The Diplomatic Relationship of Alliance in Spring and Autumn Period

Abstract

The Diplomatic Relationship of Alliance in Spring and Autumn Period Author: Kim GyongJae Advisor: Wang ChienWen Department of History National Cheng Kung University Summary The thesis focus on the alliance relationship between overlord（盟主）andfeudalist（諸侯）through the Alliance System in Spring and Autumn period which system as a medium to promote the alliance relationship betweenoverlord and feudalist By the Alliance System both sides establish the obligation and authority if between the obligation and authority elements are out of balance the realistic diplomatic relationship would be established between overlord and feudalist Because of the religious and political nature of the Alliance System itself the Alliance System as a medium plays important role in an alliance relationship between overlord and feudalist The importance of alliance depends on six elements with God（神） Blood（血） Sacrifice（盟） Oath（誓） Curse（詛） Alliance Contract（載書） The six elements have afunction to eliminate or minimize the “Threat” what the overlord and feudalist confronted The “Threat” elements faced by the overlord and feudalist are different The academic significance of this paper is trying to research the distance between ideal and reality diplomatic relationship by the Alliance System and research the model of realistic alliance relationship Keywords; Spring and Autumn period Overlord Feudalist Alliance Relationship Threat Introduction In Spring and Autumn period the alliance meeting is held more than two hundred times which alludes that Alliance System is an important institution to promote the diplomatic relationship between overlord and feudalist The Alliance System was emerged from the end of the Chinese primitive society and developed in Xia（夏） Shang（商） Zhou（周） and flourished in Spring and Autumn period At that time the overlord ship is determined in alliance meeting that means the Alliance System is a medium between overlord and feudalist Before looking at the alliance relationship between both sides we should understand the reason of the overlord`s emergence and historical background In western Zhou（西周） the main political system between the Zhou king and feudalist is Feudal（封建制） and Patriarchal（宗法制） system and the two main systems are basis of the military power of the Zhou royal family because of the decline of military power the Feudal and Patriarchal system were not operated very well by the Zhou king The powerful feudalists take over the status of Zhou king gradually and the Alliance System is a tool to help overlord have power to preside over the political structure of Central Plain By the Alliance System both sides establish the obligation and authority if between the obligation and authority elements are out of balance the realistic diplomatic relationship would be established between overlord and feudalist Obligation and authority are important elements to look at the alliance relationship between both sides The powerful overlord wants to strengthen the authority to control feudalists and the weak feudalist wants to strengthen their authority to get protection from overlord but overlord and feudalist do not want to keep obligation to each other that means there is distance between ideal and realistic alliance relationship The historical material accentuates the aspect of ideal relationship by criticizing the non-ideal relationship but this paper tries to research the realistic relationship between both sides from historical material But there is question about why the diplomatic relationship between overlord and feudalist must be established by the Alliance System? The reason is related to the characteristic of Alliance System that has function to eliminate or minimize the “Threat” what overlord and feudalist confronted Ultimately after “Armistice Alliance”（弭兵會盟）meeting end the Alliance System gradually and enter the new political system Materials and Methods The Spring and Autumn diplomatic relationship is a popular theme among scholars and established three different theories about that First theory is presented by the Xu JieLing（徐傑令）who focus on the diplomatic system in Spring and Autumn period and does not mix the concept of modern diplomacy that in order to protect the original diplomatic system of this period Second theory is presented by Hong JunPei（洪鈞培）who argues that the Spring and Autumn political system is very similar to modern political system and compared the diplomatic system between Spring and Autumn and modern period Third theory is presented by Liu BoJi（劉伯驥）who emphasizes on the active diplomatic relationship of alliance that helpful for understanding the realistic alliance relationship between overlord and feudalist In addition Stephen M Walt proposes “balance-of-threat” theory that regardless of whether a strong or weak country is aligned it is mainly to balance the "threat" Research method is basis of historical materials to try to establish model of alliance relationship in Spring and Autumn period by different perspective Results and Discussion This paper concentrates on the realistic alliance relationship between overlord and feudalistic and found that overlord and feudalist have space to make a choice their preferable alliance partner especially feudalist also has limited space to choose their own overlord that diplomatic space make alliance relationship to be more complicated There is a reason why they choose their own preferable alliance partner that they confronted threat from uncertain object therefore they try to eliminate or minimize the threat by the Alliance System Alliance System not only has function to eliminate the threat but also has function to increase diplomatic confusion between overlord and feudalist that means it has peace and short-term nature But there is also to have exception is Alliance System has long-term nature by observing the example of “Armistice Alliance”（弭兵會盟） which meeting keeps peace for forty years at least So Alliance System itself has peaceful nature and the long-term and short-term nature is determined by the international diplomatic environment This paper is consists of five parts First part is to describe the historical background of politic transition in western and eastern Zhou period Second part is to observe Alliance System Third part is to research the realistic alliance relationship by the Alliance System and try to build model of diplomatic relationship in Spring and Autumn period Forth part is to find out the intention why both sides establish diplomatic relationship must utilize the Alliance System Fifth part is to discuss the significance of “Armistice Alliance”（弭兵會盟） Conclusion This paper brings out more comprehensive realistic alliance relationship by the Alliance System The overlord and feudalist have space to choose their own preferable alliance partner and that alliance relationship is for eliminating or minimizing the “threat” The academic significance of this paper is trying to research the distance between ideal and reality diplomatic relationship by the Alliance System and research the model of realistic alliance relationship

Date of Award	2019
Original language	English
Supervisor	Chien-Wen Wang (Supervisor)