Notions of race in an East Asian centric world

Well Japan would be besieged country in that situation as China would control all the seas West and South of it, it's possible but hard.

The difference between alternate history and actual history is that alternate history has to make sense. More improbable things have happened and the Chinese were probably the most arrogant civilization on the planet before the Century of Humiliations. I don't think it's that strange if China straight up didn't care about the discovery of the Americas.
 
The difference between alternate history and actual history is that alternate history has to make sense. More improbable things have happened and the Chinese were probably the most arrogant civilization on the planet before the Century of Humiliations. I don't think it's that strange if China straight up didn't care about the discovery of the Americas.
It's not about the Americas, it's about Japan itself, having a maritime industrialized China not try to assert its hegemony over Japan is just implausible in of itself.
 
It's not about the Americas, it's about Japan itself, having a maritime industrialized China not try to assert its hegemony over Japan is just implausible in of itself.

If what China wanted was military subjugation of Japan or Korea, it could have outright conquered them centuries ago. They preferred a tributary system.
 
No matter what, the fundamental distinction would be between the civilized East Asians and everyone else.

It depends on the dynasty, but a world dominated by a Han-ruled China, like some incarnation of the Song, would tend towards a more European-like view of race, in which non-East Asian peoples are virtually biologically inferior, uncivilizable, unsavalgeable (this was how the Ming elite viewed the Mongols, and why they were so reluctant about making peace with the Mongols; they didn't believe the Mongols had the humanity necessary to honor peace treaties). A world dominated by a Chinese dynasty founded by foreigners (say an alt-Qing) would tend towards a more cultural view of "race" in which East Asia has a mission civilisatrice towards the many barbarian peoples of the world, since this was actually how the Qing justified their control of China -- by pointing out that Chinese and Confucian civilization had reached its furthest geographical extent under the Qing, despite their admittedly barbarian origins.

This is also how Zheng Chenggong and the Han elite in the Kingdom of Tungning in Taiwan viewed the Manchu:

The derogatory lyrical portrayals of the Qing rulers reflected a consensus among Zheng Jing and his elites on Taiwan that the Manchus, despite their lavish patronage of Chinese culture, remained fundamentally alien. Their strange customs and religion promoted incest and went completely against the permissible set of Confucian relationships. They were, in Zheng’s opinion, no different from sensual animals with a wild and untamed nature that could never assimilate into the Han ethnicity. Instead, the disorderly conduct among members of the Qing ruling class, which had usurped the “proper” Confucian hierarchy of the Ming, threatened, through its own example, to corrupt and tear apart the very fabric of Chinese society. Indeed, Zheng spoke of “the foul and rank odor of sheep flooding the four corners of the earth.”27 This intense racial hatred, together with his personal qualities, the consultative nature of his government, and collective exile on an overseas island, would deeply influence the character of his rule over the course of the decade.

(from Xing Hangs Between Trade and Legitimacy page 200)

On the other hand, Zheng Jing also sent people to "civilize" the Taiwan indigenes and instruct them in agriculture. While the treatment of the indigines was frequently brutal and settler-colonial in nature, it's possible that some may have been allowed to assimilate. After all, assimilation of the Yunnan indigenous people was also encouraged the Ming even as they were marginalized by Han settlers. I think the possibility of assimilation would be explored depending on the context.
 
This is also how Zheng Chenggong and the Han elite in the Kingdom of Tungning in Taiwan viewed the Manchu:



(from Xing Hangs Between Trade and Legitimacy page 200)

On the other hand, Zheng Jing also sent people to "civilize" the Taiwan indigenes and instruct them in agriculture. While the treatment of the indigines was frequently brutal and settler-colonial in nature, it's possible that some may have been allowed to assimilate. After all, assimilation of the Yunnan indigenous people was also encouraged the Ming even as they were marginalized by Han settlers. I think the possibility of assimilation would be explored depending on the context.
Can a parallel be drawn between that and the Spanish colonization of the Americas?
 
If what China wanted was military subjugation of Japan or Korea, it could have outright conquered them centuries ago. They preferred a tributary system.
So basically you have a puppet Japanese state, not an independent one.
 
Eunuch: Your Imperial Majesty, the barbarian Dongyi have discovered lands beyond the eastern seas! These lands are so rich beyond belief that they're bringing back ships of nothing but gold and silver!
Emperor: Oh really? So these upstart pirates are pirating as usual. They can have all the gold under heaven, but we'll always be on top. How's our navy doing?
Eunuch: There have been zero reports of piracy in the eastern or southern seas. No barbarians dare enter our waters. But I must tell you, these Dongyi are have stories of fantastic wealth. They even said there's an empire of entirely disciplined subjects and filled with gold, ruled by an emperor who claims to be the descendant of the sun god just like their own. We can't ignore these!
Emperor: Haaa! Haaa! Haaa! Haaa! Those wo kou must think their newfound wealth will civilize themselves. I tell you, Minister, we in the Middle Kingdom have all the knowledge and industry we ever need. Now if you excuse me, I have an appointment with the Ambassador from Ceylon to attend.

Later...
Director of the Canton Trading Company: So how was the meeting with the Big Boss? And here's your bonus for convincing him to extend our monopoly to trade with Egypt. *shoves a string of gold coins*
Eunuch: We tried to convince him to give us a monopoly to trade with the eastern realms, and if need be to muscle in on these Dongyi. I convinced him how they're getting rich. But the Big Boss still won't listen. That's fine. We'll just have to concentrate on what we already have. What's going on in the west?
Director: Our boys in Francia hear their king has spent time griping about his family feud with the king of Anglia, a small island to its north. It's none of our business.
Eunuch: Indeed. The Big Boss loves to make a show on how he's the sovereign of all under heaven, but we all know it's just a show. That's why I feel more comfortable delegating our relations with the western realms to you guys, since you will approach these western kings as equals while reporting to the Big Boss as if you were his envoys.
Director: Right, our company doesn't hesitate to use force to get us a better deal. You know the Ceylonese ambassador? He's here because we kidnapped their crown prince and held him in Sin-gia-po until the king agreed to allow our base.
Eunuch: Nice!
 
Can a parallel be drawn between that and the Spanish colonization of the Americas?

Well they're both settler colonial but the form of settler colonialism is pretty different. Spanish colonialism was generally extractive and based in using indigenous people in a serf-like system to extract resources for the Spanish metropole. Han chinese colonialism was much more like US settler colonialism and based in mass settling Han and integrating the place into the core Chinese state. This is probably due to the different places the Han colonized-both Taiwan and Yunnan were either right next the core state or were the core state. I'm not sure how Tungning or China would have dealt with Maritime Southeast Asia though. It could go both ways. Maybe more like South Africa? Not sure
 
So basically you have a puppet Japanese state, not an independent one.

My point is that nothing would change in regards to the relationship between China and Japan. The Japanese were already under a tributary system that they at times ignored by China never seemed bothered enough to enforce.
 
My point is that nothing would change in regards to the relationship between China and Japan. The Japanese were already under a tributary system that they at times ignored by China never seemed bothered enough to enforce.
Because they were unable, if they are able and they actively expand in the rest of Asia it begs disbelief why they don't enforce the Japanese under a stricter tributary status, the reminder is always a 1:10 population ratio and various past grievances and industrial technology, at this point Japan becomes really close to manuver around, especially the Southern islands.
 
The richness of the Inca and Aztec is not enough to make Japan stand their ground against China, also it's not me who said that Japan would risk confronting China, you said they tried to invade Korea and sparkled a crisis in Luzon and Moluccas:



Also if China is not literally very decentralized, very fractured between a dozen or more companies(which is quite ridiculous already) then Japan is not going to monopolize the Pacific, the remindier is that at the best of times the ratio of population between China and Japan was 8:1 often worse and if this China even controls Korea and Manchuria things aren't getting better.
The only way Japan and Korea will be able to colonize in this world will be a fractured China.

I think a permanently fractured China would be the only actual way for a "East Asian" dominated world, as first it would allow Japan and Korea to compete, and so that the new Chinese states individually wouldn't have as much resources if they were unified, so that's more reasons to go explore and exploit faraway's people land.

How that could happen is a mystery though, any suggestions?
 
After some thought, I don’t believe the Chinese assumptions on race would be anything like the European. European racial attitudes were shaped by the concentration of Caucasian people into a small geographic area of Europe. Granted there were Caucasoids outside of Europe proper, but generally the populations outside European Christiandom is physically distinct.

The Chinese would see similar looking people across nomadic central Asia and Siberia, Southeast Asia, the Pacific islands, the Americas. Most of these people have little in the way of civilizational achievements the Chinese admire. They would regard the city dwellers of the Middle East and Europe as partially civilized if lesser than their own. But there would not be a catagorical belief that people who look East Asian are better, hence the whole concept of racial superiority.

The first Chinese interaction with sub-Saharan Africans would be with the prosperous Kilwa Empire and that may influence racial perceptions as well.
 
The only way Japan and Korea will be able to colonize in this world will be a fractured China.

I think a permanently fractured China would be the only actual way for a "East Asian" dominated world, as first it would allow Japan and Korea to compete, and so that the new Chinese states individually wouldn't have as much resources if they were unified, so that's more reasons to go explore and exploit faraway's people land.

How that could happen is a mystery though, any suggestions?

Why Japan and Korea compete just fine today in a world with a unified China.
 
Why Japan and Korea compete just fine today in a world with a unified China.
How so? I mean they are bailed by the US navy and they live in a world where they are fairly richer than China and they aren't exactly expanding oversea, not sure how the comparison works there.
 
After some thought, I don’t believe the Chinese assumptions on race would be anything like the European. European racial attitudes were shaped by the concentration of Caucasian people into a small geographic area of Europe. Granted there were Caucasoids outside of Europe proper, but generally the populations outside European Christiandom is physically distinct.

The Chinese would see similar looking people across nomadic central Asia and Siberia, Southeast Asia, the Pacific islands, the Americas. Most of these people have little in the way of civilizational achievements the Chinese admire. They would regard the city dwellers of the Middle East and Europe as partially civilized if lesser than their own. But there would not be a catagorical belief that people who look East Asian are better, hence the whole concept of racial superiority.

The first Chinese interaction with sub-Saharan Africans would be with the prosperous Kilwa Empire and that may influence racial perceptions as well.

Literally everything in your post is wrong.

1. No popluations are physically distinct from their neighbors. North Africa, Middle East, and Central Asia all have populations with people who could pass as "looking caucasian" from right across the "border of christendom".

2. Regardless of the distinctiveness of differences between neighboring populations, what really matters are perceived differences. Some perceived differences are easier to notice when you know the two neighboring peoples, but from an outsider perspective "they're all the same to me". So to a European, a Tatar and Han might have "Mongoloid features" but to East Asians, Irish and Polish are indistinguishable.

Furthermore, some perceived differences even between groups on different continents are virtually imaginary, such as the "white" skin color of East Asians and West Europeans. "Yellow Skin" was pretty much invented to give Europeans who were ignorant of Asians a reason to see them as different, other, and thus fearful and untrustworthy.

This leads to -

3. Regardless of differences and similarities, ways will be found to racialize groups based on the political and economic needs of Empire-building. Other Asians with narrow eyes will be seen by the Chinese as inferior regardless of how unclear the dividing line is, just like how Europeans see Middle Easterners as different even though when shown real-life pictures of Syrian people's faces, Americans didn't realize they're weren't European until told so.

4. Civilizational developments don't really matter. They can be explained away, as "Those people couldn't possibly have built those monuments, it was obviously some transient master race which slipped into obscurity from allowing miscegenation with the dirty locals." This was a real attitude towards the achievements of Indians and Africans. Or alternatively the "They were once great but fell into becoming decadent" for the Persians.

Europeans learned of the greatness of Africa's wealth in the Malian and Songhay Empires through Muslim merchants. They did know about Africans having rich and complex societies, but then conveniently forgot about that when it was time to sell them into slavery and colonize them.

Basically, any "evidence" can be subordinated to the political needs of those who wish to exploit others for economic gain.
 
How so? I mean they are bailed by the US navy and they live in a world where they are fairly richer than China and they aren't exactly expanding oversea, not sure how the comparison works there.

They plugged into the world economy before PRC did, that's why they're richer and there's no reason they can't do that at an earlier time.
 
They plugged into the world economy before PRC did, that's why they're richer and there's no reason they can't do that at an earlier time.
You can't apply 20th century economics to the 17th century, even then the entire premise is one of a China that is the home of industrialization.
 
Literally everything in your post is wrong.

1. No popluations are physically distinct from their neighbors. North Africa, Middle East, and Central Asia all have populations with people who could pass as "looking caucasian" from right across the "border of christendom".

2. Regardless of the distinctiveness of differences between neighboring populations, what really matters are perceived differences. Some perceived differences are easier to notice when you know the two neighboring peoples, but from an outsider perspective "they're all the same to me". So to a European, a Tatar and Han might have "Mongoloid features" but to East Asians, Irish and Polish are indistinguishable.

Furthermore, some perceived differences even between groups on different continents are virtually imaginary, such as the "white" skin color of East Asians and West Europeans. "Yellow Skin" was pretty much invented to give Europeans who were ignorant of Asians a reason to see them as different, other, and thus fearful and untrustworthy.

This leads to -

3. Regardless of differences and similarities, ways will be found to racialize groups based on the political and economic needs of Empire-building. Other Asians with narrow eyes will be seen by the Chinese as inferior regardless of how unclear the dividing line is, just like how Europeans see Middle Easterners as different even though when shown real-life pictures of Syrian people's faces, Americans didn't realize they're weren't European until told so.

4. Civilizational developments don't really matter. They can be explained away, as "Those people couldn't possibly have built those monuments, it was obviously some transient master race which slipped into obscurity from allowing miscegenation with the dirty locals." This was a real attitude towards the achievements of Indians and Africans. Or alternatively the "They were once great but fell into becoming decadent" for the Persians.

Europeans learned of the greatness of Africa's wealth in the Malian and Songhay Empires through Muslim merchants. They did know about Africans having rich and complex societies, but then conveniently forgot about that when it was time to sell them into slavery and colonize them.

Basically, any "evidence" can be subordinated to the political needs of those who wish to exploit others for economic gain.

It's very interesting to note just how long it took for Europeans to stop calling East Asians white. The first instance of this happening was with Carl Linnaeus in the 18th century and it only became widespread in the 19th century. Michael Keevak goes into this in Becoming Yellow: A Short History of Racial Thinking ( a book which has some problems in unsupported assertions but is nevertheless fascinating and filled with info).
 
It's very interesting to note just how long it took for Europeans to stop calling East Asians white. The first instance of this happening was with Carl Linnaeus in the 18th century and it only became widespread in the 19th century. Michael Keevak goes into this in Becoming Yellow: A Short History of Racial Thinking ( a book which has some problems in unsupported assertions but is nevertheless fascinating and filled with info).
But did "white" mean the same thing as it did later? I mean people tend to use white to mean European descended.
 

Albert.Nik

Banned
After some thought, I don’t believe the Chinese assumptions on race would be anything like the European. European racial attitudes were shaped by the concentration of Caucasian people into a small geographic area of Europe. Granted there were Caucasoids outside of Europe proper, but generally the populations outside European Christiandom is physically distinct.

The Chinese would see similar looking people across nomadic central Asia and Siberia, Southeast Asia, the Pacific islands, the Americas. Most of these people have little in the way of civilizational achievements the Chinese admire. They would regard the city dwellers of the Middle East and Europe as partially civilized if lesser than their own. But there would not be a catagorical belief that people who look East Asian are better, hence the whole concept of racial superiority.

The first Chinese interaction with sub-Saharan Africans would be with the prosperous Kilwa Empire and that may influence racial perceptions as well.
This is actually right. Central Asia,Middle East,North Africa,parts of China,Afghanistan,Pakistan,etc might have been White populated regions once but at the time European Empires rose,they had long been turned non-white though many look white and except newly settled countries like Israel. I know,Kalash,Yighnobhi,Nuristani,Burusho,etc are actually White in comparison with British,French or other Germanic but they are a very tiny number left isn't going to make much difference. I agree that the diversity of Whites over a large area even geographically diverse where they originated and migrated to. Indo-European,Hurro-Urartian,Burusho,Hatti,possibly many other language families that are now extinct. Asians,on the other hand, actually had a settled empire on a smaller region and most of the other empires were Nomadic(Turkic,Hunnic and Mongol). I think many are jumping to timelines skipping the key things of how exactly Asians would dominate the World and not Europeans.
 
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