Study On The Historical Roles And Evolution Of Surveillance Commissioners In The Qing Dynasty

The functions and roles of the surveillance commissioners changed little before The Late Qing Dynasty when China was in the traditional society. In The Late Qing Dynasty, China was on the way from a trditional society into a modern society and the government had to take measures to deal with the increasingly severe predominating crisis inside and outside. With the evolution of the society visage, the society administration changed, which reflected on the evolution of the connotation of the surveillance commissioners'roles and the diversifications of their duty.Viewing the evolution of the duty and roles of the surveillance commissioners, their role in charge of the punishment concourse had new connotation. With the cases dealing with the peoples who believed in religions rising, the traditional national litigations developed into international ones involving with clergymen and religious civilians under the protection of the consular jurisdiction. The content of the surveillance commissioners'judicatory adjudgement was extended because of interrogating the cases involving with clergymen and religious civilians. The surveillance commissioners'role as inquisitor was weakened with the system of executing on the spot coming into being because of the custom that the laws are executed strictly in troubled times. The surveillance commissioners became the promotors of the patrol police and the ameliorators of the prison administration.With the abolishement of self-protect system and the influence of the western culture, the cops as a new way in public security appeared and the prison administration had new measures and moves. The supervising duty of the suoervisors was increasingly weakened due to the corruption of officialdom in The Late Qing Dynasty. The inspecting role of the surveillance commissioners in the imperial examinations ended with the abolishment of the systen of the imperial examinations. The role of the surveillance commissioners as dak general manager was also weakened little by little with the system of dak abolished gradually and the afferent impingement of the telegram technology. The Qing government started to reduce and remove the posthouses and set up the post offices because of the status of the dak declined and the demand of the public.Viewing the evolution of the missions of the surveillance commissioners, their traditional missions remained and new missions were manifolded. The surveillance commissioners began to act as temporary diplomats while participating in the negotiation of signing up the treaties with foreign countries and interrogating the cases involving with foreign clergymen and religious civilians. Their military missions increased especially during the time of repressing Taiping Rebellion and Nian Army uprising. The surveillance commissioners of civil service were accustomed to leading the army doing battles against the uprisers inside and the foreign invaders outside, and they became commanders. The surveillance commissioners'military talents were taken into consideration as fit government officials. The leap of the military missions to the surveillance commissioners resulted in increasing cases without adjudgement, which crippled their basic roles in charge of the punishment concourse. Some surveillance commissioners became the participators by taking part in the Westernization Movement and the New Policy of The Late Qing Dynasty conducted by the Qing government to deal with the political crisis. The emergence of the trend of the diversification of the surveillance commissioners'temporay missions is the reflection of the social division of the work and the multeity of society, economy and politics. The diversification of the role with temporay missions ran counter to the trend of the development of society in which the specialization of management were required. It was of necessity to transfer the traditional social management mechanism in oder to meet the need of the society with increasing differentiation.The local administrative reform in the New Policy of The Late Qing Dynasty transformed the system of the surveillance commissioners completely, which eliminated a lot of temporary roles of the surveillance commissioners and peeled off the old and new temporary appointed missions, and improved the specialization of the judicial commissioners originating from the surveillance commissioners.It also separated judicature from administration, judicatory administration from judicatory adjudgement, judgement from inspectation and judgement from reconnaissance in terms of laws so that it changed the old provincial judicatory administration in which the judicature mechanism was totally confused into a new one in which the judicial commissioners were the provincial elisor procurators with a clear social role in charge of the laws. The process from the evolution of the duty and roles of the surveillance commissioners and the diversification of the surveillance commissioners with temporay appointed missions to the specialization of the provincial law-officers in the New Policy of The Late Qing Dynasty was a process of judicatory modernization in its essence and also a part of China's society modernization. With the rapid perdition of the Qing Dynasty, the administrative system of the the provincial law-officers didn't develop and continue, but the reform of the system design of the surveillance commissioners relative to the juicatory system in the traditional society was an innovation of the provincial judiciary which accorded with the trend of the development of the history due to its reform direction with specialization.The evolution of the roles of the surveillance commissioners in The Late Qing Dynasty resulting from the evolution of the essential social contradictions and reflecting the evolution of the social administrative quomodo have a profound impact on the transformation of China's society, which promote the advancement of the methods for local public security, the establishment of foreign affairs institutions, the naissance of many new social administrative institutions and impel the political and economic modernizations, especially the modernization of the provincial judicatory in China's society representing China's transformation from a traditional society to a modern one.