The Failure of the Qing Dynasty

The Failure of the Qing Dynasty

Although some short term successes were achieved for China when

dealing with western demands of diplomatic relations and free trade,

in the sense that it retained their pride in their tributary systems,

such responses were in flawed in the long term. Focusing on the time

period 1793-1839, this essay will investigate what were the western

attempts and demands in diplomatic relations and free trade. It will

also investigate what was the reason to the failure of the Qing

dynasty to respond effectively to western demands of diplomatic

relations and free trade. The two aspects will be explored

respectively. It will be argued that the Qing government’s failures in

responding effectively had led to long term grievances towards China’s

existing system by the West, as well as exacerbated silver outflow of

Chinese economy. The main factor leading to failures in effective

response to western demands was China’s construct that it was superior

to any other alien powers.

Western demands for diplomatic relations can be seen in the three

missions from 1793-1834 (Macartney, Amherst and Napier), but Qing’s

rejection of Western demands resulted in Western grievances towards

the existing system. The failure for Qing to respond effectively to

Western demands was due to its world view that it was superior.

The Macartney mission was a relative success, for communication

between the West and China had been established, but the latter two

missions were failures in term of establishing a friendly relationship

between powers. The main objectives of the missions were to open the

whole East to British trade, place relatio...

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... free trade between 1793-1839 was mainly due to China’s construct that

it was superior over any other countries. If the Chinese had not been

so self-absorbed and so intent on keeping their country as closed off

as possible, they might have at least realized that the Guangzhou

system of trade was collapsing and that if it did collapse, the

tribute system would go down with it. China established the

relationship between tribute and trade as an instrument for

controlling the “barbarian”. The failure in responding effectively to

Western demands due to Chinese construct was a failure, for not only

it had exacerbated grievances of foreigners towards the Chinese

system, it had also aggravated the devastating silver outflow and

inflation problem in China. As a result, by 1839, the stage for the

Opium War was already well set.