Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China

At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Qing state confronted its most serious maritime threat since the conquest of Taiwan in 1683. From the 1790s to 1802, huge Chinese pirate fleets allied with the newly unified Vietnamese state (Tayson regime, 1778-1802) and ravaged the coastal frontier of Sou...

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Published in:Review of Culture
Main Author: Wensheng Wang
Format: Articles
Published: Instituto Cultural de Macau 2019
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.icm.gov.mo/rc/viewer/pdfViewerParts/40060/2598
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description At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Qing state confronted its most serious maritime threat since the conquest of Taiwan in 1683. From the 1790s to 1802, huge Chinese pirate fleets allied with the newly unified Vietnamese state (Tayson regime, 1778-1802) and ravaged the coastal frontier of South China. Worse yet, Britain, hoping to grab a much-needed foothold in East Asia, launched two naval expeditions to occupy Macao, a long-time Portuguese settlement under Chinese ownership, in 1802 and 1808. This paper takes the Sino-Vietnamese pirates and British intruders as a prism to view the complexity of the Qing's oceanic governance. Furthermore, it examines how this dramatic combination of transnational and global crises affected the Qing's notions of maritime sovereignty and suzerainty before the full onslaught of Western aggression in the first Opium War. As the first step, this paper studies the contested constructions of oceanic space in late imperial China and how those constructions shaped government policies and precipitated violence at sea. It also throws new light on the contingent, piecemeal and experimental nature of British imperialism in China.
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spelling Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Qing state confronted its most serious maritime threat since the conquest of Taiwan in 1683. From the 1790s to 1802, huge Chinese pirate fleets allied with the newly unified Vietnamese state (Tayson regime, 1778-1802) and ravaged the coastal frontier of South China. Worse yet, Britain, hoping to grab a much-needed foothold in East Asia, launched two naval expeditions to occupy Macao, a long-time Portuguese settlement under Chinese ownership, in 1802 and 1808. This paper takes the Sino-Vietnamese pirates and British intruders as a prism to view the complexity of the Qing's oceanic governance. Furthermore, it examines how this dramatic combination of transnational and global crises affected the Qing's notions of maritime sovereignty and suzerainty before the full onslaught of Western aggression in the first Opium War. As the first step, this paper studies the contested constructions of oceanic space in late imperial China and how those constructions shaped government policies and precipitated violence at sea. It also throws new light on the contingent, piecemeal and experimental nature of British imperialism in China.
Instituto Cultural de Macau
Macau
Review of Culture
Articles
2019
Britain
Macao
Oceanic governance
Piracy
Qing China
Sovereignty
Suzerainty.
Vietnam
Wensheng Wang
spellingShingle Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
Wensheng Wang
Britain
Macao
Oceanic governance
Piracy
Qing China
Sovereignty
Suzerainty.
Vietnam
title Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_autocomplete Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_full Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_fullStr Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_full_unstemmed Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_short Sino-Vietnamese Pirates and British InvadersMaritime Crises, Oceanic Governance and Sovereignty in Mid-Qing China
title_sort sino-vietnamese pirates and british invadersmaritime crises, oceanic governance and sovereignty in mid-qing china
topic Britain
Macao
Oceanic governance
Piracy
Qing China
Sovereignty
Suzerainty.
Vietnam
topic_autocomplete Britain
Macao
Oceanic governance
Piracy
Qing China
Sovereignty
Suzerainty.
Vietnam
topic_facet Britain
Macao
Oceanic governance
Piracy
Qing China
Sovereignty
Suzerainty.
Vietnam
url https://www.icm.gov.mo/rc/viewer/pdfViewerParts/40060/2598
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