On the Nature of the Governing System of the Qin Empire in Ancient China

Abstract

The article demonstrates that the Inca Empire was not the first early totalitarian state of its kind; we can find an even more obvious precedent for an early totalitarian state from ancient China, namely in the Qin Empire (221–207 BC). The legalist political theory, which was aimed at establishing the ruler’s absolute control over society and consolidating the central authority, is the first theory justifying totalitarian power known in world history. The authors of the Fajia (Legalism) theory (Guan Zhong, Shang Yang, Han Feizi) made a number of more or less successful attempts to implement a system of government based on it. The analysis of Sima Qian’s chronicle and the main arguments of the studies based on it show that, in view of the existing knowledge of the foundation and collapse of the Qin Empire, the structure of its governmental system, economic measures, ordering of society, legal system, religious and ideological policy, as well as its armed forces and foreign policy, the Qin Empire can certainly be identified as one of the earliest totalitarian superpowers in world history.