Commercial Treaty Negotiations In The Late Qing Dynasty

In 1902,China and Britain held a commercial treaty negotiations.This negotiations involved China's politica,diplomatic,financial reform,business,and other aspects.This negotiations is also very important to the development of the Late Qing Dynasty.In fact,abolition of liking and increase tariff rates is adjusted between customs and liking.It was a tax battle between central and local government.In this commercial treaty negotiations,Sheng Hsuan-huai is a representative of the central government interests.He hopes to strengthen the central finance by abolition of liking and increase tariff rates.However, the local governors will want to continue to maintain the financial independence.They oppose the central government to improve customs revenue,at the cost of reduce local's liking revenue.It is difficult to reconcile the interests of the central and local government.By analyzing the difficult process of negotiating this article,we can see that after the 1900"Boxer Incident",central government almost completely lost the ability to control local governors.Especially in financial terms,the local governors tend to act in accordance with the local interests.It is worth noting that,Sheng Hsuan-huai is the chief negotiators of China,but his situation is very difficult.After the "Boxer Incident",China's national situation is extremely weak.Mackay,who is the British representative,trying to obtain various privileges.In addition,the internal contradictions in China one after another.Sheng not only suffered from the constraints of the local governors,such as Zhang Zhi-dong,Liu Kun-yi, but also suffered from the constraints of the central government,such as the Grand Council,Ministry of Foreign Affairs,the Board of Revenue.Nevertheless,Sheng still use his talent and perseverance,eventually recovered some sovereignty.The researchers of modern Chinese history generally agreed thaf "No diplomacy for weak countries".But,through the research on the subject, We can see that in the specific process of diplomatic negotiations,if the experienced negotiators can not only fully grasp their negotiating objectives,but also to fully investigate and understand each other's situation,he may even recover the sovereignty, which is lost in the past. In part 1, I mainly describes the origin of the commercial treaty negotiations between China and Britain.Since the second Opium War, there are many business conflicts between Britain and China,such as abolishing likin,the rights of living in the Mainland and driving ship in inner waters.In particular,British businessmen believe that likin has hindering the British trade with China.Britain has been trying to remove these barriers to trade,but all ended in failure.On 1899,Sheng Hsuan-huai has proposal to take on the revision of the tariff policy.It seemed to him that,China can take advantage of this occasion to make a commercial treaty negotiations with Britain.This is the first time that China take the initiative to modify the commercial treaty,but the outbreak of the "Boxer Incident"suspended it.After the"Boxer Protocol"signed,in order to consolidate the status in China and abolish the trade barriers,Britain requires China to modify the commercial treaty.On the other hand,for the sake of pay the compensation,the Qing government also hopes to increase tariffs by modifying commercial treaty.In this context,the commercial treaty negotiations was held between China and Britain in 1902.In part2, I mainly analyse why the Qing government appoint Sheng Hsuan-huai host the negotiations,Sheng how to set up the China's negotiation team,research on the the system of China's negotiations. Sheng Hsuan-huai have rich experience in business and diplomatic.In addition, from 1899 to 1900,Sheng had talks with the British on abolition of likin and increase tariff rates.This experience makes Sheng have a general understanding of the provinces likin income.These factors laid the foundation for he handling of commercial treaty negotiations.During the negotiations,the Qing government also appointed Lv Hai-huan as minister who in charge of commercial treaty negotiations.However,by comparison of Lv and Sheng's role to play in negotiations,we can find that Sheng is the principal person in China's negotiations side. Sheng Hsuan-huai spent a great deal of energy on the establishment of the Chinese negotiations team.By analyzing the background and identity of the team members,we can find that Sheng take the talent as a standard for selecting members.This negotiations,the Chinese side actually pursuing a multi-discussing system,Sheng must constantly report to Grand Council,the Board of Revenue,Ministry of Foreign Affairs,Liu Kun-yi,Zhang Zhi-dong,Yuan Shi-kai.In part 3,4, I mainly narrative the members and the targhts of of the British side,focusing on analysis of why abolition of likin and increase tariff rates become the focus of this negotiations.At the period of negotiations,both sides have spontaneously take the article of abolition of likin and increase tariff rates as the core of the negotiations.However, the Chinese and British sides and China's internal sides have many contradictions on the targets of this article,such as the amount of tax increases,completely abolition of likin.Because of the importance and protracted nature of contradiction, it is become the core article of this negotiations.In part 5, I mainly describes the contradictions between Sheng Hsuan-huai and Zhang Zhi-dong,and research the internal constraints to Sheng.On article of abolition of likin and increase tariff rates, Sheng representing the interests of the Central,he advocates abolish likin completely,and strengthen the financial power of the Central government.But Zhang,on behalf of local interests against abolish of likin,and he request to reserves the rights of collecting likin tax.Because Sheng and Zhang has a fundamental conflict on this article,Zhang constraint Sheng frequently.But the Board of Revenue as the interests of recipients of Sheng's plan,not only failed to give Sheng any support, instead of restricting he.In part 6, I mainly reveal the difficult process of abolition of likin and increase tariff rates.On this article,there are many contradictions between China-Britain and China's internal.ShengHsuan-huai,LiuKun-yi,ZhangZhi-dong.Mackay,all put forward their own budget on this article.lt is very difficult for Sheng to deal with internal doubts and resist the pressure from Mackay.Finally, under the mediation of Sheng,China and Britain reached an agreement over the amount of tax and levy sales tax.But soon the two sides have debate over abolish salt-likin and opium-likin agencies.In addition, how to compensate losses of the local is another point of contention.Eventually,the two sides signed the treaty.In part 7, I mainly analyze the article of driving ship in inner waters and traffic grain abroad.By analyzing the difficult process of thse two article negotiations, we can find Sheng's hardness.In the negotiation process,Mackay often requires new privileges.on the one hand,Sheng try to resist the requirements of Mackay, on the other hand,he have to deal with the Central departments and Liu Kun-yi, Zhang Zhidong's instructions and criticism.Eventually,under the mediation of Sheng, China and Britain reached an agreement over these articles.Analysis of the contents of the articles,we can find that China has been not only loss of rights, but also through the treaty even recover the sovereignty.