts refers to the same leadership style as “the acrobatics of multiple balancing” (Roberts 2016b, 35–42). Either way, the two authors emphasize the complex balancing act of the Hong Kong government officials in managing conflicts and confrontations. 5 Not only did the top leaders of Hong Kong government view refugees as an asset but so did the US policy makers. In the eyes of the US officials, Hong Kong was an important “refugee haven” in the global battle for hearts and minds (Peterson 2006, 171–95). For them, the refugees in Hong Kong must have made a deliberate choice – “a preference for life in an ‘imperialist colony’ over life under Communism” (National Security Council 1957, 7). After making the tough decision of leaving Communist China, these “unenfranchised Chinese” were the prime target of the US psychological warfare in winning hearts and minds (National Security Council 1957, 11). In addition, if successfully mobilizing these “unenfranchised Chinese” to work in industrial production, the refugees would contribute to a significant result in propaganda: the contrast between “the physical and political well-being of the colony and conditions on the mainland” (National Security Council 1957, 1). 6 There are two sources of information for the remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace. First, the Public Record Office possesses hundreds of pages of correspondence and memoranda in which top officials of the Hong Kong government discussed intensively the removal of the remnants of Song Emperor’s Terrace and the building of Sung Wong Toi Memorial Park. Second, the Record of the Colonial Office possesses correspondence and telegrams between the Hong Kong officials and the officials at the Colonial Office in London in which they discussed the reconstruction of Song Emperor’s Terrace and the development of the Kowloon City district, especially the expansion of Kai

The question of people  99 Tak Airport. These documents indicate that the expansion of Kai Tak Airport and the remaking of the Song Emperor’s Terrace happened simultaneously from 1950 to 1958. 7 “Song Huang Tai shike yizhi zhi jingguo” 宋皇臺石刻移置之經過 (The steps that were taken in moving the rock of the Song Emperor’s Terrace,” in Jian 1960, 265. 8 Zhao Lixun 趙立勳, “Choujian Song Huang Tai yizhi shibei ji bianyin jinianji huiji” 籌建宋皇臺遺址石碑即編印紀念集彙集 (Records of organizing the construction of the stone tablet of Song Emperor’s Terrace and publishing the memorial collection), in Jian 1960, 265–66. 9 Zhao Shuxun趙樹勲, “Song Huang Tai jinianbei jiemuli jisheng” 宋皇臺紀念碑揭 幕禮紀盛 (A record of the opening ceremony of the Memorial Tablet of the Song Emperor’s Terrace), in Jian 1960, 296–97. 10 Zhao Shuxun, “Song Huang Tai jinianbei jiemuli jisheng,” in Jian 1960, 301. 11 “Song Wang Tai,” in Jian 1960, 309. 12 Jian Youwen, “Yinyan” 引言 (Introduction), in Jian 1960, ix. 13 Ibid. 14 Liang Hanchao, “Ti Song Huang Tai jinianji” 題宋皇臺紀念集 (Preface to the Memorial Collection of the Song Emperor’s Terrace), in Jian 1960, vii. The translation is mine. The original lines are: 九龍千古傷心地，遺黎今更難忘記。宋皇臺已景全 非，遺蹟猶思保千禩。 . . . 卌年世變幾滄桑，九龍今又聚流亡。 不堪回首家山 破，忡忡來對此茫茫。

Bibliography Duara, Prasenjit. 2016. “Hong Kong as a Global Frontier: Interface of China, Asia, and the World.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 211–30. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Grantham, Alexander. [1965] 2010. Via Port: From Hong Kong to Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Hon, Tze-ki. 2012. “A Rock, a Text, and a Tablet: Making the Song Emperor’s Terrace a Lieu de Mémoire.” In Places of Memory in Modern China: History, Politics, and Memory, edited by Marc Andre Matten, 133–66. Leiden: Brill. Jian, Youwen 簡又文, ed. 1960. Song Huang Tai jinianji 宋皇臺紀念集 [The Memorial Collection of the Song Emperor’s Terrace]. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Zhao Clansmen Association. Ko, Chia-Cian 高嘉謙. 2013. “Kezai shishang de yimin shi: Songtai Qiuchang yu Xianggang dijing, 刻在石上的遺民史：《宋臺秋唱》與香港遺民地景 [Adherents’ History in Stone: Autumn Chants on the Terrace of the Song Kings and the Landscapes of the Qing Dynasty Adherents in Hong Kong].” Journal of the Department of Chinese Literature, National Taiwan University 臺大中文學報 41: 277–316. Mark, Chi-Kwan. 2000, December. “A Reward for Good Behavior in the Cold War: Bargaining Over the Defense of Hong Kong.” The International History Review 22(4): 837–61. ———. 2004. Hong Kong and the Cold War: Anglo-American Relations 1949–195. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2007. “The ‘Problem of People’: British Colonials, Cold War Powers, and the Chinese Refugees in Hong Kong, 1949–62.” Modern Asia Studies 41(6): 1145–81. ———. 2009. “Lack of Means or Loss of Will? The United Kingdom and the Decolonization of Hong Kong, 1957–1967.” The International History Review 31(1): 45–71. ———. 2010. “Vietnam War Tourists: US Naval Visits to Hong Kong and British AmericanChinese Relation, 1965–1968.” Cold War History 10(1): 1–28.

100  Tze-ki Hon and Hok-yin Chan ———. 2016. “Hong Kong as an International Tourism Space: The Politics of American Tourism in the 1960s.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 160–82. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. National Security Council. 1957. “U.S. Policy on Hong Kong” (NSC 5717, July 17, 1957). ———. 1960. “US Policy on Hong Kong” (NSC 6007/1, June 11, 1960). Pigott, Peter, publication date unknown. Ka Tak: A History of Aviation in Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Government Information Service. Roberts, Priscilla. 2016a. “Cold War Hong Kong: The Foundation.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 15–25. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. ———. 2016b. “Cold War Hong Kong: Juggling Opposing Forces and Identities.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts and John M. Carroll, 26–59. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Schenk, Catherine R. 2001. Hong Kong as an International Financial Center: Emergence and Development, 1945–65. London: Routledge. Tsang, Steve. 2004. A Modern History of Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Wu, Pangmou 吳邦謀. 2015. Xianggang hangkon 125 nian 香港航空125年 [One Hun­ dred and Twenty-Five Years of Hong Kong Aviation]. Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju. Zhong, Baoxian 鍾寶賢. 2001. “Xulun: Songmo diwang ruhe zoujin jiulong jindaishi? 緒論: 末帝王如何走進九龍近代史? [How Did the Southern Song Emperors Enter into the Modern History of Kowloon?].” In Jiulong cheng 九龍城 [Kowloon City], edited by Zhao Yule and Zhong Baoxian, 1–44. Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian.

7 Honouring revolutionary heroes The political uses of Martyrs’ Shrines in Taiwan Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco After taking over Taiwan in 1945 following Japan’s defeat in the Second World War, the Kuomintang (KMT) quickly enacted a series of assimilationist measures in order to “re-sinicize” the local population. Indeed, for the regime, the 50 years of Japanese colonization deeply affected the Taiwanese and before granting them the same rights as the other citizens of the Republic of China (ROC), it was necessary to ensure that the island was expunged of everything Japanese. If some of these initiatives had a direct impact on the governance of Taiwan, others were symbolical. The best example of the imposition of this nationalistic discourse is the transformation after 1945 of the Japanese State Shinto shrines in Martyrs’ Shrine (忠烈祠) dedicated to a civic cult instituted by the KMT in the 1930s. The 1949 retreat led to the intensification of the promotion of Chinese nationalism on the island. To compensate for the loss of mainland China, the KMT presented itself as “authentically Chinese,” unlike the Maoists who were corrupted by a foreign ideology, communism. The commemoration of the national martyrs, citizens who gave their life fighting for the establishment or the survival of the ROC was an essential pillar of the symbolic order of the time. After the end of the Cold War and the democratization of Taiwan, this ceremonial underwent some modifications but is still observed nowadays. The site dedicated to this civic cult, the martyrs’ shrines, can be analyzed as a realm of memory. This concept refers to “any significant entity, whether material or non-material in nature, which by dint of human will or the work of time has become a symbolic element of the memorial heritage of any community” (Nora 1996, xvii). Started in the 1970s and conducted with the involvement of many of France’s well-known historians in the next decade, this reconstruction of France national memory from the Middle Ages to the contemporary era was immediately well received in France and abroad. Indeed, historians in Italy (Isnenghi 1997) or Germany (François and Schulze 2001) have adopted a similar approach to reconsider the national past of these two countries. Besides Nora’s conceptual framework, this study also refers to Reinhart Koselleck’s work on war memorials. In an essay originally published in German in 1979, he observed that the establishment of nation-states in Europe led to a transformation of war memorials in their signification as well as in their architecture. With the nation-state came a democratization of war death commemorations, as all DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-8

102  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco soldiers, regardless of their origin and ranks, were honoured and presented as equal whereas before the War of US Independence and the French Revolutionary Wars, only noblemen were mentioned. This is directly reflected on the decorum of monuments built in the late 18th century as well as in the text carved on their pedestals, dedicated to all the soldiers who died fighting for the nation. These changes in the commemoration of war deaths illustrate transformations in the conception of the national community, whose members are thought in a more equalitarian relationship than in previous centuries and a new type of sacredness intrinsic to the symbolic foundation of the nation (Kosseleck 2002, 285–327). Koselleck’s and Nora’s works are grounded in Western history. Although the regional and local historical dynamics are characterized by sequences different than the European ones, these concepts remain eristic for analyzing the constitution of national identity through the angle of historical memory in a non-Western context. Still hosting public commemorations nowadays, Taiwanese martyrs’ shrines illustrate the affirmation of the modern nation-state in East Asia, in Japan, in China, and in Taiwan. As they bear witness to the three regimes (the Japanese colonial rule, the KMT single party governance and today’s democracy) which successively ruled Taiwan during the modern and contemporary eras, they are what is perhaps the closest to a Taiwanese realm of memory, this regardless of the current discussion on the name, thus the identity, of the state now ruling Taiwan. This chapter deploys a threefold retrospective approach. This deconstructivist perspective will reveal the different symbolic layers of the shrines, which are constitutive of what would be Taiwan’s historical memory. The most recent, the first I will develop in my analysis, reflects the official memorial narrative during the Cold War era. In the immediate post-war years, the KMT turns Taiwan’s main State Shinto shrines into places dedicated to the worship of national martyrs or, in other words, Chinese who died for the foundation of the ROC, the different campaigns the KMT fought against the warlords and the communists, and during the Second Sino-Japanese War. If the celebration of the victory against Japan coupled with an anti-Japanese rhetoric was predominant in the aftermath of the war, after the KMT retreat to Taiwan – which acts the end of the second phase of the civil war and the entry of East Asia in the Cold War – anti-communism became the cornerstone of the regime’s ideological discourse. In the 1960s, during the Chinese Cultural Renaissance Movement (中華文化復興運動), itself a reaction against the Cultural Revolution, the shrines were rebuilt in their current architectural form, which can be qualified as neo-imperial, as it imitates the palaces of Ancient China. This decision was a way to reaffirm the cultural superiority of the ROC on its communist rival. As I will show in the second part of this chapter, the civic cult introduced to Taiwan in 1945 by the KMT was not a new creation but the transposition to the island of a ceremonial which was constituted during the very first years of the ROC before being embedded in a stable legal structure after the Northern Expedition. After the Xinhai Revolution and the promulgation of the Republic, itself a type of political regime radically new for China, the revolutionaries had to give to the regime a symbolic foundation different from the forms proper to the Empire. This dynamic shares some similarities with the transformation of war

Honouring revolutionary heroes  103 memorials in Europe in the late 18th century studied by Kosselleck, though the Chinese Nationalists did not refer to a Judaeo-Christian register in their creation of a new civic sacrality but associated the traditional practice of ancestor worship to the modern cult of national martyrs. The shrines are used for the commemoration of citizens who gave their life fighting for the Nation but also for the worship of the Yellow Emperor (黃帝). By doing so, the republicans borrowed one of the main elements of the symbolism proper to the Empire, as sacrifice to the Yellow Emperor was a state affair and only the Emperor himself could conduct the ritual. The martyrs’ shrines, and that will be the third and last part of this chapter, are not solely related to the post-war historical trajectory of Taiwan but are also related to the Japanese colonization as they were originally built for the observance of State Shinto. Pillar of the Japanese nation-state until 1945, State Shinto is the first East-Asian example of a commemorative transition leading to a new relation to war deaths reflecting the advent of the nation-state.

A China in exile Between 1945 and 1949, the main priority of the new provincial authorities, which were not directly affected by the fights of the civil war, was to expunge the island from any remaining Japanese influence. The anti-Japanese discourse exacerbated during the Second Sino-Japanese War was still dominant in the 1945–1949 period. Though it did not disappear after 1949 and during the Cold War, as the victory against Japan remained central in public ceremonies, it was toned down as Tokyo quickly became one of Taipei’s most valuable strategic partners. Anticommunism became the most important element of the official ideology. Besides the commemoration of civil and military fighters who lost their lives fighting against the Maoists, the shrines physically embodied the nationalist discourse of the Kuomintang as, while originally being Shinto shrines stripped of their most obvious Japanese Imperial symbols, they were entirely rebuilt in the 1970s according to an architectural style mimicking classic Chinese imperial buildings. On October 30, 1945, five days after the ceremony enacting the transfer of sovereignty on Taiwan from Japan to the ROC, some 20 members of the local elite founded in Taipei the Committee for the inventory of the past accomplishments of Taiwanese revolutionary martyrs (台灣革命烈士事蹟調查). With the objective of establishing the census of all Taiwanese who died fighting against the colonial authorities during the 50 years of Japanese domination on Taiwan, they soon installed offices in Hualien, Taitung, Penghu and Kaohsiung (Pan 2013, 57–58). The committee expected to reach its goal within six months. Its members also addressed requests to the government (among others, to build a shrine on the site of the former Taiwan Shrine and that the state pays for the education of the martyrs’ children) but, as the creation of the group was made without consulting the public authorities, these initiatives were ignored and this collective did not have any lasting influence. However, in 1946, the head of the Hsinchu district government was at the origin of another group, this time sanctioned by the state, the Committee of support of the families of the Taiwan province revolutionary

104  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco martyrs (台灣省革命先烈遺族救援委員會). Bigger than the previous one and comprised of influent Taiwanese, its first task was to make known the great deeds of the martyrs through plays organized throughout Taiwan. Like its predecessor, it attempted to register all the Taiwanese “anti-Japanese martyrs” and advocated that the state should financially support their families. The central government gave legal recognition to the Committee on June 1, 1946. Two days later, its members petitioned the provincial government to ask for biannual commemorations on April 17, the day of the ratification of the Shimonoseki treaty, and on October 20, which marked the 1945 transfer of sovereignty on Taiwan from the Japanese empire to the ROC. They also suggested that Chen Cheng-kung, now depicted as a historical figure binding Taiwan to the Chinese mainland, become the principal deity in every martyrs’ shrine. If the new administration agreed with the second request, it also argued that it cannot change the dates of the ceremonies, as they are national. As a result, if, in light of Taiwan’s history, it would have been more significant to commemorate days marking the beginning and the end of the Japanese rule, the Taiwanese had to celebrate events to which they – with the exception of a handful of persons – did not participate (the founding of the ROC) or, for the vast majority of the islanders involved in the war, on the enemy side (the Second Sino-Japanese War). The effort of the Committee led to the first admissions of Taiwanese martyrs in the local and national registers as early as 1946. The dramatic reversal met by the nationalist armies during the late years of the Chinese civil war and the 1949 exile brought a significant change in the recognition of Taiwanese martyrs. Before the regime’s retreat, the Hsinchu committee tried to enshrine any islanders who died fighting against the former colonial rule. This initiative, which demonstrates the goodwill of the Taiwanese elite, then eager to be acknowledged by the regime as proper Chinese patriots, was essentially seen as a local matter and did not see any intervention of the central government. It did not bear fruit as, is some indeed could reach important positions in the new administration several of the members of this committee were persecuted during the 28 February 1947 incident. Central in Taiwanese contemporary history, this tragedy is absent from the commemorations held in the shrines. The evolution, during the authoritarian era, of the official discourse on the insurrection and the brutal repression of March-April 1947 illustrates the pivotal role of 1949, a year which marks the entry of Taiwan into the Cold War. As Victor Louzon pointed out, “[T]he Red Scare entirely replaced the Japanese nemesis” and if, in the aftermath of the tragedy, the government identified communist agents and the pervasive remaining Japanese influence as the two alleged causes of the events, after 1949, the regime only mentioned the alleged role – which has been clearly debunked since – of the communists in the engineering of the 1947 uprising (Louzon 2018, 175–76). After the retreat, the KMT turned all its attention to Taiwan. In the early 1950s, on the government’s request, martyrs who during their lifetime advocated communism or displayed leftish tendencies were erased from the ceremonial registers (thus expelled from the shrines), no matter how hard they fought against Japan. If

Honouring revolutionary heroes  105

Figure 7.1 The Taoyuan City Martyrs’ Shrine is the only one which still has its post-war appearance. Though the Imperial crest has been removed, architectural elements such as the stone lanterns or the bronze votive horse, located after the arch and below the main sacrificial hall, are distinctively Japanese. (Photo taken by the author)

the celebration of the 1945 victory remains the cornerstone of national commemoration, the real enemy is not Japan anymore but the communist bloc. Besides the first recognition of Taiwanese martyrs in the commemorative framework of the ROC, the local government of the then-Hsinchu county (now the Taoyuan municipality) also organized ceremonies as early as June 1946. The shrine used is nothing more than the one built by the former power for the observation of State Shinto. Though the most apparent symbols of the imperial power are erased, whereas Chinese scriptures, deities and other elements are added, the Japanese characteristics of the site are still largely predominant.1 Far from being an exception, this diverted use of the Japanese shrines was the norm as almost every local administration, at the county or city level, proceeds to organize public commemorations in the former State Shinto shrines. Though, just as in the example mentioned earlier, the sites underwent minor changes, their original buildings were initially preserved (see Figure 7.1).

The national revolutionary army Martyrs’ Shrine In the 1950s, the KMT, while stripping them of their most apparent political symbols, simply reused former Japanese State Shinto shrines for its own civic cult. Disseminated all over Taiwan, they allowed the regime to avoid new spending at a time where its resources were limited. The ROC and Japan, both members of the Western Bloc, were on good terms. The regime was nevertheless not willing

106  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco to spend anything on the conservation of the Japanese buildings, and when they were wearing down, a new shrine, with Chinese characteristics, was erected. By the same token, the nationalists tried to answer the Maoist Cultural Revolution by launching in November 1966 the Chinese Cultural Renaissance Movement, calling for the safeguarding of the Chinese traditional culture the Red Guards were trying to eliminate in mainland China. The promotion of Chinese architecture, whether it is through old or new edifices, became a way to physically translate the cultural superiority of the ROC. In 1967, the wooden arch of the former Japanese Shrine for the Protection of the Country, located in Yuanshan in Taipei and which was used as National Revolutionary Army Shrine, fell after being attacked by termites. The central committee of the KMT quickly decided to build a new shrine, a decision praised by Chiang Kai-shek, who stated: Among all national achievements, the most significant are for the people’s well-being, but the construction of an edifice such as an ancestral hall for the nation, which would stimulate the spirit of the people and the army, cannot be neglected. We previously supported the building of the Zhongshan Hall to commemorate the Father of the Nation who established the Republic; we now suggest, out of respects for our comrades, to fully rebuild the martyr shrines in order to erase every sign of the Japanese shrine while honouring the spirit of the national revolution. (Tsai 2008, 37) In this speech, the analogy between the modern civic cult and the cult of ancestors, central in the reproduction of the traditional political and familial orders, is explicit. Built in an architectural style inspired by the imperial palaces of northern China (北方宮殿式), the new shrine was completed in March 1969. Prior to its inauguration, the government defined the shrine’s status. If local shrines are under the supervision of county and city levels of administration, the authority handling the national one is the central government, more specifically the Ministry of Defence. The inscription of a new martyr on the national shrine’s register has to be ratified by the President of the ROC, who also led the official ceremonies held on this site. The shrine is divided into three parts. A monumental arch leads to a paved courtyard, itself flanked by two small towers, leading to the shrine portal. Each tower displays the bust of one particular martyr. Designed like a traditional palace, the main structure has its own courtyard, surrounding by a wall and, it its centre, a sacrificial hall which hosts an altar with the spiritual table dedicated to all the martyrs. Two small shrines, one dedicated to civilian and military martyrs, are on the left and right sides of the sanctuary. The tablets they host are mostly honouring a single individual. The walls of the second courtyards has several engravings depicting numerous feats of arms involving the KMT before and after the founding of the ROC, as well as busts of famous individuals who gave their lives for the creation or the defence of the Republic. If most of the events depicted on the courtyard’s wall took place before 1945, one picture recalls the battle of Guningtou (古寧頭之役) fought in Kinmen between October 25 and 27, 1949,

Honouring revolutionary heroes  107 a few weeks after the proclamation of the People’s Republic in Beijing. It is the last direct land engagement between the nationalist and communist armies, as the 1958 Taiwan Strait crisis was an artillery duel. Acting the end of armed phase of the Chinese civil war and the beginning of the diffuse confrontation proper to the Cold War, this nationalist victory came after a long series of disasters and prevented an invasion of Taiwan by the PRC in the aftermath of the KMT’s retreat. Though relatively obscure out of Taiwan as it remains a minor battle, it was highly celebrated by the regime during the authoritarian era (see Figure 7.2). Altogether, 400,192 individuals are honoured at the National Revolutionary Martyrs’ Shrine. The various uprisings and campaigns fought by the martyrs are aggregated in a chronological classification made of nine categories, the first, named “the foundation of the country” (開國 literally the opening of the country) beginning 17 years before the proclamation of the ROC and related to Sun Yatsen’s various attempts to overthrow the Qing dynasty. On the last three categories, two are related to the fights against the communists. Named “extermination of the bandits” (剿匪), the former is related to the first phase of the civil war between 1930 and 1936. The latter is dedicated to the civilians and militaries who died

Figure 7.2 The Arch of the National Revolutionary Army Martyrs’ Shrine is typical of the northern palace architecture with which the shrines were rebuilt in the late 1960s and 1970s. The arches of other shrines are smaller to mark the predominance of the national shrine. (Photo taken by the author)

108  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco fighting during the “suppression of the rebellion” (勘亂) which lasted from 1946 to 1991, the year of the lifting of the “Temporary Provisions for the Period of National Mobilization for Suppression of the Communist Rebellion” (動員戡亂 時期臨時條款) enacted in 1948. This law was one of the cornerstones of the authoritarian system which with the KMT ruled Taiwan during the Cold War. Indeed, the party justified its dictatorship by stating that victory against communism and national reunification were prerequisites for democratization. The Second Sino-Japanese War (designated in the nationalist discourse under the name of War of Anti-Japanese Resistance 抗日) is in between these two anti-communist sequences. If the Cold War is inherent to the post-war context, it is also, in the Chinese-speaking world, inseparable from the civil war. Several events, such as the Long March, took place before the Second World War and were essential in the ideological discourses of the PCC or the KMT. The Cold War is, to some extents, a continuation of the civil war and still, albeit in very different fashion, ongoing today as the PCC keeps calling for the unification of the Chinese nation under its own guidance. For the KMT, the National Martyrs’ Shrine (國家革命 忠烈祠) was a way to bypass its exile by commemorating events which did not take place in Taiwan, and to which Taiwanese did not participate. It was however essential in the affirmation of the regime’s anticommunism as well as its continuity despites the 1949 retreat (see Figure 7.3).

Figure 7.3 The National Revolutionary Army Martyrs’ Shrine’s main altar hosts a spiritual tablet dedicated to all the individuals commemorated on the site as well as portraits of Sun Yat-sen. (Photo taken by the author)

Honouring revolutionary heroes  109

Figure 7.4 The Taichung City Martyrs’ Shrine is representative of Taiwan’s local shrines. It is administrated by Taichung’s municipality. Unlike the national one, it is not a tourist site and is open only for private or public worship. (Photo taken by the author)

In addition to the passing of time and the Chinese Cultural Renaissance Movement, a third event shaped the faith of the shrines in the early 1970s. In 1974, two years after Japan establishes formal diplomatic relation with the PRC and terminated the one it maintained with the ROC, the Minister of Interior enacted the Main point for the erasure of the colonial administration commemorative vestiges displaying Japanese imperialism feeling of superiority during the colonial occupation of Taiwan (清除台灣日據時代表現日本帝國主義優越感之殖民統治遺 跡要點). This decree commands the destruction of the vestiges of the Japanese shrines, of the monuments celebrating Taiwan’s former rulers and anything which could recall the “feeling of superiority of Japanese imperialism” (Chen 2004, 87). Last, if a building does not directly damage the ROC’s prestige and has an historical interest, local authorities may decide to preserve it but are not allowed to renovate the Japanese site. After the site’s demise, its remnants may be transferred in a museum. As a result, with the exception of the Taoyuan Martyrs’ shrine, local shrines have entirely been rebuilt with the same northern Chinese imperial architectural style (see Figure 7.4).

Civic worship of national ancestor and martyrs in the Republic of China After overthrowing the Qing dynasty, the revolutionaries had to strengthen the legitimacy of the new Republic. To create a new political symbolism giving shape to the regime’s ideology was therefore an essential task. To this end, they began

110  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco a vast undertaking which combines elements proper to the Chinese traditional political thought and modern nationalism. Civic cults, which played a central role in the reproduction of the cosmo-politic order proper to the empire, were not abolished but underwent significant transformations. Later on, during the Cold War, their observances allowed the KMT to proclaim its cultural superiority over the CCP. Nowadays, two ceremonials are observed in the martyr shrines.2 The first is a cult of national martyrs comparable to the homage given to the fallen soldiers in Meiji Japan and in Western nation-states. The second takes roots in pre-modern China as it is dedicated to the Yellow Emperor, one of the main deities of the imperial pantheon during the classic era. During the Warlord Era, the regime had to organize the official funerals of several famous figures of the early Republican time, including the founder of the ROC, Sun Yat-sen. The funerals were different from one another, as the regime had not yet established an official framework for national funeral; they display a hybrid sacredness associating Western modernity and political symbolism from the Imperial era (Pan 2014, 58–66). The laws giving shape to the political cult dedicated to the impersonal figure of national martyrs were enacted only after the reunification of China by the KMT under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek. The formalization of the cult began in 1933, with the enactment of the Provisions for the sacrifices honouring the martyrs (烈士附祠辦法) (Tsai 2008, 17–18). If military glory was already acknowledged in another law dedicated to virtuous individuals, it is the first legal mention of the term “martyr.” Its first article specified that the law supervised the erection of “commemorative shrines” (紀念祠) dedicated to the “martyrs who sacrificed themselves for the national revolution” (為國民革命而犧牲之烈士). Local administrations, the one of the birthplace of the potential martyr or of the locality in which he lost his life, were in charge of establishing the truth about his great deeds and to check his background. Afterward, the application was sent to the Ministry of Interior, which then officially recognized the martyr. In 1936, just before the constitution of the Second United Front, the Provisions for the establishment of martyr shrines in every county (各縣設立忠烈祠辦法) gave more weight to the cult, as it had to be observed uniformly throughout the whole country, from the administrative levels of the province to the county. The 1936 Act marks the first mention of the term “martyr shrine,” still in use nowadays. Though the erection of a new structure was defined as a priority, local governments were allowed to simply transform communal temples into shrines. The process of inscription of a martyr was simplified, as it was now only the government of the hero’s birthplace which was in charge of all the tasks leading to the recognition of his actions. Likewise, the commemoration was held by the local government, the local chapter of the KMT, representatives of the army and of the local business circles. Schools were in charge of the music, which had to be military marches (Tsai 2008, 24–25). The ceremonial was therefore resolutely modern, even if the lexical of the cult to the ancestors was used in the official terminology. The definition of the category of martyr became more specific: whereas previously the law only mentioned the sacrifice for the national revolution, something which remains vague, the new Dispositions listed

Honouring revolutionary heroes  111 different military campaigns posterior to Chiang Kai-shek’s rise to power. Commemorations were held in the ninth of July, the day when the leader proclaimed, in 1926, the beginning of the Norther Expedition. Its prestige became similar to the one held by the Xinhai Revolution. However, one year after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the latest conflict quickly gained a position in the commemorative calendar similar to the two conflicts mentioned earlier. A second commemorative day was added, named Commemorative Day of the War of Resistance and the Foundation of the Country (抗戰建國紀念日) observed on July 7, the day when the war began. Consequently, the central government took several initiatives to develop the cult at a time when its practice become more and more difficult due to the evolution of the war. Two new laws were enacted in 1940, which replaced the ones of the 1930s. Essentially modern, they do not forget the traditional sacredness, as it is required that “the famous general of the ancient times” is enshrined together with the “revolutionary martyrs” (忠烈祠應並祀古代將及革命烈士). The management of the shrines reproduces the administrative structure of the state, as three levels are distinguished (district shrines, provincial shrine and, for the first time, the laws mention a national shrine which should be built in the capital). Local, provincial and national authorities are in charge of the relevant shrines and the leading official of each administration has to lead the ceremonies. The first plan for the national one was adopted in 1941, but it is only after the 1949 retreat that the ROC will have a National Martyrs’ Shrine. Furthermore, the government, until 1942, regularly held census in the territories still under its control to identify new martyrs. Although the task, delegated to local administrations, was almost impossible under the dire circumstances faced by the KMT, the tremendous causalities suffered by the Chinese side made it even more essential to pay respect to the fallen soldiers. As it was extremely difficult to directly integrate the ones who died during the ongoing conflict, in 1942, only 33,866 persons are honoured (Chang 2010). Between the 1945 victory and the 1949 retreat, two new texts completed the legal framework dedicated to the cult. The first was dedicated to the civilians and militaries who died fighting against Japan, whereas the second modifies the official commemorative calendar. Local and national governments should organize two ceremonies, one on March 29, the day of the Canton Insurrection, and on September 3, the day of remembrance of the Victory in the antiJapanese war of resistance (抗戰勝利紀念日). This conflict, by far the bloodiest in the ROC’s history, dominated national commemorations until the defeat against the Maoists. Afterwards, the need to reassess anti-communism became at least as much instrumental for the regime’s legitimacy as the memory of its 1945 victory. This ceremonial calendar is still in use in Taiwan nowadays. Legendary figure, the Yellow Emperor supposedly had: put an end to chaos by founding the first Chinese state . . . , thanks to his genius [he] gave to his people the spiritual and material means to establish civilization. . . . [His] twenty-five sons [are] the ancestors of the first Chinese royal clans. Therefore, a genealogical filiation is associated to this

112  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco politico-cultural foundational act which connect this first ruler to every king and emperor of the first centuries of China history. (Billeter 2007, 14). Foundational myth of the imperial power, and powerful symbol manipulated by all the successive dynasties, the Yellow Emperor underwent what Terence Billeter labelled as a “nationalist transfiguration” in the early 20th century. Before overthrowing the Qing dynasty, which were Manchu, non-Han and therefore nonChinese in the eyes of the nationalists, the revolutionaries would invoke him to justify their struggle against the Manchu power. In 1912, right after the proclamation of the Republic, while Sun Yat-sen went to the Ming emperors’ mausoleum in Nanking to pay his respects to the last ethnically Han dynasty who ruled imperial China, he also sent a delegation to the tomb of the Yellow Emperor to conduct libations. These gestures were meant to signify the restauration of a Chinese (or, in other words, of Han origin) state and to bestow to the newly created Republic part of the legitimacy of the thousands-years-old empire. If, during the partition of China of the Warlords era, the cult of the Yellow Emperor was neglected, the KMT resumed this commemoration in 1935 when its power reached its peak. Whereas he was about to crush the remaining communist forces, Chiang Kai-shek was abducted in December 1936 in what is today known as the Xian Incident. He was released only after agreeing to form the Second United Front with the CCP in order to fight against the impending Japanese invasion, thus saving the CCP from total destruction – and putting an end to the first phase of the civil war. The Second Sino-Japanese War broke out a few months after in spring 1937. Later in the same year, the KMT together with the CCP paid tribute to the Yellow Emperor at his mausoleum. They displayed the unicity of the nation against the foreign enemy. The same joint commemoration is held in 1938. However, as the KMT and the CCP never trusted each other, the Second United Front quickly started to break down. In 1939 and for the following years, the KMT organized alone the yearly homage. A detailed description of the ceremony held in 1942 shows that it associates traditional (incense, sacrificial libations, reading of an eulogy) and modern (military orchestra, minute of silence, collective pictures of the officiants in front of the mausoleum) registers (Billeter 2007, 91–92). During the Cold War, while the cult was interrupted in China during the Maoist period and resumed during the nationalist turn of the 1980s, the KMT kept observing this ritual even though the party could not perform it at the Yellow Emperor Mausoleum. The commemoration allowed the regime to bypass its exile by recreating a filiation not only with the first decades of the Republic but also with Imperial China, and thus to show itself as being “more authentically Chinese” than the People’s Republic of China. In consequence, according to the KMT’s argumentation, despite the fact that the CCP controls mainland China and the nationalists only Taiwan, the ROC has more rights than the PRC to represent China on the international stage. As the regime does not control Shaanxi, the province in which is located the tomb of the Yellow Emperor, it could not follow the traditional ritual but organizes the ceremony at the National Revolutionary Martyr’s Shrine (國家革命軍忠烈祠) in Taipei. The first, and so far the only,

Honouring revolutionary heroes  113 chief of state who presided at the commemoration is Ma Ying-jeou, President of the ROC between 2008 and 2016. In an announcement dating from April 2, 2015, the Ministry of Interior stated that Ma “conducted remote sacrifices [in the direction of] the Yellow Emperor’s tomb (馬英九出席忠烈祠遙祭黃帝陵).” The text belongs to a traditional register, with expressions such as “to pay careful attention to one’s parents’ funerary rites” (慎終追遠) and “when you drink water, think of its source” (飲水思源 which means “be grateful for all the blessings”), celebrating the Confucian value of filial piety. The link between the recent and distant past is reaffirmed, as well as the Chinese nature of the regime. Her successor, Tsai Ing-wen from the Democratic Progressist Party, which advocates Taiwanese nationalism, does not observe this commemoration. During the last decade of the Cold War, after the death of Mao and the beginning of the opening of the country under Deng Xiaoping, the CCP, without relinquishing communism, had to revamp its ideological line, as the revolutionary discourse proper to the Mao era was clearly not sustainable anymore. Nationalism appears as the best alternative. The CCP then begins to hold its own commemoration at the mausoleum of the Yellow Emperor, thus directly challenging the claim of the ROC of being the one and only “authentic China.” As Taiwan’s democratization has seen a “relocalization” of the ROC state on Taiwan itself, with the abolition of institutions representing China as a whole as well as the revalorization of Taiwanese cultures, envisaged in their singularities and not as intrinsic Chinese. In parallel, a vast majority of Taiwanese nowadays advocate a Taiwanese (and not Chinese) identity which makes the observance of Chinese-nationalist political cults more and more at odds with Taiwanese realities.

The symbolic re-creation of the Japanese nation-state in the Meiji’s Era The term State Shinto was almost unheard before 1945. It is a directive taken by the American occupying authority in December 1945, entitled Abolition of Governmental Sponsorship, Support, Perpetuation, Control and Dissemination of State Shinto and ruling the deinstitutionalization of this practice, which marks the first official use of this expression. If its authors coined a new word to designate the civic cult promoted by the Meiji’s nationalist elite, they did not define it precisely but distinguished between Sect Shinto and Shrine Shinto. The directive only targeted the second type. By doing so, the authority indirectly referred to an imperial decree of 1882 distinguishing Sect and Shrine Shinto which were traditionally an indivisible whole. Just as with the 1868 separation of Buddhism and Shinto, the Meiji government, on the pretext of the return to a pure form of Shinto, was crafting a new type of Shinto by reorganizing existing elements. In the new commemorative framework: [S]tate rituals were soon distributed to a number of quite different institutions: ordinary shrine rituals were overseen by the Bureau of Shrine of the Home Ministry, rites of the Imperial Palace by the Bureau of Ceremonial Matters (Shikibu-ryo) and ceremonies at the Yasukuni Shrine by the Army

114  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco ministry. State rituals, therefore, were not performed according to a consistent, well-coordinated plan of the government. Certainly, these rituals had some obscure characteristics in common, since they were all directed towards Japanese kami and not to a “religion” such as Christianity or Sect Shinto, but neither the government nor the general populace had a clear picture of the pantheon in which all these kami – ranging from imperial ancestors to imperial loyalists and heroic citizens – existed and how they might be related to each other. (Isomae 2013, 38) In 1871, the government formalized the new cult by establishing a classification system which distinguished three ranks of imperial shrines and three ranks of national shrines. Other shrines could also be recognized – thus subsided by public authorities – without being granted any rank. Implemented by Meiji’s reformists, the new rituals were articulated around the imperial figure who was “sacred and inviolable” according to the 1889 Constitution. Strict interpretations of the Meiji Constitution reassessed the divine character of the Emperor, and, even though the Imperial Diet enjoyed significant prerogatives, the regime was not fully a constitutional monarchy. The ambiguity surrounding the imperial figure is somewhat reminiscent of the undefined nature of State Shinto. As Jun’ichi Isomae pointed out, State Shinto was legally not considered as a religion. As a consequence, the political cult was not exposed to the competition of well-established ones such as Buddhism, Sect Shinto or Christianity. In the eyes of the conservators and the nationalists, if the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion, every Japanese citizen had, regardless to his personal belief, to show his adhesion to the national community by publicly paying respect to the national kami. The separation of the religious and public spheres, acted in the Constitution, helped to enforce the observance of State Shinto. Whereas the observation of a religion was a private matter, State rituals were public, thus mandatory.3 This distinction was from time to time brought to the fore to counter the objections of Christians who argued that praying at the Yasukuni was against their belief. Ultimately, in the early 1930s, Catholic and Protestant authorities stated that paying tribute to the Emperor was an act of patriotism and thus fully compatible with the Christian faith (Takahashi 2012, 91–92). Contemporary to the establishment of the Meiji’s regime, the Yasukuni shrine is consubstantial to State Shinto. Founded in 1863, the Kyoto Shokonsha (named after a rite where the souls of the deceased are called aloud) is a small shrine dedicated to 46 young nationalists who died struggling for the Imperial Restoration. After the overthrowing of the shogunate, the government moved the capital to Tokyo and built the Tokyo Shokonsha to honour the loyalists who died fighting for the Meiji’s regime. Early 1868, the new government issued a notice ordering the enshrinement of “all those warriors and commoners who, for justice and with sincere loyalty; went before the nation in death in time of national emergency.” The first ceremony at the Tokyo Shokonhsa, held in 1869, commemorated the 3889 imperial soldiers killed during the Boshin war (Tsai 2010, 8). Although

Honouring revolutionary heroes  115 casualties on the shogunate side were much higher, they were not honoured, which breaks with traditional practices. In addition to this nationalistic distinction, the transition to a modern form of nation-state also led, just as in Europe in the late 18th century, to a democratization of war deaths commemoration. Indeed, the spirit-calling ritual proper to the Shokonsha – itself a novelty as it appeared in the 1840s – makes no difference between commoners and noblemen. The most salient aspect of the new cult is the celebration of a sense of national belonging. The deaths are dignified because they gave their lives to the nation. Likewise, by commemorating their sacrifices, the participants celebrate their adhesion to the national community the deaths gave their lives for. The nation is defined as more exclusive as in the former eras as foreigners are now excluded from the cult. Albeit the transfiguration of the deaths into deified kami is inconceivable in a Judeo-Christian context, the affirmation of the nation-state in Europe and in Japan led to comparable transformations in national commemorations. In 1879, an imperial edict changed the name of the Tokyo Shokonsha in Yasukuni (or “shrine for pacifying the nation”). A special status is given to the sanctuary, which is not included in the Meiji’s national classification of shrines and is under the jurisdiction of both army and marine ministries. The government also decided to build public Shokonsha in every province, which are local equivalents – and subalterns – of the national Shokonsha, the Yasukuni. This network parallels the one enacted with the 1871 classification mentioned earlier, and together they were the two pillars of State Shinto. Both were implemented in Taiwan. In the aftermath of the conquest of the island in 1897, the new power inaugurated Taiwan’s first State Shinto shrine. Rather than building a new edifice, the Japanese renamed Tainan’s King of Yanping shrine (延平君王祠), dedicated to Cheng Cheng-kung (鄭成功), the Shrine of the Opening of the mountain. Cheng Cheng-kung, hailed as a cultural hero who brought civilization to Taiwan, remains its main deity. As his mother was Japanese, the Japanese administration could turn him into a symbolic figure bridging together the colony to its metropolitan state. Four years later, the colonial government erected in Taipei the Taiwan shrine (台 灣神社), intended to incorporate the new colony in the State Shinto system. Classified as a First rank imperial shrine, it is dedicated to the three Gods of creation and to Yoshihisa Kitashirakawa, first member of the imperial family who died outside of Japan, as he passed away while taking part in the conquest of Taiwan. The same pantheon has been enshrined in the majority of Taiwan’s Shinto shrines. The shrine quickly occupied a central position in the public landscape of the colonial society. Erected with materials and along an architectural style reserved for buildings related to the imperial family, the site could host thousands of visitors during the main annual celebration on October 28, the day of prince Kitashirakawa’s death. Besides public ceremonies, it was also a destination of choice for end of year school trips or any others semi-official occasions. In 1928, following the model of the Yazukuni, the provincial government built the Shrine of Establishment of Merits (建功神社). Dedicated to the soul of anyone, Japanese and Taiwanese alike, who laid down their lives for the country or for the public good of the insular community, this structure had a clear assimilative

116  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco function. During a ceremony held in 1935, 16,805 individuals, mainly former soldiers, policemen, firefighters, teachers or officials, were enshrined. They were people who were well integrated in the colonial apparatus, which is also illustrated by their ethnic background. Indeed, of the 16,805 persons commemorated in 1935, 13,185 were Japanese, 3,338 Han Taiwanese and 281 originated from one of the island’s Indigenous groups (Tsai 2000, 209–2010). As a result, the shrine reproduced the inequalities intrinsic to the colonial order. In term of status, although important for the local government, the temple, just like the vast majority of State Shinto shrines built in Taiwan, had no rank in the national classification of shrines and was not integrated in the military classification dominated by the Yazukuni. The intensification of the Japanese war effort was material but also symbolic. The Taiwan Sanctuary for the protection of the country (台灣護國神 社), built after a directive of the Ministry of Home Affairs, was inaugurated in 1942. At the time of the Japanese surrender, the 30,000 Taiwanese who died in the imperial army were commemorated in this sanctuary. As the Sanctuary was the provincial Shokonsha, these fallen soldiers were automatically inscribed in the commemorative register of the national one, the Yazukuni, in which they still remain. After 1945, the shrine was not demolished, but like many other complexes formerly dedicated to the Meiji civic cult, was used by the KMT for its own ceremony. After 1949, the Nationalist regime erected on the same spot today’s National Revolutionary Martyrs’ Shrine before, two decades later, destroying what was left from the original Japanese structure.

Conclusion The establishment of nation-states in East Asia led, between the late 19th century and the early 20th, to a reformulation of the commemoration of the citizens who died for the nation’s survival similar to what happened in Western Europe and North America beforehand. In front of death, all the fallen are now symbolically equals, which illustrates the relationship binding together the members of the same national community in life as well as in death. The main specificity of the Taiwanese martyrs’ shrines is that they were first built for State Shinto ceremonies and served as war memorials during the Japanese era, before being reused for the same commemorative aim by the KMT after 1945 – and they still host commemorative ceremonies nowadays. The last major transformation of the shrines system is a consequence of Taiwan’s democratization, which coincides with the end of the Cold War on the global stage. While the shrines’ appearance remains unchanged, it became possible to inscribe on the register of a local shrine (not the national one) virtuous citizens who lost their lives not only for the survival of the nation but also for the greater good of the national community. Policemen, firemen, rescuers who died in the line of duty and other citizens who passed away while saving other people, thus making a sacrifice comparable to the loss of one’s life while fighting the enemy, are now commemorated. The first person admitted in a martyr shrine according to the new status is Lin

Honouring revolutionary heroes  117 Ching-chuan (林靖娟), a kindergarten teacher who died in 1992 when trying to save all her pupils from a minivan which caught fire during a school trip. In their legal and architectural infrastructures, the shrines therefore encompass the three political regimes which ruled the island since 1895. The critters ruling the admission of a deceased are specific to each era and reflect the moral values the State tries to promote and are therefore an essential part of the political imagination of the time. If, during the Cold War, the exclusive recognition of military glory illustrates the martial nature of the dictatorship and its pretension of an upcoming victorious counterattack which should crush the Maoist, the democratization led to the official acknowledgement of a different type of heroic deeds, a civilian glory which is unrelated to the tensions between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. Despite being Taiwan’s most prestigious shrine, the National Revolutionary Martyrs’ Shrine is, however, only dedicated to military glory. By its history and current status, this site is one of the island’s main testimonies of the Cold War.

Notes 1 There is extremely interesting video footage of this commemoration available online. http://catalog.digitalarchives.tw/item/00/31/98/80.html. 2 Current President Tsai Ying-wen ceased to organize homage for the Yellow Emperor, but, most likely, if the KMT wins the 2020 presidential election, the presidency will resume the worship. 3 J. Isomae notes that the obedience to State Shinto was not inscribed in the Constitution and therefore people who refused to follow the new ritualism were not breaking the law but were exposed to: a kind of self-censorship arising from within society, demonstrating how deeply rooted respect towards the tenno system [term referring to the imperial system] was at that time . . . punishment was not executed directly by organs of the government, but was initiated in the name of the entire society by conservative scholars or rightwing political organizations. (Isomae 2013, 42). As early as the 1890’s, these pressures were strong enough to force a university professor and a teacher who either criticized State Shinto or refused to bow in front of an effigy of the Emperor to resign from their professional positions.

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118  Vladimir Stolojan-filipesco François, Etienne, and Hagen Schulze, eds. 2001. Deutsche Erinnerungsorte. Munich: C. H. Beck. Isnenghi, Mario, ed. 1997. I luoghi della memoria: Simboli e miti dell’Italia unita. Bari: Laterza. Isomae, Jun’ichi. 2013. “Religion, Secularity, and the Articulation of the ‘Indigenous’ in Modernizing Japan.” In Kami Ways in Nationalist Territory: Shinto studies in prewar Japan and the West, edited by Bernhard Scheid, 23–50. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Kosseleck, Reinhart. 2002. The Practice of Conceptual History: Timing History, Spacing Concepts. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Louzon, Victor. 2018. “From Japanese Soldiers to Chinese Rebels: Colonial Hegemony, War Experience, and Spontaneous Remobilization During the 1947 Taiwanese Rebellion.” The Journal of Asian Studies 77(1): 161–79. Nora, Pierre. 1989. “Between History and Memory: Les Lieux de Mémoire.” Representations 26: 7–24. ———. 1996. “Preface to the English Language Edition.” In Realm of Memory: Rethinking the French Past, edited by Pierre Nora, xvii. New York: Columbia University Press. Pan, Shu-hua [潘淑華]. 2014. “國葬: 民國初年的政治角力與國家死亡儀式的建構 [Guozang: Minguo chunian de zhengzhi jueli yu guojia siwang yishi de jiegou. State Funerals: Politics and Death Ritual in Early Republican China].” Zhongyang Yanjiuyuan jindai lishi suo jikan 83: 47–87. Pan, Yi-jun [潘映儒]. 2013. “神聖空間意義的建構與競逐-從桃園神社到桃園縣忠烈祠 [Shensheng kongjian yiyi de jiegou yu jingzhu-cong Taoyuan shenshe dao Taoyuan zhonglieci. Elaboration and Contestation of the Meaning of a Sacred Space – from Taoyuan Shinto Shrine to Taoyuan Martyrs Shrine].” MA, University National Normal of Taiwan. Takahashi, Tetsuya. 2012. Morts pour l’empereur, la question du Yasukuni. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Tsai, Chin-Tang [蔡錦堂]. 2000. “從神社到忠烈祠-戰前與戰後台灣[國家宗祠]的轉換 [‘Cong shenshe dao zhonglieci-zhan qian yu zhan hou Taiwan [guojia zongsi] de zhuanhuan. From Shinto shrines to martyrs shrines, the transformation of “national sacrifices” in Taiwan in the pre and post-war eras’].” In Di yi ceng Riben yanjiu. Tai Ri guanxi. Riyu jiaoyu guoji xueshu yantaohui lunwenji, edited by Shing-Ching Shyu [徐興慶], 208–12. Taipei: Zhongguo wenhua daxue riwen xi. ———. 2008. “褒揚及忠烈祠祀榮典制度之研究 [Baoyang ji zhonglieci si rongdian zhidu zhi yanjiu. Study of the Systems of Worship and Martyrs Shrines].” Study Realized for the Ministry of Interior 21, unpublished. ———. 2010. “台灣的忠烈祠與日本的護國神社.靖 國神社之比較研究 [Taiwan de zhonglieci yu Riben de huguo shenshe, jinguo shenshe zhi bijiao Yanjiu. A Comparative Study on Taiwan’s Martyrs’ Shrine Versus Japan’s Gokoku Shrine and Yasukuni Shrine].” Shida Taiwan shixue bao 3: 3–22.

Part 3

Cityscape as a front line of physical and mental warfare

8 Cities and fears of biological warfare during the early Cold War Albert Wu

In his classic work on “capital cities,” Jay Winter argues that during the First World War, cities became important sites for protecting the “national sentiment” of the warring parties (Winter 1997, 23).1 A city, Winter argues, possesses “both an imaginative and a visible existence” that is key to maintaining wartime morale. All participating nations saw the preservation of the “well-being” of these capital cities as central to their war efforts (Winter 1997, 4–5).2 Drawing on Winter’s insight, I focus on how fears of biological warfare permeated the discursive imagination surrounding the “global city” during the early years of the Cold War. A new age of weapons ushered in by the Second World War rendered all cities vulnerable to attack. Most spectacularly, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki sparked fears of global annihilation. But invisible enemies threatened everyday life, too. During the war, microbiologists and pharmaceutical scientists had deployed biological toxins as weapons. Experts warned that warfare had entered both the atomic and microbiological age. Of course, the fear of biological agents in urban warfare has a long history. During the siege of Kaffa, the Mongols launched dead bodies infected by the plague over the city walls; British soldiers introduced blankets infected with smallpox during the siege of Fort Pitt in 1763.3 The modern industrial age, however, enhanced state capacities to trace disease. The process began in the 19th century, when a series of global pandemics – cholera and plague being the most spectacular – mobilized and transformed urban public health systems throughout the world.4 The threat of epidemics prompted the creation of sanitation reforms, hygiene campaigns, and the creation of public health systems. During the early Cold War, fears of penetration by biological warfare agents further enhanced the capacities of state surveillance and power in cities across the globe. The influential American public health official, Alexander Langmuir, in his post as the first chief epidemiologist of the newly created Communicable Disease Center, created the Epidemic Intelligence Service in 1951, which centralized the collection of data and surveillance of disease into the hands of the federal government. As Lyle Fearnley has argued, initially reluctant state health officials signed on to the programme because they were convinced by the federal government’s rhetoric that they faced an imminent biological attack (Fearnley 2010, 37–56).5 The Service became one of the most effective institutions that tracked DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-9

122  Albert Wu and predicted the outbreak of disease, and Langmuir became a leading figure in pushing for disease surveillance both in the United States and across the globe. Alongside tracking and tracing disease, American public health officials also launched massive public health campaigns intending to educate the population about the threat of biological warfare. The 1952 film What You Should Know About Biological Warfare reflected the desire by American public health officials to prepare citizens for an eventual attack.6 The film exhorted the population to maintain their hygiene, making sure to boil and cook all foods. But more importantly, public health authorities used the film to stress the importance of cooperating with the state’s epidemiological surveillance system. In an early part of the film, two machinists are eating lunch together, and one asks his co-worker: “Biological warfare? What do they expect me to do about it? It’s not my headache.” The narrator responds, “You’re wrong! You better find out the facts about biological warfare.” The film then goes on to show what individual citizens could do to maintain vigilance against a possible biological warfare attack: report diseases to the medical authorities, cooperate with medical authorities, and listen to local health officials. Public health officials launched similar public health campaigns in East Asia. As Ruth Rogaski has brilliantly shown, fears of biological warfare propelled the “Patriotic Hygiene Campaign,” transforming the public health system of cities in north-east China. Lacking funds and resources, the Tianjing Public Health office sought to mobilize people to combat disease and implement new standards of hygiene. Doctors, nurses, and public health officers taught Tianjin citizens to identify anomalous insects, anthrax bacilli, garbage, and other disease-carrying materials. They were further taught how to “struggle against dirt, disease, and nature” as a way to fulfil their “patriotic duty” (Rogaski 2002, 388).7 Governments throughout the world thus saw propaganda and other forms of popular mobilization campaigns as crucial tools for preparing citizens for the possibility of a biological attack. Yet the propaganda was shaped by the ideological divisions and conflicts that shaped the Cold War. In this chapter, I focus on the different rhetoric and discursive imaginaries surrounding the deployment of biological weapons. In particular, I examine debates centred on claims that biological agents were deployed during the Korean War. How did governmental and nongovernmental actors try to convince each other that biological weapons had been used during the war? How did they imagine the ways in which biological weapons would penetrate their cities? How did they promise to protect both the “imaginative” and “visible” existence of their cities? And why were non-governmental actors willing to believe in these claims?

Investigating claims of war crimes in Korea On March 31, 1952, the International Association of Democratic Lawyers (IADL) published its “Report on U.S. Crimes in Korea.” A year earlier, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) had repeatedly lodged complaints to the United Nations claiming that the United States had violated international law by

Cities and fears of biological warfare  123 engaging in war crimes on the Korean peninsula. The DPRK government invited a coalition of eight lawyers to travel to Korea to investigate the charges of war crimes during the Korean War. The commission, which included nine international jurists, were in Korea from March 3 to March 19, 1952.8 The first major set of war crimes that the Koreans accused the Americans of engaging in was biological warfare. They based their conclusions on the examination of reports and statements provided by the North Korean government as well as more than 100 testimonials from witnesses. Local residents had reported 15 cases between January and March 1952 of “flies, fleas, spiders, beetles, bugs, crickets, mosquitoes, and other insects,” which were “hitherto unknown in Korea.”9 According to the report, the temperature at the time was below freezing, and “the appearance of these insects roused suspicion.” Furthermore, “in many cases it was also found that the insects were carrying eggs,” which led “the opinion of experts” to assume “that these insects were bred artificially.”10 Besides the existence of abnormal flies, residents found fish infected with cholera that had suspiciously appeared in areas between fresh water and salt water. The North Korean government insisted that it had eradicated cholera and it was mysteriously reappearing for the first time in four years. Besides cholera, plague was also reported in the region. The IADL argued that the American military violated international law when they deployed bacteriological weapons, a war crime as defined by the Geneva Conventions. Moreover, the IADL had a broader claim about how the war crimes committed during the Korean War. Through a variety of methods – bacteriological, chemical, and “conventional” bombing – the Americans had targeted civilian populations in Korean cities, another clear violation of international law. The Americans, the IADL claimed, understood that cities held important symbolic value and thus purposefully sought to destroy them. Around the same time that the IADL released its report, the Chinese and Korean governments invited another group of international experts to travel to the Korean and Chinese border and investigate claims about biological warfare. Organized by the World Peace Council, led by the Nobel Prize-winning scientist Frédéric Joliot-Curie, the International Scientific Commission’s (ISC) investigatory group was headed by the Cambridge biologist and Sinologist Joseph Needham. While the IADL was primarily concerned with how the Americans had violated international law, the ISC sought to examine the scientific validity of the Korean and Chinese claims. Compared to the lawyers, the scientists of the ISC planned a more thorough and extensive itinerary. In total, it spent more than one month on the Korean and Chinese border, travelling to Beijing, Shenyang, and Pyongyang. By the end of the tour, the ISC produced a much more comprehensive account of its investigations than the IADL had. It gathered reports, autopsies, pathology reports, material evidence, and it interviewed more witnesses. The “final convictions” of the ISC, the report declared, “rested to some extent upon the reliability of the hundreds of witnesses interviewed and interrogated. Their testimonies were too simple, too concordant, and too independent, to be subject to doubt.”11

124  Albert Wu They came to the same conclusions as the IADL had: the American military had deployed biological weapons on Korean soil. The American diplomatic and military establishment immediately denounced the reports of the IADL and the ISC. Secretary of State Dean Acheson and General Ridgway refuted the accusations and deemed them Soviet-funded propaganda (Cookson and Nottingham 1969, 62).12 The US ambassador to the United Nations, Warren Austin, wrote a letter to Joliot-Curie denouncing him as being manipulated by Communists. “Your most recent communication despatched from behind the Iron Curtain to help propagate the latest big lie of the Kremlin,” Austin charged, “prostitutes science in the interest of political propaganda. You eagerly accept farfetched and sensational allegations as facts without asking for any scientific proof from an impartial source.”13 Austin argued that Joliot-Curie should instead use his standing within the academic community to support liberal international organizations, such as the World Health Organization. “If you have the slightest concern for the poor who are suffering from epidemics which regularly ravage this area,” Austin wrote, “you can support the humanitarian efforts of the World Health Organization to enter the area to help stop the spread of these epidemics and to save human lives.”14 In his response, Joliot-Curie argued that it was the American government that was perverting science. He pointed out that it was no secret that the American government had spent the past ten years developing bacteriological weapons. Invoking Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Joliot-Curie reflected on his personal culpability of having helped to discover artificial radioactivity, which had been used for both constructive and destructive purposes. “It is because I know all that science can bring to the world,” Joliot-Curie wrote, “that I will continue my efforts so that it serves mankind.”15 In the historiography, the literature has long been dominated by the question: did the Americans actually deploy biological weapons during the Korean War?16 The most judicious and neutral recent scholars have agreed that the Soviets helped to stage much of the evidence against the Americans.17 Joliot-Curie and Needham thus have appeared as well-meaning but ultimately duped advocates, who, due to ideological blinders, were used as pawns in the early Cold War geopolitical chess match. Yet the claims remain controversial, as important documentary evidence remains classified both within Russian and American archives. What has been uncontroversial, both within contemporary accounts at the time and within the scholarly literature today, is Joliot-Curie’s charge against Austin: the American government had invested heavily into the research and development of biological weapons both during and after the Second World War. As Jacob Hamblin has shown, during the war, American scientists and members of the military establishment “agreed that in a total war, disease pathogens could be effective instruments of human death, even more so than atomic bombs,” and they “believed American forces had to be ready and willing to integrate them into their arsenal” (Hamblin 2013, 38).18 As early as 1941, convinced that the Germans and Japanese had already developed the capacity to deploy biological weapons, American scientists and military officials created facilities to develop

Cities and fears of biological warfare  125 bacteriological weapons. Driven by deterrence theory, they publicly insisted that, at the very least, the Americans needed to establish a defensive capability against biological weapons. Immediately after the war, George W. Merck, president of the pharmaceutical Merck & Co. and director of the US War Research Service, revealed in a report that the Service had begun to develop biological weapons during the war. Yet Merck did not argue for the cessation of biological warfare. Rather he called for an expansion of research into biological weapons.19 In 1949, Theodore Rosebury published Peace and Pestilence, warning that biological agents could be effectively used in wartime.20 For Americans and non-American public health officials alike, the question was not if biological warfare could be used, but when. As a result, both American and non-American public health and military officials were concerned with how to protect and prepare countries and cities from a biological attack in the future. Furthermore, nobody doubted that the Korean War had initiated a new epidemiological landscape. Even in his criticism of Joliot-Curie, Warren Austin admitted that the people living in the border regions between Korea and China had been “victimized by epidemics.” Austin, of course, pointed to a different source for the epidemics: “Communist aggressors in Korea” had set the scene for the outbreak of new epidemics.21 Furthermore, he did not dispute that the Americans possessed the capability to launch biological warfare on the Korean peninsula, nor the fact that biological weapons could be effective. Thus, it seems to me the question that should be asked is not “why” Joliot-Curie and Needham accepted the claims of the Chinese and Korean governments – in 1952, considering all of the circumstantial evidence and the fact that the Americans themselves were beating the drum to stockpile biological weapons, it seems perfectly reasonable that Joliot-Curie and Needham believed the evidence put in front of them. The more fruitful question is to ask what evidence the Chinese and Korean delegates marshalled to convince the lawyers and scientists of the IADL and the ISC. What discursive strategies did the Chinese and Koreans employ to convince the international team of scientists? And what counterarguments did the pro-American forces use to justify their positions?

Biological warfare and the shadows of the Second World War For the scientists participating in the ISC, biological warfare was not some future dystopia, but a continuation of tactics deployed during the Second World War. During the war, there had already been widespread reports emerging from China that the Japanese had been using biological weapons throughout their military campaigns in China. The most notorious accounts involved the infamous Unit 731, led by General Ishii Shiro, who dropped plague-infected fleas and sprayed germs in cities throughout China to test the efficacy of their biological agents. During the war, the Chinese government had repeatedly lodged protests to the international community, claiming that the Japanese government had deployed biological weapons. The 1946 Merck report further confirmed that the Japanese

126  Albert Wu had indeed developed research capacity into the use of biological weapons. But US General Douglas MacArthur, fearful of Soviet influence in the region, offered immunity to members involved in the Japanese biological warfare programme in exchange for their expertise. Ishii evaded capture, and he was never brought to trial at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.22 The ISC’s report thus reflected the outrage at the American complicity in covering up Japanese wartime activity in Japan. During the war, rumours abounded of Ishii acting as an advisor to American forces in South Korea. The ISC noted that newspapers in Korea “reported two successive visits of Ishii Shiro to South Korea” in 1952. “Whether the occupation authorities in Japan had fostered his activities,” the ISC continued, “and whether the American Far Eastern Command was engaged in making use of methods essentially Japanese, were questions which could hardly have been absent from the minds of members of the Commission.”23 The leading member of the ISC, Joseph Needham, was certainly convinced that the evidence of biological warfare in Korea was a continuation of Japanese policy during the Second World War. Needham, who had spent 1942 to 1946 in Chongqing, had personally witnessed the Japanese bacteriological programme. Chinese officials had shown Needham evidence that the Japanese were using fleas to disseminate bubonic plague in China. He was eager to travel to Korea in 1952 because he was “naturally curious to enquire into what seemed to be further developments of [Japanese] methods.”24 Besides linking their evidence to the historical development of biological warfare in East Asia, both the IADL and the ISC also connected the presence of biological warfare with the overwhelming dominance of American air power. In all of the IADL’s accounts, the appearance of abnormal insects and other diseases was always coupled with Korean accounts of American planes flying above without releasing bombs. A typical testimony in the IADL’s report proceeded in this way: “[T]he day before the insects were found, 5 American planes had been seen circling over the place for half an hour, without dropping explosive or incendiary bombs, nor machine-gunning. The witness stated that the expert examination disclosed that the insects were infected with bacteria which caused a disease of the intestines.”25 The ISC also presented evidence that they considered damning: testimonies from captured American pilots who admitted that they had been trained to release biological agents. In total, the ISC interviewed four members of the American air force. The testimonies were remarkably consistent, reflecting either truth or coercion. In Japan and in Korea, the airmen had received “secret lectures on the methods of bacteriological warfare.” They had then been given “orders to carry out bacteriological warfare missions, and had duly flown them, though with the greatest inner reluctance.”26 Once they arrived at their targets, the airmen dropped “a germ bomb which looks just like an ordinary bomb, but is filled with germladen insects.” They mentioned that they also unloaded parachute containers, which released “animals upon contact with the ground.” They also unleashed “leaflets, toilet paper, envelopes, and paper materials which have been covered

Cities and fears of biological warfare  127 with germs . . . germ-filled soap or clothing . . . fountain pens filled with germladen ink . . . infected food to the enemy troops.”27

Biological warfare within the European and American imagination American public health and military officials were equally obsessed with the threat of biological warfare in the same time period, and they also saw cities as the central target for biological agents. But American public health officials and military strategists imagined the threat differently. In his 1951 report, “The Potentialities of Biological Warfare Against Man,” Alexander Langmuir, who had served as a member of the Department of Defense’s Committee on Biological Warfare during the war, noted that American cities were particularly vulnerable to two forms of biological warfare. The first involved “the creation of clouds of pathogenic aerosols over cities,” which “would be designed to produce large numbers of casualties in urban areas.” The second was “the contamination of our water or food supplies or the air of strategic buildings of sabotage,” which “would be directed at localized groups to incapacitate key individuals and industries or to create hysteria and undermine public morale.”28 Yet Langmuir underplayed the possibility of an airborne biological attack in the United States. While Langmuir recognized the possibility of airborne infections, he doubted that airborne biological warfare could succeed on a large-scale attack: “It remains to be proved that airborne infection is an important mode of spread of naturally occurring disease.”29 Instead, the main fear that Americans needed to watch was one of foreign agents poisoning the public sewage system. Langmuir wrote: The principles of backsiphonage are so generally known that any plumber or person with minimum sanitary engineering training could introduce with ease such a pathogenic suspension at many points along a distribution system. The exact point of the introduction would be exceedingly difficult to locate or detect by epidemiological means. (Langmuir 1951, 397) Langmuir warned: [A]n incidence of casualties exceeding those known to occur in accidental waterborne epidemics can be expected because of the greater dosage of agent that can be attained. One’s imagination is almost unlimited when one considers the wide variety of possibilities and potentialities of this form of warfare. The only limitations of consequence result from the accessibility of such food or water supplies to a subversive agent and the limited distribution of any single food or water supply (Langmuir 1951, 397)

128  Albert Wu In short, the biggest threat of biological warfare, in Langmuir’s view, stemmed not from the deployment of biological agents through the air but rather from foreign subversives injecting biological agents into the water supply. Langmuir further helped to disseminate the image of foreign agents poisoning distribution systems. In the film What You Should Know About Biological Warfare, which Langmuir had helped to create, the narrator warns the viewer to watch out for spies who could release biological agents into the water supply. The film depicts another foreign agent, who releases an aerosol spray into a factory ventilation system.30 Thus, when it comes to bacteriological warfare, we have two different imaginaries at work. One vision, propagated in the United States, involved shadow agent groups infiltrating the sewage and filtration systems. The other involved biological agents dropped from the sky. What accounts for these differences? For one, Langmuir’s account reflected the fears and suspicions of the early Cold War. In January 1950, Alger Hiss was convicted on charges related to espionage. Two weeks later, Senator Joseph McCarthy produced a list of 205 names of Communists working in the State Department, launching widespread hysteria of Soviet penetration of American institutions. Langmuir’s image of foreign spies who infiltrate the sewer systems and public health systems reflected a moment of McCarthyist fears.31 This is not to say that Europeans did not fear sabotage from foreign agents. In 1921, the infamous case of Henri Girard scintillated the French press, as Girard poisoned people with poisonous mushrooms and the organism that causes typhoid fever.32 Rumours abounded during the interwar years of German agents releasing biological agents in the Paris metro, which further inspired the French military establishment to develop biological weapons. But in a 1936 article, Anthelme-Jean Rochaix, a professor of hygiene at Lyon, downplayed the possibility of widespread epidemics spreading the contamination of sewage systems. Acknowledging that individuals may be targeted and experience the effects of disease, he pointed out that European cities were well prepared and equipped to deal with the outbreak of epidemics. Pointing to the historical containment of cholera in Europe in the 19th century, coupled with Europe’s experience of eradicating plague throughout the colonial world, he argued that European public health systems were well trained to deal with the influx of biological agents spreading through the sea or the land.33 Instead, Rochaix stressed that the most conceivable way of artificially creating an epidemic in the new landscape was through airplanes and ballistic missiles. “Airplanes,” Rochaix expounded, “can spread over a territory a considerable quantity of microbiological cultures.”34 He argued that it was possible to envision clouds, injected with microbiological agents, looming over the atmosphere. The IADL and ISC were thus rooting their analysis in a longer European historical discourse of total war and the increasingly blurred boundaries of civilian and non-civilian combatants. As Jeanne Guillemin has shown, within the European context, biological warfare was deeply linked, from its inception, to the onset of air warfare in Europe. German Zeppelin bombings had ushered in a new era of

Cities and fears of biological warfare  129 total warfare. “The distinction between combatant and noncombatant,” Guillemin writes, “already blurred by industrial-age war, could dissolve in air war, where the inaccurate bombing of military targets and the targeting of cities put civilians in double jeopardy.”35 During the interwar years, the French military establishment began to do research into biological warfare out of fears of German air superiority. Ever since the 1920s, then, European scientists had associated the deployment of biological weapons with air warfare. But perhaps another obvious reason that can explain these differences was the experiences that American, European, Chinese, and Korean scientists had with actual aerial bombardment during the war. The US had not suffered from major air raids during the Second World War. As Robert Neer has pointed out, “No German airplanes got within 1,000 miles” of the United States.36 Airborne attacks were not part of the daily experience of the war. The only airplane attack on the United States occurred in 1942, when a “a tiny Japanese bomber launched from a submarine dropped a single firebomb on a mountain slope near Brookings, Oregon, just north of the California state line. It kindled a small forest fire” (Neer 2013, 39). The Japanese government launched a balloon bombardment programme in 1944 and 1945, where 9,300 hydrogen balloons armed with small explosives were sent toward North America. About 345 of them arrived in the US, damaging power lines in Washington State and killing six Oregonians. “These appear to be the only deaths from enemy action in the continental United States during the Second World War,” Neer writes (Neer 2013, 40). It is not necessary to detail the amount of aerial warfare that the European and East Asian theatres experienced during the Second World War – photographs of the aftermath of aerial bombings of Dresden, Berlin, and London are common images in our historical consciousness. But at the heart of the IADL’s and ISC’s indictment of the United States was not just the possible release of biological warfare but the indiscriminate usage of napalm and other conventional bombs unleashed on the Korean peninsula. According to the IADL report: While travelling through many regions of Korea north of the 38th parallel, the members of the Commission have seen for themselves that all the towns through which they passed, or in which they stayed, were completely destroyed or have only a small number of intact buildings left standing. They also saw heavy damage in many villages.37 The indiscriminate bombings had demolished “buildings of culture.” The IADL also charged the American government with willfully destroying sites of symbolic and cultural significance as a way to destroy Korean morale. The most egregious example, the Commission pointed out, was the destruction of the Temple Yang Myong, an ancient building built in the 11th century; no other strategic sites are nearby. That the US bombarded North Korea with napalm and other bombs, there is no doubt. As Robert Neer has shown, US Air Force generals “pushed to burn cities

130  Albert Wu from the start of the [Korean] war.” General MacArthur “ordered the destruction of every city, village factory, installation, and means of communication, except for certain dams and hydroelectric plants, between the battle line and the border.” In November 1950, after the entrance of China into the war, B-29s dropped 85,000 bombs on the city of Shinuiju, “burned out” the city of Hoeryong, and reduced one third of Pyongyang to ashes.38 By the end of the war, 635,000 tonnes of bombs were dropped on Korea. As General Curtis LeMay later testified: We burned down just about every city in North Korea and South Korea both . . . we killed off over a million civilian Koreans and drove several million more from their homes, with the inevitable additional tragedies bound to ensue.39 Emmett O’Donnell testified to Congress in 1951, “I would say that the entire, almost the entire Korean peninsula is just a terrible mess. Everything is destroyed. There is nothing left standing worthy of the name.”40

Conclusion: silence and memory In On the Natural History of Destruction, W.G. Sebald writes of the “self-imposed silence” of the generation of Germans who had lived through the air raids in the Second World War. “The destruction, on a scale without historical precedent,” Sebald writes, “never became an experience capable of public decipherment.”41 Can we not read the Chinese and Korean complaints to the UN as a decision to refuse silence, an attempt to account for the devastation and destruction wrought on their countries? As Tom Buchanan has shown, Joseph Needham, unsure of the initial claims of biological warfare and his ability to make a clear scientific judgement, had at first been reluctant to travel to China. But once he travelled to China and Korea and witnessed the amount of devastation in the countryside, he became increasingly convinced that the Americans had used bacteriological weapons.42 Leaving aside the question of whether the Americans deployed weapons with biological agents or not, can we not read the IADL’s and ISC’s reports as attempts to rage over the bombings and destruction that the Americans had unleashed on the Korean peninsula? Furthermore, the ISC’s and IADL’s reports also sought to bring to the surface another issue that had been silenced in the wake of the Second World War. By invoking Ishii Shiro and the war crimes of Unit 73, the reports of the international committee of scientists and lawyers attempted to account for the war crimes committed in the Second World War that the post-war American occupation had sought to cover up. For both the ISC and the IADL, one gigantic war crime had been left unprosecuted: the use of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.43 In all of the literature on biological warfare during the early Cold War, the atomic bomb loomed over the entire discourse. If scientists could manipulate atoms and use that knowledge to flatten cities, what was preventing them from harnessing bacteria, the weather, or other forces of nature to further the military aims of belligerent countries?

Cities and fears of biological warfare  131 Scientists, public health officials, and military generals all acknowledged that more deadly and harmful weapons posed deadly threats to civilian populations. During the early Cold War, the global city continued to hold both an “imaginative” and “visible” importance. A nation’s ability to defend the city from future attacks remained a crucial part of its claims for legitimacy and sovereignty. Across the Cold War landscape, nations scrambled to try to prepare their cities for the possibility of biological weapons released on their civilian population. The difference, however, was that the city now took on a different symbolic place within the broader population. During the First World War, protecting the city represented the survival of the nation. By the early Cold War, however, due to the nature of the new weapons used during the Second World War, the destruction of the city stood for the possibility of global catastrophe. Across the Cold War landscape, then, countries understood that the new biological and atomic warfare could lead to humanity’s annihilation. But significant differences remained: American and European public health officers imagined their eventual annihilation in different ways. Americans saw their cities as vulnerable to foreign espionage; Europeans, Chinese, and Korean scientists saw their main vulnerability in the air. Of course, these differences reflect the ideological cleavages of the Cold War: Communist fears of American imperialist aggression clashed with American paranoia over foreign subversives. But what I suggest here is that these differences also reflected dramatically different lived experiences during the Second World War. The ISC’s and IADL’s teams, which consisted of European, Chinese, and Korean lawyers and scientists, were linked by the shared experiences with aerial bombardment. The memories of the extensive damage produced by bombing campaigns could not have been far from their minds of the lawyers and the scientists of the IADL and the ISC. American public health and military officials, on the other hand, having themselves not been subjected to widespread bombing and destruction, mobilized a different set of imaginations and fears. Instead, they injected McCarthyist paranoia over foreign subversion into their analysis of the threats of biological warfare. Thus, the ways in which scientists, military officials, and public health officials imagined the threats of biological warfare reflected divergences in lived experiences during the Second World War as much as radically different ideologies.

Notes

1 Winter (1997, 23). 2 Ibid., 4–5. 3 See (Robertson and Robertson 1995). 4 For a classic account of how the urban public health system was forged in the wake of the European-wide cholera outbreak, see (Evans 1987). For a global comparative perspective, see (Echenberg 2007). 5 Fearnley (2010, 37–56). 6 Reid R. Ray Film Industries, What You Should Know About Biological Warfare (1952). The film is available online at https://archive.org/details/WhatYouS1952. 7 Rogaski (2002, 388).

132  Albert Wu 8 Commission of International Association of Democratic Lawyers, “Report on U.S. Crimes in Korea,” March 31, 1952, www.iadllaw.org/newsite/wp-content/ uploads/2017/10/Crime_Reports_1.pdf. Hereafter cited as IADL Report. 9 IADL Report, 28. 10 Ibid. 11 World Peace Council, “Report of the International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the Facts Concerning Bacterial Warfare in Korea and China, 1952,” W.E.B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312), 8. Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries. Hereafter cited as ISC Report. 12 (Cookson and Nottingham 1969, 62). 13 See Letter of Warren Austin to Frédéric Joliot-Curie, April 3, 1952, in Pasteur Institute Archives, RAJ. C8. 14 Ibid. 15 Letter of Frédéric Jolio-Curie to Warren Austin, May 3, 1952, in Pasteur Institute Archives, RAJ. C8. 16 For examples of this type of historiographical engagement, see (Weathersby 1998, 176–84; Endicott and Hagerman 1998). For a good overview of the arguments, see (Powell 2019). 17 See, for example, (Hamblin 2013, 55; Rogaski 2002, 382). 18 Hamblin (2013, 38). 19 Wright (1990, 27–28). 20 Rosebury (1949). 21 Austin to Joliet-Curie, letter of April 3, 1952, in Pasteur Institute Archives, RAJ. C8. 22 For the best account of Japanese use of biological weapons in China and the subsequent US cover-up, see Harris (2002). See also Harris and Paxman (2002). 23 ISC Report, 12. 24 Hamblin (2013, 53). 25 IADL Report, 28–29. 26 ISC Report, 47. 27 Ibid., 49. 28 Langmuir (1951, 394–95). 29 Ibid., 388–89. 30 What You Should Know About Biological Warfare. 31 For the best single volume work on McCarthyism, see Schrecker (1998). 32 Carus (1998, 71–72). 33 Rochaix (1936, 172). 34 Rochaix (1936, 172). 35 Guillemin (2004, 41). 36 Neer (2013, 39–40). 37 IADL Report, 28-3. 38 Neer (2013, 98). 39 Ibid., 100. 40 Ibid. 41 Sebald (2004, 4). 42 See Buchanan (2001, 503–22). 43 Even during the Tokyo War Crime Trials, American hypocrisy was a major theme within the public discourse. See Dower (1999, 434–84).

Bibliography Buchanan, Tom. 2001. “The Courage of Galileo: Joseph Needham and the ‘Germ Warfare’ Allegations in the Korean War.” History 86(284): 503–22.

Cities and fears of biological warfare  133 Carus, W. Seth. 1998. Bioterrorism and Biocrimes: The Illicit Use of Biological Agents Since 1900. Washington, DC: Center for Counterproliferation Research. Commission of International Association of Democratic Lawyers. 1952. “Report on U.S. Crimes in Korea.” March 31. www.iadllaw.org/newsite/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ Crime_Reports_1.pdf. Cookson, John, and Judith Nottingham. 1969. A Survey of Chemical and Biological Warfare. New York: New York University Press. Dower, John. 1999. Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II. New York: W. W. Norton. Echenberg, Myron. 2007. Plague Ports: The Global Urban Impact of Bubonic Plague, 1894–1901. New York: New York University Press. Endicott, Stephen, and Edward Hagerman. 1998. The United States and Biological Warfare: Secrets from the Early Cold War and Korea. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Evans, Richard. 1987. Death in Hamburg: Society and Politics in the Cholera Years, 1830– 1910. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fearnley, Lyle. 2010. “Epidemic Intelligence: Langmuir and the Birth of Disease Surveillance.” Behemoth 3: 37–56. Guillemin, Jeanne. 2004. Biological Weapons: From the Invention of State-Sponsored Programs to Contemporary Bioterrorism. New York: Columbia University Press. Hamblin, Jacob Darwin. 2013. Arming Mother Nature: The Birth of Catastrophic Environmentalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Harris, Robert, and Jeremy Paxman. 2002. A Higher Form of Killing: The Secret History of Chemical and Biological Warfare. Re-print, originally published 1982. New York: Random House. Harris, Sheldon. 2002. Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare, 1932–1945, and the American Cover-Up. London: Routledge. Langmuir, Alexander. 1951. “The Potentialities of Biological Warfare Against Man: An Epidemiological Appraisal.” Public Health Reports 66(13): 387–99. Neer, Robert. 2013. Napalm: An American Biography. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Powell, Thomas. 2019. “Biological Warfare in Korea: A Review of the Literature.” Socialism and Democracy 33(2): 67–107. Robertson, Andrew G., and Laura J. Robertson. 1995. “From Asps to Allegations: Biological Warfare in History.” Military Medicine 160(8): 369–73. Rochaix, Anthelme-Jean. 1936. “Épidémies provoquées: À Propos de la guerre bactérienne.” Revue d’hygiène et de médecine préventive 58(3): 161–80. Rogaski, Ruth. 2002. “Nature, Annihilation, and Modernity: China’s Korean War GermWarfare Experience Reconsidered.” The Journal of Asian Studies 61(2): 381–415. Rosebury, Theodore. 1949. Peace or Pestilence: Biological Warfare and How to Avoid It. New York: Whittlesey House. Schrecker, Ellen. 1998. Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America. New York: Little, Brown, and Company. Sebald, W. G. 2004. On the Natural History of Destruction. New York: Modern Library. Weathersby, Katherine. 1998. “Deceiving the Deceivers: Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, and the Allegations of Bacteriological Weapons Use in Korea.” Cold War International History Project Bulletin 11: 176–84. Winter, Jay. 1997. Capital Cities at War: Paris, London, Berlin 1914–1919. Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press.

134  Albert Wu World Peace Council. 1952. “Report of the International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the Facts Concerning Bacterial Warfare in Korea and China, 1952.” W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312), 8. Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries. Wright, Susan. 1990. “Evolution of Biological Warfare Policy: 1945–1990.” In Preventing a Biological Arms Race, edited by Susan Wright. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

9 Class, gender, and the charismatic female subject Hong Kong cinema during the Cold War era Vivian P.Y. Lee The complex political landscape of Hong Kong during the Cold War era gave rise to distinctive forms of cultural politics. This chapter offers a focused analysis of the politics on the silver screen as a specific manifestation of the cultural repercussions of the left-right ideological battle in Hong Kong during the 1950s and 1960s. Beginning with an overview of the conditions of filmmaking in the ex-colonial city during the Cold War era, it will examine the productions of the major Mandarin studios to shed light on the tacit “division of labour” between the left-wing and the right-wing cinema in the articulation of their respective visions of what it means to be “modern.” More specifically, it will look at films that feature charismatic woman characters as embodiments of female agency, which is integral to the left wing’s and right wing’s imagination of modernity. No doubt, gender and class have enriched the critical discourse on modernity and its more ambivalent manifestations in the non-Western world. When it comes to the Cold War and its cultural implications in relation to the left-right ideological divide in Hong Kong cinema, not much has been done on the triangulated relation between gender, class, and the imagination of modernity under the sway of a bipolar world order. The goal of this chapter, therefore, is to establish some points of departure for further inquiry into this under-researched area.

The landscape of filmmaking in the Cold War era As a British colony located at the southern tip of the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong was as much exposed to the macro-politics of the Cold War as it was entangled by the ideological tug-of-war between Nationalist Taiwan and Communist China. Apart from the 1967–68 anti-British riots and sporadic disturbances to the social and economic status quo caused by union strikes,1 the most enduring battle was mainly fought in the realm of culture. While the local Chinese print media were more explicit in their political affiliation in the contest for public opinion leadership, the film industry was subject to both overt and covert forms of censorship that reflected the power dynamics between Taiwan, Mainland China, British Hong Kong, and the direct and indirect political interference of the US, Britain’s and Taiwan’s most formidable political ally. Another circumstantial factor with a direct impact on the film industry was the closing of the Hong Kong-China DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-10

136  Vivian P.Y. Lee border in the 1950s and the intensification of the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China in the late 1960s, which resulted in the loss of the China market and the growing importance of the Taiwan market, where Mandarin films had an absolute advantage. While the film industry was maintaining a division of labour between Mandarin and Cantonese films, studios and filmmakers would also organize themselves by political affiliations, that is, the “progressive” (left-wing) filmmakers and the “freedom” (right-wing) filmmakers, each having their respective institutional backing and production networks (Wong and Lee 2009), despite the fact that the priorities of the market would engender collaborative strategies on both sides. The better resourced right-wing studios (Cathay and the Shaw Brothers, see later in the chapter), for example, would distribute left-wing films through its Southeast Asia network to cater to the market demands in the region (Chung 2006, 130–31; Zhou 2009, 32). Against the versatile conditions of film production in the 1950s and 1960s, film studios, left or right, had to carefully steer their courses in the domestic and overseas markets where anti-Communist policies were stringently enforced (for instance Taiwan and Singapore), while the left-wing studios still enjoyed limited circulation in parts of Mainland China. The following discussion will revisit the left-right divide on Hong Kong screens during the Cold War era through the lens of gender and class politics in studio productions. Specifically, it is concerned with the way in which gender and class are embedded in the cinematic imagination of modernity of both the progressive and “freedom” camps. A selection of studio productions centring on iconic woman characters will be examined to reveal how these film texts participated in the construction of modern womanhood as a vehicle to articulate different visions of what it means to be “modern,” and how female subjectivity and class consciousness are intertwined in the left-right ideological contest. Due to differences in industrial conditions, market segmentation, production practices, and reception patterns of Cantonese films, this chapter will focus on Mandarin films of the major studios. Although Cantonese films enjoyed a natural advantage in Hong Kong, Mandarin films from this period catered to a growing population of immigrants from outside the Guangdong province. Whereas right-wing films captured a substantial market share in Taiwan, both left- and right-wing films were popular among audiences in the Chinese diaspora in Southeast Asia (Fu 2009). The transnational appeal of Mandarin films made it a powerful means of ideological persuasion in an accelerating struggle for local and regional supremacy.

The Mandarin film studios: ideological and market competitions An obvious sign of the bipolarized politics of Cold War Hong Kong was the formation of two trade associations with overt political orientations: the Hong Kong and Kowloon Theatrical Enterprise Free General Association (commonly known as the “Free Association”) and the South China Film Industry Workers’ Union. The former was directly backed by the KMT as a way to recruit and coordinate pro-Taiwan personnel in the film industry, while the latter was founded

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  137 by leading left-wing filmmakers as a platform for fostering solidarity through fund-raising and resource sharing. For a very long time since its inception in the early 1950s, the Free Association had been acting as an unofficial censor for the Taiwan authorities and carried out market access control.2 Under these stringent circumstances, Phoenix and Great Wall3 were major left-wing contenders for the Mandarin-language film market during the 1950s and 1960s. Competing against Cathay (MP&GI) and the Shaw Brothers,4 the two industry giants with close ties to the US and Taiwan as well as extensive industry networks in Southeast Asia, the left-wing studios were operating at a natural disadvantage in Hong Kong. In the heat of a left-wing initiated Cantonese Film Clean-up Campaign Movement (a high-profile campaign launched in 1949 also supported by members in the Mandarin film cluster),5 the Mandarin studios were facing an existential challenge of a different sort: to contest against their formidable right-wing rivals who had distribution and exhibition chains in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia and a de facto upper hand in the Taiwan market. High production values and a mature regional distribution network distinguished as much the studio style of Shaw and Cathay as the “period look” of the Mandarin-language cinema itself. The predominance of the two industry giants is well reflected in the critical spotlight they attracted in film criticism.6 Both Shaw and Cathay were known for their blockbuster-style commercial genre films and the glamourous images of stars, especially iconic female stars, sporting a stylish and modern outlook. Modelling after the studio system of Hollywood, Shaw and Cathay were two phenomenal transnational Chinese-language film enterprises during the 1950s and the 1960s.7 Existing literature on Phoenix and Great Wall has shown a greater interest in outlining the broader sweeps of ethical-ideological and national-political analysis, with fewer attempts to situate the studios’ productions against the dominant cinematic practices that they self-consciously, and sometimes quite explicitly, critique through the film medium.8 The following discussion therefore will shed light on the strategic positioning of the left-wing Mandarin studios to reinvent their own language of popular entertainment in order to advance their loftier goal of social and cultural transformation. Sharing the left-wing Cantonese cinema’s progressive ethos, Phoenix and Great Wall films self-consciously, and discreetly, craft their counter-narratives of capitalist modernity through charismatic female characters in a variety of roles, from schoolteachers, nightclub hostesses, single/unmarried mothers, to “prodigal daughters” in search of self-redemption. The analysis later will first look at an exemplary model of modern womanhood in Mandarin cinema, Grace Chang, who was the lead star in Cathay’s most successful musicals that defined Chang’s transnational stardom. Featuring a refined contemporary lifestyle, Cathay’s lavishly embellished cinematic fantasies popularized an imagination of modern womanhood that finds its counter-image in left-wing films. As ideologically loaded image-texts, these female screen personae are constructs and embodiments of the cinematic discourse of modernity in which the politics of class and gender is personified in their charismatic female subjects.

138  Vivian P.Y. Lee

Nightclub hostesses, prodigal daughters, and the fallen woman Since the silent film period in Chinese cinema, the femme fatale and the “fallen woman” are probably the most frequently invoked screen images embodying the seductive allure and contradictions of modernity.9 In the history of Chinese cinema, it was not uncommon to see female stars and their on-screen personae having a symbiotic relationship in the production of “star texts”10 that sustained both the popular and critical reception of film stars and their posthumous stardom. In this section, two versions of “modern womanhood” are presented through a close analysis of the screen personae of female stars in both the left- and right-wing studios. While utilizing similar prototypes, the iconic woman characters embody the polarized visions of class and gender pertaining to the left-right ideological contest in the Hong Kong society at large. Among female film stars from the 1950s and 1960s, Grace Chang, Linda Lin (Lin Dai), Ling Po, and Li Lihua are among the most written-about figures from the Mandarin cinema. With the exception of Ling Po, who is best remembered for her cross-dressing roles in traditional huang mei diao films,11 Chang, Lin, Li were known for their charismatic female screen personae. Although Lin and Li were first signed up by Great Wall, their ascendance to superstardom in Mandarin cinema began after they “deserted” to the right. Grace Chang was a legend on her own as the queen of Mandarin musicals at Cathay, the studio best remembered for its urban romance films and Chinese musicals. Chang’s musical talent well suited her in song and dance films that celebrate an active, modern, and at times decadent lifestyle. In Wild, Wild Rose (1960), she plays a femme fatale-like nightclub songstress who falls in love with an impoverished musician. Her effort to salvage her lover’s reputation and career takes the form of a cruel and sudden break-up, for which she is begrudged and strangled by the man she loves. The premature death of the heroine exhibits the tragic grandeur of a fallen woman whose submission to an imposed “fate” offers no way out for either her lover or herself. Utilizing a conventional plot of starcrossed lovers trying in vain to defy their accursed fate, the film builds its artistic core around Chang’s captivating performance, including a Chinese version of Habanera from Bizet’s classic, Carmen, and a short segment from Madame Butterfly. The same can be said of most, if not all, Grace Chang films. Mambo Girl (1957), another celebrated Grace Chang vehicle, is a lacklustre story about a young woman’s reconciliation with her adopted parents after a short and unsuccessful attempt to find her biological mother, a secret she uncovered by accident on her 20th birthday. Technically, not much happens in between the initial songand-dance sequence and the final birthday party sequence except more Grace Chang solos in flashbacks. The representation of the parent-child relationship in Mambo Girl, however, deviates from the conventional emphasis on kinship: the protagonist’s brief conversation with her biological mother (an ex-nightclub hostess) does not bring about a reunion of mother and daughter but a denial of kinship by the mother. Parent-child bonding and solidarity with the underclass, the

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  139 left-wing’s stock-in-trade, are evaded by the voluntary erasure of the mother’s voice. Mambo Girl thus justifies the protagonist’s return to an affluent middleclass life with her adopted parents. The conflict of class, which would have led to a very different conclusion, is ironed out to give way to a bourgeois dream of upward mobility and self-fulfilment.

The right wing’s gendered “class consciousness” Before we turn to the counter-images of the femme fatale and fallen woman in the left-wing cinema, a brief detour into issues of class in the cinematic imagination of modernity will illuminate the intricate “class consciousness” and its manifestations in both left- and right-wing films. Air Hostess (1959), an awardwinning film at the Asian Film Festival, is a big-budget “event film” befitting the capitalist-modernist thrust of Cathay productions. It features Chang as a beautiful air hostess trying to come to terms with the less pleasant realities of her profession, a demanding – and sometimes demeaning – yet ultimately rewarding job. A romantic subplot involving a young pilot is developed along the flight paths that literally take the lovers to popular tourist destinations in Taiwan, Singapore, and Thailand, which also underscore Cathay’s regional presence. As an entertainment film, Air Hostess delivers more than what it promises, as it satisfies the curiosity and aspirations of its intended audience about modern air travel while promoting a culture of leisure to a younger middle-class generation. Symbolically, the air hostesses and pilots represent this new social class, whom the film’s audience are encouraged to identify with: “air hostess is a new profession, a most modern profession. . . . They help shorten the distance between people and facilitate movement between nations.”12 Fu (2009) observes that Air Hostess is a projection of the Mandarin-speaking “migrant community’s changing lifestyle, attitudes, and gender relationship [in] an emerging culture of capitalist modernity in Asia” (29–30). Geopolitics certainly plays a role in this fairy tale of boundless freedom and romance: the mobile generation’s trajectories frequently foreground Taipei as a metropolitan centre of an emerging globe-trotting culture and a popular tourist destination, a politically loaded message that somehow does not sit well with what could have been a more discreet form of ideological persuasion. Commenting on the personae of Grace Chang and Li Lihua, Ford (2016) observes how Hong Kong female stars in the 1950s and 1960s “blended seemingly disparate cultural values and national ideologies, cherry-picking tradition and offering audiences a chance to ‘try on’ new ways of communicating, consuming, and being in the rapidly changing post-war world” (184). According to Ford, due to its US connections, Cathay’s films tend to be “escapist and elitist” in their engagement with issues on social class, which differ fundamentally from the “working class perspectives” in Cantonese cinema (186). The assumption that Cantonese films were more working class-oriented presumes a linguistic division of labour, which upon closer examination may exhibit a more nuanced picture. The remainder of this section will look at how the politics of class and gender

140  Vivian P.Y. Lee is played out in left-wing Mandarin films that self-consciously responded to the “escapist and elitist” discourse of the right-wing studios. If Grace Chang is the right-wing’s cinematic incarnate of modern womanhood with all the trappings of an affluent, capitalistic world, her counterparts in left-wing films offer interesting parallels-in-contrast that reveal the inherent contradictions and uneasiness of this gendered modern subject. As we shall see, the bourgeois dream of happiness and self-fulfilment as projected through the image of modern womanhood receives a different inflection in the left-wing cinema, which self-consciously engages generic conventions to mount their ideological critique.

Modern womanhood in left-wing films Of immediate interest here is the way in which female empowerment is materialized in certain character types, such as the nightclub hostess/songstress and the fallen woman, who are neither the right wing’s ideal modern woman nor the “virtuous woman” bound by the patriarchal code of ethics in the Chinese cultural tradition. Indeed, Phoenix and Great Wall’s productions do not lack what can be called “woman centreed” films in which the dramatic presence of female protagonists outweighs their male counterparts. In these films, modern womanhood is defined less by their readiness to embrace the new opportunities and promises of the modern capitalist society than by their daringness to challenge the prescribed (screen) roles of women in such a society. A selection of left-wing films be will examined here to see how a different imagination of modernity is articulated through “strong woman” characters. Spanning a broad range of social and professional positions, these strong women embody alternative expressions of modern womanhood that could well be more advanced and “experimental” than the normative culture of their time. In Sunrise (1953), Green Swan Nightclub (1958), and Rendezvous (1960), the celebratory discourse of capitalist modernity is turned inside out to reveal a more ambivalent, if not ominous, side that undercuts the glossy picture exemplified in Mambo Girl and Air Hostess. The heroines in Sunrise and Green Swan Nightclub are nightclub songstress characters that can be seen as parallels-in-contrast to the “modern woman” prototype discussed earlier. Both films feature the most representative female star of Phoenix and Great Wall, Hsia Moon, whose charismatic screen presence earned her the title of “Great Wall’s Crown Princess”,13 for which she is still fondly remembered by audiences and filmmakers today. Hsia’s star persona was the left-wing’s “answer” to Grace Chang, Cathay’s queen of Chinese musical, although Hsia’s screen persona is not genre- or character type-specific. The stories of Sunrise and Green Swan Nightclub revolve around a femme fatalelike character (Hsia) who relies on both her body and her wits to survive in a clandestine world of predatory men. Green Swan Nightclub utilizes elements of a crime thriller to tell a tale of redemption and retribution. A young woman (Zhenyi) gets involved in a series of intrigues and sabotages after being persuaded by her father’s business acquaintance, Mr. Ou, to avenge her father’s death by infiltrating a syndicate. Posing herself as a high-flying socialite from Australia, Zhenyi

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  141 begins her detective work as a songstress at the Green Swan Nightclub only to realize that Mr. Ou is the mastermind behind the murder of her father, who himself was Ou’s partner. Suspense is built around Zhenyi’s search for a document allegedly bearing crucial evidence of the syndicate’s illegal dealings. Zhenyi’s artistic talent and charismatic charm are foregrounded in a solo performance at the nightclub, culminating in an aerial shot of a ballroom dance sequence in which Zhenyi, elegantly dressed, is at the centre of a concentric circle of dancers. The layered plotline makes room for the protagonist to play out her double-agent role through a series of intrigues and decoys. The denouement is motivated by a romantic subplot between Zhenyi and Xu (a former syndicate member looking for a clean start), when the young lovers join hands to sabotage their “god fathers.” Compared to Wild, Wild Rose, Green Swan Nightclub puts much greater emphasis on female agency in the figure of Zhenyi. While Grace Chang’s femme fatale persona gradually settles into a more conventional tragic heroine character and a victim of misogynistic violence, Zhenyi in Green Swan Nightclub decisively tracks down on the real enemy after Xu discloses the truth about her father’s murder. Adopting the conventions of a crime thriller to reinvent the femme fatale as an agent of change and subversion, Green Swan Nightclub is a “progressive” version of the songstress character type and an experiment in female empowerment in genre cinema. The film’s portrayal of the nightclub as an inferno-like extension of a society dictated by greed and violence remains in line with the left-wing’s ethos, an ideological subtext that is more suggestive than intrusive at the storytelling level. A less benevolent fate befalls the “fallen woman” character in Sunrise. A seasoned socialite active in the circle of the wealthiest men in town, Bai Lu finds herself at a crossroads when she tries to save “Tiny” (xiaodongxi in Mandarin pinyin), an orphaned country girl – in whom she sees her long-gone younger self – from the hands of a gangster boss. Surrounded by the obscenely rich and their generous gifts, Bai’s alienation is dramatized through a juxtaposition of this decadent world of sex and money with the tranquil simplicity of her home village, where Bai meets her teenage lover, Dasheng, after years of separation. The story revolves around Bai’s effort to protect her young protégé at great personal risk. The film ends with Bai’s suicide as the heroine’s final resolution. This tragic closure may sound counter-intuitive to the film’s title word, “sunrise.” One wonders whether Bai’s suicide is necessitated by the plot to drive in a message about “hope”: the suicide scene fades into the ending shot where Dasheng and Tiny, hand in hand, embark on a new journey at daybreak. This brief moment of “hope” does feel like a footnote to alleviate the demoralizing effect of Bai’s suicide, if not to alter the course of events to underscore the ethical-ideological significance of her sacrifice, which, the film affirms, will create a better future for the younger generation. Gender and class politics take the centre stage in Joyce and Deli (1954), in which the fallen woman finds expression in a “prodigal daughter” character. In this film, a young woman from humble origins falls victim to the flattery and deceit of unscrupulous acquaintances posing themselves as decent members of

142  Vivian P.Y. Lee the social elite. Deli (Hsia Moon), the younger sister of Joyce (Wei Wei), quits high school to work in a trading company only to find that the boss has been using her as a pawn to woo his rich and powerful clients. Ignoring her family’s opposition, Deli turns a blind eye to the dubious conduct of her new friends in the business circle, and soon transforms herself into a social butterfly supported by wealthy patrons. Deli’s world of endless parties and banquets is juxtaposed with the working-class lifeworld where Joyce and fellow teachers set up their free school for the poor. As in most left-wing films, criticism of capitalist excesses is channelled through character symbolism. The clash between the capitalist and socialist worldview is dramatized through the frequent transition between Deli and Joyce in their diametrically opposed worlds. A failed plastic surgery marks a dramatic turning point in Deli’s fortunes. Deserted by her patrons and friends, Deli ends up in a hospital in great agony and distress. The final message of hope is delivered by a female doctor, who says Deli will be cured, body and mind. The interest of this film lies not so much in the ethicalideological message but in its gendered character symbolism and the incremental rhythm of the narrative along which Deli’s moral downfall is plotted. Deli comes across not so much as an unthinking, passive victim but a talented teenager gone astray. A “prodigal daughter” character, she pays a dear price for the lesson learned. Deli’s nuanced and complex characterization is accompanied by a line-up of “strong woman” characters, from her sister Joyce to the female doctor in the final scene. The “good doctor” is subtly juxtaposed with the male plastic surgeon, a charlatan who runs away on the first sight of Deli’s deformed face. The film’s gendered character symbolism is also evident in the absence of father figures: Joyce and Deli’s father is diseased, and in the poor neighbourhood, hard-working mothers are predominant. The “bad capitalist” role, understandably, is reserved for men as symbols of power and corruption. (This said, working-class men around Joyce are depicted as “good proletariats.”) This streamlined gender-class accounting suggests that women are considered to be playing a more central and active role in the working-class world, as professionals, single/working mothers, and leaders. This observation can be applied to the femme fatales and fallen women in the films analyzed earlier, whose self-empowerment is seen through their ability to sabotage a clandestine, maledominated regime and act on their moral choice. The selective analysis of woman-centred films here shows how the politics of class and gender shaped the imagination of modern womanhood in the Mandarin films of Phoenix and Great Wall. The femme fatale and the fallen woman are the two primary (sometimes overlapped) tropes employed in these films to critique the modern capitalist society. The character symbolism in these films further extends to the supporting cast in the clash of values and world views between the progressive working class and the unscrupulous capitalist. In this ideological tug of war, women’s suffering is a catalyst for the struggle against a misogynistic and oppressive regime. The alignment between female agency and the anti-capitalistic ethos in these “fallen women” films is echoed in a different type of woman-centred films that turns the conventions of female virtue upside down. Instead of utilizing the

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  143 trope of the “fallen woman,” these films offer alternative interpretations of the more conventional roles of women, as housewife, mother, and widow.

Marriage, widowhood, and motherhood The Wife Leads (1957), A Widow’s Tears (1956), The Unmarried Mother (1958), and The Wedding Night (1956) span a spectrum of comedy, family drama, and crime thriller films in which the central protagonist(s) actively resist and/or reinvent the normative roles of women as housewife, mother, and widow. The foregrounding of female agency in these films is achieved through the undoing of taboos and patriarchal authority. Instead of positing (working) class solidarity as a pathway to women’s liberation, female subjectivity is reasserted through shaking up the hierarchy of power from within prevailing social institutions. A first example in this category is The Wife Leads, a comedy that puts into question the micro-politics of gender in the ordinary household. The film begins with a singing performance in which a young songwriter, Zhongming, debates with his wife, Ruiqing, over the subservient status of women in the family. It soon reveals that Zhongming has been snubbed by a record company manager for his “old fashioned” taste in music. As husband and wife decide to switch roles in the family, Zhongming’s under-appreciated songwriting talent is over-compensated by Ruiqing, who by accident is signed up by his boss, a self-professed star-maker in show business. The main action revolves around the contrast between the husband’s comic mishandling of domestic chores and the wife’s preoccupation with her new career. Jealousy and suspicion lead to brief moments of tension and distrust before a happy ending ensures all’s well that ends well. This light-hearted treatment of gender stereotypes inside and outside the family does not lose sight of the malpractices of the entertainment industry: Zhongming’s songs are rejected by the company because they are “too serious” and lacking in sensational appeal. Ironically, when Ruiqing plays her husband’s latest composition in an ad hoc audition at home, she is immediately signed up by the manager mainly because she is a woman. This casual remark reveals a deeply held assumption about women’s position in the music industry: they are performers who entertain, not artists who create. As a woman composer, Ruiqing commands an exceptionality that makes her “old fashioned” style acceptable. This indirect criticism of the ingrained attitude toward women in the music industry foreshadows a more direct comment on the state of popular entertainment in a later scene when Ruiqing starts her first song recording session. The song carries the familiar beat and rhythm of Grace Chang-style Chinese musicals, but the lyrics repeatedly questions the purpose of such endless mirth-making and the superficiality of the hyperactive body movement that defines the genre’s form and style. The mis-en-scene, too, selfconsciously distances itself from its generic reference: formally dressed in a lady’s suit (in contrast to the teenage fashion in Mambo Girl), Ruiqing remains standing behind the microphone in a self-composed manner throughout the entire session. Staging a dance song without a dance, the scene draws attention to itself as a mockery of what it calls “crazy dancing” in the lyrics.

144  Vivian P.Y. Lee More outspoken statements about women’s virtue and sexuality are found in The Unmarried Mother and The Wedding Night. As its title implies, The Unmarried Mother challenges a widely held bias against premarital pregnancy, one of the biggest taboos in Chinese society. The film begins with a woman’s consultation with her family doctor (Qiao) about undergoing an abortion. Qiao, in flashback, recalls his upbringing as an illegitimate child and how he was nearly killed at birth by his own grandfather (Dong), who would not allow this “shame” to tarnish the family’s reputation. An earlier attempt to force his daughter to abort the child has been intercepted by his wife and her maid servant, who takes the infant away and brings him up as mother and son. The scene of reunion some 20 years later dramatically plays off the gender and generation gap: the grandfather stands alone as the defender of “tradition” against the rebellious Qiao, Aizhen (Qiao’s biological mother) and “mama”, his adopted mother. Like the elder sister Joyce in Joyce and Deli, Aizhen lives an independent, and unmarried, life as a schoolteacher. Qiao’s story eventually convinces his patient to embrace her unmarried motherhood without shame. The Unmarried Mother’s head-on confrontation with the tabooed subjects of premarital pregnancy and single-motherhood was atypical of its time, even among the ranks of progressive films, especially in the conspicuous absence of a positive male character in the older generations.14 Qiao, the child of two remarkable women, is the only male voice that resonates with the strong women who protect, nurture, and inspire him. The disparity between strong women and weak men is no less visible in The Wedding Night, which speaks for rape victims who are stigmatized as “unclean” and “immoral.” Lin Fen, a young woman happily in love with her cousin, Shaozong, is horrified to witness how her uncle cold-bloodedly disowns his daughter, a rape victim whom he blames has brought shame to the family. Shaozong, son of the eldest brother of the clan, tries to interfere to no avail. At a gathering with his fellow college-mates, he vocally speaks up against the social taboo on rape victims and the misogynistic obsession with women’s virginity on their wedding night. Shaozong’s liberal thinking is put to test when he realizes on his wedding night that the same fate has befallen Fen, his young bride. Outraged and confused, he steps back and lets Fen fight a lone battle with her father-in-law, who threatens to revoke the vows because Fen is now as an “unclean” woman. In a surprise countermove, Fen walks up to the patriarch and tears the marriage certificate into pieces. In rejecting an unjust and humiliating verdict of the fatherin-law, the young woman’s exceptional strength and character is an ironic contrast to Shaozong, who proves himself a weaker character, unable to live up to his ideal self-image. Female agency is also emphasized in the portrayal of widowhood in left-wing cinema. In A Widow’s Tears, widowhood subjects a young woman to public scrutiny and constant surveillance. The film starts off with the standard devices of a family drama in which Fang Mei’s seemingly happy universe collapses after her husband’s death in a car accident. Previously latent tensions with her

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  145 mother-in-law (Mrs. Shen) surface as the older woman’s grief for the loss of her beloved son turns into suspicion and hostility toward the young widow, who happens to be the only beneficiary of her husband’s estate. Mei’s isolation is paralleled by a developing, and unduly scandalized, friendship between Mei and Jun, her husband’s friend and ex-colleague. At the centre of this family drama is Mei’s struggle to come to terms with her widowed life and compromised circumstances in the family before the final moment of self-reckoning. The plot follows a classic formula that runs through all the films discussed so far: the clash of values between two diametrically opposed worlds distinguished by age, class, and/or gender difference. In A Widow’s Tears, widowhood brings into sharper focus the psychological distortion of women’s domestic confinement across generations. The conflict between Mrs. Shen and Mei points toward a generational shift in women’s self-perception as it re-examines the relationship between female subjectivity, women’s virtue, and the conventional role and status of women in the family. In her decision to move out of the Shen household, Mei leaves behind the psychological encumbrances of a domesticated widowhood and walks into a new, though uncertain, life. As in The Wedding Night, the world outside the family is only a vaguely visible, allusive presence. This limitation of the script reflects a subconscious anxiety about what might be in stock for the young rebels after their “jump” into the brave new world, and no less a reality check on the triumphalism otherwise implied in the ending.

Conclusion This chapter has adopted a microscopic approach to unpack the left-right politics in Hong Kong‘s cultural Cold War through the lens of gender and class in Mandarin film productions. Focusing on how women are cast into both traditional and non-traditional roles in both left-wing and right-wing films, it has argued that the cinematic imagination of modernity of both the progressive and “freedom” camps tends to utilize certain prototypes of the “modern woman” in articulating their respective visions of what it means to be modern. The right wing’s construction of modern womanhood in Mambo Girl, Wild, Wild Rose, and Air Hostess is juxtaposed with the left-wing’s counter-symbolic “fallen woman” and “prodigal daughter” characters. While the modern girl/woman in these right-wing films displays a stylish, charismatic allure that speaks for a gendered vision of capitalist modernity, such a vision is debunked in the left-wing’s critical appropriation of these prototypes. The final section has shown how this counter-symbolism is employed in a range of “strong woman” prototypes to re-centre female agency and female subjectivity within the social institutions of marriage and the family. It is hoped that this preliminary study will offer points of departure for future inquiries into how the battle of ideas had been fought in the image culture of Hong Kong in the post-Wolrd War II era, and how gender and class had figured in the cinematic imaginations of modernity in the midst of an intensifying left-right political rivalry.

146  Vivian P.Y. Lee

Notes 1 The anti-British riots of 1967–68 lasted for eight months and caused territory-wide disturbances and casualty. The nature and origins of the riots are still a topic of debate among scholars, especially concerning the relationship between the local riots and the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China (Cheung 2009; Ching 2018) (in Chinese). 2 The Free Association underwent several renamings since its inception in the 1950s (Zuo 2009, 271; Zhang 2004, 162). 3 Sun Luen (specializing in Cantonese film production), Phoenix (also known as Fenghuang in Mandarin pinyin), and Great Wall were the three major studios under the direct supervision of the Communist Party. 4 The Motion Pictures & General Investment (MP&GI) was the Hong Kong arm of the Cathay Organisation in Singapore (Fu 2009, 26–28). The Shaw Brothers, also based in Singapore, set up its Hong Kong headquarters in 1958 (Wong 2003, 7). 5 The third of its kind since the 1930s, the Clean-up Campaign published its manifesto on April 8, 1949, in major Chinese newspapers, including Da Gong Bao, China’s official mouthpiece in Hong Kong, and Wah Kiu Yat Po, a pro-Taiwan news agency. 6 Two edited volumes dedicated respectively to Shaw and Cathay were published by the Hong Kong Film Archive (Wong 2003, 2009). 7 The untimely death of Cathay’s founder, Loke Wan Tho, in a plane crash in 1963 led to the gradual decline of the industry giant, clearing the path for Shaw’s regional dominance. 8 An Age of Idealism: Great Wall and Fenghuang Days is an oral history collection published by the Hong Kong Film Archive in 2001. Among Chinese-language sources, more detailed treatment of films and directors from the two studios can be found in (Zhang 2010; Su 2014). 9 (Ma 2015; Mazilli 2014; Harris 2008). 10 On stardom and star-texts, see Dyer (1979) and Farquhar and Zhang (2010). 11 The huang mei diao film has its roots in traditional stage art combining song and dance, modern cinematic techniques and period costumes. It was a very popular local film genre with transnational appeal during the Cold War era (Chen 2003, 51). 12 Extract from Cathay’s official magazine, International Screen (Fu 2009, 29). 13 Hsia and two fellow Great Wall actresses, Shek Hwei and Chen Sisi, were known as the studio’s “three princesses.” 14 Another representative example in this category is a much earlier film from the silent film period, The Goddess (1934). The story of a prostitute in Shanghai struggling to bring up her son in dignity became a star vehicle for the actress, Ruan Lingyu, whose rendition of the “fallen woman” character remains one of the classic moments in the history of Chinese cinema (Harris 2008).

Bibliograhy Chen, Edwin W. 2003. “Musical China, Classical Impressions: A Preliminary Study of Shaw’s Huangmei Diao Film.” In The Shaw Screen: A Preliminary Study, edited by Wong Ain-ling, 51–74. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive. Cheung, Gary Ka-wai. 2009. Hong Kong’s Watershed the 1967 Riots. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Ching, Cheong. 2018. Xianggang liu qi bao dong shimo: jie du Wu Dizhou [The Origins of the Hong Kong Riots: The Unpublished Notes of Wu Dizhou]. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press.

Class, gender, and the charismatic female  147 Chung, Stephanie Po-yin. 2006. “The Story of Kong Ngee: The Southeast Asian Cinema Circuit and Hong Kong’s Cantonese Film Industry.” In The Glorious Modernity of Kong Ngee, edited by Wong Ain-ling, 122–42. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive. Dyer, Richard. 1979. Stars. London: British Film Institute. Farquhar, Mary Ann, and Yingjin Zhang, eds. 2010. Chinese Film Stars. Routledge Contemporary China Series, 51. London: Routledge. Ford, Stacilee. 2016. “ ‘Reels Sisters’ and Other Diplomacy: Cathay Studios and Cold War Cultural Production.” In Hong Kong in the Cold War, edited by Priscilla Roberts, and John M. Carroll, 183–210. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Fu, Poshek. 2009. “Modernity, Cold War, and Hong Kong Mandarin Cinema.” In The Cathay Story, edited by Wong Ain-ling, revised ed., 24–33. Hong Kong: Hong Film Archive. Harris, Kristine. 2008. “The Goddess: Fallen Woman of Shanghai.” In Chinese Films in Focus II, edited by Chris Berry, 2nd ed., 111–19. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Ma, Jean. 2015. Sounding the Modern Woman: The Songstress in Chinese Cinema. Durham: Duke University Press. Mazilli, Mary. 2014. “Desiring the Bodies of Ruan Lingyu and Linda Lin Dai.” In Transnational Chinese Cinema: Corporeality, Desire, and Ethics of Failure, edited by Brian Bergen-Aurand, Mary Mazzilli, and Hee Wai-Siam. Los Angeles: Bridge21 Publications. Su, Tao. 2014. Fu cheng bei wang: chong hui zhanhou Xianggang dianying [Looking north from a Floating City: Remapping Post-war Hong Kong Cinema]. Beijing: Peking University Press. Wong, Ain-ling, ed. 2003. The Shaw Screen: A Preliminary Study. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive. ———. 2009. The Cathay Story, revised ed. Hong Kong: Hong Film Archive. Wong, Ain-ling, and Puitak Lee, eds. 2009. Xianggang dian ying zi liao guan [Cold War and Hong Kong Cinema]. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive. Zhang, Yan. 2010. Studies on Hong Kong Leftist Films. Beijing: Peking University Press. Zhang, Yingjin. 2004. Chinese National Cinema. London: Routledge. Zhou, Chengren. 2009. “Glory Be with Cantonese Films: Ng Cho-fan and Union Film.” In One for All: The Union Film Spirit, edited by Wong Ain-ling, 26–35. Hong Kong: Hong Film Archive. Zuo, Guifang. 2009. “ Ziyou zonghui jianjie yu dashi ji [The Free Association: Introduction and Chronology of Key Events].” In Xianggang dian ying zi liao guan [Cold War and Hong Kong Cinema], edited by Wong Ain-ling, and Puitak Lee, 271–89. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive.

10 “ Let Raffles stand where he stands today” A symbol of the colonial in Singapore during the Cold War Ying-kit Chan Introduction Within months of achieving full internal self-rule for the British colony of Singapore, the People’s Action Party (PAP), led by Lee Kuan Yew (1923–2015), was exploring the opportunities for industrial expansion in Singapore. On the advice of his chief lieutenant, Goh Keng Swee (1918–2010), Lee Kuan Yew requested help from the United Nations Expanded Programme of Technical Assistance (EPTA) on developing an economic plan for Singapore.1 The key issues that PAP leaders were trying to resolve were unemployment and the housing shortage. In response, the United Nations appointed Dutch economist Albert Winsemius (1910–1996) to lead an EPTA team to visit Singapore in order to study its economy and suggest recommendations. At the end of his trip, when Lee Kuan Yew asked him what his advice boiled down to, Winsemius replied unequivocally: You can forget everything, Mr. Prime Minister, unless two preliminary things are done. You eliminate the communists – eliminate them in Government, in the unions, industries, and off the streets. If you don’t do it, forget about economic development. They will destroy anything which can promote Singapore because they have other intentions than you have. Number two, let Raffles stand where he stands. You will probably be the only former colony where the statue of an imperialist is still standing. Let him stand. It is your presentation to the outside world that you accept the heritage of the British. Sometime in the future, we will need the British, the Americans, the Germans . . . and their knowhow. . . . You can show it through Raffles. So let him stand, don’t tear him off his socket one Saturday morning and drag him through the streets like they did in Jakarta – like they do all over the world. . . . It will take time, it won’t be easy, but that’s what it boils [down] to. (UNDP Global Centre for Public Service Excellence 2015, 11) A close reading of Winsemius’s words may help delineate the key arguments and objectives of this chapter. Associating it with strikes and street riots, Winsemius believed that communism would cause disorder and discourage foreign companies from investing in Singapore. Rather than being allowed to resist the government, DOI: 10.4324/9780429058844-11

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  149 labour unions should be regulated or even co-opted by the government to improve industrial relations and working conditions. Otherwise, communists would continue to infiltrate them and rally the working class against the government before it could even begin to execute any economic plan. With the benefit of hindsight, we know that the PAP government followed up on this piece of advice from Winsemius. The 1960s saw the establishment of the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), which remains Singapore’s sole national trade union centre to date and one of the very few in the (non-communist) world to be controlled by or fused into the state. In response to the communist clout over blue-collar workers in the late colonial era, the NTUC advocated a tripartite partnership model for the government, employers, and workers to resolve their differences, with the government acting as the ultimate neutral arbiter in labour disputes. Although it would subsequently focus on motivating and training workers to increase their productivity, the NTUC of the 1960s was more concerned about taking the workers off the streets and away from the sway of communist instigators; the workers would work at the factories and industries that the PAP government and its foreign advisers were preparing for them (Rajah 2019, 47–48). The second precondition proposed by Winsemius was to let the statue of Sir Stamford Raffles (1781–1826), the British founder of the modern city of Singapore in 1819, “stand where it stands.” This was intended to symbolize Singapore’s acceptance of its colonial legacy and willingness to receive foreign assistance, in contrast with the stance of many newly independent nations such as Indonesia, a former Dutch colony, which perceived and were nursing wounds to their national psyche suffered under colonialism.2 In his own book, Dynamics of a Developing Nation, Winsemius suggested that “by letting the statue remain, we made it clear to foreign investors that we accepted the inheritance of the West up to the point that it would be to our advantage” (van Roij 2015, 146). Again, with the benefit of hindsight, we know that the PAP government heeded Winsemius’s advice, and the Raffles statue has remained standing to the present day.3 Even though PAP leaders clearly understood the possible political fallout from keeping the Raffles statue, they did not engage in what anthropologist Michael Herzfeld calls “spatial cleansing” seen in some countries (Herzfeld 2006, 127–49). As Lee Kuan Yew was quick to clarify as early as 1967, “We have left Stamford Raffles. But for him this would still be a mudflat. Let us not pretend it was anything else. He brought in the skills and gave the reason for what it is now.”4 That Winsemius connected the eradication of communist elements with the symbolism of a colonial past was no mere coincidence. When most postcolonial societies were riding on nationalistic waves and protecting their domestic economies, Singapore acted to curb the radicalism of trade unions and attract foreign investors. Both Winsemius and Lee Kuan Yew were thinking in binary terms: Singapore must choose between the communist and the Western or capitalist blocs. They were also thinking in capitalist terms about maintaining the flow of capital and expertise from Britain and other former colonial powers to Singapore after the latter’s independence. By rejecting the communist model of development so explicitly, they showed how symbols of the colonial mattered to a small nation like Singapore in a bipolar

150  Ying-kit Chan world that was dominated by the Soviet Union, the United States, and their key allies. Drawing on newspaper articles, parliamentary debates, and political leaders’ recollections and speeches, this chapter explores the public discussion on the historical significance of the Raffles statue during and after the Cold War. It suggests that during the Cold War, the statue acquired more of an economic importance for attracting foreign investments and foreign tourists. After the Cold War, geopolitical tensions eased; Singapore had proven itself to be a liberal economy (although it has continued to reject liberal values) (Chua 2017). As the economic and geopolitical value of the statue diminished, the debate about colonial symbolism returned, and some Singaporeans, like the “pioneer generation” (as suggested in the official narrative of recent years), questioned the validity of letting Raffles stand where he stands today. That said, the labels ascribed to the value of the statue, be it economic, geopolitical, or political, are not mutually exclusive; what exists is only an order of precedence as per the dictates of different periods. Ultimately, this chapter argues that preserving traces of the colonial in the form of material symbolism was a way for the PAP government to show, somewhat implicitly or subtly, that Singapore was aligned with the non-communist West, even though – or because – it had, immediately on independence, declared itself non-aligned with either bloc. S. Rajaratnam (1915–2006), who served as Singapore’s first foreign minister, had remarked that for an independent Singapore: [t]o have aligned itself with this or that power bloc was to have invited counter reaction from its rivals. It would have meant Singapore, an independent Singapore, being drawn willy-nilly into the big power conflicts already raging in Southeast Asia, and thus enlarging the arena of active conflict. (Rajaratnam 2006c, 28–29) Actions speak louder than words, and what was unsayable in the Cold War context may perhaps be discerned by examining a symbol of the colonial during that period. This chapter comprises four key sections. It first explains why Singapore may be considered a Cold War city at its inception and how the Raffles statue figured in its formation. The chapter then describes senior PAP statesmen’s attitudes toward their former colonial masters and examines how economic and geopolitical considerations overrode the function of the Raffles statue as a tool for building a shared history and national identity during the Cold War. Finally, unlike most other chapters in this book, the chapter devotes much attention to the post-Cold War period to highlight the twists and turns in the debates on maintaining the Raffles statue as a symbol of Singapore’s colonial past. The debates are a result of the “chronopolitics” of memory, or the changing politics and discursive conditions that affect memories (Thongchai 2020, 9). The post-Cold War geopolitical environment has rendered the memories of Raffles from the colonial and anticommunist perspectives obsolete. In view of the factors that change memory or induce amnesia, this chapter discusses public appraisals of Sir Stamford Raffles in

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  151 general and the Raffles statue in particular after the Cold War, drawing connections between opinion changes and the economic and political transformations of postcolonial Singapore. It is thus as much interested in explaining why the memoryscape of Raffles existed as it is in identifying the changes in domestic and global politics that altered the memory-scape. The public debates provide a prime example of how a local memorial site reflects various changes of and responses to global geopolitics during the Cold War from start to finish.

Singapore of the 1950s: a Cold War city in the making? The Raffles statue, erected in 1887, was cast by British poet and sculptor Thomas Woolner (1825–1892) and originally stood on the Padang, an open playing field in the city centre. In 1919, to mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of modern Singapore, the statue was shifted to Empress Place and bore the following inscription: “This tablet to the memory of Sir Stamford Raffles, to whose foresight and genius Singapore owes its existence and prosperity, was unveiled on February 6, 1919, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Settlement” (Ong 1971, 9). Little has changed in this interpretation since the 1950s, when Singapore moved toward self-rule and eventual independence. Given that no significant Cold War lieux de mémoire (site of memory) exists in Singapore, it is perhaps surprising to read Cold War geopolitics into Singapore’s development into a modern city-state.5 Like the Vienna studied by historians Günter Bischof and Stefan Maurer (Bischof and Maurer 2016, 45–73), Singapore, a city otherwise replete with commemorations of colonial rule and colonial wars when it was a part of British Malaya (Blackburn and Hack 2012), has neither a Cold War museum nor a monument that specifies its role or position during the Cold War. Individual memories of the Cold War that have survived in Vienna do not exist in Singapore, whose participation in the Cold War was indirect and felt primarily on the diplomatic front. Singapore, however, was very much a product of Cold War geopolitics. The British government, facing the pressures to accommodate nationalistic demands from within Singapore and to prevent Singapore from becoming a communist city, decided to support the merger of Malaya, Singapore, Brunei, Sarawak, and North Borneo into an independent federation of Greater Malaysia. For the British government of the 1950s and 1960s, Greater Malaysia promised to neutralize Singapore’s radical left-wing politics by anchoring it to an anti-communist state that would eventually be led by Lee Kuan Yew. As British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan (1894–1986) told Malayan Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman (1903–1990) at a conference, “[If the] mighty United States could not deal with a communist Cuba in the Caribbean, it was difficult to see how the small Federation could cope with independent communist Singapore on its very doorstep” (Singh 2015, 32). For him, Greater Malaysia must incorporate as many territories as possible to control the Chinese population of Singapore, which was considered susceptible to communist China’s propaganda and subversion. The federation, which eventually split into Malaysia and Singapore in 1965,6 would be protected militarily under a series of agreements known as the Five Power Defence Arrangements

152  Ying-kit Chan between Australia, Britain, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Singapore (Tan 2017, 188–241; Chong 2020, 179–208). When this is coupled with the fact that Singapore became a crucial refuelling base that provided aircraft and ship repair for the American military during the Vietnam War, which lifted Singapore out of its economic downturn after secession from Malaysia, the role played by the Cold War in Singapore’s economic and political development is obvious (Chua 2017). What remains lacking in the scholarship on Singapore during the Cold War, then, is a study of how the Singaporean state and society reconciled the colonial past with their Cold War present and how the significance of the colonial receded after the Cold War. A city is filled with symbols if we bother to look hard enough, and symbols of the colonial in former colonies are simply one type of them. By boldly asserting that Singapore is as much a Cold War city as it is a global city,7 as is commonly suggested in the existing scholarship, this chapter highlights the salience of Cold War thinking in the minds and actions of leaders and ordinary citizens in postcolonial Singapore. As scholars Peter J.M. Nas, Marlies de Groot, and Michelle Schut suggest, while geographers and sociologists have investigated the concept and existence of cities thoroughly (this is true for Singapore),8 they have ignored the symbolic dimension and its interpretations (Nas, de Groot, and Schut 2011, 7). Nas, de Groot, and Schut have identified four types of symbol bearers: material, discursive, iconic, and behavioural. According to this typology, the Raffles statue is a form of material symbolism, which is “the traditional terrain of urban symbolic ecology” (Nas, de Groot, and Schut 2011, 9). In Singapore, the city centre has been marked by buildings, monuments, plaques, and statues of the colonial order in terms of administrative function, architectural design, and period of construction. They connect postcolonial Singapore to its colonial past, dwarfed in time by more and more skyscrapers that would dominate the city skyline and become their own symbols of the postcolonial state’s superiority in delivering economic growth. Given that 1959 (when Singapore achieved self-rule) and 1965 (when Sin­ gapore gained independence) are years of great significance in Singapore’s history, which has been reduced to Lee Kuan Yew’s political career of steering the nation “from Third World to First” (Lee 2000; Huang and Hong 2004, 65–89), the PAP government has tactically highlighted facts supportive of the party line while silencing those that are contradictory or critical (Loh 1998, 1–21). Such years indicate more than what the official narrative suggests. They are also the years in which the PAP emerged victorious over all other political parties, especially the left-wing ones, in the 1959 general elections, and the PAP led the nation out of a merger, in 1965, that helped purge itself (and, by extension, the whole of Singapore) of remaning left-wing elements. Compared with the absence of Cold War artefacts, be they bunkers, mausoleums, or cults of personality, as seen in post-communist nations, the maintenance of colonial structures such as the Raffles statue has been choreographed and scripted by the PAP government, whose intentions and objectives should be examined through the lens of the Cold War.

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  153

PAP leaders’ views on British colonial rule Since its inception, the PAP government has generally viewed the colonial era positively, which sets Singapore apart from most postcolonial nations (Zubaidah Rahim 2009, 13). But its leaders, most of whom received their higher degrees in Britain, were not inevitably Anglophilic. When recalling how he felt in 1954, after Vietnamese communists had defeated French forces and ejected them from Indochina, Lee Kwan Yew said that he actually preferred the communists to the colonizers. He was himself allied with the Malayan Communist Party to unsettle British rule in Singapore and Peninsular Malaya and force the British to surrender power (1978, 8). But he insisted that the PAP was a non-communist socialist party, which eventually clashed with its communist allies shortly after winning the 1959 elections. Upon Singapore’s independence in 1965, even after expelling the most left-wing members from the PAP, Lee did not dismiss socialism outright, saying: “How [national survival] was to be achieved, by socialism or free enterprise, was a secondary matter.” But he quickly concluded that “the answer turned out to be free enterprise, tempered with the socialist philosophy of equal opportunities for education, jobs, health, [and] housing” (1978, 9). With the assistance of Winsemius and other foreign experts, he and the PAP government behind him developed an economy in which the enterprise of American, European, and Japanese multinational corporations transformed British military bases into industrial facilities for manufacturing and for the servicing of ships, oil rigs, aircraft, telecommunications, banking, and insurance. He observed the failed experiments of Burma, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka with socialist planning, which he believed was useful only for nationalizing land and property: “There was precious little to nationalise [in Singapore]” (1978, 10–11). He simply saw greater potential in the expanding subsidiaries of American, European, and Japanese corporations. This made Singapore different, during the 1950s and 1960s, from most other Southeast Asian countries because “she had no xenophobic hangover from colonialism” (1978, 13). In Lee Kuan Yew’s words, “The statue of the founder of Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles, still stands in the heart of the city to remind Singaporeans of his vision in 1819 of Singapore becoming, on the basis of free competition, the emporium of the East, on the route between India and China” (1978, 13). “These were our origins,” he continued, “so we have never suffered from any inhibitions in borrowing capital, know-how, managers, engineers, and marketing capabilities. Far from limiting the entry of foreign managers, engineers, and bankers, we encouraged them to come” (1978, 13). Speaking at the World Congress of the International Chamber of Commerce, an international forum for chamber leaders and professionals to share experiences and practices regarding commerce and industry, Lee could not have found a more opportune moment to show Singapore’s conformity to global capitalism without having to criticize communism or the Soviet Bloc directly or explicitly; he did, however, mention that “there are no doubts that state planning and state corporations have not brought about the economic transformation” (1978, 24). The Raffles statue thus symbolized Singapore’s supposed origins

154  Ying-kit Chan as a financial and trading hub and its participation in the world grid of industrial powerhouses in Europe, Japan, and the United States. Lee did not glorify colonial rule, to be sure, but he also did not share the anti-colonial sentiments of founding leaders of some newly independent nations, which he felt had fallen into the grip of nationalism and xenophobia. The account of the “origins” of modern Singapore (or simply Singapore, for that matter) as described by Lee Kuan Yew and by the PAP government in general, contrasts significantly with the most recent scholarly literature on the subject. As a corrective to the government’s tendency to overemphasize the contributions of British imperialism in transforming Singapore into a global financial centre, an increasing volume of research has shown that indigenous peoples in the Malay Archipelago and mainland Southeast Asia helped develop Singapore into a regional trading centre centuries before 1819, which was never the backwater or fishing village portrayed in the PAP’s official narrative.9 That such relevant works appeared decades after Singapore’s independence bespeaks the pervasiveness of the official narrative on the nation’s “true” origins in culture, politics, and society (Loh 1998, 1–21). This also implies that most PAP leaders shared Lee Kuan Yew’s views on the contributions of British colonial rule to Singapore’s subsequent development into an economic power and prosperous nation. On the issue of world domination during the Cold War, S. Rajaratnam attributed the anarchy and growing disarray in the world to the absence of world leadership by either a single nation or a group of nations. According to him, Singapore was under such leadership, under the British Empire until the Second World War, after which the “burden of leadership” slid to the United States. Singapore was one of the Third World countries to turn to the United States and its British, Japanese, and Western European allies rather than to the socialist bloc for economic assistance. For him, the world economy experienced unprecedented growth and attained “levels of prosperity unimaginable before 1945” under American leadership (Rajaratnam 2006b, 31), so American leadership in international economics and politics must continue to reduce global anarchy. He expressed the need for small nations such as Singapore to be discreet in supporting American leadership, as found in the following question: “Will the non-communist nations be as open and frank in showing their preference for the United States as a candidate for world leadership as those countries which support the Soviet Union?” The answer, he suggested, depended on whether the United States was poised to assume the risks and responsibilities for defending the capitalist world order (Rajaratnam 2006b, 35). He advocated an “adaptive reuse of history” through which Singapore’s history must begin with its colonial founder rather than with the ancestral roots of its peoples. Otherwise, Singapore would become a “bloody battleground for endless racial and communal conflicts and interventionist politics by the more powerful and bigger nations from which Singaporeans had emigrated” (Rajaratnam 2006a, 252). To prevent that from happening, he argued, Singapore must perform “some sort of collective lobotomy to wipe out all traces of 146 years of [colonial] shame” (Rajaratnam 2006d, 265). Like Lee Kuan Yew, then, Rajaratnam believed that patriotism should not be misplaced; it should be directed toward embracing,

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  155 rather than rejecting, the colonial legacy and the economic benefits and social cohesion it could bring to Singapore. Rajaratnam had more specific things to say about the Raffles statue. He called the decision to declare Raffles the founder of Singapore “an example of the proper use of history; the proper approach to the preservation of historic monuments” (Rajaratnam 2006a, 253). Acknowledging Raffles as the founder of Singapore was “a fact of history”; to pretend otherwise was, for him, to falsify history. According to Rajaratnam, British colonial rule had both positive and negative aspects; it was both liberationist and oppressive. “The intelligent and responsible anti-imperialist,” he suggested, “should, once the battle is won, retain and improve upon what is positive in imperialism while discarding its reactionary and oppressive features” (Rajaratnam 2006a, 253). For him, many former colonies had thrown out the baby while retaining the bath water. They practiced the “vices of imperialism” that included corruption, despotism, poverty, and repression while abandoning the “virtues of imperialism” (he did not specify what they were) as incompatible with “traditional” values and national pride. Like Lee Kuan Yew, Rajaratnam did not think Singapore should deny its colonial past or destroy all reminders of it: “Singapore’s history began as an imperial outpost and but for this fact most of us would not be here today and the Singapore we know today would not have come into being” (Rajaratnam 2006a, 253–54). To elaborate on why the PAP government declared Raffles the founder of Singapore, it may be useful to discuss the local public debates on who should be called the founder of Singapore and what Singapore should do with Raffles’s statue.

Let Raffles (not) stand In the wake of independence, as the PAP government was building new housing estates across much of the island, the rebuilding of old Singapore also gained impetus. Contrary to the common perception among Singaporeans that the PAP government has been indiscriminate in demolishing old buildings and monuments (which reveals how ingrained the PAP’s image of being unsentimentally pragmatic is in the national psyche), it did take steps to ensure as far as possible that sites of historical significance do not disappear (Blackburn and Tan 2015, 341–64). Monuments such as the Raffles statue were listed for preservation as early as 1969 in a bid to “save [Singapore’s] history” Campbell 1969, 12). But this was, again, not inevitable because even within the PAP ranks, calls for tearing down the Raffles statue had emerged. As Rajaratnam recalled, “[Raffles] escaped by a narrow margin” and was spruced up after a slim majority of party leaders voted to keep it.10 The preservation of the Raffles statue also signalled the transition of the PAP from an anti-colonial party to a somewhat pro-colonial one after independence. But not all Singaporeans shared the PAP’s take on their colonial past. A vandal had thrown a plastic bag of white paint at the Raffles statue in an attempt to smear it.11 That he did so on August 9, Singapore’s National Day, seems to suggest that he rejected the official narrative and did not believe that Raffles had a rightful

156  Ying-kit Chan place in building the Singaporean nation. But the government considered this a lone incident and continued to promote Raffles as part of its nation-building project, which was commodified to draw tourists to Singapore. In 1971, the Tourist Promotion Board decided to make a replica of the statue in white polymarble in order to mark Raffles’s landing site in 1819. Although no one was ever sure of the exact location,12 the board determined the site to be “the area near Parliament House and the Singapore River” (Chua 1971, 3). The connection between Raffles and nation building was again made obvious by the board’s push to install the replica for visitors in time for National Day. Again, “full-blooded” Singaporeans expected objects of colonialism to be “carted away and stored in the museum to collect cobwebs” and remained puzzled over why they still held pride of place (Tan 1971b, 16). In response, state-controlled newspapers reported the satisfaction of foreign visitors, who saw that historical aspects of Singapore were being preserved: “It would indeed be a pity if the statue of Raffles is taken down or the names of streets and places like Raffles Place changed in an upsurge of nationalism.”13 But readers, in no less a sarcastic tone, said that the Tourist Promotion Board was exploring a “novel way of exploiting a man who brought along colonial exploitation” (Sam 1971, 10). Some citizens were also unconvinced that Raffles landed at the Singapore River and not the Rochor River, as suggested by word of mouth: “There was just no concrete evidence [suggesting that] it didn’t appear at the time that Raffles’s landing was important enough to be recorded” (Tan 1971a, 3). Indeed, the journey to security in history for both Raffles and his statue has not been without its near-misses. On the pedestal of the new Raffles statue along the Singapore River, the inscription reads: “On this historic site, Sir Thomas Stam­ ford Raffles first landed in Singapore on 28th January 1819 and with genius and perception changed the destiny of Singapore from an obscure fishing village to a great sea port and modern metropolis.”14 The inscription encapsulates what PAP leaders such as Lee Kuan Yew and S. Rajaratnam have imagined of Singaporeans’ shared history. Cynical Singaporeans remarked that if the authorities bothered to determine the actual landing place of Raffles and erect a Raffles statue on that spot, then the story of Sang Nila Utama, a prince from Sumatra who discovered Singapore in 1160 and changed its name from “Tumasik” to “Singapura,” would help attract far more tourists: “Tourists come to Singapore to see our swaying coconut palms and enjoy our lapping sea and tropical sun. They are not interested in Raffles or trishaws.”15 And yet in apparent deference to their erstwhile founder, officials declared that Raffles “would have been proud of the [new] statue” when it was finally unveiled in 1972.16 At the ceremony to mark the official recognition of Raffles’s landing site on the north bank of the Singapore River, Acting President and Speaker of Parliament Dr. Yeoh Ghim Seng urged Singaporeans not to forget the past in their eagerness to build a new and progressive nation. Yeoh spoke of Raffles’s foresight in realizing Singapore’s strategic position, thus changing its destiny “from that of an obscure village to a great centre of commerce and the nerve centre of Asia.”17 He acknowledged that although Singapore’s buildings, monuments, and

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  157 sites were not as famous and awe-inspiring as those in countries with longer histories, Singapore still had things, such as the statue, to interest tourists. The significance of the Raffles statue became apparent when Queen Elizabeth II of Britain visited Singapore later in February 1972. As the local media proclaimed, “The arrival in our Republic today of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain is an event which symbolises much in the emerging international role of Singapore.”18 Although by then, America, Malaysia, and Japan had overtaken Britain as Singapore’s trading partners, the PAP government felt that decolonization had been consummated with dignity, and where Singapore had requested assistance from Britain, “from an equal to an equal,” that assistance had usually been forthcoming. As a journalist wrote, “It was our own use of the opportunities provided by Raffles and his like which has led us to our present point, but the opportunities would not necessarily have been there had a different geopolitical situation prevailed in this region in the early 19th century or had men like Raffles, dedicated to the idea of free trade, not been on the scene.”19 And as historian C. Mary Turnbull suggests, Singapore was isolated from the region geopolitically due to its predominantly Chinese population and for its Israeli army advisers, whose existence further antagonized Indonesia and Malaysia, the former of which had, in the mid-1960s, launched the “Confrontation” that opposed the creation of Malaysia and independence of Singapore. The Confrontation, alongside Malayan communists, left Singapore with a bad aftertaste, causing it to shy away from volatile geopolitics and confront its own vulnerability. For the PAP government, then, “Raffles seemed to be almost an umpire holding the ring, a neutral figure you might say” (Oral History Centre 2006, 30). Raffles, or his statue, prevented the emergence of divisive ethnic politics from within, discouraged foreign countries from capitalizing on ethnic fault lines to undermine its sovereignty, and convinced former colonial powers, both Britain and others, to have vested interests in Singapore for their own benefit. Although the link between the Cold War and the Raffles statue in Singapore did not appear obvious, it certainly existed in the minds of Singapore’s policymakers and political leaders, who, despite some dissonance on the ground, used the statue for different goals, the most important of which was national survival and subtle economic and military protection by Britain and its allies against left-wing forces. In the end, whether Raffles made Singapore or Singapore made Raffles was not as absolute as the PAP government had imagined. When the British production team of a musical play on the life of Raffles visited Singapore, one of the scriptwriters said: Raffles is a character relatively unknown in the West. . . . It is the success of Singapore, a phenomenon that is sweeping the world, and this is what really sparks off the interest in Raffles. Raffles is absolutely linked to Singapore in the minds of people. (Byramji 1978, 15)

158  Ying-kit Chan This is why the producers decided to stage the world premiere of the musical in Singapore rather than in Britain or elsewhere. The closing sequence of the play, which featured Raffles posing atop a pedestal just like the statue in front of Victoria Theatre, could be read as a tribute to the PAP’s portrayal of Raffles as a man who stood dramatically above Singapore with his vision (Chan 1979, 19). As the local media suggested, “It was [still] the show 160 years ago that made the real impact, proving for all time that fact is stronger than fiction.”20 While the musical had been a resounding success in its two-week run in Singapore, it was a flop in Hong Kong, with critics attributing Singaporeans’ reaction to mere loyalty: “The final scene with Raffles in his familiar pose, which impressed many Singaporeans in its likeness to the statue, was dismissed [by the Hong Kong people].”21 The producers of Raffles did not help matters when they said, in response to their critics in Hong Kong, that the musical was made for people, not critics.22 Notwithstanding the discussion on the artistry and production standards of the musical, the warm reception by Singaporeans suggests that many of them had begun to internalize the official narrative about Raffles being the founder of modern Singapore. That said, the PAP government continued to face occasional backlash from members of the public for its supposed Anglophilic tendencies. In response, Member of Parliament C.V. Devan Nair, who would become president, said that it would be foolish for anyone in the PAP to denounce Britain and all things British. “We in Singapore continue to draw heavily on our British heritage,” he suggested, “[and] many of our key institutions are modelled after the British” (Nair 1981, 15). “We have never been guilty of xenophobia in dealing with our British past,” he continued, “[and] the statue of Sir Stamford Raffles continues to gaze benignly on the busy traffic in the heart of the city he founded” (Nair 1981, 15). For Nair, the Raffles statue was a symbol of Singapore’s enduring links with the British, who offered generous assistance during the tumultuous days following the separation from Malaysia and the withdrawal of British bases (Nair 1981, 15). But perhaps the most serious charge came from the now-illegal Singapore People’s Liberation Organisation (SPLO), a small Islamic group that would be disbanded and whose members would be arrested in 1982 for possession of subversive materials. Believing that Muslims had been mistreated in Singapore, the SPLO circulated a pamphlet claiming that the PAP government had suppressed Malay culture and language. The pamphlet also called for Muslims in Singapore to topple the “PAP fascists” because the latter had “prohibited students from knowing that Singapore belongs to the Malays and that Singapore was handed over to Stamford Raffles by the Temmengong in 1819.”23 To prove its point, the SPLO called attention to the Raffles statue: “Go to Empress Place and look at the statue of British colonialist Stamford Raffles trampling on the Sultan’s agreement. The PAP fascists have left it there as a symbol of insult to the Malay sultanate and the Malays.”24 The SPLO sought money and manpower from Vietnam through the Vietnamese embassy in Jakarta to overthrow the PAP government, but Hanoi rejected its request. Why the SPLO did not seek help from nearby Muslim nations such as Indonesia remains unclear. But the fact that it requested aid from Vietnam, a communist nation that Singapore deemed to harbor expansionist ambitions in

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  159 the region (Ang 2013), raised a red flag, and the PAP government acted swiftly to arrest SPLO members under the Internal Security Act. This same act would be invoked again to detain allegedly Marxist dissidents in the so-called 1987 Marxist Conspiracy (Barr 2010, 335–62). This sequence of events reveals, in a somewhat circuitous way perhaps, the continuing spectre of communism in Singapore two decades after independence. One may argue that, like its future handling of the Marxist Conspiracy, the PAP government was using the Marxist or communist label – it never made an attempt to distinguish between the two ideologies – to suppress what was even more unsayable in the geopolitically and socially sensitive context of Singapore – religion. Arresting or prosecuting someone for being a communist or Marxist rather than for being religiously motivated to conduct subversive activities seemed more acceptable to the PAP and Singaporeans, even if elements of the latter were proven to exist. In the context of the Cold War, the communist-Marxist label was credible and intelligible to Singaporeans; it also pointed to the salience and usefulness of the PAP government’s portrayal of the Cold War, in binary terms, as a struggle for global hegemony between the Soviet Union and the United States. The boundary drawn between the two polarities made for simple dissemination among Singaporeans, who were of a diverse cultural, ethnic, and religious composition. As when taking to task PAP’s early adversaries, such as one of its own co-founders Lin Chin Siong (1933–1996) (Tan and Jomo 2001), using the communist label on the SPLO was more convenient than expedient. Although the PAP began as an anti-colonial and socialist party, it became more ideologically aligned with the ideas – or imperatives – of market capitalism of erstwhile colonial powers as it sought the United States to be its new patron, this time as an independent nation. Inflating domestic tensions by depicting them as by-products of a broader global conflict lent credence to the official narrative that Singapore had always been vulnerable geopolitically and must always remain vigilant to even slight changes in global power dynamics for its own survival – under PAP leadership, this would always be possible. And because “even the communists have kept buildings of old,” S. Rajaratnam warned, Singapore should not throw the Raffles statue into the Singapore River or rename streets simply because they were reminders of a colonial past.25

Standing after the Cold War By the 1980s, it was clear that Singapore had benefited from its undeclared alignment with Britain and the United States. As historian Wen-Qing Ngoei suggests, Britain had cultivated, in both its own colonies and the Southeast Asian region, pro-West nationalism that enabled the founding of anti-communist nations. The United States would, on that basis, form a geostrategic arc of states that contained Vietnam and encircled China (Ngoei 2019). Despite the PAP’s repeated claims of non-alignment, then, the Cold War made Singapore a neocolonial nation in which Britain and the United States had vested interests during the Cold War. With Britain pumping in millions of dollars annually to maintain its military installations

160  Ying-kit Chan in Singapore until 1971 and the United States paying Singapore for supplies and refined petrol during the Vietnam War, Singapore enjoyed an early boost to its economy, which entered a phase of rapid development after the war, thanks to substantial American, European, and Japanese investments. Coupled with the fact that PAP leaders had relied on foreign experts such as Winsemius for ideas and corporate networks in building the nation and making Raffles’s vision of a portcity Singapore a reality, the prevalent belief among Singaporeans that domestic PAP policies singlehandedly transformed Singapore “from Third World to First” should be considered with nuance if not with scepticism (Loh 2015, 575–94; Loh 2016, 684–710). As Singapore became a more developed economy and a more affluent society, the PAP government was assured of its control of the nation. That Lim Chin Siong and some others were allowed to return to Singapore indicated the confidence of the PAP, which nonetheless continued, as mentioned earlier, to label selected opponents as communist as it deemed fit. With the de facto elimination of the so-called communist threat, which was associated with Chinese-educated ethnic Chinese intellectuals, merchants, and ordinary citizens in Singapore, the PAP government also decided to highlight the contributions of the immigrant Chinese population of colonial times to the creation of modern Singapore. No longer seen as anti-national as per the early years of independence, Chinese culture and history became a showpiece of Singapore’s multiculturalism, or multiracialism, and a PAP instrument of social control after the Cold War.26 With initiatives taken to give prominence to the political history of post-war Singapore (although the PAP’s adversaries remained “communists”) and to the Asian Values and Shared Values discourse, Singapore seemed prepared to tap into the vast market of China, which was then opening its economy to foreign investors after its turbulent political infighting during the Cultural Revolution. In tandem with these trends, the dilapidated Sun Yat Sen Villa, where the eponymous founding father of the Republic of China had stayed, was restored as a “cultural shrine for all ethnic Chinese Singaporeans” (Huang and Hong 2004, 65). At around the same time, Chinatown, where an older generation of Chinese had lived and worked, was also refurbished and refashioned as a site of heritage tourism and an integral component of Singapore’s multiculturalism (Yeoh and Kong 2012, 117–59). In Singapore, the domestic Cold War ended at approximately the same time as the global Cold War, when it revised diplomatic relations from the Republic of China to the People’s Republic of China in October 1990. Because recounting perceptions of the Raffles statue among Singaporeans from the end of the Cold War to the present would read like a laundry list of repetitive actions and speeches, this section jumps forward to 2019, the bicentennial of Raffles’s landing on Singapore, as its period of study, illustrating what may be the most representative year for public debates surrounding the significance of the Raffles statue in Singapore. State preparations for celebrating the bicentennial took place as early as a year earlier, so some articles and opinion pieces originating in 2018 will be discussed as well. The post-Cold War era became a post-Lee Kuan Yew era after Lee, a symbolic figure of independence and prosperity, passed away in 2015. Recognized as

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  161 a (or the) founder of independent Singapore by Singaporeans, Lee had become Raffles’s strongest contender for “founder” status in Singapore, as revealed by the debates on the Raffles statue taking place in the period of 2018–2019. But the difference between Lee and Raffles should not be overstated. While Raffles’s genius lay in identifying the role Singapore could play because of its strategic location on the major trade routes of Asia, Lee’s acumen lay in understanding the role a middleman could play (Tripathi 2018). By extension, while Lee was a mentor to the Singaporean nation (he had served as “Minister Mentor”), Raffles was a sort of “spiritual mentor” to Lee, which downplayed the significance of 1965, the year when Singapore gained independence. In a thought-provoking commentary, historian Tan Tai Yong suggested that the bicentennial anniversary could be an opportunity for Singaporeans to reflect on their history, on the condition that it was sensitively shaped as an inclusive process. He noticed that compared with the Golden Jubilee in 2015, when Singapore celebrated its 50th year as an independent nation, plans to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Singapore’s founding by Raffles were met with greater ambivalence by ordinary citizens. (In fact, the government had refrained from calling it a “celebration” for fear of stoking anti-colonial and nationalistic sentiments – a testament to the success of nation-building in Singapore.) In any case, those supporting the anniversary subscribed to the official narrative that Raffles transformed Singapore from an obscure regional trading post to an internationally connected colonial port city. But despite decades of national education, this viewpoint was still not endorsed universally. According to Tan, many asked why Singapore should celebrate 200 years of colonial exploitation and subjugation. They rejected 1819 as a historical starting point because it would imply that Singapore had no history before the British arrival, excising at least five centuries of history from Singaporean consciousness. In response to concerns about a monolithic, state-driven narrative, the Singapore Bicentennial Office, to which Tan served as an academic adviser, emphasized that the anniversary was not intended to “celebrate the glories of colonialism through rose-tinted interpretations of the history of the past two hundred years” and that 1819 was “a mere pivot in a much longer storyline” (Tan 2018). The office’s stance echoed what Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had mentioned as early as 2017, that the government would “appropriately” commemorate Raffles’s landing, which had paved the way for “migrants from China, India, and other countries . . . to seek better lives [and eventually settle] in Singapore” (Mokhtar 2017). The emphasis would thus fall on the development of Singapore into a prosperous and multicultural or multiracial nation rather than on the moment of founding by Raffles. In addition to recognizing significant milestones other than Raffles’s landing or founding in the nation’s development, the Singapore Bicentennial Office surprised Singaporeans December 29, 2018–January 3, 2019 with a commissioned optical illusion created on the Raffles statue along the Singapore River. Instead of its white exterior, the statue was given a painted coat of stripes, forming the impression of it fading into one of the skyscrapers in the background. As the

162  Ying-kit Chan office explained, the illusion was intended to be “an opportunity to engage Singaporeans in an open dialogue on the arrival of the British and the contributions of those who came before and after” (Teo 2019). The temporary installation managed to capture a degree of public attention. While some Singaporeans considered it vandalism, others accepted it as indeed an invitation to ponder Singapore’s history.27 But it is perhaps what was not said that is intriguing. That Raffles was allowed to disappear, even for a short time, meant that he, or whatever he entailed, had to blend in or risk erasure from the national landscape. The people might be the barometer of opinion, but the government was the final arbiter of change. The day after the statue returned to normal, on January 4, 2019, four new sculptures joined it along the Singapore River for the bicentennial anniversary. The statues of Sang Nila Utama (Malay), Tan Tock Seng (Chinese), Munshi Abdullah (Malay), and Naraina Pillai (Indian) were unveiled in recognition of the ethnically diverse communities that had shaped Singapore. With these new statues, the Bicentennial Office acknowledged “a wider cast of characters that arrived on Singapore’s shores in 1819 and before,” even though, as it quickly admitted, they represented only a fraction of people who had contributed to Singapore.28 Although this was also a temporary installation lasting approximately a week, the Raffles statue was submerged and hidden from plain sight by the new towering effigies, marking yet another of its “disappearances” from the urban – and sociopolitical – landscape of Singapore. For a post–Cold War Singapore, the Raffles statue is no longer an important economic and geopolitical asset. Even its ability to generate tourist dollars has diminished, given the emergence of more attractive sites scattered across the island over the past decades. For a post-Lee Singapore, too, with a nation proud of its own achievements and grateful to Lee Kuan Yew for steering it through the difficult years of independence, the status of Raffles as the founder of modern Singapore was once again being challenged. For the PAP government, then, the bicentennial of Raffles’s landing posed a dilemma. Not “celebrating” it would be an awkward silence to the official narrative of Singapore’s past that has been in force since independence. But celebrating it would expose the government to criticism that Singapore is trapped in a neocolonial phase and has not been truly, or mentally, decolonized. Holding low-key events such as temporary installations and emphasizing the contributions of the three official races of Chinese, Malay, and Indian thus became the government’s preferred and “safe” strategy to commemorating Raffles’s landing on Singapore. Some Singaporeans, while not entirely ambivalent, professed to understand the government’s position and encouraged their compatriots to celebrate the bicentennial out of respect for Lee Kuan Yew, who had “wisely avoided the virulent brand of anti-colonialism [and] had no desire to rewrite the past by renaming streets or removing monuments” (Loke 2019). Such thinking did not posit it in opposition to the remembrance of Raffles, unlike that of anti-colonial critics who saw the two as mutually exclusive. However, that interest groups lamented the absence of women among the four new ethnically diverse effigies showed that officials had failed to please everyone (Wong 2019). Still, as foreign observers suggested, the government had tried its

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  163 best to offend as few sensibilities as possible in its commemoration of Raffles’s landing. With the bicentennial commemoration, the official narrative changed. It now says that the nation’s past spans 700 years and Raffles was merely one of several personalities from that past (Boh 2019). To call the events of 2019 a bicentennial commemoration would thus be a misnomer. The inclusion of Sang Nila Utama, a prince from Palembang who arrived on Singapore in 1299 in the official narrative, suggests that 1819 is only one of several crucial turning points in the history of Singapore. Moreover, as Tan Tai Yong has suggested, the PAP’s fear that a more contentious or divisive history would undermine nation building has been much reduced today, and it is now more willing to see Singapore as a part of Southeast Asia, which, like China, “will have tremendous impact on [Singapore’s] wellbeing” (Boh 2019). As a result, Singapore now celebrates only its independence and only commemorates its colonial past. Although the Singapore Bicentennial Office was careful to avoid glorifying colonialism and to offer a nuanced perspective on history that encompassed the precolonial period as well, the irony was that much of the public debate, while featuring new attempts to reconsider Raffles’s legacy, was still focused more on Raffles than on other personalities. For some Singaporeans, this debate should not have existed in the first place, and the office should not have equivocated on whether or not Raffles was worth condemning. According to historian Siew-Min Sai, the organizers, by adopting a limited and simplistic meaning of critiquing Raffles without considering the issue of European imperialism in Southeast Asia, did not provide an adequate context to Raffles’s deeds. They appeared to have glossed over Raffles’s acts of violence in Java and exploitation of a succession dispute between Malay rulers to establish a trading post in Singapore. The use of “modern” to describe post-1819 Singapore was also problematic because it already framed the debate as one of a European-led economic modernity versus a period of languor under Malay rule – what if precolonial Singapore was already modern? For Sai, then, the bicentennial remained more a celebration than a commemoration (Bowie 2019). In his “verdict” on the British legacy, esteemed Singaporean diplomat Tommy Koh described British rule as “60 percent good and 40 percent bad.” According to him, while the British were racists who promoted opium smoking and curtailed human rights in colonial Singapore, they left the English language, the free port, free trade, open economy, good infrastructure, the rule of law, a good civil service and police force, town planning, public hygiene and modern medicine, a belief in science and modernity, and an appreciation of nature and natural history (Koh 2019). He credited the PAP government for taking the “brave step of accepting our colonial past and building on the British legacy,” unlike many former British colonies that have remained “stuck in the Third World” (Koh 2019). His wish – for Singapore to continue building on the positive attributes of colonial rule – characterized the new PAP approach to the British legacy. This new approach was to laud the things that can be related to Singapore’s prosperity, while downplaying or explaining away those that defy contemporary expectations of self-determination

164  Ying-kit Chan and human rights, even though the illiberal PAP government continues to restrict protest and free speech. To be sure, S. Rajaratnam did talk about colonial rule being oppressive, but mentioning it in passing and then explaining how the pros of colonialism outweigh the cons in the longue durée approach to Singapore’s history has become a key feature in the new official narrative. The apparent unwillingness to dismiss the British legacy entirely may have stemmed from the fact that the British not only left the institutions that helped actualize Singapore’s economic success but also laid the foundation for the PAP’s decades-long rule. The “rule of law” inherited by the PAP not only aligned Singapore with British interests but also silenced political opposition to the PAP both during and after the Cold War. As historian Thum Ping Tjin has suggested, “Independent Singapore is to a great extent governed with the same flawed and prejudiced values held by British colonial officials in Singapore” (Thum 2017). Raffles thus constitutes an integral part of the PAP’s mythmaking mechanism that commemorates colonial rule in name but celebrates its own governance in practice. Perhaps it was what was not reported in the local Singaporean media that was most scathing in its treatment of the British heritage. In response to the bicentennial, Singaporean artist Jimmy Ong wanted Singaporeans to delve even deeper into Raffles’s legacy. In naming the series Raffuse Bins, Ong used a near-homonymic, tongue-in-cheek pun to compare Raffles to refuse and refused to accord Raffles the honour that he usually receives in Singapore as a gentleman-hero. He ­created sculptures of Raffles quite unlike the ones that stand in Singapore’s cultural memory. Decapitated and missing their feet, each of Ong’s three Raffles effigies was a functional bin, designed for collecting empty cans. A can could be inserted through the hole at the neck, whereupon it would fall through the hollow of the body and collect at the bottom of the sculpture. Ong invited Singaporeans to ­consider how Raffles has been a means of branding on a national scale. He insinuated that Raffles occupies a hallowed space in Singapore’s national narrative – is this mythmaking function more useful than a recycling bin? All three effigies in Ong’s series were hollow inside, holding whatever Singaporeans wanted them to hold, just as the symbol of Raffles may be made to conform to whatever national narrative the state desires.29 In the past, Raffles was associated with anti-communism; in the present, he is associated only with colonialism. There remains little middle ground on which to stand, and rather than bind Singaporeans together, the Raffles statue ironically fractures them.

Conclusion On May 25, 2020, an African-American man named George Floyd was killed by police during an arrest in Minneapolis, US, leading to Black Lives Matter protests across the world. It also set off a frenzy of statue removal in Europe and North America, where effigies associated with colonialism, racism, slavery, and white privilege were damaged, toppled, and/or thrown into the river by angry protesters. The symbolism of statues is unmistakable – they are unanimously assumed to symbolize something positive or worthy of commemoration or even celebration

“Let Raffles stand where he stands today”  165 and must be removed to ward off their positiveness. But as Scotland’s first black professor Sir Geoff Palmer suggests, removing statues and overcoming racism are two different matters. He argues against the demolition of statues, which may result in public ignorance of atrocities of the past: “I feel that if you remove the evidence you remove the deed. That’s what I’m worried about – removing and altering the past” (Peterkin 2020). For the protesters, however, representation appears as important as actual change – for now, at least. This chapter addresses a long-neglected aspect of the nation-building project in Singapore: the role of statues. Experts on Singapore have examined the economic, political, social, and urban aspects of change in the country, but by overlooking the statues, they have ignored a cornerstone of the PAP’s legitimacy fostered during the Cold War. On Winsemius’s advice, the PAP government not only kept the Raffles statue but also justified why it was allowed to continue standing in an independent, postcolonial country. Ordinary Singaporeans and foreign tourists are entertained by the statue and its various artistic guises, debating about state intentions and Raffles’s increasingly problematic legacy in postCold War Singapore. The Raffles statue is clearly not an idol in the religious sense, but it is also more than a mere medium of heritage or memories. The statue symbolizes Singapore’s relationship – or collaboration – with its former colonial master in the Western bloc and helps establish and sustain a bond of mutual obligation. The Raffles statue, more than other eponymous buildings, monuments, and sites in Singapore, weaves the client and its patron(s) together in an evolving world order. In 1944, Indonesian freedom fighters tore down the statue of Jan Pieterszoon Coen (1587–1629), the founder of Batavia (Jakarta), the capital of the Dutch East Indies. It was this very event, which took place in Jakarta, that prompted Winsemius to urge his PAP advisees to retain the Raffles statue. In 2011, a group of Dutch citizens petitioned the authorities of Hoorn, Coen’s hometown and the location of another statue, erected in 1887 on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of his birth, to have the statue removed because they considered him responsible for genocide. After much discussion, the local authorities decided to leave the statue in place but replace the old panegyric with a new plaque describing Coen as follows: Coen was praised as a vigorous and visionary administrator. But he was also criticized for the violent means by which he built up trade monopolies in the East Indies. . . . Thousands of [people] lost their lives. . . . The statue is controversial. According to critics, Coen’s violent mercantilism in the East Indian archipelago does not deserve to be honoured. (Johnson 2014, 583–598). Will the Coen statue fall as the Dutch reexamine their past in the current global wave of anti-racism (Newmark 2020)? Will the Raffles statue in Singapore, at the very least, come to bear an inscription on its pedestal that suggests the contentious nature of its standing?

166  Ying-kit Chan

Notes 1 The EPTA would merge with the United Nations Special Fund in 1966 to become the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). 2 There are two statues, one at Empress Place outside the Victoria Theatre, and the other at Raffles’s landing site, allegedly on the north bank of the Singapore River. The statue outside Victoria Theatre is more prominent than the one along the Singapore River and is the one to which Winsemius refers. Unless otherwise stated, this article discusses the Raffles statue in front of the Victoria Theatre. 3 Winsemius’s advice included building a first-rate international airport, setting up statutory boards to promote trade, and keeping taxes competitive to attract and retain foreign investments. 4 “The Singapore Government” 1967, 12. 5 Historian Pierre Nora coined the concept of lieux de mémoire, which refers to “any significant entity, whether material or non-material in nature, which by dint of human will or the work of time has become a symbolic element of the memorial heritage of any community.” See Nora (1996, xvii). 6 Brunei chose not to join the federation. 7 It is perhaps not a mere coincidence that much of this literature appeared in the beginning of the 21st century, when Singapore became a truly affluent society and developed economy – the more prosperous it is, the more global it is perceived to be. See (Hack, Margolin, and Delaye 2010; Heng and Aljunied 2011; Tan 2017). 8 For the transformation – or expansion – of Singapore from a colonial city into a citystate beyond the central district, see (Yeoh 1996; Chua 1997; Dale 1999; Kong and Yeoh 2003). 9 Examples are (Heng 2009; Kwa, Heng, and Tan 2009; Miksic 2013). 10 “Raffles” 1969, 5. 11 “Statue of Raffles Smeared with Paint” 1970, 11. 12 “Marble Replica to Mark Landing of Raffles” 1971, 9. 13 “A Complete Change in the Republic” 1971, 9. 14 “Raffles, Man of Genius” 1972, 2. 15 “Tourist Industry” 1972, 4. 16 “Raffles Gets the Finishing Touches” 1972, 15. 17 “ ‘Do Not Forget Your Past’ Call by Dr. Yeoh” 1972, 28. 18 “Welcome to Singapore, Your Majesty” 1972, 8. 19 Ibid., 8. 20 “When a New Raffles Met” 1979, 21. 21 “Raffles Never Left Pedestal” 1979, 8. 22 Ibid., 8. 23 “The False Claims Made in the Pamphlet” 1982, 8. 24 Ibid., 8. 25 “When Demolition is Vandalism” 1984, 13. 26 Huang and Hong (2004, 66). See also Chua (1998, 186–205, 2003, 58–77). 27 “Singapore Bicentennial Office” 2019. 28 “Sang Nila Utama” 2019. 29 “Singapore: The Artist” 2019; (Lim 2019).

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Index

Air Hostess 139, 140, 145 Algerian War 55 – 7 allocation 68, 72, 82 – 4 architecture: authoritarian/ authoritarianism 24, 25, 28 – 30, 33, 34; Bauhaus 20, 23, 26, 27, 30, 35; International Style/internationalism 19 – 21, 28, 30; Modernism/Modern Movement 19 – 21, 23 – 5, 27 – 35; national (German) style 20, 21, 23, 24, 27 – 9, 35; socialist classicism 23, 24; Stalinist 23 – 9, 34 axis (spatial design) 24, 25, 29, 32 – 5

Delouvrier, Paul 42, 43, 44, 45, 49, 50 democratization 101 – 2, 108, 113, 115 – 17 demonstration 52 – 61

Berlin 2 Berlin of the East 88 – 90, 97 – 8, 98n1; see also Hong Kong biological warfare 121 – 2, 124 – 7

gender 14, 16 Grantham, Alexander 88 – 90, 98n3 Great Wall 137 – 8, 140, 142, 146n3, 146n8 Green Swan Nightclub 140 – 1 Guangzhou 67 – 9, 71 – 80, 82 – 4; see also Canton

Canton 73, 76, 78; see also Guangzhou capitalism 69, 76, 78, 84 Cathay 136 – 40, 146; see also MP&GI Champs-Elysées 54, 58, 61 Chiang Kai-shek 106, 110, 111 – 12 Chinese in Southeast Asia 68, 70 – 2, 74 chronopolitics 150 cityscape 4 – 5 civil war 102 – 4, 108 – 9, 112 Cold War: Cold War cities 2 – 3; cultural Cold War 21, 23, 32, 35; memory 130 – 1; overview 1 – 3, 52 – 5 colonial 101 – 4, 109, 115 – 16, 118 colonialism 148 – 70 Cultural Revolution 136, 146n1 Debré, Michel 42, 49 decolonization 48 de Gaulle, Charles 38, 42, 44, 45, 46

European Economic Community (EEC) 45 exile 103, 104, 108, 112 fallen woman 138 – 43, 145, 146n14 farmers 59 – 60 femme fatale 138 – 42 flak 10, 11, 13 France 52 – 61 frontier 68, 72, 76, 78, 84

Hong Kong 68, 72 – 8, 80 – 3, 88 – 98 housing 19 – 22, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31, 35 Indonesia 149, 153, 157, 165 Jian Youwen 92, 94 – 6 Jinan University 68, 72, 75 – 8, 80 – 4 Joyce and Deli 141 – 2, 144 Korean War 122 – 4 Koselleck, Reinhart 101 – 2, 118 Kuomintang (KMT) 101, 102 – 8, 110 – 12, 116 – 17 Le Corbusier 39, 48 Lee, Kuan Yew 148 – 9, 151 – 6, 162

172 Index liminality 67 – 9, 72, 74, 78, 80, 83, 84; of situation 68, 79 – 80, 82 – 4; of space 68, 72, 74, 82 – 4; of status 68, 79 – 80, 82 – 4 London 39, 41, 43, 48 Macao 68, 73, 75 – 6, 78, 80 – 3 Mambo Girl 138 – 9, 140, 143, 145 May 1968 58 – 9 Meiji Japan 110, 113 – 16 Memorial Collection of the Song Emperor’s Terrace 95 – 7 Memorial Garden of the Song Emperor’s Terrace 91 – 3 Memorial Tablet of the Song Emperor’s Terrace 94 – 5 memory 101, 102, 111 military 103, 106, 107, 110 – 12, 116 – 17 modernity 135 – 40, 145 modern woman 140, 145, 147; see also modern womanhood modern womanhood 136 – 8, 140, 142, 145; see also modern woman monument 102, 106, 109 MP&GI 137, 146n4 nationalism 101, 110, 113 NATO 46 Nazi ideologies in planning 23, 28 – 30, 34 Needham, Joseph 126 Nora, Pierre 101 – 2, 118 overseas Chinese 68 – 71, 74 – 6, 78 – 81, 83 – 4 Paris 38 – 48, 52 – 61 Phoenix 137, 140, 142, 146n3 planning 19, 21 – 3, 25, 27 – 9, 31 police 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 53 – 61 prostitution 14 public health 122 public space 52 – 61 question of the people 88 – 99 Raffles 148 – 70 Rajaratnam, S. 150, 154 – 6, 159, 164 rape(s) 9, 12, 13 re-education 72, 74, 76, 78 – 81, 84 refugee camps 30, 34

refugees see question of the people Rendezvous 140 rent boys 13, 14, 15 République 52 – 61 returnees (guiqiao) 67 – 72, 74 – 6, 78 – 84 return policies 67 – 8, 70, 82 rubble 9, 10, 13, 14, 15 Sassen, Saskia 41, 49 Shaw 137, 146n4, 146n6, 146n7 Shaw Brothers 136 – 7, 146n4; see also Shaw socialism 69, 74, 76 – 8 Song Emperor’s Terrace 90 – 8 Song Wang Tai see Song Emperor’s Terrace statues 148 – 70 student returnees (guiqiao xuesheng) 67 – 71, 75, 80 – 4 students 58 – 9, 61 Sung Wong Toi see Song Emperor’s Terrace Sunrise 140 – 1 symbolic 101 – 3, 105, 109, 110, 112 – 13, 115 – 16 trade Unions 56 – 9, 61 UNESCO 46 Universal Declaration of Human Rights 46 Unmarried Mother, The 143, 144 Van Gennep, Arnold 68, 72, 74, 78, 84 vice 14 violence 53 – 61 Volkssturm 12, 14 war crimes 122 – 30; in European and American imagination 127 – 30; in Korea 122 – 3; in Second World War 125 – 7 Washington, D.C. 41 Wedding Night, The 143 – 5 welfare. 10, 11, 13, 16 Widow’s Tears, A 143, 144, 145 Winsemius, Albert 148 – 9, 153, 160, 165 Zhao Clansmen Association 91, 96