East Asia: China and Japan [individual assignment]
East Asia in the modern period
China: the Qing Dynasty
By the 1640s, the Ming dynasty had declined and been taken over by a peasant army which established the short-lived Shun dynasty.
The Manchu, a community of hunters, fishermen, and farmers from the lands to the northeast of China, soon ousted the Shun and established the Qing dynasty. Thus, China came under the rule of foreigners for the second time (the first being the Mongol-ruled Yuan dynasty).
The Manchus established and expanded their rule through military conquest. Like Genghis Khan, who reorganized the Mongol army to diminish the importance of tribal allegiances, the Manchu leader Nurhaci created a large army consisting of units called banners, which were organized on a social basis. Each banner comprised a set of military companies, but also included the families and slaves of the soldiers. Banners were led by a hereditary captain, many of whom came from Nurhaci’s own lineage. When the Manchu army defeated new groups, they were incorporated into several banners to decrease their potential for insubordination.
The Manchu had adopted elements of Chinese culture generations before the conquest. Unlike the Mongols, they incorporated traditional Chinese practices into government, including using the Confucian civil service exam system to fill government positions. Like the Mongols, however, the Manchu wanted to preserve their own ethnic and cultural identity. They forbade intermarriage between Manchu and Han Chinese, barred Chinese from traveling to Manchuria and learning their language, and forced Chinese men to wear their hair in a braid called a queue as a sign of submission.
Manchu emperors were well steeped in Chinese traditions. Both Kangxi who ruled from 1661 to 1722, and his chief successor, Qianlong, which ruled from 1735 to 1796, were Confucian scholars.
The Qing dynasty created a multiethnic empire that was larger than any earlier Chinese dynasty. It expanded into Taiwan in 1683, increased control of Mongolia throughout the 1690s, and established administrative oversight of Tibet in 1720. The final area to be annexed was Chinese Turkestan in the 1750s.
The Manchus ruled Tibet and Turkestan relatively leniently. Local religious leaders, such as the Dalai Lama in Tibet, were allowed to remain in place, and men were not forced to wear the queue. By this time, the expanding Qing and Russian empires were nearing each other, which resulted in Manchu and Russian leaders approving the 1689 Treaty of Nerchinsk, which defined borders and regulated trade.
In all of this expansion, the Chinese did not aspire to conquer the rest of the world, or even interact with it very much. They stayed focused on China and its surrounding neighbours. The Manchu did trade with the Europeans and granted rights to the Portuguese, Dutch, and British, but they were vigilant about and successful at controlling trade relations through the mid-eighteenth century. The Manchu were fierce protectors of their culture. When they felt threatened by European advances, they expelled the Europeans. In 1724, for example, Christianity was banned. In 1757, trade was restricted to just one city, Canton. Still, trade with Europeans was substantial. The Europeans bought large quantities of tea, silk, and porcelain. In exchange, the merchants received huge sums of silver, which created a new rising class of merchants in Chinese coastal cities.
Japan: Tokugawa Shogunate
Tokugawa Ieyasu established the Tokugawa shogunate in 1600, after a period of civil war that began in 1467. Fighting had broken out among various daimyos (warlords) over succession of the shogun, the supreme military leader of Japan.
The Tokugawa period is also known as the Edo period because Tokugawa moved the capital to Edo (now Tokyo).
Ieyasu hoped to stabilize the country and end the unrest by increasing his control over the daimyos. He required that they spend every other year at the capital, Edo, where he could more easily monitor them and prevent rebellion.
Relationships with the outside world became closely controlled. By 1635, a National Seclusion Policy prohibited Japanese from going abroad and from constructing large ships. Europeans were expelled from Japan, and foreign merchants were not allowed to trade in Japanese ports— the only exception was a small number of Chinese and Dutch ships. Despite all these restrictions, the Japanese economy grew, as agricultural production increased and the population grew.
In this comparatively peaceful era, the samurai warrior class took on more administrative responsibilities.
Christianity had made some important inroads in Japan by 1580, with 150,000 Japanese Christian converts, but the government ended these missions and outlawed the religion. The government even went as far as to torture and execute the missionaries who did not leave, as well as the Japanese Christians who did not renounce their religion.
Dutch merchants continued to be the principal source of information about Europe during this time, keeping the Japanese up-to-date with important scientific and technological developments.
The absence of foreign influence allowed Japanese culture to thrive. During this time period, Buddhism and Shintoism remained at the centre of culture, and unique Japanese art forms also prospered. Kabuki theatre and a new form of poetry, haiku, became very popular. Artists dedicated themselves to the creation of richly detailed scrolls, wood-block prints, and paintings. In other words, under a strong central authority, Japanese culture underwent its own renaissance, Unlike the European Renaissance, however, it was strictly intended for domestic consumption.
Experts’ questions
1. What factors influenced the history of China and Japan?
2. What were the similarities and differences between China and Japan of the given period? What were the causes of their prosperity and decline?
3. Compared to (with) nations from other geographical zones, what were the distinct features of the given oriental ones? (Before answering, read other nations in the theme 9 section).