Research On Secularization Of Ming Dynasty Ministry Councillors

Ming Dynasty is a significant historical period in the evolution process of the Chinese nation.For one thing,its strong national strength,splendid culture and economic development can be comparable with the Han and Tang Dynasty.In particular,Zheng He's Seven Voyages enables the political and military achievements of Ming Dynasty to gain a great reputation from overseas.For another,Ming Dynasty is also a dynasty in which China's imperial power was highly centralized and the system of centralization was unprecedentedly strengthened.At the beginning of the founding,the Ming emperor Zhu Yuanzhang abolished Zhong Shu Sheng(or Zhong Shu Province,a central administrative department)and the Prime Minister System.Correspondingly,the rank of six ministries was promoted,and they were all directly affiliated to the emperor and were under his command.Also,with the reconstruction of Six-ministry System,ministry councillors became the Executive Secretary and were specifically in charge of affairs in each ministry.In the late Ming Dynasty,with the evolution of its political,economic and other aspects,the official post of ministry councillor turned to become secularized.Through the analysis of the historical materials of Ming Dynasty,this paper aims to help people understand the development track of the ministry councillor in Ming Dynasty,the institution arrangement,operation functions and their evolution of secularization of localization in the late Ming Dynasty,and also to sort out their changes and development in Ming dynasty.As Ming Dynasty was already in the later period of China's feudal society,the study of mid-level officials in Ming Dynasty is helpful to our understanding of modern official positions.This paper consists of three parts: introduction,body and conclusion,In the introduction part,reasons and significance of the topic selection,research status,research ideas and methods are demonstrated.The body part is divided into three aspects,shown as below.Chapter One gives an overview of the ministry councillor in Ming Dynasty,First,their evolution course is reviewed briefly,and then specific arrangement of the post is described by analyzing the ministry councillor's administration system in terms of their examination,reward and punishment.Chapter Two discusses the localization of ministry councillors.With the gradual stablization of provincial system,ministry councillors became the local officials.After the establishment of Ming Dynasty,its ministry councillor system formed its own characteristics based on the profits and losses of Yuan Dynasty system.Although there was no arrangement of ministry councillors at the local level,their sphere of interest had become diversified gradually and they were assigned to participate in handling local incidents when they were in charge of affairs in central six ministries at the same time.Following the models of previous dynasty,they began to participate in local affairs frequently,which as a result,leads to their localization and socialization.Chapter Three displays the development situation of Ming Dynasty's ministry councillors.In the middle and late Ming Dynasty,with the rapid development of commodity economy,urban cities became prosperous and social wealth gathered in this area,which drew the attention of Ming monarch and his officials.Since the existed negative impact on the exploitation and oppression of the cities threatened the rule of Ming dynasty,for the needs of comfort to the cities,secular members of ministry councillors came to flourish gradually.Besides,the composition of the urban people is not based on regional blood,but from different places;therefore,the Ming Dynasty rulers could not apply the rule of rural area to rule the urban cities.The government of Ming Dynasty,from the perspective of social control,adopted secularization as a means of controlling the urban area.In its late phase,Ming Dynasty had approached its grave.The class conflict,frequent occurrence of natural disasters,ministers' party struggle and the resistance of lower classes prompted the social conflict to become intensified.The uprisings in the war,as well as the Qing army's entry,caused a great blow to the society,and the city was more serious in particular.Under these circumstances,the Ming Dynasty secular ministry councillors lost development platform and became declining.Their revival took place in the late Qing Dynasty,since the thriving of comprador was interlinked with secular ministry councillors.The conclusion part summarizes the main content of this paper.