Li Shizeng
| Li Shizeng | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
李煜瀛 Li Yuying 29 May 1881 Beijing, China |
| Died | 30 September 1973 (aged 92) Taipei, Taiwan |
| Nationality | Chinese |
| Education | Ecole Pratique d'Agriculture du Chesnoy, Sorbonne, Pasteur Institute |
| Occupation | Educator, political activist |
| Political party |
 Kuomintang
|
Li Shizeng (Chinese: 李石曾; Wade–Giles: Li Shih-tseng; 29 May 1881 – 30 September 1973) was an educator, promoter of anarchist doctrines, political activist, and member of the Chinese Nationalist Party in early Republican China.
After coming to Paris in 1902, Li took a graduate degree in chemistry and biology, then, along with his lifelong friends Wu Zhihui and Zhang Renjie, was a founder of the Chinese anarchist movement and a supporter of Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary activities. He organized cultural exchange between France and China, established the first factory in Europe to manufacture and sell beancurd, and created Diligent Work-Frugal Study programs which brought Chinese students to France for work in factories. In the 1920s, Li, Zhang, Wu, and Cai Yuanpei were known as the fiercely anti-communist "Four Elders" of the Chinese Nationalist Party.
Li came from a long line of scholar-officials. Though his family was from Gaoyang County, Hebei, Li was brought up in Beijing. His father was Li Hongzao, a high official of the Qing dynasty. The family was open to new ideas and to the West, and Li was encouraged to study foreign languages and modern subjects. When Li Hongzao died in 1897, the government rewarded his sons with ranks which entitled them to hold middle-level office.
In 1900, the family fled the Boxer Uprising and invasion of the Allied Armies. After their return to Beijing, Li attended a banquet at the home of a neighboring high official who had been a friend of his father. There he met Zhang Renjie, the son of a prosperous Zhejiang silk merchant whose family had purchased him a degree and who had come to the capital to arrange a suitable office. The two quickly discovered that they shared ideas for the reform of Chinese government and society, beginning a friendship which lasted the rest of their lives. When Li was chosen in 1903 as an "embassy student" to accompany China's new ambassador Sun Baoqi to Paris, Zhang had his family arrange for him to join the group as a commercial attache. Li and Zhang traveled together, stopping first in Shanghai to meet with Wu Zhihui, by then a famous radical critic of the Qing government, where they also met Wu's friend, Cai Yuanpei.
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