Pèngcí (碰瓷 lit. touching or bumping
porcelain
Porcelain () is a ceramic material made by heating substances, generally including materials such as kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to other types of pottery, arises mainl ...
) is the practice of
crooks placing ostensibly expensive, fragile items (usually porcelain) in places where they may easily be knocked over, allowing them to collect damages when the items are damaged.
The term has been expanded to include a predominantly Chinese crime where scammers feign
injury
An injury is any physiological damage to living tissue caused by immediate physical stress. An injury can occur intentionally or unintentionally and may be caused by blunt trauma, penetrating trauma, burning, toxic exposure, asphyxiation, o ...
in
traffic accidents in order to
extort
Extortion is the practice of obtaining benefit through coercion. In most jurisdictions it is likely to constitute a criminal offence; the bulk of this article deals with such cases. Robbery is the simplest and most common form of extortion, al ...
money from drivers,
as well to describe “broken porcelain”
diplomacy
Diplomacy comprises spoken or written communication by representatives of states (such as leaders and diplomats) intended to influence events in the international system.Ronald Peter Barston, ''Modern diplomacy'', Pearson Education, 2006, p. 1 ...
, in which any foreign criticism of the
Chinese government
The Government of the People's Republic of China () is an authoritarian political system in the People's Republic of China under the exclusive political leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It consists of legislative, executive, mili ...
, or its strategic issues, is met with manufactured outrage, shattering the "porcelain of diplomacy" and fanning popular anger.
The
melon drop scam in the western world is similar to Pengci which originally targeted Japanese tourists due to the high price of watermelon in Japan. The scammer will bump or cause the mark to bump into them causing the scammer to drop a watermelon. The scammer may then receive upwards of $100 for "compensation".
Origin
There are different theories about the origin of "pengci", two of which are most recognized by the public.
Terminology in the antique market
When placing antiques on the booth, some sellers deliberately placed fragile porcelain, counterfeit or damaged defective products in the middle or corner of the road, waiting for passers-by to accidentally damage them, and they can take the opportunity to extort money under false pretenses.
Declining nobles in late
Qing Dynasty
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...
During the 200 years of Qing government rule, nobles (
Eight Banners
The Eight Banners (in Manchu language, Manchu: ''jakūn gūsa'', ) were administrative and military divisions under the Later Jin (1616–1636), Later Jin and Qing dynasty, Qing dynasties of China into which all Manchu people, Manchu households ...
) enjoyed certain privileges. However, in the late Qing Dynasty, the national power weakened, and the money and food supplied to the nobles became less and less, and eventually disappeared. The nobles sold real estate and antiques in order to survive. In order to get more money, some of them walked in crowded places with a piece of defective porcelain in hand. They deliberately let the carriage or passers-by touch the porcelain and damage it, and threatened pedestrians or the carriage driver to force them to pay compensation. In the beginning of the
Republic of China
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...
, this behavior often occurred in downtown areas, but the tools of crime were replaced with pens, glasses, music boxes and other small items.
See also
*
List of confidence tricks
Confidence tricks and scams are difficult to classify, because they change often and often contain elements of more than one type. Throughout this list, the perpetrator of the confidence trick is called the "con artist" or simply "artist", and t ...
*
Staged crash
A staged crash is when criminals maneuver unsuspecting motorists into crashes in order to make false insurance claims. The cars generally suffer little damage in relation to the large demand that is then fraudulently submitted. In 2011, a group of ...
es and
collisions as forms of insurance fraud
References
Fraud
Crime in China
{{crime-stub