Since the founding of New China, historians have done a lot of work on Zheng Chenggong's research. The main characteristics of research in this field are as follows: under the influence of11960 s, scholars launched their own topics around the two core issues of "resisting the Qing Dynasty and regaining sight" and "expelling the Netherlands and restoring Taiwan", and conducted detailed textual research to fill in the gaps. The research results of this period have played a positive role in strengthening national self-confidence and promoting patriotism. After1980s, some scholars felt that Zheng Chenggong's research urgently needed to broaden their research horizons, and gradually focused on the economic field, especially the economic and cultural development of Taiwan Province Province and trade exchanges with Southeast Asia, which promoted the development of Zheng Chenggong's research. There are also some scholars who, from a purely military point of view, mainly focus on the discussion of strategy and tactics in Zheng Chenggong's military career, or the analysis of the specific combat process, as well as the textual research on relevant people, time and place to fill in the gaps.
Although the previous research results are remarkable, there are also obvious shortcomings, mainly because the research perspective is mostly limited to the scope of national history, and Zheng Group is not discussed in the world background. There is no need to avoid it. At that time, the research in this field, like any humanities and social sciences, was restricted by a strong ideological tendency to a considerable extent. In recent years, some cutting-edge scholars have studied the rise of merchant groups in the southeast coast of Ming and Qing Dynasties, including Zheng Group, in the context of world history, and their research horizons seem to have new signs of expansion. Starting with the relationship between war and culture, this paper investigates Zheng's maritime commercial military group through the comparative study of Chinese and western history, trying to explain the essential difference between Zheng's maritime military power and China's traditional navy, and the relationship between this maritime military power and the sea power in the western sense; And try to point out the deeper social significance behind this military phenomenon. Therefore, this paper will further explore the relationship between Zhenghai Shangjun Group and the budding of ancient capitalism in China, and question the traditional argumentation method of "Jiangnan Silk Industry Theory".
One,
The water army was called the Navy in the west and the Navy in ancient China. These two different appellations represent two completely different civilization traditions. Western civilization basically occurs around the Mediterranean coast, and maritime commercial trade is the main tradition of western civilization, which can be traced back to Mycenae, when Crete residents traveled to and from the coastal areas of Asia, Europe and Africa. Historically, a feature of Mediterranean civilization is that when a country's survival and development depend largely on commercial trade, sea routes become its lifeline. When these countries are at war, controlling sea routes becomes the key to the success or failure of both sides. The direct influence of this situation on the military is the birth of the navy and the precocity of sea power consciousness, which has become the symbol of ancient Mediterranean civilization in the military field. For thousands of years, the Mediterranean gave birth to the primitive cells of the navy-pirates and armed merchant ships, Persian Phoenician fleet, Greek Athens fleet, Carthage fleet, Roman fleet, Venetian fleet and Spanish fleet, and cultivated Mahan's theory of sea control in modern western navy. More importantly, however, the unique geographical environment of the Mediterranean has created a western civilization that spans historical time and space, which is essentially a commercial colonial expansion. The navy is not only the product of this civilization, but also the sword of its expansion.
Military science is divided into sea power and land power. The importance of sea power and its advantages over land power were summarized by Mahan as a systematic sea power theory at the end of 19, but as early as the fifth century BC, the Greeks and Persians realized the importance of sea power. When the Persian Empire did not pose a threat to the Greek city-state, the Greeks respected the Spartans and their infantry phalanx and pursued the tradition of "land ownership". After the Battle of Rade Sea and the Battle of Marathon, the Athenians felt vulnerable under the control of the Persian Phoenician fleet. They resolutely abandoned the tradition and created a powerful navy without precedent in the history of Athens. In 480 BC, the Greek navy defeated the Persian fleet in the naval battle of Salamis. At that time, the coastal area in the northern part of the Aegean Sea had become the rear of the Persian army, and the Greek navy could land in a big arc at any point along the coastline, cutting off the rear traffic including the Helepenster Strait (now reaching the Daniil Strait). Although the Persian army occupied Athens, it had to retreat completely because of the failure of the navy. The Athenians who gathered on Salamis Island and planned to establish another country in Sicily returned to Athens to rebuild their city-state.
The Battle of Salamis is not only the first naval battle in the world that affected the historical process because of maritime operations, as Helmut Pemsel, a German naval historian, said, but also the earliest classic war case in history that showed that sea power was superior to land warfare. Another historical revelation of this naval battle is that in the process of strengthening national strength, it is often accompanied by the phenomenon of moving from land power to sea power. Greeks can be described as the first example in the history of the world. Later Romans, Ottoman Turks, and modern British, Japanese and Americans can all be regarded as copies of "Greek drama".
Investigating the inland farming society, the survival and development depend on land farming, and a strong sense of land (manifested in the maintenance and expansion of land living space) has derived the military tradition of land rights, as well as large-scale army and infantry arms. China, modern Russia and Prussia are the representatives in this respect. China, in particular, was forced to adopt a strict compulsory social management model in order to effectively cope with the long-term flood in the north and the invasion threat of nomadic people, and used Confucianism, Legalism and other theories as ideology to demonstrate the rationality of this social management, so as to strengthen the compulsory management. Since free trade and market principles pose a threat to mandatory social order in essence, commercial activities have been strictly restricted since ancient times. Commercial economy is only a necessary supplementary part of agricultural economy, and commercial spirit has no place in the ideological field. On the other hand, although China has a coastline of 18000 km, unlike the Mediterranean civilization, the country totally or partially depends on the sea for survival. Therefore, the consciousness of navy and sea power based on commercial economy and maritime trade is difficult to germinate in China society.
In ancient times, the existence of farming civilization in China not only excluded the birth of naval service and sea power consciousness, but also excluded the derivative of nomadic civilization-cavalry service. History has proved that the large-scale development of the arms of nomadic civilization in the circle of agricultural civilization is disastrous. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty once established the most powerful cavalry unit in the history of China, and achieved success in the large-scale war against Xiongnu aggression. However, in the last years of Emperor Wu, he regretted conquering. Historian Jane Bozan pointed out: "Emperor Wu's' four foreign affairs, internal utilitarianism', while completing his brilliant career, also exhausted the remaining wealth of the state treasury since Wenjing", which undoubtedly left a profound impact on future generations and lasted for more than two thousand years. In our traditional agricultural society, to maintain a cavalry that can compete with the northern grassland nationalities in scale means that a large number of agricultural production population has become a pure consumption population, and a large number of cultivated land is barren. Historical experience shows that it is a burden to maintain an army that can compete with the northern grassland, but it is much easier to maintain an army of strategic scale than a cavalry of strategic scale by taking measures such as "combining soldiers with civilians", "combining soldiers with civilians", "recruiting surplus agricultural labor", reclaiming cultivated land by the army and perfecting the mobilization system. eight
During the Republic of China, Jiang Baili, a military scientist, made an incisive judgment on the relationship between a nation's living state and its military strength: "I found a fundamental principle in the rise and fall of the nations in the world, that is, those whose living state is consistent with their combat state are strong, those who are separated are weak, and those who are opposed are dead." The operational conditions of navy are consistent with the living conditions of maritime trade, and the operational conditions of cavalry are consistent with the living conditions of grassland nomads, which are not only divorced from the living conditions of farming civilization, but even the opposite. Therefore, in the era when the ancient cavalry units dominated the war stage and the modern naval services dominated the war stage, nomadic people and maritime trading people were always in the active position, while the farming people seemed destined to be passive at a disadvantage, so they could only adopt a defensive posture in military strategy.
The battle of Salamis also highlighted another important feature that has been repeatedly repeated in western history: the fate of the naval fleet largely determines the fate of the country and the nation. 10 even changed the course of human history to a great extent. The decline of the Persian Empire and the rise of the Greeks all began with the Battle of Salamis. The Battle of Cape Ekonomus became the starting point of Rome's prosperity and Carthage's decline. The Battle of Lepanto was a harbinger of the decline of the Ottoman Turks. The sinking of the Spanish Invincible "sent the secrets of the empire to the ears of the British like a whisper." 1+
Judging from the living conditions and cultural types, China's ancient navy was not the Mediterranean navy in the western sense at all. Let's call it "Oriental Asian" navy 14. The fundamental difference between it and the western navy is that it is based on irrigated agriculture in the big river basin, and 15 is not interdependent with the farming lifestyle. Its nature is cultural exchange and political display, and it is a traditional ceremony. The relationship between the western navy and its country is mutual support and interdependence, and it is the continuation of national commercial behavior in the military field.
Comparing the ancient navy of China with the western navy, there is another obvious difference: most of the powerful fleets in western history were annihilated in confrontation, and the direct consequence was the decline of the country or nation. China's ancient powerful fleet did not disappear in the decisive battle with its rivals, but was destroyed by the natural "rejection" of the navy by the agricultural society, which had nothing to do with the rise and fall of the country. For example, the Western Han Dynasty, Sui Dynasty and Tang Dynasty captured Korea, the Yuan Dynasty captured Japan, Zheng He went to the Western Seas in the Ming Dynasty, and Shi Lang surrendered to Zheng Group in Taiwan Province Province, all of which belonged to the golden age of China's ancient navy. However, compared with the west, they are mostly short-lived. Once something happens at sea, they occasionally use the resources of agricultural society and get angry. Once things are settled, they disappear. This phenomenon also shows that farming people and farming society lack the sustained and fundamental motivation to develop the navy, because the sustained maritime trade is the most fundamental and powerful motivation to develop the navy.
two
After a preliminary study of the relationship between the rise of western Mediterranean civilization and the navy and sea power, we will find that the maritime armed forces of Zheng Zhilong and Zheng Chenggong's family are of extraordinary significance when compared with those of China in various historical periods. The social and economic foundation of Zheng Haijun is maritime trade. 16 Zheng Haijun's nature is a military force to maintain maritime trade. It has developed from pirate ships and armed merchant ships into a huge navy, which is very similar to what happened in ancient Greece and even modern Britain. Its living conditions, economic operation and social functions are qualitatively different from those of traditional navies. It can be said that Zheng's navy was the only one in the ancient China in the western sense. 16.
From the perspective of military science, Zheng's maritime power can compete with the Ming court and the Qing court successively, which once made the mainland military power helpless. The Qing Dynasty wiped out Li Zicheng, Zhang, Li Dingguo, Wu Sangui and Geng in a short period of time, but it remained at loggerheads with Zheng Group, which only controlled the southeast corner of the sea, for 23 years. Finally, the Qing court was forced to build a navy on a large scale, which enabled the surrender of the former Zheng Group to make Shi Lang occupy the Penghu Islands and control the sea power in the Taiwan Province Strait, forcing the Zheng Group to surrender. The military significance of 17 is as follows: 1. The law of war, in which the sea is weighted over the land, is not a special product of the western Mediterranean civilization, but can also be born spontaneously in China. Second, Zheng's navy is the representative of China's ancient sea power consciousness. 18 third, from the perspective of modern military science, Zheng Chenggong's troops belong to a large number of marine corps. 1657, Zheng Chenggong's northern expedition route was exactly the same as that of the British navy during the Opium War, supplying Zhoushan Islands, seizing the Yangtze River estuary, and taking advantage of the danger of the world, the army went up the river, pushing Nanjing and shaking half of the south of the Yangtze River. This shows that the strategy and tactics under the restriction of sea power consciousness are consistent.
Since17th century, the emergence of western overseas trade, colonization, naval prosperity and sea power theory is closely related to the rise of modern capitalism. The political and economic behavior of western countries seeking cheap labor, raw materials and commodity dumping markets runs through the whole process of capitalist development. To do all this, we must rely on maritime power. Britain's modern navy paved the way for its capitalism. As far as capitalism can develop in Europe at first, it is based on the premise that Europe has a strong navy and has absolute advantages over other parts of the world in sea control. So we saw such a historical scene: on the one hand, the modern navy, sea power consciousness and sea power theory in the west, like trade, colonization, seeking overseas markets and raw materials, constitute an important part of capitalism; 18 On the other hand, the modern European navy became the pioneer of modern capitalism, which can also be regarded as a modern version of the navy paving the way for commerce in the ancient Mediterranean tradition. The consciousness of navy and sea power with the characteristics of western civilization spontaneously emerged in China, which is enough to arouse our further thinking. Obviously, the significance of Zheng Haijun has gone beyond the scope of pure military science, and we should discuss it in a broader social and historical scope. Zheng Group is another social type separated from the traditional farming society, and its survival and development are based on maritime commercial activities, not on land reclamation. Since the commercial economy constitutes the economic foundation of this society, it will inevitably derive corresponding organizational management, values, life beliefs, group psychology, morality and ethics, and behavior norms, which are fundamentally incompatible with the traditional agricultural society. Because 19 lives by the sea, in the military field, a service aimed at safeguarding the fundamental interests of this society-navy is logically derived. Therefore, the society represented by the Zheng Group, which died halfway later, is strikingly similar in nature to ancient Greece, Carthage and the Netherlands and Britain, which represent the rise of modern western capitalism.
William mcneill, an American scholar, believes that the key to the rise of modern capitalism lies in the fact that the market principle has broken through and surpassed the mandatory social structure, and the military field is the most critical breakthrough. The army plays an irreplaceable role in the emergence and development of capitalism. In this way, we have to associate Zheng Group with the budding problem of ancient capitalism in China. Before starting a new round of discussion, let's make a brief comment on the previous discussion ideas:
In the past, when historians discussed the germination of Chinese capitalism, they were often confined to the economic category. For example, He Wu first realized that "the budding of capitalism is a social and economic phenomenon", and 2 1' s thinking mode of replacing social analysis completely dominated the historians at that time. It has become a well-known view that the production relations in the silk weaving industry in the south of the Yangtze River in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties represent ancient times. The author believes that capitalism is not so much an economic concept as a sociological concept. Objectively speaking, the past discussion belongs to the discussion of budding capitalist economy and cannot replace the discussion of budding capitalist economy. Regarding the latter, we should make a comprehensive investigation of the whole society. For example, Max Weber discussed the emergence of capitalism from the spiritual field and thought that Puritanism and asceticism were the key factors of its progress. Michael E. Tugard and Madeleine R. Levy investigated the legal system; Mr. Huang Renyu analyzed the social management characteristics of capitalism from the perspective of "digital management". These multi-angle investigations are as important as economics.
Based on the above position, the author believes that judging the budding of capitalism in China includes not only the confirmation of capitalist economic form, but also the judgment of capitalist development degree. We must go beyond the traditional practice of establishing standards within the economic scope and establish new standards to include other important aspects of society. In the military field, it is obviously reasonable to make such an attempt.
Engels said: "The use of firearms not only changed the way of war itself, but also changed the political relationship between rule and slavery. ..... Firearms have been weapons for cities and emerging monarchies to rely on cities to fight against feudal nobles from the very beginning. The stone walls of aristocratic castles that were impregnable before could not suppress the citizens' cannons; The citizen's bullet penetrated the knight's armor. Aristocratic rule perished with armored aristocratic cavalry. " From the perspective of modern western history, whether it is France in agricultural society or Britain in commercial society, only by cultivating its own military strength can industrial and commercial capital launch an effective impact on the traditional economic system and political system and promote the comprehensive and thorough transformation of feudal society to capitalism. Therefore, whether industrial and commercial capital can "hatch" its own military machine seems to be a landmark sign in the history of capitalist development, and it also seems to be one of the important signs to measure the degree of capitalist development.
The silk industry in the south of the Yangtze River is under the strict control of the traditional society. The important role of the feudal autocracy based on violent machines is never to allow the commercial economy to develop to a scale that can shake the traditional economic foundation and lead to the collapse of its superstructure. The history of China shows that successive dynasties have achieved great success in strictly controlling commercial power and preventing commercial capital from cultivating military machines. This is because they adhered to the principle of "emphasizing agriculture over commerce" (Liu Ying is a special case, which will be discussed later). The differences in scale and nature between enterprises with interactive relations with the military and those without such relations are incomparable. If there is no outside intervention, can the industrial and commercial capital of Jiangnan silk industry breed a military force that can compete with the traditional social violence machine? Like Cromwell's model army, the civilian army of the French Revolution? History has been unable to provide an answer, but Zheng's maritime commercial capital has nurtured a powerful military force and effectively protected the former. As mentioned above, this relationship is one of the basic characteristics of ancient and modern western civilization. Therefore, Zheng Group is far closer to the modern western capitalist model than Jiangnan silk weaving industry, and its capitalist development degree is far more mature than the latter, not only in economic structure, but also in the characteristics of military and their relationship.
three
Drawing lessons from the western scholar William H. McNeill's view that modern capitalism originated from a "military-commercial complex", we will find that the historical significance of Zheng Chenggong's maritime business group was far underestimated when discussing the germination of Chinese capitalism in the past, and we will be more aware of its special significance in the history of China.
McNeill's main point of view can be summarized as follows: the market principle is above the monarchical power and the mandatory social structure, which is the necessary condition for the germination and development of European capitalism and the eventual expulsion of feudal society from the historical stage. The key to China's backwardness is not that there is no developed market economy, but that the market principle has never broken through the monarchy and the mandatory social structure. He pointed out that the fission of feudal society in Europe occurred in the bud of "military-commercial complex" around 1 1 century. The long-term political division in Europe has forced a few businessmen and hawkers engaged in long-distance trade to organize effective armed escorts. In this way, in addition to the knight's armed forces, a second kind of armed forces appeared in European society. This is the 1 1 century Europe's "military-commercial complex" germination. Its social management nature is the origin of modern social management nature, and its operating characteristics are that politics, economy and military are mutual power sources, supporting and expanding each other, forming a "social cycle". In essence, the history of European capitalism is an expansion history of "military-commercial complex". McNeil's other conclusion is that the "military-commercial complex" has much stronger survival and development ability at sea than inland. Venice, Milan and other cradles of capitalism are geographically backed by the sea, and the pioneers of modern capitalism, the Netherlands and Britain, also belong to maritime countries. This is because maritime trade has lower cost, greater profit and clearer cost calculation than land trade, so it is much easier to combine wealth and military affairs at sea than land trade.
It is not difficult to find that Zheng Group is the most typical maritime "military-commercial complex" in ancient China. It was originally developed from an armed merchant ship with the nature of pirates, and finally ceded Taiwan Province Province to establish local government in its actual control area, with the nature of "quasi-government". In the subsequent career development, politics, economy and military support each other, expand and form a feedback loop, which is the same as what happened in Europe.
The background of Zheng's "military-business complex" is somewhat similar to that of Europe, that is, long-distance trade and political division. It mainly trades with distant Southeast Asia and Japan, and supports political and military actions with huge commercial profits, which is different from the fact that most political and military groups in China's history rely on agricultural taxes. In domestic politics, the Li Zicheng Uprising and the rise of the northern Jurchen nationality forced the Ming court to give up tough measures and implement the policy of wooing, which enabled Zheng forces to take the opportunity to develop. However, once the mainland achieves political reunification, the survival of Zheng Group will be in jeopardy.
Through the superficial phenomenon of political and military confrontation, from the perspective of social transformation, Zheng Group is a social force that has launched a strong impact on the traditional mandatory social structure and is the most typical representative of market principles in China history. The historical significance of the collapse of Zheng Group is that the spontaneous market principle in ancient China society suffered a fiasco when trying to break through the mandatory social structure. Of course, according to the historical phenomenon that the northern minorities were assimilated once they entered the Central Plains farming area, if Zheng Group from the sea took over the heritage of the mainland dynasty, would it continue to adhere to the market principle? Or forced to repair the mandatory social structure? But this is an unanswerable question.
In the third year of Emperor Jing of Han Dynasty (BC 154), Liu Bi, the king of Wu, and Chu started a rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms. It seems that we should reconsider this incident. In the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, commercial power was very strong. "Historical Records" says ... while wealthy businessmen or poor people in financial services have turned their heads and abandoned their homes in cities, looking down. Cooking salt may dry up wealth, but it does not help the public, and the people are deeply trapped. This historical data reflects the actual situation at that time: on the one hand, the financial difficulties of the central dynasty, on the other hand, it was out of control of a large number of social wealth and commercial forces that mastered these wealth, that is, out of control of some societies. But to make matters worse, commercial forces have controlled local governors, or merged with local political forces like Liu Ying. If left unchecked, the central government will also scoff. At that time, people's understanding was that once the commercial forces controlled the whole society, the political operation of the central dynasty and the normal operation of the whole agricultural society would collapse (today, although the transition from agricultural society to commercial society was temporarily troublesome, the prospect may not be so bad).
Chao Cuo advocated cutting the vassal because Liu Bi "made money from mountains, cooked salt from the sea, lured the outlaws in the world and conspired for a crisis." . If you cut it today, it will be reversed. If you don't cut it, it's backwards. Cutting it, it is urgent, and the disaster is small; If you don't cut it, it will be too late, and disaster will happen. "To be fair, at least half of Liu Bi's rebellion was directed by the court. Smelting iron, boiling salt and casting money may not necessarily lead to future chaos, but according to normal logic, whoever controls the socio-economic lifeline and social wealth will be in an invincible position in the political and military struggle. For the sake of political security and maintaining the normal operation of agricultural society (which often makes the central dynasty's behavior against commercial forces morally tenable), the central dynasty had to choose to separate the princes, and it was easier to do it later than earlier. Liu Bi may not have rebelled at first, but just wanted to amass wealth. However, according to the logic of political operation, the court understood and reasoned the political consequences caused by his economic behavior, and took measures to cut capital according to the reasoning results. Accurately speaking, the court first regarded Liu Bi as a rebel, and finally let the latter play the role imagined by the court in advance.
Now the problem has been clarified, and the root cause comes from the economic field. Behind this political and military struggle is an irreconcilable conflict of economic interests, that is, the confrontation between local free trade and monopoly trade in the central dynasty. Fundamentally speaking, this is a conflict between the market principle and the mandatory principle in the commercial field. According to history, "the sons lured by Wu are all rogues, greedy for profits and selling people, so they turn their backs." Eliminating the derogatory tendency shows that Liu Ying's "rebel group" represents the interests of people engaged in commercial and trade activities. From McNeill's point of view, Liu Ying's "rebel army" and "cast iron boiled salt" industry and commerce may be the earliest large-scale "military-commercial complex" in the history of China. Now we ask the same question. If Liu Bi succeeded in rebellion and completed the role transformation from a local vassal to a centralized emperor, wouldn't he take a series of restraining measures against commercial forces like Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty?
This question is not meaningless. There are indications that curbing commercial power is the economic, military and political need of centralized rule. For example, the state's monopoly on the salt and iron industries financially ensured a large-scale military action against the Huns. "Han Lian sent troops at the age of three to pay for farmers, so he can help them with salt and iron." 29 "Zhao Di acceded to the throne for six years, calling counties to raise good teachers of the law, asking people's sufferings and the importance of education. They are all willing to strike salt, iron and wine and lose their jobs. They don't compete with the world for profit and regard it as frugality. The difficulty of Hongyang thinks that the country is a great cause, so the foundation for the stability of Siyi cannot be abandoned. " It can be seen that the state's monopoly on salt and iron is the financial basis for the long-term war against Xiongnu in the Western Han Dynasty.
Perhaps history has proved that the compulsory social structure and management methods are the inevitable response of the farming civilization in the Central Plains to the challenge from the nomadic civilization in the northern grasslands, and the monopoly management of salt and iron by 3 1 state and the powerful and favorable containment of commercial forces are the embodiment of this inevitable response in the economic field (the Song Dynasty is a good disproof it). The commercial development in Song Dynasty could not effectively cope with the invasion of northern grassland nationalities, which was in sharp contrast with the commercial destruction and military prosperity in Han Dynasty. In the past, the reason for the weakness of the Song Dynasty was often attributed to the social phenomenon of "emphasizing literature over martial arts" by preventing the recurrence of the separatist regime in the Tang Dynasty. This explanation is superficial. The author's point of view is that the society in Song Dynasty was commercialized on a large scale, but it was too late for the market principle to reintegrate the society. At the same time, the compulsory social management of the central dynasty was seriously unbalanced and could not effectively mobilize social resources for a long-term war. The Ming Dynasty seems to have accepted the lessons of the Song Dynasty and obviously returned to the compulsory tradition. At this point, we find that the Sino-foreign war has different social integration functions in the history of China and the West. In China, the foreign war directly or indirectly strengthened the mandatory social structure and suppressed the rise of the ancient market principle in China. In the west, foreign wars forced monarchical power and mandatory principles to yield to market principles.
Compared with Liu Ying, Zheng Group is closer to the western "military-commercial complex" model, which is also in line with the situation that the western sea is easier to develop than the land. Referring to the first breakthrough of western market principles in the field of arms production, the failure of Zheng Haishang Commercial Group lies in the fact that there are no conditions in both subjective and objective aspects to make itself an indispensable dependent factor of feudal dynasty, which has formed a relationship similar to that of European monarchies having to rely on arms manufacturing cities such as Liege (this is the fatal weakness of European monarchies and the main reason of the big market principle). The destruction of Zheng's "military-commercial complex" at sea shows that the traditional agricultural society based on irrigated agriculture in large basins and the ever-strengthening mandatory social management principles have great vitality, which is essentially incompatible with the "military-commercial complex" society based on market principles.
four
Finally, can China spontaneously produce capitalism without the intervention of western civilization?
Most domestic scholars hold a negative attitude towards this. I noticed that Mr. Gu Zhun's attitude was particularly clear. He asserted that China could not spontaneously produce capitalism. He believes: "China has never produced a business-oriented political entity, and it is impossible to produce such a political entity. ..... In China, anyone who hears that this business group is going to make a big deal in the world will be a big joke. " After investigating the decline of the Italian commercial city-state, he thought: "Capitalism can't develop in that commercial city-state only by virtue of its economic advantages, and there is no powerful military force and nation-state with appropriate scale to ensure this economic advantage." After investigating that Spain experienced navigation, commerce and colonization, but did not develop into capitalism, he concluded: "Commercial cities can only grow into capitalism under the protection of appropriate political power and powerful armed forces." 35
The author was deeply impressed by Gu Zhun's keen and broad academic vision. At that time, he was one of the few scholars in China who could think with his own mind and examine China's capitalist problems in many directions, and one of the few scholars in China who could notice the relationship between capitalist development and military power. It's a pity that Gu Zhun completely ignored the existence of Zheng Chenggong's Maritime Commercial Army Group, which is a very rare place in the ancient history of China to protect commerce with strong military force, and it is also a social group called "business-oriented political entity" and "business group wants to conquer the world and achieve great things" by Gu Zhun. Therefore, his conclusion is rather hasty.
Perhaps we have long been accustomed to using the colored glasses of "armed smuggling" and "pirate group" to look at offshore groups like Zheng. As for Xu Hai and Wu, they are a group of "pirates" who are not worthy of attention. The orthodox moral consciousness in the subconscious of historians often makes people ignore the special significance and role of these "heterogeneous groups" in the process of traditional social changes. In Europe, the seeds of capitalism were cultivated by small traders carrying swords and guns from village to village in the manor house in the 0 th century 165438+.
Looking back at history today, after the middle of the17th century, when European civilization and Chinese civilization formed specific environment and conditions due to frequent contact, it seems that China was only waiting to take the most crucial step: the military force representing the commercial society defeated the military force representing the traditional agricultural society. Unfortunately, Zheng Chenggong Offshore Group failed to do this, but in the Opium War after 180, the British navy acted as an "unconscious historical tool" when disintegrating the traditional agricultural society. Since then, China has begun a slow process of transforming into a modern society. The modern history of China shows that the military collapse contributed to the traditional society in time and logical order.