Anarchism flourished in Chinese radical thought and practice during the first three decades of the twentieth century.While the issues and concepts which anarchists introduced into radical thought would continue to retain their significance,they persisted as trace elements largely assimilated into mainstream radical ideology,increasingly represented by Marxism from the mid 1920s.Anarchist activity (including ideological activity) since then has been isolated,transient and marginal,without a visible or sustained impact on the course of Chinese radicalism.Chinese anarchists’ conflicting engagements with anarchism may be of some relevance in sorting out contemporary problems within anarchism,especially over issues of cultural difference.Most of those who identified themselves as anarchists were drawn to anarchism not because of some native predisposition but because of its universal appeal.The indigenization of anarchism indicates an effort by some anarchists to adapt native intellectual legacies to an assortment of imported ideas that already had come to be associated with the term “anarchy” in its European origins.Why and how they did so are important questions with theoretical implications that go beyond anarchism in China,as they bear upon issues of universalism and localism in anarchist theory and practice.