The Establishment of a New Dominance Relationship and the Fall of the Imperial Examination

This chapter explores Hunan&s;s 1895–1905 shift: Western-style schools gained access to the field of imperial examination amid tensions between foreign powers and China&s;s domestic power. In Hunan, competition between old and new cultural capital unfolded in two phases. From 1895 to 1901, Yuelu Academy and Shiwu School contested for the educational orthodoxy, with the academy seemingly prevailing but the discourse of imperial examination shifting. From 1901 to 1905, Western learning became new cultural capital, and academies transformed into schools, leading to the “atomistic competition” between schools and the imperial examination. Meanwhile, the gentry habitus in Hunan mutated. The 1895 upper-class gentry either clung to tradition or partially accepted Western learning, while the 1895 lower-class gentry mostly turned to new learning. Due to polarized gentry actions, foreign threats, and the needs of school development, the Qing court abolished the imperial examination in 1905 upon Yuan Shikai&s;s petition, earlier than planned.