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Confucianism And Social Injustice Against Women In China

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Before the formation of the People’s Republic of China, a traditional patriarchal society ruled China. Confucianism ideals, including gender roles, had been in play for thousands of years and would not break overnight. Women in China had been treated as subhuman per these traditional values and it was ingrained into society. As feminism grew alongside China’s revolution, it looked like there would be a change in women’s rights. The Communist wanted to strengthen all their people and women sought to benefit from the new regime. Communism brought into effect gender equality and established laws to protect women. While the Communist promised equality, their intentions were purely self-serving. The party was only seeking to increase its own power and women’s equality was not foremost on their agenda. While united strong citizens within …show more content…

Female beauty played a role in the revolution, and this is the only source that touches upon it. This will be used to show the double-sided nature in which the Communists’ attempted to advance women.

Gao, Xiongya. “Women Existing for Men: Confucianism and Social Injustice against Women in China.” Race, Gender & Class, vol. 10, no. 3, 2003, pp. 114–125. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41675091.

This source shows that not just Confucianism, but also the nationalist, did not treat women as equals. This set the stage for the continuation of the mistreatment of women in China. Gao’s article is different because it shows how traditional thinking is not changed quickly. This will be used to show how traditional values still influence societies and it takes more than a new government to change a nation’s thinking.

Edwards, Louise. “Women's Suffrage in China: Challenging Scholarly Conventions.” Pacific Historical Review, vol. 69, no. 4, 2000, pp. 617–638. JSTOR, JSTOR,

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