Mufu (Chinese: 幕府; Wade–Giles: mu-fu), a secretariat,[1] was a system for hiring able advisers, the muliao (Chinese: 幕僚), by the imperial Chinese provincial officials. It dates back to 229 BC, but was extensively used in the Qing dynasty.[2] The system was also adopted in Japan by the shōgun. The Chinese characters (kanji) for mufu (幕府) are pronounced in Japanese as bakufu.
The first Chinese character mu (Chinese: 幕) denotes curtain, and tent, and the second character fu (Chinese: 府) denotes home or government, hence mufu means "tent government". The liao (Chinese: 僚) in muliao denotes bureaucrat, official.[2]
The term mufu referred to three different institutions in Chinese history. In the Han dynasty and perhaps as early as the Warring States Period, it referred to the temporary residence of a general commanding in the field. In the Tang dynasty it referred to the office of a jiedushi (military governor), or a unit in the jinjun inner palace guards. In the Ming and Qing dynasties it referred to the offices of the regional governors.[3]
In the late Qing, powerful regional governors greatly modified the traditional mufu system, transforming it into a professional bureaucracy under their personal authority. These mufu could bypass the usual bureaucratic regulations to include members of the emerging capitalist class. Their capital and specialized skills were useful to the running of modern enterprises that were established under the Self-Strengthening Movement, and many Western-trained experts were given considerable responsibilities in this way.[4]
Conventional officials were selected from the successful candidates of the literary imperial examination who had little practical skills to govern, and the Qing central government had no provision to provide them with technical staff since there was no training or recruiting of such experts. To perform their job well, the appointed scholars were forced to hire able men, muliao, to staff the mufu, to deal with floods, rebellions, finance and foreign affairs.[2] The mufu system was the well-oil machine that produced next generation officials.[1]
Mufu were staffed by private hires, and headed by the official who responsible for their salaries. The official did not have to report to the central government, unless he wanted to promote one of the members in his mufu to a regular position within the government bureaucracy.
InZeng Guofan's mufu, his muliao included Li Hongzhang.[1]InLi Hongzhang's mufu, his muliao included Pan Dingxin, Zhou Fu and Liu Bingzhang.[1]: 217
