Best possible 19th century for the Qing?

[SavoyTruffle]

The 19th century was certainly one the Qing dynasty would rather forget. The Opium Wars showed how powerless it was in the face of the Western powers, the Taiping Rebellion showed their domestic weaknesses, and a series of weak Emperors marked by a prolonged de facto regency under Cixi did not help their rule.

So, what would be a good set of PoDs or changes in Chinese history, no earlier than 1800, could there have been to prevent an utter collapse of the dynasty?

 

[Lalli]

Avoiding Taiping and no Cixi might help, speciality if there would be progressive emperor instead reactionary empress.

 

[SavoyTruffle]

I'm thinking of a successful Hundred Days' Reform, but my opinion is that it might be a little too late.

 

[BiteNibbleChomp]

Kill opium. Somehow, probably the death penalty for anyone caught using it, as soon as possible. Opium was being smuggled in to pay for things, and then some incredible proportion of the country became drug addicts (I have read 25% before, although that is probably nonsense). This slowed down China's inner workings drastically. Then the British fought a war because of the trouble opium was causing.

Past that (which is only delaying or slowing the problem), you need a radical change in Chinese thinking. For as long as China had existed, it had thought itself the master of the world, absolutely unstoppable, chosen by God/s etc. To the point that maps given to them by the British had to be reprinted because China wasn't shown in the centre like they always thought themselves to be. The reality was that by 1800 (and more so by 1839), China wasn't the world leader, and they continued to fool themselves with this ideology. That whole idea needs to go out of the window before they will truly accept that they need to listen to the Westerners, but at that stage in history, it would go against everything China really stood for. Only the Opium wars and successive crises rammed the truth down their throats, and even then there was a great deal of dispute. In 1900.

- BNC

 

[samcster94]

Kill opium. Somehow, probably the death penalty for anyone caught using it, as soon as possible. Opium was being smuggled in to pay for things, and then some incredible proportion of the country became drug addicts (I have read 25% before, although that is probably nonsense). This slowed down China's inner workings drastically. Then the British fought a war because of the trouble opium was causing.

Past that (which is only delaying or slowing the problem), you need a radical change in Chinese thinking. For as long as China had existed, it had thought itself the master of the world, absolutely unstoppable, chosen by God/s etc. To the point that maps given to them by the British had to be reprinted because China wasn't shown in the centre like they always thought themselves to be. The reality was that by 1800 (and more so by 1839), China wasn't the world leader, and they continued to fool themselves with this ideology. That whole idea needs to go out of the window before they will truly accept that they need to listen to the Westerners, but at that stage in history, it would go against everything China really stood for. Only the Opium wars and successive crises rammed the truth down their throats, and even then there was a great deal of dispute. In 1900.

- BNC

An earlier POD(the Song, and even Ming weren't as inward thinking) might help, but that butterflies the prompt of a ethnically Manchurian Qing dynasty.

 

[RousseauX]

Past that (which is only delaying or slowing the problem), you need a radical change in Chinese thinking. For as long as China had existed, it had thought itself the master of the world, absolutely unstoppable, chosen by God/s etc. To the point that maps given to them by the British had to be reprinted because China wasn't shown in the centre like they always thought themselves to be. The reality was that by 1800 (and more so by 1839), China wasn't the world leader, and they continued to fool themselves with this ideology. That whole idea needs to go out of the window before they will truly accept that they need to listen to the Westerners, but at that stage in history, it would go against everything China really stood for. Only the Opium wars and successive crises rammed the truth down their throats, and even then there was a great deal of dispute. In 1900.

- BNC

This part is really bullshit btw, it's commonly repeated but it's still bs.

The Chinese adopted western hardware and western-style diplomacy really fast in the 19th century, and even before that the Qing dynasty treated Romanov Russia as an equal in the treaty of nerchinsk

 

[RousseauX]

An earlier POD(the Song, and even Ming weren't as inward thinking) might help, but that butterflies the prompt of a ethnically Manchurian Qing dynasty.

@BiteNibbleChomp

describe to me how the Qing dynasty, after losing the first Opium War, was inward thinking or "continued to fool themselves with this ideology" that they were "center of the world"

 

[RousseauX]

@BiteNibbleChomp

did you know right after the first Opium War, the first thing China tried to do was to buy an entire fleet of ships from England, and the British actually captured a Chinese replica of a (IIRC) British frigate before the war was even over?

how does this indicate a dynasty which refuses to accept western technology

 

[samcster94]

@BiteNibbleChomp

describe to me how the Qing dynasty, after losing the first Opium War, was inward thinking or "continued to fool themselves with this ideology" that they were "center of the world"

They had toned it down, but social elites prevented many of the needed reforms from happening. Also, what I meant is that earlier dynasties actively traded with the rest of the world, and that idea was less prevalent until after about 1430.

 

[RousseauX]

@BiteNibbleChomp

this is what a ship of the Beiyang navy look like in the late 1800s

Does it look modern? it should because China bought it from Germany

clearly a people who refuses to accept other people have better guns and ships than them

 

[samcster94]

@BiteNibbleChomp

did you know right after the first Opium War, the first thing China tried to do was to buy an entire fleet of ships from England, and the British actually captured a Chinese replica of a (IIRC) British frigate before the war was even over?

how does this indicate a dynasty which refuses to accept western technology

They clearly could adapt, but never did what their enemy Japan did and become powerful enough to fight Western powers(See 1905) and win.

 

[RousseauX]

They had toned it down, but social elites prevented many of the needed reforms from happening. Also, what I meant is that earlier dynasties actively traded with the rest of the world, and that idea was less prevalent until after about 1430.

what's the actual evidence for this?

 

[samcster94]

what's the actual evidence for this?

Well, There is plenty of historical evidence for the trading element and even one guy just before the shift had giant caravans(Zheng He, best known for appearing in any Chinese colonize North American timelines). They did reform some, as they did get some of the technology, but it was not sufficient. Also, there was the Taiping, which required Christianity being known well enough to lead to a massive war. I am no expert, but I am pointing out the common idea of China not modernizing at all in this era is inaccurate. The last major European power to end serfdom was Russia and that was well after the Opium Wars.

 

[RousseauX]

They clearly could adapt, but never did what their enemy Japan did and become powerful enough to fight Western powers(See 1905) and win.

Japan was even more isolationist and less in contact with the west since the 17th century under the Tokugawa Shogunate than the Qing was, and it's really telling that the single example of successful modernization you are citing was more isolationist than the Qing was

And the Qing wasn't unique in its failure to adopt modernization

other examples of countries which did worse than Japan include countries like Persia, the Ottoman Empire or even arguably Spain

I guess they all lacked open-mindedness to western ideas

 

[samcster94]

Japan was even more isolationist and less in contact with the west since the 17th century under the Tokugawa Shogunate than the Qing was, and it's really telling that the single example of successful modernization you are citing was more isolationist than the Qing was

And the Qing wasn't unique in its failure to adopt modernization

other examples of countries which did worse than Japan include countries like Persia, the Ottoman Empire or even arguably Spain

I guess they all lacked open-mindedness to western ideas

Exactly!!! Spain( a Western Empire) fought the U.S. in 1898 and lost horribly with much worse naval vessels. There was only one American death in the Philippines campaign, and it was from heat stroke.

 

[profxyz]

I do think that the myth of Qing 'failure' during the 19thC is overblown, and similarly the idea that 'more reform' was necessarily the better answer for the Qing seems one that is justified mainly through hindsight. After all, modern narratives play down the sheer tensions generated by Westernization (the Boxer Rebellion was triggered, in part, through the destabilizing social effects of rail and telegraphy) and the centrifugal effects that Westernizing had on the Chinese state (the most modern armies/provinces also tended to be least-obedient to Beijing).

As for potential PoDs:

1) There are so many battle outcomes that, if changed, could have deterred the destructive colonial effects that China was to experience. Stiffer resistance at the Canton forts from 1839-1841 could have stopped the British (and by extension the West) from forcefully opening China, which in itself may have stopped the Taiping Rebellion. There was also a good point made in Quest for Power - European Imperialism and the Making of Chinese Statecraft that the entire discussion of 'Japanese success vs Chinese failure' revolves essentially around the simple fact that China lost the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-5 and Japan did not.

2) Policy PoDs: some interesting policy directions during the formative years of China's modernization could have brought about large historical changes. Would a less top-down attitude towards the economy/local government come about, had reformers such as Li Hongzhang not focused so much on 'sovereignty' (by which they generally meant central govt control) as the endpoint of modernization? Would the destructive social effects of Westernization been lessened had the Qing government actually maintained its focus on agricultural maintenance/development, rather than rapid adoption of destabilizing foreign hardware (which also served as pretexts for foreign intervention - the need to 'protect' railroads, most obviously)?

3) The 'New Policies' of 1901-1910 - earlier?: one of the differences between Japanese and Chinese reform was that Japan's administrative reform was more extensive than China's (due to the former's creation essentially from scratch). After defeat in the Sino-Japanese War, the Qing quickly adopted Japanese 'innovations' such as professional police + New Army, chambers of commerce, cabinet ministries and an Educational Ministry. The Qing could have afforded these reforms much earlier (tax revenues from 1813-1911 tripled from 41m taels to 300m taels) so what would have been the result if they had done so?

 

[BellaGerant]

Less factionalism would be a necessity. In the case of the navy, the Beiyang (North Sea) fleet, with its British and German made ships, refused to help the Nanyang (South Sea) fleet as the latter fought the French fleet in the Sino-French War due to their rivalry. The same with the Nanyang towards the Beiyang during the Sino-Japanese War. Cooperation between the two major fleets would do wonders to improving the Qing's naval situation and potentially prevent the Sino-Japanese War from going as badly as it did (as they'd be able to keep Japan from controlling the Yellow Sea).

Of course, part of keeping more unity (that is to say, having the country work towards a common goal rather than have the government in control of everything) is to butterfly the Taiping Rebellion (have Hong pass his exam the first time and not go crazy). It keeps the regional generals from having too much power and actually allows the Qing government to get its armies to work together to defend the country rather than gear up for a civil war (basically the Warlords Period). During the Sino-Japanese War, again, the Beiyang army was pretty much the only one fighting, despite there being armies in various other regions (unwilling to help due to their loyalties lying elsewhere).

The Qing's defeats, especially in the later years when they had actually adopted modern equipment, was more unity based than technology based. Part of it was just the ethnic part (Manchus vs Han) and part of it was regionalist/power plays by regional generals. Keep the Empire together (hard to do with a perceived foreign dynasty, the size of China, the linguistic differences between regions, and just human lust for power, but still not impossible) and it won't fall nearly as hard. After all, each new failure just set China up for the next (losing to Britain opened the country to opium, struggling with the Taiping gave the regional warlords autonomy at the cost of unity, losing to Korea, Taiwan, Liaodong, etc. to Japan, for example, set in motion the events leading up to the Xinhai Revolution).