Essay About The Taiping Rebellion

Author John Littel claims the Taiping Rebellion of 1850-1864 to be the most destructive civil war of modern times. The Rebellion, regarded as a fanatical religious outburst, ravaged seventeen provinces, took over twenty thousand lives and irrevocably altered the Qing Dynasty. The Taiping rebels aimed to overthrow the oppressive Qing leaders as well as to change the theology in China at the time. This was done by forcibly spreading their own “Christian Messianic” theology. The Taipings used the recurrent economic changes to gain followers to their new religion. These economic changes consisted of a major growth in population which proved a negative effect in proportion to areas with land under cultivation. Furthermore, the growth of foreign and internal trade – upon the importation and use of opium – the developments in currency and the antiquated system of taxation provided peasants with a position that left them increasingly depressed, insecure and degraded. In addition, vicious cycles of failing revenue and increasing expenditures, corrupt officials and maladministration, famine and revolt, collected with social and legal inequalities as well as political inequalities further lowered the economic and human level of the peasant. Finally, the prevailing economic and social system of China being unable to provide for its increasing and permanent …show more content…
The revolution began in August 1896, upon the discovery of the anti-colonial Spanish secret organisation “Katipunan.” Led by Andrés Bonifacio, the Katipunan was a secessionist movement and shadow government that spread throughout much of the islands whose aim was independence from Spain by means of an armed revolt. In a mass gathering in Caloocan, the Katipunan leaders organised a revolutionary government and openly declared a nationwide armed