Zi Chan

Zichan ( WG: Tzu Ch'an) () (c.581-522 BCE) was a Chinese statesman during the late Spring and Autumn period. From 543 until his death in 522 BCE, he served as the chief minister of the State of Zheng. Also known as Gongsun Qiao (, he is better known by his courtesy name Zichan.

As chief minister of Zheng, an important and centrally-located state, Zichan faced aggression from powerful neighbours without and fractious domestic politics within. He was a political leader at a time when Chinese culture and society was enduring a centuries-long period of turbulence.  Governing traditions had become unstable and malleable, institutions were being battered by chronic war, and new forms of state leadership were emerging but were sharply contested.

Under Zichan the Zheng state prospered. He introduced reforms with strengthened the state and met foreign threats. His statecraft was respected by his peers and reportedly appreciated by the people. Favourably treated in the ''Zuo Zhuan'' (an ancient text of history), Zichan drew comments from his near-contemporary Confucius, later from Mencius and Han Fei.

Background

Zhou dynasty

By its military defeat in 771 BCE, later historians divide the Zhou (c.1045-221) into two periods: Western and Eastern, as Zhou moved its capital east over 500 km. The dynasty not only never recovered, its regime steadily lost strength during the Spring and Autumn period (770-481). At its start the Zhou rulers deployed the '' fengjian'' system. Differing from feudal estates, in ancient China the patriarchal kinship relation formed the primary bond between the royal dynast and the local 'vassal'. Regular state ceremonies sacrificing for Zhou clan ancestors, made by both royals and vassal rulers, at first strengthened the ''fengjian'' system.

State of Zheng

Duke Huan (r.806-771) founded Zheng, being enfeoffed by his brother the Zhou King Xuan (r. 825-782). By 767 BCE Zheng moved its capital east, near Zhou's new royal lands. Xinzheng was a walled city with a Grand Ancestral Temple and a "great city gate" that led to the main thoroughfare (c.600 BCE); population estimated at 10,000 (up to 100,000). Strategically located, Zheng prospered through trade, at first fielding strong armies. Under Duke Zhuang (r.743-701) Zheng in the Battle of Xuge (707) defeated the Zhou King's invasion. Due to his wide influence Duke Zhuang was compared to the Five Hegemons. In 673 BCE Zheng attacked the royal capital, killed the usurper, restoring the Zhou King. Its military became less effective against its larger rivals; however, a vigorous Zheng manoeuvred to survive frequent attacks.

During Zichan's youth, the reign of the figurehead Duke Jian of Zheng (r.566-530) began. Political stability was precarious during the Eastern Zhou. The prior Duke of Zheng, Xi, had been killed by nobles in his ministry. Zichan as leader confronted such political turbulence, yet achieved major civic reforms benefitting the state and its people. Later, in the Warring States (480-221) Zheng state relapsed, when "the centre of the political stage was occupied by the competition between clans". That era's fierce warfare continued among the fewer states; Zheng met its demise in 375 BCE.

Family of Zichan

Zichan was closely related to the hereditary Dukes of Zheng state, hence also more distant kin of the royal Zhou. As a grandson of Zheng's formidable Duke Mu (r. 627-606), Zichan was also called Gongsun Qiao, "Ducal Grandson" Qiao. Zichan was a member of the clan of Guo, one of the Seven Houses of Zheng. Led by their nobility these clans competed (at times, descending to internecine strife) for power and prestige. The Guo lineage was not among the strongest clans of Zheng. Zichan's ancestral surname was Ji, his personal name was Ji Qiao.

In 565 BCE Zichan's father, Prince Guo (Ziguo), led a victorious campaign against the State of Cai. His military success, however, risked provoking the hostility of stronger neighbouring states, Jin to the north and Chu to the south. Yet the Zheng leadership appeared pleased. However Zichan, the teenage son of Ziguo, had a different view. He said a small state like Zheng should excel in civic virtue, not martial achievement, else it will have no peace. In response, Ziguo rebuked Zichan. Three years after the Cai victory, during a revolt by rival nobles of Zheng, Zichan's father Ziguo was assassinated.

Career profile

Path as state official

In 543 BCE, when nearing 40 years of age, Zichan became prime minister of Zheng state. Zichan's career path to the top position started in 565 BCE, and involved finding his way through the intense social instability, sometimes violent, and foreign threats, that challenged Zheng's aristocratic political class. Selected events of his early career follow, the chief primary source being the ''Zuo Zhuan''.

Since 570 BCE Zichan's father Ziguo had been one of three leading aristocrats who directed Zheng's government. The head of state was the Duke of Zheng, but in fact this triumvirate of nobles kept control. In 563 BCE "Zisi had laid out ditches between fields" so that four clans "lost lands". Later in 563 BCE "armed insurgents" led by seven disaffected clan nobles (many who had lost lands), overthrew the government and killed all three rulers: Zisi, Ziguo, and Zi'er. Zichan recovered his father's body, and rallied his lineage. He "got all his officers in readiness... formed his men in ranks, ndwent forth with 17 chariots of war". Another "led the people" to Zichan's side. Two rebel leaders (and many followers) were killed; five leaders fled Zheng. The ruling 'oligarchy' of elite and pugnacious Zhou-era nobles prevailed against the brutal assault by rebel clan leaders.

After the 563 BCE rebellion was quelled, Zikong the new Zheng leader issued a document declaring his autocratic rule. It provoked fierce opposition from other nobility and the people. Zichan urged Zikong to renounce the document by burning it in public. His rhetoric to Zikong used likely scenarios to illustrate a probable negative outcome. Zikong then burned it. In 553 BCE Zikong tried again to monopolize political power, supported by Chu state. But two nobles rose to fatally block him. The two formed a new triumvirate to rule Zheng, the third being the popular Zichan, elevated now as a high minister.

Zheng state in 561 BCE had joined (or been recruited) a coalition headed by the powerful Jin state to the north. Zichan as a high minister maneuvered to ally Zheng with fellow small-state members, in order to lighten their burdens. Jin, as the current hegemon, required all 'northern league' members to make regular state visits to Jin, and each time to bring high-value gifts. In 548 Zichan wrote a convincing letter to Jin's chief minister. It criticised Jin for increasing the value of 'gifts' demanded. Zichan successfully argued this worked against Jin's reputation. Worth more than the gifts was Jin's good name; on it rested Jin's virtue, the very foundation of Jin state. Zichan continued to lobby Jin on behalf of the small states.

In 547 BCE Zheng started a popular war against the small state of Chen as pay back (a year earlier the large and powerful Chu state and Chen had attacked Zheng, "wells were filled up and trees were cut down"). With 700 chariots Zheng (with Zichan second in command) took the Chen capital. In the brief military occupation a ceremony was held with the Chen ruler, and the two Zheng leaders persuaded the city's priest "to sprinkle the altar of the earth". They then restored to Chen ministers their lists, seals, and charts. Zheng forces withdrew, without looting the city or destroying its sanctuaries, nor did the Zheng army seize hostages. For a military victor to act harshly, sack the enemy capital, and take vengeance was then customary in ancient China's multi-state system. Zichan later defended Zheng's invasion of Chen before resentful ministers of Jin.

In 544 a feud began between the nobles of rival clans. The Si clan partisans then attacked and burned the residence of a Jiang clan leader. It threatened the unity of Zheng state. Initially Zichan had distanced himself to avoid the bitter conflict's social contagion. Yet his attention was solicited. By using the remedial details from a local tradition, as a guide, Zichan managed to bring the raucous disputants into negotiation, circa 543 BCE. The solution worked-out did not prove agreeable to all the parties, yet the bloody feud came to an end. Zichan had remained a popular leader.

Han Hu (Zi Pi) the first minister in 544 wanted to appoint Zichan as his successor. A reluctant Zichan had declined: the office was troubled from without by strong and aggressive rival states, and from within by the constant feuding of the clans, which made Zheng "impossible to govern well". Zheng state, however, did escape the worst of fierce inter-clan violence. By the next year Zichan had been enough persuaded that a tolerable level of coexistence among the nobility was likely. Such conditions might be sufficient for Zichan to pursue reforms.

His political path in office, apparently ably pursued for decades, and his popularity, however, can be more skeptically portrayed. Prof. Lewis offers a strikingly different interpretation (than the ''Zuo Zhuan'') about the transfer of power. He first gives a sequence-of-events summary to 543 of Zichan's rise from the lower nobility to Zheng's highest office, while winning over the people. Yet he later concludes, "Following another civil war in 543, Zi Chan seized effective power".

Reform programs

Zichan initiated actions to strengthen the Zheng state. Along with subordinate ministers and aides, Zichan scrutinized and straightened what reforms might work best over time, and improvised.

Agricultural methods were managed to increase the harvest. Boundaries between farmlands were reset. Tax reforms increased state revenue. The military was kept current. Laws were published, sharply breaking with tradition. Administration of state operations were centralised, effective officials recruited, social norms guided. Commerce flourished. Zhou-era rites were performed, in an evolving social context, and the religious needs of the people addressed. The culture and customs of Zheng state were followed, its special ministry for divinations was both curbed and instructed. Interstate relations required constant vigilance, e.g., to meet demands for tribute. His negotiating skills were tested. Zichan had opposition and acquired a sophist enemy. He did not always succeed.

From the Han dynasty historian Sima Qian, his ''Shiji'':

Tzu-ch'an was one of the high ministers of the state of heng ... ts affairs had beenin confusion, superiors and inferiors were at odds with each other, and fathers and sons quarrelled. ... henTzu-ch'an asappointed prime minister. After... one year, the children in the state had ceased their naughty behaviour, grey-haired elders were no longer seen carrying heavy burdens... . After two years, no one overcharged in the markets. After three years, people stopped locking their gates at night... . After four years, people did not bother to take home their farm tools when the day's work was finished, and after five years, no more conscription orders were sent out to the knights. ... Tzu-ch'an ruled for twenty-six years ic and when he died the young men wept and the old men cried... .

The earlier ''Zuo Zhuan'' had also told of the people's appraisal of Zichan, a version similar to the ''Shiji'', but differing in stages and detail. After one year the workers complained, griping about new taxes on their clothes and about a new levy against the land. Yet after three years the workers praised Zichan: for teaching their children, and increasing the yield of their fields.

Yet however skilful his statecraft, Zichan in his reformist role as proponent of advanced policies was not unique. Over a century earlier Guan Zhong (720-645), the chief minister of Qi, earned praise for his effective management. His innovations included administrative and military-agricultural innovations. The Qi state nonetheless maintained traditional Zhou rituals. As a consequence Duke Huan of Qi became the 'first' of the Five Hegemons, and a noted "paragon". Another reformist minister was Li Kui