陈兰彬出使美国的个人功过和历史意义——兼论近代中国社会发展潮流南移广东的原因及其启示

The Individual Merits and Demerits and the Historical Meaning of Chen Lanbin's Diplomatic Mission to USA——With a concurrent discussion about the reasons of modern China's social developing trend occurred in Guangdong province and the revelations

作为中国首任留美学生监督,陈兰彬在派遣留美幼童问题上,在如何教育、管理留美幼童的问题上,有所贡献。但他不能明察曾国藩关于幼童抵美后学习内容以西学为主的真实意图,在撤回留美幼童问题上,负有不可推卸的责任。作为中国首任驻美公使,其功过可概括为"有所为"和"难作为":他在保护华侨方面的功绩应充分肯定,但由于国势衰微、个人能力不足等困境,难以在中美邦交的实质性问题上取得重要进展。

Being the first Chinese supervisor for students studying in U. S. A, Chen Lanbin made contributions as to sending children to study in USA and how to educate and manage these children, but he had misunderstood Zeng Guofan＇s real purpose of sending children to USA to learn western culture. Therefore, as for withdrawing these children to China, he held the responsibility that couldn＇t be shirked. As the first Chinese envoy in USA, Chert Lanbin＇s merits and demerits can be summarized as the following two aspects： ＂Doing something successfully＂ and ＂Achieving something hardly＂. ＂Doing something successfully＂ means that he made a positive contribution to protecting overseas Chinese; ＂Achieving something hardly＂ means that he hardly made an important progress in some substantive issues about establishing diplomatic relations with USA during his tenure of office due to being a weak nation and inadequate personal abilities.