Turning over the history of China for thousands of years, what we can see is basically a great history of chaotic dynasty rule and ups and downs. As the saying goes, "the general trend of the world will be combined for a long time, and it will be combined for a long time." The prosperity in the early years of the dynasty often turned into a bottleneck period of crisis, and then it was in a downward period and a chaotic period without exception. The decadent old dynasty finally fell in the wind and rain, and a brand-new dynasty slowly stood up from the ruins and began to enter a new cycle. Why is there such a strange phenomenon of periodic law? It is always inspired by long-term reading and reflection on history. Now I can sum up as follows: Give a brick to attract jade to have a deeper understanding:

In the early days of the new dynasty, in order to restore and develop production, rulers often adopted policies of equal rights, extensive land and low taxes, and encouraged measures such as reclaiming wasteland and building water conservancy projects. Farmers are stable, agriculture develops slowly, and society tends to be stable and upward, which is the rising period of the dynasty. With the full recovery of agricultural production, the population began to increase greatly, resulting in a decline in the growth rate of sustainable cultivated land and a decrease in the per capita cultivated land area. Coupled with the expansionary fiscal expenditure policy of the ruling class and the corruption of bureaucrats, farmers went bankrupt because they were overwhelmed, and the phenomenon that land was increasingly annexed by the rich gradually appeared. Homeless people began to appear in society, and unstable factors gradually began to stagnate.

During the downward period of the dynasty, due to the inertia of government inaction and disorderly actions and conservative policy traditions, agricultural production was further destroyed, land annexation became more serious, and more refugees appeared. When this phenomenon becomes a common phenomenon in a dynasty society, the suppressed popular uprising needs to be released through riots or revolutions. As a result, the society fell into chaos again, and the peasant class directly destroyed the ruling order of the old dynasty by violent means, which could also help various political forces to struggle and divide in the political situation and finally return to stability. At the beginning of the dynasty, the emperor gave part of the policy decision-making power to civilian groups to recruit talents and help them govern the country and restore order. This governance model disperses the political risks caused by the excessive concentration of imperial power, which is conducive to brainstorming and prevents the new regime from generating strong impact and destructive power due to decision-making mistakes.

With the increasing stability of the regime, the ability to resist shocks is also increasing. At this time, the talented emperors tried to restore and strengthen the imperial power through various means and weaken the political decision-making power of the civilian group. At the same time, with the strengthening of imperial power, the privileged groups born with imperial power become more and more powerful, often increasing control and oppression of the people. This excessive exploitation intensifies the opposition between the people and the government and damages the authority of the government.

In the downward period of the dynasty, the decision-making mode of imperial power showed a conservative tendency, lacking sensitive awareness of the factors that might impact the imperial power, often missing opportunities to save the crisis of imperial power again and again, and the imperial power fell into a passive state. At this time, the channels for scholars to enter the official career through examinations are getting narrower and narrower, and the desire to change the status quo is increasing day by day. Many people will choose to cooperate with the leaders of the national revolution, or join the ranks of rebellious aristocrats to promote the process of great social change with their own talents. In the end, the old regime that lost people's hearts will collapse after a period of impact and a new dynasty will be born.

A very important reason for the prevalence of authoritarian tradition in China's history is the dystocia of social contract, democracy and decentralization consciousness. emperor

The self-sufficient economic model has led to the prevalence of the policy of "emphasizing agriculture and restraining commerce". In people's eyes, industry and commerce is the "last industry". The dynasties in China usually ranked businessmen at the bottom of society and imposed strict restrictions on them. In order to get opportunities for survival and development, businessmen need to rely on those in power and act as vassals of politics, rather than forming an independent consciousness. This phenomenon leads to the fragmentation and non-mainstream of China's commercial civilization, which makes it difficult to form a unified internal spirit, not to mention the awareness of social contract, democracy and decentralization formed by the development of commercial civilization.

2. The excessive political participation of "learning to be an excellent official" has hindered the flow of talents to business. In ancient China, a large number of young talents entered the government in large numbers through the selection activities organized by the government, and moved towards official career. In addition, traditional ideas despise businessmen and hinder the flow of talents to the commercial field. People engaged in business generally have low quality, poor moral integrity and indifferent consciousness of abiding by contracts. This, in turn, encourages the society to despise businessmen, and it is difficult to form a business culture and political proposition acceptable to the public by relying on its own influence.

3. The phenomenon that moral spirit replaces contractual power hinders the healthy development of enterprises. In China, businessmen are in a dilemma in policy and morality. The instinct of survival can only make businessmen violate moral constraints and do not act according to contract rules, and it is even more impossible to sublimate the phenomenon of power and responsibility contract formed between them into social contract consciousness, resulting in a sense of democratic decentralization that restricts autocratic imperial power.

4. The distorted mainstream consciousness of Confucian "golden mean" hinders the development of commercial civilization. The development of business needs pioneering and competitive spirit, and develops under the guidance of fair competition rules. However, since Dong Zhongshu, the rulers of past dynasties have taught China people to be "obedient" and "tolerant", put "harmony" first, and made compromises and concessions on issues and disputes, which is not conducive to the development of business.

5. Lack of the function of chamber of commerce that truly represents the rights and interests of industrialists and businessmen. In China, the Chamber of Commerce became a vassal of the government from the very beginning, and it was a political organization that managed and guided businessmen for the government, which restricted the initiative of businessmen, dampened the enthusiasm of industry and commerce to expand reproduction, and dampened the enthusiasm of businessmen. The existence of government chamber of commerce directly suppressed businessmen, delayed the development of commerce and was not conducive to the formation of independent commercial civilization.

The last important reason for the periodic phenomenon of "controlling the rise and fall of chaos" in China's history is the periodic war between the Central Plains dynasty and foreign nationalities, mainly the nomadic people in the north. Because of the periodicity of this kind of war, the defensive nature of the early dynasty is likely to help the rulers reduce the loss of social wealth, ensure the safety of people's lives and property, maintain the relative stability of the rule, and create conditions for accumulating strength to realize the counterattack; Rulers cracked down on nomads with their strong national strength, which not only eliminated their threat to the Central Plains, but also improved the reputation of the emperor, gained more people's political recognition and strengthened their rule. At the end of the dynasty, due to the decline of the national situation, internal civil strife and the prevalence of aristocratic power struggle, it was difficult to effectively resist the intrusion of nomadic people. This phenomenon aggravated the crisis of dynasty rule, accelerated the demise of the dynasty, and even appeared the phenomenon of being replaced by nomadic people in extreme cases.

It is the circulation of production mode that leads to the circulation of farmers' problems, the dispersion, concentration and passivation of imperial power that leads to the cyclical change of governance mode, the lack of commercial civilization that leads to the dystocia of social contract, democracy and decentralization consciousness, and the fact that the circular war with foreign countries finally leads to ancient history.