Empire Building and Maintenance: Factors for

China’s Decline United

Lechuan Huang
Department of Economic History,
London School of Economics and Political Science,
London,
United Kingdom,
WC2A 2AE
l.huang1@lse.ac.uk
January 16, 2008

Abstract
It is an eternally fascinating question why China once led the world, but
only failed to industrialise even in the first half of the twentieth century.
Various factors can be sought out as plausible reasons, and they can be put
under the framework of empire maintenance. This essay tries to explore the
interplay between the factors, and their connections through one common
theme.

1 Introduction
China is the largest surviving empire from ancient times, and there are unique eco-
nomic consequences to this. China was not a poor country before the Europeans
made significant contact with her; that China once led the world before it fell to
the power of the Western colonizers is now a widely recognized fact. Yet the
reason to this fateful twist seems to provide eternal fascination for academicians.
In this essay, I am trying to analyse several factors of premodern Chinese
economic development, as well as their interplay, in light of the empire-building
framework.

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2 Empire Maintenance and the Decline of China
The basic reasoning behind the argument is that an empire is hard to build and to
maintain. While the area provides vast land for agriculture and enough distance
for commerce, and to some degree the economy of scale for the bureaucracy and
national defence, etc., there is always more risk of instability. Indeed, China has
always had the problem of instability, but the empire nevertheless survived many
short periods of disintegration, which implies that the integrity of the country was
much more cherished by the Chinese than by the Westerners (e.g., the Romans).
There is no over-simplification in this empire-building framework, because it
is actually a summary of the interplay among several specific theoretical blocks,
namely: the state, state ideology, social mobility and technology.

The State
The Chinese state was a mixture of centralisation and decentralisation. Central-
isation was important to internal and external stability, both were ‘crucial to the
survival of the empire (see Deng, 1999, p.99).’ Decentralisation was needed be-
cause it was hard to manage such a big empire; and it became possible by adopt-
ing a pro-stability, pro-harmony ideology (specifically, Confucianism, which is
discussed in the following section).
Deng (see 1999, p.108) suggests that the centralised state had some positive
influences over the economy in providing infrastructure, the effect seems to be
cancelled out by the anti-merchant policies. Considering that the policy towards
merchants was not always the same across history, its interaction with the positive
factors mentioned above might partially explain the twist in performance before
and after the Song dynasty. However, it is not likely that such fluctuation in mer-
chant policy could explain much.
Speaking of the other side, there are damaging consequences to this emphasis
on stability. Deng (see 1999, p.107) suggests that the Chinese economy was under
governed, given the lack of initiatives on the side of the state beyond social order
and national defence. The Chinese state experienced difficulty even in balancing
internal and external security. China had not been free from the plundering of
the Northern nomads since the Han dynasty (see Qian, 1985, p.91). Despite of
several successful campaigns against the nomadic people, China had to pay them
to keep them off her land. There were also piratical harassment even during the
Ming dynasty (see Qian, 1985, p.91), and the Chinese state responded not so
successfully by military actions as by refraining from seafaring. The defence
problem was exacerbated by the need to care about rebellions. When dynastic
succession wars were over, military leaders (most notably, those at the beginning
of the Song and the Ming dynasties) were often purged for fear that they might

2
weaken the authority. The ratio of the armed force at 1800 was about 0.2%, and
was poorly equipped. During the rest of the century they proved pathetically
inadequate for internal and external matters.
A large, centralised, single state also means that there was not enough polit-
ical competition. Compared with the scattered nations of Europe, there was less
incentive for the Chinese rulers to take risks in order to develop. Also, the con-
sequence of having a incapable ruler is worse for China, as in Europe such rulers
typically caused the transition of economic activities from one nation to another,
and not a total stagnation (see Deng, 1999, p.108).

State Ideology
There is not much doubt that the Chinese state ideology can be labeled as Con-
fucianism. This is not to downplay Taoism and Buddhism, which were both im-
portant parts of the Chinese spiritual life; however, it is rather a peculiar Chinese
scenario that the later two were very compatible to Confucianism, so much that
they gradually became integrated.
Confucianism helped empire maintenance in that it promoted internal stability
by defining justifiable behaviour and interactions (see Deng, 1999, pp.120-1). The
so-called ‘Jun Jun Chen Chen Fu Fu Zi Zi’ (meaning that the emperors’ higher
status over their bureaucrats, as well as the fathers’ higher status over their sons,
should always be maintained) is a typical code of conduct that promotes stable
social order. The capability of Confucianism to promote stability lies also in that
it is not coercive in nature. Instead of being the ideology for the ruling class, it
possessed binding power for the society as a whole (see Deng, 1999, p.121). The
fact that Confucianism was the guiding principle in the bureaucratic examination
means that the cost of administration coordination was reduced. This is reflected
in the decentralized decision-making under a centralized government. As official
local gazettes show, local officials taking initiatives were reported and praised
(see Deng, 1999, p.101). Decentralization without disintegration was possible
because local officials acted on the same principles. The idea that Confucianism as
a ”public-service profession, loyal to its own norms above all” is raised by Dardess
(see 1983, p.9). This theory could explain why Confucians were able to serve
dynasties in succession without contradicting themselves. Consider the collapse
of the Roman Empire, which has been mentioned by Deng (see 1999, p.121),
Confucianism does seem to lend to the perseverance of the Chinese Empire.
But just how does Confucianism negatively affect the economic performance
of China? There are two ways of looking at this problem. First, Confucian-
ism itself possess characteristics that does no good to economic activities. The
emphasis on ‘Zhong Yong’ (which means ‘being eclectic’) is not conducive to
entrepreneurship. It must be noted that Confucianism is not totally against the

3
working of economics. Freedom of occupation was allowed; heavy taxation was
discouraged (with an intention not dissimilar to the idea of laissez-faire). How-
ever, Confucianism also experienced development through history, the great the
legacy of Zhu Xi, the great Neo-Confucianism thinker, is one that inhibits the
evolution of modern thinking (see Qian, 1985, p.117). Second, that there being
one ‘state ideology’ is bad enough, as it stifled intellectual competition (see Qian,
1985, Ch.3).

Social Mobility
Eberhard (1962) spends a whole book saying that China had social mobility. In-
terestingly, he observed that the state was rather rigid in mobility, but gradually
relaxed the policy towards merchants and craftsmen. In the Song dynasty there
might be ways, be it legal or illegal, for merchants to work up the social ladder;
but finally it became totally legal to buy one’s way into officialdom. That might
be partly driven to dismiss the misconception of Westerners about the Chinese
society. He, being a Chinese, is not surprised at this fact at all, and provides more
structured analysis on the subject matter. The major characteristics of the Chinese
social mobility are: it was mainly based on state examinations, money was able
to play a secondary and indirect role in changing social status, and the system al-
lows upward and downward mobility, with individuals (or more likely, families or
clans) became prosperous by ability or connection, only to fall back into the rank
of farmers a few generations later.
With such a system, the teaching of Confucius could be infused deeply into
the society. The social mobility of both direction means a blurred line for class
struggle (if there was some class struggle at all); it also made the cooperation
between the state and the peasants easier.
There are other benefits to this system of social mobility, e.g., the bureau-
crats were very likely to be intelligent and able individuals. However, these can-
not cover up the negative effects this social mobility system had on the Chinese
economy. Apparently, this system drew people away from practical matters. The
adoption of the ‘modern essays’ (a rigid form of writing essays) was particularly
wasteful in human resources. As argued by Chen (1911), this form of examination
was of no practical use, and it required long time of practice. Helping infusing a
monolithic Confucian culture is another drawback of the system. The examina-
tion provided the single way to officialdom, offering huge incentive for students
to focus on the Confucian school. The system also to some extent discouraged
commerce, and it was discriminative against the merchant and the craftsman class
in the beginning. He (1964) raised several examples of rich merchants got their
wealth confiscated even though they had purchased a place in the bureaucracy.
(However, these examples should be treated with caution, because they are ex-

4
treme cases, and they do not say if the merchants were more likely to be confis-
cated than the general officials.)
Taking a side step, social mobility with an academic emphasis might be a
purely negative factor for the Chinese economy. I can think of two possible areas
concerning this point that are well worth studying: First, the final establishment
of the examination system in the Tang dynasty marked the victory against the
aristocracy. Hence China lost her chance to develop into a feudal society; and the
stability of the empire was consolidated. Given so many negative traits associated
with the concept of empire maintenance raised in this essay, we should question
whether this victory was worthy at all. Second, from a path dependent point
of view, once one system of social mobility is set up, it may well prevent the
establishment of another. Such is the case of the Chinese merchant, who, instead
of using their money to gain political power directly, had to choose the alternative
to buy their way into higher status.

Science and Technology

Joseph Needham would be more than willing to say that China was leading the
world in technology in Song period. Hartwell (1966) describes a thriving iron and
steel industry that seemed well suited for industrialisation. However, there is also
no argument that by the eighteenth century, China was obviously falling behind
Europe, and long before that, China had shown little technological development.
Hence the famous ‘Needham puzzle.’
Indeed, the integration of technology into the empire maintenance framework
is very complicated. Besides the simple notion that a large pro-stability state
would not prefer radical ideas, the technology story is connected to every section
above; and I think there are more reasons that cannot be fitted into the framework
of this essay.
The lack of technology could be linked to the state ideology, especially its
later development by Zhu Xi (Qian, 1985, Ch.3). He also made an interesting
guess that the so-called Chinese Golden Age was a result of possible relaxation in
ideological control, as the rulers for the Sui and Tang dynasties were not indige-
nous Han Chinese. Deng (see 1999, p.107) has pointed out, China lacked state
initiatives. Therefore, China lacked official support in technology development.
And being a physiocratic state, China biased heavily towards agriculture, which
was not helpful in developing modern technology.
The most interesting arguments are made around the ‘Needham puzzle’ and
the fact that China’s technological development stalled after the twelfth century.
As Perkins (see 1970, p.186) has pointed out, there was little best-practice diffu-
sion in China. From the early Ming period, the most important change in agricul-
ture was the introduction of corn and potatoes (Perkins, 1970, p.188). Chao (see

5
1986, Ch.10) argues that it is over population that plagued China’s agricultural
development. His argument is in line with Chayanov’s theory that peasants try to
maximize output instead of income. Specifically, for China, a family is supposed
to support every of its member by employing them in the field, regardless of their
marginal productivity. Therefore, there was no need to develop labour saving
technology; meanwhile, even there was over population and under employment in
the agriculture sector, it is not easily seen.
Lin (see 1995, p.274) does not buy this man-to-land ratio explanation, saying
if that had been the case, labour-saving technology should have been developed
around 1400 and 1670, when that ratio improved. What he ignores is exactly
Chao’s argument, that such improvement might be due to a come back to eco-
nomically rational level, while there was over-population in preceding periods.
The reason why China ‘chose’ over-population over industrialisation is elu-
sive; the link between empire maintenance not very clear. One possible line of
reasoning goes to the physiocratic state, as Deng (see 1999, Ch.2) points out that
the state relied so much on the taxation of the agricultural sector, that it had no
incentive to move to industry and commerce, even in late Qing dynasty when the
shift in emphasis might have resulted in increased taxation. Another approach can
be made by comparing China with the Roman Empire. Boak (1955) suggests that
man power shortage was a crucial factor in understanding the fall of the Roman
Empire. This gives us a clue that population might be of high importance to the
building and maintaining of a big empire. But of course, this is a proposition for
further study, rather than a conclusion in itself.

3 Conclusion
This essay tries to gather various factors under the banner of empire maintenance.
The basic argument is that an empire as large as China was difficult to maintain,
and in the face of internal and external threat, stability was an outstanding concern.
Specifically, the Confucianism ideology, the centralized state, the academic-based
social mobility and the lack of revolutionary technology all contributed to the sta-
bility of the Chinese empire; at the same time, they all took their toll on the econ-
omy. The centralised state lacked initiatives beyond stability preservation, and had
trouble balance internal and external stability threats. The Confucian state ideol-
ogy contains negative ideas with regards to economic development, and, being the
only official thought school, it stifled academic competition. The Chinese form of
social mobility around academics helped the infusion of Confucian ideology, and
potentially precluded the possibility of a wealth-oriented mobility scheme. The
lack of technology development, especially since the twelfth century, is obviously
damaging the development of the Chinese economy. This lack of technology ad-

6
vancement can be attributed to a complexity of aspects, such as the ideology, the
centralised state, the examination based social mobility system, over-population
and underemployment in the agriculture sector, and possibly many more.
Some factors have not been discussed in this essay, e.g., China’s petty cap-
italism, and urbanisation. Intensive farming is only indirectly addressed in the
technology section. However, the empire maintenance theme already shows that
many important factors do fit in well, and it can serve as a framework for the
analysis of China’s gradual decline.
However, there is a risk that this framework is too big to be taken in its entirety.
China, as the largest surviving empire, possesses a long history that is difficult to
grasp. At each point in time, China may show different characteristics, although
I believe that there are always common threads that started from the beginning.
Therefore, it might be useful to break premodern Chinese economic history into
shorter periods, and compare them. A valid question to ask is: if Song China was
so close to industrialization, what was so different between Ming and Song? This
might prove as fruitful as the comparison between the East and the West.

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