Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia: The Zheng Family and the Shaping of the Modern World, c. 1620–1720 by Xing Hang (review)

Xing Hang's Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia is one of the most comprehensive examinations of the Zheng family and their organization at the height of their power. The Zheng family was the head of an organization with a diverse membership that regularly engaged in large-scale commercial, criminal, diplomatic, and military actions. Through these activities, the organization gained the power to assert itself on the global scale in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, challenging existing powers ranging from the Qing rulers to the Dutch East India Company, also known as the VOC. Due to its power and influence in a key part of the world during a major period of political and economic expansion, studying the Zheng family can provide key insights into how those processes unfolded. Just as the Zheng organization defied categorization by acting as criminals, merchants, soldiers, and rulers, so too can Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia be hard to describe because of the range of topics it covers. Hang makes a great contribution to the field of world history by covering in great detail and with a variety of sources how the Zheng organization fit into a global story of increased state-building and international commerce.

One of Hang's goals is to bridge what he sees as several historiographical gaps in the historical discourse about the Zheng family, particularly whether or not certain family members were truly fanatical loyalists of the Ming Dynasty or if they were self-interested and ruthless pirates with a thin veneer of loyalism. To do this, Hang repeatedly explains both sides of an issue, why scholars think as they do, and his own opinion. In most cases, Hang refuses any simple explanation and incorporates elements from multiple accounts to make a more complete understanding of the peoples and situations involved, such as how the Zheng demonstrated both loyalty and self-interest.

Hang contends that the rise and fall of the Zheng organization was not the result of historical inevitabilities, but was highly contingent on a wide number of factors and how the Zheng family patriarchs chose to respond to those situations. Hang argues with particular passion and support that the Zheng family successfully forming a lasting and stable state in an independent Taiwan with Qing diplomatic recognition was in fact a plausible outcome. To support this, he points to numerous diplomatic exchanges between the Qing Dynasty and the Zheng family, which came close to agreeing to such a solution on multiple occasions before breaking down on one point or another. While Hang is not overly prone to speculation in Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia, he cannot help but extrapolate in depth on how this hypothetical might have changed history.

Another major thesis that Hang puts forth is that the Zheng organization is comparable to the VOC, in terms of being a modern political and economic entity capable of adapting to the changing international relations and the interregional markets that it existed within. He states that the Zheng organization was frequently more profitable than the VOC despite notable disadvantages in terms of weaponry and homeland support, demonstrating that the Zhang organization's structure and methods were better suited for the sociopolitical context it found itself in. As such, Hang makes the case that it cannot be said that Europeans were the sole bringers of economic innovation.

Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia is organized both thematically and chronologically, discussing the rise and fall of the Zheng family's empire in terms of the primary goals of the family's patriarchs at various points in their lives, though since Zheng Keshuang was largely a puppet, the final chapter focuses more on the actions and goals of his advisors than himself. While all chapters discuss economics, politics...