The Change Of Wancheng Dike’s Financial Management Procedures In The Qing Dynasty(1788-1911)

The Wancheng Dike which is located in Jingzhou city and hailed as "an important guarantee for all state’s security" is an important dike construction in the Qing Dynasty in Hubei Province, After Jingjiang River flood in Qianlong fifty-three years (1788 AD),Chinese government had adopted the mode of government- managed and local residents-invested which continued to the End of Qing Dynasty.During the 19th century,the Wancheng Dike’s financial management procedures has some changesThere were two kinds of capital using, the annual repair and the restoration of broken dike.During more than a century,the cost of the annual repair had a growing trend. When the dike was broken in the flood, the government had to spend much money to restore the dike.It was more expensive than the annual repair.There was the three great changes in the Wancheng Dike’s financial management procedures. From the late Qianlong period to Jiaqing period,Shuili tongzhi(the state subprefect of water conservancy management) was placed in charge of the Wancheng Dike The capital of the annual repair was the loan of governmental funds,then the local residents who was beneficial to the Wancheng dike were be taxed to repay the governmental funds. During the Daoguang period, Jingzhou Zhifu(Jingzhou state prefect) had taken over the Wancheng Dike because of the shortage of land tax which was to repay the governmental founds. During the Daoguang period, Jingzhou Zhifu(Jingzhou state prefect) had taken over the Wancheng Dike because the loan of governmental fund was hard to repay.The flood was frequently in this period and when the Wancheng dike was broken by the flood,the government was spent much money to restore the Wancheng dike. Light began to appear larger than dike management problems, the cost and the effect is not large. Xianfeng period to the xuantong period, the annual repairs by magistrate raised pad, dike spread out mainly by soil fee levy, sometimes can borrow lijin salt class turnover. Xuantong, the newly established bureau of consultations for the operation of bank fees make up the supervision. During this period each year annual repairs cost, annual repairs fee mainly depends on soil. However this time bank fee to work defects. In terms of the overall effect of disaster prevention, annual repairs cost is redundant in late qing dynasty emperor qianlong, but the effect is not satisfactory.Wancheng dike is an important public works, management of the good or not, embodies the ability of national governance. Throughout the 19th century, under the action of inside and outside China in appears the trend of the social complexity. The internal economic development and social differentiation, close to the outside of the global economy and the impact of the western, caused the social ecology becomes more complicated. Economic development is facing the challenge of environmental degradation, increasing social affairs to gentry and local power influence expanding. The complication of the qing government governance ability put forward higher requirements it requires countries to mobilize more resources, absorb more group participation, adopt more effective policy options. In the 19th century, however, the qing government’s political practice indicates that it failed to meet the needs of the society. From light when triggered by the economic crisis, because of lack of silver to the word chaos reconstruction and cope with the impact of the west, conservative rule of the qing government failed to shift from concept and system of our nation, improving the capacity of national governance. Fail this led to China’s national strength of a long-term, and the economy failed to continue the benign development of the social order is disorder.How to make the state governance and economic development, adapt to the complicated situation of diversified social, keeping national prosperity and stability of the situation, this is the era of China to answer proposition in the 19th century. Wancheng levee bank fee for the operation of the evolution reflects the response to this proposition given at that time and encounter difficulties.