The Decline of China

The Mongols Nomadic horsemen living on the steppes of Central Asia In the 1200s, the Mongols were united under Genghis Khan-Ruler of all between the oceans Conquered a great empire including Russia, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and China The Mongols were brutal as conquerors, but peaceful as rulers

The Yuan Dynasty Genghis Khan’s grandson, Kublai Khan, defeated the last Song emperor and established the Yuan Dynasty Military leaders and high government officials were mostly Mongols After Kublai Khan’s death, heavy taxes, corruption, and natural disasters angered the people The Mongols were overthrown and replaced by the Ming Dynasty

The Ming Dynasty The Ming Dynasty saw great cultural achievements and economic growth Admiral Zheng He built huge fleets to explore the world Eventually, the Ming emperors recalled the fleet and isolated China They resumed building the extremely expensive and costly Great Wall, angering the people The Ming were overthrown by the Qing, the last dynasty of China

Trade with the British By the late 1700s, China was in decline, and the Industrial Revolution caused Europeans to look for new markets for their goods The British began trading opium grown in India and Afghanistan for Chinese tea Soon, millions of Chinese were addicted and the country was broke

Opium Wars China outlawed opium and executed drug dealers, leading to war with the British The British easily defeated the Chinese, and forced them to pay for the losses of the war, give them Hong Kong, and open more ports to British trade Soon, France, Russia, and the United States also forced their way into China

Taiping Rebellion By the 1800s, the Qing Dynasty was in major decline-they failed to govern the country, while imposing heavy taxes to support their lavish lifestyles A peasant revolt known as the Taiping Rebellion occurred It lasted 14 years, and killed between 20-30 million Chinese The Qing Dynasty survived, but was weakened, and Westerners continued to make inroads

Changes? As Westerners continued to arrive in China, the Chinese argued about whether to adopt their ways Traditional Chinese rejected industrialization and trade, because they said Chinese wealth came from the land They also hated the Christian missionaries who arrived in China, since they threatened the Confucian order Any attempts to modernize were small and slow

Further Decline In 1894, China and a modernized Japan went to war, with Japan easily defeating China European countries carved up “Spheres of Influence” in China Europeans and Americans agreed on an “Open Door Policy” in China-giving them all the right to trade in Chinese lands These Westerners were now basically governing China

Boxer Uprising In 1899, a Chinese group called the Righteous Harmonious Fists rebelled against the Westerners Westerners called them Boxers, and were able to defeat them After the rebellion, even conservative Chinese supported modernization Eventually, the last Qing emperor was thrown out, and China became a republic