Compare and Contrast - Japan and China in the 19th Century

            During the 19th Century, both China and Japan had similar yet also different responses to .
            
             There were many things and ideas that the Chinese did accept and also rejected from the .
             Westerners during the 19th century. One of the things that the Chinese did not happily accept and .
             were later forced to, was the Opium trade with the British. The British started to trade Opium .
             with China in the early 19th century, but as time went on huge amounts of silver were being .
             exported from China. They realized that this relationship of opium for silver was not in their .
             favor but that the British were the ones really profiting from it. They rejected this trade process .
             and in 1839 the Opium War broke out, in which the Chinese lost. As for the Japanese they did .
             not have a problem with the trading with the Westerners, because in the 19th century the Japanese .
             did not possess any thing that was desired in the West. Unlike China they had no raw materials .
             and were not very technologically advanced so they didn't have much to offer. They had a few .
             products here and there that could be desired, but even these were most likely taken from the .
             Chinese. While the Chinese wanted the westerners to leave so that their influence would not .
             reach the people of China, the Japanese would have probably profited a lot more if a major .
             trading network would have been open with the westerners. Because then the Japanese would .
             take the ideas that they wanted from China and have some products to trade for technological .
             advancements.
             Unlike Japan, China's answer to the pressure from the West was being given in the .
             revolts that the Chinese people were experiencing. The biggest rebellion in the 19th century that .
             .
             threatened the Qing dynasty was the Taiping rebellion. The Taiping movement was the first to .
             pose a serious alternative not only to the Qing dynasty but also to Confucian civilization as a .
             whole. It offered sweeping programs for social reform, land redistribution, and the liberation of .