Water, Justice, and Local Government in Turn-of-the-Century Xinjiang

Abstract

AbstractHow local government worked in late-Qing and early Republican Xinjiang (1877-1918) in Turkic Muslim-majority areas remains largely a mystery, since the few available official records obscure the very relationships between Chinese magistrates and local powerholders that made government possible. This article uses documents from a brief period in the early Republic when the provincial government actively intervened in local disputes over water resources to explore the expectations of Muslim commoners and practices of Chinese officials. It argues that the boundaries established within the provincial system and the unsuccessful transformation of structures of authority and communication disrupted preexisting long-distance arrangements for water distribution.