He Qianyuan was also a court official and he insists, also, that Ming economy was declining by appealing to the emperor on repealing the ban on foreign trade. He makes the point that silk in China was worth twice or thrice as much in the Philippines. Also, foreign merchants wanted native products and in hopes of improving the Ming economy, the ban would need to be repealed (doc 7). Ye Chunji was a county official during the Ming Dynasty. He created an order to limit the wedding expenses that were paid in silver due to the deficiency of silver in China.
The Chinese government got really upset so they confronted the British government and this started the Opium war starting in 1899 till 1902. The British didn’t see this as a problem; they crushed the naval forces and in all won the battle. The British had complete control besides the fact that they were corrupting china with opium they also built a colony named Hong Kong. This is a prime example of what I was saying on how the British abused their power. Another major part of European imperialism was the colonization or as I call it the torture of Sudan, in Africa.
The Opium War (1839-1842) was now in full effect. For the British, the war was seen as an upholding of free trade, and national honor (in the face of the backwards Chinese), while for the Chinese the war was viewed as a fight against opium and British authority. With the advancement of British troops in northern China, the Qing emperor became increasingly dissatisfied with Commissioner Lin, leading to his expulsion and exile. Although Lin was quickly replaced by a new governor general Ch’-i-shan, he too was dismissed when agreements made between the British forces and himself were deemed inadequate (i.e. the Ch’uan-Pi Convention).
Early in the nineteenth century, the British had gained great influence and rule over China, for it was more modernized and developed, and consequently had more power. Not only that, but they started selling opium in China to balance their purchases of tea for export. (“Opium Wars” 35986). This resulted into an addiction to opium, a detrimental effect on the Chinese citizens caused by the Europeans. China’s response to this was to implement their prohibition against import of this drug by destroying a lot of opium on the ships arriving at the Port of Canton.
Document 2 [Tomas de Mercado] shows that the ballast stones used in the ships on the outgoing trip were replaced by silver during their return trips; while document 6 [Antonio Vazquez de Espinos] claims that from 1545 to 1624 a total of approximately 326,000,000 silver coins were taken out of the mines in Potosi. These documents show that during this time there was an excessive amount of silver found and it drastically affected the economy in Spain. “High prices ruined Spain as the prices attracted Asian commodities and the silver currency flowed out to pay for them.” (de Mercado) Just because there was silver flowing into
China resisted these efforts, by England, to continue trade and began attacking their ships. These acts were seen as aggressive in the eyes of the English and the first opium war resulted. The war ended with the treaty of Nanking, which ceded China to Britain. The second opium war between 1856 and 1858 ended with the treaty of Tientsin (2). These two wars were prime examples of commercial imperialism, not only through the opening of treaty ports but through British control of Chinese customs which the 1842 treaty established, and continuing opium trade without restraint (3).
The Proclamation of 1763 was the first to anger the colonist. In order to assure the Indians that settlers would not invade tribal lands, Britain emphasized colonist not to expand to the westward region. Shortly after, the use of writs of assistance, which allowed customs to search anywhere without the used of a warrant, placed a major infringement upon colonial natural rights. The Sugar Act (established at the same time) was an attempt to discourage smuggling by lowering the price of molasses below smugglers cost. It also stated that exports could only go through British ports before being sold to foreign countries.
Cycles of Silver In the article “Cycles of Silver” by Dennis o. Flynn and Arturo Giraldez the thesis was that by the 16th century, there was global trade as reflected by the silver cycles. The essay focuses on two significant cycles of the evolution of the silver market, the Potosi/Japan Cycle and the Mexican Cycle. One of the main points of the essay was that China was the primary end-market for world silver during several centuries. In the early 16th century China's monetary and fiscal systems to a silver standard led to a doubling in the value of silver in China vis-à-vis the rest of the world. Profit opportunities encouraged a surge in silver production in Spanish America and Japan.
Spain used this money to fund simultaneous wars with the Ottomans, English, Holland, the New World, the Philippines, and Asia. China caused a major shift in power towards Spain during this time period. Tokugawa Japan was previously China’s largest silver supplier. With no way to compete with Spain’s quantity and low production cost of silver due to new technology, Japan stayed out of the market. Japan invested in itself putting money into agriculture and urban infrastructure.
The British throne, trying to pay off it's war debts and for the cost of protecting the colonists from local Native Americans, decided to impose taxes on the American colonists. There was the Revenue Act of 1764 (known to the US as the Sugar Act) that taxed sugar, silks, and wine, the Stamp Tax (imposed later because the Revenue Act did not bring in enough money) which taxed local papers and print services. The