休兵讲好苏民力:绍兴和议后减免税役的政策论述

Pursuing an armistice for people’s resilience:the policy discourse on reduction and exemption of taxes and corvee after the Shaoxing Peace Treaty

南宋绍兴和议之前,宋廷为了解决兵费不足的窘困,增加许多新的财政来源,可谓重税养兵。随着绍兴和议的订立,收兵权沛然有成,孝亲、迎梓宫已然实践,偃武修文按部就班。在主和路线之下,宋高宗君臣试图改变重税养兵,改行"休兵息民"的政策,以寻求其政治正当性的新基础。和议后二十年间,在财政上的作为,一是进行减免税役,二是致力于营田及屯田,三是致力于经界田地,四是清查官有财产。其中有三层含义:一是减轻百姓负担,二是增加国家岁入,三是将税役合理化。当然,宋高宗的减免税役不过是一种政治策略,真正目的在于稳定政权,具有功利性。

The imperial court of the Southern Song Dynasty had added many financial sources to overcome the insufficient military expenditures before the Shaoxing Peace Treaty,which could be described as building army with heavy taxation.As the treaty was signed,the court succeeded in withdrawing military power from generals,the Emperor Gaozong’s captured mother returned and his father’s coffin was received and mourned,the policy to desist from armament and promote culture and education was carried out as scheduled.Under the guideline of making peace,the emperor and his ministers tried to change policies from heavy taxation for military to pursuing an armistice for people’s resilience to provide a new basis for their political legitimacy.During the twenty years after the treaty,their financial actions were:1)to reduce or exempt taxes and corvee;2)to have garrison troops or peasants open up wasteland and grow food;3)to demarcate plots of field;4)to check officials’properties.The actions had three meanings:to reduce people’s burden;to increase state’s revenue;to make taxes and corvee more rational.The emperor’s efforts,of course,were none other than a political strategy.His real aim was utilitarian,i.e.to stablise the regime.