In addition, no independent commercial bourgeoisie had developed in Warring States China. Cities were political and administrative hubs, not commercial centers, with no traditions of independence and self-government. There was no social prestige attached to being a merchant or craftsman; status was a.s.sociated with landownership.33 Property rights existed, but they were not configured to support development of a modern market economy. The Qin dictatorship dispossessed huge numbers of patrimonial landowners in its efforts to break their power, and taxed the new landowners very heavily to support its military ambitions. Instead of creating incentives for private individuals to work their land more productively, the state set output quotas (as the Communists would do two millennia later) and punished peasants for failing to meet them. While the initial Qin land reform broke up entailed estates and created a market in land, no cla.s.s of smallholders emerged, the land instead being absorbed by a new cla.s.s of wealthy families. Property rights existed, but they were not configured to support development of a modern market economy. The Qin dictatorship dispossessed huge numbers of patrimonial landowners in its efforts to break their power, and taxed the new landowners very heavily to support its military ambitions. Instead of creating incentives for private individuals to work their land more productively, the state set output quotas (as the Communists would do two millennia later) and punished peasants for failing to meet them. While the initial Qin land reform broke up entailed estates and created a market in land, no cla.s.s of smallholders emerged, the land instead being absorbed by a new cla.s.s of wealthy families.34 And there was ultimately no rule of law to limit the sovereign"s ability to confiscate property further. And there was ultimately no rule of law to limit the sovereign"s ability to confiscate property further.35 Social modernization is the breakdown of kin-based relationships and their replacement with more voluntary, individualistic forms of a.s.sociation. This did not happen after the Qin unification for two reasons. First, the failure of a capitalist market economy to develop meant that there was no extensive division of labor that would mobilize new social groups and ident.i.ties. Second, the effort to undermine kinship in Chinese society was undertaken as a top-down project by a dictatorial state. In the West, by contrast, kinship was undermined by Christianity, both on a doctrinal level and through the power that the church commanded over family matters and inheritance (see chapter 16 16). The roots of Western social modernization were thus laid several centuries before the rise either of the modern state or the capitalist market economy.
Top-down social engineering often fails to meet its goals. In China, the inst.i.tutions of the agnatic lineage and patrimonial government based on it took a body blow but were not killed. As we will see, they made a big comeback after the short-lived Qin Dynasty and continued to rival the state as a source of authority and emotional attachment in the centuries following.
8.
THE GREAT HAN SYSTEM.
The first Qin emperor and why the dynasty he founded collapsed so quickly; how the Han Dynasty restored Confucian inst.i.tutions but retained Legalist principles; how China was governed under the Qin and Han
The founder of the first unified Chinese state, Ying Zheng (also known by his posthumous temple name Qin Shi Huangdi, 259210 B.C.), was an energetic megalomaniac who used political power to reshape Chinese society. The world-famous army of terra-cotta warriors, unearthed in 1974, was created on his behalf and buried near a gigantic mausoleum within a larger mausoleum precinct of more than two square miles. The Han Dynasty historian Sima Qian claimed that seven hundred thousand workers were mobilized to build the emperor"s tomb; even if this is an exaggeration, it is clear that the state he created disposed of a huge surplus and was able to mobilize resources on a breathtaking scale.
Qin Shi Huangdi extended the inst.i.tutions of his native Qin to the whole of China and thereby created not just a state but what would become, under his Han Dynasty successors, a unified Chinese elite culture. This was something much different from modern nationalism, which is a ma.s.s phenomenon. Nonetheless, the new consciousness linking the elites of Chinese society was so powerful that it always managed to reconst.i.tute itself after the fall of a dynasty and a period of internal political disintegration. While China was conquered several times by foreigners, the latter failed to change the Chinese system but were instead absorbed by it, up until the arrival of the Europeans in the nineteenth century. Neighboring Korea, j.a.pan, and Vietnam remained independent of Chinese power but borrowed heavily from Chinese ideas.
The methods that the first Qin emperor used to unify China were based on naked political power, applying the Legalist principles first elaborated by Shang Yang when Qin was just a frontier state. The a.s.sault on existing traditions and the ambitious social engineering undertaken verged on the totalitarian and provoked such heavy opposition from virtually all segments of the population that the dynasty collapsed and was replaced a mere fourteen years after its founding.
The Qin Dynasty left a complex legacy for later Chinese rulers. On the one hand, the Confucianists and traditionalists whom the Qin rulers targeted execrated it for centuries to come as one of the most immoral and despotic regimes in Chinese history. The Confucianists returned to power in the succeeding Han Dynasty and tried to roll back many of the Qin innovations. On the other hand, Qin"s use of political power succeeded in establishing powerful modern inst.i.tutions that survived the restoration, and in fact came to define many important aspects of subsequent Chinese civilization. Though Legalism was never an approved ideology in later dynastic China, its legacy lived on in the inst.i.tutions of the Chinese state.
THE QIN STATE AND ITS DEMISE.
The first Qin emperor"s policies were implemented by his grand councilor, Li Si, a fellow student of the Legalist ideologist Han Fei who nonetheless conspired to have Han discredited and driven to suicide. On coming to power, one of the first acts of the new state builders was to divide the empire into a two-level administrative structure, with thirty-six commanderies (districts) that were in turn divided into prefectures. The governors of the commanderies and the prefects were appointed by the emperor from his capital of Xianyang, and were intended to displace the power of local patrimonial elites. The already weakened feudal n.o.bility was directly targeted, with the histories saying that 120,000 families were forcibly removed from around the country and relocated to a district close to the capital, where they could be kept under tight surveillance.1 At this early period in human history, it is hard to find many precedents for this kind of use of concentrated political power, which shows how far China had evolved from a tribal society. At this early period in human history, it is hard to find many precedents for this kind of use of concentrated political power, which shows how far China had evolved from a tribal society.
The Confucian officials inherited by the Qin emperor resisted state centralization and in 213 B.C. advised the emperor to reinfeudate the state, a move that not coincidentally provided them with a new power base in the countryside. Li Si understood that this would undermine their state-building project:
If such conditions are not prohibited, the imperial power will decline above, and partisanships will form below. It is expedient that these be prohibited. Your servant requests that all persons possessing works of literature, the Shih [Book of Odes], the Shu [Book of History] and the discussions of the various philosophers should destroy them with remission of all penalty. Those who have not destroyed them within thirty days after the issuing of the order, are to be banned and sent to do forced labor.2
The Qin emperor agreed and ordered the burning of the cla.s.sical books, and then was reported to have ordered that four hundred resisting Confucian scholars be buried alive. These acts understandably earned his regime the undying hatred of later Confucians.
Weights and measures had been standardized already under Shang Yang in the original state of Qin; this standardization was now extended to the whole of China. The first Qin emperor also standardized the written Chinese language based on the great seal script of Grand Historian Zhou, extending again a reform that had been undertaken in Qin before unification. The purpose of the reform was simply to promote consistency in preparing government doc.u.ments.3 While different dialects continue today to be spoken all over China, unification of the written language had incalculable consequences for Chinese ident.i.ty. Not only was there a unified language of administration, but the same corpus of cultural cla.s.sics could be shared across the different regions of China. While different dialects continue today to be spoken all over China, unification of the written language had incalculable consequences for Chinese ident.i.ty. Not only was there a unified language of administration, but the same corpus of cultural cla.s.sics could be shared across the different regions of China.
Strictly following Legalist methods, Qin rule was so harsh that it provoked a series of uprisings all over China and ultimately collapsed after the death of the Qin emperor in 210 B.C. The backlash began in earnest when a group of convicts on their way to a military camp were held up by rain. Since the law decreed the death penalty for delay, whatever the cause, the leaders of the group decided they wouldn"t be any worse off if they revolted.4 Mutinies then quickly spread to other parts of the empire. Many of the surviving ex-kings and feudal aristocrats, seeing that the dynasty was weakening, declared their independence from the new state and raised their own armies. Meanwhile, the grand councilor Li Si conspired with a court eunuch to put Qin Shi Huangdi"s second son on the throne, only to be killed by the eunuch, who was in turn murdered by the third son, whom he had tried to install as emperor. An aristocrat, Xiang Yu, descendant of a n.o.ble family from the extinct kingdom of Chu, and one of his lieutenants, a commoner named Liu Bang, mobilized new armies, occupied the Qin capital, and ended the Qin line. Xiang Yu tried to return China to Zhou feudalism by distributing lands to his kinsmen and supporters. Liu Bang (whose posthumous name was Han Gaozu) turned against him, and after a four-year civil war emerged victorious. He established a new dynasty, the Former or Earlier Han, in 202. Mutinies then quickly spread to other parts of the empire. Many of the surviving ex-kings and feudal aristocrats, seeing that the dynasty was weakening, declared their independence from the new state and raised their own armies. Meanwhile, the grand councilor Li Si conspired with a court eunuch to put Qin Shi Huangdi"s second son on the throne, only to be killed by the eunuch, who was in turn murdered by the third son, whom he had tried to install as emperor. An aristocrat, Xiang Yu, descendant of a n.o.ble family from the extinct kingdom of Chu, and one of his lieutenants, a commoner named Liu Bang, mobilized new armies, occupied the Qin capital, and ended the Qin line. Xiang Yu tried to return China to Zhou feudalism by distributing lands to his kinsmen and supporters. Liu Bang (whose posthumous name was Han Gaozu) turned against him, and after a four-year civil war emerged victorious. He established a new dynasty, the Former or Earlier Han, in 202.5 The regime created by the new emperor Gaozu represented a halfway house between the full feudal restoration attempted by Xiang Yu and the modern dictatorship of the first Qin emperor. Gaozu did not have a power base in a preexisting state as did Qin Shi Huangdi; his legitimacy was based entirely on his charisma as the successful leader of a rebel army fighting a hated tyranny. He led an alliance of different forces, including many traditional families and former ruling houses, in order to win power. In addition, he had to worry about incursions by the nomadic Xiongnu in the north. Hence his initial ability to reshape Chinese society was much more limited than that of his Qin predecessor.
Gaozu consequently created a two-track system. Part of the realm reverted to Zhou feudalism. He restored to rule in subordinate kingdoms several of the old ruling families and their generals who had helped him in the civil war, and enfeoffed members of his own family with new appanages. The other part of the realm retained the impersonal commandery /prefecture structure of the Qin monarchy, which const.i.tuted the core of Gaozu"s own power.6 The dynasty"s control of the new subkingdoms was tenuous for a number of years. The Qin Dynasty unification of China had never been complete, and the early years of the Han Dynasty were spent finishing up the work of creating a uniform national state. Gaozu began this process by gradually removing from power rulers of localities with a surname other than Liu. The last feudal state in Changsha was abolished under a successor, the emperor Wen, in 157 B.C. The states run by royal family members lasted longer and grew more distant from the central government, now located in the western city of Chang"an, and seven of them revolted in 154 in bids to achieve full independence. Successful suppression of the rebellion led Emperor Jing to declare that the remaining feudal lords had no authority over their territories. The government imposed high taxes on them and forced the division of the domains by splitting them among siblings. A hundred years after the founding of the Former Han Dynasty, the last vestiges of feudal rule were finally rendered powerless and local authorities were now more uniformly appointed by the central government. The dynasty"s control of the new subkingdoms was tenuous for a number of years. The Qin Dynasty unification of China had never been complete, and the early years of the Han Dynasty were spent finishing up the work of creating a uniform national state. Gaozu began this process by gradually removing from power rulers of localities with a surname other than Liu. The last feudal state in Changsha was abolished under a successor, the emperor Wen, in 157 B.C. The states run by royal family members lasted longer and grew more distant from the central government, now located in the western city of Chang"an, and seven of them revolted in 154 in bids to achieve full independence. Successful suppression of the rebellion led Emperor Jing to declare that the remaining feudal lords had no authority over their territories. The government imposed high taxes on them and forced the division of the domains by splitting them among siblings. A hundred years after the founding of the Former Han Dynasty, the last vestiges of feudal rule were finally rendered powerless and local authorities were now more uniformly appointed by the central government.7 Zhou-style feudalism, in which a family acquired a local power base independent of the central government, recurred periodically in subsequent Chinese history, particularly in the chaotic periods between dynasties. But once the central government regained its footing, it always had the ability to rea.s.sert control over these ent.i.ties. There was never a period in which the territorial barons were powerful enough to force a const.i.tutional compromise on the monarch, as happened in England under the Magna Carta. Local power holders never had the legal legitimacy that they did in feudal Europe. As we will see, when the hereditary aristocracy in later years tried to gain power in China, it was not by building a localized power base but by capturing the central government. The early centralization of a powerful Chinese state thus succeeded in perpetuating itself over time.
The eradication of patrimonial rule in the different regions of China and its replacement with a uniform national administration was, in effect, a victory for Legalism and the Qin tradition of building a powerful, centralized state. But in other respects, Confucian traditionalism made a comeback. This was particularly true on an ideological level. Under Emperor Wu (14187 B.C.), Confucian scholars were reinstated to administrative positions and a Confucian college was founded with five faculties, one devoted to the study of each of the cla.s.sics. Immersion in these books was seen to be the gateway to bureaucratic office, and the first rudimentary form of what was to become the famous Mandarin examination system was established at this time.8 An important change occurred on the level of ideas as well. The Legalist principles of Shang Yang and Han Fei that advocated the unsentimental use of the ruled for the sake of the rulers was discredited, and the older Confucian view that power ought to be exercised in the interest of the ruled regained respectability. This was far from an argument in favor of democracy: no Confucian believed that there should be formal inst.i.tutional checks on an emperor"s power or authority, much less anything like popular elections or individual rights. The only check on an emperor"s power was a moral one. That is, emperors ought to be raised with the proper moral values that would make them exhibit benevolence toward their people and were exhorted constantly to live up to these ideals.
The early emperors" power was limited by the fact that it was inst.i.tutionalized in the Confucian bureaucracy surrounding the palace. The bureaucracy served as agents of the emperor and had no formal ability to check his power. But like all bureaucrats, they exercised considerable informal influence, because of their expertise and knowledge of the actual workings of the empire. Like all leaders of hierarchical organizations from armies to corporations to modern nations, the emperor at the top of the Han government depended on a legion of advisers to frame policies, implement orders, and judge cases being brought before the court. These officials were responsible for training young princes and advising them when they grew up and exercised power as emperors. Tradition and cultural prestige reinforced the ability of senior Han bureaucrats to sway the emperor, and there are many recorded cases of councilors and secretaries upbraiding or criticizing their leaders, or getting them to reverse controversial decisions.9 The ultimate sanction for a bad emperor was armed rebellion, justified under the doctrine of the loss of the Mandate of Heaven. The Mandate of Heaven had first been introduced to justify the Zhou usurpation of the Shang Dynasty"s throne in the mid-tenth century B.C. and was subsequently invoked to justify rebellion against unjust or corrupt emperors. There were no precise rules for knowing who possessed the Mandate of Heaven, which tended to get awarded after a successful revolt (see the more complete discussion of this issue in chapter 20 20). This was obviously an extreme check on princely power that could be undertaken only at great risk.
The Confucian idea that a ruler ought to rule in the interests of his people thus introduced a principle of accountability into the government of China. As noted, accountability was not formal or procedural but based rather on the emperor"s own moral sense as shaped by the bureaucracy. Levenson and Schurmann argue that the kinds of moral injunctions fostered by the bureaucracy reflected primarily the interests of the bureaucrats themselves. That is, they were strongly opposed to the raw exercise of state power under Legalist rulers because Confucian bureaucrats were the first victims of that power. They sought nothing more than to protect their positions during the Han restoration. These bureaucrats were custodians not of a public interest but of a hierarchical, kinship-based social system at whose pinnacle they stood.10 Nonetheless, there is something to be said for a governing ideology that a.s.serts, at least in principle, that the ruler ought to be accountable to the ruled and that seeks to preserve existing social inst.i.tutions against the power of the state. Nonetheless, there is something to be said for a governing ideology that a.s.serts, at least in principle, that the ruler ought to be accountable to the ruled and that seeks to preserve existing social inst.i.tutions against the power of the state.
THE NATURE OF HAN GOVERNMENT.
The government administration that emerged during the Han Dynasty achieved a much better balance between the Qin Dynasty"s despotic centralization and the kinship-based social system of the early Zhou Dynasty. Its central administration was increasingly rationalized and inst.i.tutionalized, and over time moved against local pockets of patrimonial rule. But until w.a.n.g Mang"s attempt at land reform at the end of the Former Han Dynasty, it never attempted to use its power to engage in large-scale social engineering. It left largely intact existing social networks and property rights. Although it exacted taxes and corvee labor for public projects, it did not try to bleed the population dry the way its Qin predecessor did.
During the Han Dynasty, the Chinese government became increasingly well inst.i.tutionalized. In a patrimonial system, whether of Zhou China or a contemporary African or Central Asian state, government officials are appointed on the basis not of qualifications but due to their kinship or personal ties with the ruler. Authority resides not in the office but in the officeholder. As political systems modernized, bureaucracy replaced the patrimonial system. Among the characteristics of modern bureaucracy, according to Max Weber"s cla.s.sic definition, are offices defined by functional area with a clearly defined sphere of competence, organization of offices into a clearly defined hierarchy, candidates selected impersonally on the basis of qualifications, officials lacking an independent political base and subject to strict discipline within a hierarchy, and salaried offices treated as careers.11 The Chinese government of the Former Han Dynasty fulfilled virtually all of these criteria of modern bureaucracy.12 There were many holdover patrimonial appointees within the government, particularly in the early days of Gaozu"s reign when the emperor needed the help of his anti-Qin and civil war allies to consolidate his rule. But particularly within the central administration, patrimonial officeholders were gradually replaced by officials selected on a more impersonal basis. An increasingly sharp distinction was made between dignitaries of the court and the permanent bureaucracy that was charged with implementing the ruler"s decisions. There were many holdover patrimonial appointees within the government, particularly in the early days of Gaozu"s reign when the emperor needed the help of his anti-Qin and civil war allies to consolidate his rule. But particularly within the central administration, patrimonial officeholders were gradually replaced by officials selected on a more impersonal basis. An increasingly sharp distinction was made between dignitaries of the court and the permanent bureaucracy that was charged with implementing the ruler"s decisions.
Beginning in 165 B.C., decrees were issued calling on senior officials throughout China to nominate fixed quotas of young men of distinction for service in the bureaucracy. Under the reign of Emperor Wu, officials were ordered to vouch for their nominee"s sense of family responsibility and integrity. In 124, pupils nominated from the provinces were sent to the Imperial Academy in the capital of Chang"an for testing. The best ones went on for another year"s training with academicians and scholars based on the approved Confucian texts, and then were tested again for entry into high government service. Other sources of recruitment evolved as well, such as roving commissions that traveled around the empire looking for talented individuals, or contests in which the public was invited to respond with essays on the moral or material state of the empire. This type of impersonal recruitment allowed people of non-Han ethnic stock to rise to high positions, like the military commander Gongsun Hunye, who was of Xiongnu origin.13 In the year 5 B.C., when the registered population of China was sixty million, there were already about 130,000 bureaucrats serving in the capital and provinces. Schools were set up to train young men, beginning at age seventeen, for government service, where they would be tested for their ability to read different styles of script, to keep accounts, and the like. (The examination and recruitment system for the civil service would grow far more sophisticated during the Tang and Ming dynasties.) There was still a strong patrimonial element in Han times: high officials could recommend a son or brother for high office, and the nomination system was clearly not protected against personal influences. As in later dynasties, the degree of meritocracy was sharply limited by the educational requirements: only high-status families would have sons who were literate and therefore liable for nomination or examination.
Despite some surviving vestiges of the patrimonial system,14 the central government became increasingly bureaucratized in Weberian terms over time. The three highest officials were the chancellor, the counselor, and the supreme commander, who ranked in that order. Sometimes the office of chancellor was split between two, one of the Left and one of the Right, where the two occupants of these powerful offices could watch over each other and balance each other"s power. Underneath them were nine ministers of state, each with his own staff and budget. Among the most important officials were the superintendent of ceremonials, who was responsible for the rituals performed by the court; the superintendent of the palace, who controlled access to the palace and was responsible for the safety of the emperor; the superintendent of the guards, who commanded the palace guard and the military units of the capital; the superintendent of transport, who was in charge of logistics; the superintendent of trials, who managed the justice system; and the superintendent of agriculture, who was responsible for the collection of taxes. This last office was obviously incredibly important in this agrarian society; the superintendent of agriculture himself presided over a huge bureaucracy and posted senior officials from sixty-five subordinate offices to the provinces to manage granaries, agricultural work, and water supplies. the central government became increasingly bureaucratized in Weberian terms over time. The three highest officials were the chancellor, the counselor, and the supreme commander, who ranked in that order. Sometimes the office of chancellor was split between two, one of the Left and one of the Right, where the two occupants of these powerful offices could watch over each other and balance each other"s power. Underneath them were nine ministers of state, each with his own staff and budget. Among the most important officials were the superintendent of ceremonials, who was responsible for the rituals performed by the court; the superintendent of the palace, who controlled access to the palace and was responsible for the safety of the emperor; the superintendent of the guards, who commanded the palace guard and the military units of the capital; the superintendent of transport, who was in charge of logistics; the superintendent of trials, who managed the justice system; and the superintendent of agriculture, who was responsible for the collection of taxes. This last office was obviously incredibly important in this agrarian society; the superintendent of agriculture himself presided over a huge bureaucracy and posted senior officials from sixty-five subordinate offices to the provinces to manage granaries, agricultural work, and water supplies.15 Rational bureaucracy does not necessarily have to serve rational purposes. Among the high offices under the superintendent of ceremonials were directors for music, prayer, sacrificial meats, astrology, and divination. The director of astrology advised the emperor on auspicious and inauspicious days for holding events and rituals, and also supervised the examinations for entry into the civil service. The size of the Han government is evident in the fact that the director of prayer alone had a staff of 35, and the director of music controlled 380 musicians.16 One of the most remarkable features of government, which has been consistent from the earliest periods of Chinese history, is the strong control that civilian authorities have exercised over the military. In this respect China differed substantially from Rome, where ambitious generals like Pompey and Julius Caesar were constantly making bids for political power, or from contemporary developing countries with their frequent military coups.
This is not for lack of military authority or charisma in China. China"s history is full of victorious generals and tales of martial greatness. Even after the close of the Warring States period, China continued to fight frequent wars, primarily against steppe nomads, but also against the Koreans, Tibetans, and tribal peoples to the south. Virtually all of the founding emperors of dynasties gained their positions initially as a result of military leadership. As we have seen, Liu Bang rose from being the son of a peasant to become Emperor Gaozu based on his skill as a military organizer and strategist, and he would not be the last to do so. Ambitious generals like An Lushan in the Tang Dynasty made bids for power; the dynasty eventually fell because the frontier forces needed to defend the country from barbarians to the north escaped the central government"s control.
But in general, successful dynastic founders who rose through military conquest quickly doffed their mufti when they achieved power, and ruled by virtue of their civilian office. They and their successors were able to keep generals out of politics, exiling ambitious soldiers to distant frontier posts and suppressing others who tried to organize rebel armies. Unlike the Roman Praetorian Guards or the Ottoman Janissaries, the emperor"s palace guards never played big roles as kingmakers over the course of Chinese history. Given the importance of war to the formation of the Chinese state, it is important to understand why civilian control became as strong as it did.
One reason has to do with the relatively weak inst.i.tutionalization of the military hierarchy compared to its civilian counterpart. Positions of supreme commander, and generals of the van, the rear, the right, and the left, all ranked theoretically higher than the ministers of state, but these posts were often left vacant. They were regarded more as ceremonial positions than ones conferring real military authority, and were frequently occupied by civilians with no military background. At this point in time, there was no professionalization of the military; officials from the emperor on down moved readily between military and civilian posts and were expected to be qualified for both. Once the civil wars at the beginning of the dynasty had ended, military service often involved being posted to distant steppe or desert garrison towns far removed from civilization. This was not the sort of career that ambitious up-and-comers sought.17 These considerations just beg the question, though, of why the military received so little prestige in the Chinese system. And here the answer is likely to be normative: somehow, in the crucible of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, the idea arose that true political authority lies in education and literacy rather than in military prowess. Military men who wanted to rule found they had to garb themselves in Confucian learning if they were to be obeyed and have their sons educated by learned academics if they were to succeed them as rulers. If it seems unsatisfying to think that the pen is mightier than the sword, we should reflect on the fact that all successful efforts by civilian authorities to control their militaries are ultimately based on normative ideas about legitimate authority. The U.S. military could seize power from the president tomorrow if it wanted; that it has not done so reflects the fact that the vast majority of officers wouldn"t dream of overturning the U.S. Const.i.tution, and that the vast majority of soldiers they command would not obey their authority if they tried to do so.
The initial Han equilibrium was based on a balance between the interests of all parties in creating a strong, unified central Chinese state to avoid the turmoil and warfare of the Eastern Zhou, and the interests of the local elites across China who wanted to hold on to as much of their power and privilege as possible. The first Qin emperor tried to push the inst.i.tutional balance too far in the direction of a strong, centralized state, which rode roughshod over the interests not just of the patrimonial elites but also of ordinary peasants who exchanged the tyranny of a local lord for the tyranny of the state. The Han Dynasty shifted the balance back to take account of the interests of the royal and aristocratic families targeted by the Qin, while working to reduce their influence over time. It relegitimated itself in a Confucianism informed by certain unacknowledged Legalist premises. The state that was created in the Former Han was stable because it was based on compromise. But it was also considerably weaker than the Qin state and never sought head-to-head confrontation with the surviving pockets of aristocratic influence. The new equilibrium nonetheless worked. With a brief interruption brought on by the regent w.a.n.g Mang (45 B.C.A.D. 23), who declared himself emperor of a short-lived Xin Dynasty, the Han managed to survive for more than four centuries, from 202 B.C. to A.D. 220. This was a remarkable political achievement, but one that was not, unfortunately, fated to last.
9.
POLITICAL DECAY AND THE RETURN OF PATRIMONIAL GOVERNMENT.
Why the four-hundred-year-old Han Dynasty collapsed; significance of the growth of latifundia and inequality in a Malthusian society; how great families captured the government and weakened the state; the Chinese sense of nation
There should be no general presumption that political order, once it emerges, will be self-sustaining. Samuel Huntington"s Political Order in Changing Societies Political Order in Changing Societies began its life as an article t.i.tled "Political Order and Political Decay," in which Huntington argued that, contrary to modernization theory"s progressive a.s.sumptions, there was no reason to a.s.sume that political development was any more likely than political decay. Political order emerges as a result of the achievement of some equilibrium among the contending forces within a society. But as time goes on, change occurs internally and externally: the actors who established the original equilibrium themselves evolve or disappear; new actors appear; economic and social conditions shift; the society is invaded from the outside or faces new terms of trade or imported ideas. As a result, the preceding equilibrium no longer holds, and political decay results until the existing actors come up with a new set of rules and inst.i.tutions to restore order. began its life as an article t.i.tled "Political Order and Political Decay," in which Huntington argued that, contrary to modernization theory"s progressive a.s.sumptions, there was no reason to a.s.sume that political development was any more likely than political decay. Political order emerges as a result of the achievement of some equilibrium among the contending forces within a society. But as time goes on, change occurs internally and externally: the actors who established the original equilibrium themselves evolve or disappear; new actors appear; economic and social conditions shift; the society is invaded from the outside or faces new terms of trade or imported ideas. As a result, the preceding equilibrium no longer holds, and political decay results until the existing actors come up with a new set of rules and inst.i.tutions to restore order.
The reasons for the Han Dynasty"s eventual breakdown were multiple and involved shifts in all aspects of the original political equilibrium. The unity of the Han ruling family and its legitimacy were severely compromised in the second century A.D. because of the influence of the families of empresses and of the court eunuchs. Eunuchs played important roles in many imperial courts in addition to China"s: since they had been castrated, they no longer had s.e.xual feelings or ability, so they could be trusted as personal staff. Without families of their own, they were psychologically dependent on their masters and would not scheme to advance their (nonexistent) children"s interests. They played a critical role in allowing Chinese emperors to bypa.s.s the strong and autonomous bureaucracy, but they in turn began developing corporate interests of their own.
All of this came to a head when the leader of the empress Liang"s clan succeeded in naming a weak emperor, Huan (A.D. 147167), which allowed her lineage to claim a host of government offices and privileges. They were stopped by what contemporary Latin Americans call an autogolpe autogolpe (a self-coup) initiated by the emperor against his own government with the help of his eunuchs, who then ma.s.sacred the empress"s clan. The eunuchs in turn became a powerful force in their own right, rewarded by the emperor with t.i.tles, tax exemptions, and the like. Their rise threatened in turn the position of the bureaucracy and of the Confucians, who began an antieunuch campaign in 165 and eventually succeeded in having them exterminated. (a self-coup) initiated by the emperor against his own government with the help of his eunuchs, who then ma.s.sacred the empress"s clan. The eunuchs in turn became a powerful force in their own right, rewarded by the emperor with t.i.tles, tax exemptions, and the like. Their rise threatened in turn the position of the bureaucracy and of the Confucians, who began an antieunuch campaign in 165 and eventually succeeded in having them exterminated.1 Environmental conditions also intervened. There were epidemics in 173, 179, and 182; famines in 176, 177, 182, and 183; and floods in 175. Misery on a popular level led to the growth of Daoism, a religion that found numerous adherents among the peasantry and other common people. Confucianism, an ethic rather than a transcendental religion, was always the code of the elite, and Daoism, which had evolved out of ancient folk beliefs, served as a kind of protest religion for nonelites. Daoism became the animating principle behind the great Yellow Turban peasant rebellion (they wore yellow scarves on their heads) that broke out in 184. The rebellion was inflamed by all of the acc.u.mulated hardships endured by the peasantry in the preceding decade. Although it was suppressed after twenty years with great bloodshed (five hundred thousand people reportedly died), it succeeded in destroying a good deal of the empire"s state infrastructure and productive capacity.2 The c.u.mulative effect of these disasters was a reported drop in China"s population of an astonishing forty million people, or two-thirds of the total, between 157 and 280. The c.u.mulative effect of these disasters was a reported drop in China"s population of an astonishing forty million people, or two-thirds of the total, between 157 and 280.3 From the standpoint of China"s political development, however, one of the most important causes of the decline of the Han Dynasty was the recapture of the state by different patrimonial elites and the consequent weakening of the central government. The Qin effort to eliminate feudalism and create an impersonal modern state was undone; kinship returned as the primary avenue to power and status in China, a situation that lasted until the later years of the Tang Dynasty in the ninth century.4 This was not a restoration of Zhou feudalism, however. Too much had changed since the Qin, including the creation of a powerful centralized state and bureaucracy, and a court invested with enormous ceremonial legitimacy. The Former Han had gradually eliminated territorially based pockets of patrimonial influence, so when aristocratic families rea.s.serted themselves, they did so not by rebuilding local power bases but by inserting themselves directly into the apparatus of the central government. The difference between the Zhou and Han aristocracies was thus a bit like the difference between the British and French n.o.bilities in the late seventeenth century: the English lords still lived on their estates and commanded authority locally, while their French counterparts were forced to go to Versailles and seek power through proximity to the court and king. In China, power at court was a route to landownership: powerful officials could acquire land, retainers, peasants, and exemptions from taxes.
THE RICH GET RICHER.
Over time, China saw the growth of increasingly large estates, or latifundia, controlled by aristocratic families working in high offices either in the central government in Chang" an or in one of its provincial arms. This had the consequence of increasing the overall disparities in wealth and concentrating it in the hands of a small group of n.o.ble families, and of steadily depriving the government of revenue as these landowners were able to shield more and more of the country"s productive agricultural land from state taxation. These families were thus an early version of what we could today label a rent-seeking elite, who made use of their political connections to capture the state and use state power to enrich themselves.
There is something like an iron law of latifundia in agrarian societies that says that the rich will grow richer until they are stopped-either by the state, by peasant rebellions, or by states acting out of fear of peasant rebellions. In premodern agrarian societies, disparities in wealth do not necessarily reflect natural disparities in abilities or character. Technology is fixed and no one is rewarded for being entrepreneurial or innovative. Before the mechanization of agriculture, there were no particular economies of scale to be had, either, that would explain the growth of large latifundia in terms of efficiency. Even large landowners had their fields worked by individual peasant families farming on small plots. But small initial differences in resources reinforced themselves through the mechanism of debt peonage. A wealthier peasant or landowner would lend money to a poorer one; a single bad season or crop failure would then reduce the debtor to serfdom or slavery, with the forfeiture of his family"s property.5 Over time, the advantages of greater wealth became self-reinforcing, since larger landowners could then buy influence in the political system to protect and expand their holdings. Over time, the advantages of greater wealth became self-reinforcing, since larger landowners could then buy influence in the political system to protect and expand their holdings.
This is why the anachronistic application of contemporary property rights theory to historical situations leads to fundamental misunderstandings. Many economists believe that strong property rights promote growth because they protect private returns to investment, thereby stimulating investment and growth. But economic life in Han Dynasty China resembled the world described by Thomas Malthus in his Essay on the Principle of Population Essay on the Principle of Population much more than the world that has existed since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution of the last two hundred years. much more than the world that has existed since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution of the last two hundred years.6 Today, we expect increases in labor productivity (output per person) as the result of technological innovation and change. But before 1800, productivity gains were much more episodic. The invention of agriculture, the use of irrigation, the invention of the printing press, gunpowder, and long-distance sailing ships all led to productivity gains, Today, we expect increases in labor productivity (output per person) as the result of technological innovation and change. But before 1800, productivity gains were much more episodic. The invention of agriculture, the use of irrigation, the invention of the printing press, gunpowder, and long-distance sailing ships all led to productivity gains,7 but between them there were prolonged periods when population growth increased and per capita income fell. Many agrarian societies were operating at the frontier of their technological production possibilities, where further investment would not yield higher output. The only kind of economic growth possible was extensive growth, in which new land was settled and brought into cultivation, or else simply stolen from someone else. A Malthusian world is thus zero sum, in which a gain for one party means a loss for another. A wealthy landowner was therefore not necessarily more productive than a small one; he simply had more resources to tide him over rough periods. but between them there were prolonged periods when population growth increased and per capita income fell. Many agrarian societies were operating at the frontier of their technological production possibilities, where further investment would not yield higher output. The only kind of economic growth possible was extensive growth, in which new land was settled and brought into cultivation, or else simply stolen from someone else. A Malthusian world is thus zero sum, in which a gain for one party means a loss for another. A wealthy landowner was therefore not necessarily more productive than a small one; he simply had more resources to tide him over rough periods.8 In a Malthusian economy where intensive growth is not possible, strong property rights simply reinforce the existing distribution of resources. The actual distribution of wealth is more likely to represent chance starting conditions or the property holder"s access to political power than productivity or hard work. (Even in today"s mobile, entrepreneurial capitalist economy, rigid defenders of property rights often forget that the existing distribution of wealth doesn"t always reflect the superior virtue of the wealthy and that markets aren"t always efficient.) Left to their own devices, elites tend to increase the size of their latifundia, and in the face of this, rulers have two choices. They can side with the peasantry and use state power to promote land reform and egalitarian land rights, thereby clipping the wings of the aristocracy. This is what happened in Scandinavia, where the Swedish and Danish monarchs made common cause with the peasantry at the end of the eighteenth century against a relatively weak aristocracy (see chapter 28 28). Or the rulers can side with the aristocracy and use state power to reinforce the hold of local oligarchs over their peasants. This happened in Russia, Prussia, and other lands east of the Elbe River from the seventeenth century on, as a generally free peasantry was reduced to serfdom with the collusion of the state. The French monarchy under the Old Regime was too weak to dispossess the aristocracy or remove their tax exemptions, so it ended up placing the burden of new taxes on the peasantry until the whole system exploded in the French Revolution. Which course the monarch chose-to reinforce the existing oligarchy or to lean against it-depended on a host of contextual factors like the cohesiveness of both the aristocracy and the peasantry, the degree of external threat faced by the state, and rivalries within the court.
The Chinese monarchy during the Han Dynasty initially chose to side with the peasantry against the increasingly powerful landowners. During the Former Han there were periodic calls to return to the well-field system abolished by Shang Yang. The well-field system by that time was seen not as a feudal inst.i.tution but as a symbol of agrarian communalism, and demands for its restoration were driven by the plight of poor peasants being driven off their lands by large latifundists. In 7 B.C., a proposal was put forward to limit estates to three thousand mou mou (a unit of land of approximately 0.165 acre). The proposal died because of opposition by large landowners. w.a.n.g Mang, the court official who usurped the throne from the Liu family and brought the Former Han to a close, also tried to implement land reform by nationalizing large estates. But he too faced tremendous opposition and eventually exhausted himself dealing with a peasant uprising known as Red Eyebrows (for the color they painted their brows). (a unit of land of approximately 0.165 acre). The proposal died because of opposition by large landowners. w.a.n.g Mang, the court official who usurped the throne from the Liu family and brought the Former Han to a close, also tried to implement land reform by nationalizing large estates. But he too faced tremendous opposition and eventually exhausted himself dealing with a peasant uprising known as Red Eyebrows (for the color they painted their brows).9 The failure of w.a.n.g Mang"s land reform enabled the patrimonial aristocracy to extend its holdings and consolidate its power when the Later Han was restored. Owners of large estates succeeded in controlling hundreds or thousands of retainers, tenants, and kinsmen; they often commanded private armies as well. They secured tax exemptions for themselves and their dependents, reducing the empire"s tax base and rural population available for corvee labor and military conscription.
The central government was further weakened by decay in the military. The bulk of the Chinese army was preoccupied fighting the tribal Xiongnu in the far northwest, where it had to operate from remote garrisons with long supply lines. It was hard to conscript peasants for this kind of service, and the government progressively turned either to mercenaries recruited from among the local barbarian populations or to slaves and convicts. Soldiers increasingly const.i.tuted a separate cla.s.s of military households who lived and farmed near the frontier garrisons, and who pa.s.sed on their occupations to their sons. Under these conditions, soldiers were more likely to be loyal to local commanders like the warlords Cao Cao and Dong Zhuo than to the distant central government.10 When growing land disparities were combined with the environmental disasters and epidemics of the 170s, the Yellow Turban revolt exploded. The collapse of order and the disintegration of the central government in factional struggles then induced these powerful families to entrench themselves behind walled compounds and districts, where they were effectively beyond the weak state"s control. In the final decades of the Han Dynasty, the central state disintegrated completely and power pa.s.sed to a series of regional warlords who turned from trying to place their own candidates on the throne to ruling in their own names.11 CHINA DISINTEGRATES AND PATRIMONIALISM RETURNS.
China"s longest enduring dynasty after the Qin unification, the Han, ultimately collapsed in A.D. 220, and with one brief exception no unified Chinese state existed for the next three hundred years. The period from the Later Han to the short-lived Jin Dynasty that appeared in 280 was the subject of one of the greatest Chinese historical novels, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms The Romance of the Three Kingdoms. The novel is attributed to Luo Guanzhong and was written early in the Ming Dynasty (perhaps in the late fourteenth century, though the dating is not certain), after the Ming had freed China from the Mongols and reunited the country once again under native Han Chinese rule.12 One of the underlying themes of this novel is how China"s disunity ( One of the underlying themes of this novel is how China"s disunity (neiluan) invites chaos and foreign invasion (weihuan); it sets forth the conditions under which national unity can be restored. The significance of The Romance of the Three Kingdoms The Romance of the Three Kingdoms in shaping the historical consciousness of modern Chinese has been compared to that of the historical plays of Shakespeare, and the novel has been turned into video games and countless movies. The bad historical memories of disunity that underlie Beijing"s demand for the reincorporation of Taiwan date back to this period. in shaping the historical consciousness of modern Chinese has been compared to that of the historical plays of Shakespeare, and the novel has been turned into video games and countless movies. The bad historical memories of disunity that underlie Beijing"s demand for the reincorporation of Taiwan date back to this period.
From the standpoint of China"s political development, what is noteworthy about the dynastic interregnum between the Han and the Sui (when China was finally reunited in 581) is the way kinship and patrimonialism reinserted themselves as the organizing principles of Chinese politics. There is an inverse correlation between the strength of the centralized state and the strength of patrimonial groups. Tribalism in its various forms remains a default form of political organization, even after a modern state has been created.
The period following the end of the Han is extremely complex, but details are not important from the standpoint of the larger developmental story. China initially broke up into the so-called Three Kingdoms, Wei, Shu Han, and Wu. Wei managed to reunify the country briefly under the Western Jin Dynasty, but the empire broke up again in civil war and the Jin capital of Luoyang was sacked and occupied by the tribal Xiongnu in 311. The Xiongnu king created the first of many alien dynasties in northern China, while the survivors of Western Jin fled south and established the first of several southern dynasties, the Eastern Jin, in Jiankang (modern Nanjing) on the Yangtze River. The north and the south remained separate and both experienced continuing turmoil. In the north, the sack of Luoyang led to a chaotic period of tribal warfare known as the Sixteen Kingdoms. Two more barbarian invasions followed, first by the proto-Tibetan Di and Qiang tribes, and then by the Tuoba or Tabgach, a branch of the Turkic Xianbei. The latter established the Northern Wei Dynasty (386534), which over time became increasingly Sinicized, with tribes taking on Chinese surnames and intermarrying with Chinese families. Tensions among the Tuoba led, however, to civil war and the splitting of the state into the Eastern and Western Wei in the first decades of the sixth century. In the south, the old northern court was reestablished in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, to which large numbers of aristocratic families and their retainers had fled. This dynasty was overthrown in a military coup in the mid-fourth century, to be succeeded by other weak dynasties founded by military men.13 The Wei kingdom, founded by the Han warlord Cao Cao and his son Pei in 220, accelerated the late Han tendency toward patrimonialism by establishing the Nine Rank system, in which an arbiter was appointed to each commandery and prefecture to cla.s.sify candidates for bureaucratic office according to character and ability. Unlike the earlier Han system of recommendation, the arbiters were chosen not by the central government but regionally, where they would obviously be much more subject to influence by local elites. The new recruitment system ranked all elite families in a single formal system and tied access to government office to those ranks. Whereas in the Han a man could have high status without being a bureaucrat, under the Nine Rank system, office became the sole route to high status. This was accompanied by a growing respect for pedigree, with sons now being far more likely to succeed their fathers in office.14 In the hands of a strong central government, recruitment through the Nine Rank system might have been a method of weakening a strong aristocracy and tying it to the state. In the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, the French monarchy sold an elaborate hierarchy of t.i.tles and ranks to the aristocracy, the effect of which was to undermine the capacity of the cla.s.s as a whole for collective action. Each aristocratic family was too busy looking down at the people below them to be able to cooperate to defend their broader cla.s.s interests. In third-century China, however, the Nine Rank system seems rather to have been a means by which the aristocracy could capture the state. No longer would it be possible for a talented commoner to rise to a position of high office through recommendation or examination; these offices would be reserved for the children of existing officeholders, just as if they were conquering tribal chiefs. Evidence that real power lay with the aristocratic families and not the state lies in the fact that an emperor in this period often could not secure the appointment of a favorite to high office because his candidate lacked the appropriate family pedigree.15 With the fall of the Western Jin, patrimonialism evolved in different ways in the north and the south. In the south, the Eastern Jin court was dominated by locally prominent families and by the aristocratic emigres who had moved there from Luoyang. They brought with them the Nine Rank system and a government dominated by w.a.n.gs, Lus, and Changs, all cousins of a close degree from highly ranked lineages.16 Aristocratic domination was bolstered by the continuing growth of large latifundia. Already in the late third century the Western Jin had pa.s.sed a land law declaring the right of all peasant families to a certain minimum amount of land, in return for their being subject to taxes and corvee labor. It also limited the size of holdings for aristocratic families, and the number of tenants and retainers they could shield from national taxation. But this law, as well as a similar one decreed in the Eastern Jin, was never enforced; like w.a.n.g Mang"s abortive land reform, its failure was testament to the growing power of the latifundists and the degree to which they threatened the state"s control and resources.17 In the north, the conquering Tibetans and Turkmen were organized tribally to begin with, and simply inserted their own leading lineages into positions of authority. In the early days of continuing strife and intertribal warfare, these foreign families const.i.tuted the leadership elite of the entire region. The aristocratic Chinese families that had risen to prominence during the Han Dynasty either fled south to the Eastern Jin court or else retreated to their estates. They held power locally but otherwise steered clear of court politics. Things began to change as the Northern Wei Dynasty centralized its power in the second half of the fifth century, and particularly after it moved its capital to the historic city of Luoyang in the 490s. The emperor Xiao-wen forbade the use of Xianbei language and clothing at court, encouraged intermarriage between Xianbei and Chinese families, and invited leading aristocratic families to serve in the court. He succeeded in creating a unified aristocracy that ranked leading families much like the Nine Rank system of the south. This led to a situation where large numbers of high officials were all members of the same lineage and where aristocratic rank was a necessary condition to enter into the highest levels of the bureaucracy.18 The consolidation of land into large latifundia accompanied by the expanding power of the aristocracy was also a problem in the north, as evidenced by a decree issued in 485 aimed at limiting large estates and guaranteeing peasants certain minimum holdings. The consolidation of land into large latifundia accompanied by the expanding power of the aristocracy was also a problem in the north, as evidenced by a decree issued in 485 aimed at limiting large estates and guaranteeing peasants certain minimum holdings.19 THE STRONG CHINESE STATE.
The northern states of Eastern and Western Wei were replaced by Northern Qi and Northern Zhou in the mid-sixth century. Yang Jian, of Xianbei extraction, whose wife was of a powerful Xiongnu clan, rose to prominence as a military commander when his state of Northern Zhou attacked and defeated Northern Qi in 577. After an internal struggle, Yang Jian defeated his rivals and established the Sui Dynasty in 581. His forces went on to defeat the southern states of Liang in 587 and Chen in 589. For the first time since the fall of the Han Dynasty in 220, China was reunified under a single central government (though the actual territory controlled did not correspond exactly to that of the Qin or Han dynasties). The new emperor, known posthumously as Wendi, moved the capital back to its old location in Chang"an and reconst.i.tuted a strong central government modeled on that of the Han Dynasty. His son and successor, Yangdi, had a megalomaniacal penchant for ca.n.a.l building and initiated a rash and unsuccessful attack on the Korean kingdom of Koguryo; the Sui Dynasty disappeared after his death in 618. This time, however, the interregnum was very short: another northern aristocrat named Li Yuan raised a rebel army in 617 and the following year captured Chang"an, proclaiming a new dynasty. The Tang Dynasty would be one of China"s greatest and would last for almost three hundred years until the beginning of the tenth century.
The refounding of a centralized Chinese state under the Sui and Tang dynasties did not end the influence of the aristocratic families that had captured the governments of the different states of the previous interdynastic period. As we will see in chapters 20 20 and and 21 21, the struggle against patrimonialism continued on for another three centuries, and it was not until the Song Dynasty in the eleventh century that public administration was put back on the more "modern" basis it arguably enjoyed during the Han Dynasty. Recentralization of the Chinese state eventually served to invigorate inst.i.tutions like the examination system and the merit-based bureaucracy, which had steadily lost ground to wellborn aristocrats over the preceding centuries.
One of the most interesting questions raised by the chaotic events taking place in the three hundred years between the fall of the Han and the rise of the Sui is not why China fell apart, but rather why it came together again. The issue of how to maintain political unity over so large a territory is hardly trivial. The Roman Empire was never reconst.i.tuted after its decline, despite the efforts of Charlemagne and various Holy Roman Emperors to bring this about in later years. It would have been perfectly conceivable for the multistate system of the post-Han period to have congealed into a quasi-permanent system of competing states as Europe eventually did.
Part of the answer to this question has already come into view. The precocious modernization of the Chinese state left it as the most powerful organized social actor in the society. Even when the central state fell apart, it was succeeded by a host of would-be dynasties that tried as best they could to replicate the Han Dynasty"s centralized inst.i.tutions within their own borders and to reunify China under their own leadership. Legitimacy would ultimately come from inheriting the Mandate of Heaven, not in ruling a little local satrapy. By replicating Han inst.i.tutions within their own borders, the successor states moreover prevented their further disintegration into ever-smaller units. There was nothing like the process of subinfeudation that took place in Europe.
A second and perhaps more important reason why China reunified has implications for contemporary developing countries. During the Qin and Han dynasties, China developed a common culture in addition to creating a strong state. This culture was not the basis for anything that could be called nationalism in the modern sense, since it existed for only the thin layer of elites that made up China"s governing cla.s.s and not the broad ma.s.s of the population. But there was a strong feeling that China was defined by a shared written language, a cla.s.sical literary canon, a bureaucratic tradition, a shared history, empirewide educational inst.i.tutions, and a value system that dictated elite behavior at both the political and social levels. That sense of cultural unity remained even when the state disappeared.
The strength of that common culture became most evident when it encountered foreign barbarians with different trad