Wednesday, January 07, 2004
BETTER LATE THAN NEVER? THOUGHTS ON THE QING EMPIRE AND CHOSON KOREA. Some time ago, Flying Yangban posted some interesting observations concerning relations between China and Korea in the late 19th century. These observations elicited some interesting comments and earned some notice from the Marmot and probably elsewhere.
Since this was the topic of my Ph.D. dissertation and I presently in what is hoped to be the final stages of literally writing a book (“the” book?) about the subject, I thought I’d throw in my two bits on this topic.
Ever since the establishment of the Chosôn Dynasty (1392-1910), Chosôn Korea and the ruling power in China adhered to a system of relations that was known as a “serving the great” (sadae in Korean or shida in modern Mandarin Chinese). This system was based on two main principles.
First was the mutual acceptance of a hierarchical relationship in which China (or more properly, the Ming and Qing Empires) was clearly superior. This relationship was usually articulated in Confucian familial terms (father to son or elder brother to younger brother) and was expressed by annual Korean tribute missions to China, the occasional visit of a Chinese envoy to Korea (usually to grant investiture to a new Korean king), and the Korean willingness to adopt the Chinese imperial calendar (at least in its correspondence with China). When in Beijing, Korean envoys would present tribute to the Son of Heaven, receive gifts in return and make a bundle trading on the side. When Chinese envoys visited Korea, they would be met by the Korean king at the “Welcoming Imperial Grace Gate” (Yongûnmun) where the king would prostrate himself on the ground while the envoy read the message from the Chinese emperor.
The second principle was distance and non-interference. Aside from the above-mentioned ritual expressions of inequality and hierarchy, the Chinese and Koreans kept each other at arms length. Other forms of interaction—trade, travel, even letter writing—were severely restricted if not prohibited outright. Neither the Ming nor the Qing directly interfered in Korean domestic affairs. The only exception to this rule was in times of emergency, such as when Hideyoshi invaded Korea in the 1590s. At that time, Korea’s Ming suzerain sent troops to help protect its vassal and heavily meddled in affairs of the court. But once the crisis was over, the Chinese armies went home and things returned to normal.
This system worked very well for both sides but was rather confusing to Westerners who couldn’t make sense of declarations such as that made by the Qing Zongli yamen that “It is known by all nations of the world that Korea is a dependent state of China. It is also known by all that she is an autonomous country.” Westerners, with their Westphalian assumptions about nation-states and sovereignty consistently insisted that this state of affairs was unacceptable: Korea had to either be a Chinese dependency or it had to be independent; it couldn’t be both (never mind that it had been both for the last four centuries).
The last three decades of the 19th century saw considerable debate and contention over this issue. The Qing Empire made things even more confusing by continuing to insist on traditional nomenclature and rituals while at the same time embarking a new course of imperialistic intervention in Korea, thus abandoning the principle of non-interference. The Qing Empire sent gunboats to Korean ports; sent troops to occupy Seoul (from 1882 to 1885); negotiated on Korea’s behalf the first treaties between the Chosôn Kingdom and the U.S., Britain, and France; signed its own treaties with Chosôn Korea that guaranteed extraterritoriality for Qing subjects in Korea, the right to establish and administer Chinese concessions in Korean treaty ports, control over Korean tariffs, and a host of other imperialistic prerogatives. Qing officials such as Chen Shutang and Yuan Shikai meddled in Korean domestic politics and finances. Qing officials also set up and managed Korea’s first overland telegraph lines and maritime customs service.
In short, the Qing Empire imposed on Chosôn Korea the same type of “informal empire” that it so resented being imposed on Qing China itself by the West. The PRC’s present-day claims to exceptionalism in the area of imperialism are, therefore, a bit suspect to say the least.
I have about 399 more pages of things to say but this will do for now.
Since this was the topic of my Ph.D. dissertation and I presently in what is hoped to be the final stages of literally writing a book (“the” book?) about the subject, I thought I’d throw in my two bits on this topic.
Ever since the establishment of the Chosôn Dynasty (1392-1910), Chosôn Korea and the ruling power in China adhered to a system of relations that was known as a “serving the great” (sadae in Korean or shida in modern Mandarin Chinese). This system was based on two main principles.
First was the mutual acceptance of a hierarchical relationship in which China (or more properly, the Ming and Qing Empires) was clearly superior. This relationship was usually articulated in Confucian familial terms (father to son or elder brother to younger brother) and was expressed by annual Korean tribute missions to China, the occasional visit of a Chinese envoy to Korea (usually to grant investiture to a new Korean king), and the Korean willingness to adopt the Chinese imperial calendar (at least in its correspondence with China). When in Beijing, Korean envoys would present tribute to the Son of Heaven, receive gifts in return and make a bundle trading on the side. When Chinese envoys visited Korea, they would be met by the Korean king at the “Welcoming Imperial Grace Gate” (Yongûnmun) where the king would prostrate himself on the ground while the envoy read the message from the Chinese emperor.
The second principle was distance and non-interference. Aside from the above-mentioned ritual expressions of inequality and hierarchy, the Chinese and Koreans kept each other at arms length. Other forms of interaction—trade, travel, even letter writing—were severely restricted if not prohibited outright. Neither the Ming nor the Qing directly interfered in Korean domestic affairs. The only exception to this rule was in times of emergency, such as when Hideyoshi invaded Korea in the 1590s. At that time, Korea’s Ming suzerain sent troops to help protect its vassal and heavily meddled in affairs of the court. But once the crisis was over, the Chinese armies went home and things returned to normal.
This system worked very well for both sides but was rather confusing to Westerners who couldn’t make sense of declarations such as that made by the Qing Zongli yamen that “It is known by all nations of the world that Korea is a dependent state of China. It is also known by all that she is an autonomous country.” Westerners, with their Westphalian assumptions about nation-states and sovereignty consistently insisted that this state of affairs was unacceptable: Korea had to either be a Chinese dependency or it had to be independent; it couldn’t be both (never mind that it had been both for the last four centuries).
The last three decades of the 19th century saw considerable debate and contention over this issue. The Qing Empire made things even more confusing by continuing to insist on traditional nomenclature and rituals while at the same time embarking a new course of imperialistic intervention in Korea, thus abandoning the principle of non-interference. The Qing Empire sent gunboats to Korean ports; sent troops to occupy Seoul (from 1882 to 1885); negotiated on Korea’s behalf the first treaties between the Chosôn Kingdom and the U.S., Britain, and France; signed its own treaties with Chosôn Korea that guaranteed extraterritoriality for Qing subjects in Korea, the right to establish and administer Chinese concessions in Korean treaty ports, control over Korean tariffs, and a host of other imperialistic prerogatives. Qing officials such as Chen Shutang and Yuan Shikai meddled in Korean domestic politics and finances. Qing officials also set up and managed Korea’s first overland telegraph lines and maritime customs service.
In short, the Qing Empire imposed on Chosôn Korea the same type of “informal empire” that it so resented being imposed on Qing China itself by the West. The PRC’s present-day claims to exceptionalism in the area of imperialism are, therefore, a bit suspect to say the least.
I have about 399 more pages of things to say but this will do for now.
