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Codifying Extraterritoriality: The Chinese “Unequal Treaties”

Pär Kristoffer Cassel

in Grounds of Judgment: Extraterritoriality and Imperial Power in Nineteenth-Century China and Japan

This chapter charts the evolution of jurisdiction over foreigners in Qing China from the late nineteenth century through the Sino-British “Chefoo Convention” of 1876, which was the last British ... More

This chapter charts the evolution of jurisdiction over foreigners in Qing China from the late nineteenth century through the Sino-British “Chefoo Convention” of 1876, which was the last British treaty to deal with extraterritoriality to any large extent before the turn of the century. Prior to the Opium War, the Qing Empire granted foreigners far more legal autonomy than the contemporary Ottoman Empire did under the “Capitulations,” a series of treaties between the Sublime Porte and Western nations, which were concluded from the sixteenth through the early nineteenth centuries.Less

The Opium War and the British Empire, 1839–1842

in From Frontier Policy to Foreign Policy: The Question of India and the Transformation of Geopolitics in Qing China

This chapter explores the Opium War and the British empire during 1839–1842. New appreciation of the British as an empire contributed to the increased quantity of research conducted during the Opium ... More

This chapter explores the Opium War and the British empire during 1839–1842. New appreciation of the British as an empire contributed to the increased quantity of research conducted during the Opium War. The mission by Lin Zexu eradicated the opium trade in Guangdong. Lin was involved in developing opium policy. The Opium War can be regarded as a peerless opportunity for securing a Qing alliance against the British. At the end of the Opium War, Qing officials confronting the manifest power of the British remained unpersuaded that it rested on sound foundations. It is noted that the significance of the Opium War lay in its impact on the empire's geostrategic worldview. The Qing state persisted in its frontier-specific operational geography even though this was ill-suited to elucidating the overall strategic situation of the Qing empire in relation to its multipronged British foe.Less

The Regret of a Nation

Song-Chuan Chen

in Merchants of War and Peace: British Knowledge of China in the Making of the Opium War

The Warlike party did not get its way entirely. To further elaborate the history of the Pacific party’s efforts in arguing against the war, this chapter shows how the British public opposed the war. ... More

The Warlike party did not get its way entirely. To further elaborate the history of the Pacific party’s efforts in arguing against the war, this chapter shows how the British public opposed the war. Anti-war arguments in the London print media, drawn from Christian universalism and Enlightenment humanitarianism, were often discussed in one breath and became inseparable. Even before the British expedition arrived in China in the summer of 1840, the war was already being called an ‘Opium War’ by the anti-war campaigners, which has stuck ever since. Their opinion of the war prevailed in the second half of the 19th century. After 1860, while British imperial expansion worldwide continued, British parliamentarians, more often than not, condemned the war, and regretting that the ‘Opium War’ was ever waged.Less

Sovereign Rights, or America’s First Opium Problem

Dael A. Norwood

in Trading Freedom: How Trade with China Defined Early America

This chapter tracks how the Opium War brought the China trade back to the center of American politics. Great Britain’s invasion of the China coast was widely covered by the American press. A close ... More

This chapter tracks how the Opium War brought the China trade back to the center of American politics. Great Britain’s invasion of the China coast was widely covered by the American press. A close examination of this coverage reveals that Americans consistently mapped the war’s belligerents onto their own political divides, which in the early 1840s centered on the legitimacy of slavery and state sovereignty under international law. As major speeches by John C. Calhoun and John Quincy Adams helped make clear, Americans saw parallels between Britain’s coercive enforcement of liberal trade policy in China and the threat British-style liberal market logics posed to the security of property in human beings in the US. Alarming slaveholders and emboldening abolitionists, the Opium War helped draw sustained official attention to the Sino-American relationship. This novel political relevance led Congress and the Tyler administration to pursue formal ties with China, a feat accomplished by Caleb Cushing’s diplomatic mission and the 1844 Treaty of Wangxia that resulted. The new treaty committed the US to a significant official presence in China, and re-established the China trade as a concern in American politics – now linked to the slavery debate.Less

Civil and Other Wars — Rebels, Mercenaries and More Dope

Paul French

in Through the Looking Glass: China's Foreign Journalists from Opium Wars to Mao

The foreigners who had arrived to claim their rights in the treaty port of Shanghai had barely begun to get to work when the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom suddenly appeared in revolt and threatened the ... More

The foreigners who had arrived to claim their rights in the treaty port of Shanghai had barely begun to get to work when the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom suddenly appeared in revolt and threatened the very existence of the Qing dynasty. Much of the early writing on the Taiping followed on from the end of the First Opium War through to Lord Elgin's mission to Beijing. The Elgin Mission and a major change in Sino-foreign relations for the English-language press in China are discussed. Karl Marx commented frequently on China in his regular articles for the New York Daily Tribune. Most of Marx and Frederich Engels' articles dealt with the run-up to and then the conflict that became the Second Opium War as well as the Taiping Rebellion. They were clearly against the opium trade. Felice Beato, John Thomson, William Pryor Floyd, and Milton Miller are the important photographers in China. The Shanghai explosion is highlighted. Eventually, the foreign treaty ports were peaceful and were becoming firm bastions of trade with their own established papers and press barons, while the European powers continued to clash with China, exciting journalists.Less

God, Mammon and Flag

Paul French

in Through the Looking Glass: China's Foreign Journalists from Opium Wars to Mao

The birth of foreign newspapers and a foreign press corps in China really begins in the small enclave of Canton, the city now known as Guangzhou, in what were called the Factories, the somewhat ... More

The birth of foreign newspapers and a foreign press corps in China really begins in the small enclave of Canton, the city now known as Guangzhou, in what were called the Factories, the somewhat fortified and mostly self-sufficient warehouses where a select group of foreigners was begrudgingly permitted to trade by the Qing dynasty. God, Mammon, and flag are the primary interests in the very earliest newspapers and journals. The roots of the foreign press are revealed in opium. The nineteenth century British-dominated “mud trade”, based on opium as a narcotic smoked for pleasure or relaxation rather than medicinal purposes, was already over fifty years old by the time the first English-language newspapers appeared in China, coincidentally sponsored by the largest suppliers. The circumspect voice of the missionaries is described. The chapter also addresses the Napier fizzle and the First Opium War. It is shown that Hong Kong is a colony in need of a press.Less

Russell and Company and the Imperialism of Anglo-american Free Trade

Sibing He

in Narratives of Free Trade: The Commercial Cultures of Early US-China Relations

This chapter examines one of the largest American trading firms in early nineteenth-century, China, Russell and Co., and discusses how the company worked with private British traders to advocate an ... More

This chapter examines one of the largest American trading firms in early nineteenth-century, China, Russell and Co., and discusses how the company worked with private British traders to advocate an imperialist policy of ‘free trade’ in China. It also argues that the intense rivalry between Great Britain and the United States for the China market compelled the U.S. to adopt an autonomous China policy after the Opium War (1839–42).Less

Narco-Capitalism: Restraining The British In Shanghai, 1839–1927

Melissa Macauley

in Distant Shores: Colonial Encounters on China's Maritime Frontier

This chapter discusses people who got rich in the opium trade in China: British, Americans, Parsis, and Chinese. Prior to 1858, when the sale and recreational use of the drug were illegal, fortunes ... More

This chapter discusses people who got rich in the opium trade in China: British, Americans, Parsis, and Chinese. Prior to 1858, when the sale and recreational use of the drug were illegal, fortunes were made by smuggling. The chapter considers the south China coast as the most cosmopolitan arena for contraband trade in modern history. It mentions how the British imagined they made life easier for Western interests when they fought two wars with the Qing: the First Opium War, 1839 to 1842, and the Second Opium War, 1856 to 1860. The treaties and conventions that concluded these wars opened fifteen Chinese ports to foreign trade and after 1858, imposed a de facto legalization of opium on China.Less

Introduction

Song-Chuan Chen

in Merchants of War and Peace: British Knowledge of China in the Making of the Opium War

This chapter expounds on how the making of war and British knowledge about China were intertwined, and proves a brief review on Opium War literature. What previous historiography saw as the reasons ... More

This chapter expounds on how the making of war and British knowledge about China were intertwined, and proves a brief review on Opium War literature. What previous historiography saw as the reasons for starting the war were, in actuality, new knowledge about China to the British, which was made in Canton by the Warlike party as both a discourse for mobilising the British state to wage the war and as a moral justification afterwards. The following five chapters explain this new knowledge and its relationship to the Canton system and the war argument.Less

Sorting out China: British accounts from pre-Opium War Canton

John M. Carroll

in The Cultural Construction of the British World

The Canton System, which regulated China's trade with the West from the mid-1700s until the Opium War (1839-1842), has often been held up as an example of everything that was wrong with Qing China ... More

The Canton System, which regulated China's trade with the West from the mid-1700s until the Opium War (1839-1842), has often been held up as an example of everything that was wrong with Qing China and its relations with the outside world, and of the fundamental incompatibility of "East" and "West". This view has recently been challenged by several studies which have shown that the Canton System worked remarkably well until the abolition of the East India Company's monopolies in the early 1800s, and that the Canton System was not necessarily a cultural clash waiting to erupt. This chapter, based on accounts by Britons who visited or resided in pre-war Canton, argues that China was a site of encounter and affinity as much as one of conflict and difference. Though exposure to Chinese people and customs often reinforced British attitudes of superiority, many Britons in Canton also found much that was familiar. That which seemed unusual or strange could often be explained by way of comparison and contrast – either with the British historical past or with other societies and cultures. For many Britons travellers and residents in Canton, their time in China enabled them to try to understand China and to consider the nature of Britishness in a world in which ideas about trade, politics, and diplomacy were being questioned and challenged.Less

China of the American Imagination: The Influence of Trade on US Portrayals of China, 1820 to 18501

John R. Haddad

in Narratives of Free Trade: The Commercial Cultures of Early US-China Relations

The China Trade inspired the imagination of many Americans in the decades after the Revolutionary War; yet, within the contemporary field of American Studies and literature, China's influence on the ... More

The China Trade inspired the imagination of many Americans in the decades after the Revolutionary War; yet, within the contemporary field of American Studies and literature, China's influence on the early United States seems underappreciated. This chapter attempts to remedy this by exploring, through texts and images, the impact on the American imagination of Chinese tea, ceramics, and museum exhibitions. It traces a change in American attitudes toward China as admiration turned to cruel ridicule following China's humiliating defeat in the Opium War.Less

Social Fabric of a Collaborative Colonialism

Law Wing Sang

in Collaborative Colonial Power: The Making of the Hong Kong Chinese

This chapter focuses on the emergent formation of collaborative colonialism in the early colonial era: from the First Opium War (1840–1842) to the 1911 Republican Revolution. It notes that long ... More

This chapter focuses on the emergent formation of collaborative colonialism in the early colonial era: from the First Opium War (1840–1842) to the 1911 Republican Revolution. It notes that long before the Opium Wars, many coastal Chinese were already in close contact with Europeans as a result of the latter's trading in commodities such as tea, porcelain, silk, and foodstuffs. With commercial activities manifest in the coastal Chinese regional networks, in Southeast Asian economies, and in the European dominated New World, a class of elite transnationals arose around Hong Kong and exercised considerable economic clout. It notes that the overall effect of nineteenth-century European colonial expansion in the region was the inclusion of Chinese merchants in the newly arisen global networks; yet the dependence of the Europeans on the Chinese also helped boost the ability of some Chinese merchants to dominate intra-Asian trade, including trade with China.Less

The Burden of National Humiliation: Late Qing and Republican Years

Paul A. Cohen

in Speaking to History: The Story of King Goujian in Twentieth-Century China

The Qing dynasty was overturned and a new order brought into being in 1911–1912. In the years after 1912, however, China lurched from one crisis to another. During these years of anguish and almost ... More

The Qing dynasty was overturned and a new order brought into being in 1911–1912. In the years after 1912, however, China lurched from one crisis to another. During these years of anguish and almost continually frustrated hope, one persistent theme was nationalism. Patriotic Chinese in the late Qing and republican periods referred endlessly to the humiliations (guochi) their country experienced at the hands of foreign imperialism beginning with the Opium War. Indeed, in the republican period they even established days of national humiliation or shame (guochi ri) to mark the anniversaries of these painful episodes. Given the persistence of this open wound — a sense of grievance that not only failed to abate but kept being revisited — it is scarcely surprising that the Goujian story should bulk large in the minds of Chinese throughout these years. The distinguished historian Lei Haizong's observation on the late Zhou conflict between Wu and Yue is worth noting in this regard. Lei saw Fuchai and Goujian as symbolizing an important shift taking place in China at the end of the Spring and Autumn period.Less

Engagement and Status Conflict

Christopher A. Ford

in The Mind of Empire: China's History and Modern Foreign Relations

During the first Sino-British conflict, also known as the Opium War, there existed an ideological competition between Sinic universalism and a European-derived diplomatic worldview that continued to ... More

During the first Sino-British conflict, also known as the Opium War, there existed an ideological competition between Sinic universalism and a European-derived diplomatic worldview that continued to flare on multiple fronts long after specific opium-related trade disputes had been resolved by force of English arms. The British, well aware of the degree to which China sought to demand symbolic tokens of subjection from foreign barbarians, sought to achieve a resolution of the disputes at issue using its naval and military forces. After the British made quick work of the resistance offered by the Qing dynasty, China in 1842 agreed to sign the Treaty of Nanking, marking the first treaty unequivocally to place China on equal footing, formally speaking, with another kingdom. Taking their lead from the British, other Western powers, including the US, France, Sweden, and Norway, quickly lined up for their own treaties with China. Through their treaties, these Western powers insisted on a permanent representation in China, something that the Chinese strongly resisted because it “ran counter to the whole political and social system of Imperial China.” For them, such diplomatic relations directly threatened the authority of the emperor. In an effort to preserve what it could of its ancient symbolic supremacy, China's policy after 1860 became one of fending off actual imperial audiences while seeking to revise the treaties to remove the offending provisions that required such encounters.Less

Defining Xiamen: Trade and Migration before the Opium War (1839–1842)

Soon Keong Ong

in Coming Home to a Foreign Country: Xiamen and Returned Overseas Chinese, 1843-1938

This chapter addresses the history and development of Xiamen. It presents a general overview of trade and migration through the port of Xiamen from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, ... More

This chapter addresses the history and development of Xiamen. It presents a general overview of trade and migration through the port of Xiamen from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, culminating with its opening as a treaty port after the Opium War. The chapter then shifts to examine the interplay between trade and migration in South Fujian and the migration routes of the Fujianese before the mid-1800s. As the chapter shows, Xiamen and the Fujianese were well positioned to take advantage of the conditions and mechanisms that the treaty port era offered. The chapter then unveils how the continuation and expansion of migration through Xiamen deeply affected the port city's commercial activities and determined its development in ways that were unforeseen by the British.Less