1. The social nature of China has undergone fundamental changes.
/kloc-In the middle of the 9th century, China experienced the blow of the Opium War, and the powers forced the Qing government to sign a series of unequal treaties such as the treaty of nanking by means of war, threats and fraud. These unequal treaties have brought great influence to China: politically, although the Qing government still ruled, it has been interfered and controlled by capitalist powers, and China's territorial, judicial, customs and other sovereignty has been seriously damaged. Economically, China's self-sufficient feudal economy gradually disintegrated, and gradually became the commodity marketing market and raw material supply place in the capitalist world. China began to become a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society, and its social nature changed fundamentally.
With the change of social nature in China, the principal contradiction in China society will inevitably change. Before the Opium War, the main contradiction in China society was the contradiction between the landlord class and the peasant class. After the Opium War, there were two major social contradictions in China, namely, the contradiction between foreign capitalism and the Chinese nation, and the contradiction between feudalism and the people. Moreover, with the deepening of foreign capitalist aggression, the contradiction between foreign capitalism and the Chinese nation has become the most important contradiction among various social contradictions. At the same time, China's revolutionary task is bound to change. Before the Opium War, the nature of China Revolution was the anti-feudal struggle of the peasant class. Since the Opium War, the people of China have shouldered the dual revolutionary task of opposing foreign capitalist aggression and domestic feudal rule. Since then, China has entered the period of the old democratic revolution.
2. China's economic sovereignty has been seriously damaged.
Before the Opium War, China was an independent country, and the Qing government exercised full sovereignty. After the Opium War, Britain and other invaders forced the Qing government to sign a series of unequal treaties. Among them, the Sino-British treaty of nanking stipulated that China must agree with Britain on the taxes paid by British businessmen on import and export goods. The "Five-Port Trade Charter" also stipulates that the tax rate of major import and export goods is about 5%. These regulations not only made the Qing government become the country with the lowest tariff rate in the world, but also made the customs of the Qing government lose the role of protecting its industrial and agricultural production. More seriously, China's tariff sovereignty and trade sovereignty have been seriously damaged. It greatly facilitated foreign capitalism to dump goods and plunder raw materials, damaged the image of China and lowered the position of the Qing government in international trade.
In just a few years after the Opium War, Britain and other western powers used the privilege of aggression to dump goods to China, especially foreign cloth and foreign cotton flooded the coastal market in China, which made the traditional cotton textile industry in the southeast coast of China almost bankrupt. In addition, foreign businessmen also manipulated the export trade of China's silk, tea and other commodities, making China's silk and tea production subordinate to the needs of the world capitalist market, and China gradually became the raw material producing area of the great powers. In this way, China's natural economy began to disintegrate and was gradually involved in the world capitalist market.
3. The Qing government's finance was more difficult, exploitation was intensified and class contradictions were further intensified.
Since the late Qianlong period, the Qing government had a deficit in the national treasury and could not make ends meet. Treaty of nanking forced the Qing government to pay 265.438 billion silver dollars in war reparations to Britain. In addition, the great powers continued to smuggle opium into China, dumped commodities wantonly and controlled trade, resulting in a large outflow of silver. In order to pay war reparations and solve the increasingly serious financial crisis, the Qing government kept raising taxes and exploiting the people. Corrupt officials, local tyrants and evil gentry also took the opportunity to blackmail and exploit the people, which eventually led to further intensification of class contradictions and the outbreak of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement.
Fourth, new ideas sprouted, and feudal ideas were impacted to some extent.
The sound of the Opium War awakened the more advanced intellectuals at that time from the dream of "China going to the country". They are concerned about the country and the people, looking for ways to save the country and the people, and from resisting aggression, they have the idea of learning from the West, thus calling for "resisting foreign enemies and making changes at home", and an unprecedented new ideological trend of "learning from the West" has emerged in China's ideological circle. The core content of this new trend of thought is to learn from the west, "learn from foreigners to control foreigners", know the world and go to the world; Seek the way to strengthen the country's coastal defense, get rid of the situation of backwardness and beatings, and realize national rejuvenation. But it also has the color of maintaining feudal rule in essence.
Although China people in this period just woke up from the closed door, their understanding of western capitalism was superficial and emotional, and their understanding of feudalism was not profound. However, they opened the door for China people to learn from the West and seek ways to save the country and the people. They are undoubtedly the outstanding representatives of China who first learned from the West and sought truth in modern times. Their thoughts and opinions reflect the profound changes in the ideological circle during the social transformation period in China, and embody the brave spirit of the Chinese nation not to be left behind and forge ahead. The germination of new ideas reflected the requirements of the times, which inspired and summoned the later Westernization Movement and the Reform Movement of 1898. It is the starting point for modern China people to know and go to the world.
To sum up, the Opium War was the starting point for foreign capitalism to enslave China, which transformed China from a feudal society into a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society, and it was the beginning of China's modern history.