A Study Of The Autonomous Welfare System In Ming Dynasty

Social welfare’s development and perfection were from the Song Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty, in which period, both a relatively perfect official social security system and a relatively perfect civil welfare system were established. This paper will give a introduction of the autonomous welfare system in the Ming Dynasty, in which a Centralized financial system and the corruption of the bureaucracy made the official welfare system from prosperity to decline. Accordingly,as a supplement choice of the official welfare, the autonomous welfare system gradually developed, of which the foundation were the rapid developed economy, the traditional welfare ideas as well as the welfare concept of the Ming Dynasty.This paper discusses and analyzes three typical kinds of autonomous welfare in the Ming dynasty, which are as follows: First, the welfare system which based on blood kinship. Second, guild welfare system which based on industry division, and association welfare system which were divided by geography and industry associations. Third, welfare storage such as Yicang and SheCang, etc. These welfare systems played an extremely important security role for people in the Ming dynasty,when natural and man-made disaster were both frequent, especially for those who were in grass-roots society. The author believes that only the welfare system which contains the official welfare, the autonomous welfare and and the residents self-security can be called a complete welfare system, which could guarantee people’s life. This welfare system conforms to the polycentric governance theory. Through the analysis of autonomous welfare system in the Ming dynasty, this paper hopes to give the modern autonomous welfare system’s development some enlightenment.