Sinocentrism

Sinocentrism is any ethnocentric perspective that regards China to be central or unique relative to other countries. In pre-modern times, this took the form of viewing China as the only civilization in the world, and foreign nations or ethnic groups as "barbarians". In modern times, this can take the form of according China significance or supremacy at the cost of other nations.

 

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The Sinocentric system

Barbarians according to the Sinocentric world. Those in the east were called Dongyi (東夷), those in the west Xirong (西戎), those in the south Nanman (南蠻), and those in the north Beidi (北狄). The outward area of the Sinocentric influence were called Huawaizhidi (化外之地).

The Sinocentric system was a hierarchical system of international relations that prevailed in East Asia before the adoption of the Westphalian system in modern times. Surrounding countries such as Japan, Korea, and Vietnam were regarded as vassals of China and relations between the Chinese Empire and these peoples were interpreted as tributary relationships under which these countries offered tribute (朝貢) to the Emperor of China. Areas outside the Sinocentric influence were called Huawaizhidi (化外之地), means uncivilized lands.

At the center of the system stood China, ruled by the dynasty that had gained the Mandate of Heaven. This Celestial Empire (神州 Shénzhōu), distinguished by its Confucian codes of morality and propriety, regarded itself as the only civilization in the world; the Emperor of China (huangdi) was regarded as the only legitimate Emperor of the entire world (lands all under heaven or 天下 tianxia).

Under this scheme of international relations, only China had an Emperor or Huangdi (皇帝), who was the Son of Heaven; other countries only had Kings or Wang (王). (See Chinese sovereign). The Japanese use of the term Emperor or 'tennō' (天皇) for the ruler of Japan was a subversion of this principle. Significantly, the Koreans still refer to the Japanese Emperor as a King, conforming with the traditional Chinese usage.

Identification of the heartland and the legitimacy of dynastic succession were both essential aspects of the system. Originally the center was synonymous with the Central Plain, an area that was expanded through invasion and conquest over many centuries. The dynastic succession was at times subject to radical changes in interpretation, such as the period of the Southern Song when the ruling dynasty lost the traditional heartland to the northern barbarians. Outside the center were several concentric circles. Local ethnic minorities were not regarded as 'foreign countries'. However, they were governed by their own leaders called Local Commanders (土司 tusi), subject to recognition by the Emperor, and were exempt from the Chinese bureaucratic system.

Outside this circle were the tributary states which offered tribute (朝貢) to the Emperor of China and over which China exercised suzerainty. Under the Ming Dynasty, when the tribute system entered its peak, these states were classified into a number of groups. The southeastern barbarians (category one) included some of the major states of East Asia and Southeast Asia, such as Korea, Japan, the Ryūkyū Kingdom, Annam, Cambodia, Vietnam, Siam, Champa, and Java. A second group of southeastern barbarians covered countries like Sulu, Malacca, and Sri Lanka. Many of these are independent states in modern times.

In addition, there were northern barbarians, northeastern barbarians, and two large categories of western barbarians (from Shanxi, west of Lanzhou, and modern-day Xinjiang), none of which have survived into modern times as separate or independent states.

The situation was complicated by the fact that some tributary states had their own tributaries. Laos was a tributary of Vietnam and the Ryūkyū Kingdom paid tribute to both China and Japan.

Beyond the circle of tributary states were countries in a trading relationship with China. The Portuguese, for instance, were allowed to trade with China from leased territory in Macau but did not officially enter the tributary system. Intriguingly, Qing dynasty have used the term Huawaizhidi (化外之地) explicitly for Taiwan (Formosa) .

While Sinocentrism tends to be identified as a politically inspired system of international relations, in fact it possessed an important economic aspect. The Sinocentric tribute and trade system provided Northeast and Southeast Asia with a political and economic framework for international trade. Countries wishing to trade with China were required to submit to a suzerain-vassal relationship with the Chinese sovereign. After investiture (冊封) of the ruler in question, the missions were allowed to come to China to pay tribute (貢物) to the Chinese emperor. In exchange, tributary missions were presented with return bestowals (回賜). Special licences were issued to merchants accompanying these missions to carry out trade. Trade was also permitted at land frontiers and specified ports. This sinocentric trade zone was based on the use of silver as a currency with prices set by reference to Chinese prices.

The Sinocentric model was not seriously challenged until contact with the European powers in the 18th and 19th century, in particular the Opium War. This was partly due to the fact that there were little direct contact between the Chinese Empire and other empires of the pre-modern period. By the mid 19th century, imperial China was well past its peak and was on the verge of collapse.

 

Response of other countries

Within Asia, the cultural and economic centrality of China was recognized and most countries submitted to the sinocentric model, if only to enjoy the benefits of a trading relationship. However, clear differences of nuance can be discerned in the responses of different countries.

 

Korea

The Korean peninsula was greatly influenced by its geographic and historic proximity to China. The relationships of various Korean states with China have played a pivotal role in her history and the rise and fall of Korean states has been closely related to the rise and fall of China. After the Ming, when the "Chinese" dynasty was conquered by the "barbarian" (Manchu) Qing dynasty in 1644, Korea has called itself a Small China (小中華 sojunghwa), the last descendant of civilized world. An obvious Chinese influence can be found in Korean names.

 

Japan

In Japan, an ambivalent tone was set early in its relationship with China. Shotoku Taishi (574-622), Prince Regent of Japan, is famous for having sent a letter to the Emperor of China starting with the words: "The Emperor of the land where the sun rises sends a letter to the Emperor of the land where the sun sets to ask if you are healthy?" (日出處天子致書日沒處天子無恙云云). This is commonly believed as the origin of the name Nihon (source of the sun), although the actual characters for Nihon (日本) were not used. Not long after this, however, Japan remodeled its entire state and administrative apparatus on the Chinese system under the Taika Reforms, the beginning of a prolonged period of Chinese influence on all aspects of Japanese culture.

The Mongol invasions in the late thirteenth century had evoked a national consciousness of the role of the kamikaze (神風) in defeating the enemy. Less than fifty years later (1339-43), Kitabatake Chikafusa wrote the Jinnōshōtōki (神皇正統記, 'Chronicle of the Direct Descent of the Divine Sovereigns') emphasizing the divine descent of the imperial line. The Jinnōshōtōki provided a Shinto view of history stressing the divine nature of the Japan and its spiritual supremacy over China and India. In the Tokugawa era, the study of Kokugaku (国学) arose as an attempt to reconstruct and recover the authentic native roots of Japanese culture, particularly Shintoism, excluding later elements borrowed from China.

In 1401, during the Muromachi period (室町時代), the shogun Yoshimitsu (足利義満) restarted the lapsed tribute system, describing himself in a letter to the Chinese Emperor as "Your subject, the King of Japan". The benefit of the tribute system was a profitable trade in which Japanese products were traded for Chinese goods. This relationship lasted until Ashikaga Yoshiteru. The first great response from a Japanese ruler against the sinocentric tributary system was a military challenge under a unified Japan led by Toyotomi Hideyoshi who embarked on a campaign of conquering Ming China through the attempted conquest of Korea in the years 1592-1593. The attempt to conquer "all under heaven" (itself a sinocentric concept identifying China as "the world") ended in failure.

As a country that had much to gain by eclipsing Chinese power in East Asia, Japan in more recent times has perhaps been most ardent in identifying and demolishing what it dismissively calls Chūka shisō (中華思想), loosely meaning 'Zhonghua ideology'. One manifestation of Japanese resistance to Sinocentrism was the insistence for many years in the early 20th century on using the name Shina (支那) for China, based on the Western word 'China', in preference to Chūgoku (中国 Central Country) advocated by the Chinese themselves.

Another example is the claim, heard among some commentators on China, that general depopulation and the incursion of races from the north during the period of the Three Kingdoms (三国) led to the virtual replacement of the original Chinese race by non-Chinese. The general thrust of this kind of claim is to deny the continuity of Chinese civilization and discredit modern Chinese claims and appeals to their ancient history.

In an ironic affirmation of the spirit of Sinocentrism, claims are sometimes heard that the Japanese, not the Chinese, are the legitimate heirs of the Chinese culture. For instance, in the early Edo period, neo-Confucianist Yamaga Soko asserted that Japan was superior to China in Confucian terms and more deserving of the name "Chūgoku". Other scholars picked this up, notably Aizawa Seishisai in his political tract Shinron (新論 New Theses) in 1825.

 

Vietnam

Vietnam had an intimate but not necessarily peaceful relationship with China. Vietnam was under Chinese rule for approximately 1,000 years before gaining independence in the 10th century. In subsequent centuries the Vietnamese drove out Chinese invaders on a number of occasions, to the extent that conflict with China may be seen as one of the main themes of Vietnamese history.

However, Vietnam was also heavily Sinicized, using Classical Chinese as its official literary language and adopting most aspects of Chinese culture, including the administrative system, architecture, philosophy, religion, and literature of China.

Vietnam persistently identified itself in relation to China, regarding itself as the kingdom of the south as against China in the north, as seen in this line from a poem (in Chinese) by General Lý Thường Kiệt (李常傑) (1019-1105): "Over mountains and rivers of the South reigns the Emperor of the South. (南國山河南帝居)"

The name 'Việt' itself is cognate with Yue (越), referring to peoples of Southern China who were largely conquered by the North under the Qin Dynasty. The Vietnamese are considered as belonging to the Yue. The current name of the country, Vietnam, is derived from Nam Việt (南越), meaning Southern Yue, the name of a post-Qin kingdom covering southern China and northern Vietnam. The Chinese, who were unwilling to recognize Vietnam as a successor to the Southern Yue state, altered this to Việt Nam (越南 South of Yue).

During Nguyễn Dynasty (1802-1945), the influence of China had lessened. Vietnam stopped using Chinese characters and Chữ Nôm in the post World War II time.

 

Myanmar

Myanmar (Burma) is an interesting case. Unlike East Asian states, which communicated in written Chinese, Myanmar used a different written language in its communications with China. While China consistently regarded Myanmar as a vassal, Myanma records indicate that Myanmar considered itself as China's equal. Under the Burmese interpretation, Myanmar was the "younger brother" and China was the "elder brother".

 

Europe

The best-known official encounter between Sinocentrism and the self-assertion of 'Europeans' was the celebrated Macartney Embassy of 1792-93, which sought to establish a permanent British presence in Peking and open up trade relations. The rebuff of the Chinese Emperor to the British overtures and the British refusal to kowtow to the Emperor of China has passed into legend. In response to the British request to recognise Macartney as ambassador, the Emperor wrote:

The Celestial Empire, ruling all within the four seas, simply concentrates on carrying out the affairs of Government properly...We have never valued ingenious articles, nor do we have the slightest need of your country's manufactures, therefore O King, as regards to your request to send someone to remain at the capital, which it is not in harmony with the regulations of the Celestial Empire - we also feel very much that it is of no advantage to your country.

It was to be more than half a century before Europe gained the upper hand thanks to their victory in the Opium War. Led by the British, one Western power after another imposed "unequal treaties" on China, including provisions of extraterritoriality that excluded Europeans from the application of local laws.

 

Cultural Sinocentrism

In a cultural sense, Sinocentrism refers to the tendency to regard Chinese culture as more ancient than or superior to other cultures. This often involves regarding neighboring countries as mere cultural offshoots of China. To the extent that China has a far longer written history than neighboring countries, and given the fact that these countries borrowed heavily from the Chinese model at an early stage in their histories, a Sinocentric view of East Asia cannot be disputed. However, Sinocentrism goes beyond this and tries to deny surrounding countries uniqueness or validity as separate cultures. For example, there is a story that a sea-going fleet led by Xu Fu near the end of the Qin Dynasty resulted in large-scale Chinese settlement on the Japanese islands. This story is supported only by circumstantial evidence, but is eagerly embraced by many Chinese as proving that the origins of Japan as a nation can be traced to China.

The geographical dimension of traditional Sinocentrism was highlighted by Chinese reactions to the publication of the first world map by the Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552-1610):

Lately Matteo Ricci utilized some false teachings to fool people, and scholars unanimously believed him...take for example the position of China on the map. He puts it not in the center but slightly to the West and inclined to the north. This is altogether far from the truth, for China should be in the center of the world, which we can prove by the single fact that we can see the North Star resting at the zenith of the heaven at midnight. How can China be treated like a small unimportant country, and placed slightly to the north as in this map?

In the late nineteenth century, the idea that knowledge borrowed from the West already existed in China in antiquity, a trend of thought known in Chinese as gǔ yǐ yǒu zhī (古已有之, literally 'this already existed in ancient times'), flourished in Chinese intellectual circles. The Qing dynasty scholar, Ruan Yuan, wrote the book Chouren zhuan (畴人传, Biographies of Astronomers and Mathematicians) from the point of view that Western science had an ancient Chinese origin. This notion had its intellectual roots in the Han Learning tradition, a movement to recover “pristine copies” of the ancient classics. Scholars such as Ruan saw astronomy and mathematics as a key to deciphering the ancient classics, and until the Sino-Japanese War many believed that the science and technology coming from Europe was actually lost ancient Chinese knowledge. Although the theory of gǔ yǐ yǒu zhī is no longer taken seriously in China, there is still a residual tendency within Chinese culture to identify customs and technology borrowed from the West as having Chinese antecedents or to claim that aspects of Western culture originated in China.

Culturally, one of the most famous attacks on Sinocentrism and its associated beliefs was made by the author Lu Xun in The True Story of Ah Q, satirizing the ridiculous way in which the protagonist claimed 'spiritual victories' despite being humiliated and defeated.

 

Today

The Sinocentric model of political relations came to an end in the 19th century. The ideology suffered a further blow when Imperial Japan, having undergone the Meiji Restoration, defeated China in the First Sino-Japanese War. As a result, China adopted the Westphalian system of equal independent states. In modern Chinese foreign policy, the People's Republic of China has stated repeatedly that it will never seek hegemony (永不称霸).

While China has renounced claims to superiority over other nations, some claim that China never really completely abandoned Sinocentrism and that a sinocentric view of history lies behind many modern Chinese constructs of history and self-identity.

While the Republic of China (ROC) was too weak to do so after the Second Sino-Japanese War, the People's Republic of China (PRC), after its establishment in 1949, quickly claimed and incorporated territories which it considered to have historically been a part of China, such as the areas of Tibet and Xinjiang, but which had become de facto independent, into Chinese national territory. Attempts to persuade the Soviet Union to accept the incorporation of Mongolia failed as Mikoyan declared that this should be decided by the Mongolian people.

Some claim elements of Sinocentrism have been identified in China's recent relations with Korea. In 2004, Chinese scholars of the Northeast Project identified the ancient kingdom of Goguryeo, which included the area of southern Manchuria and northern Korea, should be regarded as a part of the history of China when its capital was in modern-day Manchuria (Northeast China), and a part of the history of Korea when its capital was in modern-day Korea. This caused an outcry among Korean nationalists who claimed Goguryeo as part of Korea's history.

 

Related concepts

Sinocentrism, unlike Han chauvinism, does not necessarily have a racial basis in Han Chinese ethnicity. Successive peoples from the north, such as the Xianbei, Jurchens, or Manchus, were quite ready to place themselves at the center of the model, although they were not always successful. The Xianbei empires during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, for example, regarded the Han Chinese regimes of southern China as "barbarians" because they refused to submit to Xianbei rule. Similarly, the Manchu Qing Dynasty regarded the initial wave of European incursions during the mid-19th century as "barbarians".

Sinocentrism is also not synonymous with Chinese nationalism. The successive dynasties of China were Sinocentric in the sense that they regarded Chinese civilization to be universal in its reach and application. Chinese nationalism, in contrast, is a more modern concept focused primarily on the idea of a unified, cohesive, and powerful Chinese nation, as one of the nations of the world.

 

See also

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

• All under heaven
• Chinese nationalism
• Emperor of China
• Chinese imperialism
• Foreign relations of imperial China
• Ming Dynasty military conquests
• List of tributaries of Imperial China
• List of recipients of tribute from China
• China as an emerging superpower
• Suzerainty
• Zhonghua Minzu
• Han chauvinism
• East Asia
• East Asian language
• Chinese Century

 

External links

• Public Secrets: Geopolitical Aesthetics in Zhang Yimou’s Hero
• China puts Korean spat on the map
• Origin of Vietnam name
• The Rise of East Asia and the Withering Away of the Interstate System
• Sinocentrism or Paranoia?
• Suzerain and Vassal, or Elder and Younger Brothers: The Nature of the Sino-Burmese Historical Relationship
• The Zhuang Literati From Ming to Mid-Qing - A study of Confucianism and the acculturation of the Zhuang ethnic group