...Introduction People have blamed corporate greed for many social and economic problems, such as the pollution of our resources, the unfair pay for the working class, major recessions, and many more. It seems that some people are unaware of how much influence corporations have when war is involved. Corporations have a heavy hand in war profiteering when it comes to oil, weapons, and even essential items such as water and food. There are many examples of corporate greed’s influence on war, although I had never heard of a war directly funded or coerced by corporations until I did some research on China’s Opium Wars. Britain and China’s First Encounter The relationship between the Chinese and the British has been unstable from the beginning. Their first encounter resulted in an immediate attack on each other on the high seas. Nevertheless, on August sixth of 1793 a fleet of ships came to shore carrying an important passenger, the British Ambassador, Lord Macartney. The objective was to open trade between Britain and China. Lord Macartney brought with him many gifts for Emperor Chi’ien Lung that had been selected to represent the best that Britain had to trade. Lord Macartney met with Emperor Ch’ien Lung in a large horsehair tent chosen by the Emperor to show he was meeting with simple barbarians rather than equals. Foreigners are required to wear Chinese clothing and practice the Kowtow. The Kowtow is a ritual of respect...
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...Revolution take home essay The Opium War The Opium War lasted from the late 1830’s until 1860, encompassing a series of conflicts between China and the British Empire over trade and diplomacy. Basically what happened was China traded a lot of goods including tea, and in return China gained opium that the British Empire imported from India. However, when China realized that opium was ruining their nation through mass addiction, China outlawed opium. This lead to war with The British Empire, because the British didn’t want to be pushed out of this important trade that they had with China. The British ultimately won because they had a navy and China did not. Through these naval conquests the British acquired the small fisher island of Hong Kong and made it into a large trade port under British rule. Somewhat were some of the deeper issues of these wars and why were they unavoidable? Who stood to benefit most in this lopsided war and why didn’t the Chinese win? From the beginning, the ruling Tang dynasty opposed the importation of opium into its territory and actively discouraged its use by placing a stigma of immorality on those who used the drug. However, the British importers saw opium, as merely a product for which there was a strong demand for in China. Opium did not have anything to do with morality or lack thereof in the British mind. These two divergent viewpoints eventually came...
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...Sauvik Chakraborty HIST 212 Dr. Ernst Pijning The Opium Wars in China: The upheaval of isolationist China The introduction of foreign commodities in Europe raised consumerist ambitions to a frenetic level of activity as the multitudes of Europeans viewed their possession and consumption, a symbol indicative of status. The throngs of people were engaged in taking advantage of some significant exploratory achievements made by certain trailblazing expeditioners. The trade routes opened up by these explorers exposed Europe to seemingly boundless prospects of trade, which in turn facilitated the meeting of demands raised by the classes favored by such ventures. There were certain commodities that enjoyed considerably higher appeal amongst the masses than certain other commodities. Opium was one such commodity that did not enjoy widespread repute in Europe as Wolfgang Schivelbusch states in ‘Tastes of Paradise’ “[narcotics] have achieved such a tremendous such a tremendous significance in other cultures but never really gained a foothold in Europe.” (205). Opium, as a substance, has been heralded as a useful crop and was adopted as food, for anaesthetic purposes and ritualistic purposes from times immemorial. Schivelbusch states that in 19th century Europe, opium had a “regular place in the family medicine chest” and was quite frequently used as “sedative and painkiller” (206). The use of opium was becoming increasingly widespread as both urban and rural workers were ushering...
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...Chinas Opium War By: Zachary Kern In this paper, I will discuss Chinas opium problem within the 1830’s. At this point, the British Empire has established a routine shipping triangle between ports in England to ports in India; here British merchants would pick up large shipments of opium. From India, the merchants headed towards China, Canton in particular. From here the large shipments were sold to merchants using large British clipper ships, who distributed the large shipments of opium to smaller smuggling ships called “fast dragons” to be dispersed amongst the vast provinces of China. I will discuss the impact of this trade triangle for both the British and the Chinese. Also to be discussed is Imperial Commissioner Lin and his anti-opium campaign in China as well as on the British front. The Chinese and British had contrasting views on Lin and his campaign to end the mass profits the British were collecting from poisoning the Chinese community. Ultimately the opium war would conclude with the Nanjing treaty signed by the Chinese in 1842. Britain forced China to sign via threat of military and naval conquest, a tactic called gunboat diplomacy. Before we delve too far into the characters that were directly involved in the diplomacy regarding the opium situation in China, we must get a better understanding of the market conditions that the situation arose from. There is a very clear line that separates the two types of trade between the British and Chinese empires respectively...
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...Anti-Drug Campaign and the First Opium War In 1930, Chinese officials began to have growing concerns about the increasing trade of opium with the British. China’s social and economic status started to decline due to the opium trade agreement. Chinese addiction to opium became overwhelming and eventually forced China to launch Lin Zexu’s Anti-Drug Campaign in 1839. As a result, this campaign was viewed as a violation of the trade agreement with Britain and helped led to the First Opium War. China isolated themselves from the western world, believing they didn’t need anything from foreign trade. For eight decades, the only port that China opened was called the Canton System. The problem was China only wanted silver in exchange for their exports to Europe. Unfortunately, Europe only traded in gold and silver was hard to come by. Desperate to resolve the foreign trade, Britain realized they can acquire such a commodity in opium from India to exchange for exports in China. The trade of India’s opium started as a medical drug in the early 1800’s between China and Britain. Eventually, it triggered massive dependences throughout China’s society that affected the rich and poor equally. Before long, the demand for the drug was overwhelming, resulting in China importing more opium than exporting trades. Thus, resulting in an imbalanced foreign trade and stability of China’s society. A decree issued in 1810 from the Chinese Emperor stating, “Opium is a poison, undermining our good...
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...more exceptions to foreign powers. In February 1899 she took a hardline against the foreigners starting with the Italians who demanded the cession of the Sanmen Bay in Chekiang. The Empress ordered the governor of Chekiang to fight enemy landings without hesitation; her hard line view of refusing to deal with foreigners was made clear when the Italians backed down in October. On November 21, 1899 Dowager instructed the provincial authorities to entertain no more fantasies of peace and so began a fervent antiforeign movement, which would turn very bloody. The Chinese people had dealt with half a century of foreign humiliation due to forced opening of trade after the loss in the opium wars, which resulted in unequal treaties and the Treaties of Tientsin in 1858 and with loss in the Sino-Japanese war. One of the factors for the uprising the text talks about is the Antipathy Toward Christianity. The Chinese people were ingrained with the teachings of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Christianity was greatly resented due to the fact that The Treaties of Tientsin in 1858 “allowed free propagation in the interior and with the Conventions of Peking in 1860, which granted the missionaries the right to rent and buy land for the construction of churches.” The gentry thought that the Christian religion was socially disruptive, delusive, heterodox sect. The Christian religion does allow to worship idols nor any other beings dead or alive, so the fact that the converts did not kowtow...
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...well as communities are affected by substance abuse. In this paper I will examine the past and current trends of substance abuse, and how the use of illicit drugs may be considered culturally appropriate. In the mid 1800’s Opium began to arrive as Chinese workers immigrated to the United States to work on the railroads and gold mines. By the late 1800s, opium was quite a popular drug. Before long, opium dens had spread throughout the United States. In 1803, the German scientist Friedrich Sertürner successfully isolated morphine from opium for the purpose of using it as a surgical and post-surgical anesthetic soon making it available to physicians in the United States. It did alleviate pain, but in the process it also left the user in an anesthetized and euphoric state. The benefits of morphine were considered amazing to physicians of the era. But, the addictive properties were not discovered until after the Civil War. “In 1895, Heinrich Dreser, working for the Bayer Company in Germany, synthesized heroin. Bayer began to market the drug in 1898 (Brecher, 1972)”. In 1600 settlers introduced cannabis to Jamestown Virginia at the time it was used for its fiber. That was used to make rope, sails, and clothing. From 1611 until after the Civil War, cannabis was the main crop in North America playing a significant role in the colonial and national economic policy. “Between 1850 and 1937 marijuana was widely used throughout United States as a medicinal drug and could easily...
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...Citizens of many countries and all continents came to Shanghai to live and work during this time period; those who stayed for long periods, called themselves "Shanghailanders”. The reasons they stayed was mostly because of the trade of opium and other things like cotton. This number of people in Shanghai now is up over 24 million and growing every day. One of the main reasons for the vast population in this region was Shanghai had a large concentration of fresh drinkable water that most people wanted and the cotton fields were vast and growing and there was a potential for a lot of money to be made. After people began to settle is when factories were built because there were a vast number of people who needed jobs. This was when the population grew vastly. Also they people began to come to this region because the Opium wars were breaking out in the ghettos of shanghai. The British, Americans and French, were allowed to live in certain territorial zones without being under the Chinese laws. After this happened the Chinese began to be influenced by all these westerner’s customs. After the port was established the population of China began to grow even more. In 1830, a silver shortage in the town of Canton which pegged the paper currency to opium prices. Because of...
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...citations for verification. (October 2014) | | | Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs | Governments of opium-producing Parties are required to "purchase and take physical possession of such crops as soon as possible" after harvest to prevent diversion into the illicit market. | Signed | 30 March 1961 | Location | New York City | Effective | 8 August 1975 [1] | Condition | 40 ratifications | Parties | 185[1] | Depositary | Secretary-General of the United Nations | Languages | Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish | Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs at Wikisource | The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961 is an international treaty to prohibit production and supply of specific (nominally narcotic) drugs and of drugs with similar effects except under licence for specific purposes, such as medical treatment and research. As noted below, its major effects included updating the Paris Convention of 13 July 1931 to include the vast number of synthetic opioids invented in the intervening thirty years and a mechanism for more easily including new ones. From 1931 to 1961, most of the families of synthetic opioids had been developed, including drugs in whatever way related to methadone, pethidine, morphinans and dextromoramide and related drugs; research on fentanyls and piritramide was also nearing fruition at that point. Earlier treaties had only controlled opium, coca, and derivatives such as morphine, heroin and cocaine. The Single Convention, adopted in 1961, consolidated...
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...world’s top illicit opium producer. Every year there’s always this new TIMES headline that titles, “Afghanistan hits record high in opium crop this year” and it’s become so repetitive, I’ve gotten to the point where I roll my eyes and ask, ‘When isn’t it?’. Then last year, I came across another TIMES article, again about opium in Afghanistan. Just as I was about to sigh in exasperation, I saw the title, “U.S. Troops Leave Widows Jobless”. The article takes a bit of a different view on things. It details the events where soldiers from the United States enter Afghan poppy fields and destroy them which, of course, leaves the owners of the poppy fields void of income. In many cases, widows cannot get another job and they fail to gather enough money to feed the children; the result is starvation. As I was reading the article, I found that I empathised with the widow to the point where I knew that if I were that soldier, I would not be able to destroy those poppy fields. However, would my empathy-borne actions eventually be beneficial? Would they truly be ethical? In 2005, 70% of the acute drug deaths were thanks to opioids. Meanwhile, opium production is still increasing in Afghanistan, up to a 6,400 ton increase in 20014. Thus from this dilemma, I formed the knowledge question, “To what extent can we rely on empathy to make ethical decisions?”. This knowledge question highlights how one should make morally-correct choices in any situation, whether it be at war or debating whether...
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...TOPIC: INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION AGAINST THE WORLD DRUG PROBLEM I. INTRODUCTION Today it is generally recognized that drugs, along with organized crime that comes with it, jeopardize the development of many resolutions in our world. It is now clear to several organizations that drug control must become an essential element of our joint efforts to achieve peace, security and development. At the same time, we must reinforce our commitment to shared responsibility and the basic principles of health and human rights. The 2011 World Drug Report documents developments in global drug markets and tries to explain the factors that drive them. Its analysis of trends and emerging challenges informs national and international drug and crime priorities and policies, and provides a solid foundation of evidence for counternarcotics interventions. Drug markets and drug use patterns change rapidly, so measures to stop them must also be quick to adapt. Thus the more comprehensive the drug data we collect and the stronger our capacity to analyze the problem, the better prepared the international community will be to respond to new challenges. Drug use affects not only individual users, but also their families, friends, co-workers and communities. Children whose parents take drugs are themselves at greater risk of drug use and other social problems that harm communities. In some regions, illicit drug use is contributing to the rapid spread of infectious diseases like HIV and hepatitis...
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...many, but also ruined the lives of many more. With the British Opium Trade, the conflicts surrounding World War 1, and then in Revolutionary China, race, rationality, and capitalism were the core principles that divided the groups involved, but also linked these historical events together. Throughout progress and history, these fundamental principles were tested and reshaped time and time again through conflict, resolution, and changes of power. The British Opium trade in China was a trade monopoly of the East India Company. It exploited the Chinese people by addicting them to opium in order to expand British wealth. After Chinese resistance, it...
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...created from the plant “papaver somniferum”, better known as the opium poppy. The earliest records of this plant date back thousands of years ago to a Sumerian tablet which called the plant the “flower of joy.” The opium poppy is the root source of all opioids, the seed pod is the source of the naturally occurring opium. To extract the opium cuts are made to the green poppy seeds, which will ooze out a latex that is collected and dried to produce the raw opium. This latex is used to produce opioids such as morphine and codeine. Throughout history opium has seen its many uses. The drug came to its most prominence in the 1700’s, when the Dutch introduced the practice of smoking opium in a tobacco pipe to the Chinese. Up until this point opium had been used largely for its medical use as an analgesic. By 1729 the Chinese government had outlawed the sale of opium, fearing the weakening of the national vitality. Additionally the Chinese government had forbade the import of opium from India where the plant was largely cultivated. However the British East India Company encouraged the cultivation of opium and were the principle shippers to Chinese port of Canton, which was the only port open to Western merchants. What followed after this was years of widespread opium abuse throughout China. Eventually, the Chinese government began to introduce strict enforcement of the edict against importation of opium. This caused the Opium Wars of 1839-1842 and again in 1856 between China and the...
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...the China and Japan Response to Westernization Source Packet, answer the following questions about each of the documents. The first 5 documents are due on Monday 2/8. The second set are due on Friday 2/12. Document 1: Key Information: Opium Wars British East India Company sold Opium China began to loose power Opium is a drug: causes numbness, yellow skin, addiction. Theatrical Poster (advertise): Man lying on cushion and smoking opium. Messy at Opium Joint. Exaggeration of what is really happening. Point of View: Western - American Bias? Who?: Yes. Against Chinese. All Chinese people are high on opium. This poster is about a big problem among some Chinese immigrants...
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... Never Ending War The United States has been involved in several wars and have declared itself the winner in most. There has been civil wars and world wars that have taken troops around the globe to defend democracy and freedom. America has stood up for those whose human and civil rights were threatened, we have supplied small armies with the funds, equipment, and intelligence needed to defeat the enemy. America has a great track record at defeating its enemy and making sure they don’t show their heads anymore, but since being declared an enemy publicly in 1971 this enemy continues to deliver major blows to America and its citizens. This enemy is not a nation of communist, an insane dictator, or a group of extremist, this enemy is drugs. The war on drugs has been the biggest and longest war in my lifetime. Although Richard Nixon is known for launching what we consider the modern day war on drugs, this war was started several years prior to Nixon becoming President of the United States. Some local laws against drugs where established as early as 1860. The first national law was the Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914. This act was to provide registration to all that dealt in the services of opium and coca leaves. Coca leaves once extracted provides the bases for cocaine. In this time cocaine was not illegal and was often prescribed by doctors to patients for ailments such as common headaches or colds. Unknowingly those patients became addicted to cocaine and opium. It was estimated...
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