The Indigenous Urban Tradition of China IntroductionSuzhou was.docx

The Indigenous Urban Tradition of China
Introduction
Suzhou was a populous city renowned for its trade,
manufacturing, and a center of learning. It was a client city of
the Song dynasty that routinely remitted taxes to the emperor
and the middle kingdom’s economic and cultural center in the
16th century despite the adversity it experienced (Johnson 23).
Suzhou was the kingdom’s richest, most urbanized and
advanced region. On the other hand, Shanghai was one of the
Treaty cities established by imperial powers in the 19th century.
It was the epitome of western influence in China in the early
part of the 20th century (Lu 174). This paper asserts that even
though both Suzhou and Shanghai urbanized at different times,
they both followed the model of the “other China” characterized
by a largely autonomous merchant class in highly industrialized
settlements that were well connected with transport and
communication networks.
Suzhou City
Suzhou was the urban corner of a vast agrarian empire. It is part
of what scholars call the “other China” that was urban,
commercial, capitalist and secular (Johnson 24). It bore
characteristics that were indigenous and existed before the
treaty ports were established and western style cities emerged in
the 19th century. Like other indigenous cities, it was sharply
distinguished from the surrounding countryside and was run by
a merchant community driven by capitalist values and interests
(Marmé 217). It was an autonomous, commercial and capitalist
urban center at odds with the agrarian, orthodox and
bureaucratic states of the time.
Suzhou was located in the low-lying part of Jiangnan and
developed later than other parts of the region. It was essentially
a backwater because it lacked investments in water control to
manage the floods (Blue, Engelfriet, and Jami 3). It required

heavy investment in manpower and to drain the paddy fields for
farming and settlement. The landlords were willing to invest in
the polders with the knowledge that a cultivatable Delta would
attract high tenancy rates that would lead to the expansion of
the area under cultivation. However, the landlords’ motivation
was not just to attract subsistent farmers. The market-oriented
landlords preferred to specialize in lower yield but more
commercially valuable strains of rice (Blue, Engelfriet, and
Jami 4). The landlords had their eyes trained on the
inexhaustible market in Xingzai rather than the needs of
peasants.
Moreover, water control served the purpose of facilitating
navigation. The raised fields and carefully dredged rivers and
intricate canals offered an excellent waterway for transporting
bulky commodities cheaply and efficiently (Blue, Engelfriet,
and Jami 5). The elaborate network facilitated the export of
high-value grains and the import of coarse grain for local
consumption. The imports enabled local peasants to substitute
quality for quantity. The city was already well secured as it was
ringed by a section of the Grand Canal linking Jiangnan with
North China’s Central Plain (Marmé 218). The area on the moat
was crisscrossed by canals and surrounded by a wall. The walls
protected the city and its inhabitants from hostile forces. The
effect was that Suzhou enjoyed improved transport and
communication within the city and protection from floods.
The city within a city
The city had the characteristic of a city within a city as the
prefecture compound to the east of the city was a walled
Zicheng occupying 6% of Suzhou’s total area (Johnson 25). It
was the walled city that accommodated the regional magistrate,
as well as schools, official temples military barracks and other
significant state and public institutions. The state used large
parts of the urban space and its activities shaped what the
residents made of the remaining space. For starters, a large
proportion of the urban officials were employed either directly

or indirectly by the public sector (Johnson 26). Official power
also shaped the residential patterns of the local elite. For
instance, even though Wu was the most successful county in
Suzhou, most elite families established residence in the eastern
side of the city close to the prefectural yamen.
During the Mongols conquest, Suzhou experienced exponential
growth as with its population rising from 329,603 households to
466,158 households between 1275 and 1290. The growth was
attributed to the shift of the center of political power to the
Central Plain (Blue, Engelfriet, and Jami 10). The growth was
also attributable to the government’s decision to send grain by
sea with Taicang port in the north becoming the transit point for
the grain. The prefectural capital also prospered as evidenced in
the expansion of temple building (Johnson 27). Trade and
industry concentrated in the north of the city such that when the
city wall was rebuilt, a moon wall was erected to protect
merchants.
Under the Ming dynasty, the tax in Suzhou was tripled and tens
of thousands of wealthy and skilled families deported to the
outskirts of the empire. Despite the punitive taxes, Suzhou
continued to thrive and even grew in size (Marmé 219). The
resilience is attributed to the fact that the most punitive taxes
around 11%s the normal rate targeted the wealthiest 0.1% of the
households while most ordinary households paid taxes similar to
other regions. Further, the dynasty reduced taxes once military
control was complete. Thus, the strain of the taxes on local
resources was sustainable in the long-term (Johnson 23). It is
also instructive that trade in non-agricultural commodities
thrived in the city implying that Suzhou’s ability to prosper
while paying punitive taxes was due its highly commercialized
economy.
The reconstruction of the Grand Canal in the 12th century
ensured that Suzhou played a major role in the integration of the
Middle Kingdom that now had separate political and economic
centers (Blue, Engelfriet, and Jami 15). The merchants also
exploited the opportunity to transport grain to the capital for

personal benefit. The introduction of silver taxes in place of
grain taxes encouraged merchants to orient themselves towards
the market economy with the result that a large proportion of
the population increasingly engaged in commercial transactions
(Marmé 221). Thus, the measures to reduce the tax burden and
replace grain tax with silver in the early 15th century were a
catalyst for further commercialization.
The intensified commercialization and monetization was further
enhanced by the spread of textile production in the city
(Johnson 23). The population explosion in the 12th and 13th
centuries were attributed to the silk economy as raising
silkworms was labor intensive. Suzhou was also producing
cotton cloth in the 16th century. Most of the raw cotton was
imported from areas bordering the Yangze as they had favorable
soils (Blue, Engelfriet, and Jami 21). Most of the silk cloth was
manufactured in the capital where specialized training restricted
expansion.
The expansion of the silk industry to the populous hinterland
was aided by the canals that connected peasant households to
high-level markets. A survey done in the 12th century indicated
that there were 27.8 miles of navigable rivers and canals in one
square mile of the city’s hinterland (Marmé 221). Most of the
expansion and prosperity happened outside the city and its main
suburbs. Thus, Suzhou continued to thrive despite suppression
by the Ming Dynasty due to its commerce and industry fostered
by sound transport infrastructure (Johnson 32). It was a major
source of the dynasty’s revenue as it contributed about 12% of
the total revenue.
Shanghai city
Shanghai was model of Western-inspired development in China.
The city survived the world wars and continued to develop and
increase its population, economic power as well as cultural and
political influence as the most successful of the treaty cities
(Ristaino 123). It also benefitted from geography, industry, and
advances in technology and industry.
Most scholars attribute the development of the port city on the

Yangtze to maritime commerce with the West (Ristaino 126). It
benefited from a flow of western capital and technicians who
stimulated the growth of its modern sector and aroused the
entrepreneurial spirit of the national nobility and accelerated
the formation of a working class. It was part of the tradition of
marginal China where communities of merchants were ignored
or ill-treated for long periods by the existing authorities
including the Imperial power (Bergère 5). In such cities,
merchants, intellectuals, pirates and industrialists thrived.
In the case of Shanghai, its otherness is manifested in the
transplanted foreigners thriving in a non-orthodox tradition of a
small but fertile piece of land (Ristaino 128). This combined
with imported food from western countries stimulated the
growth and development of export trade as the fall in gold value
lowered the cost of imports. The stimulants of modern
international trade exerted themselves in China through
Shanghai (Lu 175). At the time, international trade through
Shanghai represented 41.7% of the value of all Chinese external
trade. It had a flourishing private enterprise at a time when the
rate of Chinese industrial growth reached 13.9%.
In Shanghai, cotton mills increased while new industries such as
clothing and milling emerged. Meanwhile, several machinery
workshops emerged heralding the city’s progress towards heavy
industry (Ristaino 128). The industrial and commercial growth
was accompanied by the development of credit and modern
Chinese banking. The Shanghai banks differed from mainstream
Chinese banks in that they focused on financing private
enterprise rather than subsidizing public administration. Most
the banks in Shanghai were foreign and continued to
monopolize the financing of external commerce and control the
flow of foreign currency and precious metals (Wasserstrom
142). Shanghai enjoyed a decade of prosperity between 1910
and 1920. Historians estimate that the city’s population grew
from one million inhabitants in 1910 to almost 2.5 million in
1920.
Settler city within a city

The decade of prosperity had the effect of transforming the
commercial port into an industrial city with a new Chinese
nationalist urban class (Wasserstrom 148). The city had a small
group of foreigners who lived in foreign a Settlement that
enjoyed an international status. They enjoyed extraterritorial
rights and were only answerable to their respective consulates.
Apart from paying a customs surtax determined by foreign
authorities, their merchandise was exempt from control by
Chinese authorities (Bergère 10). Thus, the settlements were
akin to autonomous oligarchies independent of Chinese
authorities.
The foreigners in the Settlement designed western-style
amenities and institutions. They also had their own factories
and warehouses as well as postal services and news publications
(Lu 174). They also enjoyed domestic and industrial electricity
supply at very low prices. The main reason for this design was
to facilitate trade and enterprise. The result was that Shanghai
hosted 20 foreign banks and 15 of the 16 cotton mills in China
by 1919 (Wasserstrom 149). It was also the headquarters of
large trading firms.
After the First World War, the old imperialist forces began to
decline at a time when Chinese nationalism was on the rise (Lu
174). The foreigners anticipated an uncertain future and the
abolition of extra-territoriality. The International Settlement
brokered an agreement with the Shanghai Municipal Council
that allowed indirect extension to cater for increasing industrial
and demographic requirements. The agreement allowed it to
build External Roads extending 48 miles into the Chinese
territory (Lu 179). Thus, the External Road Areas were
independent of Chinese authorities.
At the same time, Shanghai experienced a rise in a new Chinese
urban class comprising of the working class, business class and
intelligentsia (Wasserstrom 150). This class rose due to the
disintegration of traditional social structures and the decline of

Confucian ideology that had the effect of loosening bureaucratic
hold on the middle class. The Chinese middle class also
experienced economic prosperity from their enterprises
(Ristaino 129). Chinese capitalists enjoyed unprecedented
profitability with margins that often exceeded 32%.
They also tried to control long-established organizations such as
the guilds and the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce
(Wasserstrom 151). However, they did not seek the expulsion of
the foreigners as they needed their expertise and capital.
Instead, they sought collaboration and cooperation that would
be mutually beneficial to both parties. They sought the
establishment of a federation of autonomous provinces that
resemble a central government while avoiding reactionary and
despotic regimes that often interfered with free enterprise
(Bergère 19).
The wave of industrialization in Shanghai created a working
class with city accounting for a quarter of the 1.5 million
Chinese workers employed in modern factories and associated
services. These workers immigrated from the squalor of the
countryside in search of a livelihood (Wasserstrom 156). They
lacked necessary skills and the influx of workers meant that
employers could keep wages at the lowest level (Lu 178). There
was no employment regulation, and there were several children
working in the textile industry.
Meanwhile, the chaotic and brutal regime in Peking caused an
exodus of elites who had formed the intellectual renaissance of
1915-1919 (Wasserstrom 155). Most of the intellectuals headed
for Shanghai that offered the newcomers safety in the
Settlements. They also benefitted from the fact that most
printing presses in the country were based in Shanghai.
Shanghai also hosted several foreign presses in the form
magazines and newspapers (Bergère 19). The modernized
publishing industry used the latest technical processes making it
the best in China. Their productions were popular with schools,
workers, and tradesmen.
Shanghai also hosted theaters and cinemas making it a center of

unorthodox cultural movement. It was here that Chinese
residents got a taste of western culture as theaters could feature
the latest western productions (Bergère 21). Thus, Shanghai
contrasted with Peking in that, unlike the latter that had
aristocratic Chinese culture, it had a westernized culture based
on foreign fashion and commercial gain. It also had art
aficionados like the Creation Society that appreciated art. The
group later embraced revolutionary literature (Lu 180). The
effect of the fusion of Chinese traditions with Western culture
was that all the great names in Chinese literature were found in
Shanghai.
Unlike other parts of China where anarchy replaced orthodoxy,
Shanghai was exceptional in that it was born out of coincidence
between the retreat of Peking bureaucracy and the existence of
an island of relative security and order (Bergère 23). Thus,
Shanghai was an outpost just like Suzhou where unorthodoxy
resulted in modernization. The presence of foreigners broke
down some of the old barriers while creating formidable
contradictions (Ristaino 132). The Chinese elite in the city
progressively eroded the privileges enjoyed by the foreign
minority until they acquired full right to supervise the affairs of
the Settlement but were keen to maintain its entrepreneurial
approach.
Just like Suzhou, Shanghai experienced suppression and
unfriendly trade conditions by the Nanking government that
replaced free enterprise with bureaucratic capitalism (Bergère
16). Even though the Nanking government took control of the
city suppressing the middle-class and the intelligentsia from
1925, life in the city continued to be largely influenced by the
evolution of the international economy. For instance, the city
was more profoundly affected by the worldwide depression than
the economic policies of the national government (Wasserstrom
159). It first benefited from the depreciation of silver between
1928 and 1931 that resulted in the devaluation of the Chinese
currency and the stimulation of exports that compensated for the
loss of certain western markets. This period experienced

heightened industrial activity as firms sought to benefit from
the export of manufactured goods.
Further, like Suzhou, Shanghai suffered under the invasion of
Japan which ravaged its industrial suburbs. The Japanese
imposed punitive taxes on residents and businesses in the city
while their activities eventually led to the decline of the
settlements (Bergère 29). This caused a steep decline in foreign
trade with the volume of trade at the port of Shanghai falling by
51%. However, the city was resilient enough to recover largely
due to its strategic location. A new industrial center arose on
the Soochow Creek where Chinese and foreign immigrants
settled injecting in capital and expertise into the economy
(Wasserstrom 161). The new industrial center was diversified
and continued the production of manufactured goods both for
local consumption and export.
Conclusion
Suzhou and had Shanghai were very similar though established
at different times in that they were urban centers enjoying
substantial autonomy and dominated by a merchant class with
an entrepreneurial outlook. Both cities were devastated by
hostile regimes that suppressed trade although punitive taxes
but retained their glamor largely due to their strategic locations.
Finally, both cities had an aspect of a city within a city where
most of the commerce and industry was concentrated before
extending to the hinterland. In the case of Shanghai, the city
within a city was the Settlement where foreign merchants
exercised autonomy in a territory that was primed for
enterprise.
Works Cited
Bergère, Marie-Claire. Shanghai: China's Gateway to
Modernity. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford
University Press, 2010. Print.
Blue, Gregory, Engelfriet Peter and Jami Catherine. Statecraft

and Intellectual Renewal in late
Ming China: The Cross-cultural Synthesis of Xu Guangqi
(1562-1633). Leiden: Brill, 2001. Print.
Johnson, Linda. Cities of Jiangnan in Late Imperial China.
Albany: State Univ. of New York
Press, 1993. Print.
Marmé, Michael. Suzhou: Where the Goods of all the Provinces
Converge. Stanford, Calif.:
Stanford Univ. Press, 2005. Print.
Lu, Hanchao. Beyond the Neon Lights: Everyday Shanghai in
the Early Twentieth Century.
Berkeley, Calif.: Univ. of California Press, 1999. Print.
Ristaino, Marcia. The Jacquinot Safe Zone: Wartime Refugees
in Shanghai. Stanford, Calif.:
Stanford University Press, 2008. Print.
Wasserstrom, Jeffrey. Global Shanghai, 1850–2010: A History
in Fragments. New York, NY:
Routledge, 2008. Print.
Fig. I T h e Jiangnan area in t h e Yuan dynasty I'
Chapter 1
Heaven o n Earth: The Rise of
Suzhou, 1127- 1550
Michael . - M a r m e _ ? ..

Sltcrnx vou 7'1un rung, xin voic S L ~
Hung.
T h e city of S u z h o u first e n t e r e d t h e historic:~l
record a r o u n d 5 0 0 H . c . .
when t h e prince of W u m a d e it his capital. T h u s . when
t h e p h r a s e .
" A b o v e t h e r e is H e a v e n ; o n e a r t h . S u z h o u
a n d Hangzhou" w a s first
used, S u z h o u was a l r e a d y a millennium-and-a-half o l d
. ' T h e p h r a s e is
a reHection of China's m a r c h t o the tropics. that s o u t h w
a r d shift in
China's c e n t e r of economic. cultural a n d political gravity
w i t h which
we have l o n g b e e n familiar. Its currency should n o t o b s
c u r e t h e f a c t
that. for S u z h o u , this formula m a r k e d t h e beginning
of a n e w s t a g e in
t h e city's d e v e l o p m e n t , nor its c u l m i n a t i o n .
D u r i n g t h e half century which s e p a r a t e d the fall of t
h e T a n g d y n a s t y
(618-906) a n d t h e consolidation uf t h e S o n g (960-
1276), S u z h o u was
t h e s e a t o f t h e n o r t h e r n m o s t p r e f e c t u r e
of t h e kingdom of W u - Y u e .
whose c a p i t a l was at H a n g z h o u . A l t h o u g h i t c
o ~ i s i s t e d of little m o r c
t h a n t h e m o d e r n province of Z h e j i a n g a n d the s
o u t h e a s t e r n c o r n e r o f
Jiangsu t h r o u g h o u t most of its e x i s t e n c e , t h e
kingdom w a s a m o n g t h e
most p r o s p e r o u s a n d stable regionb of C h i n a d u r i
n g t h e interregnum.'
Its ruler voluntarily s u b m i t t e d t o the S o n g in 978. T h

c new g o v e r n m e n t
was b a s e d , as those w h o ruled t h e Middle Kingdom had
a l w a y s b c e n .
in N o r t h C h i n a . It reorganized t h e a r e a south of t h
c Yangzi a n d n o r t h
of Fujian as the Liatig %he circuit. The circuit wkis all
administrative
level below the central government controlling a group of
neighboring
prefectures. l'he officials i n charge at this level-typically, o f
military.
fiscal, judicial, and supply commissions-had "different
functional re-
sponsibilities and powers [ i n ] the same area, sometimes with
disparatt.
hut overlappmg geopmphicai jurisdictions."' These divide and
rule tar-
tics were intended to prevent the accumulation o f power at the
regior
81 level which had llndermined jhc Tang. Boundaries not only
varic,!
with function, they also shifted over time. Liang Zhe itself was
periodi-
cally divided inlo two circuit?--a distinction which persisted
even whe!:
not officially i n use. I n this scheme, Suzhou was assigned to
Zhexi
("Western Zhe")."
A m o n g the th~rteen prefectures of the Liang Zhe circuit,
Lin'an
(Hangzhou) remained the most important. I n 1010, its eight
counties

had a registered population of 163,700 households. Suzhou's
five
counties-Wu. Changzhou. Wujiang. Kunshan, and Changshd-had
only 66.139. The 1077 commercial tax quoter tell a similar
story.
Although their assessments ranked both Hangzhou and Suzhou
among
the empire's most important trading centers. Hangzhou's quota
was
fixed at 170.813 strings o f cash, Suzhou's at a mere 77.076 ~ l
r i n g s . ~
Suzhou was designated Pingjiang / u , one o f Liang Zhe's five
"super.
ior" prefectures (/u). in 1115. But i t could not rival Hangzhou-
much
less the Song capital at Kaifeng.' N o discernible social o r
economic
trends promised to alter this situation.
I n the 1120s. the Jurchen, a Tungusic tribe from Manchuria.
broke through the Song's northern defenses. I n 1126, they
sacked
Kaifeng, capturing the emperor and three thousand members o f
his
court. I n disarray, what remained of the Song government fled
south,
with Jurchen armies In hot pursuit." In 1129 the newly
proclaimed
emperor Gaozong halted in Pingjiang, but only for a few days.
Suhse-
quent developments proved that, in this case, discrctio~i was
the better
part o f valor. O n the twenty-fifth day o f the second month.
1130. Jur-
chen units appeared at Pingjiang's southern gatc. Brcaking lnto
the

city, the invaders "plundered government oftice. and prtvitle
resi-
dences. [helping themselves to] sons and daughters. gold and
silk. the
accumulation of granaries and storehouses. They committed
;irson and
fire spread. Smoke could bc seen for 200 l i . I n all, the fires
burned for
five days and nights."" When o p n hostilities rettlecl into a
military
stalemate and an uneasy truce after 1141, thc enrperor chose
Hang-
zhou as Xingzai or "temporary imperial residencc." N v l only
was i t a
far more important place than Pingjiang but i t was also more
centrally
Heaven o n Earth: Tht: Rise of Suzhou. 1127-1550 I 9
located within the truncated realm and must have secmed
marginally
more secure than places to its north.
Such political choices had social and economic consequences.
Wlth
Lin'an as the "temporary" capital of the Southern Song (1 127-
1276).
all o f the 1-iang Zhe circuit benefited. When Marco Polo
visited the
area-after Mongol conquest had reunifieci 11.: country and
returned
the capital to the north-he found Suzho!.:, -'a large and
magnificen!
city. . . the number of [whose] inhabitants 1:; so great as to be a
sub-
ject of astcnishment," a city as noted for its rci? In trade and

manufar-
lure as i t was as a center of learning. Yet, four days' journey to
the
south lay the "noble and magnificent city of [Xingzai], a name
that sig
nifies' 'the celestial city,' which i t merits from its preeminence
to all
others i n the world, in point o f grandeur and beauty, as well
as from its
abundant delights, which might lead an jnhabitant to imagine
himself
i n paradise."t0
One must conclude that the gap separating Hangzhou from
Suzhou
widened rather than narrowed over the twelfth and th~rteenth
centur-
ies. The years which followed brought Suzhou repeated, often
bloody
conquest, higher taxes, and the exile or execution o f its social,
econo-
mic. and cultural elites. These scarcely seem ideal conditions
for over-
taking the more affluent, populous, and developed center to its
south.
Nonetheless, scholars East and West agree that by the sixteenth
cen-
tury Suzhou had emerged as the economic and cultural center of
the
Middle Kingdom's richest. most urbanized and most advanced
region.
I t remained the central metropolis integrating (and
dominating) that
region well into the nineteenth century.']
Military defeat, confiscatory taxation, and decimation of local

elites are not usually regarded as keys to local prosperity and
increased
influence. Analysis o f so unlikely an ascent should help us
hettcr untler-
stand the processes o f development in late imperial society. I t
should
also allow us to address a number o f other issues. I f
contenlporaries re-
garded Suzhou as " A l l under Heaven's Heaven on Earth." did
this
suggest incorporation in, o r transcendence of, the imperial
order'!
M i n g Suzhou was famous for 11s riots and its eremitism;" i t
was an
urban corner o f a huge agrarian empire. W;IS i t already home
t c i that
"other China" which Bergere Invokes in her attempt to lind
ind~gcnous
roots for twentieth century Shanghai-a China urban rather thiin
rural, commercial and capitalist rather than "feud;~l." i~ secular
xoci-
ety rather than a bureaucratic state. cosmopolitan rather than
clc~ed.
open-ended rather than ~ r l h o d o x ' ? ~ J
Recent work demonstrates that we can certainly trace much ut
this
"other China" back 11, the early nineteenth ccntury. A t le:~sl a
t the
great central Yangzi port city of Hankou. many characteristics
con-
ventionally attributed to Western impact have been shown to
have

roots i n an indigenous tradition which long predated the treaty
ports.
Not only was Hankou sharply distinguishable from the
countryside
which surroun+d i t , i t was also run for (and, de facto i f not
de jure.
largely by) its merchant community, a community with its own
corn-
mercial capitali5t interests and values.14 I f "truly urban"
cities can
be-found in..ghb,Middle Kingdom prior to 1842, i t becomes
necessary t n
ask how. fa;!b&ck this indigenous urban tradition-a tradition
hardy
enough to Suf$lve, even flourish, without charters or an
autonomous
military arrn-can be traced. How widely distributed was i t
spatially?
I n particular..can we trace the origins o f an autonomous,
commercial
capiralisr tradition fundamentally at odds with the orthodox,
agrarian.
bureaucratic statc as far back as M i n g Suzhou-as much of the
work
on the sprouts o f capitalism seems to imply? O r is this "other
China" a
separate. and much more recent, development?
Analysis of these issues must begin i n the Song.
SuzhouIPingjiang
prefecture occupied the lowest lying portlons o f Jiangnan:
much o f i t
was. and still is, below the water level o f .Lake Tai ; ~ n d the
Yangzi
R1ver.15 Thus, the fact that this region was developed after
other parts

o f Jiangnan is not surprising. Without immense investment i n
water
control, the area would remain, quite literally. a hackwater. I f
sodden
marshes were t o become productive fields, dikes had t o be
built. and
the waters behind them drained. The network o f polders and
canals
which resulted wab extremely delicate. A blocked channel miles
away
might result i n flood waters breaching an ill-maintained dike. r
e ~ u r n i n g
paddy field to lake. T o o many polders would leave high water
nuwhere
to go, increasing the prcssure on dikes throughout the system.
Dredg-
ing the delta's principal river channels was too large an
undertaking t o
be left t o individuals or localities: local officials, us in^
corvee labor.
periodically addressed this task.16 The work of reclaiming
fields from
the waters was however usually left t o private individuals.
Both public
and private efforts wcrc extremely labor intensive. That the
number of
households registered i n Pingjiang prefecture almost doubled
between
1184 and 1275 (rising from 173,042 t o 329,603)-precisely the
period
i n which construction of polders was transforming the entire
Yangzi
delta-thus comes as no surprise." Since creation o f polders on
this
scale required both ctrcrrd~nation and the ability to subsidize
many

hands while dikes were huilt. tields drained and a lirst harvest
ripencd,
Ic.~ving the lilsk to i ~ ~ i p r o v i ~ l p I;~~ttllords insured
that high tcnancv r;llck
WOUIII result :IS certi~illly :I cxl?i~~lsi(rr~ o i the ;Irc;l
untlcr c u l t i v ; ~ t i o ~ ~ . ~ ~
I t is hardly surprising t l ~ ; ~ r thc la~rdlords wh11
org;~nizcd i ~ n d p u ~ t l c d
this process did not go to tlic trouhlc merely to exp:~~id the
;Ire;]
for subsistence agriculture. I'incjii~ng's popul;~tion doubled ;I
c;rrly.
ripening rice and tnultiplc cropping techniques wcrs hecom~ng
w ~ d c l
known i n this p;~rt of China. Out thcsc new ~cchnok~gies
werc not cnt-
ploycd in Pingji;tny /rc [prcl'ccturcj. No ecological cond~tions
b:~rrc(l
their use and yet Suzhou pe;ls;lnts co~rtinued to specialize In
lower
yield, but more com~ncrcii~lly valui~hle. strains of rice."' T h ~
s cho~cc
clearly reflected the inlercsts o f n~;irkct-orientcd landlords. t
h c ~ r evcs
on the inexhaustible m i ~ r k c t of XIIIKZ~II. rather than
those of scli-
hufficient peilsants. As the Suzhou poet Fan Chengd;~ (1 126-
1193)
wrote, "Never oncc i n their lives have they [the peasi~ntsl
tastedIK~ce
clean and bright ;IS the c l o u d s l ~ ~ n e . " ~ ~ ' Water
control after all not only
raised fields above the w;lters, the carefully dredged rivers and
rntrlciltc

system of canals provided ;I w p c r h nctwc~rk lor transporting
hulk)
commodities cheaply and erticicntly. l'his el:~horate web
ol.stre;~m rid
channels facilitated export of h~gh-value grams a r ~ d madc p
l ~ s ~ b l e the
import o f coarse grains for consumption. Without imports. t h
r
pasants ccruld not havc s;~criticed qu;~ntity f ~ ~ r qu;~lity.
Change marked the cily ;IS well ;I!. 11s hintcrl;~nd. Yet ;I
sturdv
Iramework to which ;III but the most powcrful forces would
h;~vc to
adapt was already in placc. S u ~ h ~ ~ u ' s mo;!! provides the
most obviou
example: a section of the (;r;111tl ('~II;I~, wltich linked
Ji;~ngn;~n w11l1
North Chlna's Central Plain, fornicd part of thc river systel~l
rlnglnp
the city. The area within these wiltcrs w.1~ trisacrossetl h y
canill ;~ncl
surrounded by a wall. Local legcncl crcditvd Huang Xie, a Chu
ofhci:~l
enfeoffed at Suzhou in 203 u.c.. fur both w:ills and the grid-ljke
p a l t r r l l
of canals within them. From .I ; L I I ~ tinlc* on. IOCBI
tradition hcld t11i1t
the Jade Emperor had i~ppointed I l u ~ l n p "god of' the walls
i1111t
moats"-as city gods are stvlell in C:h~nesc-of hi3 old het. '['he
choicc
may have owed as much to his wtrrh as c;~n;~l-builder as t o
his rnlc as
wall-builder. City walls not only prtrtcctcd the inhabitants and t
h s ~ r

Properly from hoslilc forces. thcy illso rcorgicnized space.
crc;~linp .I
"pivot o f the four quarters.'. which cndowrcl rnundi~ne
arrilngemcnl
with cosmic significance Z 1 Yet, at S ~ ~ z t ~ o u . thc c;~nal
system w;~s etlui~l
ly important: not only had i t i m p r ~ r t e d lr:lllsprrt ;lnd c c
~ m m o n ~ c : ~ t ~ ~ ~ n
within the city but i t also protected rllc xrea wilhin the wi~lls
I r o i ~ r
Over the centuries. rei~dcnr. i111d ~ t l t i c ~ i t I h;ld
eliihor;ttcd
H e a v c n o n E a r t h : 'l'he Rise of S u z h o u . 1127-1
550 23
Table 1: Temple Building in the City of Suzhou -
Length No. Rate
Period in years Temples (per year)
Pre-Tang 12
Tang (618-906) 289 8 0.028
Five Dynq.s!i<s i 55 2 0.036
N . s o n g @a-1127) 168 13 0.077
S. Song (1127-1276) 150 39 0.260
Yuan (1 17641368) 93 40 0.430
Ming (1368-1506) 139 4 0.029
Source: G u Su rhi (1506): juan 29.
Huang Xie's initial design: dozens of bridges were thrown
across the
canals, and, in 922, the city wall had been rebuilt in b r i ~ k . ~

'
A rough indicator of the rhythms of development within this
frame
is available: the record of temple building within the city.
(Table 1)
These hgures are obviously i n ~ o m p l e t e . 2 ~ But, flawed
as they a r e , the
general thrust-particularly the dramatic increase in activity
during the
Southern Song and Yuan-seems too marked and too markedly a t
odds with the Chinese tendency t o prefer early origins to more
recent
ones, to be attributed t o inadequate data, Although the scenic
north-
western quarter continued to have the greatest concentration, by
the
end of the Yuan. Buddhist temples a n d Daoist monasteries
could be
found in every quarter of the city.
Even more dramatic changes can be traced in the commercial
sphere. Although a few specialized markets had already been
estab-
lished in other parts of the city, as late as 1008-1016, the
principal
business district was still t h e e a a and west markets at either
side of the
Yue Bridge. These central markets were a continuation of the T
a n g
system of organizing urban space by wards rather than streets, a
sys-
tem which facilitated careful control and official regulation of
the
market.25 By the end of the Song, the commercial district had
ex-

panded in every direction. usurping broad stretches of the urban
land-
scape (see map 1). In the same period, secondary market
districts had
developed; the most notable were north of the Changzhou
county
yamen and beside the Xihe.26
With trade came industry: in addition to textiles, Suzhou was a
center for agricultural processing of rice and vegetable oils, the
pro-
duction of wine and vinegar, the manufacture of articles for
daily use
(ropes. bottles, stovcs, shoes), boat building, rush-sail mc~king,
and thc
armaments industry. It was also a center for building trades, for
copper
work, and for financial transactions. Much of this activity was
carried
on within the boundaries of the (much expanded) market Yet. by
the
end o f Song. such limits had become too constricting. The area
within
the northeastern gates was given over to stables and pasture for
travcl-
ers' mounts; boat-building yards had taken over the area north
01 the
Wu county yamen as well as several neighborhoods in :he
southern
half o f the city; the southeast corner had become a centci. for
grain
processing; and textiles were being produced north of the
Changzhou
county yamen a s well as in the area south of the prefect's ~ f t
i c e s . ~ '

There are clear signs of guild organization, at least in some
trades:
as early a s the Northern Song, there was a Jisheng miao
(temple to the
i Loom Spirit) northeast of Yue Bridge. Although this structure
had dis-
I appeared by Yuan times, a Wujun jiye gongsuo (Guild of the
Wu Com-
i mandary Loom Industry) was then headquartered in the
Yuanmiao
Daoist 'Temple, itself northeast of Yue B~idge.~"s the location
of
I these organizations suggests. the link between temple building
and
i
i
economic activity was intimate and complex: not only did
economlc
growth generate funds which might be put to pious use but also
tem-
ples, once built, might be used to organize economic activity.2"
Even if we n o longer think of the imperial Chinese city as '.the
yarnen writ large."wthe state remained a prominent feature of
the city-
scape. Suzhou. a prefectural capital and the seat of two
counties, was
no exception. Indeed, the prefect's compound, situated in the
eastern
half o f the city, was literally a city within the city. Its walled
Zicheng

occupied almost 5 percent of Suzhou's total area. Separate
compounds
housed the local county magistrate of Wu (governing the
western half
of the city and the areas south and west of the wall) and of
Changzhou
(in charge of t h e eastern half, plus the hinterland north and
east). In
addition, schools, examination halls, tax offices, granaries,
arsenals.
and temples of the state cult were scattered throughout the city.
There
were even twenty-eight separate barracks in which units of the
military
were housed. Little wonder th;~t the official complex remained
one ( T I
the most striking features of the Pirlgjiang tu of 1229." (See
Fig. 2 . )
The state's impact on the organization of urban space was c v c
~ ~
greater than this catalog suggests for. in addition to preempting
bnwd
portions o f the landscape, [he state's activities also shi~ped the
use
made by others of what remained. Most obviously perhaps. so
large an
official establishment required an even larger complement of
SUIT-
officials, of clerks and runners, were it to rule as wcll as reign.
A sub-
H e a v e n o n F.arth T h e R i s e of S u z h o t ~ . 1127 1 5
0 2.5

stantial portlon of the urhan popul;~tion nwst h;~vr: hcrn
cn~ployed.
d ~ r e c t l y or indirectly, hy the p u b l ~ c sector. More
suhtle were the ways
In which official power bhaped the residential pattern.; o I the
local ellte.
In Song times. Wu was fur and away the most ~uccrssful of
Suzhou's
countles in achieving membership in the scholar-oficl;~l c l ~ t
c . Yet these
successful families elected to es~abllsh urban resldcncr In the
eo.crern
. c (Changzhou) s ~ d e of the city-farther from home perhaps;-
hut closer
ci t o the prefectural yamen.3'
Clearly Southern Song Suzhou was i m p r e r s ~ v r , few
thirteenth-
'_ I :,. century cilies anywhere in the world could compare in
s1i.c. ~n beauty
' k o r in wealth. Yet as long as Hangzhou remalned the c a p ~
t a l . Suzhou
would remain a prosperous satell~te in a Hang~hou-centered u ~
~ i v e r s e
Y U A N A N D EARLY MING S U Z H O U : "A 1.ARGF A
N D
! MAGNIFICENT CITY"
Mongol conquest reduced Hangzhou from a blaring sun to the
status
of another planet. I t %till exerted a considerable gravitational
pull In its

own neighborhood, but it was no longer the hotly round which
all
o t h e r s revolved.
In 1 2 3 4 , the Song conspired with the Mol~gols, an Inner
Asian
group which had recently emerged from the stcppc. to destroy
the Jur-
chen Jin dynasry in North China. This military trlumph led not
to Song
recovery of the north, bur t o thc subs~itution of ;i new and tar
more
formidable barbarian menace for the old Effective defense r e q
u ~ r e d
mobilization of all the Southern Song's resources. Yet attempt.
to d o
this. ranging from Jia Sldao's public field laws to requisitlonlng
of nier-
chant vessels, undercut elite support for the dynasty:" The
Mongols
routinely asked those under ;ittack to surrender voluntarily, i f
they re- ,
p. fused and were defeated. the Mongols would show the
vanquished n o
mercy. Chinese officirls at C h a n y h o u , the prefecture north
ol Suzhoa.
had chosen resistance: defeat and massacre had followed. I'he
bcnctits
o f Song rule clearly were outwelghetl by the r ~ r k s of
dele:~t and thv
costs (expropriation, higher taxes) of loyillty In eilrlp 127h.
Plnpj~ang
Surrendered to the Mongols without a fight:'-'
Under the Mongols the center of political power (;111d w ~ t h

11. Ihc
chief beneficiaries of tax revenue) returned to the Central ~ ' I ;
I I I I . As < I
- result, the Hangzhou region stagnated Pingjiang lo (as Sulhou
was
officially designated trom 1277 to 1 3 5 6 and from 1357 to
1168) o n the
' ' o t h e r hand, experienced dramatic growth: in the hfteer~
vr.lr ~ ~ c r l o d
from 1275 to 1290 the prcfccture's registered p o p u l a t l ~ i l
~ r<tL. I ~ o l l ~
329,603 households to 46h.151(.'h T h e government's d c c i s
~ t ~ l l 1 0 send
southern grain north by sea was a primary cause of thi
exl>;lns;it~n
Taicang. i n the northeast corner of Yingjiang l u , became a
key ccnter
of this grain traffic. B y one estimate, its port city. Liujiagang.
had a
population of half a million people in the early fourteenth
century."
Suzhou. the prefectural capital, prospered as well: i f we are to
judge
by the rate o f temple building, growth rates i n the Yuan
surpassed
those of the Southern Song. Officially sponsored factories were
estab-
lished east of the prefe.c!:s yamen; the area outside the
southeast gate
specialized i n the building and repair of ocean-going ships; the
north-

west (Chang) gate had bcmme a major commercial center
complete
with shops, warehouses, and a grain processing i n d u ~ t r y . '
~ Indced, so
many merchants collected in the northwest suburbs that, when
the city
wali was rebuilt i n late Yuan, a moon wall was added to
protect them.
This moon wall gave Suzhou its distinctive bulge.39
Suzhou's prosperity did not necessarily imply stagnation else-
where. D i d other centers within Jiangnan thrive i n equal or
greater
measure? I n particular, was this the case at Nanjing which,
from 1356.
had been the capital of Z h u Yuanzhang, the rebel who would
succeed
i n founding the Ming dynasty? A n extremely influential
sketch o f
Jiangnan's urban history posits a Nanjing cycle between the
Hangzhou
cycle of Song times and the Suzhou cycle of late Ming and high
I f this sketch is accurate, Suzhou's development i n Southern
Song and
Yuan times must be regarded as a mammoth false start. checked
i f not
reversed by the triumph of political forces hostile to it. D i d
the patho-
logical hostility of the victor bring social and economic
developments
to a grinding halt. as the received version of events would
suggest? O r
was Nanjing's ascent simply more rapid than Suzhou's?
Let us first review the received version. Shortly after rebellion
broke out in 1351. i t was clear that the Mongols would not

regain pow-
er. Although by convention the Mongol period extends to 1368.
the
1350s and 1360s were in fact a period i n which rival warlords
fought
among themselves for the succession. F r o m 1356. Suzhou
was the
capital of one Zhang Shicheng, erstwhile salt-smuggler and self-
styled
King of Wu. Down to 1367. he was Z h u Yuanzhang's main
rival for
the imperial post. Only after a ten-month siege, involving some
o f the
most bitter fighting o f a bitter civil war. d i d Zhu's armies
prevail."
According t o Zhu Yunming (1461-1527)-a Suzhou native
famous
as a calligrapher and writer-the victor, proclaimed first emperor
of
the M i n g the following year, was:
. . .exasperated with the city [of Suzhou]. For a long time
i t did nor submit. H e hated the people's adherence to the ban-
f l e a v e n o n E a r t h : The Kisc o f Suzhou. 1127- 1550 ?
i dit (Zhang Shicheng]; moreover, he suffered difticultiea from
the mansions of the wealthy [ f o r j they were dcfendcd to the
end. For these reasons, he ordered his men t o seize all the rent
registers of the powerful families and t o calculate what was
handed over to them [ i n rents]. The civil o f i c ~ a l s
oheyed, mak-
ing the fixed tax equal t o this amount. Taxes were therefore
plentiful and the levy especially heavy i n order to punish the
evil practices of one ~ i m e . ~ z

The prefecture's tax quota was tr~pled. The land of absentee
own-
ers and o f prominent supporters of the Zhang Shicheng regime
became
"official land." Tens o f thousands of faniilies, especially
familres o f the
wealthy and skilled, were forced t o move to distant parts of
the
empire. Many were executed for crimes real or imagined. The
excep-
tionally heavy tax quotas persisted down to the late nineteenth
century.4'
Thanks i n no small measure t o the wealth, culturc. and
examina-
tion success o f Suzhou men i n the Ming and Qing, this series
of mea-
sures is one o f the most famous examples of imperial
autocracy i n all
Chinese history. The individual elements are well-documented.
And at
least some shreds of the evidence we have already examined-the
dramatic decline in temple founding during the early M i n g
shown in
table 1-suggest that these blows were real and that their impact
was
lasting. Yet scrutiny of the evidence for the rise of Nanjing and
analy-
sis o f the real impact of Zhu Yuanzhang's punitive measures
leads us
to a different conclusion.
Since Nanjing started from a more modest base. it would have
to
have prospered even more dramatically in the thirteenth and

four-
teenth centuries to have overtaken, then surpassed, Suzhou. I t
is a
proposition worth testing-and testable. Under premode;n
conditions.
population is a reasonable proxy for the size o f an economy.
Thus. we
can use the figures for 1290 and 1393 in the three regions-
centered o n
Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Nanjing-which made up the Lower
Yangzi
macroregion t o compare developments during the fourteenth
century.
(See Graph, Fig. 3.) The Nanjing region, smallest of the three in
1290.
was still the smallest i n 13Y3.44 Although all three regions
lost populu-
(ion, the Nanjing region lost i t at twice the rate of the other
two
Suzhou was the only core prefecture which maintained or
rncrcased irs
size.
Thus, even afler a generation o f forced deportat~ons from
Suzhtrtl
and a generation of concerted efforts 11, make Nanjing a crty
worthy o i
F~ .---------;-: ~ ~ . . . . .. .- - - . - -. .. . . . .
POPULATION I N THE LOWER YANCZI i a
MACRORECLON 1290 - 1393
1 BASED ON NUMBER O F HOUSEIIOLDS

Fig. 3 P ~ p u l a t i o n of the I-ower Yangzi
Macroregion 1?YU-139345
a Son o f Heaven, the Nanjing region had fallen farther hehind
the rest
o f Jiangnan than it had been In late Song and early Yuan. Alter
twenty-five years of effort (136%-1393), the Nanjing cycle
remained i1
gleam i n the first emperor's eye. He had failed t o re-channcl
develop-
ments which, since the thirteenth century, had contributed to the
risc
of Suzhou.
What then of the infamous land tax? M i n g Hongwu (reign
136%
1398) had tripled Suzhou's tax quota, extracting more grain
from thia
single prefecture than from whole provinces, producing a t;tx
rate
that averaged ten times that elsewhere i n the empire. Although
reill.
this allocation of the tax burden was much lcss capricious than
thc
sources imply.'h The highest taxes were rent on "official Relds"
(guun-
rian) some of the most valuable arable i n the empire. "People's
lields"
(minrian) were taxed :#I rates slrnilar to those imposed in other
parts 01
the realm. ~ l l governments need nl8)ney; those attempting t o
establish
m i l ~ t a r y control over a subcontinent argui~bly need i t
morc than nlost.
A n d as the Ministry o f Revenue reported t o the throne i n

1370:
Taking the land tax ilntl con~p;~ring i t . only in Zhcxi arc
there many wealthy househ~~lds. I n the single prsfecture oi
Suzhou, commoners annually submit grain. Four hundred
ninety households submit one huiidred to four hundred shi:
tifly-six households submit tivc hundred to one thousand .$hi.
six households, one thousand .$hi each; 2nd two household,
submit an amount between twcl thousilnd and three thousand
eight hundred shi. I n all these five hundred tifty-four house-
I ~ o l d s annually submit more than one hundred fifty
thousand
shi.47
Analyzing the figures presented by the Minlsrry of Re,enue.
and
applying the average official rate of 0.54 .rhi per m u , these
household.:
controlled an average of 500 m u 4 " Even tissuming that thc
wei~lrhiest
h~uscholds paid at the highest ratc on the oflicial land. those
two
households controlled ten times that much. I t IS not
necessar~ly u n l a ~ r
or unreasonable t o make the wealthiest 0.1 percent of
households.
households possessing 3.5 percent of ~ h c rcgistered land, bear
7 per-
cent o f the lax burden. When wc turn to rhc way this system
was
actually administered, i t is even morc difficult to regard this
system as
the spiteful act of an arbitrary despot. l'ates were routinely
remitted.
in whole or i n part, i n time of natural dlhaster and. once
military con-

trol was essentially complete, the dynasty ~nodestly reduced the
quo ti^
As long as the complex of Ii111tl taxes and labor service
was administered as originally intcndcd. the str;~in on loc:ll
resources
would seem to have been sustainable.
I f we examine the relationship of tax quota, agricultural
produc-
tion and population district by district. however, this argument
de-
mands qualification. Consider Wu and Chnngzhou, the counties
whew
capitals were located ~ i t h i n thc wtllls o f Suzhou c ~ t y .
[See Append~x
Two, 'Table I . ] Changzhou retained n minimum 20.47 shi of
husked
rice per household i n the late fnurteenth century. ( I f we
assume that
all the arable land Qing officials could I(lciltc thrce hundred
fifty vcars
later was already under cultivation, this figure rlscs to 27.46 s l
~ i per
household.) Yet W u was left with a mere 11.77 shi per
h<ruscli<~l<l
(14.98 shi i f 1725 acreage tigures arc used) 'I.h~s was far less
t h i l l ~ ttlc
20 shi per annum conventionaily regarded as nccebsary to
suppurr ;I
family. Such tax rates would certainly seem 111 justifv
conte~~~pc)r;~rv
complaints. Indeed. i f Suzhou were IIIC~CIY -the land ol rlcc
;III~ lish."
d e p o p u l a ~ ~ o n would have been the i ~ ~ e v ~ i ; ~ h l r
. result The Ilguros tor

early M i n g trade imply that commerce in ~~onagrlcultural
commod~tics
was equal t o 30.78 percent o f thc maximum agricultural
production lor
W u a n d Changzhou, h o w e ~ e r . ~ " Foodstuffs were tax
e x e m p t but. in
light of Suzhou's leading position in rhe wholesale grain trade
from thc
S o u t h e r n Song t o High QingYs' commerce in agricullural
c o m m o d ~ t i c s
must have accounted for at least a s much activity. Suzhou's
ability to
prosper while paying these taxes d e p e n d e d from the outset
on thc
thoroughly commercialized character of the local e c o n o m y .
The p r c -
fecture was as much the victim of its e c o n o n ~ i c ~ a t u r i
t y as of its pollti-
cal indiscretions. , .,
L a t e fourteenth-century Suzhou was n o lo"eer t h e half-
suhmergctl
underpopulated a n d s e m i d e v e l o p e d area that if h a d
been a t t h e begin-
ning of the Southern Song period in the early twelfth century.
Yet, had
his successors continued the Hongwu e m p e r o r ' s policies,
building u p
Nanjing at the expense of Suzhou. Suzhou would h a v e b e e n
n o more
able in the Ming than it had been in the S o n g t o avoid
subordination t o
the capital. Political changcs delegitimated a n d destabilized

thts design
before the Ming founder's plans could reach fruition.
In 1399 the Jianwen emperor (1399-1403), grandson a n d
successor o f
t h e Ming founder, announced that differential tax rates were
inherently
unfair a n d ought t o be a b o l i ~ h e d . 5 ~ This policy d i d
n o t survive its impe-
rial sponsor. It may well never have bcen i m p l e m e n t e d ,
for the c m -
peror was preoccupied throughout his brlef reign with the
problem of
bringing his uncles ( Z h u Yuanzhang's sons) u n d e r control.
T h e most
able of these d r o v e his nephew from the D r a g o n 'Throne
in 1403. T h i s
usurper, who reigned a s the Yongle e m p e r o r (1403-1424),
could ill-
afford a tax reduction. H e was determined t o m o v e the
capital from
Nanjing to his base in the north. a decision which required both
the
costly a n d extensive rebuilding of Beijing a n d t h e
restoration of the
G r a n d Canal. 'The canal was to funnel tax grain north t o
supply the
bureaucracy a n d Ming armies which dcfended the Middle
Kingdom
against a Mongol resurgence. T h e e m p e r o r repeatedly
launched major
military operations in Inner Asia in hope of keeping t h e
Mongols
at bay. Simultaneously, Ming forces sought t o quell resistance
to
t h e annexation of northern Vietnam. A n d , he dispatched hts

eunuch
Z h e n g H e o n a series of voyages t o t h e South S e a s .
Such z~ctivism re-
quired additional surcharges on the land tax a n d drancatic
incrcases in
thc labor s e n i c e burden.
T h e period was o n e of increasing activism at t h e local
level as well:
in Suzhou t h e Yongle reign saw the second most intensive
concentra-
f 1c;rven on E a r t h : T h e Kisc of S u z h o u . 1127-- 1550
01
tion o f a c t i v ~ t y wlth respect tn water control in thc entire
Ming perlud.
Although maintenance of purcly local irrig:ltion systems was
left t o prl-
vate i n i t i a t i ~ e , ~ ' an area as low-lying and as dependent
on tr;tdc as
Suzhou relied o n official coordination of regional cfforts
physically a n d
economically. Much of the work had to be d u n e far from the
places
most immediately threatened by failure to k e c p channels o p
c n ; thc
peasants' desirc tor more land clashed with the system's need for
clcar
channcls and a m p l e reservoirs." Problcms were acute enough
by 1399
to trigger official concern, but continued Hooding made clear
the in-
effectiveness o f measures adopted in response. In 1403. the
emperor
ordered t h e Ministel of Revenue, Xia Yuanji, to take charge

of the
water control eflorts in the Suzhou arca personally. Using
corvee
labor, he o p e n e d t:~c Wu Song River and 11s attached
streams a n d
ponds; the effort extended over Kunshan, J ~ a d l n g ,
Changshu, a n d
Shanghai counties. In 1407, the dikcs and banks o f the Lou
River were
repaired; the work was d o n e in Wujiang, Changzhou, a n d
Kunshan
counties. In 1411, more than seventy l i of stone and earth
ponds.
bridges, a n d roads between Suzhou city a n d Iiaxing were
repaired.
affecting o n e hundred and thirty-one places. A n d , in 1415,
on the In-
itiative o f the vice magistrate of Wujiang. the areas around
Lake T a i
were d r e d g e d . T h i s time portions of Changshu.
Kunshan, Changzhou.
Wu, a n d Wuxi counties were involved.5s As necessary as such
eUorts
were f o r t h e viability of Suzhou's urban a n d rural
economy, they
placed additional strains on a population alrcady heavily
burllcned by
state demands.
If m o r e were bcing demanded, less cure w a s taken to
allocate bur-
d e n s equitably. A s surcharges increased, the wealthy
refused t o pay
them. T h e additional burdens thus fell on thcir less fortunate
and well-
connected neighbors. Eventually many small-holders were

forced t o
choose between taking flight a n d commending themselves t o
the pro-
tection of those better c o n n e ~ l e d . ~ ~ ' Either strategy
deercased the n u m -
ber o f taxpayers, thus ;rugmetltlng the burden for those who
rcmained.
Massive tax remissions may well have brnefitctl those whose
wcalth
and connections made it easy ro evade paynicnt rather than the
general
run o f taxpayers." Nativus of Wu a n d Changzhou passed the
provin-
cial examinations in record numbers (luring the Yongle p ~ r i o
d . ~ ~
Although in theory a career open to talent. succrbs in the e x a
m ~ n a t i o n s
required years of strenuous preparation--one had tirst t o
memorize
the classics, then to master the commcntarier ;IS wcll ;IS the
specialized
f o r m s o f essay writing. It was a game :tt which only the
wealthy a n d
well-born could usually compete -as accounts of [he rare
exceptions
prove. Thus, Chcn Yuanrno. journeying every third yc;lr to the
capital
in tattered clothes and ruined shocs to try (always without
success) to
pass the metropolitan examination. stood out."The Yangle
cmpercir's
anxiety t o co-opt elites here secms to have combined with the
auto-

crat's indifference to mundane det;~ils of local adm~nistration.
I f one
were well placed and un~crupulous, this combination of apathy
and
iippeasement provided n u m k r o t ~ , re:~dily exploited
opportunities to
advance personal and family interests. I f the number of years
that
"illustrious officials" occupicd key local posts is any guide.
Suzhou was
worse governed during the Yongle era than at any other time in
the
history of the Ming."
The results o f early M i n g policies were nut necessarily
detrimental
t i 1 the interests o f Suzhou as a collectivity. However
unwelcome to the
individuals involved. the exile of elite and artisan families-a
practice
which a k c t e d natives o f Suzhou more often than i t had
those o f most
other places-had the unintended effect of creating an unusually
dense
and well~dcvelopcd network of particularistic contacts in every
corner
of thc empirc. Such networks played a critical role. particularly
i n
trade, throughout the late imperial The decision to shift the
capital from Nanjing to Beijing. although not implemented until
1421.
was made in 1403-just ten years ;tftt.r the census indicating
Nanjing's
emcrgence as a rival for regional primacy was still incomplete.
Recon-
struction o f the Grand Canal insured that Suzhou would play a

key
role in the integration of the Mlddle Kingdom's now separate
eco-
nomic and political centers. Even the need to ship grain to the
new
capital had its advantages: each year the armada o f grain
barges
carried some ten thousand tons (ten million kilograms) i n
authorized
private cargo. I t was an open secret that these quantities were
regu-
larly exceeded and the prohibition on using the empty barges to
ship
northern goods south ignored.02
I f Suzhou and its elites could tolerate the emerging r e a l ~ t y
, neither
the imperial treasury (faced with ;I rise in the number o f tax
evaders
and an increase in uncollected taxes) nor the area's poor
(increasingly
forced to shoulder alone a tax burden assessed with less and less
atten-
tion to abilily to pay) were able to d o so. I n the 1430s and
1440s a
complex series o f reforms that were designed to reduce both
the
sphere fur evasion and the costs o f compliance were
introduced. The
prefecture's tax quotas were slashed by seven hundred and
twenty
thousand shi per year; approximately a third o f the burden was
then
converted from grain to silver at half the currcnt market r a ~ e .
~ ' Re-
sponsibilitv for administration was sh~fted from local notables,

the "tax
l i c a v c n on E i ~ r t h : I h e Ktsc of Suzhou. 1127-1550 3
3
captains." to the county yamen. Since thc most heavily burdened
tax-
payers were permitted t o use the most favorable method to
settle their
accounts. the erosion o f the local rlirc's role i n tax collection
merely
I reinforced a growing distaste for service in the sub-
bureaucracy. Con-
version o f so substantial a portion i ~ f the land tax to specie
presup-
posed an economy which was already highly monetized. Insofar
as tax
assessments in the 1440s still reflected ability ((1 pay, the
introduction
o f G o l d Floral S i l v e ~ . should have ( I ) el~couraged
the wealthy to orlent
themselves even more intenstvely toward product~on lor the
market. I f
the wealthy had long since concluded that land on the tax rolls
was an
investment for fools, this stimulus would have (2) been felt by
the
peasantry. I n either case, a growing proportion o f the
population be-
came ~ n v o l v e d i n commercial transactions s growing
percentage o f the
time. The velocity o f circulation, hence the level of economic
activity.
should have increased as ;I result-even i f the population and
silver

supply remained c o n ~ t a n t . ~
Thus, i n and of themselve. ~ h c Incasures introducecl in the
eilrlv
fifteenth century should have been a c;~talyst o f furlher
commercial-
ization. Suzhou was, and remained. a major center o f the
wholesale
grain trade. Rut growing commerc~al~zation and monetization
were
made possible, and i n turn encouraged, by the spread of
tex~ilc produc-
tion. The prefecture had produced Ilnens. ramie. hemp cloth,
and silk
: for centuries. Nonetheless down to the twelfth century, its
products
.: were deemed inferior to those o f North chin^.^
However. from the Southern Song on, Suzhou was famous (clr
its
, silk. T h e warmth and humidity o f its mild climate and
watery ecology
proved an ideal environment for transforming tiny silkworm
eggs into
fabric. The population explosion of the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries
provided the huge labor force needed to take advantage of this
poten-
. "a1 economic opportunity. N o t only did raising worms
require 'roulid-
the-clock attention, but obtaining the maximum quantity o f the
h~ghest
quality silk also demanded a delicate touch and exquisite

judgment
The rituals o f sericulture-cultivating mulberry, raising
silkworms.
feeding them on mulberry leaves, tending the cocoons. reeling
the raw
silk, winding i t , warping it, sizing i t , weaving it-were
henceforth part
[he annual local routine. "The third and fourth months of the
lunar
were called "silkworm months": every fam~ly shut it5 dclors
and stayed at home.""
. Cotton had only come t o be widely cultivated i n Jlangnan
during
Yuan. Yet i t was the production o f cotton which expanded
most
q U ' c k l ~ i n M i n g times. B y the beginning of the
sixleenth century, every
county i n Surhou prcfccture was producing cotton cloth.*' t v e
n ear-
lier, in 1466, cotton cloth merchants from Jiading. Kunshan. and
Suzhou (i.e. W u and Changzhou) jointly established a guild at
[.in-
qing, a key trading center i n Shand0ng.u Since cotton was nor
grown
i n the water-saturated soils o f W u and Changzhou,
commercially sig-
nificani:production from these counties implied organized
importation
of thei-Gw fiber irom.:areas bordering the Yangzi. where sandy
soils

were favorable to cotton.
~ ~ : i ~ . t h e ready avai1,ability of raw silk, the reputation
that Suzhou
'':..'.'
silk eni~jrjyed and the higher prices silk commanded i n the
market, corn- ,, ;
mercial productionof cotton cloth in the areas bordering Lake
Tai may
seem puzzling. Yet, in the early Ming, silk weaving remained a
highly
specialized skill, the monopoly o f male artisans i n the
prefectural capi-
tal. The expense o f the looms and the need for specialized
training
restricted entry into silk cloth production. Only i n the Xuande
reign
period (1425-1436) did silk production spread to the capitals o f
Su-
zhou's subordinate counties, a process which demanded
importation
o f skilled labor from the prefectural seat. The looms needed to
weave
cotton cloth were cheap, the skills peasants honcd i n centuries
o f pro-
ducing linen and hemp cloth readily ~ransferable.~" N o t until
demand
for silk "sky-rocketed" i n the 1470s and 1480s did silk
weaving finally
cease to be an urban monopoly, tapping the labor power
available i n
the c ~ u n t r y s i d e . ~ "
The expanded production o f silk cloth in the countryside may
well

or~ginally have been sponsored, and controlled, by members o f
the
local elite anxious to seize new economic o p p o r ~ u n i t i e s
. ~ ~ Suzhou's
hinterland was. however. densely populated, and its canals
provided
such excellent transport and communications that peasant
households
were tied directly to higher level markets. A twentieth-century
survey
measured 27.8 rniles o f navigable canals and rivers i n one
square mile
o f Suzhou's immediate hinterland.'* Boat ownership seems to
have
been widespread, and an agency system may already have been
in
place in the fifteenth century. I n the early twentieth century,
agents
made their nroney marketing peasant output tor fixed
commissions.
They provided free transportation to and from town, even m a k
~ n g
purchases for their clients, purchases they delivered free of
charge."
As a result, standard markets-periodic markels dealing i n a
limited
range of daily necessities, which organized village economic
and social
life in most of rural China-did not exist here.14
Shi and zhen near the prefectural capital were open daily; even
the smallest market towns seem to have housed several hundred
Heaven on Earth: 'l'he Rise of Suzhou, 1127-1.550 3
fa mi lie^.'^ Many of these ccnrral places had recognized s p e c

i i ~ l ~ t l c
vegetable oils were produced ill Hengtang and Xinguo, rice
wine (an
butchered pigs) were specialities o f Hengtang, Xinguo. and
Henpjir
Mudu was famed for metal work, Lumu zhen for pottery ;ind [;I
"bones."76 A s descriptions o f the Hushu/Yuechcng coniplex
lnak
clear (see below), some of these market towns were so t h o r o
u ~ h l y i r
tegratcd with Suzhou c ~ t y that attcmpts to classify them as
scb?arat
economic entities would be pointless and artificial: tiiven their
opcra
tion all day every day, the number o f resident hooscl~<~lds,
the populi~
tion of their catchment areas, and the range o f goods and
services the
offered, most of the other towns rank as central markets l7
Thnlugl
them, merchants like Qin Yunyan (1467-1506)- a fifth
gencrMron de
scendant o f a holder o f the highest degree, "superintended the
caplra
o f resident and traveling merchants, dispersing it to "shutile
and loom
households and gathering the [finished] bolts o f cloth in order
to returl
them Lo the rnerchant~."~",ocal merchants were essential lor
tht
smooth operation of the putting-out system. for only those who
h;t<
well-developed networks o f particularistic ties possessed thc
dctailec
knowledge o f skill and trustworthiness it required. As
prosperity and ;

taste for ostentation spread trom the court to the elitc in the
1i1tt
fifteenth century, demand for Suzhou' premium products
expitndcd
The stimulus was rapidly felt throughout the system, creatirlg :I
boon
economy which awed visitors and was recognized even hy
nattves ;I!
unprecedented.79
Nonetheless, as a now-standard pairing o f the Pingjiang ru o l
1225
[See Fig. 2, p. 241 and a U.S. A i r Force reconnaissance photo
of 194:
the effect on the cityscape was less dramatic than one m i g h ~
expect. Indeed, i n the course of seven centuries. almost
nothing $eem!
to have changed. The most obvious innovation within thc walls
w;rc
officially inspired. Since Zhang Shicheng used t l ~ c Zicheng
;IS Ili?
palace. M i n g Hongwu regarded attempts to refurbish I[ ;IS
evide~lce 01
subversive intent.81 The area was ilbandoned in fi~vor of ;I
Ilew. Iirorc
modest prefectural compound on ths west s~de of the city .[.his
chilngc
had its impact o n the residence pnttcrnh 01' others: clerks and
runner,
congregated i n the southwest corner o f Ihe CII~. while
~nelnbcrs 01' tllc
local elite-in Ming times drawn ,tlmosr equally Iron1 Wu :~n(l
Changzhou-concentrated inside the Chnng Gate, in the
liorthwcst
quadrant o f the The last remnitnts of the o f i c ~ a l m i ~ r k

e t syste~,~
BY the middle of the sixteenth century, eonimerce II~IL!
been diffused throughour the city. shops lining every ~ t r e c t .
~ . '
Within individual trades, institutional as well ;is physical con-
straints appear t o have fallen away T h e g u i l d system.
which h n d p c r -
s ~ s t e d f r o m early Song to Yuan times i n t h e textile
industry, seems t o
have disappeared. As the 1466 f o u n d i n g at L i n q i n g
suggests. the guild
concept had not been forgotten by Suzhou natives. I n Song and
Yuan.
g u i l d organizations were often located I n temples dedicated
t o t h e god
o f the trade (as was the Jisheng m i a o ) o r attached
themselves t o pre-
existing temples (as the G u i l d o f the W u Commandery L o
o m Industry.
headquartered i n the Yuanrniao Daoist T e m p l e , d ~ d ) .
Y e t exammation
o f the sources o n temples and monasteries i n the G u Su zhi
(1506)
failed t o provide evidence of.ghilds w i t h headquarters i n
religious i n -
stitutions. T h e earliest records of independent guilds date t o
the W a n l i
e r a (1572-1620).84 Specialized markets f o r those w i t h
particular skills
continued t o exist: satin workers at Flower Bridge, those w h o
special-

ized i n t h i n silks at the Guanghua Monastery Bridge,
spinners o f silk at
L i a n x i fang. A t each, professional intermediaries
(hangrou) matched
prospective employer and employee W' C a r e f u l mapping
has shown
that these were precisely the areas i n which guilds devoted t o
these
specialities were subsequently e ~ t a h l i s h e d . ~ ~ Some
sort of organization
clearly persisted, but lack o f physical headquarters suggests
that such
organization was weaker and less f o r m a l t h a n i t had
been i n Song and
Y u a n o r w o u l d be i n late M i n g and O i n g .
I f [ h e c ~ t y ' s activities had o u t g r o w n inherited
institutional forms.
they had also outgrown the physical constraints imposed by
encircling
walls. T h e most striking embodiment o f early M i n g
prosperity was
found outside the c i t y gates-particularly the northwestern
Chang
Gate. T h e 1379 edition o f the prefectural gazetteer listed n o
lanes
(xiatlg) outside the ramparts, a result o f the incorporation o f
p r e - M i n g
suburbs i n the city proper when the wall was rebuilt i n late
Yuan.H7 B y
1506. there were ten new lanes outside the Chang Gate; one o f
these,
the Yizhe Lane, "although narrow, was nonetheless the spot at
which
merchants ~ o l l e c t . " ~ Yuecheng was "the place where
merchants f r o m

the t w o capitals and various provinces assemble. Nan and B e
i hno as
well as Shang and X i a rang [nearby] had also become
markets. [ T h e
areal was especially prosperous."RY B y the m i d d l e o f the
sixteenth cen-
tury. i n the area between Chang a n d X u Gates and
"extending t o the
west, cottages sit close together l i k e teeth o f a comb. I t is
almost the
same as the area w i t h i n the city wall. Sojourners d w e l l
here i n large
n ~ m b e r s . " ~ Z h e n g Ruoceng, (f1. 1505-1580). a
Kunshan nalive. w h o
c o m p i l e d a n atlas t o aid i n the defense o f China's
coastal areas, n o t e d
that nine-tenths o f the pirates' interest i n Suzhou during the
mid-six-
teenth century wokou crisis had centered o n the area outside
the wall.
H e wrote that:
t l c i ~ v e n o n I:;~rth: I ' h c Kise of S u z h o u . 1 127-
1550
a r c dazzled by its brilllance. Maple Bridge in particul;tr is t h
e
s p o t where the se:~worthy vessels of t h e m e r c h ; ~ n t s
converge to
g o up river. North of the river is the center of ;I grcat tradc In
beans and grain and in cotton. G u e s t [merchants] trom north
a n d s o u t h come and g o , holding the oar a n d wclghing t
h e
anchor. All a r e here."

.The key point outside Chang G a t e was, h o w e v e r , H u s
h u , a market
town twenty-live 1; (eight miles) northwest o n the Grand
Canal. A
police slation a n d a relay post from t h e beginning of t h e
Ming. it w a s
designated o n e o f the seven Inland C u s t o m s stations
created in the
mid-fifteenth century. T h e choice no d o u b t reflected the
fact that i t was
already "the place where t h e goods of the fourteen provinces
con-
verge, and that merchant boats c o m e a n d g o , e a c h d a
y in their
rhousands."Y2 H e r e , a r o u n d 1506. " t h e c o m m o n
people dwetl by t h e
side of the water, peasants and traders living side by side. I1 is
;I great
market."9"y the end of the Ming, it had become the empire's
major
wholcsalc grain market. commodities trading ovcrsh;~dowing
11s tradi-
tional role a s a center of handicraft p r ~ d u c t i o n . " ~
T h e city's o t h e r suhurbs developed more slowly and o n a
less im-
posing scale. By 1506, the Peng G a t e was the only o t h e r a
r e a in which
settlements outside thc city walls h a d b e c n formally
clrgenizcd into
l a n e ~ . ~ 5 A century later all save the southern g a t e had
oflicially desig-
nated lanes, yet their combined n u m b e r was less than that of
the
lanes outside the "Golden" Chang Gate.* T h e Xu G a t c , s o

u t h of t h e
Chang G a t e in the west wall a n d linked most dircctly t o L
a k c .l'ai, was
usually referred to a s an extension of the complex t o its n o r
t h . T h u s .
its t h r e e lanes can be virwed a s a s o u t h e r n
continuation of the C h a n g
Gate's twenty-two. In spite of its recognized specialty (frames
for rais-
ing s i l k ~ o r m s ) , ~ ' the environs of P a n G a t c .
located in the southwest
corner o f t h e wall, seem t o have becn relatively d e ~ e r t e
d . " ~ T h e Oi
G a t e , in the northern w;ill, was known a s a center for kiln
workers a n d
m a k c r s o f rattan pillows by t h c early sixteenth century .
v Y A hundred
years later, "brokers" o r middlemen ( y a k u a i ) were said t
o converge
"like spokes at the hub o f a wheel" in these "humbler ~ u h u r
b s . " ~ ' ~ '
Significant in themselvcs, the rise o f these suburbs tied t h c
villages
more closcly to the city, a development reflected by the growing
c o n -
centration of village population in the urban penumbra."" A s
Tahlc ?
in Appendix T w o demonstrates.'"2 such integration was vital i
f
Suzhou's population were t o support itself. Commerce a n d
manufnc-
ture permitted this area t o evade Malthusian constraints, which
would
otherwise have forced resitlent5 to choose befwcen m i p r ; ~ r

~ o n ;I
starvation. All the post-1368 incrc;~sc in the population of Wu-
in el8
s u b u r b or village--and virtuillly all the m o r e modest
incrcilrc
Changzhou is ; ~ t t r i h u t ; ~ h l e to the cxp:lnsion of trade
a n d hantlic~;it
n o t t o agriculture.
By t h e beginning o f the sixteenth century. Suzhou's c c o n o
n
primacy was recognized hy iill; the important Fujian port of
Zh;m
z h o u boasted that it was a "little Su Hang."1')' As was true of
politic
hegemons in antiquity East and West, as lor;^ as the
constell;ition
forces, which brought i t into heing persisted, such universally
rcco
nized dominance was n o less eKective for the lack of
institution;~l I11rr
Such economic hegemony hroupht cultural hegemony in its train
Mil
1 policies had pushed the trends which made this hegemony
possib
1 f u r t h e r a n d faster than would otherwise have been the
cine. Ycl. r
i
should n o t replace the time-honored image of a dynasty henf
on In
poverishing the base of its defeated rival. Z h a n g Shicheng.
with ;I
image of Ming polic~cs a s ;in clahorately disguised effort to
promote tt.

development of Suzhou. T h e Ming imposed taxes. moved Ihe
c i l p ~ t ; ~
refurbished t h e Grand Canal. ; ~ n d modified administrativu
structurt
f o r its own reasons. In doing s o . the dynasty was making
the mosl (
existing possibilities. I f Suzhou had not becn as highly
comnterci;~
ized, as admirably equipped with cheap and efficient water
tritn5porl
as o p e n to new c o m m r r c ~ ; ~ l and handicraft
possibilities ;IS it w;t!
Ming p o l ~ c i e s would have proved unworkable as well ;IS
arhitracy.
O n c e in place, the brittleness of the Ming fiscel systcm &ldc
th
dynasty hostagc to Ihc continued well being of s o important ;I
shurce , I
11s revenues. Not only did Suzhou provide a tenth of the state',
Iota
annual revenue, hut the Ming system of allocating p a r t ~ c u l
a r taxc
from particular areas t o p;tr~icular ends severely limited the
govern
ment's ability to cope with fluctuations. Fnr better t o intervene
in tin^,
o f n e e d t o support a Suzhou than to rejigger the entire
fiscal sysfeln."'
. l a x . remissions, water control. and the quality of local
administrator:
all reflect this interest.b11, Yet. i n s o k ~ r ;IS Suzhou's rise f
r o ~ r i p r o n ~ i
nence to eminence was the work of the st:lie, it wits the producc
11
a d hoc decisions taken to exploit cxist~ng o p p o r t u n ~ t i e

s f o r llnperlil
advantage.
"A REPUI.ATION FOR H I C ~ I F . ~ AN[) ARUNDANCI:.,"
Y I ~ I
" A C ~ U A L L Y FUt.1. 0 1 ; WAN.[. AND [)ISTRESS"'?
Suzhou's development was no more the result of the m a c h i n
a t ~ o n s ut
canny local elites than i t was ol the polity. T h e material a n
d h u r n ; ~ ~ ~
P A R T O N E
T H E M O D E R N H I S T O R I C A I ,
P E R S P E C T I V E
1
' T H E O T H E R C H I N A ' :
S H A N G H A I F R O M 1919 T O 1949
Marie-Claire Berge're
I n 1953 R h o a d s M u r p h e y published a book calletl
.Slln~zgiiui: Kcq. l o
Modern China.' Twenty-five years latcr, t h e s a m e writer
asserted t h a t
this was n o t t h e right key, a n d that S h a n g h a i ,
britlgehend for pcnet-
ration to the West, h a d played hardly a t ~ y rolc in t h c
cvoluiion ol'

'Ites us modern C h i n a . 2 T h e q u a r t e r of a c e n t u r y
which has passed i n '
to take stock; a n d it allows us to analyse the experience of t r
e a t y ports,
in particular t h e port of S h a n g h a i , w i t h o u t too m u
c h good -- o r b a d -
feeling.
F o r t h e Revolution of 1949 eliminated, ifmot S h a n g h a i
itsell; a t least
the model of d e v e l o p m e n t inspirrtl by the W r s t of
which t h e city h a d
become t h e symbol. W i t h o ~ t d o u b t this climination
was less radical
than is generally a d m i t t e d . T h e specific q u a l i t y
which S h a n g h a i
retained within t h e c o m m u n i s t framework was o w e d ,
i t is t h o u g h t , t o
the survival o r certain characteristics inherited Ii.om a c c n t
u r y ol'
historical experience ( 1842.- 1949).
I t was t o w a r d s 1919 t h a t t h e S h a n g h a i model
reached its pcak
whilst, a t t h e s a m e time, revealing its weakness. I n fact,
from o n e world
war t o t h e next, S h a n g h a i d i d not cease t o de.elop,
increasc its
population, a n d strengthen its economic power, its political a
n d its
cultural influence. T h e d e g r a d i n g of its i n t e r n a t i o
n a l status, however,

'1'111: M O I ) I < I < N t l l S ' l ' O K I < ~ A l , P E K S P E
< : ' I ' I V E
endangered the foundation of a prosperity which, for a century,
had
been built upon integration with the world market, a n d on a
relative
independence from the bureaucratic Chinese government. I t is
true
that Shanghai held other trumps: - her exceptionally favourable
geog-
raphical situation; advances m a d e in the spheres of industry,
tech-
nology and finance; a n active middle class and a relatively
established
working-class tradition. But i t was the development of
maritime com-
merce with the West which m a d e the site of this port a t the
mouth of
thc Yangtze so important. I t was the flow of Western capital a
n d
tcclil~icians which s t i n 1 1 1 l ; ~ t c d thc growth of the
modern sector, aroused
thc compctitivc spirit of' the national bourgeoisie, a n d
speeded u p the
l'ormation of [ h e working class. How could this transplant
from the
Vest cvolve ar the very moment when the upsurge of Chinese
na-
tionalism, war, and revolution pushed back the presence of
foreigners
until the); disappeared?
'I'his question leads immediately to another, which concerns the
very
nature of a 'treaty port'. Was it simply (as Murphey thinks) a

foreign
zone cut off from the rest of China? O r a privileged place of
con-
liontation between two ci,ilizations neither of which would
give in to
the other? O r , was it, as studies by J. K . Fairbank suggest, a
Sino-
Li~reign base, governed by a condominium (or synarchy)
characterized
1)). a partial fi~sion of the values and practices found in the
two
communities? 'I'he ~n:~jc,l-it); of writers who have tackled
these problems
ha-c done so by %.a? of' institutional and economic studies,
generally
Ihcusccl o n the second h;tlf of the nineteenth century o r on
the early,
twentieth century, d u r i n g which the system was a t first
forming, a n d
later Lnctioning normally. Equally revealing, a n d m u c h
less studied,
are the years of its decline. I t is a t that point t h a t o n e c a
n grasp w h a t
foreignrrs contributed which is lasting, and take stock of what
remains
after them, including the Chinese reactions to this foreign
exposure.
'it11 rcgard to thr latter, one milst not forget to distinguish
between
;c.~~c,l)l~ol)ic :111tl ; u i t i - ~ ~ r l ) ; ~ l ~ i~:titu(lcs
triggered I)y thc rxistence of a
C ~ I ~ * I . I I ~ X C C I r~icllx)l)olis stl(.h ;LS
SI1i111glliti on [ h e o n e I~ancl and the
appearance in Shanghai itself of' a new tradition, that of
Chinese
niode~.nism, on the 01 l ~ c r .

Since 1919, nationalism has dominated the history of Shanghai
as i t
has that 01' tlic ~ I i o l c of modern China. But the rise of
nationalism in a
soc.icty c o s n ~ o ~ o l i r a n as Shanghai, is of a kind that
dispels all hope of
;In cbsc,;~l)isr return ro the past.
1:or thc nariollalism of' Shanghai reflects a new vision of the
place of
2
S H A N G H A I , O R ' T H E O ' I ' H E R ( : l l I N A '
China in the world ( d e m a n d for equality) a n d of the role
of foreigners
in China (desire for co-operation). Shanghai is at once more o p
e n t o
the outside world a n d more a w a r e of the place which C h i
n a should
have in it. Nationalism and cosmopolitanism proceed in a
parallel a n d
complementary fashion.
I n this sense, Shanghai was d i r e r e n t , a n d was seen and
rqjected as
such by the K u o m i n t a n g a n d then by the Communists,
both of w h o m
described the city aS 'foreign'. But foreign to what? 'To C h i n
a ? o r to the
dominant, rural a n d bureaucratic tradition which, after the fall
of the
Empire, was resuscitated under the K u o m i n t a n g rcginie,
,just as i t was

later to be u n d e r the Maoist strategy? But if'Shanghai had
simply been
a foreign, non-Chinese city, would she 1101 have I)c.cn swept
quickly
aside by this rejection since 1930? l%ut insrcatl, I-ighr 1111 to
1949,
Shanghai continued to display her vitality a n d origi~lality in
the midst
of the most difficult conditions: 01' repression, invasion, a n d
of chaos.
From where does this amazing capacity for survival come? Is
the p r i m e
importance given to business enough to explain the stability of
Shanghai a n d its relative invulnerability in face of successi~e
polirical
regimes? O n e thinks of H o n g K o n g in the 1960s. O n e
thinks back, too,
to the communities of merchants, ignored o r ill-treated for
long periods
by the Imperial power and by Chinese officialdom. O n e thinks
of the
smugglers, sailors, pirates, the intellectuals on the loose; of all
this
minority, marginal China; this other (:Iiina ol'whic:h Shanghai
would,
in so many ways, be a modern extension; the transplanted
Foreigners
having found in the non-orthodox tradition a small but
particularly
fertile piece of land. T h e history of the years 1919-49
illustrates h o w
the 'Shanghai phenomenon' took root, and explains why i t
continued
after the revolution. O n e c a n condemn the past; it is much
m o r e
difficult to abolish it.

The golden age of'a colol~ial-style S h a ~ ~ g l r a i , (he iigc
o f ' t l ~ c 1 r t i p n t 1 ar~cl
Anglo-Indian architecture, closed with the First World W a r .
At'rer t h e
war, the world economic situation, the shrinking of state power
in
China, and the decline of the old Imperial powers all favoirred t
h e
growth and expansion of' the city. 'I'hus h r t w r r n 1919 and
1927,
Shanghai reached the height of its time-honourcd d r ~ t i n y .
About 1919 the Chinese cconoiny rcapcd thc I)cncfits 01'
cxcep-
tionally favourable circumstances. A heavy dcmnnci for raw
materials
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t I . I .
T H E M O D E R N H I S T O R I C A L P E R S P E C T I V
E
T a b l e 1.3. The rise of traditional ch'ien-chuany banks al
ttrr time o f the First W o r l d W a r
((lapita1 data in Chinese dollars)
Avrragc cal)iial
No. of banks Capital per bank
. S o u ~ c p : . S h ( ~ ~ ~ - l i i r i ~ l ~ ' i r n - c h u a n , y
.shih-Iino (Materials for the History o f
(h'irn-ch~ion~c i n Shanghai) (Shanghai: People's Publishing
House,
1960). p. 191.
in 1920."' Stimulated by d e m a n d a n d speculation, the
price of land
increased. I n the central district of the International Settlement
t h e
mou* which was worth 30,000 t a r l s t in 191 1, was worth
40,000 in
1920.11 Shanghai suffered less a n d , somewhat later, the
effects of the

world recession of 1920-2.lV'I'he imports problem in 1921, a n
d the
Stock Exchange crisis which disturbed the financial markets in
the
same year. were integral parts of the bouts of over-speculation
which
periodically inflamed the city. M o r e serious was the crisis in
Chinese
cotton manufacturing in 1923-4.':' 'This heralded the end of' a
golden
a g e which, in 192.5. .as marked by the onset of continuing
civil war
a n d revolutionary ~)r.oblems.
'I'his short decade of prosperity - scarcely time enough for a w a
r a n d
its aftermath - was, nevertheless, sufficient to transform a
commercial
port into a n industrial city a n d to nurture a new, Chinese
nationalist
urban class. D u r i n g these same years, the foreigners worked
to preserve
their pri~rileges a n d sometimes even to increase them. T h e
foreign
population of Shanghai was a small minority of 23,307 people.
T h e
International Settlement (35,503 mou) a n d t h e French
Settlement
(15,150 ~ t l o u ) were only a small fraction of a n u r b a n
zone which
encompassed the old Chinese city a n d the industrial districts
of
N a n t a o , Clhapei, a n d Pootung.IJ T h e importance of the
Coreign settle-
n l c l ~ l s was d u c to their international status as defined by
the

nineteenth-century treaties a n d by diplomatic procedure
applied there-
after. I n Shanghai (as in all o t h e r treaty ports) foreign
residents h a d
e x t r a t e r r i ~ o r i a l rights a n d were answerable only to
their respective
consulates.
Al)proxi~narrly 1 / 16 ol' a hectare.
t 'The / o r / is an old monetary unit which represents roirghly
38 grams of pure silver, that
is i n 1920: $ 1 . 2 4 , or 6s 9:d (39pj.
S H A N G H A I , O R ' T H E O T H E R C H I N A '
Against a tax payment ( a n d , eventually, a customs s u r t a x
) t h e r a t e
of which was not determined by the Chinese authorities, their
mer-
chandise was exempt from all further control. Local
administration
(police, refuse collection, public health) was t h e
responsibility of t h e
foreign authorities entitled to collect taxes to finance it. T h e
L a n d
Regulations of 1845, 1854, 1869 a n d 1898, a n d the
Re'glement of 1868,
allowed the creation of municipal authorities, i n d e p e n d e n
t of t h e
Chinese authorities who, in the Settlements, lost all legal a n d
fiscal
jurisdiction. If the French municipality, subject to the a u t h o r
i t y of t h e
consulate a n d thence to the government in Paris, was a
'bureaucratic

autocracy',15 t h e S h a n g h a i Municipal Council of the I n
t e r n a t i o n a l
Settlement constituted 'a representative o l i g a r c h y ' , ' ~ e l
a t i v e l y a u t o -
nomous with respect to the local consulate body a n d the
diplomatic
corps of Peking, even though British influence remained d o m i
n a n t
there.
I n both cases the continued existence of these privileged
groups, a n d
of these states within the state, rested on t h e relations of the
existing
forces. Not t h a t the strength of the municipal police forces o
r t h a t of
the Volunteer Corps was very important: they constituted only a
few
thousand men. But foreign gun-boats were anchored in t h e W
h a n g p o o
and cruised o n the Yangtze, reminders of t h e political a n d
military
power of the countries w h o kept world order.
I n their Settlements, foreigners designed their own parks, a n d
built
their own churches, schools, colleges a n d hospitals. T h e y
brought in
their missions, sporting a n d cultural clubs, charitable
organizations
and folklore societies, their bars, their cafes a n d their big
hotels. T h e y
built their own warehouses a n d factories, they continued t o
have their
special postal service, a n d to publish their newspapers: a
dozen daily

and weekly papers in different languages were published, the
most
important of which, the North China D a i b new^, was
printing a b o u t
3,000 copies a t the time of t h e First World War." T h e
residents of t h e
Settlements benefited, in addition, from t h e provision of
electricity for
domestic a n d industrial use ( t h e electricity generating plant
in t h e
International Settlement was the most powerful in C h i n a a n
d its prices
were a m o n g the lowest in the world), a water service, t w o
companies
running electric trains, a n d a n urban telephone network, a l t
h o u g h
they were not provided with a good sewage system! T h e
public services
were laid o n by contracting companies.
T h e raison d'elre of this 'model settlement' was business. T w
e n t y
foreign banks h a d their head office o r their a g e n t in
Shanghai.18 I n
E
1919, of sixteen foreign cotton mills in China, fifteen were in
Shanghai.'!' Large trading firms were centred in Shanghai,
notably the
British Jardine Matheson, the German Carlovitz & Co. a n d the
Japanese Mitsui Bussan Kaisha. These firms were continually
expand-

ing a n d diversifying.
T h e foreign residents of Shanghai were deeply attached to the
privileged international status which assured their safety,
comfort, a n d
prosperity. After the 1914-18 war had shaken the world order,
as the
old imperialist forces began to decline, and as the powerful tide
of
Chinese nationalism began to rise, 'old Shanghai hands'
mourned the
'tragedy of the Washington Conference' and denounced 'the
waves of
[his absurd ~ e n e r o s i t y ' ~ ~ . l ' h e y saw in a distant a n
d uncertain future,
the abolition of extra-territoriality. I n China, foreign
Chambers of
Commerce a n d Residents' Associations were determined not
to sur-
render any of their privileges, a n d , moreover, tried t o
increase them;
some even d r e a m t of building a n enormous, free
international zone a t
the mouth of the Yangtze taking in the whole of Shanghai a n d
the
country immediately behind it.21
As the territory of thc Sctilemenis, and in pariic:i~lar that of the
International Settlement, was increasingly unable to meet
demog-
raphic a n d industrial requirements, and as the Chinese
government
Y
refused to readjust its b o u n d a r i e ~ , ~ ~ the Shanghai
Municipal Council

practised a policy of indirect extension, by building External
Roads (48
miles in 1925) in Chinese territory. These roads were
maintained a n d
policed by the Council, who also placed a tax on local residents.
T h u s
the External Roads Areas, in the suburbs to the west (7640
acres) a n d
to the north of the International Settlements (283 acres),
escaped the
administration a n d sovereignty of the Chinese. After the 30 M
a y
Movement in 1925 the building programme was interrupted, but
the
legal status of the External Roads was only settled two years
later with
the establishment of the Kuomintang g o ~ e r n m e n t . ~ "
T h e Council applied similar tenacity to leading two other
rearguard
battles: that of the 'Mixed Court', and that of the representation
of the
tax-paying Chinesc. Created in 1864 to settle differences
between
C;hinesr residents of' the Concession, the Mixed C o u r t
ceased being a I Chinese court i n 191 1 when the Consular
Corps took upon itself the right of naming a n d paying its
magistrates. I n spite of numerous
attempts by Chinese authorities, up to 1926 the Council refused
to
repeal the 'temporary measures' of 191 T h e problem of the
repre-
sentation of Chinese tax-payers in the International Settlement
in the
S H A N G H A I , O R ' T H E O T H E R C H I N A '

Council had been a n issue since 1905, a n d it presented itself
afresh in
1919 when tax-payers refused to pay the increased municipal
taxes,
rallying to the cry of 'no taxation without representation'. T h e
pro-
testors, however, only succeeded in obtaining the creation of the
Chinese Advisory Committee, a n d they had to wait until 1927
t o send
three councillors to take full part in the Council.25 I n spite of
the
'
concessions which they were forced to make by the 30 M a y
Movement,
/ the foreigners safeguarded their privileged positions in
Shanghai. But
I
I already the conditions for dialogue between the Chinese a n d
foreign
communitiks had been deeply disturbed by the rise of new u r b
a n
I classes: a business class, a working class, a n d a n
intelligentsia.
lmmediately after the First World W a r , thc precipitate
disinteg-
J
ration of traditional social structures, a n d the decline of
Confucian
ideology, loosened the hold which the bureaucracy held over t h

e
Chinese bourgeoisie. At the same time, economic prosperity
favoured
their business undertakings. T h e development of industry in S
h a n g h a i
at this time reflected that of Chinese industry ( T a b l e 1.4).
For t h e
Chinese capitalists it was a period of unprecedented profit-
making
(Table 1.5), a n d of annual dividends which often surpassed 30
per cent
(in 1919 the Commercial Press paid 3 4 per ~ e n t ) ~ e a n d
sometimes
reached 90 per cent (the Ta-sheng cotton mills, for example).27
A new
generation of businessmen appeared, formed of industrialists,
including
such men as H . Y. Moh ( M u Hsiang-yueh), C . C. Nieh
(Nieh Ch'i-
chieh), the Chien brothers (Chien Chao-nan a n d Chien Yu-
chieh) a n d
the bankers, K. P. Chen (Ch'en Kuang-fu) a n d Chiang Kia-
ngau
(Chang Chia-ao). These young Chinese managers founded their
o w n
Table 1.4. Growth of Chinese cotton
mills in Shanghai 191427
Fac~ories Looms
1914 7 160,900
1919 1 I 216,236
1920 2 1 303,392
I921 23 508,746
1922 24 629,142

1924 24 675,918
1927 24 ' 684,204
Source: Yen Chung-p'ing, T u n g - c h i 1211-
lioo, pp. 162-3.
E
Table 1.5. Projts from Chinese businesses in Shanghai
(Chinese dollars)
I'ICIIIIS I ~ I I I I I ~ I I C I I O , I A v c r ; i ~ ~ . j".olits
01' l l ~ c
mill ol' the Shen-hsin C o . ch'irn-rhuong bar1k.s
1915 20,000 25,1 I 1
1919 1,000,000 37,723
1920 1,100,000 32,371
1921 600,000 38,778
Sourrcs: Yen C h ~ n ~ - ~ ' i n g , M i a n - j b n g - c h i h
shih-kao, p. 1 7 2 ; Ch'ien-chuany shth-
lzao, p . 202.
professional associations, the Shanghai Bankers' Association
(Shang-hai
yin-hang kung-hui) in 19 1 7, and the Chinese Millowners'
Association
(Hua-shang sha-ch' ng lien-ho-hui) in 1918. T h e y also tried
to take
control of long-established organizations such as the guilds and
the
General Chamber of Commerce of Shanghai (Shang-hai tsung-

The Indigenous Urban Tradition of China IntroductionSuzhou was.docx

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