How Did European Imperialism Affected Traditional Chinese Culture

China is a continent in Asia, which has 31 states, and is approximately 8704km from Brisbane (Distance Calculator, 2018). European Imperialism greatly effected traditional Chinese culture. It changed the way Chinese people ruled and lived, as well as starting wars and creating divide. China was effected by Europeans through their culture, conflicts, and rulers.

Traditional China had a very unique culture. At the core of its beliefs was Confucianism. The philosopher Confucius (551-479 BCE) came from a noble but poor family, and as he grew older he developed strong beliefs about society (Darlington, Smithies and Wood, 2012). He taught that family was the basic building block of society and that it was the duty of the ruler to behave like a father to his people. He also believed each person should adopt and live by certain moral values, such as that people should respect and obey their parents, and rulers should be chosen because of
These include the Boxer Rebellion, the Opium Wars and the Taiping Rebellion. The Boxer Rebellion took place between 1989 and 1901 (Brown, 2013). It was a nationalist movement by the ‘Righteous Harmony Society’ which opposed foreign imperialism and imposition of Christianity on Chinese. The rebels had grievances against the opium trade, economic manipulation, political interference, evangelical missionaries, and especially ‘unequal treaties’ imposed by western powers on the ruling Qing dynasty (Brown, 2013). In June 1900 in Beijing, the Boxers forced diplomats, foreign civilians and soldiers, and Chinese christians to seek refuge in the Legation Quarter. This caused them to be besieged by the Imperial Army of China and the Boxers for 55 days, until the Eight-Nation Alliance of Great Britain, Russia, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Japan and the USA, who brought 20,000 troops to China, and defeated the Chinese army and reclaimed Beijing. This caused Empress Dowager Cixi to declare war on foreign powers (Brown,