Wang Zhengting And Tariff Autonomy

In general,customs sovereignty includes three aspects,namely,tariff autonomy,customs administration and customs authority.Since the Nanjing Treaty,China's tariff autonomy gradually fell into the hands of foreigners.The "Conventional tariff" made China's import tariff rate stay at the lowest point in China's history for a long time.With the signing of a large number of "unequal treaties",China's customs administration and customs authority are also in the hands of foreigners.Under such circumstances,China's finance has been greatly impacted,national sovereignty has been greatly damaged,and national industry and commerce have been even more difficult.With the overthrow of the Qing government,the establishment of the Republic of China,and the awakening of Chinese national consciousness,the Chinese government and people began the great struggle to restore national sovereignty and demand tariff autonomy.In the Paris Peace Conference and Washington Conference,the Chinese government put forward the proposal to request tariff autonomy,but due to the domestic and international situation and various factors,the proposal failed.However,the Chinese people did not stop demanding tariff autonomy.On October 26,1925,the Beijing government held a Special Tariff Conference,which was attended by representatives from 13 countries including China.The meeting,chaired by C.T.Wang,was huge and costly,and the Beijing government hoped to use its efforts to achieve tariff autonomy as soon as possible.However,the delegates did not have the sincerity to recognize China's tariff autonomy.According to the treaty signed by China and other countries,if China wants to gain tariff autonomy,it must obtain the unanimous agreement of the signatory countries.This has caused great difficulties to China's tariff autonomy.In particular,the United States,Britain,Japan and other large countries put forward many harsh requirements for the consideration of their own interests as a quid pro quo for the recognition of China's tariff autonomy.In the end,the special session on tariffs was suspended because of political problems in China.After the establishment of the Nanjing National Government,C.T.Wang became the foreign minister and continued the Fight for Tariff Autonomy.Drawing lessons from the failure of the special session on tariffs,Wang changed his strategy,no longer insisting on the unanimous agreement of the treaty countries,but selecting the influential countries among them to make a breakthrough.Therefore,Wang first negotiated with the United States and made a separate contract.The United States explicitly recognized China's tariff autonomy in the treaty,which had a great impact on other countries.Britain,Japan and other countries had to carefully consider China's demand for tariff autonomy.After the United States,Germany also signed a new tariff treaty with China,recognizing China's tariff autonomy.Since then,Norway,Netherlands,Belgium,Italy,Denmark,Portugal and Sweden have signed new customs treaties with China one after another,which also recognize that China has tariff autonomy.Britain has the biggest interest in China's customs,and has always refused to unconditionally recognize China's resumption of customs sovereignty.However,with the statement of the United States,the trend of countries signing contracts with China,Britain has finally recognized China's customs sovereignty.Led by Britain,France and Spain also signed customs treaties with China,recognizing China's customs sovereignty.So far,a dozen countries have signed new customs treaties with China,recognizing that China has tariff autonomy.Japan was the last country to recognize China's tariff sovereignty,almost a year and a half after the other treaty countries.Wang always insisted on promoting tariff independence,and had many exchanges with the imperialists,and constantly learned the lessons of failure,and finally realized the country's tariff independence,increased the national fiscal revenue,protected the national industry and commerce,and maintained the state sovereignty,which was supported by the society from all walks of life.However,the political significance of tariff autonomy demanded by Wang is far greater than the economic significance.The tariff autonomy based on political maintenance has great limitations.Once such tariff autonomy loses the support of economy,it will collapse rapidly.