Library has v. 2 only.
Digital ed.: [Staunton-Embassy.pdf (v.1-3)]
Vol.1 Internet Archive.
Vol.2 Internet Archive.
Vol.3 Internet Archive.

Links to this plus French, German and Dutch editions online at Bibliotheca Sinica 2.0.

Contents: The imperial court, metroplitan administration; provincial administration, government of Peking, three manchurian provinces, the Manchu military organization, the Chinese army, hereditary ranks, titles of honor and decorations, examinations and official degrees, Buddhism and Taoism, Mongolia and Turkestan; Tibet and the Lamaist hierarchy, appendix, radical index, alphabetical index.

Susan Naquin and Evelyn S. Rawski.
Part One: Qing Society / Government Policies ; Social Relations ; Cultural Life -- Part Two: Change and Diversity in Eighteenth-Century Society / Social Change ; Regional Societies ; The Eighteenth-Century Legacy.
Includes bibliography (p. 243-263) and Index.

1. Introduction -- 2. Defining Categories: Disputes and Lawsuits in North China Villages Before the Communist Revolution -- 3. Informal Justice: Mediation in North China Villages Before the Communist Revolution -- 4. Formal Justice: Codified Law and Magisterial Adjudication in the Qing -- 5. Between Informal Mediation and Formal Adjudication: The Third Realm of Qing Justice -- 6. Two Patterns in the Qing Civil Justice System -- 7. Extent, Cost, and Strategies of Litigation -- 8. From the Perspective of Magistrate Handbooks -- 9. Max Weber and the Qing Legal and Political Systems -- App. A. Village and County Data -- App. B. Weights and Measures.

The opening of archives on legal case records and judicial administration in China has made possible a new examination of past assumptions about the Chinese justice system. Scholars can now ask where actual legal practice deviated from official and popular conceptualizations and depictions. In the process, they can arrive at a new understanding not only of the legal system, but of state-society relations and the nature of the Chinese social-political system as a whole. Studies of Chinese justice also permit the joining together of social and cultural history. Historians of society and economy, on the one hand, and of mentalities and culture, on the other, have long tended to go their separate ways. Law, however, is a sphere of life in which the two are inseparable. Legal case records contain evidence for both practice and representation.--OCLC record.

"This institution, an unofficial adjunct to the provincial bureaucratic structure ... experienced its climactic development during the Qing ... evolved as a practical solution to the conflict between administrative needs of the empire and the cultural ideals of the scholar-official. Refusing to become a professional administrator, the scholar had to employ ... professionals in government who could guide him through the maze of official regulations ... the flexible nature of the mufu sustem enabled it to absorb experts in Western style international diplomacy, weaponry, production, transportation ... Self-strengthening movement ..."--dustjacket.

Preserved in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, the kesi (silk tapestry) of the British Embassy has been exhibited in the context of Europe’s economic, cultural and exploitative encounters with the Americas, Africa and Asia. The kesi, which has contributed to the misinterpretation of China’s practice of foreign relations, provides invaluable insight into the political strategies of the Qianlong Emperor in the face of British imperialism. The work commemorates the infamous meeting between the Emperor and the English ambassador George Macartney in 1793. The event marks the failed negotiation between two incommensurable power systems due to conflicting interests and grave misunderstandings on both sides. Yet in English and Chinese language histories, the failed negotiation is often attributed to the backwardness of China’s practice of foreign relations. Within the context of historical writing and museum display, the kesi is made to emphasize the Emperor’s cultural blindness and ignorance of the changing world beyond China. A closer reading of the kesi will reveal that its image and inscription integrates the zhigong tu genre (the official documentation of China’s foreign relations) and li (the guiding principle of China’s foreign relations). I will argue that the emperor employed the zhigong tu genre and li to assert the power of the Qing Empire and divert his criticism of British imperialism. Pictorially the kesi follows the power structuring process of li by emphasizing the contingent relationship between the supreme lord (the Qianlong Emperor) and the lesser lord (George Macartney). The kesi’s inscription, composed by the Emperor himself, embodies the core of China’s tributary practice: “In my kindness to men from afar I make generous return.” Thus far, the kesi channels the conventions of zhigong tu and manifests the principles of li. During the Qing Dynasty, the Qianlong Emperor’s materialization of his power through the appropriation of zhigong tu and li was necessary to foster domestic confidence. The kesi, marking the end of China’s tributary practice, can be alternatively understood as the Emperor’s last capacity to maintain internal stability through the Chinese tributary system.--Abstract.

Local access dig.pdf. [Zhang Macartney.pdf]

Contents: Foreword -- Introduction: China, from empire to nation -- The Opium War -- The Taiping rebellion -- The period of imitation of western methods -- The reform movement: the first step -- The reaction to the reform movement -- Revival of the reform movement -- The struggle between the revolutionary and the constitutional movements -- Revolutionary versus constitutional movement, 1908 to 1911 -- The overthrow of the Manchu government and the establishment of the Republic of China -- The struggle between the Kuomintang and the Peiyang military clique -- Monarchical and antimonarchical movements -- Internal dissension of the Peiyang military clique, and the war lords in South China -- A federal government movement and melee among the war lords -- Reorganization of the Kuomintang and the end of the Peiyang war lords.