ABSTRACT
The Chinese history since the Opium War is a series of continual efforts at readjustment to meet the challenge. The settlement is essentially a merger of China's cultural tradition, developed on a huge continent, with this oceanic influence. In view of the egalitarianism and collective character of the Chinese, prototypical European capitalism can be said to contradict China's cultural tradition. In the history of the development of capitalism, Renaissance Italy is its birthplace and Venice its pacesetter. Cold war and international contention have induced the Western democracies to see in capitalism a common economic cause. The greatest appeal of capitalism is its laissez faire spirit, which derives economic benefit from a geographically unbalanced situation. The population, a new economic grievance was tied to the issues of religious freedom and self-government. The historical experience of several developed nations indicates that modernization is always accompanied by economic growth and expansion.
