Investigation Of The Overseas Personnel Into The Western Prisons In The Late Qing Dynasty

In the late Qing Dynasty, the communications between the eastern and western countriesbecame more and more, many people began to go abroad to Europe, America and Japan forstudy, travel and work. These persons going abroad without any exception felt the impact ofthe Western politic and culture. As a reflection of the political, economic and culturaldevelopment of the country, especially the strongly stimulation of the extraterritorialjurisdiction, prison became the investigated object of numerous overseas personnel.These overseas personnel investigated the western prisons in different time, and theinvestigated prisons were also different. Besides that, the records left by these overseasofficers were varied in details. Their investigations into the western prisons involved manyaspects, such as the western prisons’ internal and external facilities, the prisoners’ life,education reform, and management system. However, affected by characteristics ofinvestigation, individual endowment and other factors, the western prisons in the eyes of theoverseas personnel were deviated from the reality. At that time, the nationals had not anyknowledge about prison. On such background, the overseas personnel made the "the westernprison impression" input home in the form of writing. It can be said that their writingprovided the knowledge reservation for the prison reform in the late Qing Dynasty. Theirunderstanding of the nature of the prison, and their avocations and reflections of the prisonreform made ideological enlightenment for the prison reform in the late Qing Dynasty. Therarer thing was that Huang Zunxian, Dai Hongci and others promoted the process of prisonreform in the late Qing Dynasty through their own practical action.