制度缺失与家国利益——晚清内务府腐败问题探析

System Lacking and National Interests versus Royal Interests——On the Corruption of Imperial Household Department in the Late Qing Dynasty

晚清内务府以腐败著称,究其原因,主要在于制度设计及现实执行的种种缺失,即内务府管理的封闭性、监督机制的失效、内务府大臣整体素质的降低及皇室的奢靡与包庇。作为满洲特权的某种象征和代表,腐败不堪的内务府成为时人诟病清室的口实。随着清末民族主义的觉醒和立宪运动的展开,整肃、改革内务府成为朝野上下的一致呼声,凸显了当时的满汉矛盾与家国利益冲突。而清室对于内务府腐败问题缺乏有效应对,也构成其丧失人心、走向覆亡的一个内在因缘。

The Imperial Household Department was famous of its corruption in the late Qing dynasty. The reason mainly lies in the lack of system design and implementation,including the seal of the management,failure of supervision mechanism,quality reduction of the ministers and the extravagance of the royal family.As a symbol of imperial power,the corrupted Imperial Household Department was used by people at that time as an excuse to criticize the royalty. In the tide of constitutional movement in the late Qing dynasty,people inside and outside of the court all agreed to reform the Imperial Household Department,showing the ManchuHan conflict and the contradiction between national interests and royal interests. But the royalty had not dealt effectively with corruption,which became one of the reasons leading to its demise.