ABSTRACT

Scholars often consider the late imperial Chinese state’s negative attitude toward foreign trade to be a factor explaining the country’s failure to develop a modern economy before the twentieth century. By European standards, China experienced a precocious commercial revolution in the eleventh and twelfth centuries through which increasing amounts of grain and cash crops entered commercial networks to support growing numbers of urban dwellers. In the early fifteenth century several fleets of large Chinese ships sailed as far as Africa and the Middle East. Yet despite these signs of dynamism, China did not enjoy continued economic advance. Domestic commerce’s failure to continue expanding is often blamed on state interference. Foreign commerce was also discouraged when governmentsponsored naval expeditions were halted after 1433. This was one sign that the Chinese had turned introspective; changes in philosophical attitudes also attest that the Chinese had lost their curiosity about the outside world and their desire to engage with it. These more general intellectual conditions diminished the attractiveness of foreign trade for Chinese officials. Since in European experience foreign trade was a key component of broader economic development, we are told that this lack of state enthusiasm also hampered Chinese development (Elvin 1973:203-34; Hall 1985:45-54; Jones 1988:73-84; McNeil 1982:24-62, especially 42-9).