A Study On Korean Trade With Qing Dynasty In 17th -19th Century

So far, most scholars think,under tributary system of ZongFan(宗藩),tribute given by vassal state to suzerain state or vice versa,was a kind of trade for the aim of commerce in itself. The only difference was that this sort of ancient international trade had the guise of tribute and return gifts. In the"tributary trade"between China and the peripheral countries,China adhered to the principle of"Giving more and getting less", so the vassal state got rich profit from the tribute. This was the real purpose that the peripheral countries positively paid tribute to China.But,through the analysis on the tributary relationship between Qing dynasty(清朝) and Korea,the real reason why the latter had to pay tribute to the former was that the latter had been defeated by the former. From the beginning on, Korea had no idea of making profit from the return gifts from Qing; on the contrary, the tribute increased the economic burden of the Yi Korea(李朝).According to the statistics and computation of my paper,the tribute paid by Yi Korea to Qing dynasty totally valued 3,259,218 liang(两) silver in 243 years from 1639 to 1881;in the same period,return gifts given by Qing dynasty to Yi Korea only valued 2,430,000 liang(两) silver even at the highest calculation in the period of Emperpor Daoguang. Thus,we are sure that Korea got no direct economic benefit from giving tribute to Qing, but which did not mean that Qing got benefit, either. At least after 39th year of Kangxi(康熙) (1700),Qing dynasty spent far greater than income in order to maintain the ZongFan tributary relationship with Korea. After entering the Shanhaiguan Pass,Qing dynasty never pursued direct economic benefits from the tributary relationship with Korea. Now that both sides were not pursuing direct economic benefits from tributary relationship,obviously,it is untenable to take the exchange of tribute and the return gifts as a kind of"trade". Thus, it is a wrong idea to call tributary relationship as"tribute trade"by the scholastic fields.The trade carried out by Korea to Qing can be divided into two types: Mission trade and border trade.The Sino-Korea trade carried out by Korean tributary missions could be called as "mission trade".Mission trade had two branches , one to Beijing and the other to Shenyang,the former was occasionally called"eight bags trade"in historical materials,which was the generalized usage of"eight bags trade"; the latter,also known as"head of local militia market(团练后市)"in Korean historical materials. Among them,trades to Beijing, according to its form of different,could be divided into public trade and private trade,the latter was the"eight bags trade"in Korean historical materials,which was the special usage of the concept of"eight bags trade".When missionaries visited China,the king and the government asked them to buy the articles which they hadn't domestically but urgently needed,this was called"the official trade"or"public trade". In order to make public trade smoothly,countries allowed them to carry private things to sell,and admitted its legitimacy within the limit,this was called"private trade". In the mission trade to Beijing, public trade accounted for one tenth, while the private nine tenth. Either the former or the latter, was carried out in Huitong Post, their staying house in Beijing. The principal carried by one trade mission would be worth as high as seventy thousand or eighty thousand to several hundred thousand liang(两)silver,the gross profit would be 15% to 21%.After Qing moved its capital to Beijing,it still commanded Korea send some year money to Shenyang. Therefore,after Korea mission entered China, they divided into two parts: most people led by the missionaries went to Beijing,the other led by a head of local militia(团练)escorting year money headed for Shenyang,they went back to Korea after they had sent the money. During their stay in Shenyang , they carried out trade,and carried money back with the horses carried year money before. Because the leading figure was called head of local militia,so it was also called"head of local militia market(团练后市)"in Korean historical materials. The principal of this amounted to about 16000 to 26000 liang silver. In 7th year of Yongzheng(雍正),Korea voluntarily applied to Qing dynasty to cancel this trade.Mission trade reached it prime in Kangxi period, and after Yongzheng, it declined year by year. There were many reasons for this decline, namely,restrictive policy from both governments,decrease of the profit and the carrying out of Sino-Japan trade. There existed six kinds of border trades with Qing dynasty in Korea. According to historical materials of Korea, they were called: Zhongjiang market(中江后市), gate market (栅门后市), Yuma (余马)trade, Yanbu(延卜)trade, Huiningstart marke(t会宁开市) and Qingyuanstart market(庆元开市). Distributing centre were the island of Yalu river(鸭绿江) the boundary river between China and Korea, inside and outside door of FengCheng(凤城)in China, Huining and Qingyuan in Korea. In general, the border trade between Qing dynasty and Korea were mainly carried out in two regions: one was in the Yalu river basin, and the other was in the Tumen river(图们江) basin:the former four were in the Yalu river basin, and the latter two were in the Tumen river basin; The Yalu river basin of border trade location were all in China and the Tumen river basin trade location were all in Korea. From the perspective of the size and importance of the trade, the border trade in the Yalu river basin had far more importance than that in the Tumen river basin.The exports from Qing to Korea were mainly textiles, daily necessities and medicines; while from Korea to Qing were mainly specialty paper, several kinds of cloth and limited groceries, such as tobacco and bamboo. From the exports we can see, the trade between Qing dynasty and Korea's were obvious belonged to the trade in traditional farming society, that is, trade was only a kind of complement of the farming economy, which was the attachment to the agricultural economy, and had an essential gap with modern international trade. But, from exports we can also see, the development level of handicraft industry of Qing was obviously higher than that of Korea.At the peak of the trade between Qing and Korea, the principal used in the trade of each year (including mission trade and border trade) should amount to 754500 liang silver of Qing or more. Only by 10% of the profitability, it would account for 1.54% of the total amount of field tax of Qing. In general, it equaled to about 1% of the fiscal revenue of the Qing dynasty, which could provide living expenses to 25150 people a year of the Qing according to the life level of civilians in northeast China. The Trade principal between Qing and Korea could provide a whole year living expenses for one 8th to one half of the northeast population.Traditionally, we had thought China's implementation of the close-door policy in Ming and Qing kept its international trade at very low levels. But, if we analyze from the two above-mentioned dimensions, we can say, even in today's international trade development, the enhancement of economic mutual dependency of each country, the profits of the trade between China and Korean peninsula (including north and South Korea) can not reach 1% of gross national income in China. Its trade quotas can't provide the cost of living of one 8th, not to mention half of the population in northeast. Comparing with the past, maybe we can have a new understanding of the trade between Qing dynasty and Korea.