HIST1094 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Mughal Empire, Lin Zexu, Qing Dynasty
Document Summary
Free trade in the late 1800s: specialization one country does something and trades with others, most profitable and efficient, look online. Qing china and global trade: qing dynasty (manchu) ruled over china (mostly populated by han chinese) since 1644: largest and richest country in world felt little need for trade. To get silver, british had to sell gold to get silver, was losing species(?) while. China was gaining it: as a result, had positive trade balance. Indian cotton was the most highly coveted fabric in the world at the time: beic governed bengal, used taxation to force bengals to grow opium. Massive famine (~10 million dead) endues in 1890s, india becomes major opium center. The fields that used to grow rice then grew opium. The chinese opium trade: most of the british-owned opium grown and processed in india is sold to china, opium was illegal but dealers would pay in silver-reversing typical terms of trade with.
