chants under arrest until they surrendered nine million dollars worth of opium, which he then had burned publicly. Finally, he ordered the port of Canton closed to all foreign merchants. Elliot in turn ordered a blockade of the Pearl River. In an ensuing naval battle, described as a victory by Chinese propagandists, in November +1839 the Royal Navy sank a number of Chinese vessels near Guangzhou. By January 1841 the British had captured the Bogue forts at the Pearl's mouth and controlled the high ground above the port of Canton. Subsequently, British forces scored victories on land at Ningbo and Chinhai, crushing the ill-equipped and poorly trained imperial forces with ease. Viewed as too moderate back at home, in August 1841 Elliot was replaced by Sir Henry Pottinger to launch a major offensive against Ningbo and Tiajin. By the end of June British forces occupied Zhenjiang and controlled the vast rice-growing lands of southern China.
The key to British victory was Her Majesty's Navy, which used the broadside with equal effect against wooden-hulled vessels, fortifications are river mouths, and city walls. The steel-hulled Nemesis lt; # justify gt; III. Qing Empire in the system of world trade
After +1683 the Qing rulers turned their attention to consolidating control over their frontiers. Taiwan became part of the empire, and military expeditions against perceived threats in north and west Asia created the largest empire China has ever known. From the late 17th to the early 18th century, Qing armies destroyed the Oirat lt; # justify gt; Russian-Qing economic relation
The Qing was China s last centralized dynasty. During its almost three-hundred-year-long reign, it achieved regional supremacy before sliding into a decline that occurred contemporaneously with the West s rise to global pre-eminence. The expansion of the Western world inevitably led to the disintegration of China s centuries-old tribute system, and changes in the way the Qing government interacted with its foreign counterparts. The establishment of a foreign ministry in the 1860s and the assignment of the first permanent diplomatic envoys abroad in the 1870s signalled the Qing dynasty s gradual adoption of a Western, more modernistic, system of diplomacy. Researchers raise several explanations for China s diplomatic clashes with Western countries and the ultimate changes in its foreign policy behavior. They include the shift in the balance of power from East to West, fundamental changes in Qing ideals, sense of identity and preferences and the conflicting systems of these two, quite different civilizations. The focus of this essay is on material and ideational explanations. The material explanation maintains that Qing foreign policy behavior adjusted in order to maximize China s material interests in view of the shift in power dynamics between East and West. From the ideational standpoint, adjustments to Qing foreign policy behavior were the result of changes in the preferences, values ??and behavioral norms of China s rulers. The aim of this essay explores the basis of change in Qing dynasty foreign policy and determines whether its behavioral adjustments were as a result of ideational or material factors.concept of ideas is not always clear in context of the argument that ideas propel changes in the behavior of nations. Certain scholars argue that ideas are akin to power and interests insofar as being important variables when explaining state behaviour. Robert H. Jackson, however, argues that the post-World War II decolonization movement can not be explained in terms of power or interests; that ideas and norms constitute the leading explanation for this phenomenon. This explanation places ideas in direct opposition to interests and power. Although the definition of ideas often seems clear in context, using the term as an explanatory variable can sometimes lead to confusion and misunderstanding. Such misapprehensions are attributable to ideas and interests at times, and times not, coinciding. Ideas encompass desires and knowledge and constitute the actor s interests; they are its aspirations. Knowledge involves an actor s expectations but not its interests. As Alexander Wendt notes, not all ideas are interests; in fact, most are not. Interests form part of an actor s ideas (in view of ideas also being capable of constructing the actor s identity, thereby changing its preferences) but not their entirety. Arguing whether it is ideas or interests that produce an affect, therefore, is likely to generate conceptual confusion and divergent understandings. From an ideational standpoint, it is the material, rather than interests, that opposes ideas. An explanation that treats ideas and interests as different sources of behaviour is likely to conclude that ideational interests are in opposition to material interests. An explanation th...
