MERCHANT ORGANISATIONS
IN LATE IMPERIAL CHINA;
PATTERNS OF CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
WELLINGTON K. K. CHAN*
In recent years, a growing number of scholars have begun to re-assess the conventional wisdom about institutional ossification in late traditional and early modern China. The new view is that the Chinese economic and social institutions of this period had great resilience and flexibility, and that the men who ran these institutions demonstrated a good deal of ingenuity for purposeful change. Such a re-assessment can be supported by examining the pattern of institutional developments in the various types of Chinese merchant organisations during the late Ch'ing.
Merchant organisations represented some of the most influential economic and social institutions in Chinese society. Several times in its long imperial era, new organisations were created and existing ones improved upon in response to changing environmental conditions. These institutional changes were particularly active during the nineteenth century, because the Chinese merchant community, for reasons of domestic troubles and foreign trade, was itself undergoing major and rapid changes.
One index to gauge these changes was the trend towards broader based institutions. These catered to wider economic and social concerns than the traditional commercial guilds (called under various names such as hang-hui, kung-so, t'ang, chao, kung, ko and tien), which had narrow and particularistic interests. Traditional guilds remained powerful, however, throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Indeed, following the defeat of the Taipings, guilds in many areas experienced vigorous growth because new ones were needed to re-establish the internal market system ravaged by the rebellion. Yet, in 1903, when the central government
* Dr. Chan is Assistant Professor of History at Occidental College, Los Angeles. The author wishes to express his appreciation to the American Council for Learned Societies and the Harvard-Yenching Institute for their generous financial support which made possible the writing of this paper.
MERCHANT ORGANISATIONS
IN LATE IMPERIAL CHINA;
PATTERNS OF CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
WELLINGTON K. K. CHAN*
In recent years, a growing number of scholars have begun to re-assess the conventional wisdom about institutional ossification in late traditional and early modern China. The new view is that the Chinese economic and social institutions of this period had great resilience and flexibility, and that the men who ran these institutions demonstrated a good deal of ingenuity for purposeful change. Such a re-assessment can be supported by examining the pattern of institutional developments in the various types of Chinese merchant organisations during the late Ch'ing.
Merchant organisations represented some of the most influential economic and social institutions in Chinese society. Several times in its long imperial era, new organisations were created and existing ones improved upon in response to changing environmental con- ditions. These institutional changes were particularly active during the nineteenth century, because the Chinese merchant community, for reasons of domestic troubles and foreign trade, was itself under- going major and rapid changes.
One index to gauge these changes was the trend towards broader based institutions. These catered to wider economic and social concerns than the traditional commercial guilds (called under various names such as hang-hui, kung-so, l'ang, chao, kung, ko and tien), which had narrow and particularistic interests. Traditional guilds remained powerful, however, throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Indeed, following the defeat of the Taipings, guilds in many areas experienced vigorous growth because new ones were needed to re-establish the internal market system ravaged by the rebellion. Yet, in 1903, when the central government
* Dr. Chan is Assistant Professor of History at Occidental College, Los Angeles. The author wishes to express his appreciation to the American Council for Learned Societies and the Harvard-Yenching Institute for their generous financial support which made possible the writing of this paper.
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