Abstract: There were two kinds of ways to imagine the modern state for the sake of statebuilding during the late Qing Dynasty. One was the familiar notion of the “nationstate” (min zu guo jia), that is, “One Nation, One State.” The other was the often neglected notion of “the people’s state” (guo min guo jia), which advocated the sovereignty of the people, and emphasized the direct and immediate relationship between state and citizen and equal rights and duties for the individual. Insofar as the traditional bonds between the cosmic order and the political order were severed through it, the people’s state was a modern idea. However, due to external pressures and internal crisis, the discourse concerning “the people’s state” was often replaced either with a more radical version of nationalism (racialism) or with a reformist version in which the individual was swallowed up by an organismic state and collective people. The discourse concerning “the people’s state” is still significant nowadays in reminding us that the individual should be relocated in a proper place in a modern state and given equal rights and duties.

Key words: nationstate, the people&rsquo, s state, the people, nation, state