Unequal treaty is the name given by the Chinese to a series of treaties signed during the 19th and early 20th centuries, between China (mostly referring to the
Qing dynasty
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...
) and various Western powers (specifically the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts e ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, the
German Empire
The German Empire (),Herbert Tuttle wrote in September 1881 that the term "Reich" does not literally connote an empire as has been commonly assumed by English-speaking people. The term literally denotes an empire – particularly a hereditary ...
, the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
, and the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...
), and the
Empire of Japan
The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II 1947 constitution and subsequent form ...
. The agreements, often reached after a military defeat or a threat of military invasion, contained one-sided terms, requiring China to cede land, pay reparations, open
treaty ports, give up
tariff
A tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and p ...
autonomy, legalise
opium import, and grant
extraterritorial privileges to foreign citizens.
With the rise of
Chinese nationalism and
anti-imperialism in the 1920s, both the
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Ta ...
and the
Chinese Communist Party
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Ci ...
used the concept to characterize the Chinese experience of losing
sovereignty
Sovereignty is the defining authority within individual consciousness, social construct, or territory. Sovereignty entails hierarchy within the state, as well as external autonomy for states. In any state, sovereignty is assigned to the perso ...
between roughly 1840 to 1950. The term "unequal treaty" became associated with the concept of China's "
century of humiliation", especially the
concessions to foreign powers and the loss of
tariff
A tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and p ...
autonomy through
treaty ports.
Japanese and Koreans also use the term to refer to several treaties that resulted in the loss of their sovereignty, to varying degrees.
China
In China, the term "unequal treaty" first came into use in the early 1920s.
[Wang, Dong. (2005). ''China's Unequal Treaties: Narrating National History''. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books. pp. 1–2. .] Dong Wang, a professor of contemporary and modern Chinese history at the
Gordon College in
Massachusetts
Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
, United States, noted that "while the phrase has long been widely used, it nevertheless lacks a clear and unambiguous meaning" and that there is "no agreement about the actual number of treaties signed between China and foreign countries that should be counted as 'unequal'."
Historian
Immanuel Hsu
Immanuel Chung-Yueh Hsü (, 1923 – October 24, 2005) was a sinologist, a scholar of modern Chinese intellectual and diplomatic history, and a professor of history at the University of California at Santa Barbara.
Biography
Born in Shangh ...
states that the Chinese viewed the treaties they signed with Western powers and Russia as unequal "because they were not negotiated by nations treating each other as equals but were imposed on China after a war, and because they encroached upon China's sovereign rights ... which reduced her to semicolonial status".
In response, historian
Elizabeth Cobbs
Elizabeth Cobbs is an American historian, commentator, and author of eight books including three novels, a two-volume textbook, and four non-fiction works. She holds the Melbern Glasscock Chair in American History at Texas A&M University.
She ...
writes in ''American Umpire'', her argument that "democratic capitalism" has never engaged in imperialism: "Ironically, however, the treaties also resulted partly from China's initial reluctance to consider any treaties whatsoever, since it viewed all other nations as inferior. It did not wish to be equal."
In many cases, China was effectively forced to pay large amounts of financial
reparations
Reparation(s) may refer to:
Christianity
* Restitution (theology), the Christian doctrine calling for reparation
* Acts of reparation, prayers for repairing the damages of sin
History
*War reparations
**World War I reparations, made from ...
, open up ports for trade, cede or lease territories (such as
Outer Manchuria
Outer Manchuria (russian: Приаму́рье, translit=Priamurye; zh, s=外满洲, t=外滿洲, p=Wài Mǎnzhōu), or Outer Northeast China ( zh, s=外东北, t=外東北, p=Wài Dōngběi), refers to a territory in Northeast Asia that is no ...
and
Outer Northwest China
Northwest China () is a statistical region of China which includes the autonomous regions of Xinjiang and Ningxia and the provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu and Qinghai. It has an area of 3,107,900 km2.
The region is characterized by a (semi-)arid ...
(including
Zhetysu) to the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...
,
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a List of cities in China, city and Special administrative regions of China, special ...
and
Weihaiwei
Weihai (), formerly called Weihaiwei (), is a prefecture-level city and major seaport in easternmost Shandong province. It borders Yantai to the west and the Yellow Sea to the east, and is the closest Chinese city to South Korea.
Weihai's popul ...
to the United Kingdom,
Guangzhouwan to France,
Kwantung Leased Territory and
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...
to the
Empire of Japan
The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II 1947 constitution and subsequent form ...
, the
Jiaozhou Bay concession
The Kiautschou Bay Leased Territory was a German leased territory in Imperial and Early Republican China from 1898 to 1914. Covering an area of , it centered on Jiaozhou ("Kiautschou") Bay on the southern coast of the Shandong Peninsula ( ...
to the
German Empire
The German Empire (),Herbert Tuttle wrote in September 1881 that the term "Reich" does not literally connote an empire as has been commonly assumed by English-speaking people. The term literally denotes an empire – particularly a hereditary ...
and concession territory in
Tientsin,
Shamian,
Hankou,
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four Direct-administered municipalities of China, direct-administered municipalities of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the ...
etc.), and make various other concessions of sovereignty to foreign
spheres of influence, following military threats.
The earliest treaty later referred to as "unequal" was the 1841
Convention of Chuenpi negotiations during the
First Opium War. The first treaty between China and
the United Kingdom termed "unequal" was the
Treaty of Nanjing in 1842.
Following Qing China's defeat, treaties with Britain opened up five ports to foreign trade, while also allowing foreign
missionaries, at least in theory, to reside within China. Foreign residents in the port cities were afforded trials by their own consular authorities rather than the
Chinese legal system
Chinese law is one of the oldest legal traditions in the world. The core of modern Chinese law is based on Germanic-style civil law, socialist law, and traditional Chinese approaches.
For most of the history of China, its legal system h ...
, a concept termed
extraterritoriality
In international law, extraterritoriality is the state of being exempted from the jurisdiction of local law, usually as the result of diplomatic negotiations.
Historically, this primarily applied to individuals, as jurisdiction was usually cl ...
.
[Dong Wang, ''China's Unequal Treaties: Narrating National History'' (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2005).] Under the treaties, the UK and the US established the
British Supreme Court for China and Japan and
United States Court for China in
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four Direct-administered municipalities of China, direct-administered municipalities of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the ...
.
Chinese resentment
After
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
, patriotic consciousness in China focused on the treaties, which now became widely known as "unequal treaties". The
Nationalist Party and the
Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of '' The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engel ...
competed to convince the public that their approach would be more effective.
Germany was forced to terminate its rights, the Soviet Union surrendered them, and the United States organized the
Washington Conference to negotiate them.
After
Chiang Kai-shek declared a new national government in 1927, the Western powers quickly offered diplomatic recognition, arousing anxiety in Japan. The new government declared to the Great Powers that China had been exploited for decades under unequal treaties, and that the time for such treaties was over, demanding they renegotiate all of them on equal terms.
Towards the end of the unequal treaties
After the
Boxer Rebellion and the signing of the
Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902, Germany started to reassess the policy approach towards China. In 1907 Germany suggested a German-Chinese-American agreement that never materialised. Thus China entered the new era of ending unequal treaties on March 14, 1917 when it broke off diplomatic relations with Germany.
China declared war on Germany on August 17 1917.
These acts voided the unequal treaty of 1861, resulting in the reinstatement of Chinese control on the concessions of Tianjin and Hankou to China. In 1919, China refused to sign the Peace
Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1 ...
. On May 20, 1921, China secured with the German-Chinese peace treaty (Deutsch-chinesischer Vertrag zur Wiederherstellung des Friedenszustandes), considered the first equal treaty between China and a European nation.
Many of the other treaties China considers unequal were repealed during the
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or War of Resistance (Chinese term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific T ...
, which started in 1937 and merged into the larger context of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
. The United States Congress ended American
extraterritoriality
In international law, extraterritoriality is the state of being exempted from the jurisdiction of local law, usually as the result of diplomatic negotiations.
Historically, this primarily applied to individuals, as jurisdiction was usually cl ...
in December 1943. Significant examples outlasted World War II: treaties regarding
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a List of cities in China, city and Special administrative regions of China, special ...
remained in place until
Hong Kong's 1997 handover, though in 1969, to improve
Sino-Soviet relations in the wake of
military skirmishes along their border, the People's Republic of China was forced to reconfirm the 1858
Treaty of Aigun and 1860
Treaty of Peking
The Convention of Peking or First Convention of Peking is an agreement comprising three distinct treaties concluded between the Qing dynasty of China and Great Britain, France, and the Russian Empire in 1860. In China, they are regarded as ...
.
Japan and Korea
When the American Commodore
Matthew Perry reached Japan in 1854, it signed the
Convention of Kanagawa
The Convention of Kanagawa, also known as the Kanagawa Treaty (, ''Kanagawa Jōyaku'') or the Japan–US Treaty of Peace and Amity (, ''Nichibei Washin Jōyaku''), was a treaty signed between the United States and the Tokugawa Shogunate on March ...
. Its importance was limited. Much more important was the
Harris Treaty of 1858 negotiated by U.S. envoy
Townsend Harris.
Korea's first unequal treaty was not with the West but instead with Japan. The
Ganghwa Island incident, 1875, saw Japan send Captain
Inoue Yoshika and the warship
''Un'yō'' with the implied threat of military action to coerce the Korean
Kingdom of Joseon. This forced Korea to open its doors to Japan by signing the ''
Japan–Korea Treaty of 1876''.
The unequal treaties ended at various times for the countries involved. Japan's victories in the 1894–95
First Sino-Japanese War
The First Sino-Japanese War (25 July 1894 – 17 April 1895) was a conflict between China and Japan primarily over influence in Korea. After more than six months of unbroken successes by Japanese land and naval forces and the loss of the p ...
convinced many in the West that unequal treaties could no longer be enforced on Japan. Korea's unequal treaties with European states became largely null and void in 1910, when it was
annexed by Japan.
Mongolia
Selected list of treaties
Imposed on China
Imposed on Japan
Imposed on Korea
Modern uses
In 2018, Malaysian Prime Minister
Mahathir Mohamad compared Chinese
Belt and Road Initiative infrastructure projects in
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Mal ...
to unequal treaties. He said "They know that when they lend big sums of money to a poor country, in the end they may have to take the project for themselves," and "China knows very well that it had to deal with unequal treaties in the past imposed upon China by Western powers. So China should be sympathetic toward us. They know we cannot afford this".
See also
*
Western imperialism in Asia
*
Concessions in China
*
List of Chinese treaty ports
*
Sick man of Asia
*
Century of humiliation
*
Client state
A client state, in international relations, is a state that is economically, politically, and/or militarily subordinate to another more powerful state (called the "controlling state"). A client state may variously be described as satellite sta ...
*
Puppet state
*
Most favoured nation
*
''Normanton'' incident
References
Bibliography
*
Auslin, Michael R. (2004)
''Negotiating with Imperialism: The Unequal Treaties and the Culture of Japanese Diplomacy.''Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
OCLC 56493769OCLC 300287988*Nish, I. H (1975). "Japan Reverses the Unequal Treaties: The Anglo-Japanese Commercial Treaty of 1894". ''Journal of Oriental Studies''. 13 (2): 137–146.
*Perez, Louis G (1999). ''Japan Comes of Age: Mutsu Munemitsu & the Revision of the Unequal Treaties''. p. 244.
*Ringmar, Erik (2013). ''Liberal Barbarism: The European Destruction of the Palace of the Emperor of China''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
*Wang, Dong (2003). "The Discourse of Unequal Treaties in Modern China". ''Pacific Affairs''. 76 (3): 399–425.
*Wang, Dong. (2005). ''China's Unequal Treaties: Narrating National History''. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books. .
*Fravel, M. Taylor (2008).
Strong Borders, Secure Nation: Cooperation and Conflict in China's Territorial Disputes'. Princeton University Press.
Primary sources
*
Halleck, Henry Wager. (1861).
''International law: or, Rules regulating the intercourse of states in peace and war''. New York: D. Van Nostrand
OCLC 852699*Korean Mission to the Conference on the Limitation of Armament, Washington, D.C., 1921–1922. (1922). ''Korea's Appeal to the Conference on Limitation of Armament.'' Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office
OCLC 12923609*Fravel, M. Taylor (2005)
Regime Insecurity and International Cooperation: Explaining China's Compromises in Territorial Disputes ''International Security''. 30 (2): 46–83.
doi:
10.1162/016228805775124534ISSN 0162-2889
{{Authority control
19th century in China
19th century in Japan
19th century in Korea
Boxer Rebellion
History of European colonialism
Foreign relations of the Qing dynasty
Free trade imperialism
History of the foreign relations of Japan
Lists of treaties
Treaties of the Joseon dynasty
Foreign relations of the Empire of Japan
China–Russian Empire relations