In celebration of the Chinese New Year, which started being
celebrated on the 10th of February, this week’s article is delving
into the historical relationships between the Netherlands and China.
The close ties between the Chinese and Dutch people have been forged
over centuries, primarily through the historic Silk Road. The enduring
friendship between China and the Netherlands has weathered the trials of time.
Dutch-Chinese relations trace back to the sixteenth century, marked by the
maritime exploits of Dirck Gerritszoon Pomp from Enkhuizen, who embarked on
voyages to Chinese and other Far Eastern ports aboard a Portuguese vessel. His
journeys were meticulously documented by Lucas Janszoon Waghenaer in his work
„Thresoor der Zeevaert“ (“treasure of Shipping”), capturing the
attention of the Gentlemen XVII, the governing body of the Dutch East Indies
Company. They sought to establish direct trade with China as a natural
extension of their existing trade routes to the Indonesian archipelago. In 1601
and 1603, Dutch East Indies Company representatives ventured to the Chinese
coast in hopes of fostering trade relations, albeit with limited success. A
significant milestone occurred in 1655 when the first Dutch mission set out for
Peking, aiming to secure permission for regular trade. Despite subsequent
unsuccessful attempts, a breakthrough came in 1686 when a Dutch delegation in
Peking successfully negotiated trading privileges, allowing Dutch vessels to
visit Chinese ports every five years. Over time, trade relations between the
two nations gradually flourished.
While discussing Dutch-Chinese relations, a short history of the Sino-Dutch
treaty system should of course be mentioned. Imperialism in China became
institutionalized through a complex network of agreements and privileges
outlined in a series of bilateral and multilateral treaties between the Qing
Empire and Western powers during the latter half of the 19th century. These treaties
typically focused on specific areas such as foreign trade and residency,
customs regulations, property protection, jurisdictional matters, navigation
rights, and the presence of foreign ships and missionaries. While the
fragmented nature of this system, involving 19 treaty powers with competing
interests, distinguished it from more unified imperial structures elsewhere,
Chinese imperialism still rested on a formal framework of treaty rights that
needed to be legally annulled for China to achieve its desired „national
emancipation.“
The legal foundation for Dutch involvement in this system stemmed
from the 1863 Sino-Dutch Treaty of Tianjin, modelled after similar treaties
imposed on the Qing Empire by Britain, the United States, and France following
the Second Opium War. Article 15 of this treaty included a most-favoured-nation
clause, granting the Dutch automatic access to concessions granted by China to
other powers and thereby limiting the treaty’s scope to issues requiring
explicit legal stipulations. One such issue was extraterritoriality, a
unilateral privilege that allowed foreign consular courts exclusive
jurisdiction over legal matters involving foreign citizens in China’s treaty
ports, effectively exempting them from Chinese laws. By enacting relevant
statutes in 1871, the Dutch established consular courts in several of China’s
treaty ports to handle legal cases involving Dutch nationals. Utilizing the most-favoured-nation
clause, the Dutch also participated in appointing consular officers as
observers and, in practice, co-judges in Chinese courts. Additionally, the
Dutch played an active role in governing the international settlements in
Shanghai and Xiamen through direct representation on executive municipal
councils and supervisory consular bodies.
In 1880, the Dutch established a legation in Peking, solidifying
ongoing diplomatic ties. Even after the upheavals of the 1949 Revolution, the
Netherlands maintained consistent relations with China, formally recognizing
the People’s Republic of China in 1950. Another significant treaty in the
Sino-Dutch relationship was the Boxer Protocol of 1901. Despite not being part
of the Eight-Nation Alliance that quelled the Boxer Rebellion, the Netherlands
participated in subsequent peace negotiations to seek compensation for damages
to the Dutch legation and the precautionary deployment of three Dutch warships.
In addition to granting the Dutch a share of China’s substantial war
reparations, the Boxer Protocol facilitated Dutch involvement in jointly
administering the legation quarter in Beijing, expanding the Dutch diplomatic
compound, and establishing a permanent legation guard, which operated until
1923.
The ties between the Netherlands and China go beyond the short
history mentioned in this week’s article, however, the following article will
delve into the current Dutch-Chinese relations and migration between the two
countries as well as the communities formed in both countries.
References
Chang, V. (2021). Allies as
adversaries: China, the Netherlands and clashing nationalisms in the
emergence of the post-war order, 1942–1945. Nations and Nationalism, Vol.
27, DOI: 10.1111/, 1253–1267.
Kroese , C. (1965). Dutch Trade with
the People’s Republic of China.