ABSTRACT
The history of China since the late nineteenth century probably represents the most radical and widescale human experiment in the history of mankind. This chapter focuses on the first of these moments, from the end of the nineteenth century to the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, which corresponds to the construction of the modern nation-state and the radical formatting of religion according to its mode of governmentality and the characteristics of the Nation-State regime. After drawing the landscape of premodern religion in China, this chapter shows how a Western, Christian-derived conception of religion was imported and used to funnel religion into exclusive categories: religion (zongjiao), superstition (mixin), and secular categories like sports, medicine, and philosophy. This chapter describes these transformations in some detail, including a section on Redemptive Societies. The discussion then turns to how a veritable political religion emerged in China over the course of the twentieth century, culminating in the Mao cult.
