New progress

Since the beginning of the 21st century, Sun Yat-sen research has become more and more rational, continued to expand and achieved fruitful results on the basis of previous studies, and has still been one of the hot issues of modern and contemporary Chinese history. In 2008, the Sun Yat-sen Foundation published its journal Sun Yat-sen Research, providing a specialized forum for Sun Yat-sen research.

As the 90th anniversary of the 1911 Revolution was coming in 2001, Zhongshan University published the books series entitled Sun Yat-sen and Modern China consisting of eight works: Research on Sun Yat-sen and the History of the 1911 Revolution - Collected Papers to Celebrate Mr. Chen Xiqi’s 90th Birthday, Ideal, Morality and the Great Harmony - Proceedings of the International Symposium on Sun Yat-sen and the World Peace', Sun Yat-sen’s Examination of the Domestic Situation; Sun Yat-sen’s Life and Career; Sun Yat-sen’s Activities and Thoughts; Sun Yat-sen and the Reunification of Our Motherland - Proceedings of the International Symposium on Commemorating the 90th Anniversary of the 1911 Revolution; Sun Yat-sen and Modern China’s Democratic Revolution, and Sun Yat-sen and the Awakening of Modern China.

Annals of Guangdong Province: Sun Yat-sen was published in 2004, which was the first annals on historical figures. It was divided into seven chapters: life story, thoughts, writings, family background and relatives, related figures, monument places, and research on Sun Yat-sen. There were also appendices giving a brief introduction to related scholars and others. This book had more than 100 million words, giving both a static and dynamic display of Sun Yat-sen’s contributions and research, and it has been praised as a “small encyclopedia of Sun Yat-sen research”.

Great progress has been made in the monographic studies and new works on the topics which had seldom been studied by previous scholars have been published, such as Sun Yat-sen’s Revolution and the United States, Collection of Sun Yat-sen’s Inscriptions, Sun Yat-sen and Hong Kong, Study of Sun Yat-sen’s Political Psychology, Combination and Replacement: Changes of the Three People’s Principles after Sun Yat-sen, A New Examination of Sun Yat-sen and the History of the 1911 Revolution and Sun Yat-sen and the Opening of Modern China.

The themes of the symposiums held in these years include “Sun Yat-sen and the Social Changes of China in the 20th Century”, “Sun Yat-sen and the World Peace”, “Sun Yat-sen and the Peaceful Reunification of Our Motherland”, “The 1911 Revolution and China in the 20th Century”, “The 1911 Revolution and the Development of Contemporary Chinese Society”, “Sun Yat-sen and the Social Changes in Modern China”, “Sun Yat-sen and China’s Modernization”, “Sun Yat-sen and the Rise of the Chinese Nation”, “Sun Yat-sen and the World”, “Sun Yat-sen’s Thought and the Economic Development of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region”, “Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Foundation of the Chinese Revolutionary League and the 80th Anniversary of Mr. Sun Yat-sen’s Death”, “Sun Yat-sen and China’s Revitalization”, “Sun Yat-sen and the Harmonious Society”, “Sun Yat-sen and Chinese Society” and so on.

The hot spots of research included the following 3 issues.