After the fall of the Qing dynasty following the Xinhai Revolution (1911–1912), Sun Yat-sen, who led the new Republic of China (1912–1949), immediately proclaimed that the country belonged equally to the Han, Hui (Muslim), Meng (Mongol), and Tsang (Tibetan) peoples. When the People's Republic of China was established in 1949, Chinese Muslims suffered political repression along with all other religious groups in China, especially during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976).

In modern-day China, there is a series of human rights abuses against Chinese Muslims, particularly the persecution of Uyghurs in the autonomous region of Xinjiang.

Republic of China

In the first decade of the 20th century, it has been estimated that there were 20 million Muslims in China proper (that is, China excluding the regions of Mongolia and Xinjiang).Counting up the number of people of traditionally Muslim nationalities who were enumerated in the 1990 census gives a total of 17.6 million, 96% of whom belong to just three nationalities: Hui 8.6 million, Uyghurs 7.2 million, and Kazakhs 1.1 million. Other nationalities that are traditionally Muslim include Kyrghyz, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Tatars, Salar, Bonan, and Dongxiang. See Dru C. Gladney, "Islam in China: Accommodation or Separatism?", Paper presented at Symposium on Islam in Southeast Asia and China, Hong Kong, 2002. Available at http://www.islamsymposium.cityu.edu.hk . The 2000 census reported a total of 20.3 million members of Muslim nationalities, of which again 96% belonged to just three groups: Hui 9.8 million, Uyghurs 8.4 million, and Kazakhs 1.25 million. Of these, almost half resided in Gansu, over a third in Shaanxi (as defined at that time) and the rest in Yunnan.Forbes, Andrew; Henley, David (1997, 2011). Traders of the Golden Triangle (Hui Muslims of Yunnan). Bangkok: Teak House, 1997; republished Chiang Mai: Cognoscenti Books, 2011. ASIN: B006GMID5K

The Hui Muslim community was divided in its support for the Xinhai Revolution (1911-1912). The Hui Muslims of Shaanxi supported the revolutionaries and the Hui Muslims of Gansu supported the Qing. The native Hui Muslims (Mohammedans) of Xi'an (Shaanxi province) joined the Han Chinese revolutionaries in slaughtering the entire 20,000 Manchu population of Xi'an. The native Hui Muslims of Gansu province led by general Ma Anliang sided with the Qing and prepared to attack the anti-Qing revolutionaries of Xi'an city. Only some wealthy Manchus who were ransomed and Manchu females survived. Wealthy Han Chinese seized Manchu girls to become their slaves and poor Han Chinese troops seized young Manchu women to be their wives. Young pretty Manchu girls were also seized by Hui Muslims of Xi'an during the massacre and brought up as Muslims.

The Manchu Qing dynasty fell in 1912, and the Republic of China (1912–1949) was established by Sun Yat-sen, who immediately proclaimed that the country belonged equally to the Han, Hui (Muslim), Meng (Mongol), and Tsang (Tibetan) peoples. This led to some improvement in relations between these different ethnic groups in China. The end of the Qing dynasty also marked an increase in Sino-foreign interaction. This led to increased contact between Muslim minorities in China and the Muslim-majority countries of the Middle East. By 1939, at least 33 Hui Muslims had studied at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt. In 1912, the Chinese Muslim Federation was formed in the capital Nanjing. Similar organization formed in Beijing (1912), Shanghai (1925), and Jinan (1934).Gladney (1999), pg. 457 Academic activities within the Muslim community also flourished. Before the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), there existed more than a hundred known Muslim periodicals. Thirty journals were published between 1911 and 1937. Although Linxia remained the center for religious activities, many Muslim cultural activities had shifted to Beijing.Gladney (1999), pg. 458 National organizations like the Chinese Muslim Association were established for Muslims. Muslims had a substantial presence among military leaders and the Nationalist government.

The New Culture Movement influenced elite Muslim men to begin establishing women's mosques as an effort towards modernization. These institutions converged with women's schools.

During the Second Sino-Japanese War the Japanese followed what has been referred to as a "killing policy" and destroyed many mosques. According to Wan Lei, "Statistics showed that the Japanese destroyed 220 mosques and killed countless Hui people by April 1941." After the Rape of Nanking mosques in Nanjing were found to be filled with dead bodies. They also followed a policy of economic oppression which involved the destruction of mosques and Hui communities and made many Hui jobless and homeless. Another policy was one of deliberate humiliation. This included soldiers smearing mosques with pork fat, forcing Hui to butcher pigs to feed the soldiers, and forcing girls to supposedly train as geishas and singers but in fact made them serve as sex slaves. Hui cemeteries were destroyed for military reasons. Many Hui fought in the war against Japan. In 1937, during the Battle of Beiping–Tianjin the Chinese government was notified by Muslim General Ma Bufang of the Ma clique that he was prepared to bring the fight to the Japanese in a telegram message. Immediately after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, Ma Bufang arranged for a cavalry division under the Muslim General Ma Biao to be sent east to battle the Japanese. Ethnic Turkic Salar Muslims made up the majority of the first cavalry division which was sent by Ma Bufang.

The Hui Muslim county of Dachang was subjected to slaughter by the Japanese.

Muslims affiliated with the Kuomintang moved to Taiwan after the Chinese Civil War. In the Kuomintang Islamic insurgency, Muslim Kuomintang National Revolutionary Army forces in Northwest China, in Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia, Xinjiang, as well as Yunnan, continued an unsuccessful insurgency against the communists from 1950 to 1958, after the general civil war was over.

Islamic education before 1949 Muslim Kuomintang officials in the Republic of China government supported the Chengda Teachers Academy, which helped usher in a new era of Islamic education in China, promoting nationalism and Chinese language among Muslims, and fully incorporating them into the main aspects of Chinese society.Mao 2011 . The Ministry of Education provided funds to the Chinese Islamic National Salvation Federation for Chinese Muslim's education."The China Monthly, Volumes 3–4" 1941 , p. 14.O'Toole & Tsʻai 1941 , The President of the federation was General Bai Chongxi (Pai Chung-hsi) and the vice president was Tang Kesan (Tang Ko-san)."The China Monthly, Volumes 3–4" 1941 , p. 13. 40 Sino-Arabic primary schools were founded in Ningxia by its Governor Ma Hongkui."The China Monthly, Volumes 3–4" 1941 , p. 14.

Imam Wang Jingzhai studied at Al-Azhar University in Egypt along with several other Chinese Muslim students, the first Chinese students in modern times to study in the Middle East.ed. Kurzman 2002 , p. 368. Wang recalled his experience teaching at madrassas in the provinces of Henan (Yu), Hebei (Ji), and Shandong (Lu) which were outside of the traditional stronghold of Muslim education in northwest China, and where the living conditions were poorer and the students had a much tougher time than the northwestern students.ed. Kurzman 2002 , p. 373. In 1931 China sent five students to study at Al-Azhar in Egypt, among them was Muhammad Ma Jian and they were the first Chinese to study at Al-Azhar."China Magazine, Volumes 6–7" 1941 , p. 21."China at War, Volume 6" 1941 , p. 21."Asia and the Americas, Volume 42, Issues 1–6" 1942 , p. 21."Asia, Volume 42" 1942 , p. 21.

Hui Muslims from the Central Plains (Zhongyuan) differed in their view of women's education than Hui Muslims from the northwestern provinces, with the Hui from the Central Plains provinces like Henan having a history of women's Mosques and religious schooling for women, while Hui women in northwestern provinces were kept in the house. However, in northwestern China reformers started bringing female education in the 1920s. In Linxia, Gansu, a secular school for Hui girls was founded by the Muslim warlord Ma Bufang, the school was named Shuada Suqin Women's Primary School after his wife Ma Suqin who was also involved in its founding.Jaschok & Shui 2000 , p. 96. Hui Muslim refugees fled to northwest China from the central plains after the Japanese invasion of China, where they continued to practice women's education and build women's mosque communities, while women's education was not adopted by the local northwestern Hui Muslims and the two different communities continued to differ in this practice.Jaschok & Shui 2000 , p. 97.

People's Republic of China

20th century The People's Republic of China (PRC) was founded in 1949, in the aftermath of the Chinese Communist Revolution (1946–1950). Ten ethnic groups that were traditionally Muslim became part of the state's recognized ethnicities. During the Land Reform Movement, Muslims received preferential policies, as Article 3 of the Agrarian Reform Law of 1950 expressly exempted mosque-owned lands from expropriation and redistribution, unlike ancestral shrines, Buddhist monasteries, and Christian churches.Wang X. Land Reform in The Southern Yunnan Muslim Community: Growing Divergence Beneath The Socialist Rhetoric of Unity, 1949–1958. Journal of Chinese History. 2023;7(1):157–179. doi:10.1017/jch.2022.3 However, by 1958, the central leadership had ordered all mosques’ land to be confiscated to prepare for the establishment of People's Communes.

Through many of the early years, there were tremendous upheavals which culminated in the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). During the Cultural Revolution, Islam, along with all other religions in the country, including the traditional Chinese religion, were persecuted by the atheist Red Guards, who had attempted to eradicate them through a series of atheistic and anti-religious campaigns, encouraged by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to smash the Four Olds. Traditional Chinese, Confucian, and Buddhist temples and monasteries, Christian churches, and Muslim mosques were all attacked.Goldman, Merle (1986). Religion in Post-Mao China, The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 483.1:145-56

In 1975, in what would be known as the Shadian incident, there was an uprising among Hui in what was the only large scale ethnic rebellion during the Cultural Revolution. In crushing the rebellion, the People's Liberation Army massacred 1,600 Hui with MIG fighter jets used to fire rockets onto the village. Following the fall of the Gang of Four, apologies and reparations were made.

After the advent of Deng Xiaoping in 1979, Muslims enjoyed a period of liberalisation. New legislation gave all minorities the freedom to use their own spoken and written languages, to develop their own culture and education and to practice their religion. More Chinese Muslims than ever before were allowed to go on the Hajj.New Encyclopedia of Islam, pg. 622-25

There is an ethnic separatist movement among the Uighur minority, who are a Turkic people with their own language. Uighur separatists are intent on establishing the East Turkestan Republic, which existed for a few years in the 1930s and as a Soviet Communist puppet state, the Second East Turkestan Republic 1944–1950. The Soviet Union supported Uighur separatists against China during the Sino-Soviet split. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, China feared potential separatist goals of Muslim majority in Xinjiang. An April, 1996 agreement between Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, however, assures China of avoiding a military conflict. Other Muslim states have also asserted that they have no intentions of becoming involved in China's internal affairs.Gladney (1999), pg. 471