Ming vs Qing Dyansty S Falls

Fall of Qing Dynasty The Qing Dynasty of China lasted for centuries and, for the most part, was very prosperous. They had long-tenured leaders, enjoyed a lot of good fortune for much of their existence and so forth. However, the dynasty was brought to an end by a combination of natural disasters, rebellions among the people, incompetent courts and invasions from outside. Even with its long success, the Qing dynasty eventually fell.

No matter how far and high an empire has gotten in the history of the world, there always comes a point where revolution and/or disintegration of that empire comes to pass. As noted in the introduction, the overall tenure of the Qing Dynasty was quite long. Indeed, the dynasty ran from 1644 and did not end until 1912. The beginning and middle parts of the dynasty were full of good times for the lion's share of the people. However, everything fell apart in the beginning of the 20th century.

The immediately preceding empire before Qing was known as the Qing empire. The Qing empire also lasted quite a long time, lasting about a quarter of a millennia. The fall of the Qing empire was mostly self-inflicted as it was mostly caused by internal groups and factions trying to carve out territory, power and prestige for themselves. Beyond that, the disparate groups that were engaging in such behavior were also competing and fighting with each other rather than worrying about the health and future of the empire as a whole.

As the chaos grew, there was the idea that the Ming dynasty had lost the "mandate of heaven." This was brought on by the aforementioned infighting as well as other issues like natural disasters, famine and economic calamities. This ended up emboldening people to rebel and rise up against their rulers and power-brokers. The concept of the mandate of Heaven is fairly simple to understand. It is the idea that Heaven selects the emperor that will lead the people.

If that emperor stumbles and fails to lead to the satisfaction of the people, this leads the people to believe that the emperor's mandate has been severed and this leads to the type of rebellion just mentioned (China Highlights, 2015). The onset of the Qing empire was led by Emperor Shunzhi. Shunzhi's father died when he was a child. His father happened to be Hung Taiji, who was the last leader of the Ming empire. Immediately upon his death, Shunzhi was named as his replacement.

His first order of business as Emperor was to finish the conquest of the empire and establish a government for the Ming dynasty. It took about a generation to complete but the Manchus were eventually able to defeat the remaining Ming forces. Ultimately, the Ming troops were vanquished entirely in 1659. Upon completion of that, the government was structured based on the appontments of Dorgon, the regent for the child emperor (China Highlights, 2015). Emperor Kangxi came to power in 1661 and had a very long rule, which lasted until 1722.

However, there were some problems during that long rule. There was a rebellion that was started by Wu Sangui. He had his own fiefdom and he aligned with two other rulers and their fiefdoms and they rose up against the Qing Dyansty even though they had themselves helped the Qing beat the Ming Dynasty just years earlier. This rebellion was problematic but was eventually eliminated by the rulers of the Qing Dynasty. The Qing went on to look for more territory.

They got into a scrap with the Russians in the 1680's when they invaded but a treaty eventually quashed that. The Qing Dynasty also beat the Dzungars in the northwest. Kangxi implemented new policies and procedures over the years. These policies did very well but he retained direct control of many matters due to lack of trust in others and he also would use secret message and the help of some Jesuits to facilitate changes (China Highlights, 2015). Kangxi eventually passed leadership to Emperor Yongzheng and the Qianlong Emperor.

There was good and bad with those reigns. Tibet and Xinjiang isses were suppressed but Qianlong in particular had a very rough patch near the end of his rule. He became very greedy and perhaps a little full of himself. He tried to attack Burma and Vietnam and things did not go well. Burma, by itself, vanquished four Qing armies. However, these setbacks did not stop the Emperor from indulging in his riches and wealth. This was not unnoticed by the people and rebellions started to come.

The unrest was exacerbated by his ambivalence towards trade with the Europeans (China Highlights, 2015; GWU, 2015). The end of the Qing empire too more than a century to unwind, but it was quite nasty nonetheless. They started to be attacked by the Europeans and the Japanese and they had a few full-on wars with the former of those two. One of those wars was the First Opium War with Britain. When treaty negotiations tanked, there was another conflagration. In the late 1800's, the Qing lost a war with the Japanese.

Some major revolts happened over that last century of the Qing including the White Lotus Rebellion, the Taiping Rebellion, the Dungan Revolt and a few others on top of that. These rebellions became more frequent and damaging as the 1800's dragged on. History repeated itself when the natural disasters started to come. Just as it was for the Ming, this was the beginning of the end of the Qing .. and for the same reason.

The lack of good rule from the Emperor in combination with the natural calamities led to the conclusion from the people that the Qing leadership had lost the Mandate of Heaven. After one last big rebellion (the Boxer Rebellion in 1900), there was some major last shifts in the rule of the Qing's in the early 1910's. There was briefly a new emperor that was two years old that was helpe din rule by a regent.

The Wuchang Uprising put an end to that and Sun Yatsen was briefly President of the Qing leadership. His attempt to adopt a republican constitution fell flat and he stepped down in 1912. This was the end of the Qing Empire (China Highlights, 2015; GWU, 2015). Conclusion If there.