The Song Dynasty is the only regime in our impression of a "great unified dynasty" in which there were completely equal countries abroad. It is also the only regime in China's great unified dynasty that treated the countries around it with complete equality. This made it always have a serious sense of crisis.
Because of this, the dynasty was relatively progressive, particularly in economics and culture, characterized by its openness and flourishing culture and commerce. The significance of this commercial prosperity lay in the rapid circulation of products, the relatively developed handicraft industry, and full employment. Furthermore, commercial taxes accounted for over half of national tax revenue, liberating agriculture and promoting its development, ultimately leading to the economic development of the entire country.
Landlords are the owners of the economic base and directly control social wealth and human resources, but they are only dependents of the regime.
Politically, the imperial examination system determined that they were merely guests who could be expelled at any time, rather than masters of the regime.
Military affairs were detached from their lives. Except in certain border regions or during periods of unrest, landlords were no longer the organizers of the army. Instead, the army was controlled by the imperial power and its dependent nobles. This misaligned relationship resulted in landlords becoming not a source of organizational mobilization, but rather a hindrance.
Economically, they are the ones who control the most grassroots wealth and manpower, but this control is not used for more effective mobilization, but to evade mobilization more effectively, take advantage of as much as possible, poach people, escape and collect money, and hide their household registration.
When the government army was defeated, due to their long-term separation from military life and lack of military capabilities, the landlord militia could only fight against peasants who were forced to fight for their rights, but could not fight against foreign enemies. Moreover, lacking high-level military organization, the scattered landlord armed forces were no match for the large-scale army.
Because the imperial central government did not own the economic base, it lost control of human and material resources, and its mobilization capacity was severely reduced. They could only use taxes that were collected at high costs and with great difficulty to hire expensive soldiers.
As a result, the army became a small, disposable force, because just maintaining this army had already exhausted the financial resources.
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