What if China Was Imperialist (I mean really imperialist)

Until very recently, merchants have been greatly looked down upon. This change has probably been devoloped by desperation (Cultural Revolution) and the obvious success of Chinese nearly everywhere outside of their hands, especially when close to western merchant trading (AKA 3 Little Dragons).

If China had ever realized and instituted this, and to be honest Western Nations had a checkered pattern of success in this area too, it would fit the engine to have a successful colonial mentality closer to that post 1400's Western Europe. Other posters have mentioned this with previous
AH threads.

In Europe, the Dutch eventually smothered with taxes their wildly
successful Dutch East Indies, Spain spent more than even the golden
goose of Latin America could provide, and Norway/Denmark starved and
withered Iceland/Greenland with an exclusive monopoly that did nearly
nothing for the locals. Yet the end result was enough free trade was
going on that technology and capitalism exploded colonialization. There
was not a single Adam Smith type philospher in China AFAIK.

Confucius and others had considerable amount of meritocracy, which is
a start, but this was reserved for bureaucracy rather than general
business. He personally hated merchants, I recall, though respected
in a way the business accumen of one of his followers, Zigong, in
futures and upper level genteel, good talking, smooth trading. Confucius's
favorite, though, was a Tolstoy type character named Yan Hui who
was always impoverished and died young from the same.

Certainly later proponents took the purist and generally governmental
approach. This must change if the colonial mentality flowered beyond
the stunted level it took.

I personally see no other way for colonialization easily taking hold
of China, though other aspects would have helped.

"Confucianism despised merchants. In the hierarchy of Chinese traditional society
built by Confucianism merchants were placed at the bottom. Confucians regarded
the merchants as selfish, always placing profit making first."
 
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People are projecting current China onto the past, it was certainly populous, but hardly at the limits of its carrying capacity in the way Northwest Europe was (where economic changes made millions of farmers redundant and available to move overseas). In addition its rice farming system was very labour orientated (additional yields coming from more hands rather than more lands), which strongly disincentives the elites from letting peasants emigrate.

One thing I find worth noting is that China did encourage mass migration. During the late 17th and 18th centuries, about 10,000 colonists were dispatched to the Chinese margins, where they established freehold farms. The government helped with travel costs, start up loans, seed, etc.

This isn't from some secret history of China; it's an established fact. But you'd never know it, given how these discussions always go.
 
Until very recently, merchants have been greatly looked down upon. This change has probably been devoloped by desperation (Cultural Revolution) and the obvious success of Chinese nearly everywhere outside of their hands, especially when close to western merchant trading (AKA 3 Little Dragons).

Gah. The position of merchants in China varied, depending on the period. One of the accusations from the Qing Empire was that the Ming fell because they showed too much respect to merchants. I'd recommend Confusions of Pleasure for a good look at this.

Or to quote Emperor Gaozong, circa 1145: "The profits from maritime commerce are very great. If properly managed, they can amount to millions of taels. Is this not better than taxing the people?"


Yet the end result was enough free trade was
going on that technology and capitalism exploded colonialization. There
was not a single Adam Smith type philospher in China AFAIK.

I don't know. The Discourses of Salt and Iron, a Han work on the use ofmonoplies for revenue rather than free trade, suggests the ideas were not alien.

There were scholars during the Ming-Qing Cataclysm who had similar ideas, although it was not the same, obviously.
 

Rex Mundi

Banned
I don't see how Britain and four of her former colonies accounting for 90% of the Anglosphere disproves my point that America never exported English to the same extent as the British.
 
In regards to migration, it wasn't the primary method of sinicization in times of peace (in the periods of turmoil between dynasties, say the Three Kingdoms period, however, it can be enormous [in that example, it shifted the "center" of Han China southwards. away from the Yellow River]). The process of sinicization is, however, primarily based upon assimilation, not migration. That is to say, those who are considered "Han Chinese" today make up an extremely diverse set of ethnic groups and sub-cultures (whom were all at some point subjugated, and slowly integrated into Chinese society to the point of being considered "Han Chinese").

Gah. The position of merchants in China varied, depending on the period. One of the accusations from the Qing Empire was that the Ming fell because they showed too much respect to merchants. I'd recommend Confusions of Pleasure for a good look at this.

Or to quote Emperor Gaozong, circa 1145: "The profits from maritime commerce are very great. If properly managed, they can amount to millions of taels. Is this not better than taxing the people?"
As I recall, the Ming collapse was precipitated, in part, by the central government's over-reliance on the global silver trade (Chinese merchants trading porcelain, silk, etc. for [oft-smuggled] silver from the Spaniards). Once the foreign income in silver (primarily coming from Central/South America) was cut, either by natural depletion or by crackdowns on silver smuggling to the Pacific, the Ming economy...imploded, with hyperinflation going about with the value of silver, the standard, skyrocketing with the reduced imports of it (and consequently devaluing the Ming currency, based on copper, to extreme proportions [with hoarding and an increasingly skewed copper:silver ratio]). Which ended up with peasants having an incredibly hard time buying/selling/paying taxes, and you can probably figure out the rest.
 
Gah. The position of merchants in China varied, depending on the period. -- snip -- I don't know. The Discourses of Salt and Iron, a Han work on the use ofmonoplies for revenue rather than free trade, suggests the ideas were not alien.

There were scholars during the Ming-Qing Cataclysm who had similar ideas, although it was not the same, obviously.

Thank you, Faeelin for the good sources.

But the situation is not so clear. For one thing, it would interesting how
objective these Chinese discussions were. Plenty of Subjective
Buddhist claims and counter claims, and Western arguments of topics
as well, but I have read of researchers looking for Objective discussion
(truth rather than a debating position) in China and couldn't find it. Besides,
was the Emperor Gaozong or Discourses of Salt and Iron ever about
providing social mobility rather than an ox to be harnessed? Was there
any mechanisms discussed like 'the invisible hand'? A free market is
not necessarily the same as an accepted merchant class.


Take for instance that of how merchants are treated in regular life by
the people. In England, Netherlands, or even the Fuggers of Austria, an
ordinary person could rise up the social register by way of commerce.

To the best of my knowledge not so in China. In every country it
seems in those times, about the way to rise was by way of the clergy,
military, diplomacy or best of all born into power. The west provided
more leeway. The only means regularly open (to nearly all the population)
was by Chinese examination. What do you study so hard for the
test? The lessons of merchant hater Confucius.

There were Emperors who did not like Confucius, like Chin (or more),
but enough staying power made these prejudices nearly constant in
the larger scheme of things. Chin was pretty bloody, too.

One of the accusations from the Qing Empire was that the Ming fell because they showed too much respect to merchants.
Classic. An accusation from the victor against a vanquished
foe. My guess is this shows more my point of how negative a sterotype
existed of the merchant class than anything of what the Ming did in favor,
and one more case of those winning trying to write the history in
a propaganda form to bludgeon and win favor.
 
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One thing I find worth noting is that China did encourage mass migration. During the late 17th and 18th centuries, about 10,000 colonists were dispatched to the Chinese margins, where they established freehold farms. The government helped with travel costs, start up loans, seed, etc.

This isn't from some secret history of China; it's an established fact. But you'd never know it, given how these discussions always go.

The Qing dynasty moved a lot more people than that. During the fall of the Ming dynasty, Zhang Xianzhong eradicated the population of Sichuan through genocide. The subsequent Qing rulers then spent over a century repopulating the province under the the Hu Guang Fill Sichuan program. This was a systematic process of transplanting the population of Hunan and Guangzhou to Sichuan. Probably over 90% of modern Sichuan are descendants from this migration. Hu Guang was so depopulated that it triggered another series of government resettling from other provinces to build up their populations.
 
I just noticed you're from Asia. Most members on this board are European and they don't consider Russia part of Europe. So your post threw me.

The Russians simply expanded into any vaccum they could find. They were mostly interested expanding into the Baltic and south to the Black Sea actually.

For what it's worth (somewhat off topic), to me, Russia is part of Europe; at least, Western Russia is part of Europe. But keep going with this thread, please, this is interesting stuff.
 
For what it's worth (somewhat off topic), to me, Russia is part of Europe; at least, Western Russia is part of Europe. But keep going with this thread, please, this is interesting stuff.

Europe is either an arbitrary geographical concept, or a little less arbitrary cultural concept. In the first case, you can put its border with Asia wherever you deem fit, but usually Western Russia is considered Europe. In the second case, Russia is probably Europe, but so is Australia.
Historically speaking, Russia can be considered Europe in several ways, albeit some of its "european" features are shared by, for instance, the Ottoman Empire, and it is surely Europe whenever you have to confront Europe with that other mythical entity called "Asia".
 
I'd just like to say that, as an American, I and my countrymen tend to consider Russia part of Europe. Asian Russia tends to get called "Siberia", and is generally ignored. :p

I'd like to say that, in my opinion, it doesn't matter that China despised its merchant class. Conquest and imperialism is not necessarily reliant on merchants. Should a government decide to go forth and conquer, it will do so.

I do wonder, however, why would China decide to go forth and conquer. They had everything they really needed. Unless they wanted to go on a civilizing mission. :D
 
I do wonder, however, why would China decide to go forth and conquer. They had everything they really needed. Unless they wanted to go on a civilizing mission. :D

II agree the motivations are a bit unclear, but cutting out middlemen in trade, maximizing revenue from trade, and prestige are not inviable options, IMO. But it is a bit of a stretch, isn't it? Silver mines in an adjacent country might do it, but even so...

There were things the Chinese wanted; furs, bird nests, woods, exotic feathers, etc. Spices, of course. But the Chinese went to the Spice islands anyway.

But the situation is not so clear. For one thing, it would interesting how
objective these Chinese discussions were. Plenty of Subjective
Buddhist claims and counter claims, and Western arguments of topics
as well, but I have read of researchers looking for Objective discussion
(truth rather than a debating position) in China and couldn't find it.

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by objective discussion.

Besides, was the Emperor Gaozong or Discourses of Salt and Iron ever about providing social mobility rather than an ox to be harnessed? Was there any mechanisms discussed like 'the invisible hand'? A free market is not necessarily the same as an accepted merchant class.

Are you asking if there was an accepted merchant class? The answer is yes. Honorable merchants: commerce and self-cultivation in late imperial China is a good starting point for how Note this isn't a book about merchant princes; it's a look at how China's merchant classes subverted Confucianism for their own end.

Within China, the writer Gui Yuogang wrote in the 16th century using a term best translated as "merchant-gentry" by this period. There was opposition from some, yes. But this isn't a uniquely European thing; look at how Britain in the 1790s-1850s viewed "capitalists" as opposed to the traditional landed gentry; and look at the formers lack of presence in Parliament.

(The Ming were weird by the end.).

But I suppose we should also argue Europe's failure is because of the anticapitalist nature of the Church? After all, bans on usury were far more important there than in China...

And of course, Confucian thought didn't stop Japan from booming during this period, and then undergoing the Meiji restoration.

Classic. An accusation from the victor against a vanquished
foe. My guess is this shows more my point of how negative a sterotype
existed of the merchant class than anything of what the Ming did in favor,
and one more case of those winning trying to write the history in
a propaganda form to bludgeon and win favor.

No, actually. Plenty of evidence from the Ming Dynasty shows merchants gaining more and more power and it anguishing the traditional gentry.

It doesn't help that the strongest resistance to the Qing came from... a merchant dynasty who seized Taiwan from the Dutch.
 
Faeelin
It doesn't help that the strongest resistance to the Qing came from... a merchant dynasty who seized Taiwan from the Dutch.
Ha, you are right there. Koxinga and others gave a good run for the money. There wasn't exactly a lot of competition, the Ming in charge not even bothering to look under cushions for spare change. For example, as I remember reading, one of the heirs, the young boy emperor, waited to die by setting up camp on one of the arms of Kowloon (what later became Hong Kong), not putting up a fight or otherwise trying til the Manchus caught up with him. It is easy to get the impression of bloated nobodies in charge about the time the merchants flexed their muscles. I would be surprised if direct Ming heirs, high and low, much liked this fairly temporary enroachment by the merchant men, which probably killed the chances of the long term dynasty survival (1919 White Russians had the very same problem of incompetent people of the old regime, which destroyed their chances with dead weight and worse reputations.)

Still I think there was a Chinese clear lack of the degree compared to that some key Western nations gave, grudgingly, of the merchant class. Europe was in this case very advantageous of being highly decentralized in various political approaches with various countries and within those same countries. Going backward to most of the old Roman days, the merchant class (Jews were uniquely given their own tax rates I hear, net instead of gross or something like that) were highly respected on a long distance trade as well as short distance. It is true that English discriminated against the newly rich representation (rotten boroughs, etc), especially on the dry goods level, but generally there were no comparisons in China except in times of diress of any serious direct representation at all.

Hey, it could have gone the other way in Europe as well, but as it was in OTL there was a window of opportunity that was exploited enough, in large part involving allowing merchants a considerable say, some countries considerably more so than others. Those that succeeded, thrived at the expense of others who did not.
 
The Qing dynasty moved a lot more people than that. During the fall of the Ming dynasty, Zhang Xianzhong eradicated the population of Sichuan through genocide. The subsequent Qing rulers then spent over a century repopulating the province under the the Hu Guang Fill Sichuan program. This was a systematic process of transplanting the population of Hunan and Guangzhou to Sichuan. Probably over 90% of modern Sichuan are descendants from this migration. Hu Guang was so depopulated that it triggered another series of government resettling from other provinces to build up their populations.

Damn! That's worse than almost everything that happened in the west in this regard, except to what happened under Hitler and Stalin.

And I wonder two things: First, why - just because they were unruly? Second - why don't we know more about this?
 
One of many things I found objectionable about Gavin Menzies' book on China discovering America (I think it was him) was the suggestion that China would be automatically superior to the Conquistadors due to an order to 'treat natives with kindness'. Well, they may try, but strange stuff happens thousands of miles from home; and besides, in the same book he discusses how the Admiral was castrated as a child for being a Mongol. (At least, I think he said that, as I haven't read the book in a while.) And this is before we get to the nonsense about the supposed voyages...
 
Damn! That's worse than almost everything that happened in the west in this regard, except to what happened under Hitler and Stalin.

And I wonder two things: First, why - just because they were unruly? Second - why don't we know more about this?

The collapse of the Ming dynasty cost over 20 million lives. The loss of three million in Sichuan was horrific, but typically seen as part of the whole tragedy. Zhang Xianzhong's atrocities have largely passed into legend. There is surprisingly few scholarship of his brief rule.

More importantly the collapse of the Qing dynasty cost even more lives. The Taiping rebellion alone resulted in 30 million dead. Since this is the more recent catastrophy, popular history tends to give this era more attention.

I should add my earlier post on Huguang province should be corrected as the modern provinces of Hubei and Hunan. The Huguang Fill Sichuan migration alone involved 5 million settlers being moved over a century. More settlers from Jiangxi were then moved to fill Huguang.
 
Going backward to most of the old Roman days, the merchant class (Jews were uniquely given their own tax rates I hear, net instead of gross or something like that) were highly respected on a long distance trade as well as short distance.

Is this true? I mean, look at things like sumptuary laws, which forbade merchants from dressing the same way noblemen did.
 
Is this true? I mean, look at things like sumptuary laws, which forbade merchants from dressing the same way noblemen did.

It was hardly just merchant men that could not wear purple, etc. in any old society. Even in our own day in the US, one can not wear a superior rank uniform (or inferior, technically) in public if part of the military. (Oddly, some Privates buy and legally wear General's outfits for at home use. We were in fact asked not to do this in bootcamp, though there is no law against it!) If caught wearing purple the consequences were grave, and if I recall correctly, even owning an outfit for home use/entertaining at a private party made no difference as the Empire progressed.

My point is that tollerating is one thing, making allowances for maximum productivity is another. I believe Romans and Western Europeans aimed better towards the efficient model, and Chinese or their invaders did otherwise. (Genghis wanted to make the Yellow river plain, which now has 600 million people in a size of Texas, a great uninhabited field, being dissuaded since told that "the locals could otherwise be taxed".)

Total social equality is one massive step further, and we still have not reached that. China, it seems to me, at places tollerated merchants much greater than other periods, but never went nearly the length of the Roman Empire. (It is said that some Middle Eastern people were impressed and sort of won over when for a length of time a policy of antagonizing was done on an individual level. When asking, say, a minor solidier why he did not react, didn't he not like them the reply was, "You I do not like, but it is not my job to let that change my actions."

Obviously if one took it to a protest or group public level, Legionaires changed responses quickly, but I doubt one could normally see this kind of restraint often enough in old China to make a general policy. On a business level, my guess is that even in the best of times Sino merchants were harrassed much more often. In Rome, the line was if you got cheating, especially the government or agents thereof. A recently unearthed court proceedings were, for example, of a Syrian in Britain who was caught and flogged for cheating Legionaires in a game of dice.

Let's be honest insofar as merchants do use mental tricks to keep the profit high, and always have done so. The common businessman on the street has often very obvious actions of deception. Or tricky but relatively honest methods like watching your pupil size, which become large when passing over the item wanted, while your body/face language remains impassive. Lewis & Clark had the same problem when trading with Indians (1804-6). But people can work on the principal then of "Buyer Beware" (Caveat Emptor, I think is the latin phrase of Roman times). Eventually people learn and reputations speak for themselves, although the immediate temptation quite often is to have murderous thoughts.

Making a long story short, I unfortunately disagree that dress codes makes much of a good benchmark of openness for commerce of previous times. Total social mobility was never the case in any empire that I am aware of.

Musing out loud : Wasn't Purple supposed to only be worn by the Emperor (or stripe by others) sort of funny, as the snail/mollusk of Turkey that developed the color then went extinct (and many were bred in farms along the coast). Probably relaxed and weakened central power times passed when lots of people had these clothes for private parties or home use, overburdening the harvest of this animal.
 
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