ABSTRACT
The history of public works, the records of which extend over centuries, is of unique value in estimating the economic basis of unity and division in Chinese history. The development of “water-benefits,” or the construction of water-control works for the sake of increasing agricultural productivity and facilitating transportation, especially the transportation of grain tribute, was, in China, essentially a function of the State. The fact that irrigation canals, surface tanks, drainage and flood-control works and artificial waterways were mostly built as public works links them closely with politics. By using the concept of a Key Economic Area, it is possible to analyse the function of the economic base as providing the fulcrum for the political control of subordinate economic areas in China. Chinese economy throughout the long period under discussion was primarily composed of tens of thousands of more or less self-sufficient villages which were normally woven into larger groups for purposes of administration or military action.
