International Law and State Transformation in China, Siam, and the Ottoman Empire during the Nineteenth Century

Author(s): Richard S. Horowitz Source: Journal of World History, Vol. 15, No. 4 (Dec., 2004), pp. 445-486 Published by: University of Hawai'i Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20079291 Accessed: 16/08/2010 04:06
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International Transformation

and the Ottoman Empire during the Nineteenth Century

RICHARD California S. HOROWITZ Northridge State University,

Law and State in China, Siam;

king is a man no doubt wonderfully but self-instructed, ^"TpHE that he should appreciate the great truths of political A science, one could hardly expect." Thus wrote Sir John Bowring on 7 April of Siam.1 He wrote this curious line during 1855 about King Mongkut a treaty of friendship and to negotiate in his month-long stay Bangkok commerce between Great Britain and Siam. An intimate of political a former of member and an philosopher Jeremy Bentham, parliament, inveterate traveler and a prolific writer, Bowring was a specialist on the management of those parts of "the East" beyond the direct control of the British Empire but very much in the sights of her merchants. From 1837 to 1838 Bowring sent by served as a special commissioner to investigate Lord Palmerston the commercial situation of Egypt and Syria, and he played an active role in policy debates during the "East

1 Sir John Bowring, The Kingdom and People of Siam (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford Univer at the Workshop of this paper were presented on sity Press, 1969), 2: 281. Earlier versions 2 November Late Imperial China in 2002 and at the Annual held at UCLA World History Conference of the World in Atlanta Association to in June 2003. I am grateful History commentators von Glahn David Christian and Richard and the participants in both con ferences. This paper has greatly benefited from suggestions from Michael Tom Montesano, Rachel Howes, Devine, World History, and was Giersch. and Nan inspired Yamane, by a decade and an anonymous reviewer for the Journal of of conversations with Caroline Reeves and Pat

Journal ofWorld History, Vol. 15, No. 4 ? 2005 by University of Hawai'i Press

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ern crisis" of the time. The resolution in of the crisis, which resulted treaties and free trade in exchange Ottoman of unequal for acceptance British support against the renegade Egyptian regime of Muhammad to Bowring's Ali, was not entirely liking (he advocated Ali's cause). uses for him. In to find diplomatic Palmerston Nevertheless continued in Canton, British Consul and in 1854 1847 Bowring was appointed In China Bowring was deeply of Hong Kong. of the semi-colonial treaty system?pressing taxes on service to collect for the establishment of a foreign customs international trade, and in 1856 playing a key role in turning the man into the casus belli of what is often referred ufactured Arrow incident to as the Second Opium War.2 At this time, Bowring was also the accredited British representa tive to the courts of Japan, Siam, Korea, and Vietnam. In that role he went to Bangkok in March of 1855. King Mongkut's for reputation he became involved the governor in the creation and his familiarity with English led scholarship language and history an to But while resolution. dis easy expect Bowring Mongkut proudly in his private apartments, and Albert he played figurines of Victoria was stubbornly to accede to Bowring's reluctant demands, leading to in the British envoy's journal. A sharp increase in on a few Siamese negotiators and within followed, placed was a was to he able obtain what felt agree satisfactory days Bowring the frustrated the pressure entry
ment.3

sci What exactly did Sir John mean by the "great truths of political ence"? The diplomatic record offers some clues. The Bowring Treaty extrater in Bangkok, established representation foreign diplomatic at of Siam's trade aimed and rules international opening ritoriality, with the Parkes markets. The agreement, treaty along supplementary to the semicolonial systems signed in 1857, bore a striking resemblance in place in in the Ottoman Empire and partially already in existence China. They international into began Siam's integration in the way society precisely the European-dominated that the settlements of

2 role in the Ottoman On Bowring's crisis, G. F. Bartle "Bowring and the Near Eastern For contrasting views on Crisis of 1838-1840," English Historical Review 79 ( 1964): 761-774. on the China Coast: The Open see John K. Fairbank, Trade and Diplomacy his role in China Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1953), and J.Y.Wong, ing of the Treaty Ports (Cambridge, and Deadly Dreams: Opium sity Press, 1998). 3 2: 212-226 Bowring, documentation the British Siam," Journal the Arrow War (1858-1860) (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer

a summary and text. For a historian's discussion from provides see Nicholas to "The Mission of Sir John Bowring Tarling, of the Siam Society 50.2 (1962): 91-118.

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had done to the Ottoman Empire and as the agreements 1838-1840 of 1843, 1858, and i860 would do in Qing China. Clearly, Bowring theme through had in mind the benefits of free trade?an enduring the necessity and appropriateness of British diplo his career?and matic dominance. But surely Bowring's "truths" included the practices court to of international law that he was forcing a reluctant Siamese were with Siam within articulated the accept. The agreements signed universe of European law and the patterns of international conceptual a sharp break from it behavior embodied. This marked diplomatic interstate treaties of Asian relations. These and the patterns practices a come set to out of relations would form fundamental infra they structure of semicolonial systems. political with China, and the Ottoman involvements Siam, Bowring's some to in the for investi and 1840s 1850s point Empire possibilities states. connections and these three Rela among gating comparisons a tions with the Ottoman offered model of powers Empire European how to carry on relations with non-Christian Eurasian govern large, ments. This model was then pressed into use in the Treaty of Nanking in turn formed the basis for treaties that ended the Opium War, which with Siam and Japan. Indeed, the semicolonial system?including legal a free trade regime imposed by outside power, for outsiders, privileges of imperial powers to interfere in inter and the ability and willingness to all three, and points nal affairs of subject states?applies effectively to common in in British all three states.4 While schol origins policy ars of Siam, Qing China, and the Ottoman have been reluc Empire tant to engage in comparative study, in this case it seems appropriate.5

mal

to concepts For a systematic and its relationship of infor analysis of semicolonialism in Twentieth "Semi-Colonialism and Informal Empire empire see J?rgen Osterhammel, a Framework in Imperialism and After: Continuities of Analysis," China: Towards Century and Discontinuities, ed. Wolfgang and J?rgen Osterhammel (London: Allen & J.Mommsen 5

1986), pp. 290-314. of China with Comparisons Japan include Frances Moulder, Japan, China and the in the Moderniza Modern World Economy Factors J. Levy, "Contrasting (1977), and Marion tion of China and Japan," Economic Development and Cultural Change 2.3 (1953): 161-197. More of modern China have tended to look to early modern recently historians Europe for China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of Euro e.g., R. Bin Wong, comparison, pean Experience (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1997), and Kenneth Pomeranz, The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and theMaking (Princeton, of theModern World Economy notes a reluctance to use com Press, 2000). Benedict Anderson N.J.: Princeton University see "Studies of the Thai State, parisons other than Meiji Japan among scholars of Thailand; in The Study of Thailand, the State of Thai Studies" ed. Eliezar Ayal (Athens, Ohio: Cen ter for International On comparisons of Studies, Ohio University, 1978), pp. 197-198. and Japan see Robert Ward and Dankwart in Rustow, eds., Political Modernization Turkey Japan and Turkey (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1964).

Unwin,

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states on the The three bear notable similarities. All were extensive to avoid European occu continent. All managed Eurasian colonial treaties. In each case a monar pation, but at the cost of humiliating chical regime of long standing was able for a period of time to adapt Faced to, and in some senses benefit from, the European presence. context in with common dealt them with the of dis concerns, they tinctive
constraints.

frameworks

of understanding

and unique

domestic

political

In this essay Iwill begin to explore both connections and compar isons by focusing on just one piece of Bowring's science": "political international law and its influence on the transformation of the state inQing China, the Ottoman law not Empire, and Siam. International as an maintenance served institutional framework for the of only diplo matic relations, but also embodied key concepts about law, administra tive organization, and national territoriality, Qing, identity. Ottoman, and Siamese relentless statesmen, pressure and (usu facing diplomatic to these standards to maximize threats, adapted ally) veiled military states came to their autonomy. As a result, these three old Eurasian a state by of national the models increasingly approximate European the early twentieth century.

International

Law

in Semicolonial

Environments

went When colonial abroad in the nine representatives European or not they carried international teenth century, consciously law in a curious International law has had their intellectual portmanteau. career in world history. Its roots lie in Europe before, during, and after to the Thirty Years War and efforts to bring some standards of civility sort interstate of international relations. Lacking any presiding body, law was the province of professional and small international diplomats had diplomatic groups of intellectuals (many of whom experience) behavior and discern who sought to codify standards of international its underlying the late and By early nineteenth eighteenth principles. treatises of international law were on every diplomat's ref centuries, erence shelf.6 In the minds of European international law was envoys, of civilized international behavior and served as an institu themodel tional framework for a European-centered international society. As

6 The best general survey rev. ed., (New York: Macmillan,

isArthur 1954).

Nussbaum,

A Concise

History

of the Law

of Nations,

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into Asia and States ventured from Europe and the United diplomats in the nineteenth with them Africa expecta century, they brought and should be carried out tions that international relations would law and law. Yet international within the frameworks of international to bedfellows: be strange growing Europe's politi imperialism proved in Asia and Africa forced international cal engagement lawyers to of their "science." intellectual underpinnings of the international relations have given history studying but this is largely based on false law scant attention, col about its role. In spite of high hopes for international assumptions in and United Nations lective security through the League of Nations in a manner law has not functioned the past century, international reconsider the Scholars international to criminal law. In times of conflict, powerful states breached analogous it therefore have presumed international law with impunity. Scholars to be little more than legalistic cover for realpolitik.7 The key function centuries and early twentieth of international law in the nineteenth norms for behavior was quite different: case of it established the (in the behavior of states) law this was specifically "public" international not in international law often did While international (and society. does not) greatly constrain the actions of great powers in an interna it does offer a standing tional for system, body of understandings the quotidian conflicts of day-to-day international relations. resolving it defines which organizations For example, (i.e., recognized states) are in it the of international establishes standards game diplomacy, players for the treatment and the modes of negotiation of foreign diplomats it provides principles and ratification of treaties, for settling compet over com it establishes and and claims ing jurisdiction, legal political mon definitions of terms used in treaties and other agreements.8 Inter as an institution, not in the "brick and law functioned national mortar" sense usually used by historians, but in the sense used by econ are the humanly omists. In the words of Douglass North, "Institutions economic devised constraints that structure political, and social inter actions" formal rules and informal and they are constraints, through

7 arena from the in surveying For example, Henry Kissinger, the European diplomatic to Napoleon, of of international Richelieu does not even mention the development age law in this period. See Kissinger, (New York: Simon & Schuster, Diplomacy 1994), pp. 8 D. Coplin, William "International Law and Assumptions about the State System," in International Law and Organization: An D. Falk and Introductory Reader, ed. Richard Wolfram Hanrieder Bull, The Anarchical 1968); Hedley Lippincott, Society: (Philadelphia: in World A Study of Order Politics Press, (New York: Columbia University 1977), pp. 136-142. 56-77.

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"to create order and reduce uncertainty in exchange."9 of modes international interaction, establishing everyday political an institutional has provided framework for international politics.

By law

These of the "law of nations" (the conceptions post-Westphalian term "international in the 1780s law" was coined by Jeremy Bentham and only gradually came into widespread use) and diplomatic practice were not recognized outside of Europe before the nineteenth century. Where law presumed the equality of recognized states, the and Ottoman constructed their rela Siam, Qing China, Empire states tions on the basis of hierarchies of rulers, with more powerful over lesser ones. At least in claiming special rights and responsibilities the eyes of their own propagandists, both the Ottomans (as claimants to the caliphate and as the protectors of the commonwealth of the to the be the Son and of claimed the faithful) (where emperor Qing to the East Asian world and a great khan and a supporter of Heaven in Central Asia) Tibetan Buddhism claimed special status in interna in Siam legitimated its The tional political society.10 Bangkok dynasty own position its and endorsement and patron externally by internally in East and Buddhism.11 Tributary relations, common age of Theravada Southeast Asia, also played a role. These were based on the exchange sta of gifts between subordinate rulers, with the lesser acknowledging tus and the more powerful of None this would claiming suzerainty.12 international

Journal of Economic Perspectives "Institutions," 5.1 (1991): 97. The Douglass C. North, has inspired me to make the connection with new institutionalist of Lauren Benton to Lauren Law and Colonial Cultures: See the introduction Benton, approaches. Legal in World History, Press, 2002). 1400-1900 University Regimes (Cambridge: Cambridge 10 see and Ottoman On the ideas of the caliphate Muslim commonwealth legitimacy in Globalization in "Muslim Universalism and Western Amira K. Bennison, Globalization," ed. A. G. Hopkins Selim World History, Norton, pp. 75-90. 2002), (New York: WW II Structures and the Ottoman State: The Reign of Abdulhamid "Legitimacy Deringal, International Journal of Middle East Studies 23.3 (1991): 345-359, discusses (1876-1909)," in the late nineteenth the increasing use of the idea of the caliphate century. On the mul overview rulers see Evelyn Rawski's the strategies of Qing "Reenvisioning tiple legitimating in Chinese of the Qing Period Studies Journal of Asian History," Qing: The Significance work 55.4 in Thai History, with Special Reference "Buddhist Cosmography J. Reynolds, to Nineteenth-Century Studies 35.2 (1976): Culture Journal of Asian 203-211; Change," in the Age of Colonialism: Patrick Buddhist King Jory, "Thai and Western Scholarship the Jatakas," Journal of Asian Studies 61.3 (2002): 907-908. Redefines Chulalongkorn 12 in the tribute system and other kinds of relations with the On China's involvement see the essays in John K. Fairbank, outside world, ed., The Chinese World Order, and, from a different James Hevia, perspective, Cherishing Men from Afar: Qing Guest Ritual and the For Press, 1995), pp. 29-56. Macartney Embassy of 1793 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University see David K. a lucid discussion in Siam in the early Bangkok of tribute relations dynasty, Conn.: Yale University A Short History Press, (New Haven, Thailand, 1982), pp. Wyatt, 155-161. (1996): 11 Craig 829-850.

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have

been surprising to Europeans and early nineteenth late eighteenth of conflict. early flashpoints

But before the mid-i6oos. centuries these hierarchies

in the were

of international law came in con The first stage of the globalization in the eighteenth of diplomacy flicts over the practices and proprieties centuries. The Ottoman and nineteenth Empire had been a significant on scene for centuries, international and for the European player in the 1700s, as Ottoman its own rules. Only much of that time made did the weakness became obvious, military of standards exchange European diplomatic to send envoys abroad.13 In China, where relations were quite varied, the rejection of Porte Sublime and intercourse of practices the Macartney to accede and begin international

expedition to what the British regarded in 1793 and subsequent Qing resistance as "normal" diplomatic in Chi relations famously showed the conflicts nese and British conceptions of international relations as played out in was required to find appro the rituals of diplomacy. A long negotiation rituals for audience with the Qianlong emperor priate Macartney's own to his refused to kowtow. because Macartney, account, according In the end, the Qing emperor refused British requests for trade and residence. While the throne made major concessions Qing diplomatic after the Opium Wars, allowing foreign legations in Beijing and accept in i860, it was not until after the of diplomacy ing European modes in 1900 that the conflicts over issues such as imperial audi Boxer War ences for foreign representatives and the nature of the Qing foreign office were settled

to the satisfaction of foreigners from Europe and Siam likewise operated as one of several major pow Asia within the tributary Southeast relationships in the Southeast Asian world. This similar debates accepted produced over diplomatic in 1826 and the Bowring ritual. The Burney mission over proper in 1855 also began with extended mission negotiations ritual forms.15 The debates over rituals in these cases had important underpin North America.14 ers in mainland

in The "The Ottoman and the European States Naff, Empire System," Bull and Adam Watson (Oxford: Clarendon Expansion Society, ed. Hedley of International Press, 1984), pp. 143-169. 14 For the most recent effort to understand the crisis over diplomatic rituals see James to remake the Zongli Yamen He via, Cherishing Men from Afar. On foreign pressures into a S. Horowitz, the Bonds of Precedent: The "proper" foreign office see Richard "Breaking Reform Commission and the Origins of Ministerial in Government 1906 Government China," Modern Asian Studies 37.4 (2003): 775-797. 15 1: 42-50; The Burney Papers (Farnborough: International, Gregg 1971) Bowring, 259-262. Kingdom and People of Siam, 2: 252-254,

13 Thomas

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to represent rituals were understood the European diplomatic an were states in of international which conception society European ritual systems of regarded as equals. In breaking with the hierarchical believed old empires, foreign diplomats that they were sending a mes to be con that "Oriental" monarchs, sage in a language presumed cerned with peans were Euro rather than substance, could understand: ceremony not to be treated within the patronizing of old styles over were a courts. These in first ritual the stage squabbles own inter effort to globalize of their legalistic conception

1800, proved an uncom law, as defined before to fortable fit with expansionist claims empire, and the nineteenth in order to of its philosophical foundations century saw a redefinition to contexts. it applicable make colonial and semicolonial Early writers on international law approach law had taken an inclusive, natural states and rulers to it difficult to reject claims of indigenous that made same as treatment states. in his Law Emerich the de Vattel European a standard treatise first published in 1758, declared "There of Nations, is no doubt of the existence of a natural Law of Nations, inasmuch as are is no less binding the Law of Nature upon States, where men in a political than it is upon the individuals them society, to Vattel "is a special science the law of nations selves." Consequently in a just and reasonable consists of the Law of which application to the affairs and conduct of Nations Nature and of sovereigns."16 The law is founded on natural law was rooted in the idea that international It suggests the situ work of Hugo Grotius. early seventeenth-century to men in the state of nature, where cer ation of states is analogous tain "natural" principles of morality government apply even without or religion to define them.17 The implication is that international law, united is universally and quite separate while of European origin, applicable, from Christian morality. law justification the natural the nineteenth century During disap was a more idea: that international and replaced by parochial peared in its origins and that only those non-Christian law was Christian

imperial European national society. But international

16 or the Principles of Natural to the Con Law Applied The Law of Nations E. de Vattel, vol. 3, trans, of the 1758 ed. by Charles and of Sovereigns, duct and to the Affairs of Nations G. Fenwick Publications, 1964), p. 3a. (reprint, New York: Oceana 17 and Nation, The Rights ofWar and Peace: Including the Law of Nature Hugo Grotius, tr. A. C. Campbell pp. (reprint ed., Westport: Hyperion, 1979), pp. 17-24; Nussbaum, 108-110.

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level of "civilization" could be that had reached a comparable in international law. The shift away from treated as full participants trea natural law theory is clear in the first edition of Henry Wheaton's an in tise Elements 1836. Wheaton, of International Law, published American and jurist, carefully reviewed the experienced diplomat natural law justification and concluded that it was not sufficient. He asserted that there was no universal law of nations and that in practice states was not regarded as fully applicable in relations the Law of Nations with Islamic states.18 He concluded with the following definition: The law of nations or international law, as understood among civilized, Christian nations, may be defined of consisting of those rules of con
duct which reason deduces, as consonant to justice, from the nature of

the society existing among independent nations; with such definitions as may be established by general consent.19 and modifications Where is universal, Wheaton Vattel's definition (whose work replaced as the standard handbook is quite clear that Vattel's for diplomats) international law is an artifact of Christian civilization. This served to in the of relations relations with justify reality unequal treaty European states in Asia and Africa. writers such asWheaton The work of nineteenth-century pointed to a new focus on the concept of "civilization" in international law. In his survey of international legal literature from the turn of the twenti asserts eth century, Gerrit Gong that "a standard of 'civilization' had and an integral part of the doc legal principle emerged as an explicit trines of international state needed to meet law," and a non-Christian a full participant in international that standard to be considered soci

law. The ety and fully subject to the rights granted under international state included guarantees "standard" for a civilized of basic rights of for property and person, an organized political system with a capacity to a maintenance adherence international of self-defense, law, system to the "accepted for diplomatic and a state conforming interchange, norms and practices of the 'civilized' international society."20 This in the late nineteenth standard assumed a hierarchy of states, which century were commonly divided into three groups?the civilized, the

18 Elements Henry Wheaton, of International York: De Capo Press, 1972), pp. 35-46. Hereafter 19 Wheaton 1836, p. 46. 20 Gerrit W Gong, The Standard of Civilization Press, 1984), pp. 14-15. University

Law cited

(Philadelphia, asWheaton

1836; 1836.

reprint New

in International

Society

(Oxford: Oxford

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barbarous, and the savage?and the first.21

international

law applied

fully only

to

the "standard of civilization" did offer non-European Nevertheless, states a way forward to full participation in the international legal in these states began to familiarize themselves regime. The officials with concepts of international law and to use it in shaping their rela tions with Europeans In China, and North Americans. the Qing in 1861, sponsored the Zongli Yamen, created foreign office called W. A. P. Martin's into of Wheaton American translation missionary in the mid-i86os and subsequently Chinese hired him as chief instruc tor in the Yamen's and his students school, where Martin interpreter translated several other international legal treatises.22 The Qing in the Tianjin massacre of 1870, the learned from bitter experience affair of 1874, and the Boxer Uprising that failure to live up Margary as to international such standards, protecting foreign diplomatic legal a punishing response from foreign powers. Simi personnel, produced to international to Roderic adherence law Davison, larly, according was of Ottoman from 1840 until diplomacy principle of the empire. In the case of Siam, under the reigns care was taken to observe treaties of Mongkut and Chulalongkorn, to in interna late nineteenth also the and, by century, participate who served as an interna tional society. Francis Sayre, and American in the 1920s, wrote tional legal advisor to the Siamese government of Chulalongkorn and with great enthusiasm about the achievements sense of international "a well developed Siam as having described that by 1910 extraterritorial privi ironically responsibility"?noting were at times Siam from fulfilling some of their inter preventing leges the final breakdown national names, for protecting trademarks legal responsibilities as foreign residents were the chief offenders.23 and trade a fundamental

interest in international law project and the Zongli Yamen's Immanuel Hsu's China's Entry into the Family of has been dealt with by several authors. asserts that the Qing of international law to revoke the Nations failed to take full advantage treaties?a the complex that seems unrealistic. Lydia H. Liu emphasizes position unequal ities of translation law as a means of conveying and the international imperial/colonial in "Legislating The Circulation of International Law in the the Universal: ideas in China in Tokens of Exchange: The Problem of Translation in Global Circula Nineteenth Century," The Duke University Press, tions, ed. Lydia H. Liu (Durham, N.C.: 1999), pp. 127-164. treatment in Richard in this essay follows my fuller discussion S. Horowitz, "Central Power in China," Ph.D. diss., Har The Zongli Yamen and Self-Strengthening and State Making: vard University, 1998, chap. 5. 23 in Imperial Legacy: The and Its Legacy," "Ottoman Roderic H. Davison, Diplomacy Ottoman (New York: Colum Imprint on the Balkans and theMiddle East, ed. L. Carl Brown,

21 pp. 5-6. Gong, 22 The Martin translation

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had pro law to the standard of civilization The shift from natural It for China, found consequences Siam, and the Ottoman Empire. and transgres served to justify the unequal treaties, extraterritoriality, sion of basic principles law in dealing with the non of international states a strong It gave each of these non-European Christian world. to to adhere to European in incentive order practices justify equal tone of the international even those not fully states, lawyers, "civilized" in the international sense, with a set of tools for playing the games of international politics for their own benefit even though they in positions remained of profound military weakness. Finally, it provided the patronizing despite leaders of non-Western treatment.

Treaty

Extraterritoriality, Systems, States Semicolonial

and

treaties formed the international Systems of unequal legal mechanism were techni for defining which semicolonial Treaties, relationships. were between and standard states, consenting cally agreements equal in the world. But practice European diplomatic exported eastward, they came to have a much more negative the rules of connotation, defining between and U.S. powers and older engagement European expanding in several senses: they were Eurasian states. These treaties were unequal economic interests forced at gunpoint; the and political they expressed of Britain and other powers; and key provisions, extraterrito including on tariffs on foreign trade, were not reciprocal. riality and restrictions of the treaty system, the justification The very inequalities of them with arguments about the "standard of civilization," the demands of on modern and of the these agreements impacts European diplomacy, state institutions established and expectations of "civilized" govern ment put pressure on semicolonial states to transform themselves. In each of the three cases presented here, the modern treaty sys tems were initiated by the British, but other European the powers, United In certain also States, and, later, Japan respects? participated. the emphasis on free trade?these systems fit British strate especially gic priorities particularly well. But from the view of most other major were probably not ideal, they were these arrangements powers, while to informal empire The British left the doors acceptable. approach

bia University "The Passing (1928): 73-74.

Press, 1996), p. 185. On Siam see Gong, in Siam," American of Extraterritoriality

and Francis Sayre, pp. 217-230, Law 22.1 Journal of International

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and missionar open for other powers and their diplomats, merchants, ies to play a role (in the universe of international law, Most Favored Nation served to distribute arrangements among privileges widely In other powers foreign powers). joined in and midcentury quickly at times concessions. similar treaties?and for further signed pressed in the Arrow War against Qing China, France allied with Britain and in i860 to demand of the Qing defeat Russia took advantage similar as territorial treaties as well concessions. Both France and Russia in semicolonial active players remained until World arrangements I. In the Ottoman War Empire, Russia posed a direct threat to the Ottomans and played a central role in all of the crises that came to the "Eastern Question." While territorial and forcing numerous reasons the Russians, for of balance of concessions, probably a continuation the and of the power, accepted treaty system militarily overmatched Ottoman regime. France and Germany played an increas in the latter half of the situation role in the Ottoman ingly active as economic interest In Siam, fol British nineteenth receded. century In the France became involved. opening, lowing Bowring's gradually i88os and 1890s, seeking to secure its Indochinese France colonies, territorial con placed Siam under intense pressure and gained major in Laos and Cambodia. cessions But here, as well, France ultimately form other of the semicolonial the continuation arrangements. the leading Euro semicolonial phenomenon spread beyond interest in which the The United shared British States, pean powers. the British lead in China and Siam, and played a free trade, followed on Japan in the 1850s. By central role in forcing similar arrangements one the 1890s, Meiji Japan had gone from victim to predator, becoming in China. the semicolonial of the major forces behind arrangements states such as Belgium The nationals of minor European also benefited into treaties. While from similar legal advantages written much more it seems that a key to the endurance of the treaty research is needed, accepted The a systems was that it provided system as a structure for semicolonial framework that various powers were able to live with, even if it did not

fulfill all of their desires.

nature of the semicolonial multinational treaty system also to and Siamese polit the choices available influenced Ottoman, Qing, as state institutions. than adher their Rather ical leaders they reshaped to and using only British advisors, they had a choice British models ing a The choices from range of "civilized" (primarily European) models. were eclectic: their legal system on the French the Ottomans modeled The Prussian military and employed advisors; Siam used British advisors and Belgian legal experts; Qing China hired military financial advisors

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and in what has come to be from a host of countries; and specialists seen as the quintessential the Maritime semicolonial Cus institution, toms Service was led by British it but inspectors-general, deliberately the and technical staff from across Europe, recruited both executive to fully colonial United States, and, later, Japan. In contrast systems one power exerted both political in which and cultural dominance, a cos the semicolonial treaty framework European-centered imposed as a states civilization standard which upon indigenous mopolitan would nature of nine standard that the Eurocentric judged?a international law both embodied and teenth-century promoted. This section examines how the three Eurasian states adapted insti tutions under pressure from the treaty systems. While the conse quences of these pressures spread across the full range of government be

state: the focus will be on three aspects of the semicolonial activity, at aimed the reforms establishment of ending extraterritoriality, legal ministerial forms of government, and the reform and restructuring of revenue systems in the face of opportunities and constraints created by the foreign presence. is in order.24 First, an overview of the process of state transformation If one takes 1800 as a starting point, the structures of the three states as commonalities. show at least as many differences The Qing state, at the bottom to the emperor from the county magistrate stretching at the top, was integrated, and his Grand Council and bureaucratic, run by a highly educated elite in a large part (but by no means exclu the examination system. At the local level, sively) chosen through officials were overworked, and but there was understaffed, embattled, no question to that officials were ultimately Beijing. The responsible tax burden fell primarily on agriculture land and grain taxes. through in the Ottoman the late century had By contrast, Empire eighteenth a small and less integrated civil bureaucracy, and central state leaders a tense balance between military and civil organizations. negotiated As one traveled farther away from Istanbul there was a greater level of to local decentralization than in Qing China, with power shifting over the course of the eighteenth tax sys notables the While century. as was on in tem, taxes, the China, agricultural heavily dependent on tax Ottomans in Control of governors heavily farming. depended

24 is a con rather than "state building" My choice of the term "state transformation" one. The trajectory of these changes was often not "Europeanized" to fit the enough or state building notions of state making referred to in the literature?indeed, particularly cases these periods have often been seen as part of long-term in the Qing and Ottoman more term I of imperial decay?so neutral "state transformation." processes prefer the scious

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areas far from the empire's core in the western Anatolia was sometimes a tenuous. By the nineteenth as in such Muhammad Ali few, century, were was not in a if fact form.25 Siam ruled Egypt, independent by king and a cadre of officials drawn from a small group of aristocratic fami lies. Central mixed territorial government jurisdictions departments and functional roles. While the ultimate of the Bangkok authority across the realm, on a day-to-day court was accepted basis central was on revenues went of time outside the limited. As capital authority were increasingly on on com tax various sale of the farms dependent modities.26 But a comparative look at existing suggests that nine scholarship state in Qing China, of reform made the processes teenth-century more a process and the Ottoman alike. Each underwent Siam, Empire a mixture of state transformation: of deliberate reforms and ad hoc created by foreign threats and internal admin responses to necessities its mili and military istrative, economic, problems. Each restructured in and modern the but short term tary European weaponry, imported had far greater success in suppressing internal challenges than in ward its instituted reforms to make ing off foreign threats.27 Each gradually more central government and expecta categories nearly fit European tions: in the 1860s and 1870s, Siam in the 1880s and the Ottomans reforms. Each moved far 1890s, and Qing China during the post-Boxer

For an institutional the golden survey of the Ottoman age of government during see Norman the Magnificent Itzkowitz, Ottoman Empire and Islamic Tradition of Chicago of nineteenth-century devel Press, 1972). For an outline (Chicago: University see Carter A Social History Civil Officialdom: (Princeton, opments, N.J.: Findley, Ottoman see Albert Princeton the rise of local notables, On Press, University 1989), pp. 20-28. in Beginnings Reforms of Notables," "Ottoman and the Politics Hourani, of Modernization in theMiddle East: The Nineteenth L. Chambers ed. William R. Polk and Richard Century, Suleiman of Chicago Press, 1968), pp. 41-68. (Chicago: University 26 in the Early Bangkok Period, Akin The Organization Rabibhadana, of Thai Society Southeast Asia Program, "Fam (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell 1782-1873 1969); David K. Wyatt, in Nineteenth in Studies in Thai History, ed. David K. Wyatt Siam," Century ily Politics The Provincial Administration of Siam, 1892 (Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 1993); Tej Bunnag, 1. Neil Englehart in Culture Press, 1977), chap. 1915 (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University in Traditional Siamese Government Asia Pro Southeast (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell the weakness of the Bangkok gram, 2001) argues that the literature overstates government in the provinces. 27 see Richard S. Horowitz, the Marble Boat: The Transformation On China "Beyond in A Military History ed. David Graffand of China's Military, Robin 1850-1911," of China, "The Transformation of 2002); and Kemal H. Karpat, (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, Higham East Studies 3 (1972): the Ottoman International Journal of Middle State, 1789-1908," Benedict Anderson makes the same point about Siam, citing the unpublished 251-256. see Anderson, Ph.D. dissertation of Noel "Studies of the Thai State," pp. Cornell Battye; and Power 202-205.

25

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to implement administrative rather than constitutional quickly is also a loose pattern of the progression reforms. There of reforms: to new situ institutions early reforms that sought to adapt indigenous ations followed by much more systematic efforts to use European mod els. The Ottomans with short-lived mil began the earliest, beginning of the janissaries in the itary reforms in the 1790s, the elimination even before the of the central bureaucracy 1820s, and the expansion structure came to be formalized. The Tanzimat semicolonial reforms reforms, brought about far more thoroughgoing saw the of the new treaty system. Qing China reforms from i860 to 1894 and more systematic and

which (1839-1876), followed the creation

self-strengthening radical New Policy reforms (1901-1911) that followed the Boxer War. In Siam, King Mongkut reforms after visit, but his began Bowring's more in the late reforms successor, Chulalongkorn, systematic began i88os, after years of careful domestic political maneuvering.28 and Semicolonial Order

Extraterritoriality

the aspect of the semicolonial century By the early twentieth regime was that most Chinese the institution of extraterritoriality. enraged The exemption of foreign nationals from the jurisdiction of Chinese consular courts that were widely courts, the use of foreign-controlled to be deeply biased, and the frequent abuse of these believed privileges became of growing popular nationalist touchstones and anti-imperial ist feeling. While were particularly the debates over extraterritoriality bitter in China, where Chinese it a central issue and nationalists made it was a the status quo, foreign nationals fought hard to preserve issue in as a sense, other societies semicolonial well.29 In prominent was new. Lauren Benton has shown that extraterritoriality nothing were common in colonial Powerful mul plural legal systems systems. were quite willing tiethnic empires, such as the Ottoman, to accord a

reforms see the overview in Chuzu and "Political post-Boxer Ichiko, in Cambridge History 11: Late Ch'ing Reform, 1901-1911," of China, Volume and Kwang-ching Liu (Cambridge: John K. Fairbank Cambridge University On the Ottoman reforms see especially Roderic Davison, Press, 1980), pp. 375-415. Reform in theOttoman Empire, (Princeton, 1856-1876 Press, 1963), and N.J.: Princeton University Carter V. Findley, Bureaucratic Reform in theOttoman Empire: The Sublime Porte, 1789-1922 Thai (Princeton, Press, 1980), chaps. 4-5; for Siam see Wyatt, N.J.: Princeton University land: A Short History, ch. 7; and for a more detailed account focusing on the interior min Provincial Administration. istry see Tej Bunnag, 29 in China of Cali Fishel, The End of Extraterritoriality Wesley (Berkeley: University fornia Press, 1952). China's Institutional Part II, ed.

28 On

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law to minority but with ultimate communities, in the hands of the sovereign.30 But the inscrip remaining jurisdiction tion of extraterritoriality into treaties changed in impor the situation tant ways. This was a formalized system, which foreigners blatantly in pursuing both commercial used to their own advantage enterprises and carrying on private lives. Most the treaty sys importantly, within tem extraterritorial rights could not simply be revoked by the host have been a subject of debate. John Fairbank's influential the joint interpretation emphasized in shaping role of the Qing officials and their Western interlocutors case that agree the treaty system. Joseph Fletcher made a convincing were a direct antecedent ments with Kokhand in the mid-1830s to the settlements that ended the First Opium War.31 Missing from this dis cussion has been a vision of a global pattern, one driven in a large part In exploring East these issues, a look to the Middle by British policies. a as was is quite revealing. institution semicolonial Extraterritoriality an in important in of of the respects system capitulations adaptation were initially concessions vol Empire. The capitulations on the Sultan Ottoman non-Muslim bestowed untarily by foreigners. was granted as if the foreign ambassador was the Extraterritoriality head of a millet (a recognized within the religious community empire). the Ottoman and civil cases among foreigners were to be judged by Both criminal or his appointee. The capitulations the foreign representative also pro in Ottoman vided for privileges for foreigners the realm: trading rights of residence, and conditions from some taxes, and so on. exemptions were very specifically The capitulations Otto reciprocal. Non-Muslim man subjects were to be granted privileges in their conduct of trade in such reciprocal benefits could lead the sul Europe. Failure to provide were tan to revoke the capitulation. At the same time, capitulations limited to reign of a given sultan and had to be renewed with the accession functioned of a new sultan.32 This system, which apparently reasonably well for centuries, was part of the strategy of legal pluralism fear of serious without government The origins of extraterritoriality reprisals. in China

Law and Colonial Cultures, and 244-252. Benton, esp. pp. 80-114 on the China Coast; "The John K. Fairbank, Trade and Diplomacy Joseph Fletcher, in Cambridge History in Mongolia, of the Ch'ing Order and Tibet," of Sinkiang, Heyday 10: Late Ch'ing Part I, ed. John K. Fairbank Univer China, Volume (Cambridge: Cambridge 31 sity Press, 1978), pp. 375-385. 32 Relations with Europe: Patterns and Trends," Thomas "Ottoman Naff, Diplomatic in Studies in Eighteenth Century Islamic History, ed. Thomas Naff and Roger Owen (Carbon Nasim dale: Southern Illinois University Sousa, Capitulatory Press, 1977), pp. 97-103; Press, 1933), pp. 68-88. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Regime of Turkey

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overlords dealt with the extraordinary diver through which Ottoman of their realm. sity As the Ottoman in the regime found itself in a position of weakness late eighteenth and nineteenth it to became centuries, necessary grant a growing range of special economic to individual Euro concessions was pean powers. At the same time the problem of extraterritoriality exacerbated of "prot?g?s"?Ottoman nationals by foreign protection who had received protection from foreign powers by purchase or fam For the most part these were members of the Christian ily connection. millets. By the mid-nineteenth these in the numbered century prot?g?s millions
Ottoman

and constituted
realm.33

the primary

activity

of foreign

courts

in the

It was not until the 1830s and 1840s that the capitulations began to be supplemented by a treaty system. In 1840 Great Britain, Austria, to support the Sub Prussia, and Russia agreed as part of a settlement lime Porte against Muhammad Ali and to refrain from seeking out further special concessions to others. that would be denied In effect this agreement shifted the basis of policy from the capitulatory agree ments to European model conces treaty agreements. Nevertheless, sions granted in the capitulations in perpetuity continued under newly treaties. In the the to Porte was expected Sublime meantime, signed observe treaties very closely.34 were securely in place By i860 similar unequal treaty arrangements in China and Siam. The treaties with the Qing Empire signed between and related arrangements 1842 and i860 established extraterritoriality that formed the framework of the treaty system until the mid-twenti eth century. The Bowring Treaty brought a similar situation to Siam.35 In both cases, as in the Turkish example, the British and other foreign of the treaty framework as a fundamen powers used the introduction tal element of their diplomatic to adherence operations. Conversely, treaties?an law?was taken to be a important aspect of international crucial part of the responsibilities state. of an indigenous There was a profound irony here. Extraterritoriality clearly contra vened basic principles of European law that asserted that international

Sousa, pp. 89-102. Thomas "The Ottoman and the European in The States Naff, Empire System," Bull and Adam Watson Expansion of International Society, ed. Hedley (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984), pp. 162-169. 35 not on the same scale as Ottoman While as well. Turkey, both had prot?g? problems Siam had disputes with France over French over French claims for consular jurisdiction colonial in China (defined very generously subjects by France), while foreign missionary efforts to protect to disputes their converts were fundamental over missionary activity. 34

33

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states are equals in diplomatic and share fundamental ceremony rights of independence and self-defense. The first edition (e.g., sovereignty) of Henry Wheaton's Elements of International Law clearly identifies the ... "exclusive is an essential power of civil and criminal legislation state state."36 of every right independent "every sovereign Similarly, own of in its courts has the exclusive the right regulating proceedings of justice."37 Only toward the end of the chapter on "rights of inde of extraterritoriality does the possibility (as applied to rela pendence" come tions between Christian and Muslim states) up, and here it is an to state the natural of affairs, voluntarily exception agreed to by two
parties.

in Turkey, China, The treaty agreements and Siam could not be jus to be rooted in natural law were still understood tified if international law. The argument that they did not meet the "standard of civilization" was therefore an essential to support unequal treaties and legal doctrine in in particu the semicolonial and system general, extraterritoriality lar. What involved was not particularly "civilization" clear; it included to international law through adherence fulfill (ironically enough) ment of treaty obligations and the emerging international standards on the conduct of war, maintenance of diplomatic relations according to European maintenance of social standards, stability and protection of foreign nationals, and development of an "acceptable" legal code and legal system. This "standard" offered the prospect the that unequal to treaties could be revoked if the subject states played according
European rules.38

in which the most important ways nineteenth-century law international and the treaty system that embod European unequal states was through the promulgation ied it influenced semicolonial of new legal codes. These were a direct answer to the justification of as an inevitable to unjust and brutal legal response extraterritoriality in states.39 The first non-Christian systems example of this came dur One of reforms in Turkey and involved an effort to put into ing the Tanzimat to the European commitments and powers practice already made in announced the famous decrees. These 1839 and 1856 Tanzimat to ensure to Ottoman included a guarantee subjects "perfect security

U.S.

36 Wheaton 1836, p. 98. 37 Ibid., p. 105. 38 esp. pp. 54-81. Gong, 39 on For a late and very vigorous defense of extraterritoriality to China Charles in China," Minister Denby's "Extraterritoriality Law 18.4 (1924): 667-675.

this basis American

see former Journal of

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in the former and granting of full tolera for life, honor and fortune" in the latter.40 Both posed challenges tion to non-Muslim minorities since to this point law in the Ottoman Empire had been based on three elements: Islamic law (sharia), community custom, and the Sul tan's decree. Customary law in particular was extremely diverse, as the Ottoman rulers did not try to impose Turkish law on non-Turkish to continue to communities Muslim and allowed religious minorities use their own legal systems when Muslims were not involved. While law (and in some places Islamic law) dealt with business customary was no there and civil civil or commercial code that practices disputes, as functional or legitimate. in the recognized Europeans Beginning were elements of and commercial law 1840s penal European-style into the Ottoman incorporated already complex legal system. During to adapt French the i86os and 1870s, systematic efforts were made civil law to Ottoman in and circumstances, 1867 the Grand Vizier Ali Pasha proposed that the Code Napol?on be applied to disputes involv and non-Muslims. while they drew on French ingMuslims Ultimately, the reforms instituted remained within the traditions of influences, Turkish and Islamic law.41 In Siam as well, legal reform quickly appeared on the agenda dur successor Chulalongkorn (r. 1868-1910). ing the reign of Mongkut's court sys the indigenous Siamese Foreign observers sharply criticized tem and the lack of separation of judicial from administrative func to British diplomat W. Gifford Palgrave, tions. According in 1881 there was under the existing whatsoever for system "no distinct provision the administration of law and justice throughout Siam" and indeed in the proper sense of the word, can "no judicial or legal institution, find a place."42 Palgrave concluded that until the legal system "is

Middle

For translations of these edicts see J. C. Hurewitz, in the Near and ed., Diplomacy East: A Documentary Record, 1535-1914 (Princeton, N.J.: Von Nostrand, 1956), pp. is from p. 114. 149-153. The quote 113-116, 41 sources: Esin Orucu, draws from the following "The Impact of Euro My discussion in European and Turkey," and Law: The pean Law on the Ottoman Empire Expansion ed. W of Indigenous Law in 19th and 20th Century Africa and Asia, J.Mommsen (Oxford: Berg, 1992), pp. 39-58; J.A. De Moor pp. Findley, Ottoman Civil Officialdom, Bernard Lewis, The Emergence 2nd ed. 31-32; Davison, pp. 251-256; of Modern Turkey, Brown suggests (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 118-119, 122-123. Nathan]. that the new, French-influenced the Middle East did not legal codes that spread through and

40

Encounter

the range of issues in which Islamic courts simply replace Islamic law, but rather narrowed were used for personal in the Modern uSharia and State Middle Muslim law; see Brown, East," International Journal of Middle East Studies 29.3 (1997): 359-376. 42 W Gifford of the Kingdom of Palgrave, "Report on the Present Administration on Foreign Affairs: in British Documents Siam," Reports and Papers from the Foreign Office

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no

sane

mind

can

contemplate

for

an

to of the existing Treaty any rights of foreigners to in extra-territorial Siam."43 Efforts reform the jurisdiction legal sys tem began with an 1874 decree freeing those born into slavery at age 21, the first of a series of efforts to end various forms of servitude over the next 30 years.44 In 1892 aMinistry of Justice was formed. The pre instant relaxation the European-educated Prince Rabi (son of Chula siding minister, a systematic initiated of the penal code and revamping longkorn), court system, dealing with criminal, law with civil, and commercial the help of French and Belgian legal advisors. Not surprisingly, given his continental Prince Rabi's reforms drew on the Code advisors, law as a model.45 David Wyatt and continental European Napol?on argues that the legal reforms had a dual purpose: not only were they and an effort to end extraterritoriality, aimed at foreigners but they were also part of Chulalongkorn's effort to centralize judicial power in in Bangkok.46 the hands of his administration In China New Policy reforms saw a thoroughgoing the post-1900 reform of the legal structure. A commission lead by a British-trained a as served and a dis Wu (who Tingfang mostly figurehead), lawyer,

Chinese legal scholar, Shen Jiaben, drew up a new legal the aid of Japanese legal advisors. The reformed code elim such as the use of torture to inated the use of "cruel punishments," extract confessions, brutal forms of corporal and capi and excessively At the same time the Qing tal punishment. initial regime instituted commercial and corporate law.47 While efforts to establish this has usually been seen as simply an effort to end extraterritoriality by adopt of standards, Jerome Bourgon argues that the abolition ing European on indigenous movement "cruel punishments" drew as much within as it did on foreign influences.48 Chinese legal scholarship tinguished code with

Publi Print, part i, series E, vol. 27, ed. Ian Nish (Frederick, Md.: University Confidential cations of America, 1995), p. 25. 43 p. 26. Palgrave, 44 David K. in the Reign of King Chu The Politics of Reform inThailand: Education Wyatt, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1969), pp. 51-52. lalongkorn (New Haven, 45 pp. 222-224. Gong, 46 Thailand, p. 210. Wyatt, 47 The standard work isMarinus The Introduction of Modern Criminal Law in J.Meijer, The Xinzheng See also Douglas China Revolution and Japan China. 1898-1912: Reynolds, on East Asian Mass.: Council Studies, Harvard University, 1993), pp. 179 (Cambridge, Law and law see William C. Kirby, "China Unincorporated: Company 185. On corporate Business 44-48. Roots (2003): 48 Enterprise in Twentieth-Century China," Journal of Asian Studies 54.1 (1995):

'Cruel Punishments': A Reappraisal of the Chinese Jerome Bourgon, "Abolishing of the Xinzheng Legal Reforms," Modern Asian Studies 27.4 and Long Term Efficiency 851-862.

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But new law codes and judicial systems were no quick fix for extra and the treaty system. The reports of the annual confer territoriality ences of the Association of the Law for the Reform and Codification indicate that among legal scholars there was considerable of Nations over the role of international relations law in mediating dispute states in general, and specifi between Christian and non-Christian in the international legal order. A cally the place of extraterritoriality on to issue con in this committee the report meeting 1876 appointed the two "great classes cluded the following year that relations between . . .have been on the whole The of nations unsatisfactory. extremely root of the evil lies in the fact that even such imperfectly defined prin law as exist are not regarded as binding by ciples of international it states." While in their intercourse with non-Christian Christian, was "doubtless to employ moral the duty of civilized governments to reform its laws when to induce a non-Christian influence people or these are characterized barbarity," they insisted that use by injustice of force to interfere in a state's affairs was wrong.49 their concerns articulated representatives Japanese and Chinese to in subsequent meetings, but were unable about extraterritoriality in association. In make much the the progress European-dominated ofWar suggested 1879 meeting G. A. van Hamel of the Dutch Ministry in China and Japan could be abolished that extraterritoriality only if were fulfilled, a range of conditions the of West including adoption law ern-style and country, and composed must also be trade had no of these codes throughout the codes, the implementation of courts that are "independent, the formation impartial

of scientific he added that free trade jurists." Curiously, the established country?even throughout though free in of role the international law. Even if special principles were in states instruments Christian the necessary put legal place, must, he insisted, retain the right to resume the extraterritorial system in the event that the these reforms.50 Even international lawyers, It was only on the state backslid and sought to eliminate the idealistic of among community relatively for remained support strong. extraterritoriality eve of the Sino-Japanese in 1894 that the War in Japan. After and agreed to forego extraterritoriality Asian the military power of Japan, the other Euro

British relented the war firmly established

49Association for the Reform and Codification of to 3 Annual Held at Antwerp, 30 August Fifth Conference Clowes and Sons, 1878), p. 58. 50 Association for the Reform of and Codification Seventh Annual Conference held at the Guildhall, London, liam Clowes and Sons, 1880).

the Law September

of Nations, 1877

Report of the (London: William Report of the (London: Wil

the Law of Nations, 11-16 August 1879

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suit. In Turkey, after the States followed pean states and the United I to abrogate the capit Ottoman took of World War regime advantage new state of affairs. not victorious allies did the the ulations, accept the Nationalist forces succeeded Turkish Nevertheless, subsequently not only in overthrowing the remains of the Ottoman regime, but also in driving out foreign forces that sought to intervene. This cleared the way to scrape up the for the formal end of the capitulations. Unable or will for force further the European intervention, military political new the Turkish and powers recognized government reluctantly signed in July 1924, which the Treaty of Lausanne ended foreign legal privi was able to chip away at extraterritorial leges in Turkey.51 China

movements with popular Chinese nationalist demoniz arrangements, in in the and treaty system ing general extraterritoriality particular. as a by-product But the system was only finally eliminated of the States and Britain against Japan during World alliance with the United II.52Military might?and War the relative military decline conversely a more route to inter of European effective imperial powers?proved national to undo than legal argument. Only Siam, which managed recognition in the extraterritoriality through a process of quiet diplomacy can to in have this system be said succeeded 1920s, supplanting I dramati through domestic legal reform, and only after World War British and French ability to project power on a global cally weakened
scale.53

Central A

Government area

Administrative we can

Reform

see the parallel development of the second states to in three the treaty systems is in the adaptation of response ministries of central government and ministerial patterns European A major concern of European government. imperial powers related to the the efficacy of the organs of the semicolonial state?particularly maintenance for trade to flourish and for the safety of order (essential in which

of foreigners) and the proper management of foreign relations. Euro a tolerably efficient pean and American diplomats expected foreign of social and political manned prominence ministry, by individuals at least some familiarity with and customs. with foreign languages was to be one of a the ministry important, foreign expected Equally

51 Sousa, 52 Fishel, 53 Gong,

pp.

177-249;

Gong, Sayre,

pp. pp.

115-119. 70-88.

passim. pp. 230-237;

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defined central government handful of prominent, functionally depart were to play a primary ments. Ministers in charge of each department and implementing central government role in defining policies. This was or in of ministerial cabinet system government accepted practice It formed the standard by which Euro Europe by the age of Napoleon. American states.54 Indig and pean representatives judged semicolonial enous state administrative in Qing China, institutions the Ottoman to test meet in failed this the and Siam Empire, early nineteenth
century.

to efficiently manage for organizations surprisingly, developing a was an create of and relations eign body early diplomatic specialists in demands priority. The Ottoman regime, facing growing diplomatic the late 1700s and early 1800s, first created a translation bureau, which Not into a full-fledged first part of foreign ministry?the gradually evolved two of the civil bureaucracy the dramatic expansion from an estimated to some thirty-five In the aftermath of thousand officials thousand.55 the Second Opium War the Qing dynasty created the Zongli Yamen. in the 1860s and 1870s, it was it was a powerful organization While not organized on a European its interpreters school pattern. Through it trained a corps of young diplomats and translated international law treatises as well as works on science and geography into Chinese. But in the 1880s and it became when the Yamen's far leadership changed more ant ?foreign in its orientations, a chorus of complaints from Euro the Boxer crisis, at the followed. After pean and American diplomats into demand of the foreign powers, the Zongli Yamen was transformed new in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and given the Qing prominence state structure.56 In Siam, the management of foreign affairs had been a ministry that combined part of the duties of the Krom Phra Khlang, the administration of trade, revenue, and foreign affairs as well as control over some provincial territory. In 1885, King Chulalongkorn created a Department of Foreign Affairs, and it became a full-fledged a In few later.57 other of these states years words, none ministry
54 so various the ministerial forms?was century system?in By the mid-nineteenth to be inarguable; universal that it was rarely mentioned and its benefits were assumed see, Political Science or the State Theoretically and Practically Considered e.g., Theodore Woolsey, (New York: Scribners, 1889) 2: 281. 55 Carter Findley, Ottoman Civil Officialdom: A Social History (Princeton, N.J.: Prince ton University Press, 1989), pp. 22-28. 56 see Yamen Horowitz, On the Zongli "Central Power and State Making: The Zongli in China, Yamen and Self-Strengthening Ph.D. diss., Harvard 1860-1880," University, see Horowitz, the Bonds of Precedent." 1998. On the reforms from 1901-1906 "Breaking 57 William Institutional Change and Development (Hono J. Siffin, The Thai Bureaucracy: lulu: East-West Center, 1966), pp. 56, 60.

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a European model, but gradually responded by immediately adopting in that direction. moved or the innovative use of indigenous Partial measures institutions not estimations would do the trick. of Foreign generally non-European institutions and patterns were at times acerbic. British government that "Siam is nominally, and by an diplomat Gifford Palgrave declared abuse of European words and phrases, a Kingdom, with a King, Minis in reality it is an extensive slave estate, some ters, Government, &c; between four what divided Sir Edmund proprietors."58 unequally courts in who reformed the British consular the Ottoman had Hornby, was same was sent to in do the and China, Empire remarkably unim new the office the Zongli Yamen, Qing foreign pressed by organized fol a for central government ministry. He believed lowing Qing patterns an in in an iso that it was deliberately uncomfortable placed building was lated location about the first and (he wrong about probably right the second). He found Prince Gong, the Yamen's titular leader, "rude" and "impertinent" and the other Yamen ministers "were all old men ... I am bound to women. like and looked and behaved old extremely a nonsense to to take up a great talk deal of and seemed say they great deal of time about doing it."59While these may be extreme examples, to accept they do point to the fact that foreigners were not inclined a deviated from familiar institutional that greatly model. anything a modern ministerial In the end, something cabinet approaching came states. in into all three The climax of the Tanzimat system being reforms in the 1860s and 1870s brought defined central functionally a state to ministries of Ottoman and council government Turkey.60 In in 1880s the late and the Siam, beginning 1890s Chulalong through ministries korn initiated a thoroughgoing reform of central government as well, drawing extensively on Western as minis models, appointing ters princes with at least some foreign education and hiring a range of In China the New Policy Reforms foreign advisors.61 ministries. the 1906 reforms of the central government in culminated In these reforms

58 59 1928), 60

p. 32. Palgrave, Edmund Hornby, p. 234.

Sir Edmund Hornby,

An Autobiography

(Boston:

Houghton

Mifflin,

Davison, pp. 239-244. Findley, Bureaucratic in detail. Richard Chambers, ministries "The Civil in Japan and Turkey, E. Ward ed. Robert ernization Press, 1964), pp. 318-322. N.J.: Princeton University 61 For a see Siffin, pp. 42-63; general account see Ian Brown, role of foreigners "British Financial Modem Asian Studies 12.2 (1978): Chulalongkorn,"

discusses several Reform, pp. 162-190, in Political Mod Bureaucracy: Turkey," and Dankwart A. Rustow (Princeton, for a more Advisers 193-215. analysis of the sophisticated in Siam in the reign of King

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model of the Ministry of Foreign of the administrative the expansion and functionally defined depart Affairs was applied to other ministries, ments were created along European lines?a product of a conscious institutional effort to examine the benefits of Western models.62 to recognize It is important that foreign pressure was not the only cause of change. in 1861, In China, the creation of the Zongli Yamen was a a also vehicle for while welcomed group of by foreign diplomats, to assert a position of authority. associated with Prince Gong same wrote the the memorials that reformers token, By surrounding the 1906 reforms focused on the potential for the European minister to the Qing ial models of organization for solving problems endemic see we can in the administrative reforms bureaucracy.63 Similarly, Siam as expressing Chulalongkorn's desire to centralize power in Bang sec under the central control of the throne. The kok, particularly on seems is it reforms literature the Tanzimat less but clear, ondary officials to suggest that the central government reforms of the Tanzi plausible mat era were at least in part aimed at strengthening the hand of the a major obsta vis-?-vis civil bureaucracy the military had been (which cle to reform in and earlier period) and the religious establishment.64

State Finances A insti third area in which influenced administrative treaty relations tutions in all three states was state finances. Generally speaking, for First, the treaties in all cases eign pressure came from two directions. to structured relations international trade by seeking to limit promote on imports and tax rates and eliminate arbitrary fees and corruption on the kinds states therefore faced constraints exports. Semicolonial

tax and commercial tax policies of commercial they could implement and were pressured to reform existing that British systems of taxation saw as constraints to trade. Second, the Ottoman representatives contracted Empire and later Qing China huge foreign debts, and both were forced to agree to expanding of state revenue foreign control institutions. It was well established in international and financial law that a state could not simply renege on a loan from private individu als at home between or abroad financiers in special circumstances, and close links except and political leaders in London and Paris produced

the Bonds of Precedent," pp. 789-796. "Breaking Ibid., passim. 64 in Bureaucratic Findley Reform argues that the civil bureaucracy to other parts of the Ottoman state during the nineteenth century. 63

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to ensure repayment of loans. The invasive imperial actions auton of the foreign debt collections constrained the seriously states. omy of semicolonial on international limits on taxation trade was part and Imposing

parcel of the free trade regime of the British Empire in the mid- to late in the mid-nine nineteenth century.65 In the eyes of British officials teenth century, opening the gates to trade was of fundamental impor tance. In 1838, in the Anglo-Ottoman commercial treaty of Balta to free trade: duties conceded the Ottomans what amounted Liman, were set at 5 percent on imports, 12 percent on exports, and 3 percent on transiting goods. The Ottomans also agreed to the abolition of all as part of aimed more at Egypt, still perceived (a measure monopolies were to the Ottoman While modifications made make the sys realm). tem less injurious to Ottoman the free trade remained exports, regime in place until the end of the empire and resulted in rapid increases in aid.66 foreign set the stage for what would occur the Ottoman Again, precedent in China was fought under farther east. Infamously, the Opium War not only reopened the auspices of free trade: the settlement opium also the of the foreign trade guild abolished imports, but monopoly as the Cohong, rates under con and sought to bring customs known to trol. The Second Opium War sought the enforcement of strengthen a free trade regime in the late 1850s; subsequently the Qing establish ment of the foreign-manned insti Customs Service Imperial Maritime tutionalized state Qing the free trade element of the treaty system within the itself.67 In Siam, the opening of trade was the central goal of Sir John Bowring's mission: he forced a limitation of import duties to 3 percent and export duties to 5 percent, and the abolition of com with and the of exception opium. modity trading monopolies

"The Imperialism of Free The classic work of John Gallagher and Ronald Robinson, of discussion about the causes of the "new" imperialism, but their Trade," inspired decades to Britain's mid-century assertion informal empire that the free trade regime was central in remains unchallenged. See the original article and its critics and elaborations Wm. Roger (New York: New Viewpoints, Louis, ed., Imperialism: The Robinson and Gallagher Controversy Civil Officialdom, Issawi, ed., Economic History pp. 28-29; Charles Findley, Ottoman of Chicago Press, (Chicago: University 1966), pp. of theMiddle East: A Book of Readings 38-40. 67 remains the classic analysis of British and Chinese Fairbank's Trade and Diplomacy More deals with the origins of the Arrow War, recently, Wong, Deadly Dreams, diplomacy. is Hans van de Ven, service of of the customs "The Onrush and a good recent discussion Modern Globalization York: W W. Norton, in China," 2002), pp. in Globalization 177-187. inWorld History, ed. A. G. Hopkins (New 1976). 66

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at midcentury, To British representatives the benefits of free trade were unquestioned. to Mongkut's As Bowring wrote heir apparent, fail to appreciate how rapidly the "Your Majesty's sagacity cannot friendly trading relations of one country with another tend to develop itmust be pointed out the riches and strength of each."68 Nevertheless, in Europe. The that the free trade regime was not standard practice of these demands was a direct contradiction of principles imposition states the right to administer of international law that allowed trade into properly and taxes as they chose. But once these were integrated instruments of international signed and ratified treaties, they became law that were vigorously British diplomats. policed by The impact of the free trade regime on the revenues of semicolo varied. Qing China and the Ottoman Empire were on was it and taxes, only begin dependent primarily agriculture-based century that trade became a key source of ning in the mid-nineteenth revenue. In China into before 1861, revenues on foreign trade went were not the coffers of the imperial household and ordi department for more general use. The introduction of the foreign narily available nial to the manned Customs service, which Imperial Maritime reported new foreign office (the Zongli Yamen) in Beijing, was a windfall for the Qing reforms and state, playing a major role in financing military modernization from the mid-1860s of the Sino until the outbreak case seems in The Ottoman War similar. the While Japanese 1895.69 onrush of foreign imports may indeed have done much harm to sectors of industry in the Ottoman that the free realm, there is little evidence use of trade regime did much harm to state finances. The expanding taxes kept the Ottoman commercial afloat, with Empire financially customs revenues playing a particularly role.70 important But Siam was a different the Qing and Ottoman story. Where on revenues on in the early had Empires depended primarily agriculture on state tax Siamese nineteenth the century, depended farming and as as to corv?e related well labor demanded commerce, monopolies from rural farmers. The Bowring abolished the Treaty commodity and internal trade taxes that had been a mainstay of state monopolies revenues, and appeared to hurt the leading princes and the ethnic Chi states were

2: 439-440. Bowring, see Tang Xianglong, For a breakdown of the use of customs revenues, Zhongguo jindai is drawn Press, 1992). The analysis haiguan shuishou he fenpei tongji (Beijing: Commercial from Horowitz, "Central Power and State Making," chap. 4. 70 Stanford "The Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Tax Reforms and Revenue Shaw, International Journal of Middle East Studies 6.4 (1975): 421-459. System," 69

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nese merchants In the end, the rev who controlled the monopolies. enue base of the Siamese state shifted toward excises on spirits, opium, and the lottery, as well as the customs duties set by treaty. gambling, Corv?e labor was at first informally replaced with payments, and later a tax. tax head that Within context, formally replaced by farming per sisted as a mode of administration. While the central government in tax collection in the 1890s, even then tax involved directly to the dismay of King Chulalongkorn farms remained; much and finan cial reformers, eliminating the tax farms on opium, gambling, lottery, and liquor proved fiscally for the Sia impossible.71 A major problem were mese the restrictions the treaty system placed on government taxes?Britain commercial and other altering foreign powers resisted revision. for Siamese around rice requests 1870, Siamese Beginning an of land used for exports expanded expansion rapidly, stimulating became com rice farming. Import tax rates of 3 percent were low (certainly on the with China and Ottoman and duties exports Empire), pared were fixed at the 1855 currency rate, even as the value of the baht over the following to Hong Lysa, in declined thirty years. According customs taxes transit the and inland less than 15 per 1900 produced cent of total revenues. Direct taxes?were taxes?land and capitation in 1892 and rose only slowly of total revenues less than 10 percent In short, while the treaty system certainly thereafter.72 encouraged in it economic the second half of the nineteenth century, expansion on revenues. state constraints the of placed significant growth economic While the free trade regime was the most obvious base on most of the semicolonial the direct both Otto the system, impact man and Qing states came from foreign debts. As debts rose, foreign to secure invasive measures and creditors demanded more diplomats case on In this had international law their side. While repayment. they a was not of had and rich this long history Europe unpaid public debts,

71 There has been some debate on the impact of the Bowring Treaty. Wyatt, Thailand, is harshly who criticized claims) (which fits with Bowring's pp. 184-185 by B. ]. Terwiel, to suggest that the existing taxes persisted for at least a decade argues that there is evidence and the Indigenous after the treaty. See "The Bowring Treaty: Perspective," Imperialism But at issue here seems to be the speed of Journal of the Siam Society 79.2 (1991): 40-47. in the Nineteenth rather than their basic direction. Lysa, Thailand Century: Hong changes of Southeast Evolution Institute Asian and Society Studies, of the Economy (Singapore: a detailed treatment of the tax farming system and efforts to presents 1984), pp. 75-131, reform it. 72 James Ingram, Economic Change Hong Lysa, pp. 125-129; Stanford University Press, (Stanford, Calif.: 1971), pp. 175-182. rice exports see Ingram, chap. 3. in Thailand, 1850-1970 the rise of Siamese

On

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the law. Vattel reflected in theories of international strongly endorsed to repay loans: "loans made for the needs of the state's responsibility of public affairs, are strictly State, debts incurred in the administration and are binding upon the State and the whole Nation. legal contracts can release the Nation of discharging such of the obligation Nothing indeed and used diplo took this very seriously debts."73 Europeans matic pressure to encourage foreign loans, then used debts to extract In Egypt, loan defaults became an excuse greater financial concessions. the resolution was not so drastic, for direct British intervention. While in increased foreign influence the politics of foreign debt dramatically both the Ottoman Empire and Qing China.74 and 1870s, the heyday of the Tanzimat regime turned to foreign loans to help pay for debt service. The expenses, budget deficits, and, increasingly, military to a crisis, and in conflict of 1877-1878 Russo-Turkish things brought Porte and foreign creditors 1881 an agreement the Sublime between to manage the debt crisis created the Public Debts Administration access to credit abroad. The Public Debts and reestablish Ottoman was foreign controlled and foreign run, and, through Administration an enor of Ottoman constituted control of major portions revenue, the 1850s, During reforms, the Ottoman 1860s, mous incursion on Ottoman sovereignty.75 in size and guaranteed In China, early loans were quite modest to spread with customs revenues. They were used reasonably carefully and preparing internal rebellions the cost of fighting against foreign threats. Foreign debt became a serious problem only after 1895, when from the war with Japan had to be financed the immense indemnity the customs rev with an international loan and required mortgaging enues and expanding service to oversee the foreign customs taxation of "native customs" on the still-flourishing coastal junk trade.76 Here

73 p. 186. Vattel, 74 In an re interpretation, P. J. Cain and A. G. Hopkins, British Imperialism, important 2nd ed. (New York: Longman, services 1688-2000, 2000), argue that the role of financial was ultimately more than that of trade in driving British important imperialism. Moreover elites of the city and Britain's political the financial they point to the close links between elite in influencing British of China their treatment and the imperial policy. See especially Ottoman 75 360-380. Empire, pp. 340-351, in Issawi, Economic History Rafii-Sukru Suvla, "The Ottoman Debt, 1850-1939" of theMiddle East, pp. 95-106; Donald in the Ottoman Financial Control Blaisdell, European Press, 1966). Empire (New York: AMS 76 On renmin loans see the massive yin hang documentary compilation Zhongguo zonghang can shi shi, comp., Zhongguo Qingdai waizhai shi ziliao, 1853-1911 (Beijing: Zhong guo Wright, jinrong chubanshe, 1991). The Hart and the Chinese Customs takeover (Belfast: of native 1949), pp. customs 745-753. is treated in Stanley F.

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statesmen after foreign debt became an albatross on the necks of Qing successors. States needed money and their Republican and foreigners to make loans, but only for further investment always seemed willing in 1912, Yuan Shi and revenue concessions. After the fall of the Qing kai's government contracted the infamous Reorganization Loan, which over to a foreign administration. turned the salt monopoly In any to reexamine the revenue system event, foreign debts forced the Qing and begin to move toward a system of modern budgeting.77 and Chulalongkorn, under Mongkut the government the results of European avoided loans, seeing wisely foreign perhaps in Egypt and the Ottoman finance While Empire. foreign trade with in the 1870s, it was still quite modest, Siam grew rapidly beginning dominated by rice exports and imports of manufactured goods. Only with the growth of the teak cutting enterprise industry did British move much outside of Bangkok, and compared with China and Turkey it was not seen as much of a prize by British financiers.78 Meanwhile, of Finance, the new Ministry created with foreign advice, was con to enable sufficient clarity of budgeting cerned with establishing the as contraction of foreign loans for major such investments, railway building. The hiring of a few high-profile foreign advisors to the new to enable the Siamese gov of Finance was also seen as helping Ministry ernment to contract foreign loans. But this occurred only after 1900 and on a comparatively small scale.79 To sum up this long section, the treaty systems imposed on semi states had important for the transformation colonial of implications state institutions. incentives for offered the First, extraterritoriality institutions. law codes and judicial "normal" diplomatic relations and of the systems government encouraged to create and Siam "modern" Ottoman foreign Empire, Qing China, structure of cen in the direction ministries of a ministerial and move of a free trade regime for better or tral government. The imposition of European-style development Second, foreign expectations pressure to establish "effective" of In Siam

77 Hans Studies 30.4 century. 78On

J. van (1996):

de Ven, 829-868

and the Rise "Public Finance tries to untangle financial

history

of Warlordism," in the

Modem early

Asian

twentieth

see Malcolm see Ingram, passim. On British investment the general patterns, in British Business inAsia Since i860, ed. R. P. T. in Thailand," "Early British Business and Geoffrey Press, 1989), pp. Jones (Cambridge: University Cambridge Davenport-Hines 116-156. 79 in Siam in the Reign of King Chulalong "British Financial Advisers Ian Brown, 193-215. korn," Modern Asian Studies 12.2 (1978): Falkus,

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worse constrained in each of these three states, the systems of taxation in some respects proving to be a boon and in others forcing reform. The on free trade had to be respected, but on the other hand, insistence a valuable new even with treaty limits, trade taxes often constituted source of revenue for states, such as Qing China and the Ottoman revenues. At the same time, on agricultural Empire, that had depended foreign loans did tend to result in greater foreign states. financial management of semicolonial involvement in the

Interstate and the Treaty

Territorial

Simplifications: State

International

Law

of European power over systems were an obvious manifestation Eurasian but international law also played an impor states, indigenous tant role in a more subtle and enduring phenomenon: the emergence as state in of the territorially defined the sovereign key participant international

the nineteenth Siam, Qing century, society. Before states and Ottoman the China, Empire were all complex, compound in which external boundaries were poorly defined, and near the fron tier the use of indirect rule and suzerain "tributary" relationships with local power holders were common. While seemed this would have in late medieval and early modern the situation had Europe, over states time. Intense competition between led them to changed was resources seek territory that defensible and from which could be familiar extracted. Linear boundaries slowly replaced vaguely defined border zones as states sought to define precisely the extent of their sovereign
domain.80

In the nineteenth century, as the global map was redrawn with a states had to adapt to European ideas pen, semicolonial European about the expression of power over space. This European map pre into territorially sumed that the world should be organized discrete states defined by linear boundaries. It also increasingly the favored of states that could be identified with a specific "nation." establishment

of boundaries

states and the demarcation the relationship the emergence of national between see Jeremy Black, "Boundaries in ancien and Conflict: International Relations in Eurasia: World Boundaries, ed. Carl Grundy-Warr (London: Routledge, regime Europe," Peter Sahlins, Boundaries: The Making 1994) 3: 19-54. of France and Spain in the Pyrenees of California that the process of establishing Press, 1989), suggests (Berkeley: University was slower than a traditional linear boundaries narrative would suggest. political On

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a desire on the part of both European represented international the formulation of lawyers to simplify across an to the what power James globe: analogue legitimate political as "state simplifications" Scott describes imposed by high modernist states in the twentieth the same way as Scott sees century.81 In much a variety of measures to make complex states instituting soci modern rise eties less differentiated and more the of the territorial "legible," into neat terri the global map. By dividing the world simplified a group of peo states each inhabited by a single "nation"?i.e., state simplified geography territorial ple with a shared identity?the resources. But it did so by and and the problems of controlling people states to within the need ethnic differentiation (hence obscuring to fit diverse nations), invent national the identities both ignoring torial and the social, among political power holders relationships complex linear boundaries. cultural networks that transcended and economic, of terri law texts point to the growing International importance in In the in the of statehood nineteenth the century. tory conception ... a or a wrote is "A Nation that State Vattel 1750s political body, a man in and combined their forces of who have united society together state is and security." The their mutual welfare order to procure states defined as a group of people, not as a territorial domain. While or nations have territory, this is a secondary characteristic.82 Wheaton in 1836 likewise does not identify territory as one of the defining char acteristics of a state, although he does seem to assume in other sections is far more revised that states have 1855 edition territory.83 The .. . an state is of wan unsettled horde "a from explicit: distinguishable a not into The idea of a formed civil yet society. legal dering savages state necessarily of its members obedience implies that of the habitual is vested, and of a fixed abode, to those persons in whom the superiority to the people by whom it is occu and definite territory belonging to Theodore Introduction Yale Woolsey's University president pied."84 in i860, was even more the Study of International Law, first published into his definition of a state: "A clear, inserting the territorial element certain state is a community limits of territory, of persons living within secure to a aims the prevalence which under organization, permanent state

81 Schemes to Improve the Human James Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Conn.: tion Have Failed (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1998), esp. pp. 11-83. 82 of territory see pp. 138-143. Vattel, p. 11. For his treatment 83 Wheaton 1836, p. 51. 84 Little & Brown, Law Elements (Boston: of International Henry Wheaton, p. 28.

Condi

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as "the law." Similarly, he defines sovereignty of justice by self-imposed exercise exclusive of the powers of the state" that is uncontrolled a certain territory."85 Where earlier works on inter "supreme within sover with of limited national law dealt extensively conceptions were so 1860s the and these on, eignty, protectorates, by (literally) no more than footnotes. to the emergence of the territor law was important International were the subjects of agree ial state in other ways as well. Boundaries treaties were regarded as ments, usually treaties, among states. Those on a change of government event In of the the law, binding signatories. or a revolution, takes on the legal obligations of the new government to observe its predecessor; that is, it is expected international agree ments

to pay sovereign debts. and to continue signed by its predecessors means a new government, to issue this the of that boundaries, Applied to inhabit the same territory as its pre indeed a new state, is expected that the territory of states created by the decessor. This has meant of colonies the colonial borders.86 perpetuates an to these principles: is There consequence space is important once are a to of crucial the definition boundaries demarcated state, and are inscribed to alter them. Boundaries it is extraordinarily difficult both on paper and on the ground with boundary markers. Invasions, and even long-term occupations do not destroy the bound rebellions, or a political at least within the concep instrument, ary as a concept law. tual universe of international For large Eurasian states such as Siam, Qing China, and the Otto man Empire, into these discrete the division of the world spaces into which "nations" were supposed to fit posed obvious challenges. None had particularly well-defined frontiers. The definition of a nation was The Ottoman diverse, with Empire was extraordinarily problematic. and non-Muslim The Qing Empire was huge non-Turkish populations. a Manchu as empire, ruled (at least at the top) by an ethnic minority, an explicitly multiethnic and multilingual enterprise. The conquests of the late seventeenth centuries had established Qing and eighteenth in vast areas outside of both Manchuria and paramountcy political was a China proper. Siam, while perhaps not quite so complicated, retrocession

Introduction to the Study of International Law (Boston: James Mon Theodore Woolsey, i860), pp. 81-83. 86 For background and a critical evaluation of the approach of international law to the a Better Line: Uti Possidetis and boundaries of new states see Steven R. Ratner, "Drawing the Borders of New States," American Journal of International Law 90.4 (1996): 590-624. roe,

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and significant minority pop kingdom with loosely defined boundaries ulations. The Tai-speaking eth peoples, who would form the defining were spread across nic group of Siam's modern descendant, Thailand, much of mainland Southeast Asia and the southwestern borderlands of of Bangkok's the Qing Empire. On the periphery control were outer in the and tributary kingdoms, the Lao kingdoms provinces including north but linguistically and culturally (which were Tai-speaking, from the core of Siam) different and Malay (sometimes provinces as sultanates) in the south. Siam also had a large and pow described All Chinese three states used indirect rule population.87 on the frontier, contexts. in various it was local chiefs by Especially not always a simple matter to define whether such local chiefs were or not. In these conditions, the construction of fully independent modern territorial states was not a simple task. erful ethnic

In his

landmark study Siam Mapped, Thongchai Winichakul

these issues influenced the creation of Siam and Thai explored to the construction entities and contributed land as geographical of the indigenous Thai identities. He shows how different of conceptions were from those that the British boundaries (and later the French) were imposing on the Kingdom over boundary of Siam in negotiations or sees use sov he the of shared demarcations. Similarly, overlapping how that accepted the overlordship of both Viet of Cambodia ereignties nam and Siam as a logical strategy for survival. The use of tributary a fundamental contained relations based on gift-giving (and useful) one to tribute the other (and acknowledged side gave ambiguity?if but received larger gifts in return, who was the more overlordship) to Asian inter and ambiguity were fundamental powerful? Flexibility state relations. By contrast, the British and the French, as they sought were unable to of their colonial the boundaries possessions, in Europe. this. wanted the delineations observed accept They rigid statesmen to In this context, Siamese learned gradually play by Euro a new of of administra rules. The elaboration pean system provincial to not the served tion, directly throne, only to expand responsible but also to assert more and improve administration, central control to define clearly Bangkok's demarcated. While territorial the process claims.88 Gradually, cost Siam what were the boundaries is said to be 176,000

87 G- William Skinner, Chinese pp. 28-39; Tej Bunnag, Society in Thailand: An Ana (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Press, 1957), pp. 126-154. lytical History University 88 Siam Mapped: A History of theGeo-Body Winichakul, (Hono of a Nation Thongchai of Hawai'i lulu: University Press, 1994), pp. 62-112.

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square miles of territory, or almost half of what it claimed control over in 1850, by the early twentieth century Siam did have a territorial to Theodore Woolsey and domain that would be clearly recognizable other international lawyers.89 situation was in many In i860 the Qing respects quite Empire's at least in similar to Siam's. It was a state largely without boundaries, set out in international the sense of precisely defined linear boundaries the Russian border with Manchuria and Mongolia agreement. Only as a result of the treaties of Nerchinsk had been demarcated (1689) and was to Kiakhta The Manchurian be revised under the (1727). boundary i860 Beijing convention, with the Qing reluctantly ceding territory to the north and west of the Ussuri River. Elsewhere the situation was fuzzier. Even the frontier with Korea, the state that had perhaps much the most with Qing China, did not have a regulated relationship sense. in the modern The frontier was (linear) boundary European to be defined by the Yalu and Turnen understood rivers, but rather an than setting out a linear boundary, both sides tried to maintain frontier zone to prevent unregulated contacts.90 uninhabited in frontier like Siam, much of the Qing state's involvement Again, areas was built around the concept of tributary relations and the use of native In these cases, chiefs the ruling non-Chinese populations. nature of Qing power was unclear. Was a tributary a separate state or a subordinate? Was a native mini chief the ruler of an autonomous state or a Qing official? In both relationships power was defined more over over than the issue still territory. To make by jurisdiction people more on over time, the frontier shifted Qing complicated, policies reacting
situation.91

to changes

in strategic

outlook

and

the

state's

financial

in the early 1860s, the boundary demarcations with Russia During in the Zongli Yamen faced a particularly situa the officials difficult a tion.92 In 1860-1861 time had difficult detailed maps of they finding in Beijing, the remote Ussuri River area in state offices and archives in that area were impos and when they did, officials with experience was that the Qing sible to find. The reality, they eventually concluded,

is from Wyatt, of territory The estimate p. 208. Thailand, da Qing huidian shili (Beijing: Qinding 1891), 511: 1-6; Mary C. Wright, "Adapt The Case of Korea," Journal of Asian Studies 17.3 (1958): 365. ability of Ch'ing Diplomacy: 91 C. Patterson "China's Reluctant Communities and Giersch, Subjects: Indigenous Ph.D. diss., Yale University, Frontier," Empire 1998, thoughtfully along the the Yunnan describes this process on the Yunnan-Burma and analyzes frontier. 92 The following draw on Horowitz, "Central Power," pp. 273-295. paragraphs 90

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and few interests in that border region.93 But through officials soon learned to take these territorial issues in Xinjiang for the demarcation of the boundary seriously. Preparations two years later were far more organized. The Zongli Yamen began to collect information about the frontiers and concern systematically

itself with the problems of preventing further territorial losses, and at the same time recognized the potential value of international law in The Zongli Yamen sponsored American mis negotiations. diplomatic translation of the 1855 edition of Wheaton sionary W. A. R Martin's into Chinese. Martin served as the director of the Subsequently, Yamen's school and together with his students interpreter (many of whom became diplomats) translated other texts into Chinese. These to provincial to late works were distributed officials.94 By the mid18 70s, Qing officials discussing the Russian occupation of the Yili Val on a in to occasions number of referred international law Xinjiang ley to support the Qing position. When the unfortunate Qing diplomat Chonghou, inadequately prepared for negotiations, signed the Treaty a Russian withdrawal at only of Livadia, which would have obtained the price of continued Russian of the strategically control crucial Muzart Pass, an uproar at court followed, and the Qing refused regime to ratify the treaty.95 In the discussions of the Yili issue, officials fre cited international law in support of their positions. A con quently sensus emerged to reject the treaty and not that it would be better recover Yili for the time being than to give in to the Russian demands. situation was more propitious the diplomatic When and military the issue could be revisited.96 The wily Qing diplomat Zeng Jize seems to have had the situation in 1879, in his travel figured out most clearly. While posted in London for he that noted while the principles of journal (written publication) in reality the European law were "not unreasonable," international was far less benevolent treatment of areas like Burma and Vietnam a con than Qing He subsequently describes tributary relationships.97 versation with an international law expert about treaties: "I asked him

Chouban yiwu shimo xianfeng shuju, 1980), 7: 2631-2632. (Beijing: Zhonghua 94 "Central Power and State Making," Horowitz, pp. 276-277. 95 account see Immanuel Hsu, The Hi Cri For a detailed and analysis of these events sis: A Study in Sino-Russian (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965). 1871-1881 Diplomacy, 96 Institute of Jindai zhongguo dui xifangji lieqiang renshi ziliao, vol. 3, part 1 (Taipei: Modern Sinica, History, Academia 1986), pp. 154, 281, Hsu, The Hi Crisis. 6b-7b; 97 Zeng Jize, Shi xi riji (n.p. 1893), 2: 22b-23. 289-292; Qingji waijiao shiliao, 17:

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if it was correct to understand that treaties to demarcate boundaries and commercial treaties must be distinguished from one another, because boundary demarcation treaties are fixed for good, while com mercial treaties are easily changed. 'Correct' he replied."98 a successful of Russian withdrawal while retain Zeng's negotiation solved the Yili crisis. In an 1887 ing the existing boundaries ultimately in English, Zeng noted article published that one of the most impor tant Qing priorities was to place China's vassal states?meaning Xin a and Korea?on "less resist and fur jiang, Tibet, equivocal footing" ther foreign incursion.99 Zeng understood the realities of the European on linear boundaries insistence and the single-minded on emphasis territorial sovereignty in nineteenth-century international law. Qing such as Zeng and their Republican-era officials descendents learned their lessons well. In spite of its weakness state lost lit the late Qing tle in the boundary demarcations. While China was weak Republican on paper at least those boundaries and often threatened, remained to William except for Outer Mongolia. According Kirby, under the Nationalist "the non-recognition of unpleasant realities government in China's to an art form."100 For better or border areas was brought in terms of territory the People's worse, of China Republic largely mir rors the late Qing state. In both China and Siam, for all of the painful concessions in made the demarcation territories that have endured. process, they established Once national to territory was defined, national identity was molded fit that territory. In modern Thailand, with its substantial populations of non-Tai peoples, the boundaries define "Thainess," and even Khmer art from sites within Thailand as Thailand's has been perceived cultural In the movement of 1901-1911 China, patrimony.101 Revolutionary thrived on Han Chinese ethnic nationalism in opposition to Manchu control. By 1919, with the Manchus gone, Sun Yatsen was declaring that the revolution had achieved only "the negative half of the goal of nationalism." Now "the Han people to sacrifice the sepa they needed

98 Zeng, 2: 34. 99 Chinese Recorder Marquis Tseng [Zeng Jize], "China: The Sleep and the Awakening," 152. 18(1887): 100 C. Kirby, "The Internationalization William of China: at Home Foreign Relations in the Republican and Abroad Era," China Quarterly 150 (1997): 436. 101 Siam Mapped, Charles "Presidential Winichakul, Thongchai pp. 163-170. Keyes, Address: The in the Classification and Politics of Ethnic Groups Peoples of Asia'?Science in Thailand, and Vietnam," China, Journal of Asian Studies 61.4 (2002): 1163-1203, empha sizes the political nature of defining ethnic groups in both Thailand and China in the twen tieth century.

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rate nationality, and identity that they are so proud of and history, in all sincerity with the Manchus, and merge Muslims, Mongols, in one melting Tibetans nation pot to create a new order of Chinese in alism."102 The common identity that brought these groups together Sun's mind was not history or culture or ethnicity, but the fact of their the national territory of China. coinhabiting If the problems faced by state leaders in China and Siam were to them situation in the the responses quite similar, was different. Whereas late leaders Empire dramatically Qing Siamese faced a thirty- or forty-year counterparts struggle and their Ottoman and their to define saw 120 years

boundaries and assert sovereignty, the Ottoman Empire in its territories. The Ottoman of erosion Empire came to be referred to as the "Sick Man of Europe," and the breakup of the old empire was as the Eastern Question. The major European described ominously were concerned about the of the Ottoman powers regime instability

and feared that a breakdown shatter the precarious would balance of so man up. to in the sick tended power prop European politics, they in At minorities the same time they found rebellions Christian by came to Greece and the Balkans and their irresistible, sup repeatedly port.103 In contrast, while the Qing Empire had its own restless minori in supporting interested them. The ties, foreign powers were not in the 1850s and 1860s and the in Yunnan rebellion Muslim Panthay in the 1860s and 1870s were unable Muslim Northwestern rebellions
to attract foreign support.

were rec In the Ottoman realm the claims of rebellious minorities the international and form, community given geographical ognized by often in multinational of Berlin, which settings such as the Congress in defined boundaries between the Ottoman Empire and the Balkans in suzerain Whereas Asia relations under the 1878. tributary systems were unacceptable to British and French in the Balkans imperialists, at autonomous Ottoman under least nominal suzerainty principalities were created in a series of international settlements. Autonomy proved to be a way station on the road to full sovereignty. For example, Ser from 1812 to 1829, bia, through a series of international agreements became an autonomous the Congress 1878, under principality of Berlin, within Serbia the Ottoman became fully Empire. independent In

102 Julie Lee Wei, China: Selected Writing (cf. the 1904 definition 103 For a standard York: Macmillan,

H. Myers, G. Gillin, Ramon Donald eds., Prescriptions for Saving Institution, (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover of Sun Yat-sen 1994), p. 225 on p. 42). The Eastern Question, (New survey see M. S. Anderson, 1774-1923

1966).

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and Bulgaria became an auton and Montenegro, along with Romania omous principality rule. In other words, while Euro under Ottoman agreements with the Sublime Porte to pean powers happily negotiated limited Christians (much like the tributary relations sovereignty give the European powers rejected), and Siam had, which that Qing China but short-term these were not stable arrangements, compromises new Balkan state. With Ottoman from a weakening extracted states, in Ottoman for influence and Russia all competing Austria-Hungary, to to time be boundaries continued subject Europe, dispute.104 Over and the physical forms of the autonomous inde newly principalities states in the Balkans were shaped in part by the legacies of pendent which had divided the region into manage Ottoman administration, in because of the able administrative units, pressures of nationalist part historical and self-determination and in part groups demanding rights on the deal making of the great European which powers, sought the a of while about balance worrying maintaining power.105 spoils cen the struggle over space continued through the nineteenth a in it transformation human mixed The tury, promoted geography. of Ottoman Europe began to separate. By choice or coer populations or auton left newly cion, five to seven million Muslims independent omous Balkan states and former Ottoman territories occupied by Rus areas inAnatolia, to predominantly sia and moved Muslim Syria, and same some Christians Arabia. the left Ottoman-controlled token, By areas for the new Christian-controlled states. Kemal Karpat argues As the weakened Ottoman shifts, together with population in in the Ottoman realm. fueled changes national positions, identity saw a Muslim subjects, particularly migrants, Increasingly, Ottoman as social identity as important and supported the movement known a assure movement to action "for Islamic and the unity pan-Islamism, survival of the states as a Muslim entity and to better the lives of the was not a turn to fundamentalism, faithful." This development Karpat a to Otto rather but modern argues, political movement responding
man weakness.106 Migration was, in a sense, the movement of what

that

these

104For an overview see Stevan K. Pavlowitch, A History of the politics of the Balkans, Political Frontiers and Boundaries (London: 1804-1945 J.R. V. Prescott, Longman, 1999); of the boundary shifts. (London: Allen & Unwin, 1987), chaps. 7, 11 provide an overview 105 in the Balkans," in Imperial Legacy, Maria Todorova, "The Ottoman pp. Legacy 54-57 106 "The hijra from Russia and the Balkans: The Process of Self-Defini Kemal Karpat, tion in the Late Ottoman State" inMuslim Travellers: Pilgrimage, Migration, and the Religious of California ed. Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori Imagination, (Berkeley: University

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into national Vattel called "nations" territories created in the diplo matic maneuvers of European international Ottomanism politics. (pro moted by the Tanzimat leadership), pan-Islamism (supported by Sultan Abdulhamid II, who reigned from 1876 to 1909), and Turkish nation a national alism were different efforts to construct identity to fit the reduced Empire. territory and increasingly Muslim population of the Ottoman

Conclusion The are of the Ottoman experiences Empire, Siam, and Qing China one one in in of the modern world great developments just chapter states as the dominant the emergence of national form of history: in recent A considerable organization. body of scholarship political states rise in Europe over the of national decades has examined the course of many centuries. Charles Tilly and other scholars have focused on the intensely competitive environment of Europe as a key political causal

factor in this process: states had to adopt certain characteristics, substantial efficient territories, contiguous including large armies, to tax and administer and so bureaucracies the military establishment, states elsewhere in Eurasia in on.107 But the process of creating national centuries was in a large part shaped by the nineteenth and twentieth external expectations. Processes of decolonization, great power inter to limit the scope of conflicts, ventions of "mod and external models ern states" have all influenced the shape and structure of new states. from a As Tilly remarked, "On the average state formation has moved a to In the semi 'internal' 'external' process."108 relatively strongly in unequal treaties colonial international lawTembodied environment, and the associated discourse about civilization provided powerful exter nal for indigenous dard" European model. incentives political elites to comply with this "stan

is from p. 142. For a much more extensive discussion Press, 1990), pp. 131-151. The quote see also Karpat, The Politicization of Identity, State, Faith and Commu of Islam: Reconstruction see State (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). On population, nity in the Late Ottoman and Social Characteristics (Madison: 1830-1914: Demographic Karpat, Ottoman Population, of Wisconsin Press, 1985), chaps. 3-4. University 107Charles and European States, AD 990-1992, (Oxford: Black Capital, Tilly, Coercion, ver and integrated well, 1992), surveys the literature and sets out the most sophisticated sion of this general argument. States See also the essays in Tilly, ed., Formation of National in Western Press, 1975). University N.J.: Princeton Europe (Princeton, 108 181. Tilly, Coercion,

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The coming of ministerial and cabinet systems of state organization the introduction of European-modeled law codes and legal systems in Siam, and the Ottoman China, Empire were products of the efforts by to introduce models in elites countries those of public admin political as civilized. istration that would be perceived The law codes were use of extraterritoriality. aimed primarily at ending the offensive Min was part of the search to assert that government isterial government was stable and civilized and that foreign relations were given due attention. While the process was driven externally, this undoubtedly also served the domestic elites who sought goals of political political to centralize power in their own hands. was territorial conception of sovereignty Europeans' increasingly inscribed in international law by the mid-nineteenth In soci century. was expressed eties in which sovereignty primarily over a people? The European obsession with boundaries their demarcation, and their demand for formal treaties defining lines of demarcation, to mark territory forced semicolonial societies and claim new relationships it. In the with the people who inhabited world of international into treaties written law, these boundaries a more-or-less became permanent part of human political geography. The challenge left for state leaders was establishing actual administra common tive control and seeking to cultivate identities the among of that domain. Siam and the Qing Empire had consider inhabitants able success retaining large territories and trying to subsume diverse into a communal populations identity defined by the largest ethnic and groups: Tai and Han Chinese.109 The Ottoman Empire saw the reverse: interest in Ottoman Christians made retaining Greece and European the Balkans tolerance of "autonomous" Christian impossible. Their territories within the empire was just a way station on the road to Territories defined national spaces, and to an impressive independence. to reinforce those degree "nations," by choice or coercion, migrated identities. spatial-national simplified Sir John Bowring's science" were a reality "great truths of political that semicolonial elites had to accept. The globalization of European international international it law, and the European society of which was part, created an institutional structure for global politics that has long outlasted European expansion. The homogeneity of accepted "nation" in eighteenth-century tion to territory was essential. usage?this meant that a new atten

109 Of Chinese

in central Asian territories such as Xinjiang course, particularly and Tibet, ethnic groups have been less than enthusiastic about Chinese dominion.

non

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to the is a monument forms in the contemporary world political to the situation of two of the process and a sharp contrast endurance centuries ago. Today, "failed states" in which no effective government to fit a preexisting tensions the has emerged boundary proliferate; ethnic and religious minorities between seeking political expressions of their own identities flare across the globe. The rationalization and of the simplification lowed by international international law, has in and even order, inscribed left an ambiguous legacy. hal