不同于以往圍繞所謂"新清史"展開的爭論中各方均把注意力聚集在清朝的規章制度、治理方式以及滿人精英的觀念、習俗方面,這里另從地緣戰略和財政構造兩個側面,重新審視清朝國家的形成路徑及其性質。清朝疆域的整合可分為兩個不同的階段:從后金政權在東北興起,到入關后取代明朝,至17世紀50年代基本控制關內各省,是為開國的第一階段;其第二階段從17世紀90年代至18世紀50年代,歷時半個多世紀的邊陲用兵過程,受到清廷獨特的地緣戰略和財政構造的驅動與制約。而清朝地緣戰略從被動回應到積極防御再到保守妥協的轉變,又跟其財政構造中低度均衡機制的運作及其背后社會經濟的支撐力度緊密相關。同時,如果我們將清朝國家與近代歐洲財政軍事國家和奧斯曼帝國加以比較,即可看出其在近代轉型過程中獨有的脆弱性與堅韌性,并質疑國家形成研究領域流行的"帝國—民族國家"認知范式的適用性。

Unlike previous debates on the"New Qing History,"which focus on the Qing legal code and governance style and the ideas and customs of the Manchu elite,this article reexamines Qing state formation and its essential nature in terms of geostrategy and fiscal structure.Qing territorial integration can be divided into two stages:the period of initial state foundation ran from the rise of the Later Jin regime in the northeast to its conquest and replacement of the Ming Dynasty followed by basic Qing control of the provinces inside Shanhaiguan Pass by the 1650 s.The second stage ran from the 1690 sto the 1750 s,in a half century of military action on the frontiers that was driven but also constricted by the Qing court’s unique geostrategy and fiscal structure.The changes in the Qing geostrategy from passive response to active defense to conservative compromise were closely related to the operation of the low-level equilibrium of its fiscal structure and the social and economic support that underlay it.At the same time,if we compare the Qing state with nineteenth century European fiscal and military states or the Ottoman Empire, we can see the unique fragility and resilience of its initial modern transformation,which leads us to question the applicability of the "empire/nation-state"cognitive paradigm prevalent in the study of state formation.