CHAPTER 2
The Kowtow Question and the Opium War
AT THE CLOSE of the eighteenth century, China stood
at the height of its imperial greatness. The Qing Dynasty,
established in 1644 by Manchu tribes riding into China from the
northeast, had turned China into a major military power. Fusing
Manchu and Mongol military prowess with the cultural and
governmental prowess of the Han Chinese, it embarked on a program
of territorial expansion to the north and west, establishing a
Chinese sphere of influence deep into Mongolia, Tibet, and
modern-day Xinjiang. China stood predominant in Asia; it was at
least the rival of any empire on earth.1
Yet the high point of
the Qing Dynasty also turned into the turning point of its destiny.
For China’s wealth and expanse attracted the attention of Western
empires and trading companies operating far outside the bounds and
conceptual apparatus of the traditional Chinese world order. For
the first time in its history, China faced “barbarians” who no
longer sought to displace the Chinese dynasty and claim the Mandate
of Heaven for themselves; instead, they proposed to replace the
Sinocentric system with an entirely new vision of world order—with
free trade rather than tribute, resident embassies in the Chinese
capital, and a system of diplomatic exchange that did not refer to
non-Chinese heads of state as “honorable barbarians” pledging
fealty to their Emperor in Beijing.
Unbeknownst to
Chinese elites, these foreign societies had developed new
industrial and scientific methods that, for the first time in
centuries—or perhaps ever—surpassed China’s own. Steam power,
railways, and new methods of manufacturing and capital formation
enabled enormous advances in productivity in the West. Imbued with
a conquering impulse that propelled them into China’s traditional
sphere of dominance, the Western powers considered Chinese claims
of universal overlordship over Europe and Asia risible. They were
determined to impose on China their own standards of international
conduct, by force if necessary. The resulting confrontation
challenged the basic Chinese cosmology and left wounds still
festering over a century later in an age of restored Chinese
eminence.
Beginning in the
seventeenth century, Chinese authorities had noted the increasing
numbers of European traders on the southeast China coast. They saw
little to differentiate the Europeans from other foreigners
operating at the fringes of the empire, save perhaps their
particularly glaring lack of Chinese cultural attainments. In the
official Chinese view, these “West Sea barbarians” were classified
as “tribute envoys” or “barbarian merchants.” On rare occasions,
some were permitted to travel to Beijing, where—if admitted into
the presence of the Emperor—they were expected to perform the
ritual kowtow: the act of prostration, with the forehead touching
the ground three times.
For foreign
representatives the points of entry into China and routes to the
capital were strictly circumscribed. Access to the Chinese market
was limited to a tightly regulated seasonal trade at Guangzhou
(then known as Canton). Each winter foreign merchants were required
to sail home. They were not permitted to venture further into
China. Regulations deliberately held them at bay. It was unlawful
to teach the Chinese language to these barbarians or to sell them
books on Chinese history or culture. Their communications were to
take place through specially licensed local merchants.2
The notion of free
trade, resident embassies, and sovereign equality—by this point,
the minimum rights enjoyed by Europeans in almost every other
corner of the world—were unheard of in China. One tacit exception
had been made for Russia. Its rapid eastward expansion (the Czar’s
domains now abutted Qing territories in Xinjiang, Mongolia, and
Manchuria) placed it in a unique position to threaten China. The
Qing Dynasty, in 1715, permitted Moscow to establish a Russian
Orthodox mission in Beijing; it eventually took on the role of a de
facto embassy, the only foreign mission of its kind in China for
over a century.
The contacts extended
to Western European traders, limited as they were, were seen by the
Qing as a considerable indulgence. The Son of Heaven had, in the
Chinese view, shown his benevolence by allowing them to partake in
Chinese trade—particularly in tea, silk, lacquer-ware, and rhubarb,
for which the West Sea barbarians had developed a voracious
appetite. Europe was too far from the Middle Kingdom ever to become
Sinicized along Korean or Vietnamese lines.
Initially, the
Europeans accepted the role of supplicants in the Chinese tributary
order, in which they were labeled as “barbarians” and their trade
as “tribute.” But as the Western powers grew in wealth and
conviction, this state of affairs grew untenable.