Civil Examinations and Meritocracy in Late Imperial China

Benjamin A. Elman

Published by Harvard University Press 2013

Civil Examinations and Meritocracy in Late Imperial China

Benjamin A. Elman

https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674726048

Overview
Contents

About this book

During China's late imperial period (roughly 1400-1900 CE), men gathered by the millions every two or three years outside official examination compounds sprinkled across China. Only one percent of candidates would complete the academic regimen that would earn them a post in the administrative bureaucracy. Civil Examinations assesses the role of education, examination, and China's civil service in fostering the world's first professional class based on demonstrated knowledge and skill. Civil examinations were instituted in China in the seventh century CE, but in the Ming and Qing eras they were at the center of a complex social web that held together the intellectual, political, and economic life of imperial China. Local elites and the court sought to influence how the government regulated the classical curriculum and selected civil officials. As a guarantor of educational merit, examinations tied the dynasty to the privileged gentry and literati classes--both ideologically and institutionally. China eliminated its classical examination system in 1905. But this carefully balanced, constantly contested piece of social engineering, worked out over centuries, was an early harbinger of the meritocratic regime of college boards and other entrance exams that undergirds higher education in much of the world today.

Author / Editor information

Elman Benjamin A. :

Benjamin A. Elman is Gordon Wu ’58 Professor of Chinese Studies at Princeton University.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Conventions Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I Becoming Mainstream: “Way Learning” during the Late Empire
1. Ming Imperial Power, Cultural Politics, and Civil Examinations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	13
2. Ming to Qing: “Way Learning” Standards and the 8- Legged Essay Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	46
Part II Unintended Consequences of Civil Examinations
3. Circulation of Ming- Qing Elites Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	95
4. Classical Literacy in Late Imperial China Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	126
5. Anxiety, Dreams, and the Examination Life Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147
Part III Retooling Civil Examinations to Suit Changing Times
6. Limits of Dynastic Power Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	213
7. From Ming to Qing Policy Questions Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	250
8. Curricular Reform: From Qing to the Taipings Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	280
Appendixes
1. Dates of Chinese Dynasties Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	323
2. Emperors of the Great Ming (1368– 1644) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	325
3. Emperors of the Great Qing (1644– 1911) Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	327
Abbreviations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	329
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	333
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	387
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	391

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 401
Illustrations
- Other: 2 halftones, 20 line illustrations, 2 maps, 14 tables

eBook

Published: November 1, 2013
ISBN: 9780674726048