韓國內 中國 租界交涉과 中國近代外交 -駐朝鮮總領事의 租界撤廢交涉을 中心으로-

Abstract

With the Korea‐Japan annexation treaty in 1910, the Korea‐China relationship became merely a part of China‐Japan relationship. Although the Qing Dynasty fell in 1912, there was not any radical change in Chinese foreign relations. Until other countries approved the government of the Republic of China, however, it was impossible to promote ‘official’ international diplomatic negotiations with China. While Chinese diplomatic relations were under complicated and delicate transition, the issue of the abolishment of foreign settlements (租界撤廢) in Korea as a Japanese colony was raised. Chinese negotiation over the abolishment of foreign settlements in Korea was a process for protecting its people through maintaining vested interests and, on the other hand, a process to establish the status of China in modern international relations assuming equal relations among sovereign states. Then, we are faced with the question of what meanings the analysis of the negotiation process over the abolishment of foreign settlements has in understanding the formation of Chinese modern diplomacy or the history of modern China (Chinese diplomacy). First, the analysis illuminates the basic framework of Chinese diplomatic policies during the late Qing and early republican period. The fact that in the negotiation process, the Chinese government claimed that China had already become ‘one of sovereign states,’ namely, strongly demanded ‘equal treatment’ with other countries from Japan clearly reveals its modern sovereignty consciousness and the orientation of Chinese modern diplomatic negotiation based on the consciousness. In this way, the negotiation process provided a clue to the formation of Republican China’s policy framework that, going beyond the recognition of its Beijing government as a negotiation partner representing the state, pursued an equal status in the international society and participation in the rank of world powers. Second, those in charge of negotiation representing the Chinese government were working bureaucrats of modern diplomacy. The Chinese Consul General in Korea in those days was a translator trained after the establishment of Zongliyamen (總理衙門: the General Office of Foreign Affairs), an institution for Western affairs in charge of negotiation with the West, by the Qing government and, on the other hand, there were diplomats who were carrying out negotiation administration on the frontline of foreign negotiation in various places of the late Qing Dynasty and in the process of installing overseas diplomatic offices. That is, they were competent officials of diplomatic institutions trained through the processes of accumulating knowledge and experience in ‘Western affairs (洋務)’ and reforming the new government in the late Qing Dynasty. They versed in how to apply international public laws imported from the West in actual situations of negotiation. In particular, Fu Shi‐ying (富士英) was clearly aware of what it meant in the international society for China to attend and debate at international meetings. Furthermore, they fully recognized the nature of perpetual lease and ownership in international public laws, and drew out successful negotiations through debating on whether agenda such as protocols and memorandums brought by Japan were interpreted and applied in accordance with the public laws. Lastly, features of modern China not found in the conventional description of Chinese modern history are observed. Since the Opium War, China had been counted as one of weak powers, and foreign negotiations always ended up with humiliating concessions. Since the late Qing Dynasty, in fact, China had made efforts to reform its systems and polices internally and to correct unequal treaties with foreign countries externally. Such efforts aimed to achieve the status of an ‘equal sovereign state’ in the international society. On the contrary, the issue of the abolishment of foreign settlements in Korea is interesting in that it was a negotiation led by Japan for correcting an unequal treaty with China. It seemed that there was not diplomacy for so‐called small powers, but at least in Chinese diplomacy against Japan in Korea surrounding the abolishment of foreign settlements, China struggled in its modern consciousness to protect the dignity of the state and the interests of Chinese residents living in Korea. As a consequence of the negotiation, furthermore, China reemerged as a state treated equally with other countries, namely, as a most favored nation. This is why after success in diplomatic negotiation with Japan, Acting Minister Ma Ting‐liang (馬廷亮) admired Consul General Fu Shi‐ying (富士英) for his diplomatic activities and said that the Republic of China had a future.