China: Convention of 1876

By signing the Chihuahua Convention in 1876, China, in addition to indemnity and the opening of four new ports, agreed to the establishment of mixed Chinese-foreign judicial bodies in open ports, abolished the imposition of imported goods with tax. Emperor Guangxi (Tsai Tian) agreed to introduce all the rights and privileges of diplomats that were accepted in the West and allowed the British through Burma to trade in Yunnan. Thus, the system of "metropolis - colonies and semi-colonies" was built on the ruins of the system "Celestial - tributaries".

The tribute system itself continued to function for a long time after the "opium" wars. In the second half of the XIX century. "From time to time," Danish "missions from dependent territories and from a number of countries in East and South-East Asia continued to arrive in Beijing, although by that time China had already turned into an object of capitalist and colonial violence, and then of a territorial division. China: The Convention of 1876 ...

Moreover, even in the conditions of rapid disintegration from the 70-80s of the XIX century, "Chinese world order" and the transformation of yesterday's Chinese tributaries into the colony and semi-colony of the capitalist West, the Peking rulers tried to preserve the old system of tribute. The attack of England and France on China was regarded in Beijing as a "rebellion of the barbarians" who forgot "deference" to the Son of Heaven. These new "western barbarians" must be "pacified" or "punished", like the old Asian tributaries. Chinese emperors did not fight with them, as with equals, but "pacified" (for example, "British rebels"). The Boghdians did not know their peers and considered it humiliating to answer the messages of the heads of European states. Nevertheless, in order to communicate with the powers in 1861, a special institution was created, and in 1873 the humiliating procedure for Western diplomats was formally abolished.

The ambassadors of the powers in Beijing after 1860 were not accredited with the head of state as representatives of countries equal to China, but as representatives of the countries-tributaries. Until 1873 they were not allowed to present their credentials. When the ambassadors achieved this ceremony, the latter took place in a hall where the emperor usually received tributaries or their ambassadors, thereby emphasizing the "barbarian" status of the western powers-swimmers.

China: Convention of 1876