Probing Into The Charities In Shandong Province In The Ming And Qing Dynasties

With all aspects including social politics, economy and thoughts entering into a new stage in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, correspondingly the development of charities in this period could be described as unprecedented. Chinese traditional social charities reached its climax in these two dynasties, which exerted great impact on the society. This thesis intends to probe into the background behind this phenomenon including political and economic development and natural conditions of Shandong Province in the Ming and Qing Dynasties on the basis of relevant researches done before and make a comparative and systematic conclusion on the rise, development process, incline and its social indication of charities of Shandong Province in the Ming and Qing Dynasties by appealing to sociology-related theory and concepts. In the meanwhile, both the lengthwise and parallel comparisons are arranged in this thesis, which demonstrate the comparison with the charities prior to the Ming and Qing Dynasties in terms of time difference and the comparison with other charities in Jiangnan towns in terms of space difference. These comparisons are helpful to summarize the unique development path of the charities of Shandong Province in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. The main body of the thesis is composed of four parts:The first part summarizes traditional charity thoughts and the rise of the charities in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. The Chinese ancient charity thoughts had a long history during which developed the Confucius charity thoughts represented by righteousness and politeness, the Buddhist thoughts based on cause-result cycle theory and charity outlook, the Taoist thoughts of advocating righteousness and the widespread of virtue books. All these laid a solid and deep-rooted foundation for the development of charities. The charities in Shandong Province stepped onto a new stage of development in the Ming and Qing Dynasties on the basis of prior development of earlier dynasties.The second part discusses the organization and operation of the charities of Shandong Province in the two dynasties starting from analyzing the forms and management of the charity organs. In the Ming Dynasty, the charity organs were dominated by local authorities and there could be found the dominant administration-funded charity organs such as fostering organizations, baby-sitting halls and shelters for homeless people. The Qing Dynasty witnessed the advancement of Chinese ancient charities and the establishment of charities in the reign periods under Emperor Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong and Emperor Tongzhi and Guangxu( the successive emperors in the Qing Dynasty) reached two climaxes respectively. Also, the advocate of local authorities and the folk participation gave rise to the diversification of the traits of charity organs and a considerable quantity of administration-funded, folk-funded and administration-folk co-funded charity organs began to take appearance. Most charity organs in the Qing Dynasty set up strict rules and restrictions in terms of managing operation which clearly stated the rules over the source and use of funds, the composition of managing staff and the requirements of adopted crowd. The Righteous Donation of Jiangnan Region in the late Qing Dynasty injected new vigor into the development of Chinese ancient charities; meanwhile, with the rise of charity activities advocated by missionaries, its modernized management and operation exerted deep influence on the development of Chinese modern charities.The third part mainly analyzes the development conditions and features of the charities of Shandong in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. First, in the aspects of scale and quantity, the charities of Shandong were far behind those in Jiangnan Region. This was caused by the backwardness of Shandong in terms of economic and cultural developments compared with Jiangnan Region; therefore, the development of Shandong charities was far from being sufficient. However, the unique regional culture and local customs of Shandong Province played a vital role in promoting the development of the charities in this region.The fourth part probes into the social indication of the development of Shandong charities in the two dynasties. Charities were beneficial to both the country and the people: on one hand, they provided assistance in life and emotional comforts for those poverty-stricken people to some extent; on the other hand, they served as an important means for the feudal dynasties to ease the hierarchy conflicts and to implement moral enlightenments. While, as the charities'development was subject to the growth of productivity of the time, the caused social effect was restrictive and limited. The domination of local authorities was in decline in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, contrarily, the social folk forces had been gradually gaining strength and virtually played a positive role in the promotion of charities in the two dynasties. The Righteous Donation in the late Qing Dynasty and missionary-advocated charities forwarded the convert from traditional charities to modern ones.