A great achievement in difficult times

After being rescued from Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) officials, Sun Yat-sen fled to London, where he spent a major part of his time researching at the British Museum to determine which direction China should move toward. During the course of his study, Sun Yat-sen realized that China had to solve three important problems first.

When nation states were being formed in Europe, the Qing Dynasty was in power in China and regaled in ethnic discrimination. Consequently, Sun advocated, though temporarily, that the Manchu rulers be expelled.

China had been subjected to feudal autocracy for a couple of thousand years when the Western-educated Sun realized that the country belonged to the people. Till then, most of the attempts to overthrow the monarchy had ended in the loss of innocent lives and entailed huge social costs. So Sun Yat-sen changed the norms and propagated democracy, replacing "beheading" with votes to bring the curtains down on the monarchy.