Heeding the warnings: Deng Huaxi and Zheng Guanying’s Shengshi weiyan

ABSTRACT

This article establishes a link between Qing-dynasty official Deng Huaxi (1826–1916) and comprador Zheng Guanying’s (1842–1922) political treatise Shengshi weiyan (Warnings to a Prosperous Age). It suggests that Deng Huaxi’s reforms as provincial governor of Anhui and Guizhou were inspired by Shengshi weiyan. The work did not come to be applied in the 1898 Hundred Days Reform but saw at least partial success in the modernization of the two landlocked provinces. This interpretation supports the scholarly consensus that the geographical extent of the late Qing self-strengthening reforms was contingent on various persons and places and being far more focused on coastal provinces. It also suggests that the nature, pace, and scope of reforms lay at the discretion of governors-general and provincial governors, many of whom possessed few resources with which to implement them fully. The story of Deng Huaxi challenges a common idea about late Qing China: that meaningful reforms relied only on men with deep political connections to the central court and access to private fortunes. It also shows how effectively messages by Zheng Guanying and other theorists could reach local administrators and leaders and how, in provinces not so dominated by conservative literati elites, Western-style reforms garnered much appeal without too much resistance.

KEYWORDS:

• Anhui
• China
• Deng Huaxi
• Guizhou
• Qing empire
• Warnings to a Prosperous Age

Introduction

One of the most significant books to emerge during the late Qing period was Shengshi weiyan (Warnings to a Prosperous Age), written by Guangdong comprador Zheng Guanying (1842–1922). The book was one of the key references that inspired Kang Youwei to pitch political reform and the concomitant notion of a constitutional government to the Guangxu emperor (r. 1875–1908).¹ It also provided Sun Yat-sen with a nationalist ideology that endowed the people, not their ruler, with ultimate sovereignty.² The influence of the book, a collection of essays written during the 1870s and 1880s but published only in 1893, continued to be felt as late as the 1930s, when Mao Zedong cited it as a native source of his ideas about class warfare and economic nationalism.³ The ideologically divergent Chinese intellectuals of the late empire and early republic finally found something on which they could all agree: the book was a definitive guide to the future of China.

Britain and France had defeated the Qing empire in several military conflicts during the late nineteenth century. The spectacle of war and the humiliation of defeat unwittingly triggered a general interest in the West. Instead of undertaking focused studies on individual Western nations, bureaucratic and literary circles issued calls for imitating barely-understood foreign ideas and institutions in order to “enrich the nation and strengthen the army” (fuguo qiangbing). Conservatives denounced such rhetoric, which implied a corresponding overhaul of the Confucian moral, social, and political structure that defined their own government and social statuses. Their heavy criticism transformed some reform-minded statesmen into compromisers or moderates who championed the principle encapsulated in Qing-dynasty scholar-official Zhang Zhidong’s (1837–1909) axiom of “Chinese learning as essence, Western learning for practical use” (zhongti xiyong).

Spared from the political infighting that framed the debate, Zheng Guanying remained genuinely interested in the critical issues of his day.⁴ As a comprador, he acquired English, interacted with Europeans and Japanese, and read Western newspapers and missionary accounts. But his significance in modern China’s reform movement lay not so much in his wide exposure, which many educated men of his time shared, but in how he disinterestedly and systematically articulated the pressing concerns of the Qing state and advocated exciting solutions for resolving its political dilemmas and geopolitical crises through his writing a highly influential political treatise.⁵ Although he must have understood that complex indigenous marketing structures mediated by brokers, guilds, and compradors such as himself had obstructed direct foreign contacts with primary producers and consumers, he nonetheless feared that it might merely be a matter of time before imperialistic commercial power penetrated China completely, since the dynasty and the state continued to weaken.⁶ Also at stake in the intellectual debates at the time was how far reforms of any kind could go without compromising too much of imperial authority and of Manchu rule over “Han” China.

His work Shengshi weiyan truly gained prominence during the Hundred Days Reform of 1898, when Kang Youwei tried to implement its suggestions with his own input under the patronage of Guangxu and with the complicity of high-profile ministers such as Weng Tonghe (1830–1904), who had served as Guangxu’s chief tutor.⁷ To offer officials a glimpse of his plans, Guangxu ordered the court to reprint and distribute Shengshi weiyan to them. The book received further publicity, albeit indirectly, when Empress Dowager Cixi (1835–1908), the de facto ruler, and her Manchu aristocratic allies rejected the reforms and expelled Kang Youwei and his disciples from China. Zheng Guanying was, somewhat surprisingly, not implicated; neither was his book banned from circulation. After a multinational force occupied Beijing and threatened to do away with the Qing dynasty for good during the anti-foreigner Boxer Rebellion, Cixi led a series of reforms known as the New Policies (xinzheng), for which Shengshi weiyan served as a blueprint.⁸ She trod a fine line between instituting nation-saving reforms and maintaining Manchu dominance, which the Hundred Days Reform had threatened.⁹ The concern about Shengshi weiyan was a parallel one: the empire should be strengthened, but not at the expense of Manchu power.

Compared to the fame enjoyed by Zheng Guanying and Shengshi weiyan, Deng Huaxi (1826–1916), who first brought the book to Guangxu’s attention, is not a well-documented figure in Qing-dynasty records and in modern scholarship. Deng was the provincial governor (xunfu) of Anhui Province, and he had read Shengshi weiyan prior to his governorship and been struck by the coherence, novelty, and potential of its arguments. In 1895, he submitted it to Guangxu for his perusal, which might have prompted the latter’s favorable response to Kang Youwei’s petitions in the summer of 1898; this occurred before the book became famous and factionalism became pronounced toward the end of the 1890s. In his petition, Deng Huaxi lauded Shengshi weiyan and recommended a promotion for its author.¹⁰ In 1897, he met Zheng Guanying in Anhui and was impressed with his erudition and eloquence, convinced that he had made a wise decision in introducing Shengshi weiyan to the Guangxu emperor years prior.¹¹

Born and raised during the Daoguang reign (1820–1850) in Guangdong Province, which had been the site of intensive Sino-foreign trade and cultural exchanges for centuries, Deng Huaxi witnessed the collapse of maritime defenses and the decline of Qing rule. After passing the civil service examinations in 1851, he assumed a variety of official positions and rose in rank to become the provincial governor of Anhui. He seemed typical of his generation of provincial leaders; for example, he pushed fairly popular provincial reforms and received imperial backing for new schools, commercial development, and support for farmers. He also submitted the potentially seditious – even potentially treasonous – Shengshi weiyan to the emperor for consideration to be implemented. Unlike other provincial governors, he was thus willing to risk censure, career advancement, and even capital punishment by openly endorsing radical reforms meant to save the empire from disintegration. And although he did not know Kang Youwei and his disciples personally, he acted promptly on Guangxu’s hastily issued edicts, suggesting that he had at least supported the broad shape of the Hundred Days Reform. In other words, his actual reforms might not have gone beyond those started or advocated by prominent officials such as Zhang Zhidong and economic reformer Sheng Xuanhuai (1844–1916), but he adopted Shengshi weiyan as a ready-made manual and tried to execute many of the reform proposals outlined by its writer, who had been largely ignored by literati and officials alike until the Hundred Days Reform.

In his thoughtful summary of the scholarship on the extent and success (or failure) of the Self-Strengthening Movement, historian William T. Rowe suggests that a general consensus has been reached: Western impact catalyzed Qing modernization (although historians continue to dispute the magnitude), which Confucian scholar-officials grudgingly accepted. Political power was then decentralized in favor of provincial or regional governance, resulting in the rise of local elites outside of government service at the expense of centrally appointed bureaucrats. These changes revived and industrialized the empire, although the debacles of the Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) and imperial disintegration (1911–1912) seemed to suggest otherwise. The most recent historiography has moved away from the failure narrative to highlight how China’s great-power status in the twentieth century actually grew from the industrialization begun during the Qing period.¹² But current scholarship, revisionist or not, remains fixed on the most powerful scholar-officials – men possessing extraordinary gravitas and means – who left a corpus of writings for historical analysis and were themselves written about by their contemporaries and by subsequent historians. Relatively unknown officials such as Deng Huaxi who lacked impact and resources have fallen through the cracks, even though they had also contributed in their own way to the “talk of the times.”¹³

Deng Huaxi’s agendas were heavily influenced by Shengshi weiyan; he himself was no innovator, but someone who was inspired by the talk of the times. If an official as “trivial” or “unknown” in Chinese history as he was, was also actively involved in the Self-Strengthening Movement (intensely studied from the 1960s through the 1980s but not since), then his story might demonstrate the geographical extent of a professedly nationwide movement and the prominent role of local leadership in determining the pace and scope of its reforms. More importantly, the limited resources he had at his disposal meant that ideas about Western-style reforms advocated by political theorists like Zheng Guanying could still be exported and applied in provinces that were not terribly exposed to foreign influences and not so dominated by conservative literati elites. Most of those provinces were landlocked and deprived of cash because the late Qing state had curtailed interprovincial aid and instead channeled funds toward military projects in strategic coastal areas.¹⁴

With this context in mind, the present article focuses on how Deng Huaxi tried to put Zheng’s ideas into practice in the landlocked and poverty-stricken provinces of Anhui and Guizhou. It begins by describing the main arguments of Shengshi weiyan and clarifying what Deng Huaxi inferred from the book. It then contextualizes his goals in the reform movement of the 1890s and early 1900s. The article concludes by examining how Deng Huaxi, in his retirement at a time of provincial assemblies and study societies, acted (given his personality and character), and how he adapted to the political and social formations of the aforementioned context, to become recognized after the collapse of Qing rule. It is perhaps at the level of the individual that we can truly observe how ideology became practice and how this was affected by political changes.¹⁵ For merely having lived through such large changes, Deng Huaxi deserves attention.

A final word is in order regarding the limitations of this study. The article does not dwell on Zheng Guanying’s interest in parliamentarianism and ideas about democracy; furthermore, Deng Huaxi did not spearhead such institutions during his career and retirement, but he did play a role in them from his perch as a local notable at the specific behest of the Qing court. It might not be a stretch to say that Deng experimented with Zheng Guanying’s more “tangible,” or practical, ideas on agriculture, education, trade, and transportation in Anhui and Guizhou. It was little wonder, then, that during the Hundred Days Reform, Kang Youwei commended Deng as one of the few governors-general (zongdu) and provincial governors who had instituted reforms in their provinces. Although Chinese historians have noted Deng Huaxi’s progressive rule in Anhui (he spent less time in Guizhou, where he was in any event far more preoccupied with fighting rebel groups), referring to it as the “Wan River Reforms” (Wanjiang bianfa; the Wan River runs through Anhui), most have anachronistically associated it with the Hundred Days Reform without attributing it accurately to Zheng Guanying or the latter’s Shengshi weiyan, which gave Deng a more direct reference for his relatively more “practical,” non-ideological, matters.

Reading the warnings

Zheng Guanying wrote Shengshi weiyan because he was frustrated with the defeat of the Qing during the Sino-French War (1884–1885). Cixi had widened the “stream of speech” (yanlu) during the war to receive candid suggestions from officials through the memorial system and assess public opinion about the war as expressed in the printing press. But by the end of the war, she was preparing the ground for a decisively pacifist approach to French ambitions in Vietnam, which had been a Qing vassal for two centuries.¹⁶ She needed support favoring such an approach as officials continued to petition the emperor, over whom she was regent, to forcefully defend Vietnam against the French. Moreover, public opinion expressed in Chinese newspapers such as Shenbao had coalesced to criticize the court for mismanaging the problem. Failing to suppress the dissonant voices, the court quickly concluded a ceasefire with the French under unfavorable terms, one of which was that Vietnam would become a French protectorate. Having surrendered Vietnam so readily, the rulership was seen as too enervated to hold together its tributary states. Fears surfaced that the foreign powers would dismember China. Columnists and editorialists suggested that in lieu of effective state power, the “people” (that is, the literati, lower officials, or anyone lacking the bureaucratic power to influence policy) should learn to protect themselves, precipitating both incipient nationalism and political works such as Shengshi weiyan.¹⁷

In Shengshi weiyan, Zheng suggested that the Qing state build railroads, schools, and shipyards to develop commerce, mining, and technology. Although he seemed to be merely repeating the credo of zhongti xiyong, he emphasized, more than other writers had, that the ultimate source of Western power and wealth lay not in battleships or guns, but in a parliamentary structure that forged consensus between the ruler and the ruled. Another key to national strength was the cultivation of domestic talent in science and technology to improve food production, among other things.

Zheng Guanying also promoted a comprehensive transport system. While past thinkers had stressed its importance for military deployment, he emphasized the way that railways and roads could integrate geographically diverse regions, facilitate trade among them, and resist the Western imperialism that was exploiting and impoverishing China. In response to a common, conservative argument that Western science and technology were irrelevant to China, he suggested that such skills had originated in China long before and had made their way to the West, where they became improved so as to surpass China’s own. Despite his advocacy of Western learning, then, he in this way could remain a nationalist.¹⁸ Deng Huaxi did not address the issue of institutional change but focused almost entirely on infrastructure and military reforms. Perhaps he believed that the parliamentary system would work itself into the future of the Qing state after the urgent bread-and-butter issues had been addressed.

One chapter of Shengshi weiyan discusses agriculture, which, according to Zheng Guanying, had been neglected by most educated literati, who were single-mindedly concerned about acquiring science and technology. For him, agriculture, perhaps more so than science and technology, was critical to China’s gaining power and wealth. The chapter was titled “Agriculture” (Nongshi), and in it he addressed the issue of how to fully exploit the land. He did not deny that industrialization could enhance national power. He suggested that most Chinese had depended and would continue to depend on agriculture for their livelihood; this put him at odds with many of his contemporaries.¹⁹ Advanced technologies could increase agricultural yield, as proven by the extensive use of machinery and chemical fertilizers in England. He thus proposed that the court sponsor students to study sericulture in Europe and improve the quality of silk exports, for which China was renowned. Officials themselves should visit Europe to observe methods of growing mulberry trees to aid in the raising of silkworms and the rearing of livestock. Upon their return, these officials would share their observations with farmers, who could then boost agricultural productivity. When farming became profitable, less physically demanding, and hence more desirable, men would turn to it rather than to banditry, and all could help cultivate arable land and build a rich and strong China.²⁰

To this end, Zheng Guanying encouraged the Chinese to relocate to sparsely populated areas of the empire, such as the politically sacred Manchuria (the homeland of the Manchu rulers),²¹ Xinjiang (literally “New Territories,” which became a province in the early 1880s in response to Russian territorial ambitions),²² Taiwan (once administered by Fujian but now made a free-standing province in order to fend off Japanese designs),²³ remote parts of Guangdong (the southernmost province of the empire), and other undeveloped lands. He thus anticipated the court’s directive after the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905), during which the fighting took place in northeast China, namely, a policy to populate Manchuria with Han (Chinese) and thereby reinforce Qing control of the war-ravaged region. Many Chinese went to European colonies in Africa and Asia as laborers and helped develop European colonies, Zheng Guanying wrote, so these “work troops” could return home and be organized for internal migration to enrich China instead. For him, labor was a mobile force best marshaled for economic development. Thus, in this way colonization was more an economic than a moral issue. Barely mentioning the role or presence of non-Han groups in the imperial borderlands, he appeared to have adopted the logic of settler colonialism, which, in another part of the world, had expanded the American empire westward toward the Pacific, albeit to the detriment of Native American communities.²⁴ In the United States, resettlement and frontier migrations had helped relieve the strain on food, land, and other resources in heavily populated regions and distribute capital and labor more evenly across the American empire. Perhaps Zheng Guanying was aware of the American experience and was trying to recreate it in the context of China for the latter’s benefit.²⁵

As a comprador, Zheng saw trade as “the source of strength” (yuanqi) and the “arteries” (xuemai) of a country. He recommended that the court regulate trade and protect domestic industries so that they could compete with foreign merchants. In his view, China was losing economic sovereignty to the Western powers, which had come to monopolize trade in the coastal provinces. To remedy the situation, he wrote, the court should establish a bureau in each provincial capital responsible for overseeing and promoting trade. A believer in realpolitik, and perhaps inspired by the historical successes of the British East India Company and the Dutch East Indies Company (Vereening de Oostindische Compagnie in Dutch, or VOC), he argued that military might complemented economic power by coercing cooperation, enforcing compliance to treaties and contracts, and boosting the image of merchants as a superior people.²⁶ China should thus develop its own shipbuilding industry and construct ocean-going fleets that could help its merchants conduct their own overseas trade and compete with foreign merchants.²⁷ This went beyond the modest aims of securing for the court a small yet reliable source of tax revenues and enabling indigenous firms to monopolize business on the Yangtze River.²⁸ Trade was linked to agriculture, he elaborated, because grain could be obtained from foreign countries through maritime transportation, which was especially important in the event of a famine. This appeared to be the situation in his native Guangdong, where there was a constant shortage of food supplies due to overpopulation and consumer demand for higher-quality rice from Siam and elsewhere.²⁹

Zheng Guanying consistently invoked Japan as a model for China. He wanted China to dismantle the social distinctions between scholar, farmer, artisan, and merchant and praised the Japanese for having done so to encourage trade and incentivize merchants. He cited Japan as an example of how to resist economic imperialism. The Japanese government, he wrote, encouraged exports of Japanese goods, even at a loss, and gradually changed the balance of trade in Japan’s favor.³⁰ The Japan connection, in both tangible and imaginative ways, would, not coincidentally, be instrumental in Deng Huaxi’s career and in his reform agenda in Anhui and Guizhou. We take up his life and career in what follows.

Heeding the warnings

By the time Deng Huaxi was appointed provincial governor of Anhui (1896–1900) and then Guizhou (1900–1903), he was an experienced and respected official.³¹ Having served as censor, prefect, and superintendent of transport in various provinces for more than four decades, he was well poised to execute his ideas about governance and reform – ideas informed by what he had read in Shengshi weiyan.

One of Deng Huaxi’s first self-appointed tasks as provincial governor was to develop agriculture and, in particular, sericulture in Anhui. In his “Petition to Organize Commercial Agriculture and Build Mulberry Gardens” (Chouban nongshang zhongzhi bing kaiban sangyuan cansi qing li’an zhe) he argued that the creation of wealth occurred primarily in large populations and with high agricultural productivity. Eager to disseminate knowledge about effective agricultural practices and to promote sericulture, he ordered a subscription to Nongxue bao (Agronomy) and reprinted the ancient classics Qimin yaoshu (Essential Techniques for the Welfare of the People) and Nongsang jiyao (Fundamentals of Agriculture and Sericulture). He then distributed copies to the prefects of Anhui so that they could convey their contents to farmers. On the outskirts of Anqing, the provincial capital of Anhui, he allocated government plots to silkworm farmers and sent his aides to Huzhou in Zhejiang Province, a city famed for producing silk, to buy silk-moth eggs and larvae. He also hired experts from Huzhou to set up mulberry gardens in Anqing that suited local conditions. Because these experiments were successful, he raised capital from provincial merchants and formed Anhui’s first sericulture company, which became responsible for importing foreign equipment such as silk-reeling machines with the aim of modernizing the industry. To ensure the continuation of these efforts, he founded a sericulture school for children of local silkworm farmers.³² In effect, he was trying to restructure the economy of sericulture and transform its base from agriculture to manufacturing and then to commerce in order to enrich the farmers.³³ But although Anhui had played an important role in the Self-Strengthening Movement led by Li Hongzhang (1823–1901), who was a native of that landlocked province, it remained a backwater. Given the concentration of foreign investments and state resources in the capital and the treaty-port cities, people of extraordinary gravitas and means, as well as reforms of any kind that they were able to implement, were based in the coastal provinces.³⁴

Deng Huaxi was uninterested in the late Qing intellectual controversies vis-à-vis Old Text, New Text, Han-Song Learning, Tongcheng-style writing, and various synthesizing approaches. He preferred instead to focus on delivering tangible results from his practical actions. He thus did not deviate far from the older, traditional curricula and programs that continued to operate in many academies. In “Petition to Establish a New Academy” (Chouyi tianshe xuetang zhuoni qieshi banli zhe), he indicated that schools could “nurture human talent for use” (chucai beiyong zhi liangtu), and that it would be futile to revamp only the curriculum because the instructors had not acquired Western learning (xixue). In this, he agreed with Zheng Guanying, who pointed out that classically educated tutors specialized only in philology and taking the civil service examinations: they were ignorant about current affairs, politics, and natural sciences.³⁵ Deng Huaxi thus requested permission to found an academy that would “seek truth from facts” (shishi qiushi), “boost morale” (zhenxing shiqi), and “stimulate hearts” (guwu renxin). He named it “Qiushi Academy” (Qiushi xuetang) in line with his pragmatist vision for education and Western learning.³⁶

Deng Huaxi’s petition revealed that although Westernization had developed into a trend viewed favorably by most quarters of Qing society, not everyone knew how to achieve it, and some paid only lip service to it. In any case, the central court quickly granted permission for establishing a Western-inspired academy in Anhui but decreed that the province had to secure its own funds. Deng Huaxi looked into the construction of similar academies elsewhere in China and estimated that he would require approximately 20,000 taels of silver to build one in Anhui and then 8,640 taels a year to maintain it. To build his academy, he first sold lands and property confiscated from corrupt merchants and officials. He then apportioned the ad valorem (value-based) lijin tax levied on goods in transit between provinces to fund the annual operations.³⁷ Deng saw the lijin tax, which constituted one-fifth of the Qing court’s annual income, in a positive light, unlike Zheng Guanying, who had criticized it as harming the merchants and, hence, the national economy.³⁸ In a way, Deng and Zheng based their thinking on different premises and had different objectives. Like most provincial officials, Deng held to local concerns and was more interested in harnessing the lijin system to fund, for his agenda, reform initiatives.³⁹ Zheng wanted the court to empower Chinese merchants and protect China’s sovereignty in the current, predatory international order.⁴⁰ As a result of “unequal” treaties signed after China’s military defeats, foreign merchants and imported goods escaped the control of Qing customs and enjoyed an unfair advantage because the lijin tax was imposed only on domestic goods.⁴¹ In contrast, Deng Huaxi wanted to support the merchants in their competition with foreign rivals, but not at the expense of dismantling the lijin system that remained an indispensable source of income for his own provincial administration and planned reforms. By supporting landlocked provinces like Anhui and keeping them integrated within the empire, the lijin tax was not entirely destructive, a conclusion that escaped the notice of commentators like Zheng Guanying.⁴²

Deng Huaxi’s commitment to developing modern education in Anhui provided a strong incentive to support trade and privately owned industries in the impoverished province. For their exports, Anhui farmers received Mexican dollars – the currency of international transactions at the time. They then needed to exchange Mexican dollars for Chinese banknotes and coins with local officials, but dishonest ones would siphon money off the exchange at unfavorable rates. Farmers thus sustained losses, and with few coins in circulation, commerce was hampered. To resolve this issue, Deng dispatched officials to purchase machinery and printing paper in Shanghai. He then borrowed three minting machines from the mintage bureau of Guangdong to experiment with printing money. The import of coastal technologies led to the founding of Anhui’s first mintage bureau in 1898, which facilitated business transactions and the circulation of coinage and goods in the province.⁴³ And similar to what he had done to promote agricultural science, Deng also founded a business school and recruited both Chinese and foreign – mostly Japanese – instructors to teach accountancy, Chinese mathematical texts such as Zhoubi suanjing (Arithmetical Classic of the Gnomon and the Circular Paths of Heaven), business, and historical geography.⁴⁴

In response to Guangxu’s edict, promulgated during the Hundred Days Reform, that a commerce bureau be founded in each province, Deng Huaxi established a commerce bureau in Anqing, with a branch in Wuhu, the only treaty-port city in Anhui.⁴⁵ He channeled the lijin tax collected from the sale and purchase of coal, a major product and commodity of Anhui, to the bureaus, which succeeded in raising the number of coal-mining firms from two in 1898 to twenty by 1908.⁴⁶ Then, on behalf of the provincial government, Deng set up a private enterprise (without funds or direct involvement of the imperial state) with the help of local merchants and officials. The company, Taichang Shipping Corporation (Taichang lunchuan gongsi), was Anhui’s first privately owned transportation firm. With a fleet of more than twenty steamships, the new shipping company enabled Anhui merchants to traverse the Wan River and conduct trade in southern China.⁴⁷

The military was a politically sensitive question for which only the court and governors-general were formally responsible. As provincial governor, Deng Huaxi did not – and could not – attempt much reform in that realm until the Hundred Days Reform, when Guangxu mandated that the provinces raise, train, and discipline their own armies by adopting foreign concepts and methods. Deng Huaxi selected a thousand men from the troops stationed in Anhui and organized them into a “self-strengthening army” (ziqiang jun) comprised of three infantry camps and one artillery camp. He then requested his superior, the governor-general of Anhui, Jiangsu, and Jiangxi (Liangjiang zongdu), to send German firearms and military advisers – then recognized as some of the best in the world – to Anhui to train the new army.⁴⁸ He also founded a military academy, the Wubei Academy (Wubei xuetang), to help groom local talent.⁴⁹ Although Deng left Anhui before demonstrating how he would deploy the military to advance commercial interests, the corps he had organized became disgruntled with Manchu dominance and their own lack of political power and representation. They eventually participated in one of many uprisings that overthrew Qing rule in the final months of 1911.

It might be instructive to briefly assess Deng Huaxi’s efforts in Anhui before discussing those in Guizhou. We learned that he ordered the reproduction and distribution of ancient treatises on various subjects to help bring about new knowledge in Anhui. He did not rely solely on his own analyses, thus for his vision for Anhui he referenced successful models adopted in other provinces. Behind his Anhui reforms lay a genuine concern for deliberation and careful experimentation, which he continued to possess as provincial governor of Guizhou.

Deng Huaxi assumed his new position when the Qing state was embroiled in the Boxer Rebellion, an anti-foreign campaign fostered by the court and linked to millenarian sects that ultimately resulted in the occupation of Beijing by Japanese and Western armies sent to relieve the besieged foreign legations. Although Guizhou, a landlocked and truly backwater province in southwestern China, did not bear the brunt of fighting and social disruption during the broader campaign, it had to contribute to the court’s required payment of indemnities, which dampened the province’s economic prospects. Danger was also brewing in neighboring Guangxi Province, where militias and secret societies coalesced into a politico-religious force that threatened to dislodge Qing rule from southern China.⁵⁰

Soon after he reached Guizhou, Deng Huaxi corresponded with the provincial governors of Guangxi, Guangdong, Hunan, and Yunnan as a way to deal effectively with certain issues at hand, which he believed were regional in scope and required regional coordination. The uprising in Guangxi would persist until 1905, and Deng undertook measures to prevent it from spreading into Guizhou. In the context of the New Policies implemented by the court after the Boxer Rebellion, Deng established a new academy in Guizhou. He believed that social dislocation stemmed from poverty, economic stagnation, and lack of education. He referenced the model adopted by Shandong provincial governor Yuan Shikai (1859–1916), who sought German and Japanese assistance in building an academy in his province and devising its curriculum. The Guizhou Academy (Guizhou daxuetang) that Deng Huaxi brought to fruition was similar to the Qiushi Academy in Anhui for its dual emphasis on both Chinese and foreign learning. It introduced Western sciences and studies to a province that was relatively unexposed to foreign influences and nurtured local talent for the development of provincial wealth. Deng moreover sought to improve the transport infrastructure of Guizhou using local expertise, a plan that he believed would alleviate the area’s economic woes.⁵¹

As he had done earlier in the case of the Qiushi Academy, Deng Huaxi invited Japanese instructors to Guizhou. But in contrast to his approach in Anhui, he became more proactive and comprehensive in his recruitment. Through Zheng Guanying, he contacted the Japanese consul in Shanghai to discuss contracting Japanese instructors for his proposed Guizhou Academy. After lengthy negotiations that lasted more than five months, Deng Huaxi managed to hire a number of educators and specialists for the Academy. There they taught not only mathematics and the sciences but also military technology and political ideologies. Those teachers would recommend promising students for further education at Japanese colleges, creating an alternative channel of grooming Chinese students for overseas studies parallel to the central court’s official sponsorship of such students in Japan and the United States.⁵² Deng gave the Japanese a free hand in drafting a syllabus and appeared relatively unconcerned about imposing a prescribed or standardized system of thought on students, despite his definitive commitment to maintaining Qing rule in Guizhou. By 1905, students from Guizhou comprised 15 percent of the entire Chinese student pool in Japan, owing in no small measure to Deng Huaxi’s initiatives.⁵³

In retrospect, what Deng Huaxi accomplished was remarkable. Although neighboring provinces such as Sichuan and Yunnan had tried to adopt the New Policies and reform education, they faced tremendous difficulties in funding and staffing. The proper framework for comparison is thus not the littoral provinces most exposed to Western influences but those of the hinterland. Their governors did not think of attracting foreign instructors; they hired Chinese teachers who themselves had only recently been exposed to foreign learning at state institutions and vocational schools in northern China. In contrast, Deng Huaxi led Guizhou to become one of the very few provinces that engaged resident foreigners as advisers or experts. Unlike most modern academies of its kind, Guizhou Academy was run by Japanese rather than Chinese instructors and was subject to only the authority of the provincial governor. Those policies, according to historian Tao Qichen, provided the Japanese with sufficient leeway to conduct espionage activities and expand their influence in southwestern China.⁵⁴ But nationalistic historiography has obscured the fact that the extremely limited resources at his disposal forced Deng to share such executive power with the Japanese; the latter otherwise might not have gone to Guizhou to participate directly in reforming the educational system and modernizing the province.

Before his reforms in Guizhou gained full momentum, Deng Huaxi fell seriously ill. In 1903, the octogenarian decided to retire from office and return to Guangdong where he hoped to live out his twilight years. He had set in motion the policies that would modernize Anhui and Guizhou, which extended beyond the pale of self-strengthening projects that largely took place in the Beijing metropolitan area (Zhili Province) and coastal China. The influence of Shengshi weiyan on Deng Huaxi was unmistakable. Not only had Deng emphasized the cultivation of local talent to exploit local resources and develop local economies, but he had also merged agricultural production with commercial activities and sought foreign assistance – in the case of Guizhou, through Zheng Guanying himself – to execute his plans. Like Zheng, he was not dogmatic; binaries such as East and West and “national” and “foreign” mattered little in his worldview.

Warnings ignored

Deng Huaxi retired in an era different from when he started his reforms – a time of provincial assemblies and study societies. He chose to retire in Guangzhou, the provincial capital of Guangdong, instead of Shunde, where he was born. His health slowly improved. A local notable of political stature, he became involved in municipal affairs. He was a member of the Wenlan Academy, which operated as a “public office” (gongsuo) rather than as an academic institution. The Wenlan Academy had been founded in 1810 by literati and cohong (maritime merchants) who wanted to coordinate the annual clearing of moats in the western suburbs of Guangzhou and the dredging of major canals running through the city. Supported by the provincial government, they prohibited the construction of low bridges that inhibited water transport and denied the entry of night-soil boats to the canals. Over time, the Wenlan Academy developed into a self-governing body responsible for building and maintaining public works, and Deng Huaxi would play a significant role in provincial politics through the academy.⁵⁵ Although he would also join other associations, he remained true to his character and personality and to the vision for China that he shared with Zheng Guanying, even after he had left office and Qing rule had fallen.

The Wenlan Academy symbolized the convergence of literati and merchant interests. For the literati, it was where they could host poetry and prose competitions. For the merchants, it helped display their cultural identification with the imperial state since they patronized the literati and sponsored the competitions. Although merchants could not match the social status of the literati, they could partake indirectly in provincial politics by sharing their opinions with members of the Wenlan Academy and financing infrastructure projects.⁵⁶ The Academy was an exclusive club, open only to holders of at least the shengyuan status (given to those who had passed the lower-level civil service examinations) and to illustrious officials such as Deng Huaxi. As literati culture flourished in Guangzhou from the mid-nineteenth century on, thanks to increased wealth from maritime trade, membership at the Academy swelled. By the end of the Qing dynasty, the number of metropolitan officials (jingguan) alone, or those who had served in Beijing and hence were qualified for membership, had reached 89 – a significant figure compared to that of other provinces. Most of those officials hailed from Guangzhou as well as from prosperous prefectures in the Pearl River delta such as Nanhai, Panyu, and Shunde.⁵⁷

For both literati and merchants, then, being counted as a member of the Wenlan Academy was requisite for being considered part of the gentry in Guangzhou and thus a participant in local politics.⁵⁸ Although merchants had always been active in public life through guilds and charitable organizations, they enjoyed little political clout. Those linked to the Wenlan Academy were thus the most powerful merchants in Guangzhou. In response to the New Policies, they organized the Guangdong Merchant Self-Government Association (Yueshang zizhi hui) to discuss their own commercial directives and priorities. But the union of literati and merchants remained more symbolic than real because the provincial government and a splinter group of the Wenlan Academy, the Guangdong Self-Government Study Society (Guangdong zizhi yanjiushe), continued to dominate local politics. Thus, although an “urban reformist class with a penchant for activism” and numerous political associations and study societies were formed at the turn of the twentieth century,⁵⁹ the local elites, at least in the case of Guangdong, remained divided. Those who held an examination degree, served as officials, and belonged to well-established organizations could practice exclusionist politics to maintain their dominance in local society. Old personal networks, built on a shared institutional background, were more powerful than new networks of shared ideas and political vision, which instead were facilitated by the periodical press rather than bureaucratic patronage.

In 1907, for his leading role in coordinating efforts by Guangdong literati and merchants to recover the rights and ownership of railroads from foreign banks in 1905,⁶⁰ Deng Huaxi was elected honorary chair of the Guangdong Self-Government Study Society. In principle, he was expected to discuss and explore ideas with other literati about constitutionalism and institutional separation of powers relevant to the court and the provinces. In practice, he was encouraged to consider means by which the court could answer provincial calls for more autonomy, particularly those from the Guangdong Merchant Self-Government Association and a younger generation of literati, who were increasingly critical of Qing rule.

Like Zheng Guanying, Deng Huaxi did not identify with the social distinctions between scholar, farmer, artisan, and merchant, which he believed had not only hampered commercial or economic growth but also prevented a meaningful integration of literati and merchant interests. Unlike many literati and officials, he did not view merchants as inferior and instead saw them as key to national power. In 1909, after the Guangdong Self-Government Study Society concluded its findings, the provincial government established the Guangdong Provincial Assembly (Guangdong ziyiju). Despite Deng’s suggestions, the governor-general Zhang Renjun (1846–1927) did not include any member of the Guangdong Merchant Self-Government Association in the provincial assembly.⁶¹ He ultimately staffed it with literati members of the Wenlan Academy like Deng, thinking that principled literati, rather than profit-driven merchants, could better represent and articulate provincial interests. For him and perhaps many literati of his day, merchants mattered only when financial contributions to public causes were needed. Unlike merchants in Britain and other European states, those in China were “without empire” – they were poorly understood and easily exploited by officials, as Zheng Guanying had suggested.⁶²

In October 1911, the Xinhai Revolution (also known as the Wuchang Uprising) broke out. The Wuchang mutineers sent telegrams to the provincial assemblies across China, asking them to secede from the Qing empire and reunite as a new Chinese republic. The Guangdong Provincial Assembly, then headed by Deng Huaxi, dismissed the appeal and sent a telegram to the court urging caution and warning against foreign intervention. But by late October, guilds and chambers of commerce, led by a Guangdong Merchant Self-Government Association that was frustrated with foreign competition and the Manchus’ nationalization of railway projects, mobilized hundreds of members in the streets to demand independence. Merchants threatened to withhold their contributions to the provincial assembly, and workers went on strike in support of their employers. The spread of civil unrest, which stemmed from concerns about Guangdong’s future, forced the provincial assembly to vote in favor of independence, which was declared on the ninth of November. The Guangdong Provincial Assembly then negotiated a non-violent transition of power with Guangdong revolutionary Chen Jiongming (1878–1933), who became the governor of Guangdong in the name of the new republic.⁶³

This brief description of how the anti-Qing revolution unfolded in Guangdong suggests that it was provincial in both form and content. Radical revolutionaries could look only to sympathizers at best or opportunists at worst for recognition in the provinces that they did not control, one of which was Guangdong.⁶⁴ They finally succeeded in Guangdong because its merchants had become alienated from and in many cases resentful of central, court politics. This was a sort of indirect proof of Zheng Guanying’s argument that an administrator’s or leader’s support of local merchants was crucial for social cohesion.

Conclusion

The day after the Guangdong Provincial Assembly voted in favor of independence in November of 1911, Deng Huaxi left for Hong Kong with his family. He anticipated that banditry and political chaos would follow the Assembly’s declaration.⁶⁵ Although in his diary and poems he revealed sentimentality and sadness over the end of Qing rule in Guangdong, he recognized the new republic and adopted both Qing and Republican era names in his writings.⁶⁶ But it was not until 1914, when conditions appeared less volatile, that he returned to Guangdong.

Deng Huaxi’s influence in Guangdong remained strong after the founding of the Republic, suggesting that while the political system might have changed, the prestige and status that came with the imperial structure of patronage and bureaucratic rank took longer to dissipate. Not long after his return, Long Jiguang (1867–1925), a warlord who replaced Chen Jiongming as governor of Guangdong, wanted to lift the ban on gambling and sell licenses to gambling dens and farms for flood relief revenue. Deng Huaxi led a group of literati to oppose Long, arguing that such a measure promised only short-term relief but long-term consequences, which included addiction, unemployment, and families wrecked by gambling.⁶⁷ Deng argued that the donations collected from merchants and the public were more than sufficient for disaster relief, which relied more on management than on money. For him, legalizing gambling was an easy but ultimately ineffective solution that would generate its own set of problems; a robust economy was key to eliminating all financial worries.⁶⁸ That Deng remained active and vocal in his late eighties defies what has become conventional wisdom, namely, that only the educated youth in China’s urban centers, who were stimulated by new currents of thought and disappointed with political reality, could effect changes in post-Qing politics.⁶⁹ Seen another way, perhaps Deng Huaxi and his literati friends were trying to lead by example, “focusing on the construction of moral selves as [new] political subjects,” reaffirming their local networks, and figuring out a new relationship with whoever was in power in volatile times.⁷⁰ Such was the display of personal grit and political wisdom that had seen Deng Huaxi through his career in officialdom and retirement in a province now ravaged by warlordism and political uncertainty.

Deng Huaxi and Zheng Guanying shared an emphasis on economic progress in their visions of a prosperous China. They sought state patronage and protection for merchants, who could then participate in politics, promote industry in the nation’s interests, and improve the people’s livelihood.⁷¹ As an official, Deng Huaxi could heed Zheng Guanying’s warnings and transform agriculture, commerce, education, and the military in Anhui and Guizhou according to the guidelines specified in Shengshi weiyan. But as a retired local notable, he wielded more social influence than political power and could only react to the unfolding of events in his native Guangdong, where merchants were both a source of provincial strength and a threat to political stability. Unlike most literati and officials of his day, who studied Shengshi weiyan as a political treatise, Deng Huaxi embraced it as a manual and worked to actualize its concepts. His career trajectory thus reflects the contradictions, dilemmas, and tensions that arose in the attempts at that time to build an economically powerful yet socially cohesive nation.

Glossary

Chen Jiongming	=	陳炯明
Chouban nongshang zhongzhi bing	=	籌辦農商種植並開辦桑園蠶絲請立案折
kaiban sangyuan cansi qing li’an zhe	=
Chouyi tianshe xuetang zhuoni qieshi banli zhe	=	籌議添設學堂酌擬切實辦理折
chucai beiyong zhi liangtu	=	儲才備用之良圖
Cixi	=	慈禧
cohong	=	公行
Deng Huaxi	=	鄧華熙
fuguo qiangbing	=	富國强兵
gongsuo	=	公所
Guangdong ziyiju	=	廣東咨議局
Guangdong zizhi yanjiushe	=	廣東自治研究社
Guangxu	=	光緒
Guizhou daxuetang	=	貴州大學堂
guwu renxin	=	鼓舞人心
jingguan	=	京官
Kang Youwei	=	康有爲
Li Hongzhang	=	李鴻章
Liangjiang zongdu	=	兩江總督
lijin	=	厘金
Long Jiguang	=	龍濟光
Mao Zedong	=	毛澤東
Nongsang jiyao	=	《農桑輯要》
Nongshi	=	《農事》
Nongxue bao	=	《農學報》
Paoge	=	袍哥
Qimin yaoshu	=	《齊民要術》
Qiushi xuetang	=	求是學堂
Shenbao	=	《申報》
Sheng Xuanhuai	=	盛宣懷
Shengshi weiyan	=	《盛世危言》
shengyuan	=	生員
shishi qiushi	=	實事求是
Sun Yat-sen	=	孫逸仙 (孫中山)
Taichang lunchuan gongsi	=	泰昌輪船公司
Wanjiang bianfa	=	皖江變法
Weng Tonghe	=	翁同龢
Wubei xuetang	=	武備學堂
xinzheng	=	新政
xixue	=	西學
xuemai	=	血脈
xunfu	=	巡撫
yanlu	=	言路
Yuan Shikai	=	袁世凱
yuanqi	=	元氣
Yueshang zizhi hui	=	粵商自治會
Zhang Renjun	=	張人駿
Zhang Zhidong	=	張之洞
Zheng Guanying	=	鄭觀應
zhenxing shiqi	=	振興士氣
zhongti xiyong	=	中體西用
Zhoubi suanjing	=	《周髀算經》
ziqiang jun	=	自强軍
zongdu	=	總督

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Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ying-Kit CHAN

Ying-kit CHAN (Ph.D., Princeton University) is a research fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies, Leiden University, and editorial assistant of NAN NÜ: Men, Women, and Gender in China. He is interested in the emergence of provincial identities during the late Qing period, the legacies of Empress Dowager Cixi, and natural history. His articles have appeared in outlets such as Journal of Chinese History, Journal of World History, Modern Asian Studies, and Twentieth-Century China.

Notes

¹ Hao, “Cheng Kuan-ying,” 15–22.

² Chong, “Cheng Kuan-ying (1841–1920),” 247–267.

³ Tian Tong, “Mao Zedong de zaoqi wenhuaguan,” 11–14.

⁴ For an instance of such intrigue between “conservatives” and “radicals,” see Polachek, The Inner Opium War.

⁵ For a comprehensive study of the life and thought of Zheng Guanying, see Wu, Zheng Guanying.

⁶ Halsey, Quest for Power, 78–79.

⁷ Kwong, A Mosaic of the Hundred Days.

⁸ For the New Policies, see Reynolds, China, 1898–1912.

⁹ For an ethnic dimension of the final decades of Qing rule, see Esherick, “Reconsidering 1911,” 1–14. See also Rhoads, Manchus and Han.

¹⁰ Deng Huaxi, “Toupin dingdai Jiangsu buzhengsi,” 225–226. For his complete petition to Guangxu on how to implement reforms, see Deng Huaxi, “Deng Hejian gong xiangyi bianfa,” 483–529.

¹¹ Yi Huili, Zheng Guanying pingzhuan, 530.

¹² Rowe, China’s Last Empire, 202–219.

¹³ A major exception to the narrative of “great men” is Harrison, The Man Awakened from Dreams.

¹⁴ Halsey, Quest for Power, 20–21. The hinterland was thus “made”; see Pomeranz, The Making of a Hinterland.

¹⁵ Harrison, The Man Awakened from Dreams, 7.

¹⁶ For the politics and legacy of the Sino-French War, see Eastman, Throne and Mandarins.

¹⁷ Rankin, “Alarming Crises/Enticing Possibilities,” 41–45.

¹⁸ Chong, “Cheng Kuan-ying,” 250–253.

¹⁹ On how China “joined” the world powered by industrialization (and especially fossil fuels) and surveyed and managed its natural resources, see Wu, Empires of Coal.

²⁰ Chong, “Cheng Kuan-ying,” 257–258.

²¹ Bello, Across Forest, Steppe, and Mountain; Schlesinger, A World Trimmed with Fur; and Kim, Ethnic Chrysalis.

²² Perdue, China Marches West; and Millward, Beyond the Pass.

²³ Teng, Taiwan’s Imagined Geography.

²⁴ Hixson, American Settler Colonialism.

²⁵ Chong, “Cheng Kuan-ying,” 258–259.

²⁶ Ibid., 260.

²⁷ On how shipping had complicated the idea of Chinese sovereignty and became a part of Chinese nation-building, see Reinhart, Navigating Semi-Colonialism.

²⁸ Halsey, Quest for Power, 201.

²⁹ Lee, Gourmets in the Land of Famine.

³⁰ Chong, “Cheng Kuan-ying,” 261–262.

³¹ Deng Huaxi recorded in his diary his plans for Anhui. See Deng Huaxi, Deng Huaxi riji, 177–178.

³² Deng Huaxi, “Anhui zougao,” juan 1, 29–36.

³³ When serving as a superintendent of transport, Deng Huaxi already believed that the root of Western power lay in education. See Deng Huaxi, “Caodu zougao,” juan 1, 7.

³⁴ Many scholarly works, especially those published in the 1980s and 1990s, are case studies of reforms in coastal provinces. Zhejiang Province is particularly popular among historians. See Schoppa, Chinese Elites and Political Change; and Rankin, Elite Activism and Political Transformation in China.

³⁵ Wu, Zheng Guanying, 198–199.

³⁶ Deng Huaxi, “Anhui zougao,” juan 1, 24–28.

³⁷ Deng Huaxi, “Anhui zougao,” juan 5, 6–9; and Shen Ji, “Anhui xinxing gaodeng jiaoyu,” 69–73. For the origins of lijin as a Taiping innovation and fiscal measure, see Halsey, Quest for Power, 82, 121–131.

³⁸ Wu, Zheng Guanying, 54.

³⁹ Halsey, Quest for Power, 99.

⁴⁰ Ibid., 131.

⁴¹ Wu, Zheng Guanying, 208.

⁴² Halsey, Quest for Power, 102.

⁴³ Fang Xiaozhen, “Deng Huaxi de Wanjiang bianfa,” 84–85. In 1890, Guangdong became the first province to mint its own banknotes and coins. See Ding Jinjun, “Wan Qing Anhui shi zhu yinyuan,” 133–134.

⁴⁴ “Wan xing shangwu xuwen.”

⁴⁵ Deng Huaxi, “Anhui zougao,” juan 2, 15–17, 30–32.

⁴⁶ Fang Xiaozhen, “Deng Huaxi de Wanjiang bianfa,” 85.

⁴⁷ Ibid.

⁴⁸ Deng Huaxi, “Anhui zougao,” juan 2, 1–4.

⁴⁹ Ibid., juan 1, 1–6, 13–18.

⁵⁰ Yao Hong and Luo Yingmei, Wan Qing Guizhou jiaoyu gaige, 23.

⁵¹ Deng Huaxi, “Guizhou zougao,” juan 1, 33–35. Deng Huaxi also founded a military academy in Guizhou similar to the one in Anhui. See Deng Huaxi, “Guizhou zougao,” juan 2, 10–11.

⁵² See Reynolds, China, 1898–1912; and Rhoads, Stepping Forth into the World.

⁵³ Yao Hong and Luo Yingmei, Wan Qing Guizhou jiaoyu gaige, 41.

⁵⁴ Tao Qichen, “Qingmo Qian fu Deng Huaxi,” 134–141.

⁵⁵ For brief descriptions of the Wenlan Academy, see Miles, The Sea of Learning; and Poon, Negotiating Religion in Modern China, 44.

⁵⁶ Zhou Shan, “Wenlan shuyuan yu Guangzhou shisan,” 108–112.

⁵⁷ Liang Fenglian, “Jindai Guangzhou shishen de laiyuan,” 22.

⁵⁸ He Yuefu, “Wan Qing Guangzhou de shetuan,” 260.

⁵⁹ Rahav, The Rise of Political Intellectuals, 28.

⁶⁰ For this nationwide movement, see Lee, China’s Quest for Railway Autonomy, 1904–1911.

⁶¹ He Yuefu, “Wan Qing Guangzhou de shetuan,” 254–255.

⁶² Wu, Zheng Guanying, 191; and Wang, “Merchants without Empire,” 400–422.

⁶³ For the Xinhai Revolution, see Schiffrin, Sun Yat-sen and the Origins of the Chinese Revolution; Bianco, Origins of the Chinese Revolution, 1915–1949; Wakeman, The Fall of Imperial China; and Esherick, Reform and Revolution in China. Specific to Guangdong, see Rhoads, China’s Republican Revolution.

⁶⁴ Zhong Rongchi, “Xinhai Guangdong duli zhong,” 24–28. Chen Jiongming was a junior member of the Guangdong Provincial Assembly who openly sided with the revolutionaries.

⁶⁵ Deng Huaxi, Deng Huaxi riji, 241.

⁶⁶ Ibid., 242.

⁶⁷ Ibid., 260. Another serious downside was the arrival of strongarm “Paoge” or violent secret societies and their associated crime businesses, which appeared in different parts of China during the early twentieth century. See Wakeman, Policing Shanghai; and Wang, Violence and Order on the Chengdu Plain.

⁶⁸ Liang Fenglian, “Jindai Guangzhou shishen de laiyuan,” 26.

⁶⁹ Rahav, The Rise of Political Intellectuals, 46.

⁷⁰ Ibid., 106.

⁷¹ Wu, Zheng Guanying, 193.