C. The Duties and General Activities of the _San Min Chu I_ Youth Corps (Ch'ên Ch'êng) 340 D. The _Hsiao-tsu_ (Small Group) Training Program 354 E. Party Constitution of the Chinese Communist Party 359 APPENDIX III: MATERIALS ON POLICY 371 A. Reply to Questions (Chiang K'ai-shek) 371 B. What I Mean by Action, or A Philosophy of Action (Chiang K'ai-shek) 373 C. Definition of the Problems Concerning the Organization of the Various Classifications of _Hsien_ (Chiang K'ai-shek) 388 Chart on _Hsien_ Classifications facing 388 D. A Discussion of Mao Tsê-tung's Comments on the Present State of International Relations (Ch'ên Kuo-hsin) 403 E. China's Long-range Diplomatic Orientation (Wang Ch'ung-hui) 418 GLOSSARY 423 INDEX 435 INTRODUCTION The National Government of the Republic of China, located at the auxiliary capital of Chungking, is one of the most important governments in contemporary world affairs. It has provided fairly effective unification for the largest nation on earth, and has fought a great power to a standstill. The present work is an analysis of this government. Not a biography of Chiang K'ai-shek, it is instead a delineation of the institutions, the parties and movements, and the armies which today determine the Chinese destiny. Free China, mutilated as it is, is still far more populous and complex than the Soviet Union or Germany. Its political institutions cannot be reduced to the terms of one man's caprice, and the personality of Chiang--while brilliantly conspicuous--is not the entire picture of China. Generalissimo Chiang works, perhaps because he wishes to, certainly because he must, within the framework of a triune organization: the National Government, the central armies and the Kuomintang. These institutions have developed to their present efficacy only by means of thirty years of war, preceded by almost thirty years more of conspiracy. They have become the norm of contemporary China and, whatever their particular future, significant determinants of China's eventual development. THE CHINESE POLITICAL INHERITANCE: SOME CONTINUING ASPECTS