Shangji System And Social Control In Warring States,Qin And Han Dynasties

During Warring States,Qin and Han Dynasties,the ancient China evolved gradually from a regional territorial state to a unified empire,while the Shangji system played the role of "baton" and "reinforcement" in this process.It is a system that can guarantee the state to understand and evaluate the performance of officials at all levels,to sustain the national administrative system for self-immunization and to control the society as well.Shangji system is formed with the formation of the centralized territorial state,and the development and the intensity of implementation varied with the autocratic monarchy,centralization,bureaucracy and governing policy,while what remains the same is the fundamental purpose and essential characteristics that the state relied on the system to control the society.The operation of the Shangji system relies on documents.The composition of the Shangji documents seen in the bamboo slips is diverse,including coupon(券)、Die(牒)、Bu(簿)、Ji(籍)、Ji(计)、Ke(课)、Lu(录)、Zhi(志),while the Shangji books are only the normal forms of the Shangji documents.The Shangji documents should be made in accordance with statutory norms and fixed formats,and should be stratified and integrated from bottom to top according to the administrative levels of township,county and shire,which reflects the tight rein of the state in the design of books,financial settlement,book circulation,transmission timeliness and hierarchical management.The historiographers are the executors of Shangji affairs,who are responsible for the quality of the documents,the accuracy of the data and the operation effect of the system,hence,the quality and ability of the historiographers count essentially.The state must strengthen the cultivation and management on them.County Lingshi(令史),as a representative of historiographers,played an important role in grass-roots administration and bookkeeping control in Qin and early Han dynasties.However,in the late Western Han Dynasty,the status of paviliong and the number of village constable continued to rise,and the state shifted from bookkeeping control to regional control,which objectively strengthened and supplemented the Shangji system.Historiographers are the main source of bureaucratic group.Strengthening the assessment of historiographers means the control of all officials,so as to achieve the purpose of governing the people through controlling the officials.Household registration,land and taxes and so on are the main contents of the Shangji system,the important indicators of the state assessment for officials,and the core elements of state control of the society.At that time,the country was generally sparsely populated,and the number of registered permanent residence was the primary standard to measure the development of social productive forces.The Shangji system relies on household registration system to control the identity,age and other information of the registered residents,focusing on the control and mobilization of able-bodied labor force.The state strictly controls the household registration transfer system,and uses "Jihu(积户)" and"Xianhu(见户)" as two ways to control the registration.No matter how the location of registered residence changes,the subjective purpose of strengthening registered residence control has never changed.The land-granting system is the basis of Shangji the land.The government "Tifeng(提封)" different types of land,grants them to the farmers according to their households,and sets up Tianguan(田官)to organize production and reclamation,and focuses on controlling reclamation land with economic values.With the help of atlas,"Tianbidiji(田比地籍)" and "Tianmingji(田命籍)",the state strictly administers the land reclaimed by the registered residents.With a low status,Sikou(司寇)was allocated only half the field of Shiwu(仕伍),but the burden of taxes and servitude are more onerous."Sikoutianji(司寇田计)"、"Sikoutianke(司寇田课)”shows the state control of special registered residents.The state strives to control household registration and land in order to achieve taxation.Land tax is one of the main sources of national finance.Rent coupons are a major manifestation of the standardization and rigor of land tax collection,and"Zuwuquan(租误券)" is found to show the intensity of the state’s control of land tax revenue under the strict implementation of Shangji system.Market tax is also an important part of taxation.The way to generate wealth is nothing more than the development of industry and commerce.However,the excessive development of industry and commerce not only causes the reduction of land tax,but also affects social stability and the rule of the country.The state thus controls clothes and horses to restrict the political status of Guangu(官贾).The property collected from taxation is concentrated in the warehouse.The state strengthens the management of property from three aspects:the establishment and duty guard of the warehouse,Kuaiji(廥籍)system and the entry and exit procedures,the grain weighing and the storage measurement.In essence,it is to control the state-owned assets,so as to ensure the effective operation of the state apparatus and the long-term unification of political territory.