Sunday, February 12, 2006

清代西部开发,清代西部历史论衡

During my chinese trip, I bought two chinese history books about the "west part" of china in Qing Dynasty.

清代西部开发 is published by 山西古籍出版社 with the chief editor of 成崇德。It's serious history book with only 1500 copies. It systematically talked about the development of Xinjiang, Tibet, Mongolia, Yunnan and Guangxi.

It's undeniable that Qing emporers greatly increased chinese territory during their rein. Comparing to other dynasties in china, Qing dynasty was really successful in dealing with minority nations. In Ming dynasty, the way to deal with nomads in the North was to build the "great" wall. Qing emperors had effective control over the normads outside the great wall. The mongolia people there were the great wall of the Qing emperors in some sense.

On the other hand, the developement of the west part in Qing Dynasty just look pathatic comparing to the developement of American west during about the same period. Qing dynasty were very passive in developing the agriculture and economy of the minority controlled areas. As a minority nation themselves, the overall interest of the goverment was stability. It almost never actively promoted a policy to immigrate more Han people to the these border areas. To the goverment, changing of demograph by bringing more Han people meant affecting the interest of the local chiefs.


清代西部历史论衡 is published by 山西人民出版社. It's author is 马汝珩,an Qing History expert.

The book talked about the history of Mogol people. Facing the expansion of Russia, Mogol people were tilled towards China mainly because of religion and historical reasons. Mogol people were very close to Tibet people because of religion. The history of governing the whole China in Yuan dynasty sure made them close to China emotionally.

At that time, Mogol people controlled large part of Xinjiang, especially to the north side of Tianshan Mountain. 维吾尔 people, who believe Islamlism, was the majority in several cities south of Tianshan.

There was about two lines in our hisgh school history text book about the return of 土尔扈特 mogol people in Qing Dynasty. The book actually talked a lot about the history of these people.

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