After the Ming Dynasty moves the imperial Chinese capital to Beijing, the rise of new emperors and new factions diminished such extravagances as Zheng He’s Treasure Voyages of exploration into the Indian Ocean; the capture of the Zhengtong Emperor during the 1449 Tumu Crisis ends them completely.

The imperial navy is allowed to fall into disrepair while forced labor constructs the Liaodong palisade and connects and fortifies the Great Wall of China into its modern form.

Wide-ranging censuses of the entire empire are conducted decennially, but the desire to avoid labor and taxes and the difficulty of storing and reviewing the enormous archives at Nanjing hampera accurate figures.

Estimates for the late-Ming population vary from 160 to 200 million, but necessary revenues are squeezed out of smaller and smaller numbers of farmers as more disappear from the official records or "donate" their lands to tax-exempt eunuchs or temples.

Haijin laws intended to protect the coasts from "Japanese" pirates instead turn many into smugglers and pirates themselves.By the sixteenth century, however, the expansion of European trade – albeit restricted to islands near Guangzhou like Macau – spreads the Columbian Exchange of crops, plants, and animals into China, introducing chili peppers to Sichuan cuisine and highly productive corn and potatoes, which diminish famines and spur population growth.

The growth of Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch trade create new demand for Chinese products and produce a massive influx of Japanese and American silver.

This abundance of specie allows the Ming to finally avoid using paper money, which had sparked hyperinflation during the 1450s.

While traditional Confucians oppose such a prominent role for commerce and the newly rich it creates, the heterodoxy introduced by Wang Yangming permits a more accommodating attitude.

Zhang Juzheng's initially successful reforms prove devastating when a slowdown in agriculture produced by the Little Ice Age is met with Japanese and Spanish policies that quickly cut off the supply of silver now necessary for farmers to be able to pay their taxes.

Combined with crop failure, floods, and epidemic, the dynasty is considered to have lost the Mandate of Heaven and collapses before the rebel leader Li Zicheng and a Manchurian invasion.