This was written on July 23.
Biantong (变通): the ability to apply successfully knowledge about A to B. The two characters constituting this word—bian (变) and tong (通)—suggest an understanding of intelligence as a capacity to adapt past knowledge and experience to and thus pass smoothly through the challenges of the present. At the level of cultural history, biantong simultaneously reproduces and changes tradition, creating new worlds where vestiges of the old not only have salience, but also continue function. Visiting Chengde these past few days has helped me deepen my understanding of the establishment of Shenzhen as an instance of biantong. Specifically, Chinese Emperors and socialist leaders have continuously established new cities to initiate political change or diversify administrative s policies while maintaining stability in the capital.
Qing hegemony rested on obtaining legitimacy within both Han and non-Han ethnic communities. On the one hand, the Qing were Manchurians, but governed an Empire that was primarily Han. Indeed, in the state apparatus that the Qing took over from the Ming, Beijing signified the centrality of Han ethnic identity for state building and identity formation. As a first step to securing their hegemony, the Qing occupied the forbidden city (故宫), the former center of the Ming Empire. However, to redeploy the Ming state apparatus for their own ends, the Qing Emperors mastered Han culture, presenting themselves as the embodiment of the Mandate of Heaven. The Qianlong Emperor’s mastery of Han calligraphy and poetry forms, for example, fueled rumors that he was actually a Han Chinese, rather than a Manchurian.
On the other hand, to appeal to non-Han and non-Manchurian ethnic groups, the Qing court promulgated Tibetan Buddhism (密宗), which was practiced throughout much of the non-Han Empire (Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet, Yunnan, and western Sichuan in addition to Manchuria). In contemporary jargon, the Qing located “minority affairs” in Chengde, where they resided in Chengde for five months a year—from May through October. More to the point of this blog entry, Chengde enabled the Qing to place Tibetan Buddhism at the center of imperial policy, something that could not be easily achieved in Beijing, which was already built to reflect Han cosmology. Once Tibetan Buddhism had been firmly established as the court religion, it could be transferred to Beijing. For example, the Yongzheng Emperor donated his pre-ascension Beijing residence, the Yonghe Palace to Tibetan Buddhist monks.
Clearly, minority affairs not only constituted a key element of Qing administration, but also necessitated what was effectively a second capital, begging the question: how much change can be ordered from the capitol, but not implemented there? Many people, myself included, have ascribed the success of reforms in Guangdong, generally and Shenzhen, specifically as an instance of “the Emperor is far away and the mountains high (山高皇帝远)”. However, the fact that the Qing needed a second capitol to administer a multi-ethnic empire complicates this description of change from below. Instead, it seems that political change in China has also occurred because the constraints that Beijing’s bureaucracy have imposed on the Emperor can be mediated by spatial distance. In other words, the Emperor deployed and the Communists continue to biantong urban space with an eye to transforming Beijing and by extension the country.
I have elsewhere discussed Shenzhen’s establishment in terms of the Maoist policy of “important cities (重点城市)”. While in Chengde, I became aware the extent to which the establishment of the Qing’s “Mountain Resort (避暑山庄: the Chinese includes the idea of ‘summer retreat’)” enabled them to govern the Empire through means that would have been both difficult and ineffective in Beijing. Yet once in place in Chengde, these same policies could be re-imported to the capital as national policy. Suddenly, the establishment of Shenzhen appears to be well within Chinese administrative –both imperial and Maoist—history. Cultural continuity through biantong . More importantly, thinking about Shenzhen through Chengde firmly situates the SEZ’s so-called lack of history within Chinese cultural-political history. From the height of Chengde’s mountains, it seems ignorant to argue that Shenzhen doesn’t have a history. Indeed, such arguments appear to be motivated disinformation; who benefits and how when Shenzhen is described as being without history or culture?
My regrettably fast tour of Chengde included visits to Puning Temple (普宁寺), the little Potala Palace (普陀宗乘之庙; the Mandarin refers to Tibetan Buddhism as Tantric Buddhism), the Mountain Resort, and Sledgehammer Peak (磬椎峰). While there, I enjoyed the cooling beauty of Chengde’s trees.
Biantong (变通): the ability to apply successfully knowledge about A to B. The two characters constituting this word—bian (变) and tong (通)—suggest an understanding of intelligence as a capacity to adapt past knowledge and experience to and thus pass smoothly through the challenges of the present. At the level of cultural history, biantong simultaneously reproduces and changes tradition, creating new worlds where vestiges of the old not only have salience, but also continue function. Visiting Chengde these past few days has helped me deepen my understanding of the establishment of Shenzhen as an instance of biantong. Specifically, Chinese Emperors and socialist leaders have continuously established new cities to initiate political change or diversify administrative s policies while maintaining stability in the capital.
Qing hegemony rested on obtaining legitimacy within both Han and non-Han ethnic communities. On the one hand, the Qing were Manchurians, but governed an Empire that was primarily Han. Indeed, in the state apparatus that the Qing took over from the Ming, Beijing signified the centrality of Han ethnic identity for state building and identity formation. As a first step to securing their hegemony, the Qing occupied the forbidden city (故宫), the former center of the Ming Empire. However, to redeploy the Ming state apparatus for their own ends, the Qing Emperors mastered Han culture, presenting themselves as the embodiment of the Mandate of Heaven. The Qianlong Emperor’s mastery of Han calligraphy and poetry forms, for example, fueled rumors that he was actually a Han Chinese, rather than a Manchurian.
On the other hand, to appeal to non-Han and non-Manchurian ethnic groups, the Qing court promulgated Tibetan Buddhism (密宗), which was practiced throughout much of the non-Han Empire (Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet, Yunnan, and western Sichuan in addition to Manchuria). In contemporary jargon, the Qing located “minority affairs” in Chengde, where they resided in Chengde for five months a year—from May through October. More to the point of this blog entry, Chengde enabled the Qing to place Tibetan Buddhism at the center of imperial policy, something that could not be easily achieved in Beijing, which was already built to reflect Han cosmology. Once Tibetan Buddhism had been firmly established as the court religion, it could be transferred to Beijing. For example, the Yongzheng Emperor donated his pre-ascension Beijing residence, the Yonghe Palace to Tibetan Buddhist monks.
Clearly, minority affairs not only constituted a key element of Qing administration, but also necessitated what was effectively a second capital, begging the question: how much change can be ordered from the capitol, but not implemented there? Many people, myself included, have ascribed the success of reforms in Guangdong, generally and Shenzhen, specifically as an instance of “the Emperor is far away and the mountains high (山高皇帝远)”. However, the fact that the Qing needed a second capitol to administer a multi-ethnic empire complicates this description of change from below. Instead, it seems that political change in China has also occurred because the constraints that Beijing’s bureaucracy have imposed on the Emperor can be mediated by spatial distance. In other words, the Emperor deployed and the Communists continue to biantong urban space with an eye to transforming Beijing and by extension the country.
I have elsewhere discussed Shenzhen’s establishment in terms of the Maoist policy of “important cities (重点城市)”. While in Chengde, I became aware the extent to which the establishment of the Qing’s “Mountain Resort (避暑山庄: the Chinese includes the idea of ‘summer retreat’)” enabled them to govern the Empire through means that would have been both difficult and ineffective in Beijing. Yet once in place in Chengde, these same policies could be re-imported to the capital as national policy. Suddenly, the establishment of Shenzhen appears to be well within Chinese administrative –both imperial and Maoist—history. Cultural continuity through biantong . More importantly, thinking about Shenzhen through Chengde firmly situates the SEZ’s so-called lack of history within Chinese cultural-political history. From the height of Chengde’s mountains, it seems ignorant to argue that Shenzhen doesn’t have a history. Indeed, such arguments appear to be motivated disinformation; who benefits and how when Shenzhen is described as being without history or culture?
My regrettably fast tour of Chengde included visits to Puning Temple (普宁寺), the little Potala Palace (普陀宗乘之庙; the Mandarin refers to Tibetan Buddhism as Tantric Buddhism), the Mountain Resort, and Sledgehammer Peak (磬椎峰). While there, I enjoyed the cooling beauty of Chengde’s trees.