A Reanalysis On "Theory Of Slacken-the-banning "in Daoguang Period Of Qing Dynasty

In times of modern China before 1949, the opium problems, in some respects, with which it began and followed to the end, had deep and wide impacts as a serious social problem. In Daoguang period of Qing Dynasty, the officials of all levels presented many solutions in the face of hazards caused by smuggling of opium,"theory of slacken-the-banning"was one of them. such stand held the prevention of the silver's outflow as the primary aim, attempted to curb the outflow of silver through the barter way in trade, to increase government's revenue with the legalization of the opium trade, to resist the foreign imports by the localization of the poppy, to cure ultimately the opium problem of China by the way of easing the prohibition. This view was in accordance with the social situation at that time, and was once accepted by the ruler. However, such view can not be accepted by the conservative scholar-officials as its formidable fatal defects and its solutions which really means to drink poison to quench thirst, and finally got its clamoring down with the retirement of Xu Naiji.However, the opium policy implemented by the government in the latter time of Qing Dynasty almost fitted the view of"theory of slacken-the-banning"standed forward, which to some extent implied such view's practicality and relevance of the time. The aim of this article is trying to objectively summarize and evaluate the role they had at that time by analyzing all of views of"theory of slacken-the-banning", in order to give it its proper historical position.This article is divided into the following sections: the introduction includes summarizes of the article's major contents and status of the research, and research review of the literature; the first part discusses the social background of such view and their representatives; the second part analyzes the main point of such view; the third part discusses the negative points of it; the forth part analyzes its rationality; the fifth part is the conclusion, mainly discusses the fundamental aim and its relationship with the opium traders, then discusses the deposition of Xu Naiji by the emperor Daoguang.