Organizer and Chair: Joanna Handlin Smith, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies
Discussant: Pierre Étienne Will, Collège de France
Much excellent work on famine relief in China has been accomplished during the past decade, but most of it concentrates on the early to high Qing when the state was strong and society relatively stable. One result of this focus has been to associate certain patterns of famine relief and grain storage with the dynastic cycle: bureaucratic intervention in food crises was successful when dynasties were strong; obligations for famine relief fell upon the shoulders of local elites when state coffers were depleted.
By extending the scope of discussion back to the mid Ming and forward to the late Qing this panel will explore the possibility that long term secular trends were also important in shifts of responsibility between the state and local elites. How the local elite thought of themselves, how they perceived the causes of famine, and what ideological resources they commanded for the organization and management of famine relief, contributed, no less than the withdrawal of the state, to local initiatives in relief efforts.
Thus Jennifer Downs will examine why starting around 1450-before the onset of Ming decline-the administration of famine relief shifted from the state to local elites. Bearing on this shift more than any signs of dynastic weakness was a change in how local elites thought about famines: as a practical problem calling for human effort, rather than a moral problem. Downs will ask whether this change may have enlarged their sense of responsibility or expanded their perceptions of what was possible in terms of mobilizing resources and organizing the distribution of relief.
Using a diary and other materials about a famine in Shaoxing in the early 1640s-that is, on the eve of dynastic collapse-Joanna Handlin Smith detects few signs that state authority (as embodied in local officials) was weak or that the procurement of grain was a dominant problem. What preoccupied the local elite most was creating an atmosphere of consensus about relief strategies and developing a highly coordinated program. The inclination towards consensus, Smith finds, had less to do with matters of efficacy or practicality than with the needs of the local elite to validate their actions and communicate through their relief efforts a sense of justice to their community.
Drawing on her study of famine relief in north China during the post Taiping period-in other words, precisely when the financial resources of the state were scarce-Lillian Li detects a trend towards voluntary contributions across long distances, traversing provincial boundaries. Simply explaining away these trends as desperate measures to compensate for a declining polity may obscure other changes-changes that straddle the Qing-Republican transition. Lillian Li will thus explore the possibility that a new style of voluntarism and incipient nationalism also determined the course of relief activities.
There are numerous stories to be told about famine relief other than the time worn ones about tensions between the state and local elites, or about the impact of dynastic decline. By looking at famine relief during three periods, these papers will explore how changes in elite self perception and social organization may also have shaped styles of famine relief.
Jennifer Downs, University of Minnesota
Scholarship on the Ming dynasty has concentrated on the founding and consolidation period of the late fourteenth century and on the commercialization of the sixteenth century. My study of Ming famine policy is motivated by questions about the social and institutional transitions, which, I contend, began in the second half of the fifteenth century.
This paper relies heavily on the Huangzheng yaolan (Treatise on famine administration), compiled by Yu Ruwei (jinshi 1571), and published in 1589. This collection is a rich source for the fifteenth century, both because it includes a substantial number of late fifteenth and early sixteenth century documents and because internal prefaces by Yu Ruwei provide an interesting sixteenth-century construct of fifteenth-century events and policies.
My study focuses on the evolution of both famine policy and ideas about famine beginning in the second half of the fifteenth century. During that period, the relationship between state and society underwent a shift in which state institutions became less involved in the administration of local society and local elites became increasingly dedicated to their native areas. These changes are reflected in the decline of government famine programs and the parallel intensification of local efforts. During this same period, ideas about famine also changed. Scholars writing about famine increasingly emphasized practical rather than moral solutions. This view is most clearly stated by Yu Ruwei whose work demonstrates an unshakable faith in human ability, as illustrated by his statement that "if a single person dies, it is not the bad harvest that killed him; it is the leaders who killed him."
This paper will examine the evolution of state and local famine policy as well as ideas about famine in the mid Ming. It will demonstrate that these changes were not merely the result of dynastic decline, but rather reflect the beginnings of fundamental institutional, social, and intellectual changes that continued in the late Ming and Qing periods.
Lillian M. Li, Swarthmore College
In north China, unlike the better endowed lower Yangzi region, famine relief during the Qing period was organized and funded principally by the bureaucracy rather than the local elite. This was due to the weakness of the elites and the relatively limited resources of the region. In the Zhili Beijing region, the Qing court had an unusually direct interest in maintaining economic security and political stability. Throughout the dynasty, massive amounts of grain were deployed to Zhili Beijing from the south though the grain tribute system, and from Manchuria through government purchase.
From the late nineteenth century through the first half of the twentieth century, the patterns of funding and organization of famine relief changed significantly. In the post Taiping decades, Li Hongzhang, as governor general, increasingly demanded "contributions" from the south as official sources of funding dried up. Foreign missionary and other charitable activities began with Timothy Richard's effort in 1876-79 drought, but became quite significant in the 1910's and 1920's. Less well known are the Chinese philanthropic activities of the Republican period. These famine relief activities were also generated predominantly from outside the region.
Although such fund raising can be seen as filling a vacuum left by the decline of the Qing dynasty, it may also be seen as an aspect of new trends, such as voluntarism and nationalism. This paper will explore: (1) the significance of these patterns, and whether they really marked new trends, or whether they were merely part of the dynastic cycle, and (2) the impact of these changes on the local areas receiving relief. Case studies will be drawn from famine relief campaigns in the Zhili/Hebei/Beijing area during the late nineteenth century and early Republican period.
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