Anson Burlingame's cooperative policy and China's entrance into the family of nations

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to bring attention to Anson Burlingame and his special diplomatic experience as an ambassador to China and as a representative of a Chinese embassy to the US and Europe. Burlingame was the only dual ambassador in the Chinese and American history. He was the first American minister to take residency in Beijing and he later led the first Chinese diplomatic mission to the western World. Burlingame developed a Cooperative Policy that advocated peaceful means of negotiating with Chinese leadership and that attempted to uphold China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. He was closely connected with China’s first entrance into what was then called the “family of nations.” The Burlingame Treaty that he signed with the United States on behalf of China was one result of this Cooperative Policy. He deserves a more notable place in the history because of this excellent diplomatic practice. In appreciating the Cooperative Policy, the goal is to examine a shared cultural legacy between China and the United States. Through a cross-cultural and translingual examination, this research hopes to reconsider the promise and limitation of his Cooperative Policy in the Sino-US relations during a period of imperialist expansion. Also, it considers how the America’s China policy was affected by Burlingame’s diplomacy. This thesis probes how he promoted a Cooperative Policy in China, how he presented Americans with a favorable image of China, and how he advocated treating China as an equal nation during China’s first diplomatic outreach to western countries. In addition, it considers how he engaged the legacy of extraterritoriality in China. Although he was not able to resolve the contradictions of extraterritoriality, he asserted influence on China and the US that resulted in China’s education mission, resistance to unfair immigration policies in the US, and, most importantly, the terms by which western nations first began to consider China as a sovereign peer in the world’s family of nations.