Local Force and National Identity in the Frontier Crisis of Southwest China in the Late Qing Dynasty:The Case of the Game of the Kunming-based Commercial Port
The Kunming-based commercial port in the late Qing dynasty was an action initiated by the local gentry-merchants and led by the local officials to deal with the border crisis.This action was initially supported by the central government,but was eventually abandoned after the French inter-vention,with Yunnan's efforts at maintaining a"non-opening"policy.Through analyzing the con-crete representation of the tripartite game between Yunnan local government,the central government and France in the process of establishing this commercial port,this paper discusses the active actions of the local force represented by local officials,cultural elites and business elites in the border crisis:they strove for the Kunming-based commercial port,not to fight for local interests but to safeguard the integrity of the national sovereignty.On the surface,the rise of the local force in the southwest border area of China was the result of the"shock and reaction"of Western imperialist aggression.In fact,this force had already been conceived in the frontier society,which originated from the historical development logic of the unity of Chinese civilization and rooted in the social psychology of the people in the frontier society,and was manifested through the game of the Kunming-based commercial port in the border crisis in the late Qing dynasty.This collective action embodies the result of the historical development of the unity of Chinese civilization and the integrity of the Chinese nation over the past several thousand years,representing a sense of the national identity and a sense of the national sover-eignty in the southwest border areas of China with a local political foundation and a popular psycho-logical foundation.
border crisisKunming-based commercial portlocal forcenational sovereigntycon-sciousness of national identity
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