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THE LIVING AGE

NUMBER 4029

SEPTEMBER 24, 1921

A WEEK OF THE WORLD

CONTROVERSY IN CHINA

A LIVELY Controversy is raging in China, in which Professor John Dewey, Bertrand Russell, and, very indirectly, Charles R. Crane, the late American Minister to China, are involved. Professor Dewey, who sympathizes strongly with the South China government, has accused the British of hostile propaganda against the Southern Republic. He detects a sordid motive for this attitude in certain mining concessions which the British have obtained from the Northern militarists, and charges powerful financial interests at Hongkong with desiring to perpetuate the old, corrupt régime. He says the British hold the same position in South China that the Japanese hold in North China, intriguing in favor of disorder and disintegration so as to fish in the muddy waters thus created. To this, the Japan Chronicle, which champions British interests in the Far East, rejoins with the implied suspicion that Professor Dewey is eager for the success of the Consortium, in which American capitalists are interested, and which is likewise seeking profitable openings in South China.

Mr. Bertrand Russell is involved, because, in his final address before leaving Peking, he referred to an alleged remark by Mr. Crane, at Chita,

to the effect that the only remedy he could perceive for China was some sort of international financial control. Naturally, Bertrand Russell does not agree to such a theory, his view being that China will be happier under its old social institutions than it will be if converted into a modern industrial state, with a huge operative proletariat, under the benignant forcing of international finance. The Chronicle reports that this suggestion gave great offense to Professor Dewey, who is strongly in favor of some such arrangement as Mr. Crane intimated might be desirable. Bertrand Russell thereupon addressed a letter to the Chronicle, defending Professor Dewey, though differing from his views favoring the Consortium. While Professor Dewey 'sees in the expansion of American influence in China the best hope of China's regeneration, I do not.' He adds: 'Certainly some explanation has to be sought for the extreme hostility of Hongkong to the government of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. The favor shown to that government by the Americans also needs explanation, which I hope will be provided by some American as "unpatriotic" as myself.'

PARLIAMENTS COMING BACK

UNDER the stress of war, European parliaments, like our own Congress, de

Copyright 1921, by The Living Age Co.

ferred to such an extent to the executive branch of the government, that this waiver of functions amounted almost to an abrogation of their authority. Now there is a reaction at least in France which threatens to go to the other extreme. We hear protests that the Chamber of Deputies is usurping what should be exclusively diplomatic functions. Before the recent adjournment of that body, Louis Marin, a Nationalist deputy, tried to secure the signatures of a majority of the members to a call for a special session if the foreign situation should make this seem desirable. He actually secured 280 of the 310 signatures which would have been necessary for this object. However, protests are being heard against Parliament's interfering in the diplomatic negotiations of the Republic, because these are without its proper jurisdiction, and because this policy tends to create a condition of anarchy in foreign relations.

On the other hand, the Cabinet is being severely criticized for continuing the war policy of agitating in the newspapers questions at issue between itself and other governments. By thus stimulating popular excitement, the ministry is likely to place itself in a position where it is impossible to retreat or compromise a perilous situation where Great Powers have to work together on a basis of give and take. The recent excitement in France over the Upper Silesia negotiations, which rumor says was largely manufactured for domestic political objects, is a case in point.

WORKERS AGITATING IN JAPAN

THIRTY thousand shipyard workers have recently been on strike in Kobe, and, following the example of the Italian metal-workers a year ago, they took possession of the Kawasaki dockyards, one of the largest metal-working and

shipbuilding establishments in the Empire. The Herald of Asia, a Japanese Liberal weekly, thus comments on this

occurrence:

The present dockyard strikes at Kobe mark a new advance in the labor movement

in Japan. The strikers demand, among other things, the right of collective bargaining and participation in the management of the workshops. But what more markedly differentiates the present strikes from all past strikes in this country is the way in which the striking workers conduct themselves. They strictly abstain from drinking, and all public demonstrations have been carried out with praiseworthy discipline. and unusual absence of all disorderly scenes. Evidently, they are under the control of able and wise leaders. This is indeed remarkable, in view of the greatness of the number of men on strike, namely, over thirty thousand. Official pressure brought to bear upon them in one shape or another has only stiffened their determination, and at present

there is no indication of any weakening

among them.

Later accounts of this labor-struggle indicate that it does, indeed, mark a new stage in the history of industrial disputes in Japan. The strike began at the Kawasaki yard on July 7. The Mitsubishi workers came out on July 12. This brought the number of strikers up to the maximum mentioned, more than 30,000, mostly from the shipbuilding and metal-working trades, where the most intelligent and best. remunerated mechanics of Japan are employed. At first the men proposed to conduct the dispute while staying in the workshops, using the sabotage tactics which succeeded two years ago. However, the companies locked them out, at the same time allowing the men halfpay. After ten days, both shops reopened their doors and stopped halfpay. About one third of the men returned, but the remainder have persisted in the strike, although the government has used the severest methods

of repression. For instance, last month a cordon of police was thrown around a district where the industrial workers mostly reside, and all the important strike leaders upon whom the authorities could lay hands were arrested.

Among the features which distinguish the present strike from most of its predecessors are its duration, the determination shown by the rank and file, as well as the leaders, to fight the controversy to a finish in spite of the government as well as the employers, and the syndicalist theories which are gaining ground among the workers.

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Mr. Bertrand Russell, who is now in Japan, having happily recovered from his recent reported death in Peking, recently said in a public interview that the labor movement of Japan was to-day about where the English labor movement was eighty years ago

- namely at the commencement of a transition from an agricultural to an industrial society. However, Baron Ishimoto, who is also a well-known student of social and labor questions in the Orient made the point that the growth of Socialist ideas in Japan renders the movement there quite different from the British labor movement of the forties.

The tenant farmers of Japan are also forming combinations to protect themselves against their landlords. Last spring there were already 416 such unions in existence, with an aggregate membership approaching 50,000. These unions are forcing the lowering of rent. Like the earlier Japanese labor organizations, however, they are in many cases of a temporary nature, disbanding as soon as they have accomplished their immediate object.

A significant opinion is current in Japan that, where the tenants are exsoldiers who have served in Siberia, these agricultural disputes are likely to be accompanied by violence.

ESKISHEHR

Le Figaro's special staff correspondent in the Levant describes in a recent issue of that journal his visit to Eskishehr before its capture by the Greeks, when it was still the key of the Turkish front. After bestowing much praise upon the efficient way in which the refugees, fleeing from the Greek invasion, were provided for, he adds:

The work of the Red Crescent organization is no less remarkable. I found the hospitals filled with wounded freshly received from the battlefield. The large mosques, the Catholic church, and the better houses of the city had been taken over for this purpose. A number of Red Crescent hospital trains were busy, each with a full detail of female nurses. The latter are young girls and matrons of good family, who fulfill their duties with the same patriotic devotion which our Red Cross nurses exhibited during the war. They are permitted to go about unveiled when on duty, and wear the same costume as the nurses in our own country, including a white blouse and white muslin veil. I personally visited nearly all the hospitals. I found the beds perfectly clean and tidy, the ventilation perfect, and the operating-rooms and dressing-rooms excellently conducted. I inspected the kitchens and tasted the food, and carefully examined the dispensaries and linen rooms. I could see no difference between them and our better hospitals in France. On several occasions I took impromptu meals with the staff. The members would rush in, snatching a moment from their work, just as they did with us at the height of the war. The conversation, hope, discouragement, and the supreme effort were identical with those of our own tragic memories. Then, when the crisis was over, there was the same petty friction and quarreling that always succeeds a period of high nervous tension.

He describes Eskishehr as a city where no one is idle:

Every morning, about five o'clock, sirens shriek for a full ten minutes. Are they announcing that Greek airplanes are visible,

coming to bombard the city? No, they are calling the employees of the munition factories and cannon foundries to work. After this it is impossible to get any sleep. Peasants are arriving from the country, driving huge buffalo carts, whose wheels rumble over the rough pavements. Caravans of camels wind through the streets. Red Crescent ambulances dash past, on some emergency call, returning slowly with their burden of wounded. Trains are whistling at the railway station, and automobiles are speeding in all directions. The town is wide awake, and will remain so until two or three the following morning.

LIMAN VON SANDERS

GENERAL LIMAN VON SANDERS, chief of the German military mission and forces in Turkey during the war, has added his book to the imposing mass of political and military memoirs with which the world is being flooded. His title is Fünf Jahre Türkei, or Five Years of Turkey. It appears from the reviews to record incessant bickering and bitterness between the Germans and the Turks, beginning almost as soon as Turkey entered the war, and continuing crescendo until the final catastrophe. One anecdote at least will be read with sympathetic understanding by men familiar with the Near East, and with the difficulties and misunderstandings that attend military coöperation between nations having radically different characters, ideals, and practical aims. When General von Sanders was in command of the Palestine front in 1918, shortly before the English broke through, he was scantily provided with troops, munitions, and medical supplies, and was surrounded by native tribes ready at any moment to revolt. He sent dispatch after dispatch to Stamboul, imploring reinforcements. On September 21, five days before Bulgaria laid down her arms, he received his first communication from Turkish

Headquarters. It was carefully coded. In the utmost suspense he waited for it to be deciphered. It read as follows: 'On October 8 an athletic meet is to be

held at this place. Would Your Excellency be willing to provide a prize for the sack-race?'

COUNT KAROLY'S DENIAL

COUNT MICHAEL KAROLY has addressed to the Neue Zürcher Zeitung a formal denial of each of the charges that Prince Windischgrätz recently brought against him in the Hungarian Parliament, to the effect that he and his party were in the pay of the Entente; that he revealed important military secrets to Entente emmissaries; that he maintained relations with the Soviet government, and that he had tendered Hungarian territory to the Allies before the defeat of the Central Powers. He admits, what the world knows in any case, that he was an outspoken and consistent opponent of the Triple Alliance before the war, and that he advocated at that time reconciliation, and if possible an alliance, between Hungary and the South Slavs.

THE DOMINIONS AND IRELAND

THE Dominion press appears to have little sympathy with Ireland's claim for the right to secede from the Empire. The Melbourne Argus and the Sydney Morning Herald refuse to believe that the Sinn Fein leaders will plunge Ireland again into strife. The Capetown Times expresses the same opinion, and asserts that, should the present negotiations fail, the public sentiment of the Empire will place the blame upon the Irish Independence leaders. This is the view also of the Melbourne Age, the Sydney News, and the Sydney Telegraph. Apparently, the Dominions consider their own form of government

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