In the previous episode, we talked about Li Yuanhao establishing the Western Xia in the northwest region, and a war broke out between him and the Northern Song Dynasty.
Although the Western Xia fought several victorious battles, it still chose to negotiate peace with the Song Dynasty because the consumption was too large, and the two sides reached a peace agreement.
And for the Song Dynasty, the country is getting weaker and weaker, no one can beat it, there must be a problem somewhere,
So someone stood up and said, don't panic, I have medicine here.
This person is Wang Anshi, so what about this sentence?
Let's tell the story of Wang Anshi's transformation of the law.
After the death of Emperor Renzong of Song, the successor emperor was Emperor Yingzong of Song.
In those years, he also followed Song Yingzong's eldest son to take over, and this was Song Shenzong.
At that time, the Great Song Dynasty had already shown signs of decline, and the country could not win the war and had no money.
Locally, peasant uprisings broke out at every turn,
In short, everything is a headache, Song Shenzong decided to change this situation,
So someone recommended Wang Anshi to him,
Wang Anshi, a man, proposed some reform plans to the emperor as early as the time of Emperor Renzong of Song.
However, none of them were adopted, and Wang Anshi was also very dissatisfied with some of the practices of the ministers.
At this time, his mother who was far away from home died, and Wang Anshi took this opportunity to resign and go home.
Song Shenzong was bent on changing the situation, but what about Wang Anshi? Another reformer,
Oh, the two of them are a match made in heaven,
So Emperor Shenzong of Song summoned Wang Anshi back to the imperial court, and with the support of the emperor, Wang Anshi began the greatest cause of his life, changing the law.
Wang Anshi's transformation method boils down to four words in the final analysis--to tear down and start over,
The steps are quite large, even with some contemporary thinking,
Let's pick a few of the key points to talk about.
Article 1: The Green Shoots Act
It is said that in ancient times, the peasants' work and rest laws were generally like this,
Sow in the spring, harvest in the fall, continue to sow the next spring, and so on,
But there's a problem with that.
In the spring of the following year, the autumn grain of the previous year was almost finished, and the money from the sale of grain was almost spent.
And the new seeds have just been planted, still in the seedling stage, not mature,
What to eat at this time? Where does the money needed to grow crops come from?
Especially when there is a natural disaster, and there is no social insurance, this is a life,
So the peasants would usually borrow money from the landlord, which was equivalent to usury.
If the peasants do not go to the land, they will be taken away by the landlords.
Without land, the peasants have only two ways to go, either to rebel in groups or to starve to death.
Therefore, in order to change this situation, Wang Anshi promulgated the provisions of the Green Shoots Law.
In the spring of each year, the local government borrows money to lend grain to the peasants, charging only a very low interest rate.
Farmers can use this money to cultivate the land, and when the harvest is harvested in the autumn, they will return it to the government with the profits.
You listen, it's like investing from a bank loan,
This measure can indeed increase the income of the imperial court, strike a blow to the landlords, prevent them from withholding the common people, and improve the peasants' enthusiasm for production.
However, it is not so simple, and when it is really implemented, the problem comes,
First of all, the interest rate of this loan is a little lower than that of usury, but it is not very favorable.
I'll just put it this way, you now take out a loan to buy a house, the interest rate of a business loan. That's about 5%.
And Wang Anshi's interest rate of this green shoots method is 20%, of course, the landlord's strong loan shark, it is even higher,
When it comes to implementation, local governments at all levels have tasks, and this loan must be released.
So if you don't want to borrow it, you can't lend it to you,
And even more excessively, some of the poorer local governments don't have much money.
However, in order to complete the target, not only did they not borrow, but also charged interest to the peasants in the name of reform.
There are also some places where there is not much food, and it is specially used to relieve the victims of disasters in special periods.
As soon as the Green Shoots Law came out, the government lent out the grain for disaster relief in order to increase revenue.
As a result, just in time for the natural disaster, the grain that was constantly lent out was not enough, the grain for disaster relief was gone, and in the end it was the common people who suffered.
In short, the Green Shoots Law did increase the income of the imperial court,
But it also made the burden on the people heavier, resulting in a large number of people going bankrupt.
Therefore, the BIBS method is the most controversial of the changes.
Article 2: The Conscription Law
It is said that in the past, according to the regulations of the state, ordinary people had to take turns to go to the local yamen as a unit and work as temporary workers for a period of time.
And once you go to work as a temporary worker, you delay farming,
Therefore, everyone is very reluctant to do this thing,
The newly promulgated Recruitment Law provides. In the future, you don't have to go to Yamen to work as a temporary worker.
However, you need to pay a sum of money, which is called the exemption money, that is, the money that is exempted from serving in the yamen.
This measure also looks very good.
When the people have sufficient working hours, they can promote production, pay exemption money, and increase the government's fiscal revenue.
However, it is not so simple, and the implementation of the property law has been opposed by many rich families.
Because in the past, these rich families all enjoyed exemption from military service, and there was no need to be temporary workers at all.
As soon as the conscription law was implemented, there was an indiscriminate attack, and no matter who it was, it was necessary to pay the exemption money to be exempted from service.
In addition, some poor people would have gone to the service without paying. Now you have to pay money, which adds to the burden,
But it is indeed progressive to liberate people from military service.
Only when people are more free can they create more value.
Therefore, the reform of later generations has generally followed this line of thinking.
But at that time, it was very difficult to implement, so the resistance to the recruitment law was very large.
The third is the Municipal Easy Law
In the past, materials were controlled by private merchants.
In order to make high profits, merchants often press the goods, wait until the market is out of stock, and then sell them at a high price.
After the promulgation of the Service Law, the imperial court set up a special organization for the procurement of goods.
In normal times, buy some goods that cannot be sold, wait until the market is out of stock, and then sell at regular prices.
In this way, merchants can be restricted from controlling the market, raising prices, and allowing ordinary people to buy what they need at normal prices.
But it's not that simple.
To put it simply, this measure is to replace the private businessmen with officials and businessmen, and the government will play the role of businessmen.
However, the appetite of officials and businessmen is much greater than that of fame.
Although the people's livelihood raises prices, there is still competition between different civil merchants, and monopoly prices will not be formed, nor will they be raised to a very high level.
As soon as the officials and merchants entered the market, the supply of goods throughout the world was all in one, and a complete monopoly was formed.
In order to make huge profits, the officials and merchants raised the price to a higher price than the private merchants, and in the end not only did the people become victims.
If the civil merchants want to take the goods from the hands of the officials, they must also be slaughtered fiercely.
So this measure is also thankless.
Article 4: Armor Protection Act
This measure is aimed at the national military reserves,
The Baojia Law stipulates that every household in the rural areas shall be unified and reorganized with the guarantee as the unit.
Ten families are a treasure, and families with more than two people choose one person to be a pauline,
These Paulines, we can understand as militia.
When they are not farming, they must gather together for military training,
In this way, not only can the law and order of the countryside be maintained, but also the country can go into battle to kill the enemy in times of crisis.
On the one hand, local public security has been enhanced, on the other hand, military reserves have been established for the country, and a large amount of military expenditure has been saved.
Isn't it very good to look at the armor protection method like this?
But it's not that simple.
Really execute, that's another thing.
The Paulines not only had to undergo cruel training, but also took turns on duty.
This is a devastation to their bodies and will also affect the efficiency of agricultural production.
Moreover, baoding leaders are also rude to them, arbitrarily beating and cursing, and sometimes extorting money,
Many Paulines could not bear this kind of destruction and had to flee,
But home could not go back, so they could only gather together and occupy the mountain as king.
In the end, the good armor protection method became a greenhouse for cultivating rebels.
Article 5: The Art of War
When Zhao Kuangyin was emperor, in order to prevent the military generals from rebelling,
At the suggestion of the prime minister, a new military system was implemented------------------------------------------
What is a more discipline?
That is, the forbidden army of the imperial court was stationed in the central and local areas, and the central and local armies rotated regularly.
Today you are in the locality, I am in the center, and a month later, I will go to the place where you return to the center.
When the army moves, the generals in charge of the army do not move with them, and the soldiers under the generals change batch after batch.
The end result is that the soldiers do not know the generals, and the generals do not understand the soldiers.
Then do you think such a team can have combat effectiveness?
Therefore, this reform abolished the law of more shogunate and began to implement the law of general war.
Simply put, the army is divided into many units, each unit has a certificate and an attachment, which is specifically responsible for the military training of the unit.
In this way, it changed the situation in which soldiers and soldiers were separated since the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, and greatly improved the combat effectiveness of the army.
And the art of general warfare is also one of the few relatively successful measures in Wang Anshi's transformation of the law.
In addition to these Wang Anshi transformation methods, there are many other measures, and we will not unfold them one by one.
Now let's go back and look at these measures, and it is not so simple to sum up in one sentence.
The starting point of each change measure is good, but there are some logical problems, and it is all changed to implement it at the grass-roots level.
Under the social conditions at that time, it was too difficult to implement the policy.
This 16-year change of law, with the full support of Song Shenzong, has indeed made the government richer and richer, and the combat effectiveness of the army has also been enhanced.
But although the government is rich, the people are unlucky.
All strata, such as the civil merchants and peasants, have been hit to varying degrees, and even seriously damaged the interests of some bureaucrats.
So at the same time as Wang Anshi changed the law. The opposition has not stopped.
After the death of Emperor Shenzong of Song, the empress dowager, who was obedient to the government, completely abolished the new law and re-adopted the old law.
The vigorous Wang Anshi transformation method ended in failure,
What exactly is Wang Anshi's transformation method?
The evaluation of Wang Anshi's transformation method has always been polarized.
Some people say that this change has historical and progressive significance.
Some people say that this change is not good, and it has collapsed the country from the bottom.
It also caused party strife in the imperial court, and the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty was related to Wang Anshi's change of law.
The controversy over this matter has not stopped since the day Wang Anshi began to change the law, and until today more than a thousand years have passed.
Finally, we can only say that the ideal is very full, the reality is very bone,
It's really not so easy to do perfect reforms.
But everyone who dares to change deserves our respect.
Okay, let's summarize today's content,
After Emperor Shenzong of Song succeeded to the throne, he appointed Wang Anshi to carry out reforms and changes.
Wang Anshi's change of law increased the state's financial revenue and increased the combat effectiveness of the army.
However, due to improper implementation, the exploitation of the people at all levels is serious, and the interests of the big bureaucrats are also harmed.
The change of law ended in failure.