Cynica proudly presents this week in China's history, a column by James Carter.

This week in China's history, February 12, 1912, the Qing abdication.

We, the emperor, hand over the sovereignty to the people, declared Puii, the 11th and last emperor of the Manchu Qing dynasty.

We now retire to a peaceful life and will enjoy the respectful treatment of the nation.

There was no last grand imperial audience, no pomp or circumstance intended to awe subjects and

impress rivals. The edict announcing the end of the Qing dynasty was anti-climax,

submitted by court officials, endorsed by the Empress Dowager acting as regent, and then

published in the Peking Gazette, where the denizens of the capital could read that their

world had been turned upside down.

The phrasing evokes a world-weary monarch, turning the reins of power over to his subjects,

but bear in mind that this emperor was just six years old. He had come to the throne as a

toddler, but the dynasty he headed had lasted

nearly three centuries, and the imperial system, though never as continuous or as uniform as the

old 5,000 years of history saw would have you think, had been around for millennia. There had been

gaps and schisms and splits, some of them lasting for

centuries, but for most of the 2000 years preceding February 12, 1912, there had been someone

to point out as Emperor of China, or at least a claimant to that title. After that date, aside from a handful of trivia answers,

there were none. Rules giving up their power. The U.S. Supreme Court is embroiled in debate

over Donald Trump's actions as he tried to prevent power from passing to his elected successor.

In Senegal, the president was more successful, for the moment at least,

in forestalling his constitutionally mandated exit from the presidential palace.

Xi Jinping successfully removed term limits from his job description as head of China's

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