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The phrase "Sick man of Asia" (Chinese:亞洲病夫;pinyin:Yàzhōu bìngfū), or "Sick man of East Asia" (Chinese:東亞病夫;pinyin:Dōngyà bìngfū) first referred toQing China in the late 19th and early 20th centuries which, experiencing internal divisions and social upheaval at the time, was taken advantage of by thegreat powers. It originates in a play on the concept of a "sick man of Europe".
The term "sick man of Europe" was initially coined in 1853 byTsar Nicholas I to refer to theOttoman Empire, which was then in astate of decline. AfterWorld War I the phrase was applied to various European countries includingFrance,Italy, theUnited Kingdom,Spain andGermany.[1][2]
One of the earliest instances of the term "sick man" being applied to China was in the January 5, 1863 edition of theDaily News in an article about the ongoingTaiping Rebellion.[3] That article was reprinted in the January 7, 1863 edition of theBelfast Morning News under the title "The Supposed 'Sick Man' in China."[4]
In 1895, afterJapan defeated China in theFirst Sino-Japanese War, Chinese writerYan Fu described China as a "sick man" (病夫) in an article titled "On the Origin of Strength" (原強) in his newspaperZhibao, helping popularize the term among Chinese intellectuals.[5]
In 1896, theShanghai newspaperNorth China Daily News published an article stating: "There are four sick people of the world – Turkey, Persia, China, Morocco ... China is the Sick Man of the East." Around then, the phrase was adopted by Chinese thinkers who aimed to reform the Qing government, among themLiang Qichao andKang Youwei. According to Jui-sung Yang, professor at theNational Chengchi University, although Chinese intellectuals such asZeng Pu initially agreed with the description of China as a "sick man", the term gradually became seen as a way in which the Westerners were mocking, humiliating, and insulting China.[6]
One of the most prominent 20th-century uses of the phrase was in the 1972 Hong Kong filmFist of Fury starringBruce Lee, which was released across Asia.[7] According to Chinese writerChang Ping, that film, and others, combined with Chinese education about its "century of humiliation", have linked the term "sick man" with Chinese colonial history, making it a symbol of foreign bullying.[8]
Recently, the term has been applied to countries other than China. For example, an April 2009 article entitled "The Sick Man of Asia" refers to Japan, not China.[9]
The Philippines has also been referred to as the sick man of Asia during the time ofFerdinand Marcos as president in the 1970s until his ouster in 1986.[10] The country managed to rise economically afterwards, where in 2013, under the presidency ofBenigno Aquino III, the country was dubbed by the World Bank asAsia's Rising Tiger. In 2014, the Japan External Trade Organization survey showed "the Philippines as the second most profitable among ASEAN-5 countries, next to Thailand," formally abolishing the "sick man" status of the Philippines.[11] However, during thepresidency of Rodrigo Duterte, several commentators have argued that due to the slow growth of the economy and theadministration's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Philippines has restored its "sick man" status.[10][12][13]
During theCOVID-19 pandemic, India began to be referred to as the "sick man of Asia" as adouble entendre after its government's poor management of the pandemic, with significant loss of life, wide disease expression, the eruption of thedelta variant, and substantial economic difficulties.[14][15]
Due to its continued political and economic instability, countries like Myanmar and Pakistan has been often described as the "sick man of Asia". For decades, Myanmar has experiencing various military dictatorships, prolonged civil wars, and international isolation which makes Myanmar gained such moniker.[16] In 2022, Pakistan experienced theeconomic andconstitutional crises after the ousting of then Prime MinisterImran Khan, since then, Pakistan has dubbed as the "sick man of Asia" due to such factors.[17]
In 2026,Financial Times used the term to refer to Thailand.[18][19]
On February 3, 2020,The Wall Street Journal published an opinion piece byWalter Russell Mead regarding theCOVID-19 epidemic entitled,China is the Real Sick Man of Asia.[20] On February 19, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokespersonGeng Shuang issued a statement revoking thepress credentials of threeWall Street Journal reporters and ordering their expulsion.[21][22] The statement said the WSJ article "slandered" China's efforts in fighting COVID-19[23]and "used such [a] racially discriminatory title, triggering indignation and condemnation among the Chinese people and the international community."[22]The Wall Street Journal editorial board then published a piece noting that while the term "sick man" may be seen as "insensitive", the Chinese government's actions were intended to divert public attention from its management of the coronavirus or in retaliation for the U.S. government designating Chinese state-run media operating in the U.S. as foreign missions.[24]
Great pains have been taken to impress upon the public of this country the idea that China is in "agony," but that cannot be truly said of it as a whole, and there seems some danger that the disorder of this sick man is about to be aggravated rather than alleviated.
1895年，中国刚刚遭遇甲午惨败，全国上下反思中国文化的声音开始萌发。此时，严复在天津的《直报》上发表了题为《原强》的文章，这篇文章中写道："盖一国之事，同于人身。今夫人身，逸则弱，劳则强者，固常理也。然使病夫焉，日从事于超距赢越之间，以是求强，则有速其死而已矣。今之中国，非犹是病夫耶？"严复以后，一大批觉醒的知识分子纷纷沿用了他的这个提法。
该文诋毁中国政府和中国人民抗击疫情的努力...
The truth is that Beijing's rulers are punishing our reporters so they can change the subject from the Chinese public's anger about the government's management of the coronavirus scourge...Perhaps they are also in part a response to the State Department's decision Tuesday to identify the U.S. operations of state-run Chinese media as foreign missions...
