From War to Nation-State? China and the Decolonisation of Asia after the Second World War

Tommy Yui Chim Lo is Hallsworth Research Fellow in Chinese Political Economy at the University of Manchester. He is writing a book on how in the 1940s China shaped Asia after the Second World War. His current project examines how early twentieth-century China developed its policies on emigration control, and how they shaped or were shaped by the global debates on migration, border control, and race. 

For more information, see https://research.manchester.ac.uk/en/persons/yui-chim-lo/

We know much about how Euro-American powers during the Second World War planned for post-war Europe and the world. However, we know far less about how Asian nations imagined the post-war order for Asia and beyond. This paper examines how China’s Nationalist government dealt with the post-war future of Asian colonies, using India, Indonesia, and Korea as cases. Unlike elites in many other decolonising nations, the Chinese Nationalists were less keen to call for the immediate independence of Asian colonies. China wanted to be not just a champion of colonised nations but also a working partner of the Allied great powers (except the Soviet Union). Also, concerns about the interests of Chinese migrants in migrant-receiving societies like Indonesia were an overlooked but important reason why China avoid alienating European empires when dealing with the demands for independence.