Horses for Pastures: Exchange, Negotiation, and Power on the Kazakh–Qing Frontier

Abstract

This article examines the “horse-rent” system (zuma), practiced by the Qing government in relation to Kazakh nomads during the middle period of the Qing dynasty, as a specific form of frontier economic and social interaction. In contrast to conventional interpretations that treat this mechanism as an element of fiscal policy or an instrument of imperial control, the article proposes to conceptualize it as a hybrid regime of exchange in which commercial practices, negotiation strategies, and elements of regulated access to resources were closely intertwined.

The study is based on an analysis of archival materials from Kazakhstan and China, as well as Chinese written sources. From the mid-reign of the Qianlong emperor (particularly after 1767), Qing authorities annually collected from Kazakh nomads – who utilized winter pastures in the regions of Ili, Tarbagatai, and Kobdo – a proportion of livestock corresponding to the scale of grazing. For Kazakh nomads, this mechanism functioned as a form of “equine rent for land,” ensuring access to vital pasture resources and enabling the preservation of economic mobility. For the Qing administration, the system of “pastures in exchange for horses” served both as a means of acquiring a strategically important resource and as a tool for maintaining stability in frontier regions.

Particular attention is paid to the everyday practices through which the system operated, including informal arrangements between Kazakh clan leaders and frontier guard posts that allowed for the partial circumvention of established regulations. These practices demonstrate that the actual functioning of the frontier regime rested not only on formal prescriptions, but also on flexible mechanisms of negotiation, mutual benefit, and local adaptation.

The article concludes that the “horse-rent” system functioned less as an instrument of direct imperial control than as a form of negotiated frontier order, within which trade, exchange, and elements of governance coexisted and complemented one another. This perspective makes it possible to reinterpret Kazakh–Qing relations as a dynamic space of interaction rather than a model of one-sided subordination.