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1 results

  • 11 - State, Society and Trained Violence in China, 618–1500

  • from Part III - Social, Interpersonal and Collective Violence
  • Edited by Matthew S. Gordon, University of Miami, Richard W. Kaeuper, University of Rochester, New York, Harriet Zurndorfer, Universiteit Leiden
  • Book:
    The Cambridge World History of Violence
    Published online:
    13 March 2020
    Print publication:
    26 March 2020, pp 228-247

  • Summary

    Trained violence was a central forum for establishing the relationship between Chinese dynastic governments and their subjects. Because training in the use of violence (martial arts), along with access to weapons, determined an imperial subject’s effectiveness in carrying out violence in the service of the state, or in resisting the will of the state, imperial governments were always concerned to confine skills and weapons to those loyal to the state. Not only did different dynasties solve that problem differently at the beginning of their rule, the institutions governing training in violence changed over time in response to a government’s evolving society and external threats. Seen in this light, a state’s control over trained violence and access to weapons is a direct reflection of that state’s evaluation of its subjects’ loyalty and commitment to dynastic goals.