The Qing Dynasty was a feudal dynasty ruled by ethnic minorities, and its founders were originally nomads in northeastern China, and later established the Later Jin regime and gradually entered the Central Plains.
Some people say that the Qing Dynasty entered the customs like a little daughter-in-law with a dowry, which is easily reminiscent of the Qing Dynasty's entry into the customs to bring land and expand the territory of China.
In a sense, the Qing Dynasty did lay the foundation of China's territory, but the "dowry" and contribution brought by the Qing Dynasty's entry into customs was not only manifested in the expansion and maintenance of the territory, but more importantly, the Qing Dynasty's management and exploration of non-provincial border areas.
The establishment and development of the post-Kim regime
During the Wanli years of the Ming Dynasty, the northeastern Jurchen tribes dominated their own lands, and the heroes fought in a stage of dispersion and chaos, and in such a turbulent period, Nur Hachi, the Jurchen of Jianzhou, entered the historical stage.
In 1583, Nurhachi attacked Nikan Wailan with 13 armoured cavalry and began his journey to unify the Jurchen tribes.
Those who are willing to surrender and submit, Nurhachi will pacify and give preferential treatment, and those who are unwilling to surrender and submit, Nurhachi will send troops to them. Under Nurhach's southern conquest and northern war, the Jurchen tribes such as Hada, Huifa, and Ula were conquered by him.
During the conquest of the Jurchen tribes by Nurhach, the power of the Jurchens expanded, the population increased, and the economy developed.
In order to unify the Jurchen clans more quickly, Nurhachi set about breaking down traditional forms of tribal organization and establishing more effective ruling institutions.
In 1587, Nurhachi built three castles and palaces in the southeast of Hulanhada and in Zhongpinggang, the boundary of the Gaha River, and subsequently established a system to administer the Jurchen ministries.
Previously, there were no mandatory constraints within the clan and tribal society, and Nurhach's practice changed the traditional management method and was more conducive to management, which marked the initial formation of the embryonic state of the post-Jin regime.
The Jurchen ministries had always practiced cattle recording, a system that integrated production and military and was the basic administrative organization of Manchu society.
In the process of unifying the Jurchen tribes, in order to strengthen control and consolidate political power, Nurhachi created the Eight Banners system on the basis of the Niu Record, and all the people of the Jurchen tribes under the jurisdiction of Houjin were organized into the banner, breaking the traditional tribal organizational form.
Under the Eight Flags system, there is no obvious boundary between the people and the soldiers, and the people must wear armor and go to the battlefield without hesitation when they need to fight, and when the war is stopped, the people can farm and hunt and be citizens with peace of mind.
Under this system, the Jurchen ministries neither delayed the war nor the production.
The Eight Flags system is not only a military system, but also has administrative and economic functions such as internal management of public affairs and collection and enlistment. In 1615, Nurhachi appointed five ministers and ten zarguzi to help administer state affairs.
If there is a case, it is first reported to Zarguzi for trial, after the trial, it is reported to the Minister of Justice, who after the review is reported to each Baylor, and finally the Baylor plays to Nurhach, and then Nurhachi makes the final decision.
This way of governing state affairs is more orderly and more effective.
In addition to the Eight Flags system, Nurhachi also developed a series of penal systems, which perfected the administrative functions of the state, and since then a set of state power has taken shape. In 1616, Nurhachi formally established the Houjin regime.
In order to consolidate his power, Nurhachi adjusted his ruling policy many times, but ethnic contradictions remained acute in the later stages of his reign.
In 1618, Nurhachi launched a general attack on Daming, occupying the eastern Liaoning region step by step, and from then on entered the Han region. In 1621, Nurhachi occupied Liaoshen again.
At the time of Emperor Taiji's accession to the throne, the Houjin Kingdom had a diverse ethnic composition, a large population, a vast territory, and sharp ethnic contradictions, and it was urgently necessary for him to constantly adjust political, economic, military and other systems to stabilize social order and promote social development.
In order to improve the state-level mechanism and strengthen the centralization of power, Emperor Taiji ordered the addition of Bagushan Erzhen to assist him in managing all state affairs, and added many positions to weaken the power of the Eight Banner Banner Lord.
In addition, Huang Taiji also referred to the political system of the Ming Dynasty and constantly improved the ruling institutions. In terms of military system, he perfected the eight-flag military system. With the increasing improvement of the Eight Flags system, Houjin's military strength continued to increase, which also promoted the integration of ethnic groups.
In this way, the Houjin regime centered on imperial power was established, laying the foundation for strengthening centralized power after the Qing Dynasty entered the Central Plains.
Jurchen pairs operate in the northeast
The Jurchens were divided into five departments, and Nurhachi began the work of unifying the Jurchen ministries from 1583, conquering each ministry successively and completing the unification of the five ministries of Jianzhou.
The tribes of Haixi were very dissatisfied with the expansion of the Jianzhou Jurchens, so they resisted and attacked them, but Nurhachi defeated the military alliance of the various ministries and changed the disparity in power between the Jianzhou Jurchens and the West Sea Jurchens.
Nurhachi adopted a strategy of "breaking down one by one" against the Jurchens in the West Sea, and with the assistance of the marriage alliance, won the Wujieyan War in 1607, after this war, Nurhachi completely opened the passage of Houjin to the Ussuri River and Heilongjiang River basin area, with the capture of Saharian and Engubu, Nurhachi in 1616, basically achieved the unification of the lower reaches of the Heilongjiang River.
In 1616, Nurhachi established the "Dajin", which became a local separatist regime against the Ming dynasty, and in 1618, Nurhachi began fighting with the Ming army, and the following year, Nurhachi achieved the unification of the Haixi Jurchen tribes.
After that, Nurhachi occupied more than seventy cities in Liaodong during the Ming Dynasty.
In 1625, the Later Jin regime moved the capital to Shenyang. In 1626, Emperor Taiji ascended the throne, and while competing with the Ming Dynasty for the orthodoxy of the Central Plains, he actively carried out activities to unify the middle and upper reaches of the Heilongjiang River. After Emperor Taiji came to the throne, he adopted a policy of pacifying all ministries in the Heilongjiang River Basin, and each ministry was annexed one after another.
In 1642, the Heilongjiang River basin was officially included in the rule of the Qing Dynasty, which adopted a series of necessary political management measures and strengthened its management and rule over the unification of the northeast region.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Mongolian region was divided into three parts: southern Mongolia, northern Mongolia and western Mongolia. Because the Mongol region of southern Mongolia was in an important strategic position of the Later Jin regime and the Ming regime, it has always been the focus of contention between the two sides.
Under the rule of the Ming Dynasty, the Mongol tribes of southern Mongols were separated, but they did not directly affect the rule of the Ming Dynasty.
In order to be able to control the situation in Southern Mongolia to the greatest extent, the Ming Dynasty took advantage of the internal contradictions of Southern Mongolia to maintain friendly relations with Lin Dan of the Chahar Division, and also united with it to contend with the Later Jin regime.
In order to be able to smoothly enter the Central Plains, the two generations of rulers Nurhachi and Huang Taiji made great efforts to conquer southern Mongolia.
Nurhachi took advantage of the internal contradictions in southern Mongolia to break them one by one according to the plan, and gave them rewards to seek peace with war, and Southern Mongols also accompanied the army in Nurhach's war with the Ming Dynasty.
After Emperor Taiji came to the throne, he continued to strengthen the power of the Later Jin regime and develop relations with Southern Mongols, and the Han and Naiman tribes of Southern Mongolia were successively annexed to Emperor Taiji in 1627, and in the same year, some tribes united to launch a military attack on Lin Dan Khan.
In 1628, Huang Taiji personally led the tribes that had returned to obedience to attack Lin Dan Khan, achieving a great victory and establishing Huang Taiji's position as an ally in the southern Mongolian region.
In the following year, Emperor Taiji issued decrees to the southern Mongol ministries to consolidate his rule, and when the six ministries were established in 1631, Mongolian administration was set up in each of the six ministries to strengthen the administration of southern Mongols.
In 1632, Emperor Taiji led all his troops to attack Lin Dan Khan again, and Lin Dan Khan was defeated. Later, Lin Dan Khan died, and Emperor Taiji surrendered Lin Dan Khan's old ministry, and in 1635 established the unity of the Later Jin regime in southern Mongolia.
The Ming Dynasty mainly adopted fetter rule over Southern Mongols, while the Qing Dynasty, in order to strengthen its jurisdiction over the Southern Mongol region, on the basis of the original social structure of the Mongolian region, used the organizational principle of Eight Flags Manchuria to adopt the banner alliance system, stipulating that Inner Mongolia was directly under the Qing royal family, official positions could not be hereditary, and affairs could not be decided by themselves.
For the foreign Mongols, the Qing government required it to pay tribute to itself and obey military orders, all of which effectively strengthened the Qing government's direct governance of the Mongols.
The Later Jin regime achieved the unification of southern Mongolia before entering the customs and established a relevant management system, which provided a lot of experience for the legal system construction in the Mongolian region after the Qing Dynasty later entered the Central Plains.
Governance strategies for Mongolian and Tibetan regions
In the early Qing Dynasty, the Mongolian-Tibetan issue was at the forefront of the border ethnic issues in the west and north. Among the political strategies of the Qing Dynasty, the most distinctive thing was the wisdom and strategy for dealing with ethnic and religious issues.
The first strategy implemented by the Qing Dynasty was the two-way interactive marriage policy created by Nurhachi on the basis of inheriting the practice of intermarriage between his predecessors and his pro-marriage. This policy was a long-term, large-scale, multi-level and high-frequency governance strategy for Mongolian and Tibetan regions in China's feudal historical society.
After the entry of the Qing Dynasty, a political alliance with special monarchical status was formed between the Manchurian nobles and the Mongol princes, and the Qing Dynasty controlled the rise and fall of the status of the Mongol princes and the sealing of titles through the marriage system.
Through this two-way interactive marriage policy, Nurhachi broke the deadlock in Manchu relations and laid a solid foundation for the stable development of Manchu-Mongolian relations in the future.
The second strategy practiced by the Qing dynasty was the strategy of alliances.
The alliance strategy is a common phenomenon when there is a balance of power between multiple forces, and it is a community of interests formed by regimes with equal or opposing powers on the basis of seeking common concerns and their own needs, which is manifested in political echoes and military progress and retreat. The purpose of alliances is to maximize one's own power and change the balance of power between different political forces.
Under the promotion of the alliance strategy and the deepening and consolidation of the Manchu-Mongolian alliance, in 1626, the princes of 16 departments and 49 banners of southern Mongolia jointly honored the emperor and the great khan of all Mongolia in Shengjing.
Nurhachi also adopted a strategy of combining grace and power with the Mongol ministry, and Huang Taiji adopted the policy of "deterring people with troops and cherishing virtue", and favored the policy of "cherishing with virtue", believing that it was better to use force to deter than to use pacification.
Therefore, Nurhachi and Huang Taiji accorded high courtesy to the Mongol tribes and envoys who came to the annexation, rewarded them, and gave the subordinate Mongol nobles privileges. Under this policy, in just nine years, Monan Mongolia was all subordinate to Emperor Taiji.
In addition, the Houjin regime also made full use of the bond of religion to establish direct interaction with Tibet.
In the historical process of the rise of Houjin, Tibetan Buddhism continued to spread to the Houjin region, and in order to encircle the Mongolian tribes, the rulers adopted a policy conducive to the development of Tibetan Buddhism in Mongolia since the beginning of the Yuan Dynasty.
The formulation and implementation of a series of policies not only played a great role in improving Manchu-Mongolian and Manchu-Tibetan relations, but also increased the political integration and social control of the Later Jin regime, laying the political foundation for completely changing the balance of power between the Later Jin regime and the Ming Dynasty.
In the historical process of the Qing Dynasty establishing national power and gradually unifying various tribes, the rulers adapted measures to local conditions and implemented the strategy of changing political interaction, forming different governance models such as the Mo Nan model of marriage and alliance, the Mobei model of political subordination, and the Qinghai model of bondage and subordination.
These models not only played an important role in the unification, stability, and governance of the western territory of the Qing Dynasty, but also had a profound political impact on later generations.
epilogue
The experience of the establishment and development of the Later Jin regime, the unification and management of the northeast region and the southern Mongol region, and the model of governing Mongolia and Tibet were all "dowries" brought by the Qing Dynasty when it entered customs.
In the early period of the Qing Dynasty, the traditional foundation formed by the northwest border troubles was dismantled in terms of system and mechanism, the social foundation of the centralized state of "great unification" was established and consolidated, a new type of administrative system was established, and more effective management was achieved, which greatly promoted the development of the Qing Dynasty after entering the Central Plains.
Resources:
Ma Xiao: On the Qing Dynasty's model of governing Mongolia and Tibet: from the perspective of the interaction between the central government and ethnic and local politics
Li Jiayang: The construction of the rule of law in the non-provincial border areas of the Qing Dynasty was integrated with the consciousness of subjects (nationals).
Guan Huiying: Research on migration in Northeast China before customs clearance