Chapter 27 Wang Anshi Reform

Zhao Xu, the sixth emperor of the Song Dynasty in the late 11th century AD, cited Wang Anshi and established the Sansi Regulations Department (Finance and Taxation Design Committee) to create a new law, which was a major event in Chinese history.The true meaning of this matter can only be seen more clearly by us today at the end of the twentieth century, with the depth of modern Chinese history and the modernization experience of Western European countries. Based on this point of view, we can take out this entire historical subject matter for re-discussion and review. Before Wang Anshi was reused by Shenzong, he already had a talent name. "Song History" said that he "belongs to writing like flying", and "talks about Gao Qi, and he can use his arguments to benefit his theory".Discernment is the ability of analysis, and Bo is the extensive knowledge.Since he was so talented, even though he was only a mid-level and lower-level local official, he had been recommended by Wen Yanbo and Ouyang Xiu, and had also been promoted by Sima Guang, Han Jiang, and Lu Gong (later, except for Han Jiang, they all became Wang Anshi's opponent).Shenzong succeeded to the throne in 1067. At first, Wang Anshi was appointed as the magistrate of Jiangning Prefecture. Six months later, he was transferred to the Imperial Academy.A year later, he was appointed as a political adviser (comparable to the deputy prime minister in the Song Dynasty), specializing in "classics and painting".However, Shenzong was an ambitious monarch who was determined to recover the territory occupied by Khitan and Xixia (in fact, its occupation had already occurred before the Song Dynasty).He once said to Wen Yanbo: "Financial management is the most urgent task today, and Bibian treasury must be abundant."However, with the aim of making the country rich and the army strong, ordinary Confucian scholars have regarded it as the purpose of Legalism.Su Shi, a great writer of a generation, said that "Your Majesty seeks treatment too quickly, listens too widely, and enters people too sharply."Fu Bi, the elder of the two dynasties, even said mercilessly that "Your Majesty has not been in the court for a long time, and he will serve as a bodehui, and he will not speak for twenty years."The emperor's heavy use of Wang Anshi's new law aroused opposition from the important officials of the Manchu Dynasty.Later, these "counter-reformists" were either demoted to local officials or retired.In 1070, Wang Anshi worked with Ping Zhangshi (as prime minister), and only Han Jiang and Lu Huiqing, among the high officials in the court, cooperated with him. year number). In 1074, the emperor was forced by public opinion, or perhaps because of the intervention of the Empress Dowager Cao, Wang Anshi was exempted from the prime minister, but within a year he was transferred back to Kaifeng Pingzhang as before.Wang Anshi met for another year and nine months, and was finally dismissed. The emperor gave him the title of duke and Jiedu envoy, but his actual position was "Jiangning Mansion", that is, returning to his first position under Shenzong. an official position.

Shenzong died in early 1085, and his successor Emperor Zhezong Zhaoxu was less than nine years old. When he was a child, Shenzong's mother, the Empress Dowager Gao (temple name Xuanren Shenglie), was in charge of the government.She expelled Wang Anshi's reformist party, and appointed important ministers of the previous dynasty who were counter-reformist, such as Sima Guang, Wen Yanbo, and Lu Gongzhu, and all of them were dismissed by the new law for a while.But eight years later, the queen mother passed away and the emperor was in charge. Zhao Xu came to overturn the case again.He not only reused the reformists, but also won the posthumous posthumous title of Sima Guang, and re-edited the "Records of Shenzong" in order to support the new law. For a while, the anti-reformists were called "Yuanhu Party members" (Yuanhu was Zhezong's year when the Queen Mother was in charge of the government) .

When Zhao Xu died in 1100 AD, he had no heirs, and the throne was succeeded by Shenzong's eleventh son, Zhao Ji, who was later captured by the Jin people and died in Wuguocheng (northeast of Jilin today) Song Huizong.He has long been known as "frivolous". If it weren't for the wrong arrangement of the court and fate, he would have left his name in history as a painter and collector of cultural relics, and being an emperor is indeed not the director.During his reign, he also had two different attitudes towards the new law. He initially supported the anti-reformists, and Sima Guang, Wen Yanbo, Lu Gongzhu, etc. also returned to office after death.But in just over a year, Zhang Chun and Cai Jing, who had been exiled before, were recalled to important positions in the capital.They can also be regarded as eunuchs and reformers. Zhang Chun once served as Wang Anshi's assistant, and Cai Jing was highly valued in front of the imperial court for his history.At this time, Huizong Zhao Ji also said, "I want the aspirations of my father and brother mentioned above."Therefore, in the name of "Shaoshu", the imperial court revived the new methods implemented by Wang Anshi twenty-five years ago, such as Fangtian, Ruqiancha and so on.He also urged Huizong to list the 120 people below Sima Guang as the "Yuanhu traitor party", and later expanded the list to 309 people, engraved stones in the counties and counties of the whole country, in order to distinguish "loyalty and evil", and the royal family could not communicate with them. Marriage, their children and grandchildren are not allowed to come to Kaifeng.Wang Anshi deserved to enjoy the Confucian Temple and became the third saint besides Confucius and Mencius.

So "the Song people's discussion is still undecided, and the Jin people's soldiers have crossed the river."That's not to mention, that is, the people of the Southern Song Dynasty still did not give up the disputes caused by Wang Anshi's new law.A recent article published by He Xiangfei pointed out that Song Gaozong and Zhao Gouchao were revising the "Shenzong Veritable Records" and "Zhezong Veritable Records", and they still criticized Wang Anshi again. Today, nine hundred years later, we read history from a long-term and long-distance perspective, and it is no longer possible to determine the loyalty and evil of the above-mentioned individuals, and there is no need to do so.For example, Zhang Chun and Cai Jing are indeed capable, while the former is domineering and the latter is flattering, but "Song History" included them both in the "Biography of Traitors", which is too simplified history, and Su Xun denounced Wang Anshi and others as "prisoners". The first mourning face" is used to discuss poetry and books. Xuanren Shenglie Gao was praised as "Yao and Shun among women" in "Continued Zizhi Tongjian". In the way of historical figures, there are only the best and the worst.If we are blinded by these concepts, it is easy to ignore the purpose of our own history reading.

The reason why Wang Anshi can arouse the interest of Chinese and foreign scholars today is that his economic thought is close to ours.His so-called "new law" is nothing more than a large-scale commercialization of fiscal and taxation.When arguing with Sima Guang, he put forward the theory of "the country will use enough without taxation", and his policy is to first use bureaucratic capital to stimulate the production and circulation of commodities.If the size of the economy expands, the tax rate remains the same, and the total revenue of the treasury can still increase.This is also the principle believed by all the financial managers of modern countries, but it is not practical if it is only implemented in the Northern Song Dynasty in the eleventh century.

Closely related to this issue, what needs to be clarified is that some historians have interpreted the autocratic monarchy in China for more than two thousand years as a "feudal society", which is extremely unreasonable and does not match the situation of the Song Dynasty, especially the text.Feudalism focuses on decentralization of power. The royal family only obliges the princes to make certain contributions to the central government. The internal management of their fiefs is up to them to decide. The Chinese tradition is that the emperor sends bureaucrats to collect taxes from the whole people. We call them "bureaucrats." "ism", which is a special method of centralization, and so far there is no specific book listing its various characteristics.

Personally, I have studied its financial and taxation situation for a long time, and found that this system is too broad, and the units below are too trivial. Under the traditional transportation and communication conditions, the official cannot be sure of the assets of each taxpayer, especially the taxpayer. It's best to buy it again.As for progressive taxation, it is even more technically difficult.Therefore, they are only encouraging small self-cultivating farmers to settle down in their own businesses, and are trying their best to prevent mergers, and even collect them flatly from the whole country at a very low tax rate.Moreover, the income of ordinary people is shallow, and they cannot afford the expenses of court trials. Therefore, there has been no progress in civil law for a long time, and the government advocates self-discipline and humility.In terms of administration, it means not paying attention to reality and not paying attention to efficiency.Fortunately, these personal virtues come from Confucian classics and are also recited by members of the bureaucratic group. Therefore, replacing the law with morality also has a long-term historical basis.Even if the ideal does not match the reality, as long as all officials take these principles as a mantra and emphasize the simplicity and similarity within, the integrity of the bureaucratic group can still be preserved.

However, since the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, the characteristics of the dynasty itself have been far from the above situation.First, the Zhao-Song Dynasty was a dynastic state that was the most competitive in Chinese history, so its administrative efficiency was very important.Second, its income is based on silver silk and money, that is, its managers rely on the more advanced and flexible sectors of the private economy, and take manpower and food as secondary.Thirdly, its tax base account is based on the figures of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, and the tax rate is higher than the general one.

Combining these conditions, we can also say that China already felt the pressure of modernization in some aspects in the eleventh century AD.As mentioned earlier, in the era of Song Taizong Zhao Guangyi, military raincoats and tents had "tens of thousands of pieces" moldy and rotted in the warehouse. "Song History" Shihuo Zhi also pointed out that the thirty-two warehouses of silk in the warehouse of Shenzong Zhao Xu's inner palace were full, and the accumulation of Xianying was 20 warehouses.It is necessary to manage and dispose of such a huge amount of materials in a commercial manner.At the very least, let it communicate with the private market.And private business organizations can also develop and mature through this, so they can provide second-line and third-line support to the government's financial managers and the military industry.The modernization of Western European countries and Japan has also gone through such a stage.Then Wang Anshi has a unique vision and can advance Chinese history by a thousand years in one go. Why did he encounter so many obstacles in fact?

Before answering this question, we must first know that the so-called modernization, management in a commercial manner, or the promotion of financial economy and numerical management must first meet certain basic conditions.In short, it is necessary to recognize the firmness of private property rights first, so that there are common numbers that can be accurately added, subtracted, multiplied and divided in the lower institutions.This is easy to say, but in practice it is tantamount to promoting a new religious idea, because what is involved is not only the lives of millions of people, but the purpose of their lives.In Western European terms, the goal can only be achieved through religious revolution and the separation of church and state.Secondly, the transfer of private property should also be separated from the restrictions and monopoly of the autocratic imperial power and patriarchal society. Not only should the judiciary be independent, but also the civil law should be fully developed. All marriages, heredity, debts, the credit of signing contracts, and declarations of bankruptcy The procedures must be handled reasonably, not only the legal provisions are there, but also there is no conflict with the folk living habits.During the Northern Song Dynasty, the Zhongshu was in charge of the people, the privy was in charge of the soldiers, and the three divisions were in charge of the wealth. All the important figures can no longer be compared, and there are hundreds of millions of illiterate farmers below. There is generally a lack of middle-level institutions in society, so we don’t need to ask him. Whether Anshi Jiefu, the Duke of Jing, is loyal to the country, can be asserted that his plan is unrealistic.

Carefully referring to the narrative in "Song History", we can also get a glimpse of the failure of the new law.For example, the "Fangtian Law" takes 1,000 steps to the east, west, south, and north as a side, and collects taxes according to the fertility of the land.However, in Kaifeng Prefecture of Ji State, there were technical problems in the measurement. It is said that "the time is right and the time is the end". There are mountains and forests in the county, so it is impossible to start. "Exemption money" requires the common people to contribute money as a whole to replace the "Yaqian" and other compulsory labor conscripted from the people. However, if the villagers have no money, it is tantamount to promoting a financial economy in the countryside, while finance cannot be developed in the cities at this time. The "Market Change Law" cannot focus on the wholesale business, so that the executors themselves become retailers, selling fruit and ice on the street, and even "selling comb is expensive, and selling sesame is expensive", condemned by Shenzong . "Qingmiaoqian" is based on Changping's purchase capital of 14 million yuan, which is equivalent to rural loans.But there is no bank to preside over it, and there is no right and obligation of the court to deal with the loan.Some county magistrates handed over the whole number to several farmers, without asking whether they would like to borrow it or not, and only asked them to guarantee each other that they would return it with interest after autumn.Even at the time of implementation, several counties were accused of not taking out loans but charging interest on farmers as a whole.The above-mentioned measures all have a tendency to use money extensively, but presiding over it in a collectively responsible manner is actually against the above-mentioned laws. Having said that, we can also ask again: Since the new law is so ineffective, why did Wang Anshi's "problem" take so long between the three emperors and two empress dowagers?Raw data cannot provide answers.We can only conjecture based on reason: People at that time did not have the depth of our vision, nor did we have such a fatalistic view, thinking that the new law of the day must not work.The pressure of the environment in the eleventh century has forced them to find a way out.At the same time, if some items in the new law are selectively and partially implemented according to the special circumstances of each place, it will not be completely in vain.According to Wang Anshi's biography, before he met Shenzong, he was the magistrate of Yin County (Ningbo), and he tried Qingmiaoqian, at least in a short period of time, it did work.The emperor, who was so likely to be enthusiastic, believed that the counter-reformation must be deliberately obstructing it.And every time the court changes its purpose, it is indeed an opportunity for powerful ministers to expand their power and support private individuals.But we still should not forget that within the Chinese bureaucratic system, the government's partial business operations usually have no good results.Wang Mang, Sang Hongyang, Wei Jian and Liu Yan are good examples.The distance between the two aspects of thought and action is too far. The consequences of the failure of Wang Anshi's new law are beyond the imagination of ordinary readers in the past.Three hundred years later, Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang abandoned the open financial facilities of the Second Empire and adopted a conservative and restrained system, which was related to his personal aversion to Wang Anshi, which was reflected in writing. Dabbling in big history, we also find this Wang Anshi's story deeply intriguing: Imagine that nine hundred years ago, China attempted to reform modernity, while Europe at that time was still stagnant in the black hole of the Middle Ages.Compared with the disparity between the two sides in this century, how far is the difference!But at this juncture, if we want to get rid of the concept of fatalism, we must understand the importance of geopolitics.Chinese bureaucracy is a product of the main body of the Asian continent.Its political system not only has to control hundreds of millions of farmers, but also has to deal with ethnic minorities in the forest and grasslands. It can only focus on quantity and cannot improve efficiency. It is not easy to change and has become a light-handed and commercial organization.If Wang Anshi could really advance Chinese history by 900 to 1,000 years, then such a big historical concept like ours would not be able to exist.