Economic Change in China, c.1800–1950

This concise 1999 introduction focuses on China's transition to economic modernisation.

Philip Richardson (Author)

9780521635714, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 13 November 1999

138 pages, 3 maps 8 tables
21.6 x 13.9 x 1.4 cm, 0.19 kg

"Examines the development of the Chinese economy over the period 1800-1950, exploring the dynamics of the process of change and the emergence of modern features within the Chinese economy." Journal of Economic Literature

This 1999 book provides a concise introduction to the economic history of one of the major world powers. China is probably the only major economy for which it is still not certain whether modern economic growth at the aggregate level had taken hold by the middle of the twentieth century. This introductory analysis of the process of economic change in China from the end of the eighteenth century to the middle of the twentieth looks at the nature of the traditional economy, covers the pressure it came under from both internal and external sources during the nineteenth century and assesses the evolution of modern features in the twentieth. With maps, tables and bibliography to guide the student, this concise study will provide an invaluable introduction to crucial aspects of Chinese history.

Introduction
1. Analytical frameworks
2. The eighteenth-century legacy and the early nineteenth-century crisis
3. Growth and structural change
4. Foreign trade and investment
5. Industry: traditional and modern
6. Agriculture
7. The state and the economy
8. Conclusion: the legacy of the past.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ]