Qing Dynasty (1644-1912)
Republic (1912-1949)
PRC (1949-present)

1644
Manchu invaders establish China's last imperial dynasty. The long reigns of emperors Kangshi (1662-1722) and Qianlong (1736-1795) re-establish Chinese political and cultural dominance of East Asia.

1760
The Canton system is created: all legal trade with Western maritime nations is to be conducted only at Canton, according to rigid rules.

1796-1804
The massive Buddhist-inspired White Lotus rebellion is suppressed but weakens the Qing order.

1800-1830s
Increasing amounts of illegally traded opium are used by Western merchants to balance trade with China.

1839-1842
Opium war. Britain forces China to open five treaty ports and relinquish Hong Kong. The Treaty of Nanjing (1842) is the first of several unequal treaties between China and Western nations.

1850-1864
The Taiping Rebellion, a movement of the poor motivated by aspects of Christianity and by egalitarian social and economic ideals, nearly topples Qing regime.

1860
Britain and France occupy Beijing and obtain additional concessions that diminish China's sovereignty.

1861-1895
The Self-Strengthening movement is launched: the selective adoption of Western technologies and education to save the Confucian state.

1885-1895
With a military defeat by France and Japan, China loses influence in Vietnam and Korea; Japan colonizes Taiwan.

1898
The One Hundred Day Reform, an attempt by the Guangxu Emperor to modernize the Qing regime, fails; conservative officials react, the emperor is put under house arrest, and the empress Dowager Cixi takes over the government.

1900
The Boxer Uprising. Japan and several Western nations invade Northern China and occupy Beijing.

1901-1908
Late-Qing reforms are led by the Empress Dowager Cixi, including the end of the Confucian examination system to select officials in 1905.

1911
October 10. Rebellion in Wuchang by followers of the Nationalist leader Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925) leads to collapse of the Qing.

1912
February 12. The Qing throne is formally abdicated.

Republic (1912-1949)

1912-1916
Power falls to President Yuan Shikai, a Qing general-turned-dictator; his warlords will  dominate China until 1928.

1914
Japan occupies German-controlled Shandong Province.

1915
Japan makes Twenty-one Demands for further Chinese concessions.

1919
May 4. Chinese hopes for post-World War I restoration of territorial integrity are dashed by the Treaty of Versailles; the May Fourth movement seeks to resist foreign imperialism by revolutionizing Chinese culture; this leads to the reorganization of
Sun's Nationalist Party, the  Guomindang (GMD).

1921
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is established; Mao Zedong (1893-1976) is one of a handful of Party organizers.

1923
CCP members join GMD as individuals, forming the First United Front.

1924
Soviet aid and advisors to GMD's Whampoa Military Academy train GMD/CCP leadership for national unification, headed by Chiang Kai-shek (1886-1975).

1926
GMD/CCP's Northern Expedition is launched against warlords.

1927
In the White Terror, Chiang Kai-shek virtually wipes out the urban-based CCP. CCP remnants flee to the countryside.

1927-1937
Nanjing Era. GMD is in power for a decade.

1931
The Mukden Incident initiates Japan's occupation of Manchuria.

1932
Japan attacks Shanghai.

1934-1935
The CCP is expelled from Jiangxi Soviet on Long March; Mao becomes primary leader of the CCP. With Zhou Enlai (1898-1976), Zhu De (1886-1976), Peng Dehuai (1898-1974), Lin Biao (1907-1971) and others, Mao creates the
foundations for revolution at Yanan (1935-1947), in northwestern China.

1937-1945
World War II in China. Japan invades; The Rape of Nanjing in 1937 forces Chiang's government to Chongqing. Uneasy Second United Front is formed against Japan.

1942
China's Rectification campaign uses thought reform, not purges, to promote party policies.

1946
The CCP creates the People's Liberation Army (PLA).

1946-1949
Civil War. The CCP is victorious; Chiang and remaining GMD forces flee to Taiwan.

People's Republic of China (1949-present)

1949
October 1. The People's Republic (PRC) is formally established in Beijing as a democratic dictatorship based on the coexistence of four democratic classes.

December. Mao visits the Soviet Union in his first journey outside China. There is major alignment with the Soviets despite
limited advantage to China.

1950
Territorial consolidation (except Taiwan). Troops enter Tibet (by 1951).

The economy is rehabilitated.

New laws are put into
effect, including the Agrarian Reform law (often-violent redistribution of landlords' holdings, completed by 1953), and the New Marriage law (promising new rights to women).

The Three Selfs movement requires Chinese-Christians to cut ties with foreigners.

The Resist America and Aid Korea campaign is waged against Western, especially American, influences.

October. Chinese "volunteer" troops secretly enter the Korean War; counteroffensive is launched in November.

1951
Two new campaigns are launched: the Suppression of Counterrevolutionaries campaign, and the Three Antis campaign (against corruption, waste, bureaucratic abuses).

1952
The Five Antis campaign is effected: a mass movement against the bourgeoisie.

1953
Drive begins for collectivization in agriculture (completed by 1957, with nearly 800,000 collective farms).

July. Truce in Korea.

The First Five-Year Plan is proposed, using the Soviet model for heavy industrial development; with advisers and loans, the Soviet influence is strong.

December. In the first major purge of CCP, regional leaders Gao Gang and Rao Shushi are ousted.

First modern-style census: population approximately 582.6 million.

1954
Constitution is implemented; Mao becomes Chairman of the PRC. Business enterprises become "public-private."

Zhou Enlai plays prominent role in Geneva during talks to settle the Franco-Vietnam War.

1955
All private enterprises are socialized.

Anti-Hu Feng movement: famous writer who questioned CCP control over culture is jailed as counterrevolutionary (until 1979).

Zhou Enlai represents China's enhanced position in the international world at Bandung Conference of Afro-Asian States.

1956
China's industrial output increases enormously. Higher education is revamped, with an emphasis on  technical education and a downgrading of the liberal arts.

May. Mao delivers One Hundred Flowers speech, calling for more openness in cultural and scientific inquiry. Anti-Rightist
campaign promptly follows criticism of the CCP; China's intellectuals are harshly suppressed.

1957
The Soviet Union agrees to assist China's nuclear development.

The Socialist Education movement emphasizes "redness"-loyal adherence to Communist ideology-over expertise.

August-November. Socialized agriculture is effected in the creation of People's Communes, incorporating 98 percent of the
farming population; claims of production increases are wildly exaggerated.

November. Mao makes a second trip to the Soviet Union; the Sputnik satellite is seen as evidence that the Socialist system
is destined to overthrow the capitalist system.

1958
The Second Five-Year Plan sets goal of a 75 percent increase in industrial and agricultural production.

February. The Great Leap Forward movement's unrealistic aim is to achieve huge increases in production by 1960; frenzied attempts are made to increase steel production with backyard furnaces.

1959
Indications of hunger in the countryside are followed by an outbreak of major famine (20-30,000,000 deaths from starvation by 1962).

Khrushchev begins withdrawal of Soviet experts, frustrating China's atomic development.

March. Tibetan uprising is brutally suppressed. Dalai Lama flees to India.

August. The CCP is split when Defense Minister Peng Dehuai is dismissed for criticizing Mao's Great Leap Forward and the
People's Communes; Lin Biao becomes Defense Minister. Mao gives up chairmanship of state, but remains party chairman.

1960
China is critical of Soviet revisionism and idea of peaceful coexistence; a major rift occurs between China and the Soviet Union. Remaining Soviet advisors are recalled from China.

1961
February. A production of Wu Han's play Dismissal of Hai Rui from office is staged, a thinly disguised critique of Mao's purge of Peng Dehuai and a cry against tyranny.

1962
With an economic retrenchment and stress on practical policies, Liu Shaoqi (1898-1969) and Deng Xiaoping (1904-1997) downplay Maoist policies.

Lin Biao uses Quotations from Chairman Mao (the "little red book") to inculcate correct behavior in the PLA, giving rise to cult of Mao. The fictitious Diary of Lei Feng, a heroic tale of a soldier, is used in the campaign to promote Mao's ideas of revolutionary commitment.

September. Mao calls for a new Socialist Education movement to emphasize class struggle in cultural life.

November. There is a unilateral Chinese cease-fire on Indian border after years of clashes over delineation of borders.

1963
Mao's Rural Socialist Education movement is implemented.

Jiang Qing calls for a ban on traditional drama.

1964
China protests US bombing of North Vietnam, claiming that an attack on North Vietnam would be the same as an attack on China.

October. China enters the nuclear age with a successful test of the atomic bomb.

The East is Red, an extravagant operatic celebration of CCP history and Mao's role in it, is staged.

1964 census: population approximately 694.6 million.

1965
September. Mao calls for criticism of reactionary intellectuals, with little response.

November. Mao moves to Shanghai to organize hard-line radicals, including his third wife, Jiang Qing, a major critic of
recent cultural tendencies. Shanghai journalist Yao Wenyuan attacks Wu Han's play as "anti-Party poisonous weed," for undermining Mao's view of the masses as the primary force in history.

1966
February. Lin Biao enlists Jiang Qing to develop cultural policies for the PLA.

Mao's May Seventh directive: the PLA is to be a "great school."

May 9. China makes its first thermonuclear test.

May 16. Politburo decides that the Cultural Revolution group must attack bourgeois elements in the CCP, the government, the PLA, and cultural circles.

Spring/Summer. Important figures in Ministry of Culture are purged; attacks are made against Wu Han and other writers; radical protests on campuses. First appearance of Red Guards, who proclaim Mao as their "great teacher, great leader, great supreme commander, and great helmsman." Mao, fearing the bureaucratization that befell the Soviet Union economy and
society, encourages urban youth to criticize and reform the CCP from below. Mao at first restrains the party, police, and army from interfering. As the youth began to splinter and fall into factions, Mao calls on the military to repress them, only to have it collapse along factional lines as well.

September. Quotations from Chairman Mao is published for the general public.

Fall/Winter. Schools are closed amid huge struggles. China's youth are urged to destroy old customs, old habits, old culture, and old thinking; to attack teachers, leaders, and parents. There is an outpouring of violence, with widespread mass criticisms, imprisonment, sadistic torture, and killing. Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, major party leaders, are purged.

Population: approximately 750 million.

1967
January. Radical struggles continue in Chinese cities. The PLA is instructed to side with the "left-wing masses."

February. The Shanghai People's Commune is established. Mao allows PLA crackdown on militant radicals.

June. China explodes its first hydrogen bomb.

Summer. China's cities are in chaos.

1968
Widespread campaigns are waged against "bad elements."

July. Mao signals an end to the extreme radical phase of the Cultural Revolution.

December. Mao announces a directive to send educated urban youth to the countryside for re-education by poor and lower-middle-class peasants.

1969
Border clashes with the Soviet Union over Zhenbao Island in the Ussuri River and in Xinjiang Province.

Lin Biao is chosen as Mao's successor.

December. US trade embargo against China is partially removed.

Population: approximately 806 million.

1970
January. At Warsaw talks, China indicates a willingness to discuss substantive issues at a higher level with US.

April. The first Chinese satellite orbits successfully.

August. Mao issues new instructions for the CCP: downplay ideology and reduce the PLA's role.

Mao doubts Lin Biao's loyalty.

October 1. American journalist Edgar Snow is invited to the twenty-first anniversary of the PRC. This is seen as a signal to
President Richard Nixon.

1971
Screenings of model dramas The Red Lantern and The Red Detachment of Women, models of leftist patriotic cultural works.

April. US table-tennis team is invited to China ("ping pong diplomacy").

July. Henry Kissinger meets with Zhou Enlai in private talks.

September. Lin Biao is killed in a plane crash in outer Mongolia, allegedly after an attempted coup against Mao.

October. Taiwan's seat in the UN is given to the PRC.

November. Publication of the first book of classical literature since the start of the Cultural Revolution: on the Tang poets Li
Bo and Du Fu.

Population: approximately 852 million.

1972
February. President Nixon visits China, with the Shanghai Communiqué signifying a basic realignment of foreign policy for the US and China; US recognizes the principle that Taiwan is part of China.

Population: approximately 870 million.

1973
January. Struggles between radical and moderate factions in the Party leadership. Radicals, led by Mao's wife, Jiang Qing, gain the upper hand and begin a campaign to criticize Lin Biao and Confucius as a way of attacking the moderates, led by Zhou Enlai.

April. Deng Xiaoping, protégé of Zhou, reappears as vice-premier, and addresses UN General Assembly.

The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra visit China.

Population: approximately 892 million.

1975
April. Chiang Kai-shek dies in Taiwan.

May. In a Politburo meeting, Mao warns Jiang Qing and her associates against maneuvering as a "gang of four." However by fall, radicals convince Mao that moderates want to repudiate him and his work.

December. President Gerald Ford visits China and meets with Mao.

1976
January 8. Premier Zhou Enlai dies.

February. Hua Guofeng (b. 1921) succeeds Zhou as acting premier. A campaign is waged against "capitalist roader" Deng
Xiaoping.

April 5. The Tiananmen Incident: violent clashes break out in Beijing and elsewhere between authorities and demonstrators
mourning Zhou Enlai.

April 7. Hua is appointed premier; Deng is dismissed from all posts.

July 6. Zhu De dies.

July 28. In one of history's worst earthquakes at Tangshan, 300,000-600,000 people are killed.

September 8. Chairman Mao dies. A coalition of political, police, and military leaders forms to oppose radicals.

October 6. The Gang of Four is arrested.

Population: approximately 925 million.

1977
May 24. Building of Chairman Mao Memorial Hall in Tiananmen Square is completed.

July 21. Hua Guofeng is confirmed in leading posts; Deng Xiaoping is restored to secondary positions.

1978
November. Posters on Beijing's Democracy Wall accuse Mao of having supported the Gang of Four.

December 18-22. The Third Plenum of the 11th Party Congress focuses on economic modernization-the Four Modernizations (industry, agriculture, defence, science/technology); this begins Deng's Revolution, a fundamental reorganization of Chinese economy, society, and culture.

1979
January 1. US-China diplomatic relations resume.

January 7. China denounces December 1978 Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia.

January 28-February 5. Deng Xiaoping visits the US.

February-March. Chinese invade Vietnam.

March. Democracy advocate Wei Jingshange is arrested; in October he is sentenced to fifteen years in prison for counterrevolutionary activities.

April. US Congress passes Taiwan Relations Act. US commits to resisting force against Taiwan.

July. The Party plans to establish four Special Economic Zones (SEZs) for export.

December. Political posters are banned; the 1978-79 pro-democracy movement ends.

Students and scholars travel abroad, particularly to the US.

Responsibility system in agriculture is implemented, reverting responsibility for land to individual farmers. Communes are phased
out in the ensuing years.

1980
February. Liu Shaoqi is posthumously rehabilitated.

February 29. Hu Yaobang is elected Party secretary-general.

March-April. China is admitted to International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

September 10. Zhao Ziyang replaces Hua Guofeng as premier; Deng Xiaoping and others resign vice-premierships due to old age.

Revised Marriage Law is put in effect to reduce population growth with later marriages: earliest age for marriage is now twenty-two for men, twenty for women.

October 20-December 29. The Gang of Four and several others are tried and convicted for their role in the Cultural Revolution.

1981
June 29. A Party communiqué cites the Cultural Revolution as a disaster, and criticizes Mao's role and the policies of his
last years.

1982
July. Third national census: China's population is over one billion.

September. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher visits China to discuss the future of Hong Kong. Deng Xiaoping and
associates occupy most positions of Party and state power.

1983
May. Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, directed by the playwright, opens in Beijing.

July 1. Deng's Selected Works are published.

Plans are made for a large-scale Pearl River economic zone.

A report is issued stating that economic crimes are at a record high.

September. Regulations are made governing joint ventures in China.

October. China is approved as a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

A campaign is launched against "spiritual pollution" from the effects of Western influence.

1984
January. Premier Zhao Ziyang makes an official visit to US.

April. President Ronald Reagan visits China.

June. Deng promises that Hong Kong's socio-economic system will remain the same after its return to China: "One country, two systems."

December 19. Prime Minister Thatcher and Premier Zhao sign Sino-British Joint Declaration on Hong Kong; Hong Kong will return to Chinese jurisdiction on July 1, 1997.

1985
March. Deng proposes "socialism with Chinese characteristics." Zhao Ziyang cites changes in wage and price systems essential to economic reform.

May. The Party orders modernization in education.

June. Deng reports the intention to reduce the PLA size by one million within two years.

July. The Party issues a report on large-scale smuggling and
other economic crimes in Hainan.

September. In a major shift, the Party's power is transferred from elder leaders to younger, better-educated ones; sixty-four
resign.

October. The Bolshoi Ballet performs in Beijing.

December. China's first public demonstrations against nuclear testing take place.

1986
March. China becomes a member of the Asian Development Bank.

April. US agrees to supply high-technology aviation equipment to China for military modernization.

April 21. A new law, to be implemented by 1990, requires nine years of compulsory education for all.

July 12. Military clash on Sino-Soviet border.

July 28. Mikhail Gorbachev calls for resumption of friendship between China and Soviet Union.

September 26. Shanghai Stock Market reopens after nearly
forty years.

September 28. Party attacks "bourgeois liberalization" that undermines Socialist system and promotes capitalism.

October. Government encourages foreign investment in China.

November-December. Thousands of students demonstrate for democracy in Beijing and many other cities. In Hefei, Anhui Province, they rally in response to a speech by astrophysicist Fang Lizhi who says that democracy is "not granted but won."

December 2. Bankruptcy law is approved.

December 26. In Beijing, demonstrations that lack prior approval are banned.

1987
January. The People's Daily attacks bourgeois liberalization, saying that the success of the reform depends on Four Cardinal Principles: leadership of the CCP, Marx-Lenin-Mao Thought, people's democratic dictatorship, and the "socialist road."

Hu Yaobang resigns as CCP general secretary; he is replaced by Zhao Ziyang. The CCP expels Fang Lizhi and People's Daily
reporter Liu Binyan for opposing the Four Cardinal Principles.

March 26. China-Portugal agreement is signed for return of Macao (under Portuguese administration since 1557) on December 20, 1999.

July. The CCP reports widespread corruption in the Party.

September-October. Demonstrations are held in Lhasa for Tibetan independence; clashes with authorities lead to arrests and
deaths.

October 6. The US Senate condemns Chinese actions in Tibet. China protests US interference in internal affairs.

November. Zhao Ziyang names Li Peng acting premier.

1988
January 14. The CCP sends condolences to GMD in Taiwan on death of Jiang Jingguo (son of Chiang Kai-shek).

July 3. Li Peng encourages Taiwan to invest in mainland China.

August. Politburo decides to allow most commodity prices to be regulated by market.

September 17. Li Peng indicates his willingness to normalize
relations with Soviet Union.

1989
February 1-4. Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze visits (the first Soviet state visit since 1959).

February 25-26. President George Bush visits.

March. Anti-Chinese demonstrations in Lhasa erupt in violence; martial law is declared. Li Peng acknowledges that inflation and price hikes threaten China's modernization program.

April 15. Death of Hu Yaobang is followed by student demonstrations for Hu's rehabilitation and for democracy. Official mourning on April 22 sparks large student demonstration in Tiananmen Square.

April 27. Demonstration is held in Tiananmen Square for democratic freedoms, calls for government accountability and cleanup of Party corruption.

May 4. Massive demonstrations are held in Beijing and other major cities to commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the May Fourth movement. Calls are made for freedom of the press and democracy.

May 13. Beijing demonstrators vow to occupy the square until demands are met; they begin a hunger strike.

May 15-18. Gorbachev visits (the first visit of a Soviet leader since 1959). Deng and Gorbachev announce normalization in
Sino-Soviet relations.

May 19. Zhao Ziyang meets with demonstrators on Tiananmen Square.

May 20. Martial law is declared for parts of Beijing. The PLA refuses to move against demonstrators. Li Peng's overthrow
is called for.

May 30. Tiananmen Square demonstrators construct Goddess of Democracy, statue inspired by the Statue of Liberty.

June 3-4. Beijing massacre: widespread violence throughout the city.

June 5. US provides sanctuary in Beijing for Fang Lizhi; the Bush administration suspends US-China military contacts and
sales.

June 9. Deng praises China's military for suppressing counterrevolutionaries, and pledges to continue post-1978
open-door policy and reforms.

June 10. Arrests of leaders and participants of demonstrations begin.

June 24. Zhao Ziyang is dismissed from all high Party positions; he is replaced by Jiang Zemin as general-secretary.

August 24. The People's Daily promises punishment according to the law for demonstrations' leaders only, not ordinary
participants.

November 9. Deng announces his intention to resign as chairman of Party Military Affairs Commission; Jiang Zemin is to replace him.

1990
January. Martial law is lifted in Beijing. Nearly six hundred arrested student-movement participants, having confessed, are released.

April 4. Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the PRC is adopted. The law, designed to ensure a
fifty-year continuance of Hong Kong's economic system, will be effective July 1, 1997.

April 7. Asia's first regional communications satellite is launched.

April 23-26. Li Peng visits the Soviet Union.

May 1. Martial law ends in Lhasa, Tibet.

1991
GDP grows at a role of 7.5 percent. In the most rapid growth of any major world economy, China's GDP will average 11 percent per annum through 1997.

Population: approximately 1.152 billion.

1992
January. Deng makes "southern tour" to Shenzhen and Zhuhai SEZs, and to other cities to defend open-door economic strategies against hard-liners.

Major Yangtze River and border cities open to foreign investment.

Zhu Rongji becomes one of the chief leaders in China's economic growth; GDP grows by 12 percent.

Population: approximately 1.167 billion.

1993
Wei Jingshang is released early from prison as part of Beijing's unsuccessful bid for the Olympic Games in the year 2000. (Wei is re-arrested and sentenced in 1995 to fourteen more years in prison.)

GDP grows by 14 percent.

1994
February. Deng's last public appearance.

May. President Bill Clinton ends link between China's human-rights record and Most Favored Nation trade status.

GDP growth rate is 12 percent, inflation 24 percent.

Zhu Rongji's austerity plan is designed to slow down China's economy.

1996
Democratic elections are held in Taiwan; PRC rockets landing nearby bring US naval response.

Reduction of inflation to 6 percent; GDP grows by 10 percent.

1997
February 19. Death of Deng Xiaoping at age ninety-three.

July 1. Hong Kong is returned to Chinese jurisdiction.

October. Jiang Zemin visits the US to discuss human-rights issues, a nuclear accord, and a promise of Chinese tariff cut
to address trade imbalance.

November. Wei Jingshang arrives in US after his release from prison.

1998
March. Li Peng is replaced as premier by economic reformer Zhu Rongji.

April. Prominent dissident student leader Wang Dan is released from prison, and arrives in the US.

China's economic growth drops sharply to below 8 percent per annum.

June. President Clinton visits China.

August. Major flooding occurs on the Yangtze and other rivers.

China wins world respect for economic role in Asian crisis.

Population: approximately 1.21 billion.

1999
Population: approximately 1.243 billion.