Chapter 34 Lecture Six: Wang Anshi's Reform: The Final Overall Supporting Reform

The fact that the Song regime was able to outlast the Tang Dynasty and last for two hundred years is related to many governance ideas of the rulers, among which it is worth mentioning that "drinking wine releases military power".With Tang Taizong's great talent and general strategy, he solved the problem of the family and powerful family, but left the hidden danger of warlord separatism. Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin eliminated this problem from the system. Zhao Kuangyin's method was to confiscate the military power. He confiscated all the military power to the central government through a banquet, changing from "soldiers in the military town" to the central government to raise soldiers.This is a great innovation in the centralization-decentralization system arrangement between the central and local governments.

The regimes of all dynasties have been exploring the way of power distribution. Shang Yang's system of prefectures and counties solved the problem of personnel power. China bid farewell to the enfeoffment system and entered an era of centralized power.However, from the Qin, Han, Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties to the Tang Dynasty, the threat of local separatist forces to the central government never disappeared. The most serious thing in the Tang Dynasty was the "Anshi Rebellion". After this rebellion, the central government has been powerless against the separatist regime.After the fall of the Tang Dynasty, there were five dynasties and ten countries, and more than ten countries emerged in more than 50 years. The heroes competed for the throne, and the world was miserable.By 960, Zhao Kuangyin finally solved this big problem with the method of "releasing military power with a glass of wine".

Since then, the local vassals have never had the power to challenge the central government.Since the Song Dynasty for three hundred years, there has not been a single local government rebellion incident, and the Ming Dynasty has not occurred for more than two hundred years. The Qing Dynasty only had the Wu Sangui incident during the Kangxi period, but it did not occur due to institutional reasons.That is to say, from 960 to around 1860, for nearly nine hundred years, there was no event in China where a local government challenged the central government.Therefore, the first system of the four major systems has since been finalized, which completely guarantees the stability of centralization politically. After 1860, the power of feudal towns revived, which was related to the suppression of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. The Central Army such as the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion were weak. coming.

However, after the military power was taken over, another big problem arose, that is, the central government will have to raise soldiers from now on.The Song Dynasty raised 1.4 million soldiers, the most in history (the Qing Dynasty raised 800,000 soldiers, including 200,000 in the Eight Banners and 600,000 in the Green Battalion).Of the 1.4 million soldiers, 800,000 imperial troops were deployed near the capital Bianliang (now Kaifeng, Henan). There was a "leopard head" Lin Chong. imaginary number.There are 600,000 Xiang troops on the northern border.These 1.4 million able-bodied men, together with the food and grass for the horses, basically ate up more than half of the central government's finances.Therefore, Zhu Xi said: "Since the end of the dynasty, most of the wealth of the prefectures and counties has been attributed to the top. ... The lack of financial resources all starts with raising soldiers. Ten or eight percent is for raising soldiers, and other expenses are limited to two percent. "That is to say, 80% of the fiscal revenue is spent on military expenditures.

From the Song Dynasty to the Ming and Qing Dynasties and even the Republic of China, overwhelmed military expenditures have always been the most troublesome thing for the rulers of the country, and it is called "the trouble of military administration".In contemporary times, the "military and political problems" do not seem to be too serious, but there are more and more civil servants, so there are "official problems", which are all genetic diseases inherent in the unified system.