Most of the people in the crowd actually only have a literal understanding of historical concepts, and do not really understand, was the Qing Dynasty really closed to the country? Not quite.
Here it is necessary to first explain the origin of the word "lock country", it belongs to the Toei Japanese imported products, after the tokugawa old turtle unified Japan, in view of the erosion and adverse influence of Western culture and science and technology on Japan, (iron cannon to facilitate rebellion, Christianity advocates human rights) in order to live a good life, so the "lock country order" was issued.
What is the meaning of the national lock order, which is divided into internal and external and cultural aspects, and has three meanings!
Internal: Japanese immigrants are prohibited, japanese at the unofficial level are prohibited from participating in trade activities, and Japanese are prohibited from sailing away from Japan.
External: Trade with Japan was strictly controlled by foreign ships, and the only people who were allowed to trade were the Dutch and China. And even restrictive trade has clear regulations on trade goods, the volume of trade, and even the place of trade (Nagasaki and artificial islands: Dejima).
For culture: The spread of culture, especially the spread of Catholic Christian Renaissance ideas and the like, is strictly prohibited.
(Japan living behind closed doors)
If, in layman's terms, that is, the Japanese want to go out, it is a big no- and trade must be carried out, you must strictly control it according to me, ideas must be disseminated, sorry, we prohibit the spread of ideas here.
Under this policy, Japan closed the door to exchanges with the world, and the Sino-Western exchanges that Japan originally had in the Warring States period were cut off!
So what was the situation in the Qing Dynasty?
The Qing Dynasty's sea ban was actually carried out in stages, and the craziest time was during the Shunzhi Kangxi period before Taiwan was pacified!
Cruel "sea removal orders" and "sea ban orders" were issued.
Relocation order: That is, within how many kilometers close to the coast, even people cannot have it, and all the indigenous people must be forcibly relocated, let alone trade, and are not allowed to survive on the coast.
Prohibition of the Sea: The literal meaning is correct, you cannot go to the sea to fish, you cannot trade in the sea, and you cannot have a relationship with the sea.
The purpose of all this is to deal with the Zheng regime in Taiwan, which can be regarded as a different kind of jianbi Qingye, with the purpose of trapping the Zheng clan on an isolated island.
Because of the order to move the sea and the ban on the sea, it has caused an unknown number of human tragedies, and countless coastal residents have suffered greatly.
Duration, policy implementation density is rare in the world, the "sea relocation order" policy, issued three times, "sea ban order" issued five times.
It is no longer enough to describe the density of policies.
However, this does not mean that the Qing Dynasty completely banned maritime trade, on the contrary, while brutally "moving the sea and banning the sea" against the people, the Qing government was officially affiliated and carried out active foreign trade activities, the purpose is also very simple!
Hit your opponent just.
The Zheng regime, derived from the remnants of the Zheng Zhilong pirates after being absorbed by the Ming Dynasty, recovered Taiwan under the leadership of Zheng Chenggong, and only then did it have a base area.
Zheng Zhilong was not so much a pirate as he was the largest maritime power and the largest maritime merchant in Southeast Asia at that time.
Doing business is a very profitable thing, not to mention the blockade of the mainland, with such location conditions as the premise, the Zheng clan monopolized the trade transit needs of Japan and China (smuggling) and the West, and made a lot of money.
Economic strength determines combat effectiveness, if the Zheng regime is getting richer and richer, then how to fight?
So in order to attack the Zheng clan, the Qing Dynasty oppressed the people through "moving the sea and forbidding the sea", and also carried out foreign trade activities, and the Zheng clan competed for the right to transit trade with Japan, not only that, the Qing Dynasty also actively contacted the Netherlands, using the Dutch navy as a backup to attack the Zheng clan!
(Zheng's sphere of influence)
It can be seen from this that the Qing Dynasty's initial attitude towards maritime trade was not deeply resentful but supportive.
There is also evidence that as early as the twelfth year of Shunzhi (1655 AD), the Qing Dynasty carried out a tribute trade with the Dutch sea coachman, and even stipulated that the Netherlands could pay tribute to the Qing Dynasty for eight years!
The Netherlands thus had the right to study in Beijing to sell goods.
After obtaining the official license, the Netherlands also saw a lot of large-scale trade with The King Shangzhixin of Zhennan, who was stationed in Guangdong!
According to the data of the "History of East-West Transportation", the Dutch East India Company's trade with China lasted for a long time and the trade volume was as large as tens of billions of livres (Dutch currency).
The Netherlands made not much money in China through import and export trade, which was also the source of wealth in the netherlands at that time.
After decades of sea bans, the Zheng regime was depleted of its wealth and was finally wiped out by the Qing Dynasty in 1682 AD!
Without the threat of the Zheng regime, there was no need to move the sea and ban the sea, so the Qing Dynasty Kangxi 23 years. (1684 AD), began to restore the maritime trade!
Now the unification of the sea, the tranquility of the world, the same unity of the Manchu and Han people, so that the foreign trade, in order to show the rule of wealth, to open the sea trade - "Qing Literature General Examination"
The opening of the people's shipbuilding trade will be opened, and two Fujian Customs (Fujian Customs) offices will be set up to manage foreign trade, one in Fuzhou and one in Xiamen.
A year later, in the 24th year of Kangxi (1685), Kangxi ordered the opening of Guangdong Customs (Guangdong Customs), Jianghai Customs (Lianyungang, Shandong), and Zhejiang Customs. (Ningbo, Zhejiang)
(Qing Dynasty Overseas Trade)
Customs were set up along the route, and for a time China's maritime trade activities returned to their former prosperity.
So why did a prosperous scene disappear later?
It has to do with the hidden problems after the customs trade boom!
First of all: it is the issue of immigration, after the opening of the sea order, large-scale immigration of coastal residents has become a common practice, in order to pursue a better life and freedom, immigration has become the norm in the coast, and now the Chinese in Southeast Asia in addition to the late Ming Dynasty migration, many of them went to Southeast Asia at that time.
Secondly, it is a national security issue, western trading ships coming to China have artillery equipment, Western ships threaten China, and there is a threat to Qing rule from the possible flow of weapons, which is a big problem for the Qing government.
Finally: there is the problem of ideological dissemination, and the Qing government is afraid that under the guidance of the ideas brought by westerners, the submissive people will become rebels.
Faced with this problem, the Attitude of the Qing Government was not to rationally guide but to contain, and repeatedly issued control in the three dynasties of Kangxi, Qianlong, and Jiaqing.
In the 56th year of Kangxi (1717 AD), Kangxi issued a decree to strictly control the outflow of population, restrict private samples, prohibit personal trade, and stipulate that if you go abroad to settle for more than three years, it is not Chinese, which is also the basis for the subsequent "Lanfang Republic" to face the threat of Dutch aggression, the Qing government ignored it, and those immigrants were not Chinese in the eyes of the Qing government.
In the 22nd year of Qianlong ( 1757 AD ) , in the face of the possible threat of force from foreign merchant ships wandering around , the problem of internal flow of weapons , Qiankun decided to close the original four customs in Fujian (Fujian), Zhejiang ( Zhejiang ) and Jiang (Shandong ) , leaving Guangzhou as the only foreign trade port!
This is the so-called "one-port trade" stipulating that the trade between Western countries and China can only be carried out by The Guangzhou Customs.
However, this ban was only for powerful Western countries, and as for The Qing government's vassal states such as Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia, it was not included in the ban.
Moreover, for Chinese merchants to go to sea, as long as there is an official permission, not private smuggling, there are not many restrictions.
(One Mouth Trade)
The main ports of Western trade with China are not the one-way closures of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Fujian, but the Guangdong (Guangdong) customs!
It can be seen that the Qing Dynasty did not have the so-called closed country, and the problem of completely reducing contact with the outside world did not arise.
So why did the "closed country" lead to the backwardness of the Qing Dynasty?
In fact, this is just a confusion of concepts, because what caused the Qing Dynasty to lag behind was not "closed to the country" but "arrogant and arrogant" externally, "strictly controlling the people" internally, and "rampant corruption" itself.
In the case of arrogance and arrogance, the attitude of the Qing Dynasty towards Western countries has always been full of contempt and discrimination, which stems from the vanity of the Heavenly Kingdom. They treated the Western powers as small states like vassal states.
I would like to ask, how could the Qing Dynasty, which existed like a vassal state, look at them squarely?
Every time they came to trade, the only thought might be that this yellow hair, golden retriever, red hair came to send money again.
So will there be a need for communication?
In the case of strict control of the people, all the Chinese, in fact, can not contact with foreigners, the setting of the thirteen lines of Guangzhou, is to let foreigners do good business set up a special area, as for foreign businessmen want to go deep inland, sorry, without official permission, you can not go.
Under such circumstances, how can the Chinese people have the opportunity to understand the outside world?
In the case of horizontal corruption, all officials only have money in their eyes, so how can they think, how much more advanced is this foreigner than us? Are they stronger? Will they be aggressive?
If they are full of silver, will they consider these questions?
In the process of continuous development of Western countries, although China is not "closed to the country", it is still lagging behind.
Backwardness comes from...
The "arrogance" in attitude made the emperor and the foreigners in the central government who did not pay attention to sending money, and only then did they have a joke about where England was.
The policy of "strict control of the people" has made countless Chinese people have no chance to contact Westerners at all, and they have never seen it before.
How can countless officials think about the "rampant corruption" in enforcement that countless officials only see money?
After such layers are superimposed, a country that was not originally closed is more closed than Japan, the country where the "lockdown order" prevails.
(This war did not wake up China.)
When the British appeared at the door with sticks and did not hesitate to fight for opium, the Qing Dynasty was sad.
The root cause of the great changes that have not occurred in three thousand years is never how big the changes are, but that we ourselves have never changed.
Whimpering, sighing...