Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T14:02:04.692Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - The Economic Impact of the West

A Reappraisal

from Part I - 1800–1950

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 February 2022

Debin Ma
Affiliation:
Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo
Richard von Glahn
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Get access

Summary

For the Chinese, the nineteenth century was a period of waking up and realizing why the Middle Kingdom had fallen behind the West in economic growth. Not only had this large and once prosperous country fallen behind economically (with its apparent failure to industrialize), it also fell prey during the two Opium Wars to the same country that first embarked upon the Industrial Revolution – Britain. Consequently, a long period of autarky came to an end. While initially China was forced to open up only several “treaty ports” for trade and commerce, eventually the entire country was subjected to the influences of the West, and in spheres that went far beyond trade and commerce to also include industry, education, and even politics. By assembling data from a variety of previously untapped historical sources, this chapter attempts to analyze the Western influences that shaped the economic trajectories of late imperial China.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Further Reading

Bai, Y., and Kung, J.K-S., Diffusing Useful Knowledge While Spreading God’s Message: Protestantism and Economic Prosperity in China, 1840–1920, Journal of the European Economic Association 13.4 (2015), 669–98.Google Scholar
Chang, Yufa 張玉法, “清末民初的外資工業” (Foreign Industries in Late Qing and Early Republican China) Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica 1987, 129–249.Google Scholar
Chang, Yufa 張玉法, 近代中國工業發展史, 1860–1916 (A History of Modern Chinese Industrial Development, 1860–1916) (Taipei, Gui guan tu shu you xian gong si, 1992).Google Scholar
Dernberger, R. F., “The Role of the Foreigner in China’s Economic Development, 1840–1949,” in Perkins, D.H. (ed.), China’s Modern Economy in Historical Perspective (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1975), pp. 1947.Google Scholar
Du, Xuncheng 杜恂誠, 民族資本主義與舊中國政府, 1840–1937 (Chinese Capitalism and the Old Chinese Government, 1840–1937) (Shanghai, Shanghai shehui kexueyuan chubanshe, 1991).Google Scholar
Esherick, J., “Reconsidering 1911: Lessons of a Sudden Revolution,” Journal of Modern Chinese History 6.1 (2012), 114.Google Scholar
Feuerwerker, A., “The Foreign Presence in China,” in Fairbank, J.K. (ed.), The Cambridge History of China, vol. 12, Republican China, 1912–1949, part 1 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 128207.Google Scholar
Jansen, M., “Japan and the Chinese Revolution of 1911,” in Fairbank, J.K. and Liu, K.C. (eds.), The Cambridge History of China, vol. 11, Late Ch’ing, 1800–1911, part 2 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1980), pp. 339–74.Google Scholar
Jia, R., “The Legacies of Forced Freedom: China’s Treaty Ports,” Review of Economics and Statistics 96.4 (2014), 596608.Google Scholar
Perkins, D. H., “Government as an Obstacle to Industrialization: The Case of Nineteenth-Century China,” Journal of Economic History 17.4 (1967), 478–92.Google Scholar
Reynolds, D., China, 1898–1912: The Xinzheng Revolution and Japan (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1993).Google Scholar
Shen, Diancheng 沈殿成, 中國人留學日本百年史 (A History of a Hundred Years of Chinese Studying in Japan) (Liaoning, Liaoning jiaoyu chubanshe, 1997).Google Scholar
Zhang, Hongxiang 張洪祥, 近代中國通商口岸與租界 (Treaty Ports and Concessions in Chinese History) (Tianjin, Tianjin renmin chubanshe, 1993).Google Scholar
Zhang Pengyuan 張朋园, 中国民主政治的困境, 1909–1949 (The Predicament of Democracy in China, 1909–1949) (Changchun, Jilin chu ban ji tuan you xian ze ren gong si, 2008).Google Scholar
Zhang, Jianqiu 張建俅, 清末自開商埠之研究 (1898–1911) (Research on the Self-Initiated Ports of the Late Qing) (Taipei, Huamulan wenhua chubanshe, 2009).Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×