The Chinese nations

[Cicero the Younger]

I was reading somewhere (was it Guns, Germs, and Steel? I think it may have been) that, despite its early start and knack for technological innovations, China nevertheless had one major disadvantage compared to Europe in that, for most of its history, it has been one single, unified nation. The nations of Europe were encouraged to keep advancing in order to keep ahead of each other, and if at any time a ruler popped up in one European nation that decided to turn inward and stop the advancement, then they'd simply get left behind as the rest of Europe kept going. But China was surrounded only by people they considered "barbarians", not worthy of competing against, and there were times when the Emperor turned isolationist, and China did get left behind.

I'm thinking, of course, of the great Treasure Fleets of the Yongle Emperor. Half a century before the European voyages of discovery began, the Chinese were sending ships as far away as Africa until his successor was convinced by the Confucian advisors to cease the voyages and turn inward. While we could easily speculate on a mighty Chinese colonial empire resulting from these voyages, the question on my mind at the moment is slightly different: What if, instead of a single China that could send or not send ships depending on its whim, there were instead a multitude of nations in the region made up mostly of Chinese people who were all in competition with each other?

First of all, how could such a thing have happened? I imagine the best way would be to prevent the man who in OTL became Qin Shi Huang from ever unifying China in the first place. If the Warring States Era can somehow end without anyone unifying the states, then could they potentially survive into modern times as separate nation-states, the way the fragments of the old Roman and Frankish empires did? I assume a POD for such a situation would have to be that early; the longer we wait, the more accustomed the Chinese become to unity, and though there were other periods of disunity later, those were mainly contests to see who got to found the next dynasty to rule over all of China. But if the Warring States Era does seem too early (maybe the barbarians were too much of a threat for the states to survive, or maybe Chinese culture wasn't developed enough for the states to have much of a Chinese identity?), then is there a later POD that would make this plausible?

And if we do have China divided amongst a number of Chinese nations, would they be powerful enough to send out those fleets and start dividing up the world between them, the way the Europeans later did in OTL? Or would it require the resources of all China to make such a thing possible? In short, would a more fragmented China advance more quickly and take over much of the world as Europe did, or would it consist of nations that would be too weak to stand against outside incursions and would get eaten up by every upstart who wandered into the area from the steppe nomads to the European adventurers?

 

[Ptholemaios]

Well, Cicero this is one of things most fascinating to me. I think that those "Chinese nations" (if breaking about the Zheng He's time) would open a colonial quest, exploring coast of Africa (maybe even reaching Europe) and on east- reach American coast. Then, their colonial empires will have much to fight with the Spaniards, the French and the English. On the Indonesian islands they will face Portuguese and Dutch. However, that could make China less isolated and give them ability to become real world-superpowers, each fighting with another.

 

[Faeelin]

I was reading somewhere (was it Guns, Germs, and Steel? I think it may have been) that, despite its early start and knack for technological innovations, China nevertheless had one major disadvantage compared to Europe in that, for most of its history, it has been one single, unified nation.

I always find this dubious. Did the textile industry of Flanders benefit from division? How about the Scottish lowlands?

Sure, cannons get more advanced in a divided world. But does it follow that textiles do?

IWhat if, instead of a single China that could send or not send ships depending on its whim, there were instead a multitude of nations in the region made up mostly of Chinese people who were all in competition with each other?

On the other hand, perhaps a single state would have trouble affording the Treasure Voyages.That said, I am less inclined to favor unity than I used to be.

Don't tell Merry I said that though.

assume a POD for such a situation would have to be that early; the longer we wait, the more accustomed the Chinese become to unity, and though there were other periods of disunity later, those were mainly contests to see who got to found the next dynasty to rule over all of China. But if the Warring States Era does seem too early (maybe the barbarians were too much of a threat for the states to survive, or maybe Chinese culture wasn't developed enough for the states to have much of a Chinese identity?), then is there a later POD that would make this plausible?

To prevent a concept of Chinese nationhood/ethnicity? I don't know when the dividing line is, but I'd place it with the Tang.

Divided among Chinese states? Well, up to the 1940s . More seriously, I think the Ming-Qing transition gives the best oppurtunity.

And if we do have China divided amongst a number of Chinese nations, would they be powerful enough to send out those fleets and start dividing up the world between them, the way the Europeans later did in OTL? Or would it require the resources of all China to make such a thing possible? In short, would a more fragmented China advance more quickly and take over much of the world as Europe did, or would it consist of nations that would be too weak to stand against outside incursions and would get eaten up by every upstart who wandered into the area from the steppe nomads to the European adventurers?

Hrmm. You might wanna make check out some writings by Kenneth Pommeranz, who talks about why England, and not part of China, launched the industrial revolution. He's not always right, but he's interesting.

 

[Malta]

Seperate Chinese nations could be as far back as Three Kingdoms. If Wu had not fallen in on itself or if the Status Quo between the Wei, Shu, and Wu (the major Kingdoms, plenty of smaller Kingdoms could have popped up around them) had remained. Wu was speculated to have either sailed to Taiwan or the Ryukyu Islands, they most likely wpuld have expanded south to the seas.

Or if lower Ming had not collapsed. Or if the many different ethnicites had bound together in seperate nations.

The Treasure Fleets were large, thousands of ships, smaller expeditions would have been quite as effective.

Plus Zheng He did establish overseas chinatowns . The Ming were more for making the exsisting kingdoms into tributary states, but they could have colonized the uninhabited.

 

[The Sicilian]

If you look at a map of China proper, you'll find it is not geographically harboring to the mishmash pattern of states that arose in Europe. Europe has peninsulas, mountain ranges, major rivers, islands and diverse climates. This produces a lot of diversity of people and cultures, therefore a diversity of nations. China proper does not have nearly as many geographic barriers to unification. That is why even when it is split along say a north-south basis (Jin-Song, Qing-Ming), it always manages to reunite.

 

[carlton_bach]

If you look at a map of China proper, you'll find it is not geographically harboring to the mishmash pattern of states that arose in Europe. Europe has peninsulas, mountain ranges, major rivers, islands and diverse climates. This produces a lot of diversity of people and cultures, therefore a diversity of nations. China proper does not have nearly as many geographic barriers to unification. That is why even when it is split along say a north-south basis (Jin-Song, Qing-Ming), it always manages to reunite.

Keep in mind a lot of this is part of the 'national narrative'. China is always a united empire because it doesn't properly count as China if it isn't The same way we think of Egypt as a great empire in the Nile valley interrupted by interim periods of anarchy.

Following the Han dynasty, we get strong divisions, then we get the Tang and again, division. For much of its history, the Song dynasty effectively shared the country with a rival, and there even was a degree of factual acceptance that there were, in fact, several dynasties (just as there had been during the Liang-Wei conflict). I don't see where the geography of China mandated that these periods had to end. The Yangtze and the Himalayan foothills make decent enough borders. The imperial ideology of inevitable unity doesn't really become a political fact until the Ming and Qing dynasties.

 

[The Sicilian]

Right, there is some division along the major rivers and and mountains, but that's it. You cannot get the kind of balkanization that happened in Europe to last for long (long enough to get the 'race for exploration'). China proper (where the Han live, not places like Tibet and Xinjiang) is geographically united in one 'core' as Jared Diamond calls it; the Yangtze and the Yellow river valleys, both of which are long and fertile (and have been connected to each other by canals). This connects most of the country and allows for very productive agriculture. On the other hand European rivers are much shorter and less fertile, therefore Europe has many cores that are two weak to lead to unification. That is compounded by the mountain ranges (which are much higher in Europe than in China proper) and large islands, which lead to language diversification. And we all know that people with diverse languages are a bitch to unite (Not to mention that China proper has only one major ethnicity, one language, and one alphabet)

So, to conclude, China is very easy to unify for geographic and cultural reasons, while Europe is nearly impossible to do the same for the same reasons.

 

[Typo]

The Yangtze and the Himalayan foothills make decent enough borders. The imperial ideology of inevitable unity doesn't really become a political fact until the Ming and Qing dynasties

The Yangtze makes a good border for two states, Chinese divisions have traditionally been along the Yangtze river. However, the northern part have always conquered the southern part. Unification isn't hard when geography favours at most two states.

I think if you want multiple Chinese nations, you need Chineses states to survive outside China proper. But OTL has plenty of sinized states there.

 

[Tizoc]

[...] (Not to mention that China proper has only one major ethnicity, one language, and one alphabet)

IIRC, there is no such thing as single Chinese language - typical inhabitians of Canton, Shanghai and Peking wouldn't understand what others are talking about - they are using, in fact, different languages that are just written using the same alphabet...

 

[Hendryk]

they are using, in fact, different languages that are just written using the same alphabet...

Written mutual intelligibility was all that mattered until the advent of modern means of communication.

 

[Cicero the Younger]

All right, so the Chinese have a mutually intelligible writing system. I don't see where that makes unification a foregone conclusion. For centuries, the various nation-states of Europe had a mutually intelligible writing system by virtue of the fact that they all did all of their serious writing in Latin. That didn't spark a re-unification of the Roman Empire. Most of the nations of the Americas still write and speak in Spanish, yet everyone is perfectly happy to maintain the fragmentation that occurred after the fall of the Spanish Empire in this hemisphere. At no point has anyone in Mexico or Panama or Argentina said, "Hey, we're all Spanish-speakers here. We should all be united under one government!" (Or if anyone has said it, at least, it's never been an idea that got much support.)

As to the question of geographic "cores", I will readily acknowledge that there are more barriers to unifying Europe than there are to unifying China, and I think that adequately explains why Europe has never been united under a single empire. If the Romans, with their technological edge and the centuries they had to work with, couldn't do it, then it probably couldn't have been done. However, I don't think that is sufficient to explain why China tends toward unity. I strongly suspect that China tends to be reunited because China expects to be reunited.

China has had several periods of disunity over the last couple of millennia, but as far as I know, the various fragments never said, "At last, we are free from the domination of the oppressive Chinese Empire!" No, it was more like their rulers said, "For now I control this fragment of the glorious Chinese Empire, and soon I will conquer the rest and then I will be the new Son of Heaven!" In other words, the fact that China spent most of its time united led the Chinese to think of themselves as being a single nation, despite diversity in language and appearence. (Identical writing system aside, spoken Mandarin and Cantonese and Shanghainese are not mutually intelligible. And a Chinese person can usually tell a North Chinese from a South Chinese at a glance. While they may all look generically "Chinese" or even just "Asian" to many outside eyes, there are enough general physical differences that it is possible to distinguish.)

That's why I assumed we'd have to have a POD as early as the Warring States Era. Before Qin Shi Huang, there were different states ruled by kings and dukes and such, and no assumption that it was ever meant to be otherwise. After Qin Shi Huang, the whole land was an empire, ruled by the Emperor, and the Chinese got so used to being an empire that future divisions were about nothing so much as who got to be the next Emperor. It occurs to me that if Qin Shi Huang is taken out of the picture, then the peoples of China, even with their similar appearance and related languages and identical writing system, might not ever start to think of themselves as being intended to live under one government. After Qin Shi Huang, reunification was probably inevitable every time China split up. But without Qin Shi Huang, I'm not convinced unification was ever inevitable in the first place.

 

[Faeelin]

All right, so the Chinese have a mutually intelligible writing system. I don't see where that makes unification a foregone conclusion. For centuries, the various nation-states of Europe had a mutually intelligible writing system by virtue of the fact that they all did all of their serious writing in Latin. That didn't spark a re-unification of the Roman Empire.

Then again, there was a Holy Roman Emperor until 1806, right? Perhaps Europe is the aberration, not China.

 

[The Sicilian]

Unification isn't a forgone conclusion. It is just vastly more likely to happen in China than in Europe, for geographic and cultural factors. Also, it becomes more and more implausible for a disunified collection of Chinese states to coexist, even without Qin Shi Huang. I believe that eventually one of the states would grow powerful enough to topple the others. Or something that happened multiple times IOTL would happen; China would be (re)unified by a non-Chinese, Altaic power.

 

[Keenir]

Seperate Chinese nations could be as far back as Three Kingdoms. If Wu had not fallen in on itself or if the Status Quo between the Wei, Shu, and Wu (the major Kingdoms, plenty of smaller Kingdoms could have popped up around them) had remained.

if I may ask, would only one of them have adopted the Mandate Of Heaven? or would it be a shared belief?
(I might be thinking of the Warring States period)

 

[Cicero the Younger]

Then again, there was a Holy Roman Emperor until 1806, right?

As the title of the nominal head of a patchwork quilt of loosely-aligned German principalities, yes. Even if their borders did shift now and then to include non-German principalities from time to time, the Holy Roman Empire would hardly qualify as a re-unification of the Roman Empire. It held precious little territory of the Roman Empire, and the vast majority of the peoples who did their serious writing in Latin lived outside its borders. The Holy Roman Empire is not much of an analogue for China.

 

[Faeelin]

As the title of the nominal head of a patchwork quilt of loosely-aligned German principalities, yes. Even if their borders did shift now and then to include non-German principalities from time to time, the Holy Roman Empire would hardly qualify as a re-unification of the Roman Empire. It held precious little territory of the Roman Empire, and the vast majority of the peoples who did their serious writing in Latin lived outside its borders. The Holy Roman Empire is not much of an analogue for China.

I don't know.

We look at China, and hey, the Han and Ming sort of cover similar regions, and this is true. But the population balance shifts dramatically, so that the southern provinces are exporting rice via the Grand Canal to feed Beijing.

Compare this to as late as the Tang, when the south was a place you were exiled to.

I'd say, look at people like Frederick II, who certainly saw themselves as emperors in the line of Hadrian, Vespasian, and Augustus.

If anything, the fact that the Empire was based around non-Latin peoples shows how compelling this idea was.

 

[Cicero the Younger]

I'd say, look at people like Frederick II, who certainly saw themselves as emperors in the line of Hadrian, Vespasian, and Augustus.

He could see himself that way all he wanted. That didn't mean his realm was a true reunification of their Empire. Even the Byzantine Emperors, the true successors to the Roman Emperors, never managed to reunify the Empire. Ever since the fall of Romulus Augustulus, Europe has consisted of separate domains with their own identities, and even if some ephemeral empires, such as those of Charlemagne or Napoleon, have sprung up from time to time and rearranged the map, the fact is no one has ever managed to unite Europe under a single government. The various nations have their own separate identities, and they tend to view rule by other nations as a conquest to be resented and shaken off if possible, not as a welcome return to some glorious Empire that holds them all together.

All of which is rather off-topic, since my main question does not concern Europe. Even if you had managed to prove my Roman Empire example wrong--and I do not feel that you have--that still does not address the question of whether it would have been possible to have the Chinese living under those same conditions, meaning separate nations with their own identities and with no desire to be swallowed up by one another. I'm not convinced that unity was an inevitability in the case of the Chinese, at least before Qin Shi Huang. After him, it probably was, but if he had never come along, I'm not sure it would have been.

Or at least not permanently; I'm sure some Chinese Charlemagne would spring up from time to time and conquer most or all of the Chinese nations, but if those nations had had the time to develop separate identities and considered rule by one distant Emperor to be an aberration of the norm instead of the norm itself, then those unifications would have been as short-lived as the Frankish Empire itself, and no one except the conquerors would regret to see the empires crumble. I still think it is the historical expectations of the Chinese, rather than the geography of China, that makes unity more natural in China than in Europe.

 

[JP_Morgan]

I don't completely agree with what Cicero says. The state of Qin was already becoming the most powerful state in China before Qin Shihungdi came to power. Their takeover would merely have been delayed if they didn't have a leader like him. China's geography is hilly, and doesn't have mountains like the Alps, or peninsulas and gulfs to divide regions in the same way.

Besides, the Warring States period lasted for 500 years. The fact that they didn't develop any real separate identity during that time, is a tribute to the strength of the "Mandate of Heaven" concept, since eveyone wanted to control all of China. Barring some dramatic change or more likely, an earlier POD, then there is no reason for it. And I'm sure the geography of the region helped it to develop among other things. Most of China except for the South really isn't jungly, so it couldn't be like India, whose land was mostly made up of jungle, and also had disunity for much of it's history until it was welded together into a coherent entiety by the British.

 

[Keenir]

I'm not convinced that unity was an inevitability in the case of the Chinese, at least before Qin Shi Huang. After him, it probably was, but if he had never come along, I'm not sure it would have been.

Or at least not permanently; I'm sure some Chinese Charlemagne would spring up from time to time and conquer most or all of the Chinese nations, but if those nations had had the time to develop separate identities and considered rule by one distant Emperor to be an aberration of the norm instead of the norm itself,

so, prior to the Warring States Era, was there utter anarchy? surely there was some sort of regional identies, since there was no OverArching State present.

 

[Cicero the Younger]

so, prior to the Warring States Era, was there utter anarchy?

Anarchy does not mean lack of national identity. I never said anything about anarchy.

surely there was some sort of regional identies, since there was no OverArching State present.

There is still regional identity in China today. But evidently it did not trump their overall sense of "Chinese-ness", because, as I've mentioned, there is no history of the regions trying to shake off the yoke of Imperial dominance. I'm merely trying to imagine a world where their regional identities were so strong that they developed into separate nations, but it seems I'm fighting a losing battle; no one else evidently believes it even could have happened.