Insurgent Ecology and the Rise of the Taiping Rebellion, 1847-1853

• In Event: 285 - Regular Session. Historical Sociology 2. Changing China: Political Upheaval and Societal Transformations in the 19th and 20th Century

Abstract

This article develops an ecological theory to revisit a historical puzzle: why and how could the Taiping Rebellion take off from local insurgencies occurring since the late 1840s? Instead of using preexisting structural or internal organizational factors to explain revolutions/rebellions, this article argues that the totality of rebellious and repressive forces constitute an insurgent ecology in which certain rebellions could gain an advantage. Furthermore, the ecological nature of state reactions drives the divergence of rebellious development. This article first depicts a picture of the militarized and confrontational society comprised of rebels, pirates, bandits, militias, and other forces that occupied Guangxi province since the late 1840s. The Taiping Rebellion was triggered by fierce competition among these militarized groups, radicalized by ideological competition with local popular religions, and driven to assemble its diffusive adherents because of its disadvantaged role in this perilous environment. On the other hand, the Qing state employed most of its regular forces to fight against their familiar Triad rebels and bandits, and thus overlooked the assembly of Taiping insurgents in late 1850 and had not identified Taiping as rebellious until 1851. Even after the outbreak of the Taiping rebellion in early 1851, the Qing state was unable to redeploy its regular forces in order to pacify Taiping, since it needed to cope with other rebellions as well. The paper concludes that the relationship between the insurgent ecology and the focal group is key to understanding the rebellion’s emergence.

Author

• Yang Zhang, University of Chicago