Study On Disaster Relief In Gansu In The Late Qing Dynasty(1875--1912)

The late Qing Dynasty was not only a period of drastic changes in Chinese society,but also a period of frequent natural and social disasters.Gansu is located in the northwest inland,where droughts,floods,hail,locusts and earthquakes occurred frequently,and plagues,wars and famines came one after another,which had a serious impact on the political,economic and social development of Gansu.Since ancient times,the ruling class had attached great importance to the famine disaster relief policy,and the two dynasties followed many measures taken by the previous dynasties.According the legal disaster relief procedures were carried out one by one in five procedures,according to the legal disaster relief procedures,including disaster reporting,disaster survey,household verification,relief distribution and relief investigation,and then started with that,the specific measures such as disaster relief,post-disaster recovery and disaster prevention and reduction would be implemented,so as to reduce the losses brought by disasters and maintain the feudal rule.However,The frequent occurrence of disasters could not be completely solved,the frequent occurrence of disastersonly by official relief.Therefore,the spontaneous voluntary disaster relief activities of folk gentry,rich people and businessmen became increasingly active and became an important supplementary form besides the to government relief efforts.With the decline of the official disaster relief force,the emergence of modern media and the introduction of western charity thoughts,justice relief gradually emerged,breaking the restrictions of traditional folk relief and developing into an emerging disaster relief force,bringing vitality to the disaster relief activities in Gansu in the late Qing Dynasty.Among them,the Gansu drought relief activities in the first year of Xuantong Dynasty reign(1909)were typical,and all forces played a non-negligible role in this disaster relief efforts.The Qing government has made great efforts to control the famine in Gansu Province,and has achieved some practical results.However,in terms of the overall effect of drought management relief policies,there are also many drawbacks in traditional official disaster relief measures.Due to the many factors that hindered policy implementation in the backward conditions of Gansu,The local conditions in Gansu are backward and there are many factors restricting the implementation of policies.Therefore,the seemingly complete and effective disaster relief mechanism is difficult to play a full role,and its actual effect is often not satisfactory.Therefore,The new justice relief radually became the key to relieving the victims in Gansu in the late Qing Dynasty.In a word,the study on disaster relief in efforts of Gansu Province in the late Qing Dynasty may offer a certain historical consult meaning for the disaster relief work in Gansu and even the whole country.