The Treaty Of Beiyang Government Research About Research

The Treaty Revision Commission of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the decision-making mechanism in charge of the revisions of the expiring unequal treaties during the late period of the Beiyang Government. The best way to conduct a study upon this Commission embarks on an analysis about the decision-making process of the treaty revision, as its major mandate. Based upon a research about its decision-making process, we can comprehend its social cognition as regards to both the international and domestic atmospheres in which the Beiyang Government was faced with. For specific aims of respective treaty revision, the conflicting international and domestic atmospheres resulted in a complex decision-making environment which was out of equilibrium and consistence. In its endeavors to conduct the treaty revision, the Treaty Revision Commission was mired in tremendous decision-making challenges. Considering the weak national power of the Beiyang Government at that time, the Commission couldn’t do more than diplomatic arts and tactics to get rid of the challenges against its foreign policies. Besides the rare abolition of certain unequal treaties, the Commission led a way of forwarding gradually with compromises in most cases, making its endeavors to retrieve the national interests out of concert among all relevant parties. A comparative study provides an objective assessment to its foreign policies and notions conducted by the Commission trapped in severe challenges.This dissertation employs diplomatic decision-making dilemma theory as its main theoretical tool. This theory is based upon context conflict and resembles with inductive method in the premise of concrete person rather than abstract person with the latter as the logical origin for deductive method. This theoretical perspective analyzes the heterogeneity rather than homogeneity of the abstract person, namely the notion that an individual is united in both rationality and irrationality, both sense and sensibility in its internal world, while individuality and sociality in the internal-external ratio. According to the famous notion that "A state means the decision-makers" advocated by Schneider, a state in united in its individuality and sociality. The decision-makers are capable of conducting social cognition as for both the international and domestic atmospheres for a state. As a result, the conflicting and unbalanced atmospheres consist of the diplomatic decision-making dilemma as regards to different specific policy goals. These dilemmas stem from macro structure regimes, and domestic issues. The change of macro structure or the promotion of its own capability is essential to resolve the dilemma with regards to the macro structure. Without these conditions, we have to resort to the way of forwarding gradually with compromises. As for the domestic issues, we can only deal with them with specific measures under different conditions.With the function of the decision-making dilemma theory, this dissertation analyzes different kinds of decision-making dilemmas the Treaty Revision Commission encountered during the treaty revision process, including the structural and institutional dilemmas as a result of the international political structure and regimes in the macro level, as well as the micro structural dilemmas in the interactive level, in addition to the decision-making dilemma in the domestic level, such as the independence dilemma, the public opinion dilemma, multi goal dilemma, the contest between abolishing the treaties and revising them, and the dispute between the central government and the local governments. These aforementioned dilemmas led the Treaty Revision Commission to be caught in a quandary as a decision-maker. Faced with multi decision-making dilemmas, the Commission, without any outside help, had to resort to the way of forwarding gradually with compromise to revise the unequal treaties. It abode by realism, and conducted its foreign policies with the guidelines of better less than nothing.This dissertation develops a positive analysis as for the decision-making dilemmas, the action scenarios, and notions for the Treaty Revision Commission, based on a comprehensive study of the original files of the Commission conferences.It’s so difficult to solve those dilemmas that we have to wait for the structural transformation, the promotion of its own capability, and the ideal progress of the international society. Without these conditions, it’s improper to abolish all the treaties utterly, viz. it’s inappropriate to rupture with the western great powers completely. As a result, it’s only possible for the Commission to revise the unequal treaties. It’s essentially important for the revolutionary diplomacy to hold on to nationalism, because the latter can publicize and advocate the former, and call for the general public. On one hand, the revolutionary diplomacy accumulated the power and promoted the ability, on the other, it helped to develop a favorable atmosphere for the Treaty Revision Diplomacy. Under various decision-making dilemmas, the Treaty Revision Commission was challenged by complicated and severe decision-making process of revising the treaties. Constrained by the unfavorable realities, the Commission could only lead the way of forwarding gradually with compromises and adhere to the notion of better less than nothing. This way and notion were the only possible measure to defend and retrieve the most of the national interests at that time. Despite a better atmosphere to rectify and sign new treaties with the western powers, the Nanking Government of the Republic of China inherited much from the methods and notions held by the Treaty Revision Commission, under the generally similar macro environment.