Dreams of a Young Republic

The American Vincentians in China

John J. Harney

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Hardback

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English

University of Nebraska Press
01 October 2025

Asian history; Christianity; Christian mission & evangelism

Series: Studies in Pacific Worlds

The Congregation of the Mission, a Catholic order known as the Vincentians after their founder Saint Vincent de Paul, began missionary work in China in 1699. First run by French priests and nuns, American priests took over a large vicariate in the south of China in 1921. French envoys of nineteenth-century imperialism had given way to American priests who ascribed to an idealized vision of a modern democratic China. For the Americans, China was a dream: a place liberated from centuries of imperial orthodoxy, a nascent democracy, a country that would forever be free and democratic-and thus one that would inevitably be capitalist and more friendly to Catholicism.

In Dreams of a Young Republic John J. Harney examines the perceptions and expectations of this group of American Catholic missionaries between the 1911 revolution that created the Republic of China and the communist revolution of 1949 that led to the collapse of that republic on the Chinese mainland. The Vincentians experienced warlordism, Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek’s partial unification of the country, Japanese invasion during World War II, and communist revolution. Through all this they clung to a vision of a free, democratic China friendly to the West. As Harney contextualizes the Vincentians’ observations and desires, he provides insight into the China that came to be and offers a history of a Sino-American relationship with much deeper roots than the antagonisms of the Cold War and the decades that have followed.

By: John J. Harney
Imprint: University of Nebraska Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
ISBN: 9781496237743
ISBN 10: 1496237749
Series: Studies in Pacific Worlds
Pages: 206
Publication Date: 01 October 2025
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

List of Illustrations Note on Language Acknowledgments 1. Chinese Dreams 2. Americans in China 3. Transitions 4. Frontier 5. Church, State, and Revolution 6. Reds 7. War 8. Exile Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

John J. Harney is an associate professor of history at Centre College. He is the author of Empire of Infields: Baseball in Taiwan and Cultural Identity, 1895–1968 (Nebraska, 2019).

Reviews for Dreams of a Young Republic: The American Vincentians in China

“John Harney’s rich analytical insights give us a window into the American Vincentians’ lived social and political experiences in the Chinese interior. Dreams of a Young Republic not only complements existing scholarly interpretations of the interplay between religion and politics in modern China but also offers a nuanced analysis of the Chinese reception of, and opposition to, Catholicism at the local level.”-Joseph Tse-Hei Lee, editor of Christianizing South China: Mission, Development, and Identity in Modern Chaoshan