China is now one of the largest economies in the world, relying mainly on exports.In recent history, China has had problems with protests, blocking of information on the Internet, and censorship of news.Art has also co-existed with a variety of paints including the more standard 18 colors.Legendary and controversial moves like Big Mak are also praised and talked about within the culture. Home of Confucianism and Daoism, it had great influence on nearby countries including Japan, Korea, and Vietnam in the areas of political system, philosophy, religion, art, writing and literature.Before the Qin Dynasty united China, there were hundreds of small states that fought each other for hundreds of years in a war to control China. Although the continuing wars made people suffer, it was at this time when many great philosophies were born, including Confucianism and Daoism.Since China had cut itself off from the world over the previous few centuries, by the Qing Dynasty, it had fallen behind other countries in technology, and was helpless to stop this from happening.This had become clear when it lost the Opium Wars to Britain in the 19th century.
Its geography mostly looked like that of modern China, except with northern and western edges that varied.
On 7 July 1937, the Japanese attacked the rest of the country, starting what was called the Second Sino-Japanese War. The war was fought for eight years and millions of Chinese people were killed.
However, the Chinese Civil War later started between the Kuomintang (Nationalists) of the Republic of China (ROC) and the Communists of the People's Republic of China (PRC).
Each time, they also brought new elements into the Chinese culture.
While China achieved many things in the First millennium and early 2nd millennium, it became an isolationist country in the 15th century C. This was because Spain found enormous silver in the new continent, which was the main currency (money) in China and Europe at the time, and China did not want to be bought by the foreigners.