The Shifting Balance of Power in the City God Temples, Late Qing to 1937

Bibliographic Data

ID20478752
AuthorsVincent Goossaert (École Pratique des Hautes Études, corresponding author)
Year2015
Volume43
Issue1
Pages5-33
Publication date2015-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Chinese Religions (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0737-769X • E-ISSN: 2050-8999
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1179/0737769x15z.00000000016
OpenAlexW1588117662
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited18

The City God temples 城隍廟 occupied a particular place in the socio-religious organization of late imperial China. They were state-mandated shrines under the control of local officials, but also housed a large variety of local religious organizations. There was cooperation between such organizations in staging festivals, but also tensions about control over temple resources and management. These tensions evolved during the late Qing and the Republican period, as political and social change empowered certain actors and weakened others, thus affecting temple life and activities. The article first presents the various actors that played a role in managing and running a City God temple, what type of religiosity they invested in it, and how they shared its space. It then examines two moments of change in this sharing of the common temple space, namely the post-Taiping reorganization of local society, and the post-1898 policies to build a nation-state

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Art · China · Economics · Management · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Religiosity · Sociology · Temple · Chinese history and philosophy · History · Law · Philosophy · Public Administration · Religious Tourism and Spaces · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies