Chinese Studies in History

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The Social Consequences of the May Fourth

Movement
The Establishment of Women's Property Rights

Li Changli

To cite this article: Li Changli (2010) The Social Consequences of the May Fourth Movement,
Chinese Studies in History, 43:4, 20-42, DOI: 10.2753/CSH0009-4633430402

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.2753/CSH0009-4633430402

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Chinese Studies in History vol. 43, no. 4, Summer 2010, pp. 20–42.
© 2010 M.E. Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved.
ISSN 0009–4633/2010 $9.50 + 0.00.
DOI 10.2753/CSH0009-4633430402

Li Changli

The Social Consequences of the May

Fourth Movement
The Establishment of Women’s Property Rights

Abstract: The May Fourth movement gave rise to discourses on women’s liberation.
Yet whether the idea of gender equality indeed improved women’s real lives remains
an open question. This study seeks to offer a case study of women’s property rights in
the era. It shows that from the late Qing, Chinese women began to be given certain
legal rights, including owning property. Thanks to the rise of the feminist movement
in the May Fourth era, gender equality became well received by the public, which
eventually resulted in the bill passed by the congress controlled by the Guomindang
in the late 1920s guaranteeing women’s property rights. Nonetheless, for a long
time after its implementation, Chinese women were still prevented from owning
property in many parts of the country. The passing of the bill thus seemed to be
anachronistic, even though it was a significant historical event.

The May Fourth New Culture movement emerged during the period of rapid social
transformation in the late Qing dynasty and early Republican era; it attempted
to resolve the problem of reconstructing culture, promote democracy, science,
and other core values and ideas that represented social progress, and establish a
foundation for modern Chinese culture; the movement defines its era. However,
the reconstruction of a culture is not an intellectual issue, but rather the process of
implementing ideas as social reality. Were the values and ideas promoted during
the May Fourth movement a reality in that contemporary Chinese society? Were
they put into practice? Many people of the time had doubts. Today, ninety years

English translation © 2010 M.E. Sharpe, Inc., from the Chinese text: Li Changli, “Wusi de
shehui houguo: Funü caichangquan de queli.” Translated by Carissa Fletcher.
Li Changli is a research fellow at the Institute of Modern History, Chinese Academy of
Social Sciences, Beijing.
20
 summer 2010  21

later, China has again entered a period of social transformation, and we again face
the task of reconstructing our culture; reviewing the May Fourth movement is thus
the logical starting point for reflections on our culture. In recent years, some have
asked whether the cultural issues raised during the May Fourth movement were
overly radical and avant-garde, detached from China’s reality and therefore subject
to abuses. Although these challenges stem from different sources, they highlight
the issue of how to manage the relationship between ideas and practice, the ideal
and the real during the process of reconstructing a culture, and are worth serious
consideration. This review of the May Fourth movement is not merely a theoretical
examination of cultural ideas and abstract concepts, but rather an investigation of
the practical effects that the core values and ideas of the May Fourth movement
had on contemporary society, and the practical role that these ideas played in social
reform and progress.
The May Fourth period gave rise to numerous cultural issues, which operated
on different levels of Chinese society. In a rising trend of feminism, many ardently
discussed the issues of “gender equality,” “equal rights,” and “women’s liberation.”
Through the ideologically enlightening effect of the May Fourth movement, the
concepts of “gender equality” and “equal rights” achieved a place in mainstream
public discourse; these ideas stimulated a group of women to awaken and launch
a women’s rights movement that struggled for equal social rights with men. Later
historians have already amply researched and confirmed the enlightening signifi-
cance of the May Fourth concept of “gender equality” during the thought revolution
and identified the core practices and activities of the women who participated in the
women’s rights movement. However, as a social concept, “gender equality” cannot
truly put down roots in society and become a living moral principle that is part of
people’s social reality until it has become a concrete practice in women’s real lives
and evolved into the behavioral norm and moral standard of people’s everyday lives.
Therefore, it is necessary to investigate whether the concept of “gender equality”
was implemented in society, how it was implemented, its concrete effects, and how
it influenced women’s real lives.
The idea of “gender equality” is embodied in the issue of “equal rights,” that
is, whether women had equal social rights with men in their practical lives, and
whether they possessed the minimum guarantees to live independently, that is, if
they had the right to own and control the materials required for existence, namely,
the right to own property. Therefore, the May Fourth women’s rights movement also
promoted the establishment of women’s property rights. Whether women possessed
equal property rights with men can also act as an important indicator to measure
the practical effects and realized extent of the concepts of “gender equality” and
“equal rights.” Women’s property rights are manifested in two ways: one is through
the practical condition of their real lives, expressed through social customs and
habits; the second is through a country’s legal system, which embodies the will of
the ruler and the trends of public society. The two are related, yet different. While
customs form the foundation of law, they are also regulated by the law. Law, which
22 chinese studies in history

is both mandatory and normative, draws its support from sovereign power and
represents the ascendant concepts informing society; through the use of force, or
by guiding and standardizing people’s behavior, the law plays a dominant, leading
role in society. Therefore, examining the evolution of women’s legal property rights
before and after the May Fourth movement is one way to investigate the practical
effects of the May Fourth concept of equal rights.
Since the women’s rights movement began in the early twentieth century, the is-
sue of women’s economic rights and interests has occasioned profound thought and
discussion; during the period from the early years of the Republic to the May Fourth
era, the issue of women’s rights was central to public discourse, and numerous es-
says were published on the topic.1 However, those that directly addressed women’s
economic rights and interests focused primarily on the issue of women’s right to
employment, and few addressed the issue of women’s property rights. Not until the
New Culture movement was launched did the struggle for women’s property rights
finally gain public attention as the women’s rights movement began to escalate. During
this period, scholars also began to conduct fairly specialized research on the issue of
women’s legal status and benefits. One example is Zhao Fengjie’s Chinese Women’s
Legal Status (Zhongguo funü zai falü shang zhi diwei), published in 1928, which
conducted a relatively focused and systematic investigation into several aspects of
women’s historical legal status, including women’s inheritance rights and, to some
extent, their property rights; however, the work was decentralized, imprecise, and
unmethodical, and omitted several important developments in recent history, such as
the law revisions carried out in the late Qing dynasty.2 In recent years, research on the
history of Chinese women has expanded, though specialized research on the evolu-
tion of women’s property rights is still sparse: most works in this field are treatises
on legal history or women’s history, which only vaguely address women’s property
rights; very few specifically focus on the latter issue. The newly published Women and
Property in China: 960–1949,3 by American scholar Kathryn Bernhardt, represents
the most focused and penetrating treatise on this topic; it consists of a monographic
study of women’s property rights under traditional Chinese law and under the new
civil code of the Republic. Bernhardt offers several valuable new conclusions: for
instance, she points out that, although the new civil code of the Republican period
strengthened widows’ inheritance rights, it weakened their right to adopt an heir,
thus demonstrating the versatility with which women’s rights waxed and waned.
However, this book focuses solely on traditional laws and the new civil code of the
Republic and does not address the evolving conception of women’s property rights as
reflected by the several revised law codes drafted during the late Qing and the early
Republican periods. This article will investigate the evolution of women’s property
rights as manifested in the revisions made to traditional law codes in the late Qing
and during the Republican period, before and after the May Fourth movement; it will
also explore the role and social significance of the concept of “equal rights” promoted
during the May Fourth movement and examine how it was reflected in changes to
women’s legal property rights.
 summer 2010  23

Women’s Property Rights According to the Confucian Classics and

Previous Dynastic Law

Women’s struggle to gain property rights during the May Fourth period was
launched to redress women’s complete lack of such rights under traditional Chinese
social custom and previous dynastic law. That said, what property rights did women
have under traditional Chinese customs and laws?
The Confucian classics written during the pre-Qin period are not only records of
the society, customs, rites, and ethics of the time, but also the basis of the theories of
governance that informed Chinese rule from the Han dynasty to the Qing dynasty.
Although these classics lacked the significance of formal legal codes, they formed
the heart of the customs and mores that comprised the Confucian ethical code and
were the main theoretical basis for later laws drafted to handle civil affairs. Investi-
gations of the legal principles informing China’s traditional civil law therefore must
adopt the Confucian classics as a starting point. Given that the issue of women’s
property rights is a universal problem affecting all women (half of the population)
and affecting the daily life of every household, the Confucian classics do address
this issue, primarily through the Book of Rites (Liji), which records the system of
rites and customs that governed society during the Zhou dynasty.
The patriarchal clan family system (under which patrilineal families co-resided
and shared common property) had already taken shape during the Zhou dynasty;
on the basis of a small-scale farming economy, the clan had become the basic unit
of society and the economy. Women’s importance to the household rendered them
subject to the standards of the etiquette system. In the chapter “Pattern of the Fam-
ily” (Neize) in the Book of Rites, women’s obligations to the household and their
standards of behavior were clearly and comprehensively delineated.
Women’s property rights and other economic interests were primarily related to
their role and responsibilities in the family economy. In the patrilineal family, all
members of the household, young and old, men and women, were ranked according
to their role in supporting the family, as either senior or junior members; mutually
dependent, each member of the household had specific duties and responsibilities
to the household, regulated by a gendered division of labor. The principle of a
gendered division of labor and the idea that men and women are subject to differ-
ent standards of behavior pervade the Book of Rites. On the principle that men and
women must be trained to master different skills to suit their different roles and
responsibilities, the chapter “Pattern of the Family” enumerates men and women’s
respective duties at different stages in their lives:
At the age of seven, boys and girls did not occupy the same mat or eat together.
. . . At ten, (the boy) went to a master outside and stayed with him (even) over
the night. He learned the (different classes of) characters and calculation. . . .
At twenty, he was capped and first learned the (different classes of) ceremonies,
and might wear furs and silk. . . . At thirty, he had a wife and began to attend to
men’s affairs. . . . At forty, he was first appointed to office. . . . A girl at the age
24 chinese studies in history

of ten ceased to go out (from the women’s apartments). Her governess taught her
the arts of pleasing speech and manners, to be docile and obedient, to handle the
hempen fibers, to deal with the cocoons, to weave silks and form fillets, to learn
(all) women’s work, how to furnish garments, to watch the sacrifices, to supply
the liquors and sauces, to fill the various stands and dishes with pickles and brine,
and to assist in setting forth the appurtenances for the ceremonies. . . . At fifteen,
she assumed the hairpin; at twenty, she was married.4
The text here clearly differentiates between boys’ study of “men’s affairs” and girls’
study of “women’s work.” While boys left the household at age ten to study “men’s
affairs,” such as “characters and calculations,” etiquette, and the art of making a
living and becoming an official, at ten, girls were no longer allowed to casually
leave the household; they were supposed to stay in the house and study “women’s
work” under the tutelage of their mothers’ generation. Their work consisted of
spinning and weaving silk and hemp to make clothing, and preparing the food and
drink pertaining to sacrifices and ceremonies; after five years of studying these
basic skills, the girl became an adult.
“Women’s work” is comprised of women’s two basic responsibilities: to make
all the clothing required by the family in their daily lives and to prepare food. The
chapter “Meaning of the Marriage Ceremony” (Hunyi) in the Book of Rites describes
a woman’s responsibilities after marrying and joining her husband’s household as
“making cloth and silken fabrics, and maintaining a watchful care over the various
stores and depositories (of the household).” One can see that once a woman mar-
ried and joined her husband’s family, aside from her natural function of bearing
children, attending to the family’s wants in terms of clothing and food comprised
her main economic obligations. While men primarily bore the responsibility for
supporting the family and adding to its material wealth, women were chiefly
responsible for managing, processing, and manufacturing the materials required
for the family’s consumption of food and clothing; they therefore belonged to a
subordinate position in the family economy, though their labor was an important
component of the latter.
According to pre-Qin custom, women’s economic rights in the family were based
on the patriarchal clan system and the gendered division of labor in the household.
Under the patriarchal system, patrilineal families co-resided and shared common
property. Due to the practice of patrilocal exogamy, adult men were the successors
in the family lineage, while male heads of household were the clan representatives.
In addition, men were responsible for the important task of sustaining the family.
As the main force and deciding power in the family economy, men held a dominant
position in the household and therefore possessed the right to control the family’s
material wealth; on the other hand, women were responsible only for the secondary
and supportive economic tasks of preparing clothing and food for the family. The
gendered division of labor, according to which men were dominant and women
subordinate, determined their respective places in the economic structure of the
family, as well as their unequal rights to use and benefit from family property.
 summer 2010  25

Classical records from the pre-Qin period, such as the Book of Rites, provided the
following stipulations with regard to women’s property rights:
First, women could not own personal property. In the patrilineal family, all assets
and property were jointly owned by the family, though only the head of the house-
hold (who was, of course, male), as representative of the family, had the right to
control and dispose of these properties; his status as the head of household provided
him with proprietary rights over the family wealth. Within a given family, all fam-
ily members aside from the head of household were designated as “juniors”; these
young, low-ranking family members had no rights with regard to family property,
particularly women, who were in a subordinate economic position. “Pattern of the
Family” in the Book of Rites notes: “A son and his wife should have no private
goods, nor animals, nor vessels; they should not presume to borrow from, or give
anything to, another person.” That is, as a family member, a son and his wife (or
any others in that generation), being in a subordinate position under the command
of the head of the household, were not allowed to own any private property, could
not regard anything in the household as their personal belongings, and could not
manage family property without authorization; for instance, they could not lend
out or give away any family property or goods. Not only did the individual have
no right to possess or allocate common family property, women were explicitly
required to present their parents-in-law with any gifts they might have received,
including clothing or ornaments supplied for their personal use, as a donation to
the family’s common property. “Pattern of the Family” provides detailed regula-
tions on the matter:
If any one should give the wife an article of food or dress, a piece of cloth or
silk, a handkerchief for her girdle, an iris or orchid, she should receive and offer
it to her parents-in-law. If they accept it, she will be glad as if she were receiving
it afresh. If they return it to her, she should decline it, and if they do not allow
her to do so, she will take it as if it were a second gift and lay it by to wait till
they may want it.
Thus when a woman received a gift, she was required to not only present it to her
parents-in-law, but also display perfect happiness while doing so; even if her parents-
in-law returned it to her and allowed her to enjoy the use of it, as a daughter-in-law,
she was required to “lay it by to wait till they may want it,” preserving it for family
use in a time of scarcity. One can see that women could not exclusively possess
any personal possessions: all property and goods belonged jointly to the family.
That is, women possessed no property rights whatsoever within the family; only as
dependents of the family did they have the right to jointly own family properties.
Second, women had a certain right to benefit from family property. From the
classical records of the pre-Qin period we can see that, as family members and
dependents, women had a certain right to benefit from communal family property.
When a woman married into her husband’s family, she became a member of the
household; according to custom, husband and wife were regarded as one. Thus the
Book of Rites, in arranging the family hierarchy, often places married couples, such
26 chinese studies in history

as parents, parents-in-law, or sons and daughters-in-law, in the same hierarchical

rank within the clan, as seniors or juniors; in addition, a man and his wife’s status in
the household and their economic benefits were essentially the same. For instance,
when a woman lost her ability to labor in her old age, she still enjoyed the same
right to economic support as her husband. “Pattern of the Family” in the Book of
Rites notes: “While the parents are both alive, at their regular meals, morning and
evening, the (eldest) son and his wife will encourage them to eat everything, and
they will themselves eat what is left.” A son and daughter-in-law were required to
attend upon his parents’ daily meals, which namely provided his parents with the
right to be supported by the younger generation; here the father and mother are not
differentiated. In addition, upon the father’s decease, if the mother yet lives, her
son and daughter-in-law must continue to wait upon her everyday meals, as when
the father was alive. “Pattern of the Family” adds: “When the father is dead, and
the mother still alive, the eldest son should wait upon her at her meals, and he and
his wife will eat what is left as before.”
Here the text emphasizes that even if “the father is dead, and the mother still
alive,” the son and his wife must continue to wait upon the mother in her daily
meals, just as if the father were still alive. The text underlines a mother’s continuing
right to be supported by her son and his wife, even after the father’s death; yet one
might also conjecture that these added stipulations are required because, in reality,
a son and daughter-in-law might become slack in attending upon the mother fol-
lowing the death of the father. Reading between the lines, the text illustrates that,
although the father and mother possessed equal rights to be supported by their son
and daughter-in-law, the mother’s rights were somewhat weaker than the father’s,
and, to some extent, depended upon the father’s. That is, as a mother, a woman
had a right to be supported, but her right was weaker than a man’s, and naturally
strictly limited to what was required to sustain her. This is consistent with the fact
that, according to pre-Qin custom, the woman was secondary in the marital rela-
tionship, obedient to and dependent upon her husband; her economic rights were
thus correspondingly weaker than her husband’s.
In combing through the Book of Rites and other pre-Qin Confucian classics, we
can see that the traditional Confucian system of laws and custom provided several
principles to regulate women’s economic role and their properties:
• First, within the family economy, besides their basic function of bearing
children, women were also responsible for managing, processing, and
manufacturing goods such as clothes and food, in addition to other secondary
productive functions, namely “domestic matters”; consequently, they were a
secondary labor force in the family economy.
• Second, under the patrilineal system of coresidence and common property,
as subordinate members of the family, women were not allowed to own
personal property, including ornaments and other items of personal use.
 summer 2010  27

• Third, as members of the household, women’s right to support themselves

on family property was weaker than men’s.
The principles pervading the pre-Qin Confucian classics informed the Chinese
system of etiquette and rites through two thousand years of successive dynasties,
up to the Qing dynasty.5 The extant laws from the Tang dynasty, continuing through
the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing, reflect that there were two primary features of
women’s property rights:
First, women essentially had no right to own or manage family property. When
the family structure was stable, family members coresided and held communal
property, and the head of household, as family representative, had the right to own
and manage said property, while the other members of the family had no such
rights; thus successive generations of law codes all contained an article entitled
“Junior Family Members’ Unauthorized Use of Family Property.” The Tang Code
(Tanglü) decreed: “All junior members of the household who privately utilize family
property shall be given ten lashes for every ten bolts of silk, in increments of ten, up
to one hundred lashes.” The code noted further: “Every communal household has
its senior members: in the presence of senior family members, the junior members
must not act unilaterally to make private use of household property”; therefore,
they must be punished for their crime.6 The section “Household Laws: Household
Labor” (Hulü: Huyi) of the Qing Code (Daqing lüli), which adheres to the practices
of the Ming law codes, also contains an article entitled “Junior Family Members’
Unauthorized Use of Family Property,” which stipulates: “Junior family members
who privately use property without authorization from their elders shall be given
twenty lashes for every five hundred grams, in increments of twenty, up to one
hundred lashes.” The annotations to this clause read: “When junior and senior
family members co-reside and share common property, the property in every case
belongs to the senior members, and juniors may not privately lay claim to it.”7 The
tag “junior member” refers to all family members besides the head of household,
namely, all those family members who are of lower status and younger age than
the head of household, which naturally includes women; even the wife of the head
of household was no exception. Since male children and grandchildren would be-
come the head of some family after their marriage and the subsequent division of
the household, they would eventually have the right to own and manage their own
family property; however, since women could never serve as heads of households,
they would never possess the right to own and manage family property; women
were thus thoroughly without property rights for the duration of their lifetimes,
while men’s “lack of private property” was limited and only temporary.
Second, women had extremely limited rights to inherit property or act as a
trustee. Since women had no right to own or manage family property, the issue of
women’s property rights only arose when there were changes to the family structure
(for instance, when the head of household died and the issue of inheritance had
to be settled) or when changes occurred in a woman’s relationship with the fam-
28 chinese studies in history

ily (following the division of property occasioned by a division of the household,

marriage, divorce, and so on). Since successive generations of laws and customs
had all supported the system of male inheritance, under which all sons received
equal shares, even those families without issue were required to adopt a male of
the same clan as heir; women therefore did not have equal inheritance rights with
men, though they still had limited rights.
First, when an unmarried girl left the household to marry, she was entitled to
receive a dowry from her parents, though the amount was limited.
For instance, the article “Juniors’ Private Ownership of Property,” in the section
“Household Commands” (Huling) of the Song dynasty Song Code (Song xingtong),
states explicitly that during a division of the household, all brothers receive equal
shares and the sisters receive no share, but can receive a small amount of property as
dowry: “All fields, residences, and goods to be divided shall be shared equally among
the brothers; unmarried brothers shall receive a separate amount as bride price; all
unmarried sisters shall receive half of that designated amount as dowry.”8
Although Ming and Qing law codes did not directly regulate this matter, it was
popular custom to give unmarried girls a certain sum as a dowry and this became
common law. The concrete amount was not clearly stated as under Song laws and
generally each family decided according to their particular financial situation, but
what we can determine is that a woman’s dowry could only consist of a very small
portion of the family property and could not compare with the amount of family
property obtained by her brothers. Furthermore, after a woman married into her hus-
band’s family, her dowry became part of the husband’s family’s property and she no
longer had the right to own or manage that property. For instance, the Ming-dynasty
Collected Statutes of the Ming Dynasty (Daming huidian) and the Qing-dynasty Qing
Code both explicitly state that if a widow “remarries, her former husband’s family
has first claim to her husband’s family property and her original dowry.”9
Second, when there was no male heir to a property and there were none who
should inherit within the clan (namely, in the case of an “extinct clan”), successive
generations of law codes all stipulated that women had certain inheritance rights.
Such provisions were included in law codes from the Tang and Song dynasties to
the Ming. A Qing law code, written in imitation of Ming practices, stated: “Upon
the extinction of a clan, if there are none from the clan to inherit the property, it
shall revert upon any women of blood relation. If there are no women of the clan,
the local officials should report to their superior in consideration of appropriating
the property for government use.”10
Aside from the problem of women’s inheritance of property from their biological
parents, there is also the issue of a widow’s inheritance of her husband’s property. In
the Collected Statutes of the Ming Dynasty, it is stated: “Those wives who maintain
chastity after their husband dies without issue shall inherit their husband’s share;
the clan head shall appoint an heir from the appropriate generation. If a woman
remarries, her former husband’s family has first claim to her husband’s family
property and her original dowry.”11
 summer 2010  29

This means that if a widow did not remarry following her husband’s death, she
could inherit the family property under her husband’s name; however, she only
had the right to act as a trustee, and once a (male) clan heir had been selected, the
property would revert to the latter. In addition, if a widow remarried, regardless
whether her husband’s property consisted of her own dowry from her natal family,
all of it reverted to the former husband’s family and was disposed of according to
their wishes. The Qing Code contains a completely identical clause.12
Third, women of the elder generation had the right to be supported by their
children and grandchildren.
As successive generations of custom had continued to uphold the principle
identifying “father and mother as one,” women of the elder generation enjoyed the
same right to be supported by their children and grandchildren as men did. The
article “Descendants Who Transgress Against the Law” in the litigation chapter
of the Tang Code stipulates: “All descendants who violate the law, that is, those
who fail to support [their elders], shall be sentenced to hard labor for two years.”13
“Support” for elders here refers to descendants’ obligation to unstintingly provide
for their parents and grandparents. In this case, the mother and father enjoy the same
benefits: the mother has the right to be supported by her children and grandchildren
and to have access to family property for the materials required for her sustenance
for the duration of her lifetime.
The custom of descendants supporting their parents and grandparents has been
passed down unchanged through generations; it is viewed as the heart of filial piety
and it is a mother’s basic right. According to popular custom, during a division of
family property in households in which the patriarch is deceased, while the matri-
arch yet lives, the contract appertaining thereto often provides clear stipulations
regarding the descendants’ duty to support the matriarch. For instance, a 1796 c.e.
document describing a division of property in the Chen household of Anhui province
records that the Chen patriarch had died of illness ten years before and the division
of property was handled solely by the Chen matriarch (maiden name Huang); it is
clear that, prior to the division of the household, she had acted as the caretaker of
the family properties for some time. Of her three sons, two had already married;
apart from a sum set aside for the unmarried son as a bride price, the property was
divided equally among the three sons. Lastly, the document stated distinctly: “The
three sons shall equally provide for their mother’s room and board, and they shall
also share the costs of her funeral apparel and burial.”14 This contract, which was
signed and authorized by the clan head and the mother’s uncle, provided clear
stipulations regarding the three sons’ mutual obligation to provide for their mother’s
meals and burial arrangements; it reflects a universal popular custom.
Similar documents, spanning successive generations of law, from the Tang to the
Qing dynasty, demonstrate that women’s property rights were always informed by
the basic principles of the pre-Qin Confucian classics, such as the Book of Rites;
in addition, a few fundamental laws were passed down through generations with
relatively few changes. These reflect three main principles:
30 chinese studies in history

1. Women could not own private property within the family, and they could
not make decisions about family property without authorization.
2. In the absence of a male heir, women had limited inheritance rights.
3. When women married, they could receive a limited sum as their dowry;
also, a mother had the right to be supported by her descendants; that is,
women had a limited right to enjoy the use of family property.

It is plain that, from the pre-Qin period to the Qing dynasty, women’s property
rights were weaker than men’s. Dependent on their families for existence, women
had almost no independent property rights; that is, if a woman once separated her-
self from the family, she had no guarantees for her subsistence and was unlikely
to survive. This reflects the fact that, under the patrilineal system of coresidence
and common property, the law and convention regarded the family as a unit. As
dependents of the male head of household, women were merely an appendage to
the family and had no independent economic status.

Late Qing Legal Revisions and the Seeds of Women’s Property Rights

Following the late Qing dynasty’s national misfortune in 1900,15 the Qing govern-
ment was compelled to proclaim the implementation of a “new government” in
1901; in imitation of the West, the Qing began to conduct modernizing reforms
of the political system. As an essential organ of the government, the legal system
was naturally included in the list of items to be reformed. In 1902, the empress
dowager Cixi and the emperor Guangxu issued an imperial edict to reform the
legal system, appointing Shen Jiaben of the Ministry of Punishments and Wu
Tingfang16 (who had once studied law in England) as the ministers in charge of
revising the laws, and giving them the task of drafting new laws. The edict clearly
stated that its aims were: “To examine and correct, with the utmost care, the whole
of the laws now in effect; and, in accordance with circumstantial developments,
and with consideration for the laws of foreign nations,”17 to draft new laws that
not only imitated the Western system and conformed to the values and norms
generally accepted by “civilized” nations, but were also appropriate to China’s
practical situation; the objective was to “accommodate both China and the West.”
Chen Jiaben and his colleagues set about eliminating or reforming old laws,
collecting translations of foreign laws, launching surveys of popular customs,
and drafting new laws, in which efforts they engaged the assistance of several
Japanese legal experts. Since China had never had a specialized civil law code,
civil cases had always been tried through the criminal law system; in addition,
civil affairs were highly influenced by popular custom, which differed greatly
from foreign conventions. The work of a drafting a new civil code therefore
progressed slowly. During the brief ten years remaining of the Qing dynasty, in
total two new law codes were created.
 summer 2010  31

During this time, stimulated by the national misfortune of 1900, a rising tide of
public support for studying western customs and reforming society emerged, and
several new western concepts were imported into society: the idea of gender equality
entered the scene, and the issue of women’s rights, from women’s right to education
to their right to employment, was hotly debated within public discourse. Calls for
the promotion of women’s property rights also emerged within this discursive tide.
The first socially influential article to publicly advocate women’s property rights
was “Women’s Hour” (Nüjie zhong) (1903), written by Jin Tianhe and published
by the Shanghai Datong Publishing House. In this article, the author employed an
extremely ardent and indignant tone to emphatically appeal for women’s rights.
He listed six economic rights that women ought to possess: aside from women’s
right to employment, he also clearly advocated women’s “right to own property.”
This article had a great impact on society following its publication; it marks the
first inclusion of the struggle for women’s property rights in the general women’s
rights movement.
In the final years of the Qing dynasty, how did these ideological trends influence
reform efforts? The newly revised legal codes of the period allow us to examine
their impact on the issue of women’s property rights.
The first revised code to be completed was Active Criminal Law of the Qing
Dynasty (Daqing xianxing xinglü); though the process of revising the legal codes
was incomplete, the drafting of the above law code, which was based on the existing
Qing Code, was expedited due to practical needs; the revisions were completed in
1909 and the code went into effect the next year.
The newly revised code, Active Criminal Law of the Qing Dynasty, which was
in effect for seven years, claimed to imitate the West and approximate “civilized”
law; the most obvious changes were the abolishment of old-style corporal punish-
ment and cruel torture, such as flogging, beheading, and dismembering, methods
that were seen as “uncivilized” and “savage”; for relatively light civil offenses, the
cudgel was replaced by monetary fines. However, there were very few changes to
the content on household civil cases: the laws governing women’s property and
inheritance rights, as regulated by the articles “Junior Family Members’ Unau-
thorized Use of Family Property” or “Transgressions of Legitimate Offspring” in
the section “Household Laws: Household Labor,” did not diverge in the slightest
from previous practice; even the text of the laws was unchanged. An annotation
was appended to the original text: “The ministers sincerely note that the above
adheres to Ming law; after three years of revisions, [we have decided] to adhere to
previous practices, with the caveat that fines should be exchanged for the cudgel,
in accordance with regulations.”18
One can see that, although the idea of gender equality was ardently discussed
during this period, under the laws then in effect (which concretely influenced
women’s lives and basic economic rights), women’s economic status and rights
did not see the slightest improvement. This reflects the strong conservative forces
that guided revisions to the legal system under Qing rule and shows that women’s
32 chinese studies in history

practical economic rights did not advance at this time, but rather retained a strong
inertia, adhering to China’s two-thousand-year-old system of traditional laws and
customs.
The second revised law code produced during the Qing dynasty, the Qing Civil
Code (Draft) (Daqing minlü cao’an), was completed in 1911 but never implemented.
After the Qing court’s renovation of its political administration, society’s demands
for political reforms and national salvation from extinction were overpowering;
leading figures in various new factions called for the implementation of modern
and “civilized” new ideas, such as equality, freedom, and human rights. However,
the Active Criminal Law of the Qing Dynasty of 1909 in essence diverged little
from traditional legal practices and did not embody these modern and “civilized”
new values and concepts; thus it was clearly estranged from the new ideological
trends informing society of the time. During the same period, pressured by social
forces, the Qing government proclaimed in 1906 that it would prepare to establish
a constitution; given that the traditional legal system was clearly inconsistent with
the values and concepts informing a constitutional monarchy, the Qing court once
again commanded Minister Shen Jiaben to preside over a revision of the laws. With
Western law as his prototype, he was to revise the legal system in accordance with
the political concepts of a constitutional monarchy and the customs of modern
Western law, and create a separate section for civil law, which had previously been
integrated into the whole; the resulting Qing Civil Code (Draft) was completed
in 1911. The latter represented China’s first stand-alone civil code; it embodied
modern civil law and adhered to the principles and concepts of European civil law.
Although the draft was never implemented, for various reasons, it did reflect the
degree to which the Chinese people’s conception of legal principles had advanced
during that period; in addition, it demonstrated the evolution of the legal principles
regulating women’s property rights.
The Qing Civil Code (Draft) made three main changes to women’s property
rights:
First, women had the right to own private property. The article “Head of
Household and Dependents” in the section “Relations” stipulated that “dependents
may exclusively possess the property which they obtain in their own name.”19 As
“dependents” refers to all family members aside from the head of household, this
category naturally included women. In addition, under the article “Consequences
of Marriage,” the code stated: “All properties that the wife possesses at the time of
marriage, and the properties she obtains following her marriage, are her exclusive
possessions. However, her husband has the right to manage, use, and benefit from
her properties. Many predict that the husband will abuse his right to manage his
wife’s properties: therefore the wife may request a trial to obtain sole manage-
ment rights.”20 The article “Divorce” stipulated: “Following the completion of a
divorce, the [former] wife retains possession of her properties.”21 These articles,
which gave women the right to exclusively possess the properties they obtained and
provided them with the right to own and manage those properties, differed widely
 summer 2010  33

from traditional law, which denied women the right to own private property and
gave a woman’s husband the right to claim the dowry from her natal family upon
her marriage; in comparison with the traditional clan family system, under which
women “had no private property,” the new code acknowledged that women had
the right to “exclusively possess” what belonged to them—namely, they had the
right to own private property.
Second, women’s right to inherit family property was expanded. Although the
chapter on “Inheritance” stipulated that an heir be the “direct junior descendant of
the property-owner” (that is, a male child or grandchild of the property-owner), it
also stated that, on the death of the father, the family properties were to be managed
by the mother; although the son had the right to inherit, he could not partition the
property without his mother’s permission: “If the mother lives, those heirs who
wish to partition the property must do so with her permission.” If the property-
owner had no children, then the wife could inherit her husband’s properties: “A wife
who maintains chastity after her husband dies without issue inherits her husband’s
share, as his heir.” This section of the code also noted that, if the property-owner
had no children, the succession of heirs to his or her properties was as follows: (1)
husband or wife; (2) directly related senior relatives; (3) blood brothers; (4) the
head of household; (5) blood sisters.22
In this civil code draft, women’s right to inherit family property, especially with
regard to spousal properties, was greatly expanded; however, women’s inheritance
rights still fell far short of being equal to men’s. This gap corresponded to the
code’s stipulation that men and women bore somewhat different responsibilities
within the family economy. The section “Relatives” indicated that when a man
and woman married and formed a family, “the household expenses shall be borne
by the husband; if the husband is unable to bear the expenses, the wife shall bear
them.”23 That is, men had the primary responsibility of providing for the family,
while women’s responsibility was secondary. This clause represents a compromise
with the practical demands of popular custom.
Third, men and women had a mutual and equal right to support one another
and be supported. The section “Relatives” states that “the head of household and
dependents are obligated to mutually support one another”;24 similarly, “a husband
and wife are obligated to mutually support one another.”25 These stipulations made
it clear that all women, whether they were daughters, wives, or mothers, had the
right to be supported by their family members, and that all family members, be they
men or women, the head of household or dependents, had equal rights to mutual
support. Thus, for the first time since the establishment of pre-Qin Confucianism
two thousand years earlier, children and grandchildren’s “mild” obligation to sup-
port senior women (in order to fulfill the claims of filial piety) was unambiguously
expanded to include all female family members; the code provided explicit legal
stipulations that guaranteed women’s right to be supported.
The above demonstrates that, although men and women’s rights were not entirely
equal under the Qing Civil Code (Draft), overall, and especially in comparison with
34 chinese studies in history

traditional law, the code fundamentally embodied the modern legal principle of
gender equality, and, in addition, guaranteed women’s basic property rights; this
code represents a fundamentally important reform in China’s legal history and is
a sign of the extent to which Chinese law had been modernized. However, at the
moment of the draft’s completion, the Qing dynasty fell and the Qing Civil Code
(Draft) was never put into effect.

Women’s Property Rights Before and After the May Fourth

movement, Under the Republic’s First Civil Codes

At the inception of the Republic of China in 1912, since China’s civil law had not
yet seen any revisions, the Ministry of Justice renamed the Qing Civil Code (Draft)
as the Provisional Civil Code of the Republic of China (Draft) (Zhonghua minguo
zanxing minlü cao’an) and issued the law for enforcement. When the Beiyang
warlord government came into power, its leaders believed that the Qing Civil Code
(Draft) was overly westernized, excessively focused on individual benefits, too
greatly distanced from real life and popular customs, and thus difficult to implement;
therefore, they decided to continue enforcing the civil and commercial sections of
the Active Criminal Law of the Qing Dynasty of 1909, that is, to continue relying
upon the traditional laws of the Ming and Qing dynasties as the legal standard of
the justice system in civil and criminal affairs, with the exception of executions,
which were subject to individual discretion.26 According to judicial practice in the
early years of the Republic, the issue of women’s property rights thus essentially
still conformed to unequal traditional law, under which women had no property
rights. Although judicial practice during this time sought to accommodate folk
customs and circumvent newly arisen social unrest, it clearly violated the principle
of gender equality espoused by the Republic; therefore, under the pressure of social
forces, the Beiyang warlord government was compelled to expedite the creation
of a civil code that truly embodied the founding spirit of the Republic. In 1914,
the law committee appointed by the Beiyang warlord government began drafting
a civil code, and also conducted a survey of civil customs; the section “Civil Law:
Relations (Draft)” was completed the next year, but revisions to the Civil Code of
the Republic of China (Draft) (Minguo minlü cao’an) were not completed until
1925, at which time the Ministry of Justice issued a general order for every level
of the courts to implement the code.
During this period, which corresponded to the inception of the dynamic May
Fourth movement, cries for “gender equality” and “equal rights” had already
inundated society, flooding media discourses. Among the adherents of the new
culture and the intellectual youth these ideas became mainstream. However, during
the May Fourth period, debates on equal rights, most of which took the form of
propaganda only, still primarily focused on women’s rights to participate in poli-
tics, receive an education, or pursue a career, and so on; little attention was paid
to that issue which most directly affected women’s lives and benefits—women’s
 summer 2010  35

property rights. Under warlord rule, the government of Beijing tended to espouse
conservative political principles; therefore, as the legal system was under revision,
great consideration was given to existing popular custom with regard to the issue
of women’s rights and benefits. In terms of women’s property rights, which had an
impact on the practical interests of so many households, even more compromises
were made to accommodate prevailing popular convention. The Civil Code of the
Republic of China (Draft), which was completed in 1925, was the first civil code to
be implemented following the establishment of the Republic; it ostensibly embodied
the founding spirit of the Republic and reflected modern legal principles. However,
the text regulating women’s property rights represented a step backward from the
Qing Civil Code (Draft) (1909), mainly in terms of the following stipulations:
First, the restrictions on women’s private property were increased. The section
“Relations” in the Civil Code of the Republic of China enforced the “marital property
system,” which differentiated between a husband and wife’s joint property and the
“exclusive property” owned by the individual. Although with regard to women’s
private property, the code acknowledged that a wife had the right to exclusively
own her possessions, it also stipulated that the property should be restricted to
some extent by the husband. The text stated: “The clothes, ornaments, and articles
of daily use supplied to the wife for her personal use are regarded as the wife’s
exclusive property. If it is unclear to whom other personal effects belong, they shall
be regarded as the husband’s property.” The text also stipulated: “The property that
the wife possesses prior to marriage, and the property she acquires after marriage,
are hers exclusively. However, the husband has the right to use and benefit from
his wife’s property.” The property that the wife “acquires after marriage” refers to
the profits that she might gain through employment or business; with regard to the
latter, the code also stipulated that a wife must have her husband’s permission to
seek employment or engage in business ventures: “A wife who has her husband’s
consent may seek one or more forms of employment; and within the scope of her
employment, she has the right to freely make decisions with regard to all busi-
ness matters. The husband may revoke or restrict his consent.” It is plain that the
code gave a husband clearer and more comprehensive rights to restrict his wife’s
personal property rights.
Second, women’s inheritance rights were reduced. With regard to women’s in-
heritance rights, the Civil Code of the Republic of China did stipulate in the section
“Relations” that: “When a man’s daughter is married, he is obligated to provide
her with a dowry, in accordance with his financial standing.”27 However, while
this guaranteed a daughter’s right to be granted a dowry by her parents, the code
did not mention a concrete amount to be given, but rather let the father decide, “in
accordance with his financial standing”; therefore, the amount of property that a
daughter could receive from her parents as dowry was extremely limited, and most
certainly could not compare with the shares her brothers would receive in the case
of a division of property; a daughter’s proprietary rights were thus still far weaker
than her brothers’. In addition, with regard to a wife’s inheritance rights, the section
36 chinese studies in history

“Inheritance” noted: “A wife who maintains chastity after her husband dies without
issue may inherit her husband’s share and manage the property instead of the rightful
inheritor, until an heir is named.”28 In comparison with the 1911 Qing Civil Code
(Draft), which stated that “a wife who maintains chastity after her husband dies
without issue inherits her husband’s share, as his heir,” the above clause clearly
represents a step backward: a wife in the aforementioned situation went from be-
ing a direct heir to the property, to being a guardian of the rightful heir’s property;
in essence, the code reinstated the traditional laws of the Ming and Qing periods.
Only when there were none who could inherit did the wife enjoy the right to act as
a direct heir. The code also stipulated that “on the death . . . of a wife who leaves
behind property, her husband shall succeed to her property.” Clearly, a husband and
wife had unequal rights with regard to the inheritance of their spouse’s property.
As for blood sisters, who were fifth in the line of successors, the code added: “All
sisters of the property-owner, be they married or unmarried, must be regarded as
inheritors to the property during the disposal of a legacy.” This clearly guaranteed
married sisters’ inheritance rights. In terms of a widow’s right to be supported, the
code stated: “The wife of the property-owner, upon inheriting the property, may
utilize the legacy to provide for herself, with consideration for the total amount of
her property and her own needs.” This clause lends a certain security to a widow’s
right to be supported.29 These stipulations all promoted the security of women’s
property and inheritance rights in certain cases.
It is plain that the Civil Code of the Republic of 1925, in comparison with the
Qing Civil Code (Draft) of 1911, regressed considerably with regard to widows’
property rights, though it did provide more detailed standards to guarantee women’s
limited property rights. This was the first civil code to be produced and (partially)
implemented following the establishment of the Republic. Although it provided
women with limited property rights, their rights were still far weaker than men’s;
the code was still markedly influenced by traditional laws and customs and fell
far short of the modern idea of equal rights. This reflects the fact that, though this
civil code was produced during the May Fourth period, the May Fourth concept of
equal rights had not yet had a great impact on the legal principles informing the law
codes, and that the conservative legal principles of Beijing’s warlord government,
as well as the inert force of popular customs and conventions, were sufficiently
strong to influence the principles of the legal system.

The Republic of China’s Second Civil Code Following the May

Fourth Movement and the Establishment of Women’s Property
Rights

After the May Fourth movement, inspired by the ideological enlightenment, in-
creasing numbers of women began to participate in the day-to-day activities of the
struggle for women’s rights. During this time, the women’s liberation movement
flourished and expanded rapidly. One by one, progressive women everywhere
 summer 2010  37

established women’s organizations that advocated women’s liberation and equal

rights. Relying on the power of the community, they launched a struggle for equal
rights on the issues that most practically benefited women in their personal lives.
Using women’s collective voice to speak to society about “gender equality” and
“equal rights,” they abandoned vague slogans for the pursuit of concrete practical
benefits and sought to convert ideological principles into social practice. Democ-
racy and equality were the founding principles of the Republic of China, but the
existing legal inequality of men and women clearly ran contrary to these ideas; the
Beijing government’s continuous implementation of legal standards that clearly
discriminated between men and women was met with criticism and resentment by
progressives and was targeted by the escalating women’s rights movement. During
this time, some women’s groups began to vociferously advocate the establishment
of women’s legal property rights.
In 1922, groups of Beijing schoolgirls began to establish organizations such
as the Society for the Promotion of Women’s Participation in Politics and the
Alliance for the Women’s Liberation Movement that campaigned for women’s
right to participate in politics. Similar organizations sprang up in every province,
all identifying with and endorsing the proposals made by their progenitors. In
their founding manifestos, the above two organizations proposed a campaign to
establish women’s rights; both also advocated a campaign to establish women’s
legal property rights.
At the same time that these popular local women’s groups emerged, the Chinese
Communist Party (CCP; the leader of the revolution) and the Nationalist Party, un-
der pressure from women’s groups within both parties, also successively proposed
campaigns for women’s legal property rights. In June 1923, the Third National
Congress of the Chinese Communist Party passed the motion “Resolution with
Regard to the Women’s Movement,” which proposed ten slogans for the women’s
rights movement, including “Women Should Have Property Inheritance Rights.”30
In August of the same year, the “Resolution with Regard to the Women’s Youth
Movement,” adopted in the Second National Congress of the Chinese Socialist
Youth Group, proposed twelve slogans for the Women’s Youth Movement, includ-
ing “Women Should Have Legacy Inheritance Rights.”31
Under pressure from the women’s rights movement, when the Chinese National-
ist Party reorganized in January 1924, the manifesto of the First National Congress
proclaimed its goals as the establishment of gender equality and “the advancement
of women’s rights, on the principle of affirming men and women’s legal, economic,
educational, and social equality.” Within the area under the Nationalist Party’s
legal jurisdiction, measures were implemented that, to a certain extent, strength-
ened women’s property rights. In January of 1926, the Second National Congress
of the Chinese Nationalist Party passed the motion “Resolution on the Women’s
Movement” (adopted on January 16, 1926), which stated: “We urge the National
Government to implement as soon as possible the twelfth item of the party platform
on domestic policy, that is, ‘the advancement of women’s rights, on the principle
38 chinese studies in history

of affirming men and women’s legal, economic, educational, and social equality’”;
and on the legal side, to implement plans to “institute gender equality laws” and
“provide women with property inheritance rights.” Under the heading “Suitable
Slogans for the Women’s Movement,” the motion also clearly promoted goals such
as “professional gender equality,” “absolute legal equality for men and women,”
“equal wages,” and “property and inheritance rights for women.”32
Following the adoption of this motion, although it was implemented in principle
in the region under Nationalist jurisdiction, it was not thoroughly carried out in
practice within the courts. For instance, the courts more often than not failed to
guarantee a married daughter’s right to inherit from her parents, in accordance
with traditional custom. Thus total gender equality in property and inheritance
rights had not yet been realized.33 Not long after, following the establishment of
the Nanjing National Government under Nationalist Party rule, the success of the
Northern Expedition, and the end of the Beiyang government’s rule, the principles
of this Nationalist Party resolution became the foundation of a revised civil code
implemented by the National Government.
Between 1929 and 1930, the National Government drafted the Civil Code of
the Republic of China (Zhonghua minguo minlü): its component sections, “Civil
Law: Relations” and “Civil Law: Inheritance,” were issued in December 1930 and
officially implemented in May 1931. This was the first civil code that essentially
realized gender equality. Its content regarding women’s property rights mainly
comprised the following principles:
First, a husband and wife’s property rights were basically equal. The section
“Civil Law: Relations” implemented a marital property system, according to which
the husband and wife’s shared possessions at the time of marriage and after marriage
were regarded as joint property, but the husband and wife each had exclusive rights
to certain properties, including: (1) items specially supplied to the husband or wife
for personal use; (2) items needed by husband or wife for professional use; (3) items
received by the husband or wife as gifts or given to others and stated as his or her
exclusive property; (4) the remuneration received by the wife for her labor.34
According to these regulations, the wife’s individual property rights were no
longer restricted by her husband, and the husband and wife essentially enjoyed
equal rights.
Second, men and women enjoyed fundamentally equal inheritance rights. The
section “Civil Law: Inheritance” stated: “Spouses have a mutual right to inherit
the other’s property.”35 A spouse was given the first rank in order of succession to
a legacy: since the term “spouse” did not discriminate between men and women,
a widow thus had the right to inherit her husband’s property; both the husband and
wife had equal rights. In comparison with the unequal regulations of the Civil Code
of the Republic of China (Draft) of 1925, which stated that, while a husband could
inherit his wife’s property, the wife was prohibited from inheriting her husband’s
property, the 1931 code represents a fundamental change to legal standards. In
comparison with the prescriptive clause in the 1911 Qing Civil Code that only “a
 summer 2010  39

wife who maintains chastity after her husband dies without issue” can inherit her
husband’s property, the 1931 code represents an even greater step toward equal
rights.
With regard to other heirs to a legacy, aside from spouses, the section “Civil
Law: Inheritance” stipulated: Aside from spouses, the heirs shall succeed to a
legacy in the following order: (1) direct junior relations; (2) parents; (3) brothers
and sisters; (4) grandparents.36
In this list, “direct junior relations” became the principal heir. Since the lineage
inheritance system which specifically favored male heirs had been abolished, and
blood relationships were emphasized instead, daughters and sons enjoyed the same
inheritance rights. In addition, the code no longer distinguished between married and
unmarried offspring. In every other category of heirs, men and women were given
equal rank and equal rights, and women were no longer discriminated against. The
1931 code thoroughly realized the principle of equal inheritance rights for men and
women. Although equal inheritance rights for men and women were often not fully
implemented in the practical lives of the people, especially in the vast rural regions,
due to the formidable inert force of traditional custom, the formal promulgation of
a civil code that upheld the principle of gender equality to some extent served as
a corrective model for and guide of popular custom.

Conclusion

The above examination of the evolution of women’s legal property rights, from
traditional laws and customs to the Republican period before and after the May
Fourth movement, demonstrates that after the period of legal revision in the late
Qing dynasty, men’s traditional monopolization of property rights, which had lasted
for over two thousand years, began to give way to the principle of equal rights,
according to which women also enjoyed property rights. This evolutionary process
was closely linked to the political transformation of Chinese society, as well as the
growth of the modern women’s rights movement.
Through the enlightening effect of the May Fourth movement, the women’s
rights movement grew vigorously. Illuminated by May Fourth ideologies, the
concepts of gender equality and equal rights gained a place in mainstream public
discourse and were accepted by society. The ideology of equal rights and the
women’s rights movement, both formed under the impetus of the May Fourth
movement, became important motive forces promoting the complete realization
of women’s legal property rights. Almost twenty years after the foundation of the
Republic, the Nationalist Party, which had proclaimed the goal of establishing
legal equal rights, finally drafted and implemented a law code that provided men
and women with equal property rights. In reality, the repetitive course of revising
and implementing laws was like a game of chess between the legal principle of
equal rights and popular custom. One could say that the establishment of women’s
legal property rights was a social consequence of the institution of the May Fourth
40 chinese studies in history

concept of equal rights as social practice. With the legal system as intermediary,
the idea of equal rights promoted during the May Fourth movement was finally
transformed into a real social achievement that influenced the practical lives of
the masses of women.
However, although women’s property rights had been legally established, the
latter merely indicated that the principle of equal rights had become acceptable
and mainstream within society’s system of ideologies and public values. Although
this principle could be legally implemented through the force of the law, due to
the enormous disparities between urban and rural Chinese society and the large
gap between China’s social classes, the applicability of some legal articles was
extremely limited. One example is the stipulation that women had proprietary
rights over their “remuneration gained through labor.” Since one could only obtain
a quantitative amount of “remuneration” through professional urban labor, and the
vast rural areas were still based on a household economy, women’s performance of
agricultural work, domestic handicrafts, and housework (both urban and rural) did
not provide them with quantitative “remuneration,” and their proprietary rights were
thus restricted to other properties, besides that “gained through labor.” Women’s
profits from this sort of labor could not be legally protected and they were deprived
of proprietary rights. This represents a continuing inequality in women’s economic
rights. Moreover, in the vast rural areas, due to custom and the immovability of land
and residences, the masses of poor, lower-class women were still universally treated
in accordance with popular custom during the division of properties occasioned by
marriage, divorce, or the division of the household. Women’s property rights were
still unequal to men’s. Even today, ninety years later, this situation is still prevalent
in many rural areas. This reflects the difficulties and limitations that Chinese society
faced during its transformative period in attempting to reconcile the structure of
life in industrialized cities with the rural life of small-scale farming and resolve the
disparities between the principles of the legal system and judicial practice.
This history of the vicissitudes of Chinese women’s legal property rights in-
dicates that political transformation, ideological revolution, and the evolution of
popular custom are intertwined, rather than synchronized. During the political
transformation that China underwent between the end of the Qing dynasty and the
establishment of the Republic, the concept of equal rights became more acceptable.
As the concepts promoted in the May Fourth movement gained dominance over
public discourse and the women’s rights movement exerted pressure on society,
the principle of equal rights became part of the legal system, thus affecting the real
lives of the masses of women. The practical effectiveness of the legal system was
limited by the fact that China’s vast rural areas were still influenced by traditional
customs and the fact that the people’s practical way of doing things did not at all
conform to a few legal statutes. With regard to the latter, there was perhaps a certain
distance between the concept of “equal rights” as an idea and as a practice; ideas
“outstripped” the system to a certain extent. However, the legal implementation of
women’s property rights established the idea of “equal rights” as a legal principle,
 summer 2010  41

as the dominant value governing the social system. It will serve as a powerful guide
and model for the ideologies and customs of the masses.

Notes

1. During the early Republican period, all sorts of publications featured discussions
on women and women’s rights: in 1923 these were collected in Anthology of the Debates
on Chinese Women, parts one and two (each was three volumes, edited by Mei Sheng,
and published in 1923 by the Shanghai Xin wenhua shushe). Volume two, part one, in-
cluded a special section titled “Life Issues,” which contained several essays discussing the
problem of women’s economic independence; some touched upon a few issues regarding
women’s labor and employment, but none specifically focused on the issue of women’s
property rights.
2. Zhao Fengjie, Zhongguo funü zai falü shang zhi diwei (Shanghai: Shangwu yin-
shuguan, 1928).
3. Kathryn Bernhardt, Women and Property in China: 960–1949 (Stanford: Stanford
University Press, 1999).
4. Chinese-English translations of the Book of Rites and other classical texts can be
found at http://chinese.dsturgeon.net/index.html.—Trans.
5. My predecessors have already conducted research on this topic. Zhao Fengjie’s
Zhongguo funü zai falü shang zhi diwei and Kathryn Bernhardt’s Women and Property in
China, 960–1949 both contain fairly in-depth research on the matter. This article will here
only synthesize a few other sources to make a general outline.
6. (Tang) Zhangsun Wuji ed., Tang Code, part 2, vol. 12, “Huhun shang” [On house-
holds and marriage], 111.
7. (Qing) Hu Zhaokai et al., eds., Daqing lüli tongzuan jicheng [Grand compendium
of the Qing Code], vol. 8, “Household Laws: Household Labor: Junior Family Members’
Unauthorized Use of Family Property,” woodblock edition, 1831, 1.
8. Song Code, “Household Commands: Juniors’ Private Ownership of Property,” 15.
9. (Ming) Li Dongyang, Shen Shixing, eds., Collected Statutes of the Ming Dynasty,
vol. 19, “Household, Section Six: Household Census,” woodblock edition, 1573, 20. Da-
qing lüli tongzuan jicheng, 1.
10. Daqing lüli tongzuan jicheng, 1–2.
11. Collected Statutes of the Ming Dynasty, 20.
12. Daqing lüli tongzuan jicheng, vol. 8, “Household Laws: Household Labor: Descen-
dants Who Transgress Against the Law,” addendum 2, 101.
13. Quoted in Zhao, Zhongguo funü zai falü shang zhi diwei, 100.
14. Bao Chuanjiang et al., ed., Guzhidui [Ancient papers], vol. 3 (Beijing: Tushuguan
chubanshe, 2003), 15.
15. This refers to the Boxer Rebellion of 1900.—Trans.
16. Shen Jiaben: 1840–1913; Wu Tingfang: 1842–1922.
17. “Daqing Guangxu chao shilu” [Historical records of the Guangxu reign of the
Qing dynasty], 498.
18. Shen Jiaben, Yu Liansan et al., ed., Active Criminal Law of the Qing Dynasty, “House-
hold Laws: Household Labor” (issued fall 1909 by the Justice Dept.), 34.
19. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 2 “Family System,” article
2 “Head of Household and Dependents,” clause 1330. Yang Lixin, ed., Qing Civil Code
(Draft): Daqing minlü cao’an: Minguo minlü cao’an [Civil code of the Republic of China
(draft)] (Changchun: Jilin Renmin chubanshe, 2002), 170.
20. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 3 “Marriage,” article 3 “Con-
sequences of Marriage,” clause 1358. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), 173.
42 chinese studies in history

21. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 3 “Relations,” chapter 3 “Marriage,” article 4 “Di-
vorce,” clause 1368. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), 175.
22. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 5 “Inheritance,” chapter 2 “Inheritance,” clauses
1466, 1467, and 1468. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), 187–88.
23. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 3 “Marriage,” article 3 “Con-
sequences of Marriage,” clause 1356. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), 173.
24. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 2 “Family System,” article
2 “Head of Household and Dependents,” clause 1331. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft),
170.
25. Qing Civil Code (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 3 “Marriage,” article 3 “Con-
sequences of Marriage,” clause 1352. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), 173.
26. October 30, 1915, third provisional supplement to the Sifa gongbao [Judicial gazette]
of the Ministry of Justice; Jiang Yong, director of the Beiyang government’s law revision
offices: “Wushi nianlai zhongguo zhi fazhi” [China’s Legal System in the Past Fifty Years].
Also see Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft), explanatory notes: 7.
27. Civil Code of the Republic of China (Draft), section 4 “Relations,” chapter 4 “Chil-
dren,” article 2 “Parent-Child Relations,” clause 1188. Yang, ed., Qing Civil Code (Draft),
362.
28. Civil Code of the Republic of China (Draft), section 5 “Inheritance,” chapter 3
“Legacy Inheritance,” article 1 “Heirs to a Legacy,” clause 1338. Yang, ed., Qing Civil
Code (Draft), 382–83.
29. Civil Code of the Republic of China (Draft), section 5 “Inheritance,” chapter 3 “Legacy
Inheritance,” article 1 “Heirs to a Legacy,” clauses 1344, 1340, and 1342. Yang, ed., Qing
Civil Code (Draft), 383.
30. National Chinese Women’s Federation, Dept. on the History of the Women’s Move-
ment, Zhongguo funü yundong lishi ziliao [Historical materials on the Chinese women’s
movement, 1921–1927] (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe: 1986), 68.
31. Ibid., 72.
32. Originally published in Zhengzhi jubao [Political gazette] 6, no. 7 (April 10, 1926).
National Chinese Women’s Federation, Zhongguo funü yundong lishi ziliao, 506–7.
33. Kathryn Bernhardt describes and analyzes this situation in detail in Chapter 6 of
Women and Property in China, 960–1949, “Daughters’ Inheritance Rights under the Re-
publican Code.”
34. Civil Law: Relations (Promulgated by the National Government on December 26,
1930, and implemented on May 5, 1931), chapter 1 “Marriage,” article 4 “Marital Property
System,” clause 1013. Dong Kang, Minfa qinshu jicheng liangbian xiuzheng’an [Amend-
ments to the Civil Code, relations and inheritance sections], appendix (Republic of China
letterpress edition in the collections of the Institute of Modern History, Chinese Academy
of Social Sciences), 5.
35. Civil Law: Inheritance, chapter 1 “Heirs to a Legacy,” clause 1144. Dong Kang Minfa
qinshu jicheng liangbian xiuzheng’an, appendix, 1.
36. Ibid., clause 1138.

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