Origin and further development
The history of the place from a fishing village to a modern trading metropolis goes back many centuries and is strongly linked to the history of Beijing. From the 11th to the 14th century, Tianjin was a small seaport that was highly important to the imperial court as a grain warehouse. Later, when originally independent kingdoms in southern China were subjugated, the city was a port of passage for tribute and supplies from those kingdoms to the capital. During the Yuan Dynasty, the Imperial Canal running through Tianjin was finally completed or extended to Dadu (Beijing) in the 13th century.
The city received the name Tianjin from Emperor Zhudi during the early years of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). At this time, it received its pre-eminence as a port for Beijing and a heavily fortified garrison city. Later, under the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), it became a thriving trading center (especially for sea salt).
Foreign concessions
In the 19th century, the city came to the attention of seafaring powers from the West. As a result of China's defeat in the First Opium War, Britain forced the opening of five southern Chinese port cities to its trade through the Treaty of Nanking in 1842 (see Unequal Treaties). On the pretext - Chinese officials had seized the British-flagged Lorcha Arrow on October 8, 1856 - the United Kingdom again declared war on China. European gunboats and warfare also proved superior in this so-called Second Opium War, also known as the "Arrow War," which France joined on the British side for comparable, trade-political motives. (See Gunboat Policy) The Treaty of Tianjin, signed on June 27, 1858, gave the victorious Europeans the right to establish further concessions on the Chinese mainland. In return, the treaty provided for the withdrawal of the British from Tianjin (historical transliteration Tientsin) and the evacuation of Dagu Fortress, 60 kilometers southeast of the city. China subsequently refused to implement the treaty. As a result, the British opened the second phase of the Second Opium War in June 1859 with a renewed attack on Dagukou. Only after the campaign in 1860, during which an invading army led by Lord Elgin reduced the Old Summer Palace in Peking to rubble, did Prince Gong, representing Emperor Xianfeng who had fled to Manchuria, confirm the terms of the treaty. In the so-called Beijing Convention of 18 October 1860, they were supplemented by further points, in particular the opening of the port of Tianjin itself, further reparations and cessions of territory to Great Britain and Russia.
On this basis, first Great Britain and France (as already in the 1840s in Shanghai) established two concession areas in Tianjin southeast of the walled city, from which northern China could be opened up for international trade. Due to the growing importance of the city as an important centre of trade and communication (as "Shanghai of the North") not far from Beijing, other colonial powers (Russia, Japan, the German Empire, Austria-Hungary, Belgium and Italy) followed suit until 1895/1900, negotiating follow-up treaties (see Unequal Treaties) and establishing separate concessions along the Hai He by means of diplomatic but also military pressure. These foreign enclaves - built in the respective national architectural style - had their own infrastructure and administration. The concessions shaped Tianjin's development into a modern city, but equally symbolized China's quasi-colonial penetration. One of the main roads that ran through these European neighborhoods (today's "Jiefang Beilu", 解放北路 - "literally Liberation Road North") carried sectional names representing the respective dominions: "Rue de la France", "Victoria Road", and "Wilhelm Road" (or after 1919, "Woodrow Wilson Road"). In 1900, Tianjin was the scene of fierce fighting in the Boxer Rebellion, as a result of which the city's geopolitical importance also grew with increased foreign garrisons. Some of the concessions continued to exist de jure until 1943.
In the context of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, parts of the former Italian concession areas were revitalized as a tourist attraction. A similar project on the Austrian concession area is in preparation.
Uprisings and Japanese Occupation
Tensions between the local population and the privileged foreigners erupted, among other things, in the events of Tianjin on 21. June 1870, the so-called Tianjin Massacre (天津教案, Tiānjīn jiào'àn, historical spelling Tientsin Massacre), when an angry Chinese crowd attacked the French orphanage of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires (望海樓教堂 / 望海楼教堂 - "Wanghailou Church"). This was prompted by rumors of Chinese orphans being bought or taken there and even cases of cannibalism on the part of the European nuns. Despite efforts by Chinese officials to calm the people, the situation escalated, as a result of which the French consul, nuns, priests, other foreigners and Chinese Christians were killed. It is estimated that a total of about 60 victims were killed. Twenty Chinese were then beheaded and the prefect banished from the city.
Although, or rather because, Tianjin (historically Tientsin) was effectively a protectorate of the European foreign powers, the city rose to become the second largest trade and communications center in China after Shanghai.
As the center of secret resistance against the Europeans, the city was the scene of fierce fighting in the Boxer Rebellion in the summer of 1900. From here, the expeditionary force formed by soldiers from eight nations (2066 soldiers in total) set out to relieve the legation quarter in Beijing besieged by insurgents and regular Imperial Chinese troops on June 10, 1900, but failed to break through and even fell on the defensive in Tianjin in the meantime. With the landing of larger foreign troop contingents (mainly British-Indian, Russian, Japanese, and U.S. units) and their arrival in Tianjin on July 14, 1900, communication with the coast was restored. The concessions saw the deployment of the now significantly reinforced multinational army (some 20,000 troops), which reached Beijing on 13 August 1900 and liberated the trapped foreigners. Major parts of the old city, including Tianjin's city walls, were destroyed during the fighting but were soon rebuilt in European style. Eventually, the foreigners demolished the walls and the old Chinese quarter in order to have a better view of the residents.
A prominent resident in Tianjin at the time of the Boxer War was Herbert Hoover, the later (31st) President of the United States, who was then a mining engineer in China. Having survived weeks of shelling of foreign concessions by the "Boxers" with his family, he was able to be useful as a local expert to the U.S. Marines who had followed. For Hoover, Tianjin was a "universal city - like a world in miniature with all its nationalities, its architectural styles, and its cuisines."
As a result of the Boxer Rebellion and its suppression, the city's geopolitical importance grew due to increased foreign garrisons.
From 1900 to 1909, the city was administered by an international commission representing those powers that had branches in Tianjin: Russia, Great Britain, France, Belgium, Japan, Italy, Austria-Hungary and the German Empire.
In 1906, the first tramway was put into operation in Tianjin.
After being expelled from the Forbidden City and placed in the custody of the Japanese legation, Aisin Gioro Pu Yi, the last emperor of the Qing Dynasty, moved to Tianjin on February 23, 1925. Here he resided in a stately villa in the Japanese concession until 1932 and took an active part in the social life of the cosmopolitan port city.
In 1927, Tianjin received the status of an independent city at the provincial level (直轄市 / 直辖市 - "Government-Independent City").
With the beginning of the Second Sino-Japanese War as a result of the so-called Marco Polo Bridge (Lugouqiao) Incident on July 7, 1937 near Beijing (then Peiping), Japanese troops, who had already occupied Manchuria in 1931 and already controlled large parts of northern China (see Manchurian Crisis), advanced southward across the Great Wall at Shanhaiguan. On July 29, 1937, Tianjin-in particular Nankai University, adjacent to the Japanese concession and an active center of "anti-Japanese agitation" among the nationally conscious Chinese student body-was bombed by Japanese aircraft. The few, poorly led Chinese units could hardly offer any resistance against the superior strength of the Japanese army, so that the city was taken almost without a fight the following day and remained under Japanese occupation until the end of the war. The sovereign rights of the other colonial powers, with which Japan was not (yet) at war, were initially respected, so that the foreign concessions continued. However, with the Japanese blockade of the British concession in the summer of 1939, it soon became apparent that these could not be held militarily. Even before Japan entered the war against the USA and Great Britain, their garrisons withdrew from Tianjin in 1940.
The expansion of the Tianjin-Xingang seaport took place during this period.
The Japanese occupation lasted until August 15, 1945, when U.S. forces entered the city after Japan surrendered, ending World War II. In December 1946, the rape of Chinese women in Tianjin by American soldiers sparked protests in the city that culminated in a large demonstration on January 1, 1947. US troops subsequently withdrew from Tianjin in June 1947.
Communist period of government
Communist troops captured Tianjin on January 15, 1949, after a 29-hour battle during the civil war with Kuomintang forces. After the Communist takeover, Tianjin initially remained an independent provincial-level municipality in China. In 1958, Tianjin became the capital of Hebei Province and was granted the status of a government-owned city in 1967.
According to official figures, 23,938 people died in Tianjin as a result of the Tangshan earthquake in 1976, and the city suffered severe destruction. Since the implementation of the economic reforms adopted by the Chinese government in 1978, the economy of Tianjin has shown a high stable growth until today, which led to a rapidly growing prosperity of large parts of the population.
The biggest problems facing the city today, due to failed modern urban planning policies, are growing immigration, air pollution caused by unfashionable factories, and sprawling traffic, which contributes to poor air quality and brings the city to the brink of gridlock. But a renaissance is also taking place in many social problems that were thought to have been eliminated forever by the communists after 1949. Unemployment, drug abuse and prostitution are showing strong growth.
On 12 August 2015, serious explosions occurred at the port in Tianjin (in Binhai) in a warehouse for hazardous materials. 173 people died and 797 were injured.
Population development
While Tianjin's population has doubled since the 1950s, it has remained relatively constant since the early 1990s, partly due to the introduction of the one-child policy. In the core city (high building density and closed place form) live 3.8 million people with main residence (2007). The population density is 22,379 inhabitants per square kilometre.
The entire administrative area of the Government Unified City has a population of 10.5 million (2007). Of these, 9.5 million are registered permanent residents (戶口 / 户口, hùkǒu) and 1,0 million temporary residents (流動人口 / 流动人口, liúdòng rénkǒu) with temporary residence permits (暫住證 / 暂住证, zànzhùzhèng). The population density is 879 inhabitants per square kilometre. The urbanization rate for the entire administrative area of Tianjin is given as 72 percent.
Anyone wishing to stay in the city for more than three days must report to the Public Security Office and is registered there. The applicant then receives a temporary residence permit for three months, which must be renewed at the end of the period. A certificate from the place of origin must be presented to the office confirming that the person is registered there.
Of Tianjin's 9,848,731 residents identified in the 2000 census, 97.29% were Han Chinese, 1.75% Muslim Hui Chinese, 0.57% Manchu, 0.12% Mongolian, and 0.11% Korean. Of China's 56 officially recognized nationalities, only four are not represented among Tianjin's residents.
The following overview shows the population figures for the core city (excluding the suburban belt). Listed are the registered residents with main residence in Tianjin.
| Year | Inhabitants | | 1860 | 300.000 | | 1896 | 600.000 | | 1911 | 750.000 | | 1920 | 800.000 | | 1923 | 900.000 | | 1936 | 1.081.000 | | 1939 | 1.223.000 | | 1948 | 1.686.000 | | | Year | Inhabitants | | 1953 | 1.714.354 | | 1957 | 2.049.200 | | 1970 | 2.291.000 | | 1982 | 3.272.725 | | 1990 | 3.693.938 | | 1995 | 3.687.081 | | 2000 | 3.771.900 | | 2007 | 3.755.249 | |
Development of the housing situation
The supply of housing is still precarious, although according to official figures from the city government the living space per capita has tripled since 1957. The communist city government had by no means been inactive; since the early 1950s, housing and living conditions had already been improved in the city districts with inadequate standards, and many new residential areas had been built. In China, it is expected that up to 350 million more rural residents will flock to the urban agglomerations in the coming decades.
For some years now, there has been a tendency to build large-scale new housing estates in conjunction with landscaped parks, golf courses and man-made lakeside lots. These buildings are usually above the normal standard, designed for a well-off middle class and hardly affordable for the average wage earner. One particular project is the construction of an ecologically sustainable large housing estate. Around 24 kilometres south of the city centre, around a 7 kilometre long and 3 kilometre wide artificial lake, an attempt is being made to counteract the monotony of a dormitory town serially populated with high-rise buildings with something different. About one third of the area east of the suburb of Jinghai, which covers several square kilometers, is to be supplied with renewable energy; otherwise, it will have an infrastructure suitable for everyday use and workplaces close to the city. The Chinese government has declared the project a reference project for future urbanizations. The first apartments will be ready for occupancy at the beginning of 2013, and everything is scheduled for completion by 2020.
The housing situation of the approximately one million residents with limited residence permits is significantly worse in contrast to the residents with main residence. Numerous migrants, mostly former farmers from China's rural regions, live on construction sites, in simple company dormitories or they rent a room from farmers on the periphery of the city. A large proportion of temporary residents live on the outskirts of the city because there is more space for self-built huts.
