Editing Open Door Policy (section)

{{Short description|Late 19th/early 20th-century U.S. foreign policy seeking to open trade with China}}
{{About|the US and Chinese trade policies|the NATO policy|NATO open door policy|the managerial practice of leaving the office door open|Open door policy (business)|the album by the Hold Steady|Open Door Policy (album)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date = April 2019}}
{{Use American English|date = April 2019}}
[[File:Putting his foot down.jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|US cartoon from 1899: [[Uncle Sam]] (center, representing the [[United States]]) demanding Open Door access to trade with [[Qing China|China]] while European powers plan to cut it up for themselves. From left to right: [[Kaiser Wilhelm II]] ([[German Empire|Germany]]), [[King Umberto I]] ([[Kingdom of Italy|Italy]]), [[John Bull]] ([[British Empire|Britain]]), [[Tsar Nicholas II]] ([[Russian Empire|Russia]]) and [[Emile Loubet|President Emile Loubet]] ([[French Third Republic|France]]). [[Emperor Franz Joseph I]] ([[Austria-Hungary|Austria]]) is in the back.]]

The '''Open Door Policy''' ({{zh|t=門戶開放政策}}) is the [[History of United States foreign policy|United States diplomatic policy]] established in the late 19th and early 20th century that called for a system of equal trade and investment and to guarantee the territorial integrity of [[Qing China]]. The policy was created in [[U.S. Secretary of State]] [[John Hay]]'s '''Open Door Note''', dated September 6, 1899, and circulated to the major European powers.<ref>[https://www.loc.gov/law/help/us-treaties/bevans/m-ust000001-0278.pdf "Commercial Rights in China ('Open Door' Policy): Declarations by France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, Japan, and Russia accepting United States proposal for 'open door' policy in China, September 6, 1899–March 20, 1900"], Bevans Vol. 1, p. 278.</ref> In order to prevent the "[[Scramble for China|carving of China like a melon]]", as [[Scramble for Africa|they were doing in Africa]], the Note asked the powers to keep China open to trade with all countries on an equal basis and called upon all powers, within their [[sphere of influence|spheres of influence]] to refrain from interfering with any [[treaty port]] or any vested interest, to permit Chinese authorities to collect [[tariff]]s on an equal basis, and to show no favors to their own nationals in the matter of harbor dues or railroad charges. The policy was accepted only grudgingly, if at all, by the major powers, and it had no [[legal standing]] or enforcement mechanism. In July 1900, as the powers contemplated intervention to put down the violently anti-foreign [[Boxer Rebellion|Boxer uprising]], Hay circulated a '''Second Open Door Note''' affirming the principles. Over the next decades, American policy-makers and national figures continued to refer to the Open Door Policy as a basic doctrine, and Chinese diplomats appealed to it as they sought American support, but critics pointed out that the policy had little practical effect.

The term "Open Door" also describes the economic policy initiated by [[Deng Xiaoping]] in 1978 to [[Opening of China|open China]] to foreign businesses that wanted to invest in the country. The policy set into motion the economic transformation of China.<ref name="bbc"/>  In the 20th and 21st centuries, scholars such as [[Christopher Layne]] in the [[neorealism (international relations)|neorealist]] school have generalized the use of the term to applications in 'political' open door policies and 'economic' open door policies of nations in general, which interact on a global or international basis.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PN5CDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT30 |title=From World Factory to Global Investor: Multi-perspective Analysis on China's Outward Direct Investment |date= 2017 |editor= Xuedong Ding, Chen Meng |isbn=978-1-315-45579-2 |publisher=Routledge}}</ref>