Tuan Hsi-p'eng (1896-26 December 1948), a leader of the May Fourth demonstrations of 1919 and the first chairman of the Student Union of China. He taught history at Wuchang University in 1925 and at Kwangtung University in 1926. In 1932-37 he was vice minister of education, and in 1938 he became chairman of the education committee of the Kuomintang Central Training Corps.

Born into a scholarly family in Yunghsin, Kiangsi, Tuan Hsi-p'eng received his early education in the Chinese classics at home. He then enrolled at a normal school near Yunghsin, where he learned English. After graduation in 1916, he received a scholarship which enabled him to go to Peking and enroll at the law school of Peking University. Thus, he was a student at Peking University during its golden era under the chancellorship of Ts'ai Yuan-p'ei (q.v.)

Secret negotiations between the government of Tuan Ch'i-jui (q.v.) at Peking and the Japanese gave rise to student unrest in 1917-18. The floating of the so-called Nishihara loans (see Ts'ao Ju-lin) and the signing in May 1918 of the Sino-Japanese Military Mutual Assistance Conventions led to massive student demonstrations at Peking on 21 May 1918. Tuan Hsi-p'eng was among the 13 student representatives who met with Feng Kuo-chang (q.v.) that day in an attempt to learn the contents of the Sino- Japanese agreements and to press for the annulment of these and other agreements. Although the students failed to achieve their aims, the 1918 demonstrations were not insignificant. They served to unite the students and prepare the way for such significant joint actions as the May Fourth Incident of 1919 (for details, see Lo Chia-lun).

Tuan Hsi-p'eng helped organize the demonstrations of 4 May 1919, as a result of which 32 students were arrested. On 5 May, he presided at a meeting of some 3,000 students. The students called for the release of the 32 who had been arrested and resolved that they would boycott all classes until this demand was met. They also passed resolutions asking for the punishment of pro-Japanese officials and the restoration to China of Tsingtao.

To promote the patriotic May Fourth Movement, they established the Student Union of Peking, with Tuan as one of its chief representatives. Because their demands were refused by the government, Tuan and his colleagues went to Shanghai to organize a nation-wide student union. The Chung-hua min-kuo hsueh-shenglien-ho-hui (Student Union of the Republic of China) was established on 16 June at a meeting, held in the Ta Tung Hotel in Shanghai, which was attended by more than 30 student representatives and some 200 guests. Two days later, Tuan Hsi-p'eng was elected to a one-year term as chairman of this organization. As one of the best organized bodies of its day, the Student Union of China was a highly effective pressure group. It helped secure the release of the arrested students and the dismissal of several pro-Japanese officials.

After graduation from Peking University, Tuan Hsi-p'eng went abroad. In 1920-24 he studied successively at Columbia University, the University of London, Berlin University, and the University of Paris. Upon his return to China in the autumn of 1925, he joined the faculty of Wuchang University as a professor of history. The following year, he went to Canton, where he was appointed chairman of the history department at Kwangtung University.

In 1926 Ch'en Kuo-fu (q.v.) brought Tuan Hsi-p'eng into the organization department of the Kuomintang as part of his attempt to limit Communist influence in that body. Ch'en sent Tuan to Kiangsi in November to oversee party activities in that province. Tuan soon discovered that the provincial Kuomintang organization was dominated by such Communists as Fang Chih-min (q.v.). To counter Communist influence, Tuan organized the A. B. (anti- Bolshevik) Corps. His efforts were hindered by the establishment of the left-wing Kuomintang regime at Wuhan, for it supported the policy of collaboration with the Communists. On 1 April 1927 the Kiangsi provincial government and party organs were ordered reorganized, and anti-Communist officials were dismissed. A number of these anti-Communists were arrested the following day. On 4 April, Tuan fled Kiangsi in disguise. He went to Shanghai.

Subsequently, he played an important role in the purge of the Communists from the Kuomintang. Tuan became chief of the office of party guidance at Chiang Kai-shek's field headquarters at Nanchang in 1930 and a member of the Huai River Conservation Commission. In June 1932, having become vice minister of education, he was appointed acting president of National Central University in Nanking. Because of student opposition, the university had lacked a president for some time. When Tuan tried to assume office, the students assaulted him. The Executive Yuan then ordered the temporary dissolution of the University. Tuan continued to serve as vice minister of education until the end of 1937.

In February 1938 Tuan Hsi-p'eng became a member of the Central Executive Committee of the Kuomintang and chairman of the education committee of the Central Training Corps, the leading training center for Kuomintang cadres. Throughout the Sino-Japanese war, he devoted his attention to the activities of the Central Training Corps. He died of lung cancer on 26 December 1948 at Shanghai. Newspapers in Shanghai and Hong Kong eulogized Tuan as a righteous statesman who never lost his revolutionary spirit.