IV.
Economical crisis (1909-1913)
At the end of the Ming dynasty, just before the Manchus overthrew the Ming and established the Qing dynasty, China's economy was in a period of expansion. New markets were being founded, and merchants were extending their businesses across provincial lines and even into the South China Sea. Chinese merchants were already active in Southeast Asia during this time, and, in fact, one of the arguments then made regarding the cessation of China's state-sponsored maritime expeditions to various places in the southern seas (such as the famed "Ming Voyages") was that these expeditions were no longer necessary. Chinese merchants themselves were going out to the South China Sea and were trading with these areas themselves, so there was no longer a need to have a tributary relationship with other states or city-states in this area. In certain instances the Qing state did balk at the movement of people into overseas commerce and tried to limit rice and metallic currency from moving out of the country, but the state simply did not have the capacity to stop trade completely. The circulation of goods went on with or without state approval. The economic growth so evident under the Ming dynasty continued under the Qing dynasty, up until the time of the Opium War in the 1840s. During this time China’s domestic economy was a dynamic, commercializing economy, and in some small ways, even an industrializing economy. The Stereotype of an "Anti-Merchant" Qing State A common stereotype about late imperial China -- one that is actually perpetuated in the study of practically every period in Chinese history -- is that the Chinese government was anti-merchant. Common reasons given to support this assertion are: that Confucianism was anti-business and anti-merchant; that Confucian scholar-officials were at the top ranks of Chinese society; that state policy impaired economic activity by not supporting it in any constructive way; and that taxes were so heavy that they squeezed the life out of merchants and their businesses. But all these things are untrue.
The Qin dynasty, after unifying the territory later known as "China", took some contradictory measures to enhance the economical productivity of the empire. On the one side, money and weights and measures were standardized throughout all commanderies, leading to smoother transactions over longer distances. On the other side, the First Emperor and his successors ordered gigantic construction work in the Capital Xianyang and its surroundings as well as in other parts of the empire. The tomb of the First Emperor, the Epang Palace and the Great Wall are the most famous examples. Higher taxes and intensive corvée labour required from the peasants prevented the "national economy" from reposing after decades if not centuries of permanent warfare.
The economic policy of the Qin was compared by the early Han period writer Jia Yi with that of a wartime economy kept running even in peacetime. The exploitation of the peasantry finally lead to uprisings that would bring the downfall of the dynasty. The economic history of China stretches over thousands of years and has undergone alternating cycles of prosperity <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity> and decline. According to the book 'China and the Knowledge Economy: Seizing the 21st century', China <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China> was for a large part of the last two millennia the world's largest economy, even though its wealth remained average <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regions_by_past_GDP_(PPP)_per_capita>. China's history is usually divided into three periods: The pre-imperial era, consisting of the era of before the unification of Qin, the early imperial era from Qin to Song, and the late imperial era, marked by the economic revolution that occurred during the Song Dynasty.roughly 10,000 BCE, in the Neolithic <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neolithic> Era, agriculture was practiced in China. Stratified bronze-age cultures, such asErlitou <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erlitou_culture>, emerged by the third millennium BCE. Under the Shang <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shang_dynasty> (c. 1600-1045 BCE) and Zhou <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Zhou_Dynasty> (1045-771 BCE), a dependent labor force worked in large-scale foundries and workshops to produce bronzes and silk for the elite. The agricultural surpluses produced by the manorial economy <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manorialism> supported these early handicraft <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handicraft> industries as well as urban centers and considerable armies. This system began to disintegrate after the collapse of the Western Zhou Dynasty <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Zhou_Dynasty> in 771 BCE, preceding the Spring and Autumn <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_and_Autumn> and Warring states <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warring_states> eras.the feudal system collapsed, much legislative power was transferred from the nobility to local kings. A merchant class emerged during the Warring States Period <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warring_States_Period>, resulting in increased trade. The new kings established an elaborate bureaucracy, using it to wage wars, build large temples, and perform public works projects. This new system <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merit_system> rewarded talent over birthright; important positions were no longer occupied solely by nobility. The adoption of new iron tools revolutionized agriculture and led to a large population increase during this period. By 221 BCE, the state of Qin <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qin_(state)>, which embraced reform more than other states, unified China, built the Great Wall <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Wall>, and set consistent standards of government. Although its draconian laws led to its overthrow in 206 BCE, the Qin institutions survived. During the Han Dynasty, China became a strong, unified, and centralized empire of self-sufficient farmers and artisans, though limited local autonomy remained. The Song Dynasty <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_Dynasty> (960-1279 CE) brought additional economic reforms. money, the compass, and other technological advances facilitated communication on a large scale and the widespread circulation of books. The state's control of the economy diminished, allowing private merchants to prosper and a large increase in investment and profit. Despite disruptions during the Mongol conquest of 1279 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_conquest_of_the_Song_Dynasty>, the population much increased under the Ming Dynasty <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ming_Dynasty> and Qing Dynasty <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qing_Dynasty>, but its GDP per capita remained static <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regions_by_past_GDP_(PPP)_per_capita> since then. In the later Qing period, China's economic development began to slow and Europe's rapid development since the Late Middle Ages <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Middle_Ages> and Renaissance <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance> enabled it to surpass China - an event known as the Great Divergence <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Divergence>.
empire economy opium crisis
Conclusion
Upon overthrowing the Ming dynasty, the incoming Qing rulers inherited its system of tribute. The Qing court was punctilious about the rules attached to paying tribute. In common with its predecessors, the new government imposed specific regulations as to when and how foreign nations were permitted to pay tribute to the imperial court. In 1637, for example, the Qing government ruled, ‘It is agreed that Korea may pay tribute once annually in addition to at the Holy and Pure Festival, New Year and the Winter Solstice.’ This rule remained in force until the outbreak of the Opium Wars in 1840. Another instance occurred in 1829, when Vietnam moved its capital to Fuchun. The new capital was even more distant from Zhennanguan, the prescribed point of entry by inland water route from which the Vietnamese made their way to Peking. Vietnamese officials requested permission to travel by an alternative, maritime route from southern Canton. The emperor refused, on the grounds that it would violate convention. The rules applying to the number of foreign delegations coming to Peking by ship or road to give tribute were more or less the same as those of the preceding Ming Dynasty. In 1652, the Qing Dynasty ruled that, ‘Representatives of all countries coming by land to pay tribute must not exceed 100. Twenty may enter the capital while the remainder stays on the outskirts and waits for their largess; those arriving by a maritime route must travel in no more than three ships and not exceed 100 person per ship. The remainder is not permitted to disembark’. Another edict issued by the Qing government in 1644 states, ‘Countries may pay tribute depending on their official documents and local produce’. Tribute documents were based on Qin Dynasty memorials from vassal states entering the suzerain. They exemplified the underlying principal-subordinate relationship of the tribute system, their language based on imperial edicts and tribute ceremonials. China's rulers, however, had a clear and pragmatic approach to the tribute system. They were aware that the main objective of many tributary expeditions, superficial protestations of loyalty and obedient kowtows notwithstanding, was to carry on trade. The grandiose and chauvinistic language espoused by the Qing court, therefore, was largely symbolic. China's illusion of its superiority over its neighbours did not stem from a desire for global dominance. In reality, Qing leaders were content to seal themselves off from the outside world, having little interest in forging relationships with other nations.to the 19th century, China and the West conducted their international affairs on the basis of completely different norms. The setting of respective permanent missions in Italian city-states and their vassals, other than at times of war, became conventional practice in the early 15th century. The Italian practice gradually made its way to other European nations. By the end of the 16th century, the phenomenon whereby serious diplomatic relationships between monarchs, put in place during peacetime and maintained in the midst of European power struggles by means of reciprocally assigned permanent foreign envoys, had become relatively common. By the latter half of the 17th century, the exchange of permanent diplomatic missions among Western nations and their counterparts was also commonplace.
The Peace Treaty of Westphalia marked the formation of
a set of Western norms that would shape the international system. In time, the
canon of conventions governing international relations became increasingly
complex. The 1815 Congress of Vienna, for example, sought to standardize norms
applying to diplomacy and commerce and also to codify court protocol. The
standard Western etiquette for greeting a foreign head of state stated that
visiting emissaries should, upon presenting themselves to the monarch, bow
three times before directly presenting diplomatic credentials. After a brief
conversation, the emissary repeated the initial ritual before making his exit
with a full bow, rather than getting down on one knee.21
<http://cjip.oxfordjournals.org/content/1/3/447.full> These
details are important by virtue of their complete contrast to Chinese protocol.
The voyages of discovery during the 15th and 16th centuries that increased
interaction between China and the West led inevitably to conflicting
perceptions of the rituals appropriate to diplomatic protocol.Qing dynasty
forbade maritime intercourse with foreign countries shortly after it was
founded, much to the dismay of ambitious European traders. Eager to surpass
their Spanish and Portuguese rivals, the Dutch decided to join the tribute
system as a means to gaining access to Chinese markets. Holland, according to
tributary state protocol, was assigned a set time frame and itinerary for
offering tribute.1653, the governor of Dutch Batavia dispatched a special envoy
to Canton (Guangdong province) where he made the request to pay tribute and at
the same time trade. The envoy, however, had not brought with him the requisite
tribute documents or gifts and was refused. The Dutch official immediately
expressed willingness to respect China's customs, and suggested that he would
despatch members of his retinue back to Batavia to obtain the necessary
documents and gifts and awaited their return in the provincial capital of
Guangzhou, so that he can travel to Peking to offer tribute when the necessary
preparations had been made. But this request was denied by Peking.years later,
the Batavian governor again dispatched a special envoy. On this occasion extra
care had been taken to ensure that the required materials were prepared. The
envoy then requested, and was granted, the Qing court's permission to enter the
capital. During his time in Peking, the Dutch envoy adhered strictly to all
ceremonial rituals required of him, to the extent of executing the full kowtow
before the Emperor. All of this, as may be inferred, was motivated by Dutch
desire to establish trade relations with China. The court's response to the
Dutch tribute and request to trade was one of ‘sympathy and understanding for
the people from a distant land’, and to extend the tribute period (to eight
years) on condition that, ‘the tribute delegation does not exceed 100 members,
20 of whom may enter the capital; all produce carried must be handed over to
the Embassy. There must be no unauthorised selling of merchandise on the East
China Sea’. This actually restricted the scope of tributes received by the Qing
court which, moreover, refused all requests to engage in direct trade.ban on
maritime trade and intercourse with foreign countries was lifted after Taiwan
came under Qing Dynasty control. Thus the Dutch were able to enter Guangdong
and Fujian to trade with China. As, the Dutch sent no more envoys to pay
tribute to the Qing court over the succeeding 100 years, their tribute period
was curtailed, thereby rendering the regulations pertaining to Dutch tributes
nothing more than a worthless scrap of paper.Dutch approach to courting the
Qing contrasted with that of other Western diplomatic missions in that it
unquestioningly followed the dynasty's established ceremonial protocol. The
Dutch obviously expected that abiding by Chinese formalities would advance
their trading interests. Moreover, they dared not risk losing favour with the
Chinese government merely through a breach of court decorum. The Qing court, on
the other hand, regarded Western nations merely as tributary states to whom
occasional conciliatory gestures must be made to keep them under control, the
selected method of mollification being that of trade. Governmental relations
between China and the West were of a loose, nominal nature. Sentiments
expressed regarding common protection were in cognizance of China's superior
national power, particularly during the flourishing Qing reign. Upon first
arriving in China, the Portuguese and Dutch had no illusions about their
ability to contend with this huge nation's superior might, an assumption that
inhibited them from any attempt at establishing diplomatic relations on a
modern, equal footing.the Dutch tribute protocol compromise was not entirely in
vain, it nevertheless failed to produce the desired effect, a reality that was
not lost on other European countries. The discovery that adherence to Chinese
tribute rituals was insufficient to satisfy Western trading ambitions lessened
the likelihood of Western deference to the system's ceremony and rituals. Their
reasons, on the one hand, were that such concessions would not achieve their
desired interests. On the other, as their power grew stronger, the benefits of
compromise correspondingly shrank.establishment of Sino-Russian relations in
the early 17th century occurred at a crucial point in China's early
interactions with the West. The Russians’ first contacts with China marked a
change in Qing diplomatic policy, whereby rulers played down their grandiose
self-image and liberalised their foreign policy. Despite these conciliatory
gestures, however, early Sino-Russian relations were plagued with intense
disputes over diplomatic protocol.after the founding of the Qing dynasty, the
Russian government dispatched diplomatic envoys to China to explore trading
possibilities. In February 1654, the Russians sent Feodor Baikoff and his
mission to China. The Russian Czar gave Baikoff detailed instructions as to
protocol, stressing that the letter of credence and gifts should be personally
handed to the Emperor. He was also emphatic that the Qing Emperor writes the
Czar's full name and title on the diplomatic credentials he presented to
Baikoff. If there was any variance on this point, the documents were not to be
brought back to Russia. The envoy was forbidden to bow to the imperial palace
or to kiss the Emperor's feet, although he was permitted to kiss the Emperor's
hand. The Russians were evidently ill informed about Chinese diplomatic
protocol.this time, the Qing Court was equally unconversant with Russian
affairs. It was unaware, for example, that the Cossack invasion of northeast China
had actually been Russian. In view of this historical misapprehension, the Qing
court assumed that Baikoff's mission to Peking as one based on admiration of
China's culture or economic prosperity.arrival of Baikoff's diplomatic mission
in Beijing in March 1656, Qing officials requested that, in accordance with
standard protocol, the visiting envoys hand gifts and diplomatic credentials
over to them, that they may in turn convey them to the Emperor. But the Russian
Czar had specifically instructed Baikoff to deliver the documents and gifts
personally. This put him in the predicament of being unable to satisfy one set
of protocol without breaching the other. After extensive negotiations, Baikoff
was compelled to deliver the gifts that the Czar had exhorted him to present
directly to his Chinese counterpart to Qing officials. Shortly after, the Qing
court demanded that Baikoff also hand over his credentials. On the basis of his
original instructions from the Czar, Baikoff refused. After over four months of
deadlock, the Qing court eventually elected to compromise and allowed Baikoff
personally to present his credentials to the Emperor.of the wrangling between
the Russians and Chinese lacked substantive content. As neither side knew very
much about the other, each entered into negotiations with a host of unrealistic
expectations. While Baikoff's mission and those later lead by Russian envoys
Ivan Perfilyev and Abolin were largely unsuccessful, they substantially
increased the two sides’ understanding of one another. Later Russian emissaries
clearly benefited from the work of these early diplomatic pioneers.lack of
understanding between the two nations did not change until after a military
dispute during the reign of the Emperor Kangxi. The most intense conflict over
protocol in the early days of Sino-Russian relations was triggered by Nicholas
Spafari's mission to China. Emperor Kangxi had already sent two letters to the
Czar before Spafari's visit in an effort to resolve the conflict at the
Heilongjiang river basin as well as the matter of Tahur chief Gantimur's
defection to Russia. This made clear the Qing Dynasty's awareness of its need
for flexibility and compromise in diplomatic protocol if it were to reach
agreement with Russia on major issues. Soon after Spafari arrived in Beijing,
he found that his instructions as to how to present his diplomatic credentials
conflicted with Chinese protocol. According to Qing protocol, after each
country's tribute had crossed the border its credentials and gifts were to be examined
by the official of the relevant locality. Before crossing the Nen river, the
protocol official Ma La that received Spafari demanded, according to official
protocol, that he hand over his credentials in order that they may be checked
for ‘discourteous wording’, also the gifts that they may be scrutinized. This
request was flatly refused. Spafari insisted on delivering the documents
personally to the Emperor.the time the Russian envoy spent in the capital there
seemed to be no end of dispute over the respective protocol. In the normal
course of events, upon arrival in the capital the foreign envoy would hand over
the credence letters and gifts to be presented to the relevant government
office for respective translation and checking. The documents would then be
submitted to the Qing emperor and the gifts to the Ministry of Internal
Affairs. On this occasion the Qing court altered conventional protocol by
allowing Spafari to place his letter of credence on top of a yellow damask seal
case. This and the gifts were then presented to a Grand Secretariats (Great
Academicians of the Inner Hall) acting as Emperor Kangxi's representative.
Another difference of opinion as to protocol was that of whether or not the
Russian visitors should kowtow or, as the Russian Czar had insisted, merely bow
to the emperor. As Qing officials were obdurate on this point of etiquette, the
Russian emissaries had to decide between compromise or failure to complete
their mission; they ultimately opted for the former option.as to the format and
style of diplomatic documents further complicated relations. Qing court
conventions in this regard were based on imperial edicts issued to vassal
states. Letters of credence submitted by vassal states paying tribute were in
complete contrast to conventional Western diplomatic intercourse, which were
conducted on the basis of equality of both parties. The Russian envoy to
China's mandate was that the Czar's complete name and title be written on the
Qing Court letter of credence, thereby upholding the Russian ruler's dignity.
If the Chinese refused to comply, the document would not be taken back to
Russia. Before Spafari returned to Russia, he demanded a copy of the Qing
reciprocal letter of credence in Latin, on the grounds of ensuring that it showed
his full title and contained no inappropriate wording that might in any way
‘damage the Czar's dignity’. It was by the similar consideration that the Qing
court demanded that Spafari submit the Czar's letter of credence to them in
order that Qing officials could translate it and ensure that it did not contain
any wording that might be considered disrespectful to the emperor. Spafari
refused and Qing officials sternly rebutted. As both sides appeared to have
reached a stalemate on this issue, the Qing court took the view that ‘talks
between the two rulers have reached a conclusion’, and asked Spafari to leave
Beijing for Russia as soon as possible without the reciprocal letter of
credence.refusing to issue diplomatic credentials to Spafari, the Chinese were
able to avoid further dispute. Scholar Li Yunquan points out that in taking
this decision, the Qing court nominally maintained the established system of
protocol. In reality, however, it had given considerable thought to whether or
not the Russians would accept the high-handed, condescending tone in which the
Qing letter of credence had been written. It was at this point that it began to
occur to Qing officials that official documents other than imperial edicts
should be written in less high-blown language. This posits the suggestion that
China's knowledge of the outside world had evolved, moreover that in order to
protect China's interests the court had to be prepared to compromise when
dealing with more powerful counterparts.
References
1. Chesneaux, Jean, Marianne Bastid, and Marie-Claire Bergere. China from the Opium Wars to the 1911 Revolution. Trans. Anne Destenay. New York: Pantheon, 1976.
2. "China," Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia 2004 1997-2004 Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
3. Samuel Wells Williams (1848). The Middle kingdom: a survey of the ... Chinese empire and its inhabitants ....(1 ed.). New York: Wiley & Putnam <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiley_%26_Putnam>. p. 489.
. Bartlett, Beatrice S. Monarchs and Ministers: The Grand Council in Mid-Ch'ing China, 1723-1820, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1991. ISBN 978-0-520-06591-8 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/9780520065918>.
6. Ebrey, Patricia. Chinese Civilization: A Sourcebook (2nd edition), New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993. ISBN 978-0-02-908752-7 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/9780029087527>.