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China and Foreigners
Laborious negotiations have begun between the Beijing government and representatives of the powers to resolve the Shanghai incidents and, if possible, put an end to the xenophobic movement agitating China. To the extent that the talks initiated by the powers imply the existence of a Chinese state capable of exerting its influence over the most diverse parts of the territory, they cannot give rise to very solid hopes. But perhaps the signs of moderation, goodwill, and firmness given by the legations will be perceived by both the titular rulers of the amorphous republic and, behind them, by the dictators, great and small, who remain in the vicinity of the capital or in the provinces. Whatever happens, the experiment had to be attempted.
The Europeans are on the defensive. Since the Treaty of Nanking (1842), which was signed following the Opium War, they have established prosperous colonies around which most of Chinese trade is concentrated. These colonies or establishments, encroaching in one way or another on regular sovereignty, are of four types:
1. The concessions: Tien-Tsin, Kiu-Kiang, Newchwang, Canton, and other ports open to international traffic. Here, a European state received the land on lease, and its consul headed the executive. In Tien-Tsin, there are thirteen separate concessions, administered either by an elected municipal council (English concession), by an appointed council (French concession), or simply by the consular authority. The state, the beneficiary of the concession, sublet the land, and the revenues it thus obtained were used to build roads, sewers, etc. 2° The international "settlement" and the French "settlement" of Shanghai. The land was not leased; it was simply demarcated and reserved for Europeans, with Chinese properties remaining as in the past. But the Europeans were authorized to establish a municipal government: police, etc. The English settlement (1843) merged with the English settlement in 1863, with the French zone avoiding the merger. There is therefore an international municipality of Shanghai and a French municipality of Shanghai, reigning in separate domains.
3° Let us also mention the European communities that organized themselves spontaneously without being granted defined rights (e.g., Chefoo) and other communities (e.g., Yochow) that owe the development of their city to the Chinese government and enjoy the joint supervision of the Chinese taotai and the customs administrator. 4° In Beijing, the Legations Quarter (since the protocols of 1901 and 1904) forms a sort of privileged enclosure, capable of being put into a state of defense, occupied by European and Japanese guards, governed by the decisions of the diplomatic corps which appoints the indispensable administrative commission. The military occupation of the railway from Beijing to Mukden (as far as Shan-Kai-Kiran) by European and Japanese troops completes the system. Thus the intrusion of a continent into a continent is manifested. This state of affairs is often compared to what was found in Turkey before 1914. Good to strong. No transition is manifested between the two worlds which confront each other and penetrate each other. Assimilation, when it occurs, is only superficial; it divides those it touches, widens the abyss which separated them in the past. The entry on the scene of the "Christian general," at the very time when China is rising up against foreigners, is eloquent in this regard. The powers made the mistake, in Washington, of promising the reform of a regime of which we have described only the most general features. To complete the picture, it would be necessary to describe the complicated and ineffective judicial institutions imposed by the Europeans, the regulations that they had to enforce in Peking to safeguard interests that have no counterpart among the natives. A radical reform is out of sight because China has no central government and because, if it took shape, the most it could do would be to mimic Europe without any truly useful result. And yet, an irresistible Chinese push is taking place towards these foreign establishments where so much wealth is accumulating. Illusions have been created, passions have been aroused, which will undoubtedly be harshly refuted, or will signal the more or less violent end of a beautiful colonization.
PERTINAX
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