Tribute System and Rulership in Late Imperial China

Tribute System and Rulership in Late Imperial China PDF Author: Ralph Kauz
Publisher: V&R Unipress
ISBN: 3847014021
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 367

Get Book Here

Book Description
Demanding and offering tribute is a most common feature in human societies and nothing special to China. In the course of the development of Neolithic and later societies social classes have developed where persons who achieved superior positions first could demand 'presents' or tribute from neighboring societies they defeated and then, with the assistance of sturdy 'servants' from their own people. China was certainly no exception to that principle and one of the first terms for tax was thus 'gong', tribute. In China's early, 'feudatory' social system, tribute was demanded from lower political entities, and the mutual 'political' relations were already highly developed during the Zhou dynasty (1045–256 BCE). This system of 'inner Chinese' relations became a sort of matrix when China expanded and achieved contact with countries which were more or less independent, and thus the 'tribute system' evolved. The individual case studies in this volume focus on the latest manifestations of the tribute system in late Imperial China.

Tribute System and Rulership in Late Imperial China

Tribute System and Rulership in Late Imperial China PDF Author: Ralph Kauz
Publisher: V&R Unipress
ISBN: 3847014021
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 367

Get Book Here

Book Description
Demanding and offering tribute is a most common feature in human societies and nothing special to China. In the course of the development of Neolithic and later societies social classes have developed where persons who achieved superior positions first could demand 'presents' or tribute from neighboring societies they defeated and then, with the assistance of sturdy 'servants' from their own people. China was certainly no exception to that principle and one of the first terms for tax was thus 'gong', tribute. In China's early, 'feudatory' social system, tribute was demanded from lower political entities, and the mutual 'political' relations were already highly developed during the Zhou dynasty (1045–256 BCE). This system of 'inner Chinese' relations became a sort of matrix when China expanded and achieved contact with countries which were more or less independent, and thus the 'tribute system' evolved. The individual case studies in this volume focus on the latest manifestations of the tribute system in late Imperial China.

Sacred Mandates

Sacred Mandates PDF Author: Timothy Brook
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022656293X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292

Get Book Here

Book Description
Contemporary discussions of international relations in Asia tend to be tethered in the present, unmoored from the historical contexts that give them meaning. Sacred Mandates, edited by Timothy Brook, Michael van Walt van Praag, and Miek Boltjes, redresses this oversight by examining the complex history of inter-polity relations in Inner and East Asia from the thirteenth century to the twentieth, in order to help us understand and develop policies to address challenges in the region today. This book argues that understanding the diversity of past legal orders helps explain the forms of contemporary conflict, as well as the conflicting historical narratives that animate tensions. Rather than proceed sequentially by way of dynasties, the editors identify three “worlds”—Chingssid Mongol, Tibetan Buddhist, and Confucian Sinic—that represent different forms of civilization authority and legal order. This novel framework enables us to escape the modern tendency to view the international system solely as the interaction of independent states, and instead detect the effects of the complicated history at play between and within regions. Contributors from a wide range of disciplines cover a host of topics: the development of international law, sovereignty, state formation, ruler legitimacy, and imperial expansion, as well as the role of spiritual authority on state behavior, the impact of modernization, and the challenges for peace processes. The culmination of five years of collaborative research, Sacred Mandates will be the definitive historical guide to international and intrastate relations in Asia, of interest to policymakers and scholars alike, for years to come.

China and the Uyghurs

China and the Uyghurs PDF Author: Morris Rossabi
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1538162997
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 183

Get Book Here

Book Description
This balanced history of Xinjiang and its Uyghur inhabitants traces the development of this ethnic group from imperial China to the present and its fraught relationship with the Chinese state. Morris Rossabi focuses especially on CCP policies, both progressive and repressive, toward the Uyghurs since 1949.

Ming China and its Allies

Ming China and its Allies PDF Author: David M. Robinson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108489222
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 263

Get Book Here

Book Description
Explores the Ming Dynasty's foreign relations with neighboring sovereigns, placing China in a wider global context.

The World Imagined

The World Imagined PDF Author: Hendrik Spruyt
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108870678
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 413

Get Book Here

Book Description
Taking an inter-disciplinary approach, Spruyt explains the political organization of three non-European international societies from early modernity to the late nineteenth century. The Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires; the Sinocentric tributary system; and the Southeast Asian galactic empires, all which differed in key respects from the modern Westphalian state system. In each of these societies, collective beliefs were critical in structuring domestic orders and relations with other polities. These multi-ethnic empires allowed for greater accommodation and heterogeneity in comparison to the homogeneity that is demanded by the modern nation-state. Furthermore, Spruyt examines the encounter between these non-European systems and the West. Contrary to unidirectional descriptions of the encounter, these non-Westphalian polities creatively adapted to Western principles of organization and international conduct. By illuminating the encounter of the West and these Eurasian polities, this book serves to question the popular wisdom of modernity, wherein the Western nation-state is perceived as the desired norm, to be replicated in other polities.

China Inside Out

China Inside Out PDF Author: P l Ny¡ri
Publisher: Central European University Press
ISBN: 9789637326141
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 372

Get Book Here

Book Description
The "war on terror" has generated a scramble for expertise on Islamic or Asian "culture" and revived support for area studies, but it has done so at the cost of reviving the kinds of dangerous generalizations that area studies have rightly been accused of. This book provides a much-needed perspective on area studies, a perspective that is attentive to both manifestations of "traditional culture" and the new global relationships in which they are being played out. The authors shake off the shackles of the orientalist legacy but retain a close reading of local processes. They challenge the boundaries of China and question its study from different perspectives, but believe that area studies have a role to play if their geographies are studied according to certain common problems. In the case of China, the book shows the diverse array of critical but solidly grounded research approaches that can be used in studying a society. Its approach neither trivializes nor dismisses the elusive effects of culture, and it pays attention to both the state and the multiplicity of voices that challenge it.

International Law as World Order in Late Imperial China

International Law as World Order in Late Imperial China PDF Author: Rune Svarverud
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9047420640
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 332

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is the first systematic analysis of the early introduction and reception of international law as a Western political and legal science in China. International law in late imperial China is studied both as part of the introduction of the Western sciences and as a theoretical orientation in international affairs between 1847 and 1911. The first chapters serve the purpose of analysing the political, institutional, intellectual and linguistic process of adapting the theories of international law to the Chinese context language. The second major part of the book is dedicated to the discourse on China and world order within this framework.

Cherishing Men from Afar

Cherishing Men from Afar PDF Author: James Louis Hevia
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822316374
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 316

Get Book Here

Book Description
In the late eighteenth century two expansive Eurasian empires met formally for the first time--the Manchu or Qing dynasty of China and the maritime empire of Great Britain. The occasion was the mission of Lord Macartney, sent by the British crown and sponsored by the East India Company, to the court of the Qianlong emperor. Cherishing Men from Afar looks at the initial confrontation between these two empires from a historical perspective informed by the insights of contemporary postcolonial criticism and cultural studies. The history of this encounter, like that of most colonial and imperial encounters, has traditionally been told from the Europeans' point of view. In this book, James L. Hevia consults Chinese sources--many previously untranslated--for a broader sense of what Qing court officials understood; and considers these documents in light of a sophisticated anthropological understanding of Qing ritual processes and expectations. He also reexamines the more familiar British accounts in the context of recent critiques of orientalism and work on the development of the bourgeois subject. Hevia's reading of these sources reveals the logics of two discrete imperial formations, not so much impaired by the cultural misunderstandings that have historically been attributed to their meeting, but animated by differing ideas about constructing relations of sovereignty and power. His examination of Chinese and English-language scholarly treatments of this event, both historical and contemporary, sheds new light on the place of the Macartney mission in the dynamics of colonial and imperial encounters.

Empires and Exchanges in Eurasian Late Antiquity

Empires and Exchanges in Eurasian Late Antiquity PDF Author: Nicola Di Cosmo
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108547001
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 1284

Get Book Here

Book Description
Empires and Exchanges in Eurasian Late Antiquity offers an integrated picture of Rome, China, Iran, and the Steppes during a formative period of world history. In the half millennium between 250 and 750 CE, settled empires underwent deep structural changes, while various nomadic peoples of the steppes (Huns, Avars, Turks, and others) experienced significant interactions and movements that changed their societies, cultures, and economies. This was a transformational era, a time when Roman, Persian, and Chinese monarchs were mutually aware of court practices, and when Christians and Buddhists criss-crossed the Eurasian lands together with merchants and armies. It was a time of greater circulation of ideas as well as material goods. This volume provides a conceptual frame for locating these developments in the same space and time. Without arguing for uniformity, it illuminates the interconnections and networks that tied countless local cultural expressions to far-reaching inter-regional ones.

East Asia in the World

East Asia in the World PDF Author: Stephan Haggard
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108479871
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 333

Get Book Here

Book Description
This accessible collection examines twelve historic events in the international relations of East Asia.