When it comes to the ancient Chinese system, the most widely circulated sentence is the sentence "China has a dark history of autocracy for 2,000 years since the Qin Dynasty", which completely attributes China's 2,000-year feudal history to the word "autocracy", and even labels China as "autocracy" accordingly.
The question is: Since we judge Chinese history in this way, where is the autocracy? Moreover, since the Qin Dynasty, China has a vast territory of many people, a vast territory, and a large number of people, and the emperor is a man and not a god, so how can he dictate everything? Lingnan and Huaibei, Shandong and Shaanxi, and so on, have very different customs and customs, so how can they dictate everything?
In fact, from the perspective of Chinese history, it is extremely inaccurate to use the word "autocracy" to summarize China's feudal history, and even there are partial generalizations.
First of all, whether the imperial power can be autocratic
Since the Qin Dynasty, China has been a unified and centralized state, but the emperor who is high above cannot actually rule everything.
During the Qin Dynasty, the "Xiangguo" held huge power to govern the country and could compete with the emperor. Because of the excessive power of Xiangguo, the Han Dynasty gradually did not set up the position of Xiangguo, and later the prime minister who originally assisted Xiangguo became the highest court official. During the reign of Zhu Yuanzhang, the prime minister was abolished, and the Ming Dynasty later formed a cabinet system.
That is to say, although from the Qin Dynasty to the Ming and Qing dynasties, the imperial power was indeed strengthened, but the objective fact is that the emperor and the prime minister or ministers have always competed for power, so how can it be said that the emperor is autocratic? On the other hand, if the imperial power is autocratic in everything, it is still necessary to strengthen the imperial power, and it is still necessary to abolish the state and the prime minister?
In fact, it is often when the emperor issues a "central decree" that it has an authoritarian color. Because the ministers below have the right to "refute", that is, when they do not approve of the emperor's opinions, or regard them as illegal opinions, they will force the emperor to reluctantly issue a "central decree" and forcibly realize the monarch's will, but this also means that the emperor and the prime minister or ministers have turned their faces. In the late Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the civil officials were strong, and the emperor's decree was not easy to make.
Of course, because of the particularity of the Qing Dynasty's regime, the imperial power was indeed more authoritarian than before, and Kangxi once said, "Today's affairs, big and small, are handled by me alone, and there is no excuse." It is not feasible to delegate the priorities to others. Therefore, no matter how big or small, I bow down to self-determination", because of the reason that the Qing Dynasty emperors ruled the majority of Han people with small and large ones, so the Qing Dynasty emperors were more diligent in government, which is not diligent and not good. (The picture below is the Ministry of Civil Affairs, because of the avoidance of Li Shimin, it was later changed to the Ministry of Households)
Second, there is no autocracy in employing people
The employment system includes at least two levels: one is how to select talents to be officials, and the other is whether they can be dismissed or promoted at will!
In the selection of talents and officials, the Spring and Autumn Period was an aristocratic politics, and blood was higher than talent, but after Li Kui's reform, he actually began to pay more attention to talent. After the Qin and Han dynasties, they moved towards civilian politics, the Qin State implemented the military merit system, the Han Dynasty selected talents as officials from the bottom up (filial piety is one of its main subjects), the meritocracy of Cao Cao of the Three Kingdoms, and the imperial examination system after the Sui and Tang dynasties, and there was a set of official election system in all dynasties. Especially in the imperial examination system, the emperor intervenes in the rankings at most, but cannot decide who to admit or not to admit without special reasons.
More importantly, the Han Dynasty inspection system was that every region had to recommend talents, even remote areas, which formed the formation of all regions to participate in the imperial court, to use an inappropriate analogy is that each region has "public opinion representatives". After the imperial examination system, it was even more so, and Zhu Yuanzhang's north-south division made a great contribution to this. Therefore, the imperial court of the past dynasties was a court in which people from all over the country participated.
In the treatment of officials, the emperor needs to act according to the rules, and cannot dismiss or promote an official at will. At the beginning of this century, on the archaeological excavation of the Liye Qin Jian, the Qin Dynasty had a set of evaluation systems for lower-level officials, and the emperor was not good at overstepping his authority. In fact, the emperors of previous dynasties rarely interfered in the appointment and dismissal of lower-level officials, and the more grassroots they were, the less they interfered, with the possible exception of the Qing Dynasty.
Third, there is no tyranny in the law
Whether the law is autocratic or not can be examined in two main points: one is whether it is open or not, and the other is equality and inequality.
During the Spring and Autumn Period, Zheng Guozi produced the "Casting Punishment Book", which was the first public written law in Chinese history. Since then, the criminal books of all dynasties in China have been released publicly, rather than hidden and kept secret. Later, Han law, Tang law, Song law, etc., were all publicly displayed, and the punishment was basically based on this.
However, in the early days, although there was still some bias towards officials and nobles, for example, in the Han law, nobles or some officials could be "invited first" if they were guilty, referring to the system that royal relatives, nobles, and high-ranking officials were not allowed to try the law without authorization, and must petition the emperor for ruling, but it also emphasized that "the prince who broke the law was guilty of the same crime as the common people" or that the murderer would pay for his life. By the Sui and Tang dynasties, the law had made a big step forward and became more egalitarian. The real "government and people are guilty of the same crime" began with the demonized Zhu Yuanzhang, and the Da Ming Law is more equal in comparison.
Since it is open, relatively fair, and protects ordinary people, it is obviously difficult to use it as an authoritarian.
Aftermath
Judging from the above three points alone, there is no "autocracy" in ancient China, or that there are some autocracy, but the mainstream is not autocracy.
In fact, judging from the size of China's territory, it is impossible to achieve true autocracy, even if the Qing Dynasty regime with the full support of a clan behind it can only control the middle and upper classes, and cannot be truly autocratic, let alone the Han, Tang, Song and Ming emperors without tribal private armies. Once there is really an imperial power that wants autocracy, the result will inevitably fall apart, after all, China has always had no shortage of Chen Sheng and Huang Chao. Conversely, the city-states of the West are more likely to be autocratic.
The reason is very simple: On the one hand, this is a label that the West demonizes China and uses it to oppose the dishes, but is it just black and white, and there is no middle ground? On the other hand, it was the propaganda needs of the political reformists at that time, because they wanted to overthrow the Qing Dynasty and overthrow the feudal system, so they called it "dark and autocratic." The propaganda needed for innovation is fine, but it is not advisable to take it as a final word.
What is more serious is that in this process, there are also two problems, namely, the deep belief in Western views and the measurement of Chinese history by Western standards, and finally the conclusion that ancient China was autocratic in the end. In fact, the similar mistakes caused by this may not be limited to this, such as whether the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties were "slavery", whether ancient Greece was a commodity economy, and whether China during the Warring States period was a "self-sufficient" natural economy.