ABSTRACT
Sun Zhongshan recognized the instability of industrial capitalism but did not accept the extent to which the success of that economic system depended on imperialist expansion, whether through formal or informal empire. Although Otto von Bismarck and Sun Zhongshan each accepted the general terms of nationalism and development, the points of departure for Germany and China were quite different. Neither Otto von Bismarck nor Sun Zhongshan favored democracy for its own sake. Generally accepted characteristics of the nation, such as common language, history, or territory, far from being naturally occurring attributes, are features constructed in the process of nation-state-building itself. The political and economic realignments necessary to create the institutions of a nation brought forth new status groups from among the existing spectrum of social interests. The cosmopolitanism which Europeans are talking about to-day is really a principle supported by force without justice.
