2024 Academia Sinica Open House

For many of us, it is hard to escape the portrayal of the Qing dynasty as a “closed-door state,” but does this impression match reality? From the reigns of the Kangxi to the Qianlong emperors, namely 1661–1796, the Qing Empire operated an intelligence network that spanned Europe and Asia, giving the court an astonishing level of knowledge of parts of the world. This talk will analyze the rise and decline of this Qing intelligence network in Ladakh and Tibet from the perspective of information transmission, as well as exploring the ever-changing understanding of international relations during the Qing. Emphasis will be placed on these two regions, analyzing the influence of Tibetan Buddhism, the key role of local peoples in Ladakhi within this network, and why the emperors of the Qing largely did not share this outside information with their subjects. Finally, the decline of the intelligence network and its impact on international relations in the late Qing will be examined