뉴스레터

“Suzerainty” issue to the fore

 "The Outline of Chinese and Foreign History," the Chinese high school history textbook designated by the government since 2019, states China’s relations with Joseon and other peripheral countries after the time of the Ming and Qing dynasties as the following:

 “The difference in economic and cultural development has created an international system called zongfan relations between China and some peripheral countries in the Ming and Qing era. Some countries paid tribute to the Ming and Qing courts and called themselves servants. Some were ascended to the throne by the Ming and Qing emperors and used the era names of the Ming and Qing emperors. Suzerain states did not interfere in the internal affairs of vassal states. This kind of relationship was not developed by power. Joseon, the Ryukyu Islands, Vietnam, and Myanmar formed this kind of relationship with China. Zongfan relations, in other words, gradually disappeared after Japan annexed the Ryukyu Islands in 1879.”

 This is the first time China has used the term “zongfan relations” in its history textbook for secondary education since its establishment. Zongfan relations refer to the relationship between “suzerain states” and “vassal states.” The textbook states that this kind of relationship was formed “peacefully” between China and its peripheral countries based on cultural and economic “superiority” of China. This is China’s typical Sinocentrism which implies that neighboring countries looked up to Chinese civilization and voluntarily paid tribute to China to become servants of the Chinese Emperor, and that the Chinese Emperor ruled such countries in return.

 The problem is, this kind of awareness is more than emphasizing the historical “greatness” of China. In April 2017, U.S. President Donald Trump of the time said that he has heard from President Xi Jinping that Korea “used to be a part of China.” There was no closure to this case, as China did not confirm what Xi had actually said. However, this shows the current stance of China on how it views its historical relationship with neighboring countries, including Korea, and what kind of attitude it will maintain in further issues related to the Korean peninsula.

Traditional Chinese’ awareness of suzerainty

East-West conflict in the 19th century and the tangled concept of suzerainty

 How did the traditional relationship between Korea and China come to be perceived as Korea being “historically a part of China” after the 20th century? This was a phenomenon that emerged during the process of explaining the international orders of East Asia within the frame of the modern sovereign state system of the West, after the Western powers advanced to East Asia in the mid-19th century.

 After the Opium Wars (1839–1842), the imperial power of the West led by Britain and France intended to gradually force its international orders represented by their treaty system in East Asia. In response, China and Japan translated several books on Western international law to understand the rules used in modern international relations in the West and make use of them to protect their own rights and interests. In the early stages, the West used the terms “vassal state”, “protectorate”, “dependent state”, or “colony” to translate concepts that already existed in East Asia. The translation misleads the concept of tributary countries as dependent or colonized countries to China.

 This kind of conceptual misunderstanding and confusion made the idea stronger that tributary states of China were part of China. In fact, in the 1870s, the bureaucrats of the Qing dynasty did not believe that its tributary states were part of the Empire of China that required China to protect them. Myanmar, Thailand, and the Ryukyu Islands were distant from China that only caused waste of national power when attempting to help them and even conflicts with powerful countries, so China viewed it was more reasonable to cut ties with them. However, in the 1880s, Qing’s treaties began to call these countries “vassal states” and strongly call for suzerainty. Some claimed that Joseon—which was in a critical geopolitical location—had the previous relationship that respected their independence adjusted so that  China can actively control and manage Joseon the way the Western powers did to their colonies.

 Qing’s strengthened suzerainty over tributary states foundered after the disgraceful losing of the Sino-French War (1884–1885) and the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895). Nevertheless, Qing’s claim on suzerainty over its neighboring countries significantly influenced the historical awareness of the Chinese people. After tributary states, including Joseon, cut the tributary relationship with China or were annexed by Western powers, anti-foreign nationalist Chinese began to see these countries as their territory taken by foreign powers. “Map of National Shame” that went popular in the Republic of China in the early 20th century is the outcome of this kind of awareness. This map marks the lands that China lost by Western powers since the 19th century. The Korean peninsula, Vietnam, Myanmar, Thailand, Nepal, and Bhutan are some of the marked regions. This map was created to distort history and advertise that Qing’s tributary states were part of Chinese territory and subsequently taken by foreign powers. It portrays that China had a greater past before it went through “national shame,” making the Chinese people believe that the peripheral countries were actually part of China.