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.As the central state facedsevere fiscal restraints by the nineteenth century, the military fell intodisarray, and officials neglected maintenance of the infrastructure of dams,dikes, canals, and the granary system.These problems contributed to therebellions of mid-century, and remained unchecked even after the centralgovernment recovered power.Some historians have traced a devolution in power from the center tothe regions, but this was not a zero-sum game.The Beijing government wastrying to increase its powers and sometimes succeeded.In general, however,China saw a growth of political power that benefited a variety of local elitesmore than it did the state.The functions of government were being extendeddeeper into society than before, but not necessarily under the auspices orcontrol of the imperial state.Merchants in some cities raised funds, forexample, to fight fires.To a degree, this was a long-term secular trend.19 Inthe wake of the Taiping Rebellion when the Qing granted provincial andlocal authorities unprecedented rights to collect taxes for their own militarypurposes, as well as the right to serve in their own districts, the centralgovernment was never fully able to recover those rights.As the bureaucracywas restored to functioning order, parallel institutions dominated by localelites also grew.Society was more militarized than before, and families withmixed commercial landed interests made sure they dominated local militias.Occasionally, ambitious families could parlay power on the county level intoprovincial influence during the Qing, and even provincial domination after1911.20 Militarization was particularly marked in peripheral and frontierareas; in economic core areas another innovation gave certain elites newpowers.When tax and rent collection were combined, landlords were givendirect access to the police powers of the imperial state.It may be that insome areas, after the Taiping Rebellion was finally crushed, the state limitedlandlord exactions in order to forestall peasant disturbances.21 China s eliteswere not completely oblivious to the lessons of the rebellion, and rural crisiswas stayed for a generation.But only until the turn of the century.Local elites derived their power and influence from a variety of sources inthe late Qing.22 For centuries elite power had revolved around displaying aparticular lifestyle, maintaining critical social networks (marriage andfriendship patterns), and other behavior having nothing directly to do withdegree status.Even nationally prominent families did not rely on the exami-nation route, at least not in every generation, but rather on private economicenterprises (including, but not limited to, landholding) and local publicfunctions (such as coordinating the building and maintenance of irrigation 1911: History and historiography 47works or, in times of trouble, leading local militia).Examination successdepended on economic and social success, for Chinese elites lacked many ofthe strengths of elites in other agrarian kingdoms, such as inheritable titles,entailed property, or positions at court.They none the less depended on thestate for their legitimation, just as the ruling dynasty depended on the gentry.The Taiping Rebellion had permanently weakened the Qing by battering theprestige of the imperial house, by raising the long-suppressed issue of legiti-macy of Manchu rulers, by fostering militarization, and by forcing localelites to adopt new strategies of survival.This is not to say the revolution was inevitable.The gentry and provincialofficialdom remained loyal, and the reforms from the 1860s did much torestore the integrity of the Qing s administration.It was by no meansapparent that the Qing would inevitably fail to suppress, adapt, or reachaccommodation with such new social forces as challenged it.The militarydecentralization of the Taiping period set a precedent for the military reformseventually led by Yuan Shikai, which allowed him to finally push over thetottering Qing, but the court remained in control almost until the end.Still, if the revolution was not inevitable, the court was constantlythwarted, and its control reflected the weakness of the opposition or thefailure, until the end, to imagine an alternative to the Qing.The governmentfound that any effort to make itself more efficient created dissatisfactionamong some constituency.In broad historical perspective, the New Policieslook like a significant chapter in modern Chinese state-building.Bureaucraticrestructuring to create ministries of industry and commerce, finance, interior,and education shaped later Republican and Communist governments.But theimmediate impact of the Qing s New Policies was to weaken the state.Forthey tried to put the dynasty and the imperial system on a new foundationwhile they simultaneously legitimated elite oppositional politics.The symbolicand emotional power of the emperor over Chinese elites was thus enfeebled.What might have worked in the 1890s was too late by the 1900s.Traditionalmoral texts in schools began to be replaced by a Westernized curriculum.Local constitution offices and provincial assemblies legitimated the kind ofgentry politics previously condemned as factions. A national assembly evenbegan to meet in 1910.And again, the practical and symbolic lynchpin of themonarchy gentry relationship, the exam system, was abolished in 1905.The Qing did not simply fall; it was also pushed [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]