Macao in the Making of Early Sino-US Relations, 1784-1844

The Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Macao S.A.R. Government will organize an Academic Research Lecture in the Cultural Affairs Bureau Auditorium (Edifício do Instituto Cultural, Tap Seac Square, Macao) at 6:30pm on September 28 (Friday). Dr. He Sibing from Miami University will give a lecture on “Macao in the Making of Early Sino-US Relations, 1784-1844”. In the late eighteenth century, American merchants in the Canton Trade formed a trade-centered community in Macao that became the first Sino-American meeting place. The following century witnessed a significant expansion of American economic interests in East Asia. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the China trade, which ranked third in importance for the United States, surpassed only by trade with England and Cuba, evinced the preeminent role of commerce in American relations with that region. American trade with China was indeed the cardinal nexus out of which Sino-US diplomacy and missionary activity ultimately evolved. In 1844, the first Chinese-American treaty was signed at Kun Iam Temple in Wangxia, a village on the outskirts of the Portuguese settlement of Macao. This agreement, which included the most-favored-nation clause and extraterritoriality, created a mechanism that was to infringe China’s sovereignty for nearly a century to come. In this process, as a traditional entrepôt and the sole European settlement on the China coast, Macao functioned as a nexus between the old Celestial Empire and the emerging imperial state in the new continent, playing a pivotal role in the evolution of early Sino-US relations. This lecture provides a sketch of Macao’s role in the evolution of Sino-US relations during these formative years. It begins by reviewing the position of Macao during the period of the Canton trading system, from the arrival of the first trading vessel from America, the Empress of China, in 1784 to the conclusion of the Anglo-Chinese Opium War in 1842. It then examines the international status of Macao and Wangxia on the eve of the signing of the first treaty between the United States and China, in order to explain why the two governments opted to negotiate and conclude the treaty at that place. It also reveals the diplomatic role the leading American firm, Russell and Company, played in the interactions between Chinese and Americans, and finally discusses the historical implications of the Wangxia Treaty from the comparative perspective of international law. He Sibing obtained a Ph.D in US Diplomatic History from Miami University, USA, in 1997 upon the completion of his doctoral dissertation “Russell and Company, 1818-1891: America’s Trade and Diplomacy in Nineteenth-Century China”. His academic researches include Sino-US relations, overseas Chinese studies and space policy. He is currently the executive editor of Newsletter on Overseas Chinese Studies published by the Chinese University of Hong Kong Library. He has taught courses in international affairs at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies and was also the editor of Space Age Publishing Company, Kona, Hawaii, USA from 2000 to 2003. He Sibing has published a number of articles related to international relations, which include his book History of the Philippine Chinese, coauthored with Huang Zisheng, Guangdong Higher Education Press, 1st edition, 1987; enlarged edition to be published in 2007 (in Chinese) and the dissertations “Macao in the Making of Sino-US Relations: From the Empress of China to the Treaty of Wangxia, 1784-1844”, “Russell & Company and America’s Trade with Canton in the 19th Century” and “The Philippine Chinese and Sino-Philippine Relations in the Nineteenth Century.” This research topic was awarded a grant in the Cultural Affairs Bureau Academic Research Grant. The lecture will be given in Mandarin with Cantonese, Portuguese and English simultaneous interpretation. Entrance is free. For further details, please contact Ms. Chu of the Macao Historical Archives of the Cultural Affairs Bureau at 5986544.