Manila, Macao and Chinese networks in South China Sea: adaptive strategies of cooperation and survival (sixteenth-to-seventeenth centuries)

Abstract

Manila was the Spanish base for the conquista of the Philippines and a vital key point to reach China. Competition with the Portuguese Macao soon emerged, in a tense process that would fade in the seventeenth century, thanks to emergent mutual threats: the arrival of the Dutch, the fall of the Ming dynasty and the closure of Japan. This paper aims to study some aspects of the relations between Macao and Manila and their adapting strategies, focusing also on the Ming-Qing transition and its impact on the transversal role played by overseas Chinese communities in the South China Sea.