Diminished Empire and Nomadic Challengers 69
Xia court substantial annual payments as well, thus buying peace on the
northwestern frontier.
The constant border threats required continuous expansion of the
Song military, which swelled from 387,000 troops in 975 to 1,259,000
troops in 1045. The cost of training and equipping such a large army,
on top of the very large annual “ransom” payments to the Liao and
Xi Xia rulers, threatened to bankrupt the state in the eleventh century.
In response to this crisis, Song offi cials in these years carried on the
most thorough debate since the Warring States period over the nature of
“good government” and the proper relationship between the state and
the society it ruled. The result was factional bureaucratic argument and
infi ghting that lasted a generation and has echoed through the halls of
Chinese government ever since.
At the heart of the debate was Wang Anshi (1021–1086), an eccen-
tric idealist who argued that the state needed drastic reforms to fulfi ll
its classical Confucian obligations to serve the people. Wang believed
that most Confucian offi cials had lost touch with the true meaning of
the classics and had grown too comfortable to perceive the crisis faced
by the state. In 1069, Wang Anshi rose to the position of chief councilor
(like the prime minister) under the young and ambitious Emperor Shen-
zong. Wang immediately declared a series of reforms, starting with a
government program to make low-interest loans to poor peasants, both
to prevent their exploitation by private loan sharks and to use money-
lending to raise state revenues. He ordered a land survey to assess new
tax rates based on the actual productivity of the land. He declared that
taxes would be collected in money, not in labor services, a change aimed
particularly at the wealthy. He vowed to reduce the size of the expensive
professional army and to train local citizens in self-defense militias. He
proposed a nationwide school system to educate those of modest means
and called for changing the emphasis of the civil service examinations
from poetry and memorization of the classics to current political and
economic problems. Wang’s government would become more directly
involved in the economy, compete with private merchants, set up gov-
ernment pawnshops nationwide, and buy local products to transport
and sell elsewhere. This would increase state revenues and undercut
excessive profi ts of the merchant class.
When offi cials opposed Wang’s ideas, he was quick to dismiss them
from offi ce. He frightened the wealthy and well established, the very
people who dominated the government. He tried to do too much too
quickly, and his loan program backfi red, for local offi cials ended up
charging interest rates as high as the loan sharks, thereby defeating the