The first four decades of the Qing Dynasty were concerned with attempting to placate Ming loyalists. Peace only came in the 1680s. The subsequent success of the Qing can be attributed to three powerful leaders who ruled China for a total of 138 years. This included a period recognized as the least corrupt in Chinese history. The period from 1735 to about 1790 was known as the `Golden Age.' China expanded positively on every front: its armies were victorious, its economy healthy and its population grew rapidly.
However, the last few years of the 18th century saw the emergence of unchecked corruption and levels of inefficiency which would not previously have been tolerated. The [G 25 / White Lotus] Rebellion of the 1790s brought anti-dynastic sentiment into the open. The situation deteriorated in the early 1800s and by the 1830s, China's balance of trade surplus was being seriously upset by the opium traffic. Natural disasters exacerbated the problem.
At the same time, Chinese rulers found themselves challenged by foreign powers wanting to open up China to foreign trade and exploitation. The Opium War began in 1840 and ended two years later with the Treaty of Nanjing. China agreed to pay Britain a substantial indemnity and opened four additional coastal ports to foreign trade.
Similar agreements were made with other European powers (such as the French) but the [G 11 / Manchus] did not generally regard these foreign influences as a major threat to their power. Internal difficulties in the mid-1800s - such as the [G 24 / Taiping] and [G 13 / Nian] Rebellions - were seen as more serious and efforts were made to improve military capabilities to protect the dynasty from threats without and within. However, the Chinese failure in the Sino-French and Sino-Japanese Wars was proof of the policy's failure.
Problems with the Qing leadership worsened. The Empress Dowager Cixi wielded too much power behind the scenes. She supported policies that maintained her power, but were often detrimental to the interests of the country. When she gave her support to the Boxer Movement, the results were disastrous. The [G 04 / Boxer Rebellion] led to the foreign occupation of Beijing which resulted in a subsequent protocol forcing China to pay a large indemnity to the foreign powers. A number of reforms followed but these were not sufficient.
In the early 20th century, the [G 20 / Republican] Movement under Sun Yat-sen gained greater popularity. With the [G 26 / Wuchang] Uprising of 1911, strategic towns and cities followed Sun Yat-sen and a provisional government was formed in Nanjing. In February, 1912 the last emperor, Puyi, was forced to abdicate, ending 2,000 years of imperial rule.
CHINA UNDER THE MANCHUS:
Had the Ming used trade and diplomacy, it may have averted the Manchu threat. The Manchus held territory on both sides of the Ming walls, thus depriving them of their status as defining the boundary of China. The Manchu rulers, a non-Chinese or `[G 03 / barbarian]' group, managed to present an image that was acceptable to both the Manchu peole and the Chinese. They did, however, face some problems from Ming loyalists who hoped to stage a restoration, but never did.
Conflict between the Chinese and the `barbarians,' which had caused many of China's problems in the past, disappeared. Not being Chinese, the Manchus were not so defensive or antagonistic to other barbarian tribes. China under the Qing Dynasty was a multiracial empire unified by its rulers rather than by its Chinese ethnicity. Hence, the importance of the wall as a barrier decreased in significance. This was in contrast to the Ming for whom the wall stood as a national symbol and a military boundary.
