Praxis II Citizenship

Answer: A - The outcome of the First Opium War between Britain and China forced the latter to engage in unrestricted trade with Western countries, ending the monopoly of the Canton System. Prior to the war, which began in 1839, China required trading partners to pay tributes to the Chinese emperor in order to secure permission to trade. Over time, they became more and more restrictive and demanding about trade agreements, which the Europeans and Americans (the British in particular) expected to enter more or less as equals. Britain and its allies (including the United States, intermittently) won the war in 1842. Part of the peace treaty, the Nanking Treaty, required China to open five ports for trade with the British.