Why was China weaker than Japan in the 19th century? -

China was responsible for some of the most powerful dynasties before the 19th century while Japan practiced seclusion for almost two centuries. Why is it then when the 19th century came around, China was weaker than anyone had ever imagine?

Well, I have to consider your time-frame here. I think it goes from events that occurred cumulatively from the 1700s to the early 1900s. The quot;nineteenthquot; century is in the 1800s, is that what you meant? China s real downfall began in the 1840s. China s individual monarchies had come under the control of the empire (an empire is a monarchy over other monarchies - plural) way before our recorded history, and after that, China s society and political system had steadily declined in function because the realm was too large for any one central emperor to monitor and control. Actually, the monarchy heirs began to take less and less interest in the people and the empire! There was also the drug trade, which England participated in from the 1800s to the early 1900s. It really decimated the Chinese culture. The Russo-Japanese war affected all of the Asian nations, but China wanted to be more isolationist in its military defense. There were also internal wars and rebellions which began to divide the people into regional groups after the empire was formed. They even had their own languages! This lead to a lack of communication, just as with our Mongolian Americans (whom we wrongly call quot;Indiansquot;) on northern America were also unable to communicate with each other about their invasion by Europeans; when our Admiral Perry invaded China and Japan with threats to use our superior navy and military against them, this further weakened the Chinese system of self-sufficient markets and defense. quot;Japanquot; (Nihon) on the other hand, although resentful of our US and the European commercial invaders, copied everything new-technology that they saw as being critical or advantageous. They developed by copying everything military especially, and improved their communications. China was actually ripe for being conquered. Japan pretty much became an uncontrollable tyrant by the time of the Russo-Japanese war. This is just a rudimentary explanation. I hope I have helped you out, I did not check Wikipedia but you might want to investigate there for some information.

The Japanese saw that, in order to defend themselves against the west, they had to modernize. In China, people refused to do that. They, especially the Mandarins wanted to stick to their original culture, with the Mandarins at important positions, all living after Confucius philosophy. One political movement was encouraging modernization, but because there was little respect for technicians, and modern trade didn t match their culture. Japanese did modernize, especially their army, which was why they won the war in 1894. China had to lose the boxer-war in 1899, against the western world, before they finally started to adept their culture.

cuz the last ruler of the Qin, the queen, didntt care about about the military and spent all the money on like palaces and bath houses... instead of modernizing the miliary... and japan came in with guns and stuff and china was still using swords...