The Age of Openness: China before Mao

143 Pages·2008·2.33 MB·English

by  Frank Dikotter

THE ACiE OF OPENNESS
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.~ Understanding China:
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New Viewpoints on History and Culture
Each book in Understanding China series provides a short and
accessible guide to the research highlights of an active field of
Chinese studies. Focusing on interdisciplinary work that bridges the
humanities and social sciences, the books introduce readers to the
subject, discuss the major problems and, by critically analyzing
competing solutions and taking up new viewpoints, draw readers into
the debates. The books are written in language accessible to readers
outside Chinese studies, but are sufficiently informative, current and
provocative also to engage the specialist reader.
Editors: David Faure, The Chinese University of Hong Kong and
University of Oxford
Helen F. Siu, Yale University and the Hong Kong Institute
of Humanities and Social Sciences
Also in the series:
China and Capitalism: A History of Business Enterprise in MotU!m China
David Faure
A Social History of the Chinese Book: Books and Literati Cultun in Late
Imperial China
Joseph P. McDermott
THE AGE OF OPENNESS
China before Mao
Frank Dikotter
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HONG KONG UNIVERSITY PRESS
Hong Kong University Press
14/F Hing Wai Centre
7 Tin Wan Praya Road
Aberdeen
Hong Kong
© Frank Dikotter 2008
ISBN 978-962-209-920-3
All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Secure On-line Ordering
http://www.hkupress.org
Printed and bound by Condor Production Ltd., Hong Kong, China
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
1. Introduction 1
2. Open governance 7
3. Open borders 31
4. Open minds 53
5. Open markets 81
6. Conclusion 99
Notes 103
A note on further reading for the non-Chinese reader 121
Index 127

Acknowledgements
I am thankful to David Faure for the invitation to contribute to the
series Understanding China: it provided me with a rare opportunity to
sit back and make explicit, in the form of a long essay, some of the
more general ideas which have grown out of a series of six more
detailed research monographs I have published over the past fifteen
years on the globalisation of ideas, institutions and commodities in
modem China. A number of people have generously shared their
ideas and suggestions with me and read and commented on draft
versions, in particular Kingsley Bolton, University ofStockholm;John
M. Carroll, University of Hong Kong; Joseph P. McDermott,
Cambridge University; Christopher Hutton, University of Hong Kong;
Angus Lockyer, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of
London; Andrew Nathan, Columbia University; William T. Rowe,
Johns Hopkins University; David Strand, Dickinson College; Francesca
Tarocco, University of Manchester; and Arthur Waldron, University
of Pennsylvania. I bear final responsibility for all errors and omissions.
F. D.
Hong Kong, August 2007