Correct Option: A

One of the oldest examples of a civil service based on meritocracy is the Imperial bureaucracy of China, which can be traced as far back as the Qin Dynasty (221–207 BC). During the Han Dynasty (202 BC–220 AD) the xiaolian system of recommendation by superiors for appointments to office was established. The civil service recruitment method and educational system employed from the Han dynasty (206 B.C.– A.D. 220) was abolished by the Ch’ing dowager empress Tz’u Hsi in 1905 under pressure from leading Chinese intellectuals. The Sui dynasty (581–618) adopted this Han system and applied it in a much more systematic way as a method of official recruitment.