The Salt Merchants of Tianjin: State-Making and Civil Society in Late Imperial China. By Kwan Man Bun. [Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2001. viii+239 pp. $42.00. ISBN 0-8248-2275-7.]

Extract

Salt merchants, despite their critical role in the traditional Chinese economy, have largely been ignored by historians. Indeed, Ping-ti Ho's pioneering article on the Yangzhou salt merchants was published nearly 50 years ago. With The Salt Merchants of Tianjin – a revision of his 1999 Chinese book – Kwan Man Bun intends to help fill this gap.