Download or read book Power for a Price written by Lawrence Zhang and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2023-01-10 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Qing dynasty office purchase system (juanna), which allowed individuals to pay for government appointments, was regarded in traditional Chinese historiography as inherently corrupt and anti-meritocratic. Lawrence Zhang's groundbreaking study of a broad selection of new archival and other printed evidence contradicts this widely held assessment.