The state and empire of Ch'in

Bodde, Derk

doi:10.1017/chol9780521243278.003

Cited by 65 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 109 publications

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“…Ancient China was once a Gemeinschaft nation of poor rural villages with a long feudal history from the Ch'in Dynasty (221 BC) to the Ch'ing Dynasty (1911). The first Ch'in emperor provided his people with a uniform code to facilitate a single approach to the fields of politics, economics and culture; collectivistic values were adaptive for a society in which the most valued job was to be an official and the second most valued job was to be a farmer (Bodde, ). Confucian values of effortful and respectful learning, behavioural reform, pragmatic learning and acquisition of essential knowledge (Tweed & Lehman, ) were representative of that time and were employed by the emperors to consolidate their power.…”

Section: Ecological Change and Value Shiftsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cultural evolution over the last 40 years in China: Using the Google Ngram Viewer to study implications of social and political change for cultural values

2015

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Chinese people have held collectivistic values such as obligation, giving to other people, obedience and sacrifice of personal interests for thousands of years. In recent decades, China has undergone rapid economic development and urbanisation. This study investigates changing cultural values in China from 1970 to 2008 and the relationship of changing values to ecological shifts. The conceptual framework for the study was Greenfield's (2009) theory of social change and human development. Changing frequencies of contrasting Chinese words indexing individualistic or collectivistic values show that values shift along with ecological changes (urbanisation, economic development and enrollment in higher education), thereby adapting to current sociodemographic contexts. Words indexing adaptive individualistic values increased in frequency between 1970 and 2008. In contrast, words indexing less adaptive collectivistic values either decreased in frequency in this same period of time or else rose more slowly than words indexing contrasting individualistic values.

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Section: Ecological Change and Value Shiftsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cultural evolution over the last 40 years in China: Using the Google Ngram Viewer to study implications of social and political change for cultural values

2015

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“…However, Chinese historians (Bodde 1986;Creel 1964; agree that these counties were managed in a much less bureaucratic and centralized manner than they were in later periods. However, Chinese historians (Bodde 1986;Creel 1964; agree that these counties were managed in a much less bureaucratic and centralized manner than they were in later periods.…”

Section: Measuring T the A Amount O Of Warfarementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Zhao's first indicator of seventh century bureaucratization in Chu is that rulers appointed officials to manage territorial units (counties). However, Chinese historians (Bodde 1986;Creel 1964;Hsu 1999) agree that these counties were managed in a much less bureaucratic and centralized manner than they were in later periods. Moreover, the appointment of officials to manage territorial units was used in many clearly patrimonial states, including the Russian voevoda, the Ottoman timar system, and early modern French governors (Pipes 1974;Inalcik 1973;Mousnier 1979).…”

Section: Measuring B Bureaucracy: W Was There a An E Earlier W Wave O Of Bureaucratization I In C China?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Comment on Kiser and Cai, ASR, August 2003: Spurious Causation in a Historical Process: War and Bureaucratization in Early China

Zhao

2004

Am Sociol Rev

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“…The time period concerned is the Warring States period (475-221 BC) when the royal Zhou court was rapidly losing its territorial control with the upsurge of regional economic and military powers, before the Qin State eventually unified the country with their coercive military force and advanced technologies in 221BC. 11 The Warring States in north China also underwent fundamental changes in land ownership and subsequently farming practices, namely from the so-called field-well system to large-scale irrigated farming. 12 The emerging states begun to invest more and more resources in the construction and maintenance of large-scale irrigation projects.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

State and irrigation: archeological and textual evidence of water management in late Bronze Age China

Zhuang

2017

WIREs Water

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Ancient China remains an important case to investigate the relationship between statecraft development and 'total power'. While important economic and social developments were achieved in the late Neolithic, it was not until the late Bronze Age (first millennium BC) that state-run irrigation systems began to be built. Construction of large-scale irrigation projects, along with walls and defensive facilities, became vital to regional states who were frequently involved in chaotic warfare and desperate to increase food production to feed the growing population. Some of the irrigation infrastructures were brought into light by recent archaeological surveys. We scrutinise fast accumulating archaeological evidence and review rich historical accounts on late Bronze Age irrigation systems. While the credibility of historical documents is often questioned, with a robust integration with archaeological data, they provide important information to understand functions and maintenance of the irrigation projects. We investigate structure and organisation of large-scale irrigation systems built and run by states and their importance to understanding dynamic trajectories to social power in late Bronze Age China. Cleverly designed based on local environmental and hydrological conditions, these projects fundamentally changed water management and farming patterns, with dramatic ecological consequences in different states. Special bureaucratic divisions were created and laws were made to further enhance the functioning of these large-scale irrigation systems. We argue that they significantly increased productivity by converting previously unoccupied land into fertile ground and pushed population threshold to a new level. A hypothesis that needs to be tested in further archaeological research.

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The state and empire of Ch'in

Cited by 65 publications

References 109 publications

Cultural evolution over the last 40 years in China: Using the Google Ngram Viewer to study implications of social and political change for cultural values

Cultural evolution over the last 40 years in China: Using the Google Ngram Viewer to study implications of social and political change for cultural values

Comment on Kiser and Cai, ASR, August 2003: Spurious Causation in a Historical Process: War and Bureaucratization in Early China

State and irrigation: archeological and textual evidence of water management in late Bronze Age China

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