The Art of Domination: How Qing China Became a Regional Hegemon

Abstract

This paper examines a period of East Asian history when the region was dominated by a regional hegemon: the Qing dynasty (1644-1911), and discusses the implications for understanding China’s broad international behavior today. The central question is two-fold: How does a political actor become a hegemon in its region of the world? And once it becomes dominant, how does the hegemon maintain its supremacy in the international system and minimize resistance by lesser political actors? I argue that a political actor becomes a regional hegemon through expansion and accumulation of relative power and manages its dominance through establishing rules of the game for the system. The Manchus of the Qing dynasty expanded from a small area in present northeastern China to become the preponderant state in East Asia, its hegemony lasting more than 150 years. The Qing conquered Ming China, Mongolia, and Xinjiang, and incorporated Tibet into the empire. Qing rulers skillfully adopted a strategy of domination that combined both force and diplomacy and used its preponderant power to establish tributary rules of the game to govern interactions between political actors in the system. Through the use of military force and institutional innovation, the Manchus were able to achieve regional hegemony in East Asia and eliminate security challenges to its dominance. The present boundary of China is a legacy of Qing territorial reach. Like its imperial predecessor, China’s current rise cannot be divorced from a consideration of relative power. The international distribution of power holds the key to understanding Chinese foreign policy today.