Self-Strengthening Movement
Topic: Paths to Modernisation: Japan, China, Korea · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
The Self-Strengthening Movement was a reform programme run by Qing officials from the 1860s to the 1890s, after China's defeats in the Opium Wars. It brought in Western weapons and set up arsenals, shipyards and some modern industries. However, it kept the old Confucian system of government and learning unchanged. It showed the limits of taking Western technology without changing institutions.
Example
China lost the war with Japan in 1894–95 and had to give up Taiwan. The defeat showed that new arsenals and ships alone could not make China strong.
Don't confuse with
- Meiji Restoration (1868): Japan changed its whole system, including schools, the army, the bureaucracy and the constitution, not just its weapons. That is why Japan defeated China in 1894–95.
Related concepts
- Qing dynasty
- Triangular trade
- Opium Wars
- Treaty of Nanking 1842
- Semi-colony
- Taiping Rebellion
- Hundred Days' Reform 1898
- Kang Youwei
- Liang Qichao
- Boxer Rebellion