Ming Dynasty 1566 —— A living sample of the political structure and the law of rise and fall of feudal dynasties
The plot of this drama focuses on the two core figures, Emperor Jiajing and Hai Rui of Daming, and describes a series of events around the "Chao Bureau" from 39 to 45 years of Jiajing. In my opinion, apart from the well-known reasons such as careful costume props and incisive characterization, the core of this drama is to give the audience a glimpse of the principles of political structure design and the underlying logic of power distribution in China feudal dynasty. This part of the content is always interspersed with the plot, or is clearly or implicitly displayed in the plot. In the last episode, on the deathbed of Jiajing, with the last machine argument with Harry, the two contradictory and unified contradictions of "Jiangshan" and the emperor's mind were taught to Yu Wang and the young Wanli. Jiajing made an appropriate analogy between the Yangtze River and the Yellow River. Jiajing said, "The Yangtze River is clear and the Yellow River is turbid ..... The water of the Yangtze River has irrigated the fields on both sides of several provinces, and the water of the Yellow River has also irrigated the fields on both sides of several provinces, so it can only be used only because of the clear water, and it can only be neglected because of the turbid water." Criticizing Harry for not knowing how to govern the country, he advised himself to use the Yangtze River instead of the Yellow River in his recitation. The governance of the Yangtze River and the Yellow River illustrates the reasons of killing Xia Yan, Yang Jisheng and Shen Lian, and killing a bunch of corrupt officials such as Yan Song and Yan Shifan. It is nothing more than a clean stream represented by the Yangtze River or a power traitor represented by the Yellow River. Once it cannot be used by the imperial power, it threatens the status of the imperial power, just like "the water flooded the mountain", so it must be abandoned. When Harry was taken back to the imperial court, faced with a disappointed little Wanli, Jiajing said to him, "What others promised you doesn't count, only what you can decide counts." Teach children and grandchildren the supremacy of imperial power and the emperor's dogmatism. At the last moment when Jiajing was about to die, when he explained the affairs to Zhu Zaihou, the weak and honest king of Yu, he left Hai Rui's "Sword of Daming" to his son, and revealed the last mystery between him and Hai Rui's monarch and his subjects: "Hai Rui's performance is to hope that I will take the people as the foundation and govern the Ming Dynasty." Through the ups and downs of the plot, the relationship of the ternary structure of the ancient feudal dynasty society in China was skillfully displayed.
all of them show that they died of party struggle. I think they are only half right, and they have not raised the fundamental structural problems. In the late Eastern Han Dynasty, the Qing Dynasty's discussion and partisanship, and the party struggle between Niu and Li in the late Tang Dynasty were as harmful as the party struggle in the Ming Dynasty. At best, this is just an internal contradiction of the ruling class. The power structure of China feudal dynasty can be roughly divided into three systems: imperial power, bureaucratic group and civilian class. Among them, the imperial power and the power of bureaucratic groups are interdependent, and the power of the civilian class, including agriculture, industry and commerce, has been squeezed. The degree of squeezing depends on whether the incumbent is a "wise king" or a "bad king". The emperor needs to rely on bureaucratic groups to rule the vast territory, complete the realization of imperial power, maintain the stability of imperial power, and thus compromise and grant part of the power of imperial power to bureaucratic groups for use. Bureaucratic groups rely on imperial power to obtain privileges different from those of the civilian class: such as not paying taxes, not serving, and even "wasting money" and land annexation. However, the imperial power and bureaucratic system, an organization that has absolute discourse power and lacks effective constraints, have an irreversible trend of self-expansion. Even if a wise master like Emperor Taizong or an able official like Zhang Juzheng appeared to carry out the reform of the distribution mechanism similar to "Long Wan Reform" and create a temporary prosperity of "Zhenguan Governance" and "Wanli Zhongxing", but the fundamental problem of power distribution was not solved, the historical law of "long-term separation and long-term separation will inevitably appear.
Churchill said, "There are no eternal friends or enemies, only eternal interests." At the beginning of the play, Jiajing, who represents the interests of imperial power, showed superb ruling art: Qingliu Group headed by Xu Jie managed the household department to check and balance the strict party and prevent these corrupt officials from emptying the treasury. When Gao Gong questioned that the Ministry of Industry spent a lot of money to repair the palace view for Jiajing, he skillfully expressed his support for Yan Shifan with the phrase "Only a hero can marry nine wives". At the same time, the eunuch group was used as its own minions and megaphones, instead of its own voice, forcing civil servants to pander. In the end, whether the palace is good or not, the emperor needs to maximize the interests of imperial power, and hopes that these people below will check and balance each other and ensure their position as the final arbiter. So that later, after Lu Fang privately held Maotai to persuade the first and second assistants to drink, Jiajing thought that when the three men joined forces to endanger their right to speak, Lu Fang was sent to Xiuling as a punishment. When Yan Party lost control and endangered the stability of the regime, he made decisive moves to oust Yan Song and eliminate Yan Party. For imperial power, it is more important to maintain its supremacy and stability. As for who is the representative of the bureaucratic group, it is irrelevant. Xu Jie, unwilling to pander to the sacred will, used the national treasury for Jiajing's private use, and Jiajing quickly enabled Chen Hong to be the official eunuch of Sili supervisor, and used the eunuch power to suppress the civilian group that tried to "rule the monarch and his subjects". The Qingliu Group, which seems to be concerned about the country and the people, was silent in the process of formulating the national policy of "changing rice into mulberry", and did not lend grain to Zhejiang after destroying the embankment and flooding the fields, trying to force the southeast to squeeze out the "rotten sore" of Zhejiang, leaving hundreds of thousands of people living in Zhejiang in disregard, and even saying that "1, people are dead, and millions of people are dead" is nothing more than hoping to overthrow Yan Song and replace it. Therefore, Jia Jing, who knows this well, also warned his son when he drew up the candidates for the future records of Yu Wang: "Sometimes it is not up to them to be virtuous or not, so he will use them when he is virtuous, and he will be ashamed when he is not virtuous", which is the fundamental policy of employing people.
As for the largest number of civilians with the weakest power, in the history of two thousand years, they have always been insignificant supporting roles. As all the sources of productivity, they have supported the imperial class and bureaucratic groups. Even a giant like Shen Yishi can only be attached to the bureaucratic groups and imperial power, which shows that businessmen cannot become an independent political force under this system, and finally they are hollowed out by the former two and burned themselves. And the peasants with more humble status are just "numbers" in the mouth of a Confucian scholar like Zhao Zhenji, let alone. These large, docile and industrious civilians, in the feudal dynasty, either became farmers who paid for food and taxes, or became craftsmen who built cities, or sergeant who settled the frontier and opened up territory. Among them, the number of farmers is the largest and the exploitation is the strongest. When Hai Rui tried the Qin case, he faced Tan Lun and Wang Yongji in the post office to persuade him that "the greed for ink in the officialdom all started in the imperial court", and counted that "the grain rice saved every year in Zhejiang is 629, tons, but it costs 1.23 million tons. With two years' grain storage in Zhejiang, it is not enough for the royal government to supply rice in one year." More pointed to "royal clan, * * * heavy eunuchs, officials at all levels, the merger of the grange accounts for half of the world are not paid. Wang people can cultivate less than half of the land in the world, but they have to pay the tax of the world. The people worked hard to enrich the national treasury, but the national treasury was squandered by the two classes, and the land on which they lived was constantly deprived by the powerful class, and the living space was constantly squeezed and there was no means to bind each other, so they had to use the only and extremely lethal power in their hands-rebellion. The fundamental reason why the feudal dynasties in China eventually declined and perished was that the land, the core means of production of the civilian class, was constantly annexed by the imperial power class and bureaucratic strongmen, and eventually rose up.
In this way, the old ternary structure was overthrown, and the winner established a new ternary structure. Then, after the initial period, the common people cultivated their lives and raised their interest-the country prospered-the imperial power and bureaucratic strongmen continued to expand-the living space of the common people continued to deteriorate-the common people rebelled-and a new order was established. Just like the Monkey King said, "Everyone in the emperor will do it and come to my house this year." However, unlike the West, which evolved from the Stone Age to the Bronze Age, then to the Iron Age and finally to the industrial civilization, China's feudal dynasty just kept rolling in the quagmire of the turn of the tide, repeating the futility of destruction-reconstruction-destruction for two thousand years, with no obvious progress in its productivity and finally falling behind the world.
prosperity, people suffer; Death makes the people suffer.