334 The China Quarterly agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.3 The issue of government personnel was more subtle,but no less intrac- table.For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic,those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims:the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office,versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings"(gan renging).If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption.Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely,some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance,and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men"was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particu- larism of society in some sort of balance.0 In terms of institutions,the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage.Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men,"but clearly "good institutions"were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic,however,neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations,viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress,had been abolished in 1904-05,but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replace- ment.Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modern civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active govern- ment,the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off re- calcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9.Young,The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai,pp.164-167.On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments,see S.A.M.Adshead,The Modemization of the Chinese Salt Administration,1900-1920 (Cambridge,MA:Harvard University Press,1970),pp.61-117.Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State:Rural North China,1900-42 (Stanford:Stanford University Press. 1988),pp.59-85,also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation,virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10.The relative weights of the perceived importance of"good institutions"and "good men"in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially,and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English,see Benjamin Schwartz.The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge,MA:Harvard University Press,1985),pp.102-105 for a discussion of the importance of"good men."For the importance of "good institutions,"see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor,The Magistrate's Tael:Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China(Berkeley:University of California Press,1984). 11.Wolfgang Franke,The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System(Cambridge,MA:Harvard Monographs,1960)and Benjamin Elman,"Delegitimation and decanonization:the trap of civil service examination reform,1860-1910,"paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History,National Chung-shan University,Kaohsiung,Taiwan,19-21 November 1993
334 The China Quarterly agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993. agencies that were independent organizations but nominally supervised by the central government in the 1910s and 1920s.9 The issue of government personnel was more subtle, but no less intractable. For centuries prior to the establishment of the Republic, those in state service in China had to strike a balance that could accommodate the inherent tensions between two sets of claims: the Confucian bureaucracy's demand that the individual in its employ be responsive to its standardized and impersonal rules and regulations while in office, versus the more enduring claims of the individual's friends and family to provide for them and "be sensitive to human feelings" (gan renqing). If left unchecked this latter set of pressures could easily lead to rampant corruption. Although real levels and subjective perceptions of corruption as a problem in the late imperial state certainly varied widely, some combination of "good institutions" through formal and bureaucratic sanctions of deviance, and normative socialization into behaviour as "good men" was the recognized way of keeping the tensions between a depersonalized bureaucracy and the particularism of society in some sort of balance.10 In terms of institutions, the existence of Confucian civil service exams as the primary route into the bureaucracy cut off one obvious way of providing patronage. Years of studying the Confucian ethics may have pre-disposed individuals to be "good men," but clearly "good institutions" were also necessary to maintain an equilibrium between particularist interest and impartial law. By the early Republic, however, neither of these components obtained. The Confucian civil service examinations, viewed by progressives as hopelessly archaic and a brake on progress, had been abolished in 1904-05, but nothing convincing had been instituted as a replacement.11 Although all Republican regimes repeatedly professed their desire to recruit talent through the institution of modem civil service examinations to create a technically competent and pro-active government, the short-term pressures to provide patronage and buy off recalcitrant subordinates and would-be allies repeatedly stymied the 9. Young, The Presidency of Yuan Shih-k'ai, pp. 164-167. On the creation of the Sino-Foreign Salt Inspectorate and the revenues it remitted to the Beiyang governments, see S. A. M. Adshead, The Modernization of the Chinese Salt Administration, 1900-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970), pp. 61-117. Prasenjit Duara in Culture, Power and the State: Rural North China, 1900-42 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 59-85, also suggests that the very late imperial and Republican proliferation of local tax bureaus and tankuan led to significant increases in the rate of real taxation, virtually none of which was passed up to the central government. 10. The relative weights of the perceived importance of "good institutions" and "good men" in late imperial Chinese statecraft varied substantially, and is a vast topic in its own right. For views in English, see Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), pp. 102-105 for a discussion of the importance of "good men." For the importance of "good institutions," see Madeleine Zelin's excellent study of the rationalizing fiscal reforms of the Yongzheng Emperor, The Magistrate's Tael: Rationalizing Fiscal Reform in 18th Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984). 11. Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Monographs, 1960) and Benjamin Elman, "Delegitimation and decanonization: the trap of civil service examination reform, 1860-1910," paper prepared for the First International Conference of Ch'ing Intellectual History, National Chung-shan University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 19-21 November 1993
The Evolution of Republican Government 335 re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality,however attractive they remained in principle.Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization,made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic.Clearly,in this highly unfavourable environment of frag- mented organizations,ambiguous loyalties,internal divisions,slender resources and external pressures,what the central governments of Repub- lican China needed was,in effect,an "institutional breakthrough"-some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period,there were two analytically distinct methods or"logics"by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity.The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions"for government and administration."Good"was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy,characterized by ob- jectively oriented,efficient,rule-based technocracy,with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it,and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising auth- ority."13 The second"logic,"which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men."In this conception,"good men"were the raw materials who would effect institu- tional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends,and,where "correct"values and norms were lacking,would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs:Pre-1927 Visions and Implemen- tation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of"government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive"did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s,there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12.For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough,"I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough"for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems.In contrast to"revolutionary breakthroughs,"which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic"programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society,"institutional breakthroughs"are more generic,and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones).However,both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented.See Kenneth Jowitt,Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley:University of California Press,1971),pp.94-95. 13.This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber,Economy and Sociery (Berkeley: University of California Press,1978),pp.223-26
The Evolution of Republican Government re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. re-institutionalization of norms of objectivity and impartiality, however attractive they remained in principle. Fairly consistent foreign pressure, combined with distressing levels of domestic militarization, made the operations and institutions of civil Republican government even more problematic. Clearly, in this highly unfavourable environment of fragmented organizations, ambiguous loyalties, internal divisions, slender resources and external pressures, what the central governments of Republican China needed was, in effect, an "institutional breakthrough" - some means by which to climb out of this morass of weakness and begin to implement a vision of centrally led institution building and development while standing up to external pressure.2 Over the course of the Republican period, there were two analytically distinct methods or "logics" by which government elites worked to build institutional capacity. The first was to try to create a new set of "good institutions" for government and administration. "Good" was now redefined to be impersonal Weberian bureaucracy, characterized by objectively oriented, efficient, rule-based technocracy, with a de facto division of labour between politicians who set policy and bureaucrats who implemented it, and a sharp legal distinction between office and office-holder as the "most rational known means of exercising authority."'3 The second "logic," which arose with the reorganization of the KMT and the expansion of revolutionary sentiment in the mid-1920s, used long-standing beliefs in the importance of "good men." In this conception, "good men" were the raw materials who would effect institutional breakthroughs via a controlled mobilization whereby political leadership would arouse the pre-existing values and commitments of those below towards collective ends, and, where "correct" values and norms were lacking, would inculcate those norms. Attempting Institutional Breakthroughs: Pre-1927 Visions and Implementation of Statist Technocracy Although the full-fledged articulation of the vision of "government as statist technocracy responsive to the executive" did not occur until the emergence of a group of Kuomintang administrative reformers in the mid-1930s, there can be little doubt that in embryo very similar principles animated both the Yuan Shikai and Beiyang governments of the 1910s 12. For the idea of an "institutional breakthrough," I slightly adapt Kenneth Jowitt's concept of a "revolutionary breakthrough" for the early developmental stage of Leninist systems. In contrast to "revolutionary breakthroughs," which are highly specific to Leninist regimes attempting to consolidate and carry out a "heroic" programme of modernization through collectivization and transformation of the basic units of society, "institutional breakthroughs" are more generic, and can be directed towards any number of different ends (including socially quite conservative ones). However, both revolutionary and institutional breakthroughs are sought after by executive elites wherever institutions are weak and fragmented. See Kenneth Jowitt, Revolutionary Breakthroughs and National Development: The Case of Romania (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. 94-95. 13. This list of attributes is drawn from Max Weber, Economy and Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 223-26. 335
336 The China Quarterly and 1920s.In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916,Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions"by regularizing,standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective"technocracy.Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole.He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path"into the bureaucracy,which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training.And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent"who had been educated either abroad or domestically in modern subjects.4 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s.The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death,and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before.The Beiyang Ministry of Finance,at least in its earliest years,seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai:in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s,when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside,the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime"men of talent"who had some mix of credentials in the "modern"subjects of government,economics and law,and practical experience in local,provincial or central govern- ment financial administration.5 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy,standardization,rationalization,examin- ation and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s,it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough,as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments.Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning.During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body,fiscally kept alive (as noted above)by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control,and loans from Western banks.16 14.This discussion draws on my article,"Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s,"Moder China,Vol.20,No.2 (April 1994).Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.),Beiyang zhengfu shigide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period)(Beijing:Zhonghua shuju,1984). 15.This segment is based on details in ch.5 of Strauss,Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No.2 Historical Archives,files 1027/176(2), 1027/179,1027/181,and1027/188(1). 16.The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial
336 The China Quarterly and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial and 1920s. In his short tenure between 1912 and 1916, Yuan Shikai devoted a considerable amount of attention to attempting to create "good institutions" by regularizing, standardizing and establishing executive control over the government bureaucracy while pushing it in the direction of "objective" technocracy. Yuan established a new system of rank classifications and procedures for promotion in the civil bureaucracy as a whole. He drew up draft regulations to re-institute nation-wide open civil service examinations that assessed a combination of literacy in Chinese and knowledge of technical subjects as the preferred "regular path" into the bureaucracy, which was then followed by a provisional assignment to a ministry and two-year probationary period of intensive training. And Yuan consistently wooed to his administration "men of talent" who had been educated either abroad or domestically in moder subjects.14 There is some evidence to suggest substantial continuity of these policies in the central Beiyang governments into the early 1920s. The first nation-wide post-imperial civil service examinations were held in 1916, shortly after Yuan Shikai's death, and were identical in form to those he proposed the year before. The Beiyang Ministry of Finance, at least in its earliest years, seems to have continued in the way outlined by Yuan Shikai: in 1917 it assigned some 35 examinees who had passed the national civil service exams to a two-year probationary appointment. Until the early 1920s, when large numbers of staff began to be regularly replaced with those from outside, the Ministry of Finance probably retained many of the Yuan Shikai regime "men of talent" who had some mix of credentials in the "moder" subjects of government, economics and law, and practical experience in local, provincial or central government financial administration.15 Although the Yuan Shikai and early Beiyang government push towards central government technocracy, standardization, rationalization, examination and training systems provided a powerful model that continued to influence parts of the National Government once the KMT came to power in the late 1920s, it did not in its own time effect an institutional breakthrough, as it had no means by which to project its authority much beyond Beijing into highly unstable and militarized provincial and local environments. Taxes from the provinces simply did not come in and government regulations had little meaning. During the Beiyang period the central government of China operated as a head without a body, fiscally kept alive (as noted above) by regular transfusions of the surpluses remitted by quasi-government tax collection agencies that it did not control, and loans from Western banks.16 14. This discussion draws on my article, "Symbol and reflection of the reconstituting state: the Examination Yuan in the 1930s," Moder China, Vol. 20, No. 2 (April 1994). Many of the original details can be found in Qian Shipu (ed.), Beiyang zhengfu shiqide zhengzhi zhidu (The Political System of the Beiyang Government Period) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984). 15. This segment is based on details in ch. 5 of Strauss, Strong Institutions in Weak Polities, with the original documentation from the No. 2 Historical Archives, files 1027/176 (2), 1027/179, 1027/181, and 1027/188 (1). 16. The fact that the Beiyang government in Beijing was the officially recognized central government of China meant that control of it provided automatic access to a range of financial