Anarchism is a political philosophy[1][2] that advocates self-governed societies based on voluntary, cooperative institutions and the rejection of hierarchies those societies view as unjust. These institutions are often described as stateless societies,[3][4][5][6] although several authors have defined them more specifically as institutions based on non-hierarchical or free associations.[7][8][9][10] Anarchism holds capitalism, the state, and representative democracy to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful.[11][12][13][14][15]

Yuan Shikai (Chinese: 袁世凱; pinyin: Yuán Shìkǎi; 16 September 1859 – 6 June 1916) was a Chinese military and government official who rose to power during the late Qing dynasty, and tried to save the dynasty with a number of modernization projects including bureaucratic, fiscal, judicial, educational, and other reforms. He established the first modern army and a more efficient provincial government in North China in the last years of the Qing dynasty before the abdication of Xuantong Emperor, the last monarch of the Qing dynasty, in 1912. Through negotiation, he became the first official president of the Republic of China in 1912.[2]

This army and bureaucratic control were the foundation of his autocratic rule as the first formal President of the Republic of China. He was frustrated in a short-lived attempt to restore monarchy in China, with himself as the Hongxian Emperor (Chinese: 洪憲皇帝).