The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 by Kenneth Pomeranz (PDF)

Description

This wholly original reassessment of critical issues in modern Chinese history traces social, economic, and ecological change in inland North China during the late Qing dynasty and the Republic. Using many new sources, Kenneth Pomeranz argues that the development of certain regions entailed the systematic underdevelopment of other regions. He maps changes in local finance, farming, transportation, taxation, and popular protest, and analyzes the consequences for different classes, sub-regions, and genders.Pomeranz attributes these diverse developments to several causes: the growing but incomplete integration of North China into the world economy, the state’s abandonment of many hinterland areas and traditional functions, and the effect of local social structures on these processes. He shows that hinterlands were made, not merely found, and were powerfully shaped by the strategies of local groups as well as outside forces.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: About the Author Kenneth Pomeranz is Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐An interesting and detailed study of major social change in rural China in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Pomeranz focuses on a rural region of Northwest China that become increasingly impoverished, and not just in relative terms, in this period. He indicates that this is paradigmatic of a number of rural regions over this period. These same regions later became strongholds of the Chinese Communist Party. He describes 3 interrelated phenomena that drove this change. The first was a major economic-technological change. This part of China had been traversed by the Grand Canal. Over the course of the 19th century, the Qing state became less reliant on the Grand Canal to feed the capital and other northern regions. The transport features of the Canal were increasingly replaced by seaborne shipping and railroads, leaving this part of China a relatively isolated backwater. Beyond the obvious economic consequences, the decay of the Grand Canal system imposed considerable burdens on this region as poor market integration restricted access to crucial resources like wood and building stone. The second was the decay of the Qing state and the inadequacies of its successors. As state withdrew its support and direction from crucial activities such as hydrologic management, not just restricted to the maintenance of the Grand Canal, this region lacked the resources to avoid devastating floods. Pomeranz argues that this was a deliberate choice as the Qing and their successors did invest in coastal regions that were economically dynamic and perceived as crucial to avoid domination by Japan and western powers. Finally, the expanding world economy and pressures of imperialist powers advantaged the coastal regions in other ways that worked to the disadvantage of this hinterland region. Pomeranz has a good deal of detailed analysis exploring these phenomena and how they interacted with a number of local features. While generally written clearly, parts are a bit repetitive and rather dense in terms of detail. Generally, however, an interesting view of the decay of the Chinese state and the impact of global capitalism-imperialism.

Keywords

Free Download The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 in PDF format
The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 PDF Free Download
Download The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 2008 PDF Free
The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 2008 PDF Free Download
Download The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937 PDF
Free Download Ebook The Making of a Hinterland: State, Society, and Economy in Inland North China, 1853-1937