Chinese Diaspora: Not How China Survived

As a Chinese descendant myself, I find it interesting to find out about my culture's past, whatever remains of it now. Thus, I present this essay, a reviewed translation of a part of my World History paper about half a year ago. There was a 500 word limit, and there were further discussion on the implications for Indonesian students, but I'll simply stick to the more interesting part.

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Throughout history, numerous civilizations rise and fall. Ancient Egypt, Greece, and the Roman Empire were but three such civilizations whose impacts are still felt until this day, but could only be seen through archeological finds and ancient texts. Meanwhile, the Chinese culture and civilization, as old and as far-reaching as Egypt, Greek, and Latin, found their way to the light of globalization. Some would argue that the Chinese diaspora, or people originating from the same Chinese culture that spread across the world, was what made China survive as a civilization for longer than most. However, by comparing and contrasting China's history with those of the other cultures, factors for the survival of a civilization could be found.

The main cause of the decline of the Egyptian kingdoms was that they never expanded far out from their origins on the banks of the Nile. After being conquered by Alexander the Great at 323 BC, Egyptian culture, one that has developed for more than a thousand years, were covered under the Greek culture brought by the Ptolemaic pharaohs. 

With the submission of all Egypt for a very long time--in fact, no Egyptian pharaohs shall ever be restored to the throne--the Egyptians slowly forgot their old ways, to be assimilated into the Greco-Egyptian culture (Dodson, 2011). From here, we could conclude that the end of a culture would happen only if all its people were conquered under a different civilization.

Meanwhile, the Greek colonies, either Doric or Attic or any other branch of Greek culture throughout the Mediterranean were also conquered by Rome. The Latin culture brought by the Romans was not all that different from the Greeks, as Rome was a Greek colony, over time influenced by Etruscan and other Italian cultures, (Gill, 2015). After the split of the Roman Empire, the West was quickly overran by Frankish, Celtic, and Germanic peoples, and all that was left were an assimilation of cultures: French, Spanish, German, and British as we know today. 

The remains of old Greco-Latin culture could still be seen in the Byzantine Empire, however after Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks at 1431, only traces of Greek culture could be seen (History.com, 2010; Toynbee, 1981). From here, we could conclude that if the conquering civilization is not that different, then the change would not be drastic enough, such that it could be said that the people still follow the same culture.

China, on the other hand, did fall into the Mongols under the Yuan dynasty of the 13th century, but they reigned for merely a century, until being deposed by the Han Chinese (China Highlights, 2015). During the Qing dynasty, the last of the line of dynasties, the Manchurians that held power also was not all that different from the Han Chinese, so that they changed so little. Furthermore, it was during the Qing dynasty that the Chinese spread throughout the world, partly due to the European colonization that invited them. (Theobald, 2000; Jacques, 2011)

The fact that Chinese diaspora mostly colonized the world when and after they were ruled by foreign powers proves that it wasn't them, the diaspora, which helped restore China. On the contrary, China simply never fell to foreigners for a time long enough that their essence and culture changed enough to be unrecognizable, unlike Egypt and the Greco-Latin world.

However, while the diaspora played but a little role in the history of Chinese culture and civilization, currently, China faces an economic problem in the near future, one which the diaspora could help restore the 'glory' of old. 

China has the largest population which makes it an economic powerhouse, but its long-standing one child policy, though already revised, caused their numerous population to grow old; in reality, they face a shortage of working-age people. (Shorbert, 2013; McElroy, 2008). This time, with the advent of globalization, China could muster its equally numerous diaspora in other countries, unhampered by this law, to establish a strong economic connection. Indeed, the diaspora wasn't the reason how China survived, but it might well be the reason how they will survive.