Modern China’s ascent to great power status and its geostrategic, political, and economic power and influence, is reverberating in China and the world. This course provides an overview of the history of the fall and rise of modern China from 1839 to the present. It covers the First and Second Opium Wars; the unequal treaties; the Taiping Rebellion; the Sino-Japanese War; the Open Door Policy; the Boxer Rebellion; the Chinese Revolution and the fall of the Qing (Manchu) Dynasty; the political, social and economic instability of the Republic of China; the Chinese Civil War between Chiang Kai shek’s Nationalists and Mao Zedong’s Communists; the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and greater China; the China-Japan conflict in World War Two; the Communist victory in 1949; Communist China’s intervention in the Korean War; the Mao Era (the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and the Sino-Soviet conflict); the Deng Era (economic reform and Tiananmen Square); China’s post-Cold War rise and its assertiveness under Xi Jinping; the Belt and Road Initiative; tensions over Taiwan, Hong Kong, North Korea, and the South China Sea. The course also examines the problematic relationship between China, the United States and Australia from the 1840s to the present.

Your Tutor is Dr Daniel Fazio

Dr Daniel Fazio PhD, MA, BA (Hons) has been teaching at WEA since 2018.

Daniel is a Lecturer in History and Politics at the University of South Australia. His areas of expertise include the history of American and Australian foreign policy and politics, the history of the US-Australian relationship, US-Korean-Australian relations, and modern Korean history and politics. He teaches World and US History, and international and Australian politics.

Daniel has taught the history of American foreign policy, the American Civil War, America at War, Twentieth Century America, Nazi Germany, Russia/USSR 1917-53, History's Turning Points and Killing Fields, War and Society, and World History.

Daniel is also an experienced political activist, having worked on a number of federal, state and local government election campaigns.