| Abstract: | Based on a close examination of the 1870 government famine relief efforts in Zhili, this study reassesses some significant changes in Qing state power in the nineteenth century. Most previous research has sought to explain receding state power as a response to mounting pressures from an activist society. The famine relief efforts of 1870 demonstrate a less well‐known but equally important aspect of the problem. While social pressures had undoubtedly worn away at the 200‐year‐old state machine, they also stimulated responses from it. While local activism had indeed taken over the levers that had slipped from the imperial government's hands, the challenges it presented jump‐started the state machine, tightened its screws and set it on the path to restoration. In 1870, Imperial Commissioner Li Xingrui, under orders from his superior, Governor‐General Zeng Guofan, executed a textbook operation of famine relief in Zhili. Challenges arose as wealthy locals wrestled with Li for control of the relief operation; government officials, too, sought private gain. Nevertheless, the commissioner and his superior conscientiously followed the Qing statutes, warded off these various challenges and completed the relief work. The display of state power during the operation was impressive, and was sweetened by a bureaucratic culture that condoned semi‐legitimate personal gain in public affairs. The pairing of “stick and carrot” redirected the challenges to the operation from wealthy locals into a channel unique to China: an activist elite who sought to fulfill their ambitions by working within the existing system rather than by breaking away from it. Thus, Qing state power not only proved reasonably resilient in times of crisis, but also offered some hope for the successful building of a modern state. |
