The Strange Journey of the Tributary System
| Date | 01 September 2021 |
| Author | Yuan-kang Wang |
| Published date | 01 September 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/03058298211050674 |
| Subject Matter | Book Forum |
https://doi.org/10.1177/03058298211050674
Millennium: Journal of
International Studies
2021, Vol. 50(1) 267 –277
© The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/03058298211050674
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The Strange Journey of the
Tributary System
Yuan-kang Wang
Western Michigan University, USA
Abstract
Scholars of international relations have embraced the tributary system as the dominant lens to
studying historical orders of East Asia. Hendrik Spruyt’s The World Imagined, a rare gem in the study
of comparative international orders, argues that the tributary system articulated the ontology of
the historical East Asia international society. This article cautions against two common pitfalls. First,
the tributary system is a modern conceptual construct that can blind researchers to other types of
political orders existing throughout East Asia’s diverse landscape and history, thus contributing to
a Sinocentric bias. Both the Mongols and the Tibetans adopted a distinctive set of rules of inter-
polity conduct that have little to do with the Chinese tributary system. Second, the tributary system
perpetuates the myth that East Asia has been historically peaceful, while glossing over the numerous
interpolity warfare that took place in the region as well as internal conflicts within the same cultural
sphere of a state. I argue that our understanding of international orders can be substantially enriched
when we take material power seriously and study its interplay with ideational factors.
Keywords
tributary system, world order, East Asia
In The World Imagined, Hendrick Spruyt takes us on a tour de force of three non-European
international societies in East Asia, the Islamic world, and Southeast Asia. Dismissing the
Eurocentric view that only Europe constituted an international society, he forcefully argues
that each of the non-European regions constituted a distinctive international society in which
members shared collective beliefs about the nature of authority, the legitimation of rule, and
interpolity interactions. Moreover, when these non-European polities encountered the
Westphalian nation-states, contrary to the widespread misperception of passivity and stagna-
tion, they adapted and adjusted to the external challenge. The dyadic encounter not only
redefined their identities but also those of European states, giving the latter a convenient
Corresponding author:
Yuan-kang Wang, Department of Political Science, Western Michigan University, 1903 W. Michigan Ave,
Kalamazoo, MI 49008-5346, USA.
Email: yuan-kang.wang@wmich.edu
1050674MIL0010.1177/03058298211050674Millennium – Journal of International StudiesWang
research-article2021
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