This study seeks to lay bare the relationship between the sociopolitical structures that shaped peasant lives in Manchuria (northeast China) during the Qing dynasty and the development of that region's economy. The book is written in three parts. It begins with an analysis of the ideological, political, and economic interests of the Qing ruling house in defending its homeland in the northeast against occupation by non-Manchus, and examines how these interests informed state policy and the reconfiguration of the region's social landscape in the first decades of the dynasty. The book then addresses how this agrarian configuration unraveled under challenge from settler peasant communities and gives an account of the resulting property and labor regimes. The study ends with an account of how that social formation configured peasant economic behavior and in so doing established the limits of economic change and trade growth.

This study seeks to lay bare the relationship between the sociopolitical structures that shaped peasant lives in Manchuria (northeast China) during the Qing dynasty and the development of that region’s economy. The book is written in three parts. It begins with an analysis of the ideological, political, and economic interests of the Qing ruling house in defending its homeland in the northeast against occupation by non-Manchus, and examines how these interests informed state policy and the reconfiguration of the region’s social landscape in the first decades of the dynasty. The book then addresses how this agrarian configuration unraveled under challenge from settler peasant communities and gives an account of the resulting property and labor regimes. The study ends with an account of how that social formation configured peasant economic behavior and in so doing established the limits of economic change and trade growth.

In War and Geopolitics in Interwar Manchuria Kwong Chi Man revisits the civil wars in China (1925-1928) from the perspective of the often-overlooked "warlords," who fought against the joint forces of the Nationalist and Communist parties. In particular, this work focuses on Zhang Zuolin, the leader of the "Fengian Clique" who was sometimes seen as the representative of the Japanese interest in Manchuria. Using primary and secondary sources from China, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States, this work tries to revisit the wars during the period from international, political, military, and economic-financial perspectives. It sheds new light on Zhang Zuolin's decision to fight against the Nationalists and the Communists and offers an alternative explanation to the Nationalists (temporary) victory by revealing the central importance of geopolitics in the civil wars in China during the interwar period.

To a lively cast of international players that shaped Manchuria during the early twentieth century, At the Frontier of God's Empire adds the remarkable story of Alfred Marie Caubrière (1876-1948). A French Catholic missionary, Caubrière arrived in Manchuria on the eve of the Boxer Uprising in 1899 and was murdered on the eve of the birth of the People's Republic of China in 1948. Living with ordinary Chinese people for half a century, Caubrière witnessed the collapse of the Qing empire, the warlord's chaos that followed, the rise and fall of Japanese Manchukuo, and the emergence of communist China. Caubrière's incredible personal archive, on which Ji Li draws extensively, opens a unique window into everyday interaction between Manchuria's grassroots society and international players. His gripping accounts personalize the Catholic Church's expansion in East Asia and the interplay of missions and empire in local society. Through Caubrière's experience, At the Frontier of God's Empire examines Chinese people at social and cultural margins during this period. A wealth of primary sources, family letters, and visual depictions of village scenes illuminate vital issues in modern Chinese history, such as the transformation of local society, mass migration and religion, tensions between church and state, and the importance of cross-cultural exchanges in everyday life in Chinese Catholic communities. This intense transformation of Manchurian society embodies the clash of both domestic and international tensions in the making of modern China.

Polyandry. "Getting a husband to support a husband." Attitudes of families, communities, and women toward polyandry. The intermediate range of practice -- Wife-selling. Anatomy of a wife sale. Analysis of prices in wife sales. Negotiations between men in wife sales. Wives, natal families, and children. Four variations on a theme -- Polyandry and wife-selling in Qing law. Formal law and central court interpretation from Ming through high Qing. Absolutism versus pragmatism in central court treatment of wife sales. Flexible adjudication of routine cases in the local courts.

This book is the first Western-language monograph on the study of the Qingshui River manuscripts. By examining over 3,000 contracts and other manuscripts, this book offers constructive insights into the long-standing question of how and why a society in late imperial China could maintain a well-functioning social system with few laws but many contracts, i.e., Hobbesian “words without sword.” Three interrelated questions, what contracts were, how and why they worked, are explained successively. Thus, this book presents a non-stereotypical “contract society” in southwest China, arguing that the social order which provides predictability and regularity for economic prosperity could be formed and maintained through contracts even under the condition of relatively weak influence of governmental and legal authorities. This book benefits readers who are interested in law, society, and history. While presenting the socio-legal landscape of a frontier area in late imperial China for historians, this book provides a novel and empirical interpretation of the supposedly well-known contract device for legal researchers, thereby proposing materials for an integrated theoretical explanatory framework of contracts in general. By employing the innovative theory of blockchain in its key argumentation, the book offers a creative interpretation of historical and social phenomena.

In the Later Han period the region covering the modern provinces of Gansu, southern Ningxia, eastern Qinghai, northern Sichuan, and western Shaanxi, was a porous frontier zone between the Chinese regimes and their Central Asian neighbours, not fully incorporated into the Chinese realm until the first century BCE. Not surprisingly the region had a large concentration of men of martial background, from which a regional culture characterized by warrior spirit and skills prevailed. This military elite was generally honoured by the imperial centre, but during the Later Han period the ascendancy of eastern-based scholar-officials and the consequent increased emphasis on civil values and de-militarization fundamentally transformed the attitude of the imperial state towards the northwestern frontiersmen, leaving them struggling to achieve high political and social status. From the ensuing tensions and resentment followed the capture of the imperial capital by a northwestern military force, the deposing of the emperor and the installation of a new one, which triggered the disintegration of the empire. Based on extensive original research, and combining cultural, military and political history, this book examines fully the forging of military regional identity in the northwest borderlands and the consequences of this for the early Chinese empires.

Civilians play crucial roles in building empires. Constructing Empire shows how Japanese urban planners, architects, and other civilians contributed – often enthusiastically – to constructing a modern colonial enclave in northeast China, their visions shifting over time. Japanese imperialism in Manchuria before 1932 developed in a manner similar to that of other imperialists elsewhere in China, but the Japanese thereafter sought to surpass their rivals by transforming the city of Changchun into a grand capital for the puppet state of Manchukuo, putting it on the cutting edge of Japanese propaganda. Providing a thematic assessment of the evolving nature of planning, architecture, economy, and society in Changchun, Bill Sewell examines the key organizations involved in developing Japan’s empire there as part of larger efforts to assert its place in the world order. This engaging book sheds light on evolving attitudes toward empire and perceptions of national identity among Japanese in Manchuria in the first half of the twentieth century.

This book explores aspects of this vibrant market economy in late imperial China, and by presenting a reconstructed narrative of economic development in the early modern Jiangnan, provides new perspectives on established theories of Chinese economic development. Further, by examining economic values alongside social structures, this book produces a historically comprehensive account of the contemporary Chinese economy which engenders a deeper and broader understanding of China's current economic success.

Exploring local practices of dispute resolution and laying bare the routine role of violence in the late-Qing dynasty, Conflict, Community, and the State in Late Imperial Sichuan demonstrates the significance of everyday violence in ordering, disciplining, and building communities. The book examines over 350 legal cases that comprise the "cases of unnatural death" archival file from 1890 to 1900 in Ba County, Sichuan province. The archive presents an untidy array of death, including homicides, suicides, and found bodies. An analysis of the muddled and often petty disputes found in these records reveals the existence of a local system of authority that disciplined and maintained daily life. Often relying on violence, this local justice system occasionally intersected with the state’s justice system, but was not dependent on it. This study demonstrates the importance of informal, local authority to our understanding of justice in the late Qing era. Providing a non-elite perspective on Qing power, law, justice, and the role of the state, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of Chinese and Asian history, as well as legal history and comparative studies of violence.