Introduction
"Eastern wisdom for Western audiences"
Part1
- History of Chinese Dynasties
- Republic of China (1912-1949)
- The Long March (1934-1936)
- The People's Republic of China, 1949
- The Cultural Revolution (1966–1976)
- In Summary
"The wise man doesn't compete; therefore nobody can compete with him."
- Lao Tzu, 6c BCE
"The Master said: In ruling a country of a thousand chariots there should be scrupulous attention to business, honesty, economy, charity, and employment of the people
at the proper season.
A virtuous ruler is like the Pole-star,
which keeps its place,
while all the other stars do homage to it.
People despotically governed and kept in order
by punishments may avoid infraction of the law, but they will lose their moral sense.
People virtuously governed and kept in order
by the inner law of self-control
will retain their moral sense,
and moreover become good."
- Confucius (551-479BCE)
"Human nature is good. -
By using force and pretending to benevolence
the hegemon will certainly have a large state.
By using virtue and practicing benevolence
the wise ruler will achieve humane authority."
- Mencius (372-289BCE), Confucian philosopher
"Heaven has its reasons.
Earth has its resources.
Man has his political order
thus forming with the first two a triad.
But he would err if he failed to respect
the ground rules of this triad
and infringed on the other two." - Xun Kuang Xunzi ((310-220BCE)
“When you see good,
then diligently examine your own behavior.
When you see evil,
then with sorrow look into yourself.” - Sun Tzu (298-238BCE), The Art of War
Introduction
"Eastern wisdom for Western audiences"
Sinophile:
Adjective - strongly attracted to or interested in Chinese history and culture. Discovery of ancient China's cultural wisdom sparked my interest during my early teen years, shortly after my family moved from rural Ireland to San Francisco, where I discovered Alan Watts, (1915-1973) (self-styled "philosophical entertainer") the legendary interpreter of "Eastern wisdom for Western audiences". Enrolment in a YWCA Tai Chi Chuan summer class, at age 18, 'moved' me from strict Irish traditional dance and formal Ballroom dance to the bliss of "mindfulness" in free-form movement.
As a student of late 1800s US history at San Francisco State University, I was astonished to discover the impacts of British colonialism on "Indigenous" Irish, American, African, Indian, and Australian cultures. The fact that "Indigenous" Chinese 'out-smarted' Western imperialists is a major cultural lesson:
I needed to know why!
Following my interest in Buddhist history ("expect change"), during my mid-20s, I was gifted with a year-long role as English language tutor within palace walls of the royal family of Thailand: I was especially impressed to learn that the Thai royal family enjoyed their long lineage simply by moving their capital when challenged by invaders.
"Indigenous" Chinese suffered over 400 years of varying degrees of control under Russia, Britain, France, Germany, United States, Japan, Italy, and Austria-Hungary, until the early 1900s.
During the last decades of the Qing dynasty (1644–1911/12), the Self-Strengthening Movement (1861-1895), was initiated by Feng Guifen (1809-1874): 'Feng Guifen spent his career studying how China could learn from the Western "barbarians," - his neighbors in 1860's Shanghai. Influenced by Wei Yuan, Feng Guifen believed China's salvation would be achieved through a process of "self-strengthening."' (ASIA Society), followed by the "Boxer Rebellion" (Nov.1899 - Sept.1901) attempting to drive out all foreigners- cultural and corporate imperialists- especially Christian missionaries, whose settlements were established during the 16th century (detailed under Economic History, Part 3). This ongoing turmoil led to world-wide mass migrations, especially of the Cantonese "Han" people.
The complexities of international relations during the transition to the People's Republic of China (PRC) are illuminated in "The Mother" (1933), by Pearl S. Buck, the daughter of missionaries, who told the story of a rural Chinese mother, whose son hid banned books under the floorboards during the Warlord Era uprising (1916-1928) of regional factions, warning farmers that "young radical revolutionaries" will steal their property, when, in fact, those "young radicals" (including Returned Students) intended to overcome the remnants of more than 2,000 years of dynastic rule in China.
(For perspective, Mao Zedong (1893-1976), born in December 1893, was age 23 in 1916 and 35 years old at the 1928 conclusion of the 'Warlord Era uprising'.)
Invasions of Manchuria
Japan made two attempts to capture China, beginning on September 18, 1931 and ended with Japan's surrender in 1945.
The Second Sino-Japanese War, from 1937 through 1945, before and during World War II, the Japanese captured China's capital city, Nanjing, and slaughter over 300,000 civilians - the "Nanjing Massacre": THIS TIME, the Chinese government outsmarted the Japanese by relocating their headquarters south-west - to Chongqing.
In recent times, I've turned my attention to the surprising degree of influence Confucian philosophy brought to the advancement of economic theory in overcoming western feudalism: The Leader of the French Physiocrats, Royal physician and economist Francois Quesnay (1694-1774) became known as “the Confucius of Europe” during his lifetime. In 1758, Dr. Quesnay wrote "Tableau Oeconomique" documenting the Physiocrats' precept: "that the wealth of nations was derived solely from the value of land agriculture or land development." Scottish social philosopher and political economist, Glasgow University Professor Adam Smith (1723-1790), the reputed founder of Classical Political Economic Theorem, visited the Physiocrats in France while touring across Europe (1764-1766) as tutor to the young Scottish nobleman Henry Scott, 3rd Duke of Buccleuch, who then endowed Professor Smith with a life-time 'pension'.Ten years later, Classical Political Economic theorem was formally launched with the 1776 publication of Adam Smith's "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" - aka "The Wealth of Nations".
From 1809, English Economist David Ricardo (1772-1823), defined the income derived from the ownership of land and other free gifts of nature as "The Law of Rent" - aka Ricardo's Law. (Detailed under Part 4, Economic History)
"The influence of the Chinese upon the physiocrats was probably more extensive and more significant than has generally been appreciated. If one will but look into the matter, he can readily discern similarities in thought on the part of Chinese sages and French économistes…. This similarity is more than mere coincidence; it is due to an actual borrowing on the part of the physiocrats."
- Zhang, 2000, p. 195
"A man's greatness must always be measured, in the first place, by the consensus of opinion in his own country; the judgment of foreigners can only be allowed to have a secondary value."
- Wisdom of the East: The Sayings of Confucius, by Confucius -
A New Translation of the Greater Part of the Confucian Analects,
Lionel Giles, (1910) Department of Oriental Books and Manuscripts of the British Museum: Internet Archive - Project Gutenberg EBook
China - 3,000 Years of History in a Minute
Territories of Chinese Dynasties from 1,000 BC to the present day.
Animated Map.
Following the Spring and Autumn period, the Eastern Zhou dynasty, approximately 770 to 476 BCE, is associated with the rise of Confucius (551–479 BCE).
The names Chine, Chin, China, derived from the Qin dynasty (221-206 BCE), later evolved to become CHINA, the first name for 'united China' known to foreigners, while the Chinese still identify as Qin, Qi, Chu, Yan, Han, Zhao, Wei Chinese.
The extraordinary benefits of unity across China: From the 221BCE rise of the short-lived Qin Dynasty (221-206 BCE),
to the golden age of the Eastern Han Empire (25-220 CE):
Born in 259 BCE, Qin state, northwestern China, Ying Zheng (259-210BCE), "the boy King" ascended the throne in 246 BCE. At the age of 38, in 221BCE, after he had conquered the "Warring States". He "proclaimed himself Qin Shihuangdi (First Sovereign Emperor of Qin) - China's first emperor of a united China, and the emperor who initiated the building of the Great Wall of China in 221BCE.
"To rule the vast territory, the Qin instituted a rigid, authoritarian government; they standardized the writing system, standardized the measurements of length and weight and the width of highways, abolished all feudal privileges, oversaw large-scale construction of what then became the first Great Wall, and in 213, to halt subversive thought, ordered all books burned, except those on such utilitarian subjects as medicine." – Britannica
Emperor Qin Shihuangdi ceased further expeditions and built the first Great Wall to protect his subjects from the Northern Tribes - nomadic horsemen, led by Xiongnu people, who constantly raided their northern provinces. Recent archaelogical discoveries shine light on bordering cross cultural movements (Russo, et al. 2008).
Multiple later additions to the Great Wall were constructed with brick, to "lengthen and strengthen" the Wall, beginning in the east, at Shanhaiguan in Hebei province, and ending in the west at Jiayuguan in Gansu province - on the edge of the Gobi Desert. The full length of the Great Wall of China, 21,196 km (13,171 ml), which included horse tracks to thousands of watch towers, shelters, and fortresses, became a migration corridor with major trading posts controlling transportation along the Silk Road.
The 400-year Han Dynasty (206BCE-220AD) was briefly interrupted by the rebellious Xin Dynasty. The first part of the Han Dynasty is known as the Western Han period; the Eastern Han period began when the Han overthrew the rebellion and reestablished the dynasty in 25 CE. ...
The Eastern Han Period
A new Han emperor, Emperor Guangwu, took control and ruled from Luoyang, in eastern China; thus began the Eastern Han period, which lasted from 25-220 CE. He defeated the Chimei rebels, as well as rival warlords, to reunify China again under the Han Dynasty.
Under Emperor Guangwu, the empire was strengthened considerably. Areas that had fallen away from Chinese control, such as Korea and Vietnam, were reconquered. The Hun Confederation, which had grown strong during China’s period of instability, was pacified. >>>more
The golden age of the Eastern Han Empire (25-220 CE): Following the successful rule of Emperor Guangwu (5BCE-57AD), Emperor Ming of Han, the second emperor of China's Eastern Han dynasty, and his son Emperor Zhang, continued to lead an era of prosperity; taxes were reduced, Daoism and Confucian ideals were encouraged, Buddhists were welcomed in China, and the processes of creating paper and porcelain were perfected.
Chinese philosophy and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM)
Based on clinical diagnostics, herbal medicine and acupuncture progressed.
“The key to a long healthy life is to follow the Tao, the natural way of the universe” (Curren, 2008). The Chinese way of looking at the body, and the world, is focused on processes. The earliest surviving work on Chinese medicine, “Huangdi Neijing”, created between the Warring States period and the Qin-Han period, shows that acupuncture was widely used as a therapy from ancient times. Various kinds of acupuncture needles were discovered in the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng who died around 200BCE:
“The history of traditional Chinese medicine begins in the neolithic period (10,000-4,000 years ago).”(Cavalieri, et al, 1997)
As told by Marco Polo (1254-1324)
Vast territories, from the Caspian Sea to China and the Pacific Ocean, unknown to European geographers, were referred to as “Tartary” until Venetian explorer Marco Polo reported details of his family's exotic sojourns, lasting over 23-years: “Concerning the Old Man of the Mountain” (Travels of Marco Polo, Book 1, Chapter 23): “Mulehet is a country in which the Old Man of the Mountain dwelt in former days; and the name means 'Place of the Aram'". Polo shared reports of the hypnotic power used over ‘captives’ under the influence of hashish and recounts a story of the "Old Man of the Mountain" (Sabbah) who led his young captives to a "paradise" - under the influence of hashish. His disciples, believing that only he could return them to 'paradise' - a life of great riches, harems, and glory - fully committed to his cause, they were willing to carry out his every request as his trusted "assassins".
See The Assassins (Hashshashin): Their History, Victims and Hashish Training.
The "Silk Road" opened trade routes between the Far East and Europe from 206 B.C. to 220 A.D, and became the conduit for teachings of the Confucian and Buddhist philosophers, and all branches of the Abrahamic religions.
According to Finland-based Mandarin-speaker, specialising on the history and cultures of China and Japan, Dr Jonathan Clements, visiting Professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University, China from 2013-19, author of "A History of the Silk Road" (2017), (Mandarin edition published July 2021), “The Silk Road is not a place, but a journey, a route from the edges of the Mediterranean to the central plains of China, through high mountains and inhospitable deserts. For thousands of years its history has been a traveler's history, of brief encounters in desert towns, snowbound passes and nameless forts. ..."
Dr Jonathan Clements, who was a Visiting Professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University, China from 2013-19, describes geographic timeline impacts on settlement of Proto-Celtic “Caucasian” cultures: Mummies, including Chinese, Mongul, and Caucasian, found around the Talkamakan Desert, are now showcased at the Xinjiang Regional Museum, in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang,
“These long-dead locals were interred in dry, salty ground that was never flooded... but the ones that foreign tourists want to see are Caucasian … between India and the Black Sea. These red-haired, long-limbed explorers were the easternmost outliers of the ancient Tocharian culture - shepherds and horsemen who once lived at the edge of a great lake. … covered 10,000 square kilometres. … beneath the Tianshan and the Kunlun mountain ranges. As the glacial ice finally melted, the water poured in torrents down the steep hillsides and filled much of the eastern end of the great valley. …
The region was one of the last places on earth to find human habitation. Perhaps they wandered in from the north, from the great grasslands and through the wind swept valley where Urumqi now stands. Perhaps they struggled through the passes from the southwest. But when they reached the great water, they settled at its edge.
The lakeside was thick with trees. They used them to build their houses and to make the canoes they paddled on the fast river waters, and the upright hinges - circular constructions with an internal ditch - that surrounded their graveyards. When they died, they used the wood to make the canoe-like cowlings that covered their graves. Their horses grazed on the grasslands, and their children picked through the reeds on the waters edge, looking for fish. They raised sheep on the hillsides, mixed pigments with dark wool to make purple cloth. … The waters of the mountains gradually dwindled. It would not have been obvious on the ground. … in geological time it was the merest blink. The great inland sea came and went in barely 1,000 years. – Clements, J. "A History of the Silk Road" (2017), pp.31-33
How Was The Great Wall Of China Built? Blowing-Up History: Seven Wonders, Discovery UK, 5 May 2021
(9:54)
Partial transcript: William Lindesay, Historian: (3:12) "In 1550, the Mongols stormed through the walls and the vulnerability of Beijing's position came into perspective."
The Mongol army surges through the wall and sieges Beijing.
It devastates the surrounding population and countryside.
"The court and the 'corridors of power' were absolutely shaking in fear. The question was, how could the Great Wall of China fail?... To protect China and the Silk Road, the Chinese build a vast structure using billions of tons of solid stone and bricks, sitting on a sturdy foundation of huge granite blocks. Smooth bricks make the sheer walls almost impossible to scale ..." (4:15)
By the mid-1500s, China had withdrawn from world trade in order to focus on internal border protection. In 1557, Portugal was given permission to ‘rent’ land on Macau in return for help in safeguarding China's coastline against "wokou" pirates. (The History of Ming states: thirty percent of the 16th century wokou were Japanese, seventy percent were ethnic Chinese.)
Carrying a copy of Ortelius' map, in 1582, at the age of 30, the Italian Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) travelled to the Portuguese settlement in Macau, China, to join the small Jesuit mission there. Following instructions to establish trust amongst the Chinese establishment, Ricci mastered the Chinese language, became a prolific writer, and was renowned as a mapmaker whose services were sought by the court. On the command of the Wanli Emperor, Zhu Yijun, (1572-1620), the fourteenth emperor of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), Matteo Ricci drew a world map, Kunyu Wanguo Quantu, 1602, depicting in great detail the entire Northern Hemisphere and placing China at the center of the world. The map measured 5.5 feet tall by 12.5 feet wide and was designed to be mounted in six panels on a folding screen.
(See an interactive version HERE)
. . . Jesuit Missionary Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) introduced the works of Confucius to Europe with his Italian translation of the ‘Four Books’. Shortly after Ricci's death, his Jesuit colleague Nicolas Trigault published a Latin translation, De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas (1615)
Leading to The European Triumph of Reason -1600 - 1800s
"For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." – Isaac Newton (1643-1727)
CEM: Chinese Educational Mission to the United States: In 1872, 120 students arrived in America, to an overwhelming welcome; went on to great diplomatic achievements around the world; and are referred to as "Returned Students" in China's reports. See references under Part 5
Historical Context The Chinese Educational Mission (1872-1881) From 1872 to 1881, 120 Chinese young boys at different ages arrived in the U.S. on government sponsorship. Chinese Educational Mission was a pioneering but frustrated attempt of China to modernize Chinese education and industry. At that time, the U.S. was scarcely a world leader in education. Although the United States was industrializing and urbanizing quickly, it was in turmoil during Reconstruction (following the American Civil War), and its educational institutions were not as advanced as European ones. Yet, China chose the U.S. to train its first groups of students abroad because of two people.>>>more
Following the collapse of the Qing dynasty following the 1911 Revolution, Dr. Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925), physician and philosopher, born in a small village near Macau, became the “founding Father of the Republic of China” and assumed the title of President of Republic of China, acknowledging the ancient Chinese origins of the 18c European Classical Political Economic Theorem, based on a "Land & Resource Tax".
"He learned the Chinese classics as a child and studied at American schools in Honolulu. When he returned in 1883, he became greatly troubled by what he saw as a backward China that extorted exorbitant taxes and levies from its people. ... During the following decade, he [Sun Yat-sen] was destined to endure much hardship and anguish as he fought the many warlords in his quest to unite the new China.” – DR. K.N. LAI, Journal of Medical Humanities, 2013
"Sun Yat-Sen repeatedly acknowledged the influence of Henry George and this influence went beyond details of land policy. Significant parts of George's work involved his extensive references to China, his diagnosis of China's ills, his vision of a probably better economic order, and his strong attack on the Malthusian theory, these too influenced Sun." - Henry George, Sun Yat-Sen and China:
More than Land Policy Was Involved, (1994) by Paul B. Trescott, Professor of Economics, Southern Illinois University
Catastrophe
The 1920 8.5 magnitude Haiyuan earthquake that struck the Gansu province in northwest China was the largest quake recorded in China in the 20th Century, killing "about 273,400 people, over 40,000 more than previously estimated" (CHEN Na 2010). But it was drought and floods that were the most deadly. China endured a number of large floods and droughts through the 1920s and 30s, which often led to widespread famine and killed millions at a time.
On a theoretical plane, the Returned Student leader Lo Fu explained the significance of the campaign: "The revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the workers and peasants above all relies on force for the seizure and maintenance of its power. It relies on force to carry out the cruel and protracted civil war with external enemies, imperialism and the armed forces of the KMT. It also relies upon force to suppress landlord remnants within the soviet areas, and capitalist and rich peasant counter-revolutionary activity. But when it comes down to it, what are the prerequisites this force is dependent on? Lenin clearly answered this question thus: 'Rely on the masses.1" …
Reliance on the masses implied, winning the support of the people by bringing them into the political life of society, and making them feel that they played their part, however little, in the decision making process, a concept that was quite absent from the traditional life of the Chinese peasant. >>>more
Excerpt: "If we only mobilize the people to carry on the war and do nothing else, can we succeed in defeating the enemy? Of course not. If we want to win, we must do a great deal more. We must lead the peasants' struggle for land and distribute the land to them, heighten their labour enthusiasm and increase agricultural production, safeguard the interests of the workers, establish co-operatives, develop trade with outside areas, and solve the problems facing the masses-- food, shelter and clothing, fuel, rice, cooking oil and salt, sickness and hygiene, and marriage. In short, all the practical problems in the masses' everyday life should claim our attention. If we attend to these problems, solve them and satisfy the needs of the masses, we shall really become organizers of the well-being of the masses, and they will truly rally round us and give us their warm support. Comrades, will we then be able to arouse them to take part in the revolutionary war? Yes, indeed we will.">>>more
The Long March (1934-1936)
In 1934, the Communists began their "Long March" - over two years -
from southeast China, over 6,000 miles to the north.
"The Long March" - A Poem by Mao Zedong, 1935
The Red Army fears not the trials of the Long March
And thinks nothing of a thousand mountains and rivers.
The Wuling Ridges spread out like ripples;
The Wumeng Ranges roll like balls of clay.
Warmly are the cliffs wrapped in clouds washed by the Gold Sand;
Chilly are the iron chains lying across the width of the Great Ferry.
A thousand acres of snow on the Min Mountain delight
My troops who have just left them behind.
Edgar Snow's Account of "The Long March"
Excerpt:
All movements — political, religious, social — have their foundation myths and stories about their beginnings that reach heroic proportions over time and that are used to inspire and unify followers. For the Chinese Communist Party, it is the story of the Long March. In 1934, the Communists left their base in southeast China, where they had been more easily attacked by the Nationalists, and wound their way over 6,000 miles to the north on their Long March. The journey took two years... >>>more
In 1938, Mao married his fourth and last wife, 21 years older, Jiang Qing / Madam Mao (1914-1991), famed as a 24 year old actress in patriotic stage plays.
China's "First Lady" Madam Mao became a controversial revolutionary, criticised for advancing ultra-leftist policies.
Excerpt: Madame Mao, as she is now called, organizes festivals for revolutionary plays and begins to work closely with the student movements which have always been so important in China. She organizes and speaks to rallies of thousands of people to help launch the Cultural Revolution. Finally, Mao and Jiang decide to launch a student-led army called the Red Guards that she would be in charge of. The Red Guards end up having more power than the official military for a number of years and wreak havoc throughout the country. Her relationship with Mao is no longer romantic in the least but is mutually beneficial: 'For him, it is the security of his empire that she aids and for her, the role of a heroine. In retrospect she not only has broken the Party's restriction, she runs the nation's psyche. She is gripped by the vision that she might eventually carry on Mao's business and rule China after his death. ...
Mao's 1948 poster Download (74.3 MB) China-1948-49x69cm.pdf Mao's 1948 poster beautifully depicts his respect and concern for farmers -
because they provide food and medicine. How wise!
The final stage of the Chinese Civil War (1927-1949).
The Yangtze River Crossing campaign (20 April to 2 June 1949), along a 400-mile stretch of the Yangtze river on both sides of Nanking.
Two reviews:
1. Mao Tse-tung issued orders to prepare to cross the Yangtze (The Guardian, archives)
Excerpt ... His manifesto said:
I. Strike forward bravely with determination and completely wipe out all anti-democratic, reactionary Kuomintang forces on Chinese territory.
2. Advance with courage and arrest all notorious war criminals, and try them according to law. Special attention must be paid to ‘gangsterissimo’ Chiang Kia-shek.
3. Proclaim finally the draft of the peace programme before all Kuomintang provincial and local governments and local military organs, and sign local agreements with those willing to stop the war and settle things by peaceful methods.
4. After the people’s liberation array has surrounded Nanking, and if the Li Tsung-jen Government has not yet escaped, we are willing to take a step back and offer him a last chance to sign the programme. >>>more
2. Wikipedia: After the successful conclusion of the campaign, Chairman Mao wrote a poem that has since been set to music and remains popular throughout Mainland China
Wind howls and rain falls upon the Bell Hills in twilight,
A million gallant warriors shall cross the river tonight.
Like a Tiger Crouched and a Dragon Coiled we outshine our glorious past!
As Heaven Turns and the Earth Churns, the World upside-down at last!
Hark! We cross, we chase our foe who flee to our advance,
We shall not be the crowned monkey, not a single chance.
If the Heavens above had Heart and Soul then Heaven itself shall age!
In the Azure Seas and the Mulberry Fields, Mankind has turned a page.
October 1, 1949
The People's Republic of China was proclaimed by Chairman Mao Zedong
The Chinese Revolution of 1949
U.S. Department of State, office of the Historian
On October 1, 1949, Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong declared the creation of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The announcement ended the costly full-scale civil war between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang (KMT), which broke out immediately following World War II and had been preceded by on and off conflict between the two sides since the 1920’s. The creation of the PRC also completed the long process of governmental upheaval in China begun by the Chinese Revolution of 1911. The “fall” of mainland China to communism in 1949 led the United States to suspend diplomatic ties with the PRC for decades. >>>more
From early 1950, under US Republican Senator (1947-1957) Joseph R. McCarthy, the term "McCarthyism" aka "the Red Scare" referred to obsessive anti-communist propaganda.
Chairman Mao was both criticised and praised
for policies contrary to USSR/US expectations.
Post-WWII catastrophes, China was acting to keep all of those who caused WWII out of their territory, while dismantling their own dynastic hierarchies.
"Banning the Four Olds:
Old Ideas, Old Culture, Old Customs, and Old Habits" Chairman Mao challenged what he perceived as new forms of domination (in his words, "revisionism," or "capitalist restoration").Mao's efforts led to energetic multi-focused campaigns:
Dismantling dynastic feudal hierarchies, and institutionalised forms of slavery, which included vassal status and concubinage;
The rural land reform movement against landlords;
The Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries.
The Great Leap Forward (1958-1962) "Man Must Conquer Nature"
In December 1958, Chairman Mao released the "Eight Elements Constitution," introducing new agricultural practices to achieve higher output goals throughout the country. One proposed solution was labeled "pest control," with sparrows identified by Mao as pests: "His slogan Ren Ding Shen Tian (Man Must Conquer Nature) became a rallying cry, and in 1958 he famously declared: 'Make the high mountain bow its head; make the river yield the way.'” (Steinfeld, J. 2018, China’s deadly science lesson:).
The Four Pests Campaign(1958) planned to rid the country of Eurasian tree sparrows, rats, mosquitoes and flies, because they ate grain and spread disease. NOT realising that the sparrows"which ate grain seed and fruit"
also hunted the pests that devoured their grain harvests, everyone, adults and children, joined in the 'communal spirit' - enthusiastically hunting sparrows - destroying their nests - banging on pans to prevent them from landing, until millions of exhausted sparrows fell from the sky.
Unintended consequences:
Ecological disaster and famine
In the absence of sparrows, locust swarmed freely, devouring agricultural harvests. According to varying reports, 15 to 45 million people died during the Great Chinese Famine (1959–62) that followed. When Sparrows Fall: China's Great Famine | Asian Century YouTube 3min. video:
Excerpt:
...Frank Dikotter, Chair Professor of Humanities, University of Hong Kong (1:21) “Around about the year 2003 or four I noticed that increasingly archives from the Communist era were being declassified and they really allow me to put together what I would refer to as 'a self-portrait by the Communist Party of China' (1:39)… in Sichuan province … (2:07) a quarter million of kilos of mud have been dug up and eaten…white porcelain coloured mud referred to as 'quan yin' soil. It’s a vision of hell. I want you to know what happens when people ingest mud. Once the moisture is taken out, it acts like concrete. The digestive system is just blocked. People are dying of pain, excruciating pain. Awful!"
"The Little Red Book" was published in 1964,
and
translated into
English in 1966 by
American scholar Sidney Rittenberg (1921-2019), from South Carolina (Obituary) who settled in China in 1944, became a senior member of the Chinese Communist party, an adviser to Mao Zedong, married Wang Yulin in 1956, translated Mao’s Complete Works and the Little Red Book into English in 1966, and became a leader during the Cultural Revolution - until Madam Mao "had him thrown into jail for a 10-year term. The convulsions of a China constantly reinventing itself led to Rittenberg twice falling foul of the leadership. Of his 35 years in China, he served a total of 16 imprisoned in solitary confinement, accused of being an American spy. Disillusioned with communism, he returned to the US in 1980 ..." (Margolis, 2019)
Sydney Rittenberg returned to the US in 1980 with his wife and their four children, and were well received by the Carter administration [1977-1981]. "Today, my politics are - well, I think one day there will be a better system. We have to wait for capitalism to be properly cooked. We need an abundance of the basic means of living and better understanding. The point is how to make the capitalist system work.” - Jonathan Margolis, The man who made friends with Mao, January 12, 2013, Financial Times.
Comparing notes on Chairman Mao's Little Red Book (pdf)
LaTrobe University, Melbourne: Asia Rising podcast discussion
Listen: Podcast #60, Duration 22:47, with Matt Smith and Dr. James Leibold
"In 1964 the Communist Party of China released a collection of Mao's speeches and statements, titled "Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong" (download here). Small easily carried and bound in bright red it became commonly known as The Little Red Book, and went on to become the most important tool of propaganda during the cultural revolution. Associate Professor James Leibold (Politics and Philosophy, La Trobe University) talks to Matt Smith about the power of Mao's book and how to spot a real one."
The "Five Man Group" (1965-1966)
An informal committee established in early 1965 to explore the potential for a "cultural revolution" based on popular trends in the arts and cultural realms.
The era's 'atmosphere' is well documented in Yao Nien-Yuan's autobiography, "Life and Death in Shanghai" (1987), written under the pen name Nien Cheng, after she moved to Washington DC in 1980, detailing the Red Guards' "Four Olds" impacts on "Old Ideas, Old Culture, Old Customs, and Old Habits" - seizing power, looting homes, confiscating and destroying symbols and artefacts of the old tradition in order to 'begin again' without links to ancient cultural heritage - now being restored by Master craftsmanship in the Forbidden City.
"A Prisoner of the Thought Police" New York Times 1987
ONE night in August of 1966 the home of Mrs. Nien Cheng in Shanghai was broken into by some 40 young people wearing Red Guard armbands. Mrs. Cheng barred their way and asked for their search warrant. ''The Constitution is abolished,'' they replied. ''We recognize only the teachings of our Great Leader Chairman Mao.'' They then proceeded to vandalize the house, breaking furniture and porcelain, slashing paintings, burning books. Mrs. Cheng tried to save the more irreplaceable of her possessions by pleading that they were part of the great Chinese cultural heritage. ''Shut up!'' she was told. ''They are the useless toys of the feudal emperors and the modern capitalist class and have no significance to us, the proletarian class.'' The destruction went on. ... >>>more
The "Gang of Four" (1966-1976)
Led by Madam Mao, whose vision was extreme in that she wanted to 'remove' all symbols of the old hierarchal culture - the "Four Olds". As leader of the Gang of Four, Madam Mao helped Mao develop the concepts behind the Cultural Revolution, which increased her influence and power.
Mao's death in September 1976, age 82, dealt a significant blow to Jiang's ambitions to become his successor. Madam Mao was charged with treason and blamed for the excesses and failures of the Cultural Revolution. She was arrested in October 1976, condemned by party authorities, and sentenced to death. Her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1983.
Jiang died by suicide in May 1991, age 77.
The Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party has gradually transformed from a revolutionary organ to a peaceful government body responsible for a multi-ethnic National Republic:
Over 200 Members, elected every five years, convene at least once a year.
IMDB
Summary: Inspired by true events, Founding of a Republic weaves a rousing tale of one man who fought against the tyranny of a ruler and led his people in battle in the ultimate sacrifice for his country.
While China's One-child policy sterilizations (1980-2015) were shocking,
today we can be glad that China’s 1.4 billion population is not many more times that number - and that now extreme poverty in China is nearly eliminated.
This is the answer to my original question:
How did "Indigenous" Chinese 'out-smart' Western imperialists?
"The best method of public revenue is when you do not appropriate what people rightly regard as their private property." - Dr Peter Bowman
About Dr. Bowman:Dr. Peter Bowman (1956-2020) read chemistry at Oriel College Oxford and continued his studies there to obtain a D. Phil., researching into chemical carcinogens. University College London has launched The Bowman Scholarships in honour of Dr Peter Bowman. About the IU:The International Union for Land Value Taxation was established in 1926: The purpose of the IU is to promote sustainable prosperity for all via public finance policy reform.
Transcript:
In March 2013, I took the high speed train from Beijing to Shanghai for the first time. It is a five hour journey with a steady speed of three hundred kilometres per hour. I was eager to get out of the city and see what the Chinese countryside was like. The scene was fascinating. For the whole journey almost all the land I saw was in use, much of it under cultivation and most of that in rectangular patches silver. The cultivation lay right against the built up areas which were considerable. In fact, there was nothing I would have called countryside. Later that month I took another train journey, this time from London Paddington to Devon. I was struck by the contrast. Travelling west through England, once you are out of London, there seem to be great expanses of green, very pretty but not very much appearing to be happening. The relationship of the Chinese people with the land was noticeably different to that of the English and I suspected that went back a long way.
A short while later, I stumbled across a published copy of the doctoral thesis of Han Liang Huang, published in 1918 which traced back the story of Chinese land tenure from the beginning of its history. At first glance it looked like it would provide a useful source of information to help understand the Chinese relationship with the land but his underlying thesis was also arresting. Essentially it was this: over its long history the principle source of government revenue has come directly from the land. What follows here is to quite a large extent a summary of Han Liang’s findings.
China is the single most extensive and enduring civilization in the world.
Its language, in spoken and written form, has been largely unchanged for some four thousand years. Its early history fades into mythology. Back in 2967 BC, Huang-Ti (diHuang) brought the feudal provinces under his control, made them acknowledge him as emperor, and received tributes which were in the form of levies derived from the land. The Xia dynasty was founded in 2070 BCE, by Yu the Great. There had been a great flood and Yu was the administrator responsible for bringing the water under control. After the inundation, arable land was in short supply. At that time the tradition was that the land belonged to the people at large (not to individuals, nor feudal chiefs - not even the emperor). Individuals were allotted a plot of land, fifty mous (probably about ten acres) the traditional measure of area, at the age of twenty and they gave it back when they reached sixty. There was a tribute system called Kung fa. For the central province of Zhi Zhou, one tenth of the produce of the land was given to the emperor. In the other eight provinces the same fraction went to the feudal lord.
Xia Dynasty 2070 – 1600 BCE Land distributed following the great flood
The Xia Dynasty was overthrown by the Shang Dynasty: A system of land taxation known as tsing tien (nine squares) had been established but its origins may be longer ago. The previous system of tribute had become based on fixed amounts related to average yields of produce. This did not work well in practice, particularly in years when the harvest was poor. In the tsing tien system, families were formed into groups of eight. The land was arranged in squares of three-by-three plots. Each family was assigned a plot. The central plot was farmed collectively and the product of this part constituted the levy that went to the government as “aid”. In addition, the buildings were on the central plot so, overall, one tenth of the produce went as tribute. The system was very fair and effective.
Lesson 2:
The best method of public revenue is when you do not appropriate what people rightly regard as their private property
The next dynasty was the Zhou (1046 – 249BC). This was a high point of Chinese civilization and corresponds to Ancient Greek Civilisation in Europe. It was the time when much of the legal code, political organization and social structure was established. It was the era of China’s greatest philosophers – Confucius and Lao Tzu. The system of land tenure and tribute were still based on the tsing tien although the concept of “aid” now transformed into one of “universal obligation”.
– Land allocated for use
– Severe penalties for not using allocated land
– Amount of land allocated depends on fertility
– Public revenue
– first gift (kung), then aid (tsu) now replaced by universal obligation(cheh)
– requirement to provide produce and military equipment
– Progressive taxation of feudal chiefs
Lesson 3:
The basis of allocation of land should be use.
Mencius was a Chinese philosopher who advocated for land tax around 300 BCE. “In past times, when King Wen ruled at the city of Qí, he took only one part in nine as a tax on those who tilled the land [a land tax], and those who served his government inherited their stipends. At the border, goods in trade were inspected but no fees were levied [no import duties restricting free trade], [and] no restrictions were placed on the use of fish traps installed by dams and weirs [no taxes on capital goods].” The Book of Mengzi, 1B.5, MENCIUS: An Online Teaching Translation, Robert Eno, 2016 (pdf)
A number of refinements were introduced.
Firstly it was recognized that land varies in it fertility so that when allocating land three different degrees of fertility were recognized. There was land that could be cultivated annually, bi annually or only once every three years. The area of land allocated was varied accordingly rather than just having one uniform area. Secondly severe penalties were imposed for the non-use of allocated land. Thirdly, in addition to the annual levy there was also the additional requirement to provide military recruits and/or military equipment. Finally a progressive system was established of the tribute that feudal lords had to pass on to the emperor. The must powerful lords dukes, had to pass on one half of their tribute whereas lesser earls passed on one third and barons, the third tier only passed on one quarter.
The latter part of the Zhou dynasty was a period of “warring states” in which there was consolidation of the various feudal states. This required increased military expenditure and hence increased taxation. The Qin province eventually rose to domination. This province was to the west. It was extensive but thinly populated. The neighbouring province of Jin was small and highly populated. To encourage migration Duke Shiao of Qin and his minister Shang Yin offered free land. The system of tsing tien was abandoned and private property was established. To continue to provide government revenue the basis of taxation shifted from the land to the people.
In 221 BC the Qin ruler Qin Shi Huang became established as emperor of all China. He effectively changed the previous loose federation into a centralized empire. There was significant state expenditure. The building of the Great Wall was begun. There was other building of palaces andQin’s preparation for the afterlife was very lavish and extensive. It included the assembly of the army of terracotta warriors near the capital Q’ian. The level of taxation was high. Many tenant farmers sold up their land in order to pay and rich merchants began to become landlords. “The rich own thousands of mou whilst poor have not enough land for an awl to stand on.”
The Qin dynasty was short-lived. The oppressive conditions imposed on the people, including high taxes, led to rebellion and in 207BC the new Handynasty was established. The earlier privatization of land had led to the establishment of a powerful landed aristocracy who resisted the imposition of taxes on the land.
The economic philosophers of the time argued in their favour: the two sources of production are labour and land and, in order that all lands capable of production might be cultivated and all hands engaged in agriculture, taxes on land should be abolished. Thus at that time taxes on land were light, typically only about one thirtieth of the produce whereas the rents paid by tenants were high, amounting to around half the product. Attempts were made to re-distribute the land but these were unsuccessful due to the powerful influence of the landowners who had gained position in government.
Han Dynasty 206 BC – 220 AD
– Private ownership of land
“The rich own thousands of mou whilst the poor have not even enough land for an awl to stand on.”
– Powerful landowners influence government
“The two sources of production are labour and land and in order that all land capable of producing crops might be cultivated and all hands engaged in agriculture taxes on land should be abolished.”
Low taxes on land
Tenants paying high rent
Poll tax
Part of tax paid in cash
Lesson 4:
There will not be an effective land tax when thereis unrestrained private ownership of land.
The period following the Han Dynasty 221 – 618 AD was a period of civil war with short-lived dynasties and destruction of wealth and reduction of the population including the landlords. Order was restored with the establishment of the Tang Dynasty (618 – 907). There was a re-distribution on a basis of equal shares for all. In return annual rents were charged which were a combination of produce, personal service and commodities such as silk. However, everyone was taxed the same regardless of the actual situation on the basis that the land had been distributed equally. The system ran down: there was a loss of revenue, avoidance of tax by the rich and a market in land sprang up.
In 780 Yang Yan Chancellor of Emperor Dezong took steps to put things on a more just footing by enacting tax reforms. The central idea was a single tax on land relating to the amount of land held and its fertility. The system was know as liangshui - the summer and Autumn levy - since there were two times and type of payment: The summer payment was in produce or commodities and the Autumn payment on copper coin. These reforms established a system that was followed for the next thousand years.
Tang Dynasty 618 – 907 AD
– Order restored
– Distribution of land re-established
Lesson 5:
It is possible to move back from unrestrained private ownership to government allocation of land
780 Yang Yen tax reforms liangshi – Summer and Autumn levy
“People were not taxed according to their age – but according to their wealth or the amount of land possessed”
See References: World History
Lesson 6:
a tax on land is better than a tax on people
Song Dynasty 960 – 1277AD
Sources of public revenue:
– Rent from public land
– Farm rents
– Urban rents
– Poll tax
– Other taxes
Ming Dynasty 1368 – 1644 AD
Initially an effective system but declined as tax roll became obsolete and additional levies raised.
– Number of taxable heads and land tax to be fixed and immutable for all time
– Poll tax and land tax amalgamated into single land tax
– Complexity of additional charges appeared later
The multiethnic Qing empire formed the territorial base for modern China, and the fourth largest empire in world history in terms of territorial size.
Lesson 7:
An effective land tax needs regular updating of land values
Lesson 8:
An effective land tax needs effective administration
Lesson 9:
that administration has to be paid for Magistrate’s yamen
TO SUM UP
Lesson 1: The land belongs to the people at large
Lesson 2: The best method of public revenue is when you do not appropriate what people rightly regard as their private property
Lesson 3: The basis of allocation land should be use
Lesson 4: There will not be an effective land tax when there is unrestrained private ownership of land
Lesson 5: It is possible to move back from unrestrained private ownership to government allocation of land
Lesson 6: A tax on land is better than a tax on people
Lesson 7: An effective land tax needs regular updating of land values
Lesson 8: An effective land tax needs effective administration
Lesson 9: That administration has to be paid for
CONCLUSION
The state of the earth bears witness to the way it has been used, even 100 years later!
Part 3 The Maritime Silk Road- 2nd century BCE to 15th century CE. Back to top
The naval history of China dates back thousands of years, with archives from the late Spring and Autumn period (722 BC – 481 BC) documenting the various shapes and materials used, including teak and bamboo "Junks" said to be the size of today's aircraft carriers.
China became a great maritime power in the years 1405–1433, under the legendary leadership of Admiral Zheng He (1371-1433).
Abstract
“…On the 8th of March, 1421, the largest fleet the world had ever seen sailed from its base in China. The ships, huge junks nearly five hundred feet long and built from the finest teak, were under the command of Emperor Zhu Di’s loyal eunuch admirals. Their mission was ‘to proceed all the way to the end of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas’ and unite the whole world in Confucian harmony. The journey would last over two years and circle the globe.
When they returned Zhu Di lost control and China was beginning its long, self-imposed isolation from the world it had so recently embraced. The great ships rotted at their moorings and the records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America seventy years before Columbus and circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan. They had also discovered Antarctica, reached Australia three hundred and fifty years before Cook and solved the problem of longitude three hundred years before the Europeans…” >>> more
Excerpt from Q&A Why should we believe anything the book says? In total, some 34 different lines of evidence have been found to support the theory that the Chinese circumnavigated and charted the globe, a century before the Europeans staked claim to having done so. The evidence is overwhelming, and encompasses both physical entities, (such as shipwrecks of Chinese junks in America, Australasia and Indonesia,) and examples such as the carved stones of Africa, the remains of Chinese peoples in South America, and artefacts scattered all over the world, inscribed with Chinese characters, in Chinese styles, and some successfully dated back to before the arrival of the Europeans. There also exists more circumstantial evidence such as the linguistic, ceremonial and spiritual similarities between the Chinese culture and those of other parts of the world in the fifteenth century. The linguistic similarities found between place names in Peru and Chile are heavily supportive of the notion that the Chinese exerted a huge influence there, in pre-Columbian times. >>>more
Six hundred years ago, during a time of turmoil in the west, China held a vast unstoppable fleet, led by a forgotten admiral. One of the world's most accomplished voyagers, Zheng He remains a mystery outside of his home country. This is the story of how one explorer assembled the greatest armada the oceans had ever witnessed. In the age of discovery, could this naval superpower have conquered the world?
Mapping the world (Excerpt from Part 3, Economic History) By the mid-1500s, China had withdrawn from world trade in order to focus on internal border protection. In 1557, Portugal was given permission to ‘rent’ land on Macau in return for help in safeguarding China's coastline against "wokou" pirates. (The History of Ming states: thirty percent of the 16th century wokou were Japanese, seventy percent were ethnic Chinese.)
See also Columbia University's Asia for Educators Map of the World, from "Theatrum Orbis Terrarum" (Theater of the Whole World)
See an interactive version HERE
Matteo Ricci (1552-1610)
Carrying a copy of Ortelius' map, in 1582, at the age of 30, the Italian Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) travelled to the Portuguese settlement in Macau, China, to join the small Jesuit mission there. Following instructions to establish trust amongst the Chinese establishment, Ricci mastered the Chinese language, became a prolific writer, and was renowned as a mapmaker whose services were sought by the court.
On the command of the Wanli Emperor, Zhu Yijun, (1572-1620), the fourteenth emperor of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), Matteo Ricci drew a world map, Kunyu Wanguo Quantu, 1602, depicting in great detail the entire Northern Hemisphere and placing China at the center of the world. The map measured 5.5 feet tall by 12.5 feet wide and was designed to be mounted in six panels on a folding screen.
See an interactive version HERE
Ricci described the discovery of the Americas in his notes: “In olden days, nobody had ever known that there were such places as North and South America or Magellanica (using a name that early mapmakers gave to a supposed continent including Australia, Antarctica, and Tierra del Fuego).
But a hundred years ago, Europeans came sailing in their ships to parts of the sea coast, and so discovered them."
Matteo Ricci's Italian translation of ‘The Four Books’, China's classical education curriculum texts, introduced the works of Confucius to Europe. Shortly after Ricci's death, his Jesuit colleague Nicolas Trigault published a Latin translation, in 1615, De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas.
In 1953, Matteo Ricci's writings were first translated into English by Louis J. Gallagher who informed us that Matteo Ricci saw the teaching of Confucius as "moral, rather than religious, in nature and perfectly compatible with or even complementary to Christianity".
The diplomat Sir Charles Bell said at the time: "The Tibetans were abandoned to Chinese aggression, an aggression for which the British Military Expedition to Lhasa and subsequent retreat were primarily responsible.”- Robert Twigger, 2017
Excerpt:
By 1903 the viceroy of India, Lord Curzon, had determined that only an armed invasion would make Tibet bow to British imperialism. The euphemistically named Tibet Frontier Commission was formed with the aim of forcing the Tibetans to sign an accord.
. . .
In 1903, a British military expedition crossed into the long-isolated and inhospitable land of Tibet - but the pseudo-diplomatic mission became a bloody assault.
. . . For decades Britain and Russia had been involved in the political tussle in central Asia known as the Great Game. Tibet acted as a buffer between India and Russia, but Britain had become concerned that the Chinese – who had considerable influence in Tibet, and considered it part of their empire – might allow Russia to gain control there. Despite British requests, it had become clear that China was unable to make Tibet comply with demands for negotiations.
. . . Massacre at Guru pass
. . . It was a massacre. Of the Tibetan army – around 1,500 men – possibly 700 lay dead. The British, in contrast, suffered no fatalities and just 12 casualties in total. That pattern was repeated during further skirmishes as the expedition marched towards Lhasa; hundreds of Tibetans were killed in encounters, with few British losses. . . The road was now open to the heart of Tibet.
. . .
When the expedition arrived in Lhasa on 3 August, they discovered that Tibet’s leader, the 13th Dalai Lama, had fled to Mongolia.
. . .
In fact, no real evidence of a Tibetan-Russian pact was uncovered. After the British left Lhasa, Chinese influence soared, planting the seeds of the 1950 invasion. The diplomat Sir Charles Bell said at the time: “The Tibetans were abandoned to Chinese aggression, an aggression for which the British Military Expedition to Lhasa and subsequent retreat were primarily responsible." . . .
The last forbidden country had been stormed and found to be… still a mystery, but not quite the kind they had been expecting.>>> more
Part 4 European influence - 16th to 18th centuries Back to top
By the mid-1500s, China had withdrawn from world trade in order to focus on internal border protection.
In 1582, at the age of 30, the Italian Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci travelled to the Portuguese settlement in Macau, China, to join the small Jesuit mission there. Following instructions to establish trust amongst the Chinese establishment, Ricci mastered the Chinese language, became a prolific writer, and was renowned as a mapmaker whose services were sought by the court. Matteo Ricci's Italian translation of ‘The Four Books’, China's classical education curriculum texts, introduced the works of Confucius to Europe. Shortly after Ricci's death, his Jesuit colleague Nicolas Trigault published a Latin translation, in 1615, De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas. In 1953, Ricci's writings were first translated into English by Louis J. Gallagher, who informs us that Ricci saw the teaching of Confucius as "moral, rather than religious, in nature and perfectly compatible with or even complementary to Christianity".
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1664-1716) - "truth polymath".
Born in Leipzig, Germany, Leibniz is ranked amongst the foremost philosophers of his time and chiefly remembered for his contributions to the Jesuit mission in China: "Novissima Sinica", published in Latin in 1697, was a testament to his interpretation of Confucian "humanistic or rationalistic" doctrines of political philosophy linking the history of mathematics with philosophy, cosmology, theology, and metaphysics using the Chinese Yijing, or Book of Changes, aka the I Ching, as a teaching tool -
"a prophetic book containing the mysteries of Christianity" (David E. Mungello, 1989, Curious Land, p. 309), supporting the Figurist movement and the accommodationist strategies by which the Jesuits hoped to convert the Chinese people to Christianity. Mathematician and historian, Professor Frank J. Swetz remembers Leibniz as “a synthesiser of ideas” and as a “truth polymath- a universal genius and intellectual leader of the European Enlightenment” (Frank J. Swetz, (2003), Leibniz, the Yijing, and the Religious Conversion of the Chinese, pp. 276-291).
"I consider it a singular plan of the fates that human cultivation and refinement should today be concentrated, as it were, in the two extremes of our continent, in Europe and in China, which adorns the Orient as Europe does the opposite edge of the earth. Perhaps Supreme Providence has ordained such an arrangement, so that, as the most cultivated and distant peoples stretch out their arms to each other, those in between may gradually be brought to a better way of life."
– G.W. Leibniz, Novissima Sinica, 1697
Leibniz sings his praise of Chinese civil life
in his Preface to the "Novissima Sinica":
"But who would have believed that there is on earth a people who, though we in our view so very advanced in every branch of behaviour, still surpass us in comprehending the precepts of civil life? Yet now we find this to be so among the Chinese, as we learn to know them better. And so if we are there equals in the industrial arts, and ahead of them in contemplative sciences, certainly they surpass us (though it is almost shameful to confess this) in practical philosophy, that is in the precepts of ethics and politics adapted to the present life and use of mortals." – Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1664-1716)
Source: Zhang, Wei-Bin, (2000), On Adam Smith and Confucius: The Theory of Moral Sentiments and the Analects (GoogleBooks scan)
Flourishing of high culture "using Tibetan Buddhism"
Founders of the Qing dynasty, the Jurchen Jin Dynasty (meaning “Golden”), hunter-gatherers, pastoralist semi-nomads, or sedentary agriculturists, were renamed Manchus in 1635 by Hong Taiji:"...who was part Mongol, followed in his father’s footsteps and continued the patronage of Tibetan Buddhism and set about the precedent for the consolidation of relationship among the Manchus, Tibetans and Mongols through the policy of using Tibetan Buddhism" - Columbia Tibetan Studies (2018)
"The Jurchen originated from Manchuria, but in conquering the neighbouring Liao empire of the Khitan and parts of Song China, they came to rule the Great Plain of Asia from 1127 CE until their fall at the hands of the Mongols." - WorldHistory.org
Han officials of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) classified them into three groups, reflecting relative proximity to the Ming: ..." >>>more
The 3rd emperor of the Manchu-led Qing Dynasty (1636-1912), considered one of China's greatest emperors, the Kang Xi Emperor, Shengzu of Qing, reigned for 61 years (1654-1722): The longest-reigning emperor in Chinese history brought about long-term stability leading to a flourishing high culture. Two major Qing Dynasty achievements:
- The Russian invasion was blocked on the Amur River, retaining Outer Manchuria
- Mongol rebels in the North and Northwest were forced to submit to Qing rule.
Russian conquest of Siberia - 1580–1778 The annexation of Siberia and the Far East to Russia was led by the Russian Cossackswho committed atrocities against the indigenous peoples across Siberia.
The semi-nomadic and semi-militarized Cossacks of Russian Ukraine were "allowed a great degree of self-governance in exchange for military service":
St. Petersburg State University Professor Yury Akimov (2021) examines the ideology of Russian expansion in Siberia from the second half of the sixteenth to the early eighteenth century, focusing on several interrelated pillars that shaped this ideology. The first is the category of political-legal-force. Based on the legal incorporation of the Siberian Khanate into Muscovy in 1555 the Russians began to move further east, until they reached the Pacific and the borders of China and Mongolia. These territories were also declared parts of Siberia, and the Russians consequently believed they had a legal claim to its possession. Thus, one could say that Siberia as a territory was amorphous- the boundaries of the region “ended” wherever the Russians came up against powerful entities capable of opposing their expansion. The second pillar of Russian expansion drew on religious arguments. However, the Church followed in the wake of the explorers and tended not to pursue goals of its own. - Akimov, Yury (9 August 2021). "Political Claims, an Extensible Name, and a Divine Mission: Ideology of Russian Expansion in Siberia". Journal of Early Modern History. 25 (4): 277–299.
Russian colonization of North America
The Russian colonization of North America covers the period from 1732 to 1867, when the Russian Empire laid claim to northern Pacific Coast territories in the Americas. Russian colonial possessions in the Americas are collectively known as Russian America. Russian expansion eastward began in 1552, and in 1639 Russian explorers reached the Pacific Ocean. In 1725, Emperor Peter the Great ordered navigator Vitus Bering to explore the North Pacific for potential colonization. The Russians were primarily interested in the abundance of fur-bearing mammals on Alaska's coast, as stocks had been depleted by over hunting in Siberia. Bering's first voyage was foiled by thick fog and ice, but in 1741 a second voyage by Bering and Aleksei Chirikov made sight of the North American mainland. >>>more
"Closest-known ancestor of today's Native Americans found in Siberia"
Study traces complex migrations tens of thousands of years ago by Michael Price, June 2019, Science.org
Culture Shock - "century of humiliation": With the fall of the last long dynasty in China - the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), from 1850, the Taiping Rebellion, (illustrated overview) which lasted fifteen years and devastated the Qing empire, came to be known as the bloodiest civil war in human history.
Abstract
Chinese elites today draw on the “Century of Humiliation” (1839–1949) as a starting point for their views on how China should interact with other nations. Arguments about the nature of international competition, about the reasons that nations succeed or fail in the international arena, and about the prospects for long-term global peace and cooperation draw not just on China's experiences during that period, but on the vocabulary and debates that Qing- and republican-era intellectuals developed to understand the modern international system.
Today there are at least three views among Chinese elites of the international system and China's role in it. All three start from the implicit premise that today's international system has not changed in its essence from the 19th century: the world is composed of strong and weak nation-states that vie for dominance on the global stage. They differ, however, on whether this state of affairs is permanent and on what global role China should seek. Some assert that the international system still revolves around Western interests that aim to subjugate and humiliate weaker nations, and that China's bitter experiences during the Century of Humiliation should provide a cautionary tale about the dangers of this system.
A second viewpoint suggests that the current system is acceptable now that China can play a prominent role in it. They assert that China's period of humiliation has ended, and that China should now seek to ensure the stability of the system and to assure other nations of its commitment to doing so. This view suggests that the potential dangers of a competitive international system can be mitigated by adapting existing institutions and practices.
A third line of reasoning suggests that China is in a unique position to fundamentally remake the international system because its experiences of shame and subjugation have given the Chinese people an alternative vision of how international relations can and should be conducted. >>>more
The Opium Wars between Britain and China 1839-1860:
The British, under Queen Victoria, brokered a 99-year lease agreement for the use of Hong Kong after China lost a series of wars fought over the British trade in tea and opium. By the Convention of Peking,1898, the New Territories together with 235 islands were leased to Britain for 99 years from July 1, 1898.
"If you want to pick an event that marked the change of the Chinese Imperial attitude towards the rest of the world you could well pick the episode of the Opium Wars. It marked the beginning of what is regarded as China's ‘century of humiliation’..."
- Chinasage: All About China
Opium’s History in China Opium has been used as a medicinal and recreational substance in China for centuries, its shifting meanings tied to class and national identity.
by Livia Gershon, January 9, 2023, JSTOR
Starting as early as the Tang period (618–907 CE), opium arrived in China by sea and caravan. Over centuries, it became a common medical treatment. But, the authors write, recreational smoking of opium only became a thing after Europeans introduced tobacco from the Americas to China in the late sixteenth century. Tobacco smoking and cultivation spread rapidly. Some doctors credited it with medicinal properties, including fighting malaria. Officials smoked and drank tea during meetings to stimulate their minds.
Like brewing and drinking tea, preparing and smoking opium involved a complex ritual.
Smoking opium, a far more expensive pastime that built on the smoking culture, was introduced to China by Dutch merchants in the seventeenth century. It became a luxury for the wealthy, usually smoked together with tobacco. But, by the nineteenth century, Chinese doctors were becoming concerned about the health risks of tobacco smoking, so people became more likely to smoke pure opium. Over these centuries, many people valued opium for its exotic association with Europe and as a status symbol perfect for social climbers. Like brewing and drinking tea, preparing and smoking opium involved a complex ritual. Wealthy families hired specialists to prepare pipes for their gatherings.
... >>> more
Devastation caused by Western powers (1839-1842) & (1856-1860)
Wikipedia excerpt:
The First Opium War, fought in 1839-1842 between the Qing and Great Britain, was triggered by the dynasty's campaign against the opium trade; the Second Opium War was fought between the Qing and Britain and France, 1856-1860. In each war, the European forces used recently developed warfare technology to defeat the Qing forces and compelled the government to grant favorable tariffs, trade concessions, and territory.
The wars and the subsequently-imposed treaties weakened the Qing dynasty and Chinese governments, and forced China to open specified treaty ports (especially Shanghai & Guangzhou/ Canton) that handled all trade with imperial powers.[1][2] The resulting concession of Hong Kong after the wars compromised China's territorial sovereignty. Around this time China's economy also contracted slightly, but the sizable Taiping Rebellion and Dungan Revolt had a much larger effect.[3]>>>more
Excerpt: ... When the East India Company’s China trade monopoly ended in 1833, the opium trade was taken over by several smaller firms. Some of these operated out of Bombay, where the Government didn’t have a monopoly on opium production, while others operated out of Calcutta, where production was controlled by the colonial state. In both ports, however, the opium production of the previous year went to auction at the beginning of the year, and began to be shipped out in small quantities.
For the shippers, the real money in the opium trade was actually made in insuring shipments rather than in shipping or selling cargo.
The Qing Dynasty tried to smash the opium trade in the late 1830s, having become aware of the huge drain it represented in terms of money, labor, trade losses, etc. When the seizure and destruction of opium imports escalated to the seizure of ships, complaints were made to the British Government, and interested MPs pushed Parliament to approve military action. For many people, it was a “bottom line” argument; the opium trade was worth about 4 million pounds to Britain every year, at least, and that was an enormous sum in the 1830s. Meanwhile, the prevailing attitude, at the time, was that there was no moral stigma to purveying drugs; the onus was on the consumer, not the capitalist.
A series of opium wars, ending in 1860, succeeded in forcing China to legalize opium sales, cede Hong Kong and other territories, and create the Treaty Ports, which enabled the foreign powers to penetrate the entire Chinese economy and establish what became known as “gunboat diplomacy” in East Asia. Perhaps inadvertently, the legalization of opium imports also gave rise to indigenous opium production, as the Chinese state decided to profit from what it could not stop.
'The Opium Wars between Britain and China 1839-1860' - "If you want to pick an event that marked the change of the Chinese Imperial attitude towards the rest of the world you could well pick the episode of the Opium Wars. It marked the beginning of what is regarded as China's ‘century of humiliation’ 1842-1949..." - Chinasage: All About China, provides a well illustrated overview: Headed by Rob Stallard, director for the Society for Anglo-Chinese Understanding, who first came across Chinese culture and civilization at Cambridge University, with "one of the most outstanding intellectuals of the 20th century,” Sinologist Dr. Joseph Needham (1900-1995).
Failed British Missions The British felt that they had done everything they could reasonably have done to introduce free trade with China during the period of pre-1700 and 18 century contacts. In 1793 Lord Macartney went as far he could to negotiate a trade agreement with Qing Emperor Qianlongat Chengde. His refusal to show due deference to the Emperor with a kowtow proved a diplomatic stumbling block and also neatly symbolized Britain's self-estimation as an equal not a subordinate nation. There had been earlier unsuccessful missions dating back as far as 1553, a trend was continued. China had a stranglehold on the tea trade that had grown from 6 million to 16 million taels of silver in 20 years. Britain was by then buying 15% of all tea grown in China producing a very useful income in silver for the struggling Qing regime. Yet access to the Emperor was minimal and the Macartney mission was unsuccessful, although it is said that they came away with tea plants that helped found the Indian tea industry which eventually cost China dearly in lost revenue. The Emperor viewed the British as yet another barbarian state of little consequence trying to inveigle higher prestige from China. The modern industrial and technical gifts Macartney gave the Emperor were not seen as having any particular purpose, just interesting toys. China had all it needed and had been run much the same for centuries, there was no need to change. In return the Emperor gave his visitors a priceless jadeRuyi ornament which was not perceived by them to be of much value...
World Drug Report 2008 (pdf):
The United Nations office of Drugs and Crime provides a detailed overview
Excerpt: A Century of International Drug Control
2.1 Origins: The development of the opium problem in China.
Chinese addiction did not reach epidemic proportions, however, until the end of the 18th century, when the lion’s share of the trade fell into the hands of the British East India Company. Founded in 1600, the British East India Company was given monopoly privileges by the Crown on trade with the East Indies. The British first arrived in China in 1637 and in 1715 were allowed to open a trading station in Canton. But they only began to aggressively market opium after they took control of the main opium producing areas of India in the mid18th century. >>>more
“Certain it is that no people or group of peoples has had a monopoly in contributing to the development of Science. Their achievements should be mutually recognised and freely celebrated with the joined hands of universal brotherhood" - Joseph Needham, 1954, Science and Civilization in China Vol 1, Preface.
Excerpt: Dr. Joseph Needham FRS, FBA (1900-1995) ... it is in the field of Sinology, in particular the history of science, technology and medicine in China, that his greatest contributions were made. A visit of three young Chinese biochemists to Cambridge in 1937 sparked his interest in China, and he set to learning the language, especially Classical Chinese. He spent the years 1943 to 1946 in China, setting up the Sino-British Science Cooperation Office (SBSCO), travelling the length and breadth of Free China visiting laboratories and factories to assess the needs of scientists working in extraordinary conditions, and arranging for research materials and equipment to be supplied to them. After a further two years serving as the first Director of the Science Section of UNESCO in Paris, he returned to Cambridge in 1948, intending to write a single volume history of China's contributions to the scientific, technological and medical heritage of human civilisation. With the assistance of his research collaborators, this was to grow into his monumental series Science and Civilisation in China. Described as 'perhaps the greatest single act of historical synthesis and intercultural communication ever attempted by one man', the first volume was published by Cambridge University Press in 1954, and to date a further 25 volumes have appeared of a projected 27. >>>more
Economic Reform: 1978-Present "Following the collapse of the Great Leap Forward and China’s political split with Moscow, China’s economic policies in the 1960s and 1970s vacillated between Mao’s ultra-leftist tendencies and more conventional socialist policies..."
- Ralph W. Huenemann, Economic Reforms, 1978-Present (2013), Oxford Bibliographies Online: Chinese Studies.
See also:
- Columbia University overview: The Confucian Classics & the Civil Service Examinations “which had its beginnings in the Sui dynasty (581-618 CE) but was fully developed during the Qing dynasty. The system continued to play a major role, not only in education and government, but also in society itself, throughout Qing times...”
- Britannica overview: Mao Zedong (1893-1976), aka Chairman Mao
"When China emerged from a half century of revolution as the world’s most populous country and launched itself on a path of economic development and social change, Mao Zedong occupied a critical place in the story of the country’s resurgence..."
1991: Fall of the Soviet Union ended China's large-scale border threat
2001:
China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) 11 December 2001. - This page gathers key information on China's participation in the WTO, and includes Trade Policy Reviews of China, Regional Trade Agreements of China, and details of dispute cases involving China. >>>more
China will adopt a more proactive opening-up strategy by
exploring new areas, improving internal system, enhancing the
quality of the economy, forming a new pattern of development
and promoting development, reform and innovation.
“…China's opening to the outside world in the past 30 years
and more tells us that only an open and inclusive country can
be strong and prosperous…”
"When Yan Jinchang stamped his fingerprint on a secret agreement 30 years ago for a piece of farmland to cultivate on his own, as he had been longing for, he didn’t expect that he would lease the land one day."
Turning points:
2011:Chongqing, China officially linked to Duisburg, Germany by road. 2015:China's "One Belt, One Road" (yidai yilu) initiative promises infrastructure and investment across Central Asia, creating a "new Silk Road"
Once again, the Chinese economy has defied the hand wringing of the nattering nabobs of negativism. After decelerating for six consecutive years, real GDP growth appears to be inching up in 2017. The 6.9% annualized increase just reported for the second quarter exceeds the 6.7% rise in 2016 and is well above the consensus of international forecasters who, just a few months ago, expected growth to be closer to 6.5% this year, and to slow further, to 6%, in 2018.
. . .
An October 1998 cover story in The Economist, vividly illustrated by a Chinese junk getting sucked into a powerful whirlpool, said it all.
Yet nothing could have been further from the truth. When the dust settled on the virulent pan-regional contagion, the Chinese economy had barely skipped a beat. Real GDP growth slowed temporarily, to 7.7% in 1998-1999, before reaccelerating to 10.3% in the subsequent decade.
China’s resilience during the Great Financial Crisis was equally telling. In the midst of the worst global contraction since the 1930s, the Chinese economy still expanded at a 9.4% average annual rate in 2008-2009. While down from the blistering, unsustainable 12.7% pace recorded during the three years prior to the crisis, this represented only a modest shortfall from the 30-year post-1980 trend of 10%. Indeed, were it not for China’s resilience in the depths of the recent crisis, world GDP would not have contracted by 0.1% in 2009, but would have plunged by 1.3% – the sharpest decline in global activity of the post-World War II era. >>>more
Outsourcing
China's rise to industrial power, by importing and developing manufacturing technologies supporting international corporatons seeking high profits by the use of Chinese cheap labor(i, ii), includes military defenses and China's "space program".
The importance of China on the global economic stage cannot be ignored, and its unique legal and tax systems are of great inters to international scholars and business people alike. China’s tax system is acquiring western features while remaining entrenched in its rich cultural and historical roots. This makes for interesting study, analysis and comparison as its laws are becoming more accessible. The Journal of Chinese Tax & Policy focuses on the policy, administrative and compliance aspects of the Chinese tax system.
It also welcomes comparative studies between China and other countries. The Journal is an internationally peer reviewed scholarly publication. >>> more
Chinese Australian History: What Happened to Riley - A Selection of Short Stories by China’s Modern Writers
Series No. 1, The United China Publishing Syndicate, Shanghai, China, 1933
Inside the blue covers of this intriguingly titled volume is probably the first piece of Chinese-Australian literature written in English. ... Why is this short story almost unknown, despite this distinction and its remarkable tale of a confrontation between a Chinese Australian and a European Australian in warlord China? The answer reflects the narrowness of perceptions about what is “Australian” coupled with the breadth of experiences that embodies the term “Chinese Australian”. >>> more
2018 marked the 40th anniversary of the Third Plenum’s decisions on opening-up and reform (1978). Institute of East Asian Studies
Excerpt:
Institutional Change and Reconfigurations of China’s Political Economy. The experimental integration of market elements into China’s centrally planned economy, sometimes classified as “Chinese variety of capitalism” or “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics”, is still an ongoing and dynamically evolving process. To cope with the negative externalities and unexpected socio-ecological side-effects of the 1978 decisions, the 19th Party Congress held in 2017 redefined the guidelines of China’s official development path in the “New era”. This refined developmental strategy reflects domestic challenges as well as changing constellations at the global level and China’s role in international institutions. >>>more
"Our 40 Years"
China celebrated “Opening up” with a gala celebration on 14 December 2018 When one group of Chinese farmers made a secret deal to end collective land ownership 40 years ago, in 1978, they didn’t expect that one day they would be celebrated for leading China into a market-based economy. >>>more
The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet, since 1940, Gyalwa Rinpoche (b.1935) is from central China, while the 13th Dalai Lama is from southern India.
"The only thing that will bring happiness is affection and warmheartedness. This really brings inner strength and self- confidence, reduces fear, develops trust, and trust brings friendship. We are social animals, and cooperation is necessary for our survival, but cooperation is entirely based on trust. When there is trust, people are brought together—whole nations are brought together. When you have a more compassionate mind and cultivate warmheartedness, the whole atmosphere around you becomes more positive and friendlier. You see friends everywhere."
- The 14th Dalai Lama, Gyalwa Rinpoche
Upon ratification of the United Nations Convention
on the Law of the Sea Ratified by China, 25 August 2006
Declarations made upon signature, ratification, accession or succession or anytime thereafter.
In accordance with the decision of the Standing Committee of the Eighth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China at its nineteenth session, the President of the People's Republic of China has hereby ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 and at the same time made the following statement:
1. In accordance with the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the People's Republic of China shall enjoy sovereign rights and jurisdiction over an exclusive economic zone of 200 nautical miles and the continental shelf.
2. The People's Republic of China will effect, through consultations, the delimitation of the boundary of the maritime jurisdiction with the States with coasts opposite or adjacent to China respectively on the basis of international law and in accordance with the principle of equitability.
3. The People's Republic of China reaffirms its sovereignty over all its archipelagos and islands as listed in article 2 of the Law of the People's Republic of China on the territorial sea and the contiguous zone, which was promulgated on 25 February 1992.
4. The People's Republic of China reaffirms that the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concerning innocent passage through the territorial sea shall not prejudice the right of a coastal State to request, in accordance with its laws and regulations, a foreign State to obtain advance approval from or give prior notification to the coastal State for the passage of its warships through the territorial sea of the coastal State.
Declaration made after ratification (25 August 2006) Declaration under article 298:
The Government of the People's Republic of China does not accept any of the procedures provided for in Section 2 of Part XV of the Convention with respect to all the categories of disputes referred to in paragraph 1 (a) (b) and (c) of Article 298 of the Convention.
– UN Source
In addition, article 298, paragraph 1, allows States and entities to declare that they exclude the application of the compulsory binding procedures for the settlement of disputes under the Convention in respect of certain specified categories kinds of disputes. Article 298, paragraph 1, reads:
"Article 298. Optional exceptions to applicability of section 2
"1. When signing, ratifying or acceding to this Convention or at any time thereafter, a State may, without prejudice to the obligations arising under section 1, declare in writing that it does not accept any one or more of the procedures provided for in section 2 with respect to one or more of the following categories of disputes:
(a) (i) disputes concerning the interpretation or application of articles 15, 74 and 83 relating to sea boundary delimitations, or those involving historic bays or titles, provided that a State having made such a declaration shall, when such a dispute arises subsequent to the entry into force of this Convention and where no agreement within a reasonable period of time is reached in negotiations between the parties, at the request of any party to the dispute, accept submission of the matter to conciliation under Annex V, section 2; and provided further that any dispute that necessarily involves the concurrent consideration of any unsettled dispute concerning sovereignty or other rights over continental or insular land territory shall be excluded form such submission;
(ii) after the conciliation commission has presented its report, which shall state the reasons on which it is based, the parties shall negotiate an agreement on the basis of that report; if these negotiations do not result in an agreement, the parties shall, by mutual consent, submit the question to one of the procedures provided for in section 2, unless the parties otherwise agree;
(iii) this subparagraph does not apply to any sea boundary dispute finally settled by an arrangement between the parties, or to any such dispute which is to be settled in accordance with a bilateral or multilateral agreement binding upon those parties;
(b) disputes concerning military activities, including military activities by government vessels and aircraft engaged in non-commercial service, and disputes concerning law enforcement activities in regard to the exercise of sovereign rights or jurisdiction excluded from the jurisdiction of a court or tribunal under article 297, paragraph 2 or 3;
(c) disputes in respect of which the Security Council of the United Nations is exercising the functions assigned to it by the Charter of the United Nations, unless the Security Council decides to remove the matter from its agenda or calls upon the parties to settle it by the means provided for in this Convention." SOURCE: UN: Division for Oceans Affairs and The Law of the Sea
Rudimentary forms of testing in China - from 2200 B.C.
Although the widespread use of psychological testing is largely a phenomenon of the twentieth century, historians note that rudimentary forms of testing date back to at least 2200 B.C. when the Chinese emperor had his officials examined every third year to determine their fitness for office (Bowman, 1989; Chaffee, 1985; DuBois, 1970; Frankie, 1963; Lai, 1970; Teng, 1942-43). Such testing was modified and refined over the centuries until written exams were introduced in the Han dynasty (202 B.C.-A.D. 200). Five topics were tested: civil law, military affairs, agriculture, revenue, and geography.
The Chinese examination system took its final form about 1370 when proficiency in the Confucian classics was emphasized. In the preliminary examination, candidates were required to spend a day and a night in a small isolated booth, composing essays on assigned topics and writing a poem. The 1 to 7 percent who passed moved up to the district examinations. Perhaps 3 percent of this final group passed and became mandarins, eligible for public office.
Although the Chinese developed the external trappings of a comprehensive civil service examination program, the similarities between their traditions and current testing practices are, in the main, superficial. Not only were their testing practices unnecessarily gruelling, but the Chinese also failed to validate their selection procedures. Nonetheless, it does appear that the examination program incorporated relevant selection criteria. For example, in the written exams beauty of penmanship was weighted very heavily. Given the highly stylistic features of Chinese writing forms, good penmanship was no doubt essential for clear, exact communication. Thus, penmanship was probably a relevant predictor of suitability for civil service employment. In response to widespread discontent, the examination systems was abolished by royal decree in 1906 (Franke, 1963). – Gregory, 2007, CH. 2, p. 47
CEM: The Chinese Educational Mission Abroad (1872–1881)
"In the late 1800s China was ravaged by poverty, population growth, and aggressive European armies. Driven by a desire for progress and reform, called the Self Strengthening Movement, the Chinese Imperial Court agreed to send students under the direction of Yung Wing to American to study at New England’s finest schools. " – (Lamb, 2014)
Historical Context /????/???? The Chinese Educational Mission (1872-1881) From 1872 to 1881, 120 Chinese young boys at different ages arrived in the U.S. on government sponsorship. Chinese Educational Mission was a pioneering but frustrated attempt of China to modernize Chinese education and industry. At that time, the U.S. was scarcely a world leader in education. Although the United States was industrializing and urbanizing quickly, it was in turmoil during Reconstruction (following the American Civil War), and its educational institutions were not as advanced as European ones. Yet, China chose the U.S. to train its first groups of students abroad because of two people.>>>more
See also:
1. "Termination and Recall"
In the summer of 1881, only nine years into the career of the CEM, the Chinese Government disbanded the Educational Mission and recalled all the students. The causes of this premature closure were complicated, but they had nothing to do with the academic performance of the students themselves.
2. Exeter Academy, New Hampshire hosted seven students, 1879 to 1881: documented by Barbara Rimkunas, (2014), Hidden History of Exeter, Arcadia Publishing, available on GoogleBooks scan
... the pioneering but frustrated attempt by reform-minded officials of the Qing dynasty to educate a group of 120 Chinese students in the United States.
In 1871, Yung Wing, himself the first Chinese graduate of Yale University, persuaded the Chinese government to send supervised groups of young Chinese to the United States to study Western science and engineering. With the government's eventual approval, he organized what came to be known as the Chinese Educational Mission, which included 120 students, some under the age of ten, to study in the New England region of the United States beginning in 1872. The boys arrived in several detachments, lived with American families in Hartford, Connecticut, and other New England towns; and after graduating high school, went on to college, especially at Yale. When a new supervisory official arrived, he found that they had adopted many American customs, such as playing baseball, and felt they were neglecting their Chinese heritage and becoming "denationalized." In addition, external pressures such as the US government's refusal in 1878 to permit students to attend the Military Academy at West Point and the Naval Academy at Annapolis [1] in contravention of the Burlingame Treaty of 1868 called the whole purpose of the mission, the acquisition of Western military expertise, into question. Due to internal and external pressures, the mission was ended in 1881. When the boys returned to China, they were confined and interrogated.[2]
The influential official Huang Zunxian (1848-1905) wrote a poem which admitted that the students had lived luxurious lives and become Americanized, but lamented the lost opportunity:
Unfortunately, in the Imperial Academy
The curriculum has not included Western learning.
Withal, on the promotion of science
Now depends the future of the nation.
A decade's effort in training youths
Will lay the foundation for a century's wealth and strength.[3]
Many of the students later returned to China and made significant contributions to China's civil services, engineering, and the sciences. Prominent students on the mission included Liang Cheng, Tang Shaoyi, Cai Tinggan, and Zhan Tianyou.
OECD: PISA
Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) was first conducted in 2000: 250,000 students from 32 countries took part in PISA 2000
...given the fact that expenditure per primary and secondary student rose by more than 15 % across OECD countries over the past decade, it is disappointing that most OECD countries saw virtually no improvement in the performance of their students since PISA was first conducted in 2000. In fact, only seven of the 79 education systems analysed saw significant improvements in the reading, mathematics and science performance of their students throughout their participation in PISA, and only one of these, Portugal, is a member of the OECD.
During the same period, the demands placed on the reading skills of 15-year-olds have fundamentally changed. The smartphone has transformed the ways in which people read and exchange information; and digitalisation has resulted in the emergence of new forms of text, ranging from the concise, to the lengthy and unwieldy. In the past, students could find clear and singular answers to their questions in carefully curated and government-approved textbooks, and they could trust those answers to be true. Today, they will find hundreds of thousands of answers to their questions on line, and it is up to them to figure out what is true and what is false, what is right and what is wrong. Reading is no longer mainly about extracting information; it is about constructing knowledge, thinking critically and making well-founded judgements. Against this backdrop, the findings from this latest PISA round show that fewer than 1 in 10 students in OECD countries was able to distinguish between fact and opinion, based on implicit cues pertaining to the content or source of the information. In fact, only in the four provinces/municipalities of China, as well as in Canada, Estonia, Finland, Singapore and the United States, did more than one in seven students demonstrate this level of reading proficiency. >>>more
About PISA
Up to the end of the 1990s, the OECD’s comparisons of education outcomes were mainly based on measures of years of schooling, which are not reliable indicators of what people actually know and can do. The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) changed this. The idea behind PISA lay in testing the knowledge and skills of students directly, through a metric that was internationally agreed upon; linking that with data from students, teachers, schools and systems to understand performance differences; and then harnessing the power of collaboration to act on the data, both by creating shared points of reference and by leveraging peer pressure. The aim with PISA was not to create another layer of top-down accountability, but to help schools and policy makers shift from looking upward within the education system towards looking outward to the next teacher, the next school, the next country. In essence, PISA counts what counts, and makes that information available to educators and policy makers so they can make more informed decisions. …
15-year-old students in four provinces/municipalities of China – Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu and Zhejiang – outperformed their peers in all of the other 78 participating education systems ... What makes their achievement even more remarkable is that the level of income of these four Chinese regions is well below the OECD average. … >>> more (pdf)
Chinese students far outperformed their international peers in a test of reading, math, and science skills, according to the 2018 results of the Program for International Student Assessment.
...
The PISA results showed that 20 percent of American 15-year-olds don’t read as well as they should by age 10. Also, the results showed American performance in reading and math has been flat since 2000. That suggests that federal initiatives like No Child Left Behind and Common Core — which have cost billions of federal and private dollars — haven’t improved education quality in the U.S.
One of the most surprising findings was that only 14 percent of American students were able to reliably distinguish fact from opinion in reading tests. . . .
>>>more
Tales from Tartary Vast territories, from the Caspian Sea to China and the Pacific Ocean, unknown to European geographers, were referred to as “Tartary” until Venetian explorer Marco Polo (1254-1324) reported details of his family's exotic sojourns, lasting over 23-years: Travels of Marco Polo, (1285) is available on Gutenberg.org
“Concerning the Old Man of the Mountain” (Travels of Marco Polo, Book 1, Chapter 23): “Mulehet is a country in which the Old Man of the Mountain dwelt in former days; and the name means 'Place of the Aram'."
In Tales from Tartary, (1979), available on archive.org, James Riordan (1936-2012/Obit), shared folk tales told around his Russian wife's family fireside and follows each story with an examination of the historical origins.
Marco Polo and James Riordan recount the story of a Muslim "Old Man of the Mountain" (Sabbah) who captured young men - all carefully chosen individuals: Leading his captives to his mountain "paradise" - of great riches, harems, and glory; under the influence of the hypnotic power of hashish, they became his fully committed disciples - his trusted Hashshashin "assassins" willing to carry out his every request, believing that only he could return them to 'paradise'."The Assassins were masters of disguise and stealth. They often masqueraded as soldiers or servants and worked themselves into a position of trust, sometimes taking months to achieve this, so they could easily kill their victim—a vizier, a prince, a religious leader, warrior or king." - (Eventually, they were 'put down' by Genghis Khan.)
See The Assassins (Hashshashin): Their History, Victims and Hashish Training, for a detailed overview.
“The Silk Road is not a place, but a journey "
- a conduit for new philosophical teachings
The "Silk Road" opened trade routes between the Far East and Europe from 206 B.C. to 220 A.D, and became the conduit for teachings of the Confucian and Buddhist philosophers, and all branches of the Abrahamic religions.
According to Finland-based Mandarin-speaker, specialising on the history and cultures of China and Japan, Dr Jonathan Clements, author of "A History of the Silk Road" (2017), (Mandarin edition published July 2021), “The Silk Road is not a place, but a journey, a route from the edges of the Mediterranean to the central plains of China, through high mountains and inhospitable deserts. For thousands of years its history has been a traveler's history, of brief encounters in desert towns, snowbound passes and nameless forts. ..." Dr Jonathan Clements, who was a Visiting Professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University, China from 2013-19, describes geographic timeline impacts on settlement of Proto-Celtic “Caucasian” cultures: Mummies, including Chinese, Mongul, and Caucasian, found around the Talkamakan Desert, are now showcased at the Xinjiang Regional Museum, in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang,
“These long-dead locals were interred in dry, salty ground that was never flooded... but the ones that foreign tourists want to see are Caucasian … between India and the Black Sea. These red-haired, long-limbed explorers were the easternmost outliers of the ancient Tocharian culture - shepherds and horsemen who once lived at the edge of a great lake. … covered 10,000 square kilometres. … beneath the Tianshan and the Kunlun mountain ranges. As the glacial ice finally melted, the water poured in torrents down the steep hillsides and filled much of the eastern end of the great valley. … The region was one of the last places on earth to find human habitation. Perhaps they wandered in from the north, from the great grasslands and through the wind swept valley where Urumqi now stands. Perhaps they struggled through the passes from the southwest. But when they reached the great water, they settled at its edge.
The lakeside was thick with trees. They used them to build their houses and to make the canoes they paddled on the fast river waters, and the upright hinges - circular constructions with an internal ditch - that surrounded their graveyards. When they died, they used the wood to make the canoe-like cowlings that covered their graves. Their horses grazed on the grasslands, and their children picked through the reeds on the waters edge, looking for fish. They raised sheep on the hillsides, mixed pigments with dark to make purple cloth. … The waters of the mountains gradually dwindled. It would not have been obvious on the ground. … in geological time it was the merest blink. The great inland sea came and went in barely 1,000 years.
– Clements, J. "A History of the Silk Road" (2017), pp.31-32
In 1944, the US produced a propaganda film identifying territories
of Tibet, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Manchuria within China's borders.
Why We Fight #6: The Battle of China YouTube (Image: Screen capture 3:03)
Drawing The Line - a sweeping claim: The line on a 75-year-old map that threatens to set off a war in East Asia
(Click on map for larger version)
The dashed line was first shown in 1947 on a map entitled “Map of South China Sea Islands” published by the government of the Republic of China. With 11 dashes at the time, it encompassed most of the South China Sea. The Chinese communist party adopted the map in 1949, but removed two dashes to give the Gulf of Tonkin to communist Vietnam as a courtesy. Within the dashes were key archipelagos -including the disputed Spratly and the Paracel islands -and various other features, including the Scarborough Shoal, a set of coral reefs near the Philippines.
Over the next six decades, little happened with the map.
“The nine-dash line was not controversial between 1949 and 2009 because no one ever spent time talking or thinking about it,”... “China rarely asserted it publicly.” - Julian Ku, a professor at the law school of Hofstra University in New York. >>>more
Indigenous Taiwan
The first known settlers in Taiwan were Malayo-Polynesian, Austronesian people, with origins in southern China, Oceania, Brunei, East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Micronesia, Polynesia, etc.
Taiwan government:Historical timeline
FACT FOCUS
• Dutch and Spanish settlers established bases in Taiwan in the early 17th century.
• Around 1.2 million people relocated from China to Taiwan along with the Republic of China (Taiwan) government in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Excerpt:
The ROC was founded in 1912 in China. At that time, Taiwan was under Japanese colonial rule as a result of the 1895 Treaty of Shimonoseki, by which the Qing ceded Taiwan to Japan. The ROC government began exercising jurisdiction over Taiwan in 1945 after Japan surrendered at the end of World War II.
The ROC government relocated to Taiwan in 1949 while fighting a civil war with the Chinese Communist Party. Since then, the ROC has continued to exercise effective jurisdiction over the main island of Taiwan and a number of outlying islands, leaving Taiwan and China each under the rule of a different government. The authorities in Beijing have never exercised sovereignty over Taiwan or other islands administered by the ROC.
The following timeline focuses on Taiwan’s recorded history dating from about 400 years ago, although it has been home to Malayo-Polynesian peoples for many millenniums. >>> Historical timeline
Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian's inauguration speech,
May 20th 2000
"... let's always remember this moment; let's always remember to value and feel gratitude for it, because the fruits of democracy did not come out of the blue."
Excerpt: “The guiding principle of "peaceful reunification" and "one country, two systems", which is in the interests of all, is the best way for resolving the Taiwan issue, as has been proved in Hong Kong and Macao.
Taiwan's new leader must recognize absolutely the one-China principle and the fact that Taiwan is part of China.”>>>more
Excerpt: Chiang was a good influence because he fought for the unification of China. ... An editorial in the English-language newspaper Taipei Times said the reason for restoring the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall’s name was "to honor a symbol of one China" now that on the mainland Chiang's role "has gradually been rehabilitated" ...
"Chinese people don't want to remember the disputes that divided us in the past."
It is historical irony that Chiang has become a symbolic link for the two sides across the Taiwan Strait...
Part 8 Remembering Sun Yat-sen - "Father of the Republic of China” Back to top
Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925), Chinese statesman, philosopher and physician, “founding Father of the Republic of China” and Provisional President of the Republic of China, was born in a small village near Macau. (See dedicated Sun Yat-Sen study references here)
“The land tax as the only means of supporting the government is an infinitely just, reasonable, and equitably-distributed tax, and on it we will found our new system.” - Sun Yat-sen
"He learned the Chinese classics as a child and studied at American schools in Honolulu. When he returned in 1883, he became greatly troubled by what he saw as a backward China that extorted exorbitant taxes and levies from its people. .. During the following decade, he [Sun Yat-sen] was destined to endure much hardship and anguish as he fought the many warlords in his quest to unite the new China.” – DR. K.N. LAI, Journal of Medical Humanities, 2013
In the midst of political chaos, shortly after the downfall of the Manchu Dynasty, in 1911, ending more than 2,000 years of imperial rule in China, the "Republic of China" was formally proclaimed on 1 January 1912.
Dr. Sun Yat-sen, who upheld three principles: nationalism, democracy, and the livelihood of the people, was an advocate of the "Single Tax". He was the leader of the Revolutionary Alliance, and became Provisional President of the Republic of China from 1 January 1912. As planned, he resigned on March 10, to be succeeded by Prime Minister Yuan Shikai, whose death, on 6 June, 1916, four years later, at the age of 56, created a ‘power vacuum’ - a 12-year period (1916-1928) known as the Warlord Era, when local generals across China’s provinces challenged the central authority of the Republic of China. – Kuomintang historical timeline – Wikipedia references – Sun Yat-sen Foundation, Hawaii – Sun Yat-sen Quotes –"Only powerful people have liberty."
Excerpt:
Taiwan is another place that "did it," in part. Its present government is what remains of the Kuomintang, founded by Dr. Sun Yat-sen on the mainland around 1920. Sun's ideas were abandoned to corruption until the Kuomintang's remnants, discredited and beaten, fled to Taiwan in 1948. Then finally, backs to the wall, they purified themselves. They put Sun's visage on their currency and buildings, and beatified him. They created an efficient, honest government and applied the policies Dr. Sun had prescribed long ago for all China. Sun's basic economic program was simple. He was a convert to the ideas of Henry George, which were stirring the world in Sun's formative years. Tax the land; exempt the buildings, said Dr. Sun. That is what Taiwan finally did; the Taiwanese economic miracle ensued. It is there to see and study. Them as has eyes t'see, let'm see.
It's not that simple, of course, and certainly not that pure: nothing ever is. That is the gist of it, however. As to adequacy of revenues, they have combined their local land tax with a national tax on land gains, levied at time of sale. These two taxes between them raise a full 20% of all Taiwanese revenues: local, regional, and national. Remember we are talking about a government under siege, with a heavy military budget. We are talking about land prices that keep rising in spite of taxes levied on the land value base... p. 10 - Full article pdf
Excerpt:
Actually, China is in a better situation than some countries in the West because it has the main ingredients needed to help mitigate the threat of a bursting housing bubble.
Beijing need not look far for inspiration. It could refer to the writings of Sun Yat-sen, the revolutionary leader who is still fondly remembered on the mainland. A man of letters and a philosopher on a range of topics, Sun took a particular interest in land tenure, probably after discovering American political economist Henry George as a young man in Hawaii. George argued for a single tax on land value, a principle now known as “Georgism”. Sun was such a convinced Georgist he subsequently built an entire reform programme around the idea of developing an equitable land tenure system. He argued: “The land tax as the only means of supporting the government is an infinitely just, reasonable, and equitably-distributed tax, and on it we will found our new system.” . . .
As academic Anne Haila argues in her book Urban Land Rent: “Singapore has used its scarce land resources to balance between maximising rent revenue and using its landed property for public good, to provide public housing for the majority of its population and public industrial space for the transnational companies locating in Singapore.” … >>>more
Excerpt:
Perhaps more than in other civilizations, however, the Chinese heroic tradition and the cultivation of morality were considered to be inherently interwoven and closely identified with the wellbeing of the community. Thus these matters were of concern to the government. Identification and recognition of the heroic personality became a part of the formal literary production of scholars and were intended to convey lessons in morality. When these writings, especially those relating to history in some way, received government acknowledgement, they reflected an officially sanctioned interpretation of the meaning and roles of the hero.
Officially sanctioned standards of morality that underlay the figure of the hero had origins in the distant past. Chinese ideas about the basically harmonious nature of the universe and society contributed to an emphasis placed on morality in human affairs, for morality ensured continuing harmony in the human and natural realms. Distinguishing right from wrong and identifying what was deserving of praise or blame were important responsibilities undertaken by the government for the welfare of the people. The figure of the hero or villain and what each signified easily expanded into a mythic dimension supported by official sanction. >>> more
"The Dr. Sun Yat-sen Hawaii Foundation is pleased to have stimulated this English version of Sun Yat-sen in Hawaii – Activities and Supporters. An article was originally published in 1996 in Beijing, China, in Chinese, with a circulation limited within China. This book, coauthored by Yansheng and Raymond Lum, significantly expands and revises the original work..."
Sen Yet Young: "Father of Chinese aviation" Sen Yet Young aka Young Sen Yat, (1891-1923), born in the Kingdom of Hawaii, was named "the father of Chinese aviation" by Sun Yat-sen, and posthumously awarded the rank of lieutenant general and named the leader of China's air force. >>>more
A certificate issued in China commemorating Sen Yet Young's death reveals his activities:
“Following the death of Yuan Shih-K’ai, the Kuomintang had established itself as the controlling party of China with Dr. Sun Yat-Sen as its president. With the nationalist government under democratic principles, the party’s new push was for national unity which could only be brought about by the abolishment of warlordism. This, however, was a slow and enduring process since the Kuomintang had only light and limited armaments with which to fight the warlords as they had previously done against Yuan Shih-K’ai. Seeing the lack of effective weapons, one of the Kuomintang members stood out as a national patriot by devoting his life to the establishment of larger, more effective and more powerful military armaments, Young Sen Yet.” Source: Hawaii Aviation archive
Bertrand Russell: In response to China, on The Law of Rent Theorem
British philosopher, Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), internationally celebrated for his work in mathematical logic and analytic philosophy across metaphysics, ethics, educational theory, and religious studies, was awarded the Noble Prize for Literature in 1950 for his "rationality and humanity, as a fearless champion of free speech and free thought in the West":
See Russell’s Chronology
Bertrand Russell understood the Confucian origins of "The Law of
Rent" theorem (Principles of Social Reconstruction, 1916), when, in 1920, he was invited to take up the post of Professor of Philosophy at the University of Beijing. Traveling with his future wife, Dora Black, he remained for one year and lectured widely to great audiences beyond university circles.
"The Chinese are a great nation… They will not consent to adopt our vices in order to acquire military strength but they are willing to adopt our virtues in order to advance in wisdom. I think they are the only people in the world who quite genuinely believe that wisdom is more precious than rubies. That is why the West regards them as uncivilized.” – Bertrand Russell, 1920
Reports on Russell's experience in China are documented in the China Zurich DATABASE, 2012 (pdf), on cultural relations between China and the West, collated by the University of Zurich (Prof. Robert Gassmann, Andrea Riemenschnitter, Wolfgang Behr) and Harvard University (Professor Peter Bol).
Excerpt:
1920 - Raoul Findeisen:
Bertrand Russell talked publicly on board the French liner 'Portos' on what he had seen in Soviet Russia which incited some fellow-travellers to ask the British Embassy in China whether it would be possible to prevent him getting off board in Shanghai, since he had 'expressed pro-Bolshevik and anti-British sentiments' and would 'prove subversive and dangerous to British interests at Chinese educational institutions'. The Chinese authorities were not of the same opinion and Russell held a triumphant premiere in Shanghai, together with Dora Black. They were 'treated like Emperor and Empress' ... “When I went to China, I went to teach; but every day that I stayed I thought less of what I had to teach them and more of what I had to learn from them,” he notes. >>>more
The Problem of China, 1922 - FREE eBook via Gutenberg
By Bertrand Russell
This study of the history of China, its social forces and tendencies and the character of its people, published in 1922, following the author's return from a year as Professor of Philosophy at the University of Beijing, has a great value and interest for all who are concerned to understand China and her future amongst the major nations of the world. Excerpt:
A European lately arrived in China, if he is of a receptive and reflective disposition, finds himself confronted with a number of very puzzling questions, for many of which the problems of Western Europe will not have prepared him. Russian problems, it is true, have important affinities with those of China, but they have also important differences; moreover they are decidedly less complex. Chinese problems, even if they affected no one outside China, would be of vast importance, since the Chinese are estimated to constitute about a quarter of the human race. In fact, however, all the world will be vitally affected by the development of Chinese affairs, which may well prove a decisive factor, for good or evil, during the next two centuries. This makes it important, to Europe and America almost as much as to Asia, that there should be an intelligent understanding of the questions raised by China, even if, as yet, definite answers are difficult to give.
The questions raised by the present condition of China fall naturally into three groups, economic, political, and cultural. No one of these groups, however, can be considered in isolation, because each is intimately bound up with the other two. For my part, I think the cultural questions are the most important, both for China and for mankind; if these could be solved, I would accept, with more or less equanimity, any political or economic system which ministered to that end. Unfortunately, however, cultural questions have little interest for practical men, who regard money and power as the proper ends for nations as for individuals. The helplessness of the artist in a hard-headed business community has long been a commonplace of novelists and moralizers, and has made collectors feel virtuous when they bought up the pictures of painters who had died in penury. China may be regarded as an artist nation, with the virtues and vices to be expected of the artist: virtues chiefly useful to others, and vices chiefly harmful to oneself. Can Chinese virtues be preserved? Or must China, in order to survive, acquire, instead, the vices which make for success and cause misery to others only? And if China does copy the model set by all foreign nations with which she has dealings, what will become of all of us?
2011 Review of "The Problem of China":
A man ahead of his time Bertrand Russell made uncannily accurate China predictions 90 years ago
Jul 29, 2011
Excerpt
The title might imply an anti-Chinese tone. Far from it. Instead Russell predicts China’s resurgence and looks at the strengths of its civilisation. Written at a time when China was still viewed by most Europeans as weak and degenerate, Russell’s achievement is to rise above the prejudices of his era.
In the last chapter he notes: “China, by her resources and her population, is capable of being the greatest Power in the world after the United States.”
He has been proved right, albeit 90 years after publication... >>>more
The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell (Routledge Classics, 2009)
Edited by Robert E. Egner and Lester E. Denonn: PDF
NOTE:
“A Symposium on Communism” in Modern Monthly 9 (April 1934): 133-165, comprised three essays entitled “Why I Am Not a Communist” by Bertrand Russell (pp. 133-34), John Dewey (pp. 135-37), and Morris R. Cohen (pp. 138-42), with a reply by Sidney Hook entitled “Why I Am a Communist: Communism Without Dogmas” (pp. 143-65). The four essays were reprinted in Sidney Hook’s and Sherwood Eddy’s Meaning of Marx: A Symposium (New York: Farrer and Rinehart, 1934)
– Why I Am Not a Communist by Bertrand Russell, 1934, page 52 WHEN I speak of a "Communist," I mean a person who accepts the doctrines of the Third International. In a sense, the early Christians were Communists, and so were many medieval sects; but this sense is now obsolete. I will set forth my reasons for not being a Communist seriatim.
1. I cannot assent to Marx's philosophy, still less to that of Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism. I am not a materialist, though I am even further removed from idealism. I do not believe that there is any dialectical necessity in historical change; this belief was taken over by Marx from Hegel, without its only logical basis, namely the primacy of the Idea. Marx believed that the next stage in human development must be in some sense a progress; I see no reason for this belief.
2. I cannot accept Marx's theory of value, not yet, in his form, the theory of surplus-value. The theory that the exchange-value of a commodity is proportional to the labor involved in its production, which Marx took over from Ricardo, is shown to be false by Ricardo's theory of rent, and has long been abandoned by all non-Marxian economists. The theory of surplus-value rests upon Malthus' theory of population, which Marx elsewhere rejects. Marx's economics do not form a logically coherent whole, but are built up by the alternate acceptance and rejection of older doctrines, as may suit his convenience in making out a case against the capitalists. >>>more
– The Sphere of Liberty, by Bertrand Russell, 1934, Esquire
That free competition should lead to increase in ideas and opinions.
LIBERTY, as conceived by eighteenth century reformers, depended upon the economic structure of society at that time. In America, and in France after the Revolution, there were, on the land, large numbers of small independent freeholders; in the towns, artisans could work without borrowed capital, and therefore with a certain degree of independence. The obstacles to liberty, so far as large classes were concerned, were, therefore, political rather than economic, and could be removed, to a great extent, by purely political means..." (Russell, 1934)
Visit The Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation: here and here
Part 10 Debating China's Economic Rise Back to top
"Human nature is good" -
"By using force and pretending to benevolence the hegemon will certainly have a large state. By using virtue and practicing benevolence the wise ruler will achieve humane authority."
- Confucian philosopher, Mencius (372-289 BC)
2023
NPC History: The NPC Observer is dedicated to improving the accessibility of China’s national legislature, the National People’s Congress (NPC)
On September 1, 2023, China’s top legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), adopted the Foreign State Immunity Law (Law) [???????], which will take effect on January 1, 2024. The Law marks a historic change in China’s stance on foreign state immunity—a doctrine that shields states and their property from the jurisdiction of foreign courts—and brings China’s practice in line with international norms. In short, starting next year, foreign states will be subject to suit in China in certain circumstances as provided in the Law in which they currently enjoy immunity. Below, we for the most part offer only a straightforward summary of the Law, without attempting any critical or comparative analysis. For that, we recommend instead Prof. William Dodge’s two–part analysis of the Law’s December 2022 draft at Transnational Litigation Blog, which we drew on for our summary. Our English translation of the Law is available here and a chart comparing the Law’s two public versions here (pdf).
Just finished a 2-week trip in China (Shanghai, Beijing, Xi’an, Yen’An). Hadn’t been since Dec 2019, previously visited multiple times/year for 20+ years. Had to see for myself how things are vs. media reports within the US. For the record, I am neither Pro or Anti China, I am Pro-Business. Here are my summary observations/opinions:
• Economy is definitely slowing down and most people feel or see the impact. However, the loudest complainers are from the ‘elite’ segment (well educated, experience with MNCs, live in Shanghai, etc.). Noticed people in Beijing, Xian, and smaller cities weren’t as concerned.
• Despite downturn, most people aren’t severely impacted for now. They have plenty of savings, almost no debt, and can live with their parents. Chinese are notoriously frugal and save for a rainy day - guess what? It’s raining now. Also, for perspective, economy still going to grow 4–5%, just not 8–10% as hoped/expected. So people aren’t buying as many luxury goods, the 10+ Uber/Lyft rideshare companies aren’t getting as much traffic, and not every engineer will get their dream job.
• Foreign population visibly lower, the smallest number I’ve seen in 20+ years even in Shanghai. Took a flight from BJ to Shanghai, saw less than 20 foreigners at airport and plane, most appear to be from Europe. Shouldn’t have been surprised given the situation but eye opening nonetheless.
• Technology progress in China is for real. ~35–40% of cars in Shanghai are EVs. And they are much nicer than expected, even from brands I’ve never heard of. BYD has a version that can do 900 KM on full charge (vs. 450 for a Tesla). Huawei 6G pro is impressive. Bullet train system is easy, convenient, and fast (some routes didn’t exist just a few years ago). Subways are upgraded. Robotic companies everywhere. This was my area of expertise, a bit disturbed to see how quickly they copy-catted, highly likely they got some IP improperly IMO. One executive told me they don’t need any tech know-how from America today. This is where things are at whether the US admits to it or not.
• 80–90% of all money transactions for me was electronic. I linked my ATM card to Alipay and it was pretty easy most of the time. I got a bunch of added charges though, some expected, some not. Kind of annoying.
• My US cell phone was blocked in China, meaning I couldn’t iMessage or call Chinese numbers (not the case before). My WeChat messages to locals came with warnings. Just some minor retaliation from China.
• Downloaded 2 VPNs, between the two I was able to get most of what I needed from US though they would crash 1/day or work very slowly sometimes. People still use WhatsApp a lot in Shanghai. One bonus: Spotify worked great even within the firewall!
• In Shanghai I saw signs of small groups of “youts”, meaning younger generation Chinese dressed more hip or alternative (baggy pants, blond hair, etc.). Hadn’t seen much of this before, we’ll see if it evolves like Japan in the 80s.
• Most Chinese are aware of the Sino vs. US tension. The more educated are privately quite critical of the current CCP government. But they are also confused with US positions. For example, why are Huawei and BYD banned in the US but Apple and Tesla are allowed in China? They don’t see all the negative coverage on China from the US, but do get amplified coverage of US deficiencies (gun violence, Trump, Biden gaffes, gov’t shutdown talk, etc.). They all hope things get better. And nearly all Chinese I talked to aren’t big fans of Russia.
• In summary, my takeaway is China is going through a pretty big correction. For some, it’s hurting but for now, the country is fine. I do see the impact of lesser foreign investment but IMO, there is still significant opportunity. China still covets global products and services, and believe established quality is paramount - especially in Shanghai. The rules are just tighter and some sectors are more complicated than before. I believe if things don’t get better in 1–2 years, there could be some serious trouble. I’m guessing many Chinese nationals outside of the country are also paying attention to this as well.
About Godfree Roberts Ph.D.
I've been visiting China since 1967 and following its rising fortunes ever since. After receiving my doctorate from UMass, Amherst, I moved to Chiang Mai, Thailand, an hour from the Chinese border, and began trying to understand the country's phenomenal success.
The result is a book, "Why China Leads the World: Talent at the Top, Data in the Middle, Democracy at the Bottom," the only book in English that explains why China works so well, and why 95% of Chinese think it's heading in the right direction.
'Talent at the Top' means that only the brightest, most honest and idealistic people are admitted to politics–a policy they have not changed in 2200 years.
'Data in the Middle' means that every policy is tested, implemented, tracked, and optimized based on terabytes of data. The PRC is the world's largest consumer of public surveys.
'Democracy at the Bottom' means that ordinary people have the last say on everything. 3,000 honest amateurs from across the country assemble twice a year to check the stats and sign off on new legislation. Policies need a minimum of 66% popular support to become law. That's why 95% of Chinese say the country is on the right track.
'Why China Leads the World' shows how the epidemic accelerated the change of global leadership from America to China and examines China’s bigger, steadier economy, its leadership in science, stronger military, more powerful allies, and wider international support.
Crammed with charts, footnotes, and lengthy quotes, 'Why China Leads the World' is a profoundly disturbing book that helps you understand the tectonic shift and adapt to this new era–and even thrive in it.
Why does this matter? Because, by the end of 2021, there will be more hungry children, more poor, homeless, drug addicted, and imprisoned people in America than in China.
2019
Why will China’s economy crash soon?
Answered by Godfree Roberts,
Blog: Here Comes China -
China’s economy will crash soon because we want it to crash soon, that’s why!
All authorities agree that China’s economy will crash soon:
1990. China's economy has come to a halt. The Economist
1996. China's economy will face a hard landing. The Economist
1998. China's economy’s dangerous period of sluggish growth. The Economist
1999. Likelihood of a hard landing for the Chinese economy. Bank of Canada
2000. China currency move nails hard landing risk coffin. Chicago Tribune
2001. A hard landing in China. Wilbanks, Smith & Thomas
2002. China Seeks a Soft Economic Landing. Westchester University
2003. Banking crisis imperils China. New York Times
2004. The great fall of China? The Economist
2005. The Risk of a Hard Landing in China. Nouriel Roubini
2006. Can China Achieve a Soft Landing? International Economy
2007. Can China avoid a hard landing? TIME
2008. Hard Landing In China? Forbes
2009. China's hard landing. China must find a way to recover. Fortune
2010: Hard landing coming in China. Nouriel Roubini
2011: Chinese Hard Landing Closer Than You Think. Business Insider
2012: Economic News from China: Hard Landing. American Interest
2013: A Hard Landing In China. Zero Hedge
2014. A hard landing in China. CNBC
2015. Congratulations, You Got Yourself A Chinese Hard Landing. Forbes
2016. Hard landing looms for China. The Economist
2017. Is China's Economy Going To Crash? National Interest
2018. China's Coming Financial Meltdown. The Daily Reckoning.
Any day now…
2019
Nature: China’s science silk road: Part 1
“Bai Chunli, president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has been the architect of the science component of the Belt and Road Initiative.”
How China is redrawing the map of world science
The Belt and Road Initiative, China’s mega-plan for global infrastructure, will transform the lives and work of tens of thousands of researchers.
By Ehsan Masood, 1 May 2019
Excerpt:
Xi and other Chinese leaders see science as a central element in building bridges with other countries and Bai Chunli, president of CAS, emphasized that point last year in the Bulletin of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS Bulletin). “Science, technology and innovation are the core driving force for the BRI development,” he wrote.
For the past six months, Nature has been travelling to countries participating in the BRI. From Beijing to Islamabad, Colombo to Nairobi to Lima, we are exploring in a series of five articles over the next two weeks how China is transforming the world of science. China’s universities — along with a vast network of CAS institutes — are fanning out across the globe. They are offering scientific assistance and signing collaborative agreements on a scale not seen since the United States and the former Soviet Union vied with each other to fund researchers in allied nations during the cold war. On 19 April, Bai announced that CAS has invested more than 1.8 billion yuan (almost US$268 million) in science and technology projects as part of the BRI. ...
On "Single Tax" policy: Will the revenue be enough? The answer is “yes” - Professor Mason Gaffney, (1993), The Taxable Capacity of Land (pdf)
Since the Land Reform Movement was completed, in 1953,
there is no "real estate investment" in China.
One can only obtain rights to use land.
A land lease of up to 70 year cycles is usually granted for residential purposes. Foreigners who have worked or studied in China for at least a year are allowed to buy a home.
Article 1 This Law is formulated in order to strengthen the administration of the urban real estate, maintain the order of real estate market, protect the legitimate rights and interests of real estate obligees and promote the sound development of real estate business.
...
Article 38 Where the land-use right has been obtained by means of granting, transfer of the real estate shall meet the following conditions:
(1) Having paid all the fees for the granting of the land-use right as agreed upon in the granting contract and obtained the certificate of the land-use right; and
(2) Having invested for development as agreed upon in the granting contract and having fulfilled twenty-five percent or more of the total investment for development in the case of housing projects, or having constituted conditions of land-use for industrial purposes or other construction projects in the case of developing tracts of land.
Where real estate is transferred with the construction of houses completed, the certificate of the house ownership shall be acquired. >>>more
21 Century "Real Estate" Law
For the first time, 'multi-national' Chinese citizens have joined 'the West' in following "Boom-bust cycles" - banking, crypto currency, stock market, and with mega-speculation in real estate (which, in China, does not include sale of land).
It will be interesting to see how they, too, will manage the next F.I.R.E. Sector 'GFC' - predicted for 2026/7.
Why Chinese Cities are the Most Expensive Places in the World to Buy Real Estate
by Benny Lin, January 30, 2019, McGill Business Review
Excerpt:
...
The confusing statistic is that despite these high prices, China has a very high home ownership rate of 70% among millennials compared to the US rate of 35%. How are the Chinese able to afford their expensive properties? Even considering tremendous income growth, their average salary is still considerably lower than that of the US and Canada’s. The answer is not how much they make, but how it is used.
China has an unusually high savings rate of about 50% compared to the US rate of 18%. This correlates with investments as a share of GDP of 48% and 15%, respectively. This means the average person in China is living well below their means and saving a large share of their income, giving them a higher capacity to invest and purchase property.
And they aren’t just buying one property. The Chinese are using generations of savings and investments to purchase multiple homes with the vision of selling for a much higher price in the future and living off the capital gains earned. >>>more
2022
BRICS Nations:
Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa "We saw a major shift at the G20 this week."
- Nov. 21, 2022 China just SHOCKED the world and the U.S. is in real trouble
Clayton Morris, YouTube- (12:47 Minutes)
Excerpts:
3:20
Alan Greenspan "after he left office":
"Well, you know what's interesting is gold is still significant. I ask myself, if it's a relic of a long history, why is there a trillion dollars held in gold by the world's central banks, plus, the IMF, and all the other financial institutions, if it's worthless and meaningless, why is everybody still holding it?" - Alan Greenspan
...
China
(6:16)
Russia announced that over a dozen countries have now applied for membership to join the BRICS nations - the BRICS nations being Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, who have a currency that is backed by gold. Iran, Argentina, and Algeria have formally applied. Iran, alongside Russia, India and China, is already part of the Eurasian Quad, which is very strong. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Afghanistan, are extremely interested in becoming members. They are 'mineral rich', Indonesia just applied, in Bali this week.
...
So that means BRICS nations will increasingly be using the Chinese banking infrastructure instead of the US-led IMF and the World Bank. ...
(7:34)
They're going to use gold while the US uses DEBT.
That's right. This is huge.
You're seeing the balance of power shifting from The West, to The East, to a BRICS currency that's backed by gold, and precious minerals ...
Referenes: - Confucius of Europe, on China's contribution to the European Enlightenment: The Origins of Psychological Testing
Mao's analysis divided rural society into five classes: landlords, rich peasants, middle peasants, poor peasants, and farm laborers...
This analysis was based on a person's relationship to the means of production. Landlords and rich peasants were defined as those who derived income from the exploitation of others' labor and had income exceeding their needs.
- Landlords owned land but did not work it themselves (instead either renting it to tenants or hiring laborers).
- Rich peasants rented out land or hired laborers but also worked the land themselves.
- Middle peasants were those who owned their own land, earned income from their own labor, and were neither in debt nor had significant surplus.
- Poor peasants were defined as those who owned some land but had to also work for landlords or rich peasants in order to survive.
- Laborers owned no land at all.
Excerpt from Summary:
People’s Wars in China, Malaya, and Vietnam explains why some insurgencies collapse after a military defeat while under other circumstances insurgents are able to maintain influence, rebuild strength, and ultimately defeat the government.... The empirical chapters of the book consist of six case studies of the most consequential insurgencies of the 20th century including that led by the Chinese Communist Party from 1927 to 1949, the Malayan Emergency (1948–1960), and the Vietnam War (1960–1975). People’s Wars breaks new ground in systematically analyzing and comparing these three canonical cases of insurgency. The case studies of China and Malaya make use of Chinese-language archival sources, many of which have never before been used and provide an unprecedented level of detail into the workings of successful and unsuccessful insurgencies. The book adopts an interdisciplinary approach and will be of interest to both political scientists and historians.
China sets economic growth target of about 6.5% for 2018 by Gabriel Wildau in Shanghai, March 5, 2018 "... signalling a slowdown from last year’s recorded expansion of 6.9 per cent as the Communist party moves to emphasise quality over quantity amid concerns over wasteful investment and environmental degradation."
“It seems that the odds of the eventual passage of a property tax are rising, but that the odds that it will be a shock to the market are falling.” - Rosealea Yao, property analyst at research group Gavekal Dragonomics in Beijing
2018
"China revives long-stalled property tax to combat housing bubble”Wealthy homeowners have repeatedly blocked progress, but momentum is building. Beijing to push ahead with levy viewed as crucial to taming housing bubble" by Gabriel Wildau and Yizhen Jia in Shanghai April 1, 2018, Financial Times
Excerpt:
After years of delay and quiet opposition from vested interests, China will push ahead with a property tax that is viewed as crucial to taming the country’s housing bubble.
House prices in large Chinese cities are among the highest in the world in terms of price-to-income ratios, with speculative demand from Chinese investors — who see few other good places to park their savings — as a major driver. The result is an estimated 50m empty homes, according to a survey by the Southwestern University of Finance and Economics in Chengdu.
A landmark blueprint for economic reform that the Communist party leadership approved five years ago included a pledge to push ahead with a property tax. But a subsequent slowdown in the economy, including a housing-market downturn in 2014-15, prompted authorities to shelve those plans.
Quiet opposition from wealthy urbanites, including government officials who own multiple homes, also hindered progress.
The property market has since come roaring back, prompting one senior lawmaker to warn that the economy has been “kidnapped” by excessive reliance on property.
President Xi Jinping’s declaration that “houses are for living in, not for speculation” is also strengthening resolve for the tax.
In his annual work report at the opening of China’s annual parliament session last month, Premier Li Keqiang called for advancing property-tax legislation, the first time since 2014 that the work report contained such a reference.
Zhang Dejiang, the outgoing National People’s Congress standing committee chairman, confirmed that drafting of property legislation was back on the parliamentary agenda for this year, its first appearance there since 2015.
Concerns over housing affordability are also prompting policies to improve the rental housing market, including the rollout of residential real estate investment trusts (Reits).
“When will the tax actually come out is difficult to say, but at least the intention has strengthened,” said Chen Shen, head of property research at China Securities in Shanghai. “Two years ago everyone was discussing whether it would ever happen, but now it’s very clear that it will.” . . .
A dose of reality from Beijing. Its credit rating agency, the Dagong Global Credit Rating Co., has challenged the capitalist paradigm by downgrading the rating of the US, UK, Germany and France They lost their AAA rating. Reason: Dagong accuses its western competitors of ideological bias. But that bias was not designed to favour the West against the East. The bias flows from the theory of capitalism which favours rent-seeking activities.
Dagong calculates its ratings by giving greater weight to “wealth-creating capacity”. This exposes the weakness at the heart of the capitalist economy, which is structured to shove entrepreneurship aside in favour of speculation which generate the maximum gains out of land. That is the Achilles heel of capitalism.
But China is not immune to this pathology. Since April, Beijing has had to rein in its overheated economy. Property speculation had got out of hand. Last month, real estate prices eased for the first time in 18 months as the stranglehold on the value-adding economy began to curb the speculators.
Austerity in the West, Big Time
While the Chinese fine-tune, Western governments are using Red Adair-type fire-fighting methods – dropping TNT down their economic holes to try and blow back the debt conflagration. Policy-makers are being berated for not maintaining spending levels to cushion the downturn, by commentators like The Guardian’s Polly Toynbee.
Writing on July 13, she accused the UK’s coalition government of “social cleansing” because it plans to cut housing benefits for low-income families. Instead, she says, the discredited Labour party ought to have adopted the policy highlighted by Martin Wolf – the taxation of future growth in land values.
Says Toynbee: “That is what Labour should have done and should commit to in the future”. So where was she when the Blair/Brown coalition was in power, when Labour could have forestalled the Depression of 2010?
Excerpt:
…On the afternoon of March 20 local time, President Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow on a special plane to pay a state visit to Russia....
President Xi Jinping delivered a written statement. He stressed that China and Russia are friendly neighbors connected by shared mountains and rivers. The two countries have consolidated and grown the bilateral relationship on the basis of no-alliance, no-confrontation and not targeting any third party, and set a fine example for developing a new model of major-country relations. The growth of China-Russia relations has not only brought tangible benefits to the people of the two countries, but also made important contributions to the development and progress of the world.
On the afternoon of 20 March local time, President Xi Jinping, upon invitation, met with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin. The two Presidents had an in-depth and candid exchange on China-Russia relations and issues of mutual interest. President Xi expressed his appreciation to President Putin for immediately sending him congratulatory messages on his reelection as General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee by the 20th CPC National Congress and on his reelection not long ago as Chinese President. He noted that Russia will hold the presidential election next year, and under President Putin’s strong leadership, Russia has made good progress in development and rejuvenation. President Xi said he is confident that the Russian people will continue to give firm support to President Putin.
President Xi stressed that there is a profound historical logic for China-Russia relationship to reach where it is today. China and Russia are each other’s biggest neighbor and comprehensive strategic partner of coordination. Both countries see their relationship as a high priority in their overall diplomacy and policy on external affairs. China always upholds an independent foreign policy. To consolidate and develop well China-Russia relations is a strategic choice China has made on the basis of its own fundamental interests and the prevailing trends of the world. China is firm in keeping to the general direction of strengthening strategic coordination with Russia. Both China and Russia are committed to realizing national development and rejuvenation, support world multi-polarity and work for greater democracy in international relations. The two countries should further deepen practical cooperation in various fields and strengthen coordination and collaboration on multilateral platforms such as the UN to boost their respective national development and rejuvenation, and be a bulwark for world peace and stability.
President Putin said that in the past ten years, China made impressive and great achievements in all areas of development. This is attributable to the outstanding leadership of President Xi and proves the strength of China’s national political system and governance system. . .>>>more
Excerpt: Translation:
During the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, informatization is entering a new phase of accelerated digitized development and building a digital China. General Secretary Xi Jinping has stressed that without informatization, there is no modernization. Informatization brings opportunities for the Chinese nation to scale difficult peaks, and the historical opportunity of informatization development must be acutely grasped. Accelerating digitized development and building a digital China are inherent requirements for meeting the changed circumstances of a new development phase, grasping the opportunities of the information revolution, building new advantages for national competition, and accelerating the creation of a modern Socialist country; they are strategic steps in implementing new development ideas and promoting high-quality development; and they are a necessary road to promote building a new development structure and building a modern economic system. Directly facing the profound changes in industrial chains and supply chains in the “post-pandemic era” as well as the profound changes in global governance systems, responding to the change in the main contradiction of our country’s society, accelerating digitized development, and building a digital China are necessary choices to foster new development drivers, stimulate new development vitality, bridge the digital divide, accelerate the advance of the modernization of the national governance system and governance capability, and stimulate the people’s comprehensive development and society’s comprehensive progress.
This Plan has been formulated on the basis of the “14th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People’s Republic of China and 2035 Long-Term Objective Planning,” the “National Informatization Development Strategy Outline,” etc.; it is an important component of the national planning system for the “14th Five-Year Plan” period and a guideline for action for informatization work in all localities and all departments during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period.
“The Chinese whom I’ve talked to for years and years did not expect the dollar to weaken. They’re not crying about its rise, but they are concerned about flight capital from China as I think after the Party Congress [starting on October 16] there will be a crackdown on the Shanghai free-market advocacy. Pressure for the coming changes has been long building up. The spirit of reform to rein in ‘free markets’ was spreading among students over a decade ago, and they have been rising in the Party hierarchy.”
... Keynes is back
Following our email exchanges, Professor Hudson gracefully agreed to answer in detail a few questions about the extremely complex geoeconomic processes in play across Eurasia. Here we go.
...
“A year or two ago it seemed that the task of designing a full-fledged alternative world currency, monetary, credit and trading system was so complex that the details hardly could be thought through. But US sanctions have proved to be the needed catalyst to make such discussions pragmatically urgent.
The confiscation of Venezuela’s gold reserves in London and its US investments, the confiscation of $300 billion of Russia’s foreign-exchange reserves held in the United States and Europe, and its threat to do the same to China and other countries resisting US foreign policy has made de-dollarization urgent..." >>>more
2021
Larger role in int'l affairs expected for China 9 September 2021, China Daily
By Zhang Yunbi, "a high-level seminar marking the upcoming 50th anniversary of China regaining its lawful seat at the United Nations."
Excerpts:
Prominent political figures and scholars from across the globe have voiced hopes about China playing a bigger role in the future in advancing multilateralism, improving global governance and helping developing countries to thrive.
They stated their expectations for Beijing on a range of issues, including climate change and poverty relief, at a high-level seminar marking the upcoming 50th anniversary of China regaining its lawful seat at the United Nations.
To restore all rights to the People's Republic of China, the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 2758 by an overwhelming majority in October 1971.
At the event on Wednesday, hosted by the UN Association of China and the Chinese People's Institute of Foreign Affairs, guests hailed the remarkable progress that China has made during its engagement with the international organization over the past five decades.
… China is now the second-largest contributor to the UN peacekeeping budget and the top contributor of peacekeeping troops among the five UN Security Council permanent members.
China's role has shifted from the world's biggest recipient of aid to "a contributor to global development" over the past five decades, and it has implemented thousands of projects and programs of in-kind assistance to benefit more than 160 other developing countries, …
…
Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum and its executive chairman, said the restoration of China's seat at the UN 50 years ago "was a remarkable moment", and "it has changed the history of global cooperation".
"China has been playing an increasingly important role in global peace and security, poverty alleviation and helping the least-developed countries and the people," he said.
"China's continued poverty alleviation efforts helped over 800 million people out of poverty in the past 40 years. It's the biggest contribution to the UN Millennium Goal on poverty of any nation," he added.
Former Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd, who is now president and CEO of the think tank Asia Society, noted that China began calling for building a Green Belt and Road years ago.
He also noted that at the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly nearly a year ago, President Xi Jinping outlined China's ambition to peak carbon dioxide emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.
As China promoted the dual goals on carbon to the level of a national strategy, all these efforts "are a manifestation of China's position and (sense of) responsibility in addressing climate change and climate crisis", Rudd said in a video speech, which he delivered in Chinese.
'New vigor'
. . . "China has not drifted away from its original aspirations, and it has always kept in mind that it was the developing countries that helped bring China back into the UN," he said.
China "will always vote for developing countries and for those standing with justice", he added. >>>more
2021 LaTrobe University, Melbourne, Australia Public Lecture | Webinar 10 August 2021
Discussants [NOTE:
Mandarin speaker, Kevin Rudd graduated from the ANU with honours in Chinese studies.
Malcolm Turnbull began his career with Goldman Sachs as director of Australasian investments and became a Partner in 1996.]
The Hon. Kevin Rudd AC
Kevin Rudd AC (a Mandarin speaker)
served as Australia's 26th Prime Minister (2007-10, 2013), Foreign Minister (2010-12), and President of the Asia Society Policy Institute in New York from 2015 to 2023.
The Hon. Malcolm Turnbull AC
Australia’s 29th Prime Minister (2015-2018)
Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull - The Challenge of China La Trobe University is honoured and delighted that Kevin Rudd AC and Malcolm Turnbull AC, two respected and perceptive former Australian Prime Ministers, have agreed to come together online with Dr Bec Strating, Executive Director of La Trobe Asia, to discuss some of the most critical questions posed for Australia and the world by China’s rapid rise.
The recent emergence of China as an economic and military super-power, rivalling the United States, is one of the most significant and challenging developments of the present era.
La Trobe University is honoured and delighted that Kevin Rudd AC and Malcolm Turnbull AC, two respected and perceptive former Australian Prime Ministers, have agreed to come together online with Dr Bec Strating, Executive Director of La Trobe Asia, to discuss some of the most critical questions posed for Australia and the world by China’s rapid rise.
Why have relations between China and Australia deteriorated so comprehensively in recent years?
Has the threat China poses to Australia been exaggerated by conservative politicians and the Murdoch media?
Has Beijing decided to isolate and punish Canberra as a warning to other nations not to challenge Chinese interests and ambitions?
What, if anything, can Australia do to restore more amicable relations with China?
Should Canberra encourage Washington to attempt to maintain its supremacy in Asia?
Is the sharing of power between the United States and China in the Asian region a realistic possibility and an acceptable outcome?
Should Canberra encourage Washington to follow a policy of containment with regard to China, the kind of policy that succeeded with the former Soviet Union?
To what extent should the China policies of Washington and Canberra be determined by human rights considerations, like Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang?
How might the United States and China find a way of cooperating on international issues, including the existential question facing humankind, catastrophic climate change?
Or is a new Cold War, or something even worse, already inevitable?
The Xia dynasty was founded in 2070 BCE, by Yu the Great. There had been a great flood and Yu was the administrator responsible for bringing the water under control. After the inundation, arable land was in short supply. At that time the tradition was that the land belonged to the people at large (not to individuals, nor feudal chiefs - not even the emperor). Individuals were allotted a plot of land, fifty 
Zhou Dynasty 1046 – 246 BCE
