| Research Abstract |
During 2005, I completed the following research related activities.
1.Within Japan, I visited Kyoto University Library, the Library of the Graduate School of Letter, Kyoto University, and the Documentation and Information Center for Chinese Studies at the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, where I collected materials on the purchase of office.
2.Internationally, I visited and collected materials at the following : National Library of China, Beijing University Library, Library of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Nanjing University Library, Gansu Provincial Library, and Qinghai Provincial Library. Further, with my own private funds, I visited and collected materials at the Tianjin Library and the Nankai University Library.
3.At the National Library of China, I presented a talk entitled "Education on China at Japanese Universities."
4.Based on materials collected last year, I created a database of donators' lists from the relief efforts of a disaster in 1889 in China's Zhejiang Province. Additionally, I analyzed these donator lists.
5.Using the example of flooding in Zhejiang in 1889, I analyzed the social impact and role of post-purchasing. In the fiscal system of the Qing state, more than eighty percent of expenditure was devoted to support of the imperial clan, officials' salaries, military costs, etc. Nearly nothing was allocated for responding to natural disasters. In regard to relief efforts, the state did reduce taxes and sometimes offer relief funds. However, most of these were not specially earmarked funds. In this context, the government, in order to raise more funds, implemented. the sale of offices. In the case of 1889, the government sold positions as government students at the National University and honorary governmental posts in order to raise cash.
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