Looming For Two Hundred Years

Opium house, also called opium dens, is a specialized sites for the use of opium and providing related service. In China, opium house had emerged no later than the early years of Yongzheng, and probably had been produced in the late Ming Dynasty. It had been eliminated after the foundation of PRC. During the period over 200 years, the policies concerned with opium house vary from ban to relaxation depend on those in power. With its influence, the existence of opium house shows a picture that hiding or appearing in general.To the terms of category, this study should be confined as microscopic study of opium history. The basic point is that most of existing researches on the view of macro history. There are two dimensions, link to awakening nation-state from a political point of view, or treat China as a part of the world's opium trade market from an economic point of view, or discuss the relationship between taxation and authority on the view of combining these two. In this sense, opium house, as a thing that had been existed for such a long time and concerned with so many people, deserved a detailed and in-depth analysis.This research draws the theories and methods of micro-history and new cultural history.The following are the main contents of parts of this thesis:Part one, focus on the existence of opium house, following the clue of authorities' opium policies. Tracing the flow of opium in China, find that opium house throughout the land of China with the expansion of opium's marketing system. Although opium had been banned by those in power again and again, opium house existed for so long because of the dependence of opium tax and incomplete sovereignty.Part two, focus on the management and consumption of opium house, and refer to supervision from authorities. In which the business involves the holder, business strategy and guild, the consumption related to consumer and consumer content. This paper also pays attention to the waiters and the parasite in opium house.Part three, focus on the social cognition of opium house and the link between opium house and China's image. The main society's attitude to opium house took a remarkable change in 1906 with large-scale opium banning, from approval to against. Opium house, as the thing widely recognized by foreigners, become an integral element of China's image at a large extent, and been interpreted again and again.In conclusion, opium house is a pathological product of the sick society, and opium house exacerbates the sick. Thus, only the society is changed radically, opium house can be swept away.