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Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Publications Sociology & Anthropology Department

Fall 2002

Europe and China Compared

Eric Mielants Fairfield University, [email protected]

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Repository Citation Mielants, Eric, "Europe and China Compared" (2002). Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Publications. 46. https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/sociologyandanthropology-facultypubs/46 Published Citation Mielants, Eric. “Europe and China Compared” in Review of the Fernand Braudel Center, Vol. 25 (4), Fall 2002, pp.401-449.

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Eric Mielants

/^hina hasbeen regarded as one ofthe most glorious civilizations V>Deng,2000). Yet,800 yearslater, Europe dominated the globe politically, militarily, eco- nomically,and technologically.Was theChinese Empire incapable orunwilling to develop by conquering, subordinating, and systemati- callyexploiting its peripheries as westernEurope would? Tradition- ally,scholars have located the "great divergence" between China and Europein theperiod of the Industrial Revolution, which then opens up thequestion why China "failed" to experience an IndustrialRevo- lution(e.g., Elvin, 1973), and thebenefit of recurring growth. Pomeranz's(2000) recentstudy is a majorcontribution to the fieldof worldhistory as it attemptsto present,by way of Charles

* I would like to acknowledgemy gratitude to NorihisaYamashita (Hokkaido Uni- versity),John Chaffee (Binghamton University),and George Satterfield(SUNY- Morrisville)for their comments and suggestionson the firstversion of thisarticle. Of course, no one but myselfis responsiblefor any errorsof factor interpretation. review,xxv, 4, 2002,401-49 401

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Tilly's(1984) "encompassingcomparative method," a convincing explanationof whythe Westexperienced recurring growth and China(or India)did not. Pomeranz challenges the traditional (Euro- centric)position of Western social scientists who continue to believe thatmore "perfect competition," and morefree labor in Western marketsthan elsewhere enabled a take-offtooccur in Europe (2000: 17),as ifthe Industrial Revolution in Europewas an almostinevita- bleevent, due toits unique internal features. Pomeranz does a great job in carefullygoing over the available literature to dismissEu- rope'suniqueness (or predisposednatural or teleologicalpath to uniqueness)prior to 1800.He underminesany scholarly attempt to explainthe "rise of the West" (or the emergence of capitalism within Europe)by solely looking at Europe(e.g., Bois, 2000; Lachmann, 2000) or byexplaining Europe's advantage in termsof cultural and religiouspeculiarities to theregion (e.g., Park, 1995). He repeatedlypoints out that Europe was not the motor behind worldhistory before the Industrial Revolution, that there existed multiplecores prior to Europe'sdomination of world trade in the nineteenthcentury, and that these areas were all experiencing mod- estper capita growth as well.In hiswords the mostdeveloped parts of westernEurope seem to have sharedcrucial economic features- commercialization, corn- modificationofgoods, land, and labor, market-driven growth, and adjustmentby households of both fertility and labor allo- cationto economic trends- with other densely populated core areasin Eurasia(Pomeranz, 2000: 107). In his carefuland thoroughoverview of theliterature, Pomeranz rightfullydebunks Eurocentric myths, but unlike Frank (1998), he at- temptsto re-evaluatethe era beforethe nineteenth century as a fundamentally"polycentric world with no dominantcenter" (Pomer- anz,2000: 4, 273). AlthoughPomeranz distances himself from world-systems anal- ysisby claiming that "the exploitation of non-Europeans- and access to overseasresources more generally- [is] not the sole motorof Europeandevelopment" (2000: 3), hisfocus on theunique exploit- ativerelations of westernEurope with the New World,"and the exceptionalscale of the New World windfall" (2000: 11) whichthis generated,the importance he attributesto thelink between "capi-

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 403 talism,overseas coercion and industrialization" and his emphasis on thevisible hands of political-economicinstitutions of Europeancapitalism and violentinterstate competition, combined with some very lucky (forEurope) globalconjunctures, [which] made European (especiallyBritish) relations with the rest of the world unique amongcore-periphery relationships (2000: 185) comescloser to the world-systems paradigm than he seemswilling to admit. LikeWallerstein (1983), Pomeranz (2000: 187) is quitecritical of O'Brien's(1990) outrightdismissal of Europeanprofits generated outsideof Europe, and likeWallerstein (1974) theconquest of the NewWorld (in turn "the result of intense military competition with- in Europe")is consideredto be crucialto explainEurope's rise (Pomeranz,2000: 282). More importantly, Pomeranz himself insists on theimportance of fundamental differences between European- dominatedperipheries, and therelations China had withits own peripheries(2000: 255, 267, 289). WhilePomeranz's book should be appreciatedfor its efforts to underscoreonce more the vitalityand importanceof the non- European(especially East Asian) arena in termsof socioeconomic developments-since world-systems analysis sometimes stresses the increasingpower of Europe and the "passivity" ofthe to-be-incorpo- ratedexternal arena- the study is neverthelessproblematic from the pointof view of Braudel's longue durée. I contendthat both the structural (geographical, demographic, geopolitical)constraints and limitations China was facing on theone hand,and theagency and policychoices made by elites, in theface of internaland externalchallenges on theother, have to be taken intoaccount in orderto comprehendthe different political/eco- nomictrajectories of Europe and China in the long run. Although it has latelybeen in vogueto dismisseither the impact of European influenceto a verylimited period in time(e.g., Frank, 1998) or to attributeit(mainly) to a military/technological breakthrough because ofthe Industrial Revolution,1 I will attempt to tracethe roots of the

1 Pomeranzalso regardsthe Industrial Revolution as thewatershed that ultimately transformedthe world, and in variousparts of hisbook he discussesthe debates on (proto)-industrialdevelopments (2000). The obsessionof equating modernity with the

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greatdivergence in the thirteenth-fifteenthcenturies. Only by lookingat thehistorical trajectory of China and Europein thelong run(from c. 1200on) can one assessthe specific divergent trajecto- ries(or pathdependencies) at play.2

THE CHINESE SOCIOECONOMIC REVOLUTION DURINGTHE SUNG DYNASTIES(C. 900-1280).

Pomeranzis ofcourse correct in claimingthat the scale of trade networksand themultitude of goodsexchanged in Asia weredaz- zlingwhen compared to Europe throughout most of the premodern era (2000).From the tenth century, the Chinese took to theseas in increasingnumbers with junks of 200 tons.Although some scholars havesuggested that mostly luxury products were transported by the Chinesemerchants in theIndian Ocean (e.g., Lewis, 1978: XI, 462), itappears that already under the Sung dynasty significant amounts ofbulk goods such as "rice,porcelain, pepper, lumber, and miner- als"were transported overseas (Shiba, 1983: 104).3 During the Sung, jointventures in shippingand leasesof vessel services had become "quitecommon" (Deng, 1997a: 102), and "formsof commenda and societasmaris" also cameinto use (Shiba,1983: 108). Although the

IndustrialRevolution (e.g., Vries, 2001: 435; Vries, 2002: 122, 126) is however an unfortu- naterecurrent theme (see Mielants,2000) which prevents social scientists from raising questionsabout the path dependence of different political economies in thelong run. The IndustrialRevolution only enabled the West to achieveeconomic growth more rapidlyand moreintensely (which ultimately widened the gap between the core and the peripheryeven more)after c. 1800 AD(see the debatebetween Wallerstein, Hicks, Furtado,and othersin Guarducci[1983: 695-746] and essaysin Prak,[2001]). Moseley remindsus thateven before the Industrial Revolution "there had already been a radical shiftin theglobal balance of powerin favorof Europe,particularly by virtue of its controlof the seaways of world trade" (1992: 538). 2 On theuse of in historicalsociology cf. Mahoney (2000). 3 pathdependence In theinternal Chinese market many bulk commodities (e.g., rice, tea, and salt) wereexchanged over long distances (Golas, 1980: 299), which is probablyrelated to a seriesof impressive technological innovations that in turn stimulated market activity and ruralproductivity (Rawski, 1972: 96-98). But in thisarticle I willfocus on theexchange betweenChina and non-China;hence a comparisoncan be madewith Europe, as tothe mannerwherein the capture and dominanceof international markets were crucial for theestablishment of a capitalistsystem. I do notimply that local or regionalmarkets wereless significant, but when one dealswith the creation of a capitalistmerchant class, one has to focuson thehighest levels of profit, i.e., long distance trade networks (Ptak, 1994:35).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 405 causesof theeconomic boom can be tracedback to thelate Tang dynasty(Balazs, 1969: 16), it was under the Sung that Chinese gov- ernmentalrevenue, obtained from taxes on trade,reached an unpre- cedentedpeak.4 When during the Sung maritime technology im- provedeven further (Shiba, 1970: 5-6) andthe Chinese government embarkedupon massiveship building programs (Dawson, 1972: 167),a "majorupsurge in trade"occurred (Hall, Kenneth,1985: 194),parallel with a subsequent"change of commoditystructure" (Xiyu,1991: 220-21). During the Sung and Yuan dynasties, the "pro- ductionof immediatematerial means of subsistence"and the transportof these bulk commodities had become central to overseas trade(Kai, 1991:232).5 Aside from the increasing silk trade (Ma, 1999),the massive trade of porcelainsprobably became the main exportcommodity loaded in the oceangoing ships (Xiyu, 1991: 221), althoughlarge quantities of perishable foodstuffs were transported overseasas well,for example to Japan and Korea(Shiba, 1970: 88). Underthe Sung, people were "gradually induced to turn to commer- ciallyoriented forming or to take to nonagricultural pursuits" (Shiba, 1975:39), and- even more important- "an active foreign trade policy wasformulated to promote trade relations with overseas countries" (Ma, 1971:33). Thattrade flourished was therefore a direct result of Imperialgovernment policies (Filesi, 1972: 10; Lo, 1969a:24). "The relationshipbetween the state and the merchant associations during theSung was more intimate than at anyother period in thehistory ofChina" (Ma, 1971:90). Thiswas related to thefact that although officials"were prohibited from participating in any form of trade, privatelymany of themengaged in commercialventures [as] they exploitedtheir specially favorable position and carriedon busi- nesses"(Ma, 1971: 129).6 By the end of the twelfth century, revenues

1 In themid-twelfth century, as muchas 20% ofthe state's cash income was derived "fromthe tariff on themaritime trade" 1991:217). r> (Xiyu, Accordingto Xiyu, it took large ships 40 daysto sailfrom Canton to Sumatra, and 60 daysfrom there to theArabian peninsula (1991: 220). 6 Ma statesthat because of their position, governmental officials evadedtaxes in business transactions, cornered their commodities, and paid no transportationcost on theirgoods by using government boats and freelabor. Theyeven invested government funds as privatecapital (1971: 130). Forofficials, itwas "common practice to put the ownership of [their] commercial estab- lishmentsunder the names of the official's close relatives or even his servants" (Ma, 1971:

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 406 EricMielants fromindirect taxes on tea,salt, and wine was about 70% of the total staterevenue (Deng, 1999: 316). Thus, the principal wealth of China underthe Sung- more than at theend of theMing or duringthe Ch'ing-came fromcommerce and craftsmanship(Gernet, 1982: 323). Whereasin theearly Sung revenues were still mostly derived fromthe taxation of agriculture, "after the middle of the Northern Sungperiod, the state drew an increasingproportion of its revenue fromtrade" (Shiba, 1970: 45). Thus,China was by the twelfth cen- turynot a stateliving on theextraeconomic coercion of itspeas- antry,but rather a stateattempting to survivethe growing might of nomadicincursions by fostering revenues derived from trade. The SouthernSung depended even more on trade(Deng, 1999: 314) since because of the threatof nomadicinvasions it "constantly turnedfor help to big merchants"(Balazs, 1969: 19). These had emergedin theSung period when the expansion of trade led to in- creasingurban development and growing divisions of labor, particu- larlyin themining, porcelain, and saltindustries, which seemed to havedeveloped identical features of capitalism as inEurope's textile and miningindustries, only on a muchlarger scale (e.g.,Weiji, 1992).7This is confirmedby the fact that commercial activities in Fukien,Chekiang, and Kwantungoccurred "on a farlarger scale thanthat of theEuropean countries" (Gernet, 1982: 326). Accord- ingly,the standard of life must have been much higher in China than in Europein this period (Needham, 1969: 171), which probably con- tinuedto be thecase fora verylong period of time,as Pomeranz pointsout (2000: 94). Relatedto thisupsurge in internationaltrade wasthe ever growing threat from the nomads which created a "Sung

134), since officialswere legallyforbidden to partakein anyform of business(Dawson, 1972: 176). Duringthe Sung, not onlyofficials but also even "membersof thecourt held shares in shippingand manufacturingcompanies" (Lo, 1969a: 24). In eleventhcentury Quanzhou, forinstance, "local officialstraded privately with the merchants"despite the factthat international trade was thenstill prohibited in thatport (Clark, 1995: 58). 7 This is actuallynot surprising,given the fact that in Sung China "wheatand barley yield/seed ratios were about 10:1, and a good deal betterfor rice, [while]the typical medieval European yield/seedratio forwheat was 4:1" (Maddison, 1998: 31). Chinese agriculture,however, was "persistentlyself-sustaining" (Maddison, 1998: 32), whilethe Europeans,in order to achievea divisionof labor in theircontinent, found it expedient to constructa peripherythrough a systematiccolonization process, first within Europe, later abroad (Wallerstein,1974). Moreover,a structuralbullion drain to the East (see below) resultedin a relativeshortage of capital,which often caused highinterest rates, in turnlimiting agricultural yields (Clark, 1988).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 407 mercantilepolicy [that] sought by all meansto increase the national wealththrough the expansion of trade"(Shiba, 1983: 110).In this theChinese government became very successful: trade with South- eastAsia flourished (Willmott, 1966: 23), butcommercial contacts withother parts of theworld grew more intense as well,most no- tablywith the Philippines (Hall, Kenneth, 1985: 227), India (Dawson, 1972: 174),East Africa (Chittick, 1970), Arabia (Chou, 1974: 103), and evenEgypt (Scanlon, 1970). The factthat Chinese naval power wasvery impressive (Lo, 1955)was no coincidenceeither: this was a directresult of the nomadic incursions (Dars, 1992: 10). Since 1 126- 27 (the conquestof NorthChina by theJurchen) the "lastgood Asianpastures" were cut off from the Sung while the caravan routes throughCentral Asia became closed to them(Hall, Kenneth, 1985: 196).This forced the Chinese government to "compensatefor its ir- reversibleshortage of horsesby creating a powerfulnavy" (Smith, Paul,1991: 306). It was thusthe growing threat of nomadicincur- sionsthat encouragedthe Southern Sung to build a navyin order to man all waterwayswhich stood between them and theirnorthern competitors.This construction produced techniques and skills whichproved beneficial to the economy (Hall, John, 1985: 46; Dawson,1972: 164). Accordingto Gernet, it was because China was "blocked in its expan- sion to thenorth and north-west,[that] the Chinese world turned resolutelyto thesea and its centerof gravityshifted towards the maritimeregions of the south-east" (1982: 328). Thus,because of thegrowing threat of Chinand Mongolinva- sions,the Sung government was forced to first,stimulate trade for thesake of increasing its revenues to be ableto counterthe military danger,and secondly,expand its navy into a formidableforce (in orderto counterthe nomadic threat since the build up of a large cavalrywas no longeran option).This in turnhad a positiveimpact on maritimetrade (due to thelowering of protection and informa- tioncosts). It is probablybecause of stateintervention (through the con- structionof hugeships) that the Chinese ships had becomemuch largerthan their European or Arabcounterparts (Xiyu, 1991: 222). At thesame time, the combined prospering of theSouth and the nomadicwarfare in theNorth lead to an enormousinflux of mi-

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 408 EricMielants grantsfrom North to South(Shiba, 1970: 181),which in turnin- creasedthe demand for all kinds of commodities (Lippit, 1987: 39), and propelledtechnological innovations in thatarea (Jones,1988: 77). Thus,the enormous and unprecedentedmass migrations from northernto southernChina in thetwelfth and thirteenthcenturies can notbe separatedfrom the economic "boom" (agricultural spe- cialization,commercialization, increasing urbanization and industri- alization)in theSouth after 1127 (Dars, 1992: 35; Elvin,1973: 113- 79) and the subsequentincrease in maritimetrade (Ebrey, 1996: 141-44).8In thirteenth-centuryFujian, for instance, the regional economywas "transformedfrom a subsistenceeconomy based on thecultivation of riceand hempinto an export-orientedeconomy producingluxuries [as wellas] a rangeof finishedartisan goods, includingstoneware, porcelain, and metal"(Clark, 1995: 70). The regionbecome so commercializedthat rice had to be importedto Fujian "fromareas of surplusproduction, such as theJiangnan provincesof the Yangzi River valley and Guangdong"(Clark, 1995: 70). Essentially,it was "theSung combination of stateinvestment and greatermarket freedom that accounted for the releaseof productiveenergies" (Jones, 1988: 78) on an unprecedentedscale. Despitethe enormous profits merchants made during the Sung, theEmpire remained in firmcontrol of certain sectors of the econ- omy,as statemonopolies were imposed upon themost lucrative commodities:salt, alcoholic liquors, incense, and tea (Rossabi, 1970: 140-41).Profitable industries (such as thesilk industry) were con- trolledby the government (Shiba, 1970: 111), an entirelydifferent situationfrom the conditions in westernEurope. The Chinesegov- ernment"did not allow private enterprise to touchthese trades ex- ceptin areaswhere it could not itself supervise transport and distri- bution"(Gernet, 1962: 81). Nevertheless,"despite the competition fromthe state, private traders flourished during the 12th and 13th

8 Because of the massivemigration from northern to southernChina (related to nomadic incursionsin the North), the sudden increase of population in SouthernChina, where cultivablelands werelimited, had forcedpeople livingin thesoutheast coastal areas to participate in marinetrade to earn theirliving (Hui, 1995: 31). The populationgrowth in South China has been estimatedat 4 millionhouseholds in 750 ADand grewto 12 millionin 1290 ADwhile population in northernChina fellfrom 10.5 millionhouseholds in 1110 AD to below 1 millionin 1235 AD (Kracke, 1955: 480).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 409 centuries"(Gernet, 1962: 77). In addition, because of the decrease of transactioncosts (due to governmentalbuilding of canals,and securitywithin the realm), Sung China witnessed the formation of a nationalmarket (Elvin, 1996: 25), whichwas capableof achieving intensivegrowth (Curtin, 1984: 110). It is notan understatementto label theeleventh and twelfthcenturies the era of a Chinesecom- mercialrevolution (Fairbank, Reischauer & Craig,1973: 132; Elvin, 1978:79), which was based on a divisionof labor, regional specializa- tion,and overseastrade- and whichwas more impressivethan anythingin western Europe at thattime (Gernet, 1982: 320; Fu & Li, 1956:239). Indeed,the Imperial state itself, because of itswealth, can be consideredas a drivingforce behind much socioeconomic developmentas ittriggered demand, built roads and canals, printed papermoney, and implementeda policy of "strict currency control designedto prevent as faras possibleany flight of Chinese currency beyondthe confinesof the Empire"(Filesi, 1972: 9). The state "turneditself into a merchantand producer, by creating workshops and commercialenterprises run by civil servants and bysystemati- callydeveloping the state monopolies in orderto providefor the maintenanceof its armies" (Gernet, 1982: 323). Unlike Europe, the Imperialstate was capable of pacifyingthe national(internal) market,which in turnmade the increase of Chinese iron and steel productionpossible (Hartwell, 1966; Curtin, 1984: 110). During the Sung-not fornothing labeled "China'sgreatest age" (Fairbank, 1992: 88)9-"the production of ceramicsexperienced an unprece- dentedexpansion" (Gernet, 1982: 321); archeologicalstudies dem- onstratedthat large amounts of Chinese porcelain went all overthe IndianOcean, up to coastalEast Africa (Filesi, 1972). Moreimportantly, thebalance of long distance trade was unques- tionablyin China'sfavor (Lo, 1958:154). Its imports were (with the exceptionof textiles)mostly raw materials(horses, hides, gems, spices,medicines, and otherluxuries) (Deng, 1997b: 271) whileits exportswere (with the exception of minerals) mostly manufactured

9 "Thebest economic performance of the Song as measuredby per capita produc- tionwas probably not surpassed in Chinabefore the twentieth century" (Feuerwerker, 1992:765). Some scholars assert that the degree of economic expansion during the Ming dynastysurpassed the commercial revolution under the Sung (e.g., Zurndorfer, 1988: 154;see Dixin& Chengming,2000). Yet, the commercial expansion under the late Ming is beyondthe temporal scope of this article. In addition,it is notnecessary to elaborate on itin thecontext of the arguments presented here.

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 410 EricMielants commodities(porcelain, silk textiles, books, art objects, and iron and steelproducts) (Fairbank, Reischauer & Craig,1973: 136) butalso tea,lead, tin,and otherprecious metals (Balazs, 1972: 63; Deng, 1997b:272-73). Duringthe Sung, the biggest Chinese ships were probably550 tons(Xiyu, 1991: 218), and under the Yuan some grain carrierswere as bigas 1350tons (Deng, 1997b: 263). This is clearly muchlarger than in medievalwestern Europe.10 By theearly fif- teenthcentury the Chinese constructed ships of 2,000tons, much largerthan any European ones (Chang, 1974: 349). Thus, up to the mid-fifteenthcentury, China was technologicallyfar ahead of Eu- rope's maritimecapabilities (Chang, 1991b: 2 1).11 That the Sung governmentrelied on overseastrade resulted in the increaseof societalstatus of merchants from the twelfth century onward (Ma, 1971:125). Clark even goes as faras tospeak of an exceptional"cul- turaltransformation: thegrowing acceptance of merchants and mer- chantcareers among elite society" (1995: 71).12 But a majorproblem whichimpeded the transitiontowards a capitalistenvironment

10 Thirteenth-centuryHanseatic cogs generallyhad a loading capacityof ISO tons, whichby 1400 had increasedup to 300 tons (Schildhauer,1985: 149). 11 Schildhauerestimates that the entireHanseatic League could musterc. 1,000 vesselsin themid-fifteenth century, which represented a freightcapacity of c. 60,000 tons (1985: 150). When I referto Europe's technologicalinferiority in termsof naval power, thisdoes not implythat European city-statescould not constructhuge ships: 1000 ton nefswere used byVenice in theEastern Mediterranean in thebeginning of thethirteenth century(Hocquet, 1995: 549). But it was the multitudeof warshipsthat China could constructwhich was so impressive(Gernet, 1962: 72). Indeed, in 1257 the Sung mobil- ized in only threeprefectures 20,000 ships forwarfare against the Mongols (Lo, 1970: 171). In addition, some individual Chinese merchantsmust have been enormously wealthysince thewealthiest traders could own 80 or more sea-goingvessels (Shiba, 1970: 188; Deng, 1997b: 278), somethingunprecedented for thirteenth-centuryEurope. I thereforethink it is erroneous and Eurocentricto claim thatprivate businessmen in China were not capable of "accumulatingcapital on as large a scale as European entre- preneursmanaged to do in earlymodern times"(McNeill, 1992: 119). 12 Beforethe eleventh and twelfthcenturies* merchants had been excludedfrom elite circles; orthodox Confucianismhad designated them the least prestigi- ous membersof society.In a societyexperiencing soaring prosperity so clearly derivedfrom commerce, however, such stigmas were no longerviable and were increasinglyignored (Clark, 1995: 71). Clark's assessmentsare certainlycorrect, but mostlikely refer to the coastal provinces around Fukienand Kwantung,not thewhole of China (Ptak,1994: 42) since merchants continuedto be "legallyranked at thebottom of society"(Chang, 1994: 65; Kracke,1955: 485). Whatwas exceptionalwas thatunder the Sung thestate was so desperatefor revenue based on trade that "honoraryranks were awarded to merchantswho were especially successfulin promotingforeign trade and inducingforeign merchants to bring their wares to China" (Dawson, 1972: 166).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 4 11 whichwas clearly occurring under the Southern Sung (Ma, 1971: 86; Kirby,1954: 141), was the fact that impressive socioeconomic devel- opmentsdid not result in the growing political and military might of theChinese inside Eurasia.

CHINAAND THE MONGOLS

Theseimpressive patterns of socioeconomic growth did not pre- ventthe Mongol conquest of Chinain thelate thirteenthcentury (Davis,1996). The destructionthis brought about was enormous, es- peciallyin northernChina (Roberts, 1996: 171) and centralChina (Smith,1992: 670-72), but also in Persia(the Khwarazm Empire) (Marshall,1993: 53-57). Jones estimates that as manyas "35 million Chinesewere killed by the Mongols [or] one-third of the population in thethirteenth century . . . thedeath toll in China alone at thetime of theMongol conquest was so largethat it musthave obliterated economiclife over wide areas" (1988: 109-10).13The Mongolinva- sionof Sung China has also beenreferred to as a "crisisof capital- ism"(Jones, 1988: 110; Kirby, 1954: 153). Alan K. Smithgoes as far to claimthat "after the overthrow of the Sung dynasty by the invad- ingMongols in 1276,. . . thecountry was subjected to a devastating foreignrule [and] China never regained the dynamism of its past" (1991: 27-28). Buellconsidered the Mongol invasions as nothing morethan "an unparalleled disaster for the sedentary states and em- piressurrounding Mongolia" (1992: 2). Thus,it is quitecommon to blamethe Mongols for economic failures later on (Jones,1988: 1 13) while,though the initialonslaughts must have been devastating, theseshould not be exaggerated(e.g., Huang, 1989: 147). In any case,the Mongol conquest of Sung China can not be thesole reason whythe transition to capitalism did not occur, but one hasto takeit intoaccount as an importantvariable (Hartwell, 1962: 162; Gernet, 1962:18; Chase-Dunn& Hall,1997: 47).

13 AlthoughJones' s (1988) estimateis quite extreme,there is a consensusthat "the campaignsof ChinggisKhan and his successorsdown to the 1250's were murderousto a degree recenthistory can scarcelyequal" (Dreyer,1982: 14). Even to thirteenth-century contemporaries"the extent and frequencyof massacrescommitted by the Mongols were profoundlyshocking" (Phillips, 1998: 67).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 412 EricMielants

One ofthe key questions is therefore:who really benefitted from thePax Mongolicain thelong run? The Mongolrulers themselves certainlybenefitted from their military conquests in theshort run. Needlessto say, many merchants saw their protection costs decrease once theMongols established their rule (Rossabi, 1990: 356). But werethe Europeans in generalnot most "blessed" of all in thelong run?14Increasing amounts of knowledge,such as navigationtech- niquesand gunpowder, were passed on toEurope (Needham, 1995; Chou,1974: 1 15), and a subsequentlowering of protection costs for commerce,on whichthe city-states depended for their survival, was obtained.Even in termsof geopolitics the Europeans benefitted in theform of an indirectweakening of their Muslim enemies in Egypt. Alliancesbetween the Mongolsand Westernpowers against the Mamluksnever materialized (Boyle, 1977: xiii), but the Mongol wars againstthe Mamluks (Amitai-Preiss, 1999) certainly delayed the fall ofseveral Crusader outposts in the Eastern Mediterranean. The only Europeanswho did suffer substantially were the Russians whose ter- ritorieswere ravaged and whoseprincipalities were brought under tutelage.15 Becauseof the Pax Mongolica, which resulted in a rareperiod of politicalunity in CentralAsia (Adshead,1993: 78), an "uninter- ruptedflow of Europeantraders" (Ray, 1991: 83) butalso envoys, artisans,and missionaries, ventured safely into East Asia (Needham, 1954:188; Rossabi, 1997: 81). Yetduring the same period the main bruntof the Mongol campaigns directed towards Burma, Vietnam, Japan,Java, and CentralAsia (Dars, 1992:328-43), fell upon the Chinesepopulation (Dreyer, 1982: 14). In thepart of the Eurasian

14 In the shortrun mostlyTurkish Muslim and Uighurmerchants profited as they, more thanany other group, were used as tax-farmersin theMongolian Empire (Endicott- West, 1989: 146; Allsen, 1989: 116). But some westernEuropean merchantsalso bene- fittedin obtainingoffices under the Mongols (Richard, 1976: xxx) while otherspene- trateddeep into Asia and made significantprofits (Lopez, 1975: 83-186). Indirectly, Westernmerchants benefited tremendously from the Pax Mongolica "qui avaitcréé les circonstancespolitiques favorables à l'expansionéconomique des Occidentaux"(Nysta- zopoulou, 1973: 570; see Balard, 1992: 29). 5 The traditionalexplanation of the Mongols' sudden withdrawalfrom Europe in 1241-42 aftertheir successful engagements against European armies in Liegnitzand Sajo, is attributedto thedeath of the Grand Khan (Fletcher,1986: 47). Yet logisticaland geographical problems that plagued the Mongol armies in their failed attemptsto conquer Syria(Smith, 1998: 61-62) may also have been a variableto explain whythe Mongols did not renew any major offensivesin Europe (Sinor, 1972; Sinor, 1999: 20; Morgan, 1986: 141).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 413 landmasscontrolled by the Mongols, elaborate networks of "postal relaystations" were installed which insured rapid communication betweenvarious parts of the Mongolian Empire. These stations must have reducedcosts of manyforeign merchants as theyprovided safety,supplies, and lodgingfacilities (Rossabi, 1990: 354), but ulti- matelythe "maintenance of the stations was a heavyburden on the sedentarypopulace" (Allsen, 1983: 264), specificallyin northern China(Schurmann, 1967: 72). Moreover, itwas "western merchants" whoused thehorses of theofficial mail to furthertheir own com- mercialinterest, despite the fact that they were unauthorized to do so (Lopez, 1943: 172-73).16The increasedexploitation of the Chinesepeasantry under the Yuan coincided with a majorincrease of commerceacross the Eurasian landmass and a continuationof large-scalecommerce with southeast Asia (Ptak,1998). This is no coincidence:the increased levies exacted from the sedentary popula- tionby theMongol overlords "gave them a sizablesurplus to ex- changefor products, which they needed. This in turnstimulated craftsand manufacturing"(Schurmann, 1967: 5). Butof course this upturn,though stimulated by greater expenses of the nobility, by an initialgrowth of commerce due to the increasing economies of scale, and bya decreaseof protectioncosts and the "introductionof a nationwidesystem of paper currency which replaced the local cur- rencieswhich had beenin circulation"(Schurmann, 1967: 8) could not last.The intensifiedexploitation of thepeasantry augmented "thesurplus available for the Mongols and thus reinforced the basis forthe great expansion of commerce.However, since in thelong runneither agricultural production or productivityincreased, the materialbasis forcontinued commercial expansion was lacking" (Schurmann,1967: 8). For Chinathe Mongolheritage was quite negativein thelong run (Dawson, 1972: 209; Dars, 1992:46-48) sinceit was "not only a handicapto thefurther growth of the coun- try'seconomy, but also the cause of its regression" (Rodzinski, 1979: 184). Especiallythe fact that most of the trade was in thehands of foreignmerchants (Rodzinski, 1979: 185) and thatmost profits derivedfrom trade were taken out of China(Dars, 1992: 49), was quiteharmful. Thus, once again, for western Europe the "pacifica-

16 In addition,foreign merchants could easilymake up chargesof theftor robbery, thereby"defrauding the local population[since] by Mongolian law thelocals were made collectivelyresponsible for all goods lost by travelingmerchants" (Allsen, 1989: 99).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 414 EricMielants tion"of the Eurasian landmass implied nothing but benefits: because of increasingcontact with the East, it wouldcome to knowabout superiorEastern nautical technology17 (e.g., compasses), gunpowder (Ling,1947), printing (Chou, 1974: 115),and muchmore (Need- ham,1969: 213; Kuhn,1981: 52). In thelong run, the Mongols just squeezed too much out of their subjectsuntil they finally rose up in rebellion.18When the Mongol Yuan dynastywas finally driven out of Chinaby 1368,after seven- teenyears of bloody wars and uprisings (Mote, 1988), the victorious MingDynasty was preoccupiedwith maintaining its power.The Mongolthreat was alive and well under Tamerlane up tohis death in theearly fifteenth century, and with the Oyirat Mongols. Hence, the maininterest of the Chinese Emperor had to be focusedonce more on thesafety of the Middle Kingdom against nomadic invasions, and on thestabilization of the countryside since many peasants had suf- feredtremendously during the uprisings against Mongol rule (Mote, 1977: 197). The Mingdynasty thus no longerlooked upon naval poweras necessary;adequately defending the Great Wall had be- come importantonce more(Mote, 1999: 610-11). It is therefore ironicthat it was preciselythe early Ming dynasty that was behind the famousmaritime expeditions of ZhengHe thatcaught the attentionof so manyscholars (e.g., Ptak, 1996). Nevertheless, ithas to be emphasizedthat "the climax of theChinese sea- and ocean- activitiesoccurred in times,not in Ming"(Deng, going 19 Sung-Yuan 1997a:57). The natureand goalsof the short-lived expeditions by ZhengHe haveto be interpretedwithin the context of the resurgent ChineseEmpire.

17 This is demonstratedby the factthat in the earlyfifteenth century a flotillaof Zheng He was capable of making "a direct crossingfrom Sumatra to Mogadishu, a straightrun of 3,700 miles"(Morton, 1995: 128). 18 Di Cosmo claims thatthe Mongol government"was plagued by the proliferation of an extraordinarilywasteful administration ... the Mongols' attitudeto governance remained erraticand negligent"(1999: 34). 19 "The Ming court had no sustained interestin seafaring,no grasp of the possibilitiesof sea power.The Mingvoyages were not followedup but remainedisolated toursde force"(Fairbank, Reischauer & Craig, 1973: 199).

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MINGCHINA AND EUROPE:DIVERGENT PATHS

Althoughthe maritimevoyages by ZhengHe in the earlyfif- teenthcentury had an economiccomponent (Ju-kang, 1981), it was notso muchthe interest in tradeitself, or monopolisticrights (priv- ileges)in themarket place that dominated these voyages, but rather thepolitical component (international prestige) which was important (Wang,1970b: 375-401; Morton, 1995:128), in orderto makethe "barbaric"people, living on thefringe of the Middle Kingdom, fit in thetributary trade system (Abu-Lughod, 1989: 343).20 Indeed, sellingdesired products such as silk,porcelain and lacquer- wareto barbaric peoples was viewed by the Chinese as a mani- festdemonstration ofcultural superiority [as] Chinese culture itselfwas China's greatest commodity, while valued wares were testimonyto thatculture's excellence (Finlay, 1991: 6). Thus,the notions of diplomatic and culturalprestige- through the demonstrationofChinese wealth and power- were central to Zheng He's voyages(Dawson, 1972: 230).21 Not so forthe ships sent out by thepuny European city-states, which from the late Middle Ages on- ward,systematically designed and implementeda foreign policy of directconquest, political control, and commercialexploitation in

20 It is estimatedthat on Zheng He's voyagesan averageof 27,000 men traveledwith him on 60 large vessels (Chou, 1974: 127). This exceeded by far"anything Europeans were able to dispatchto thesame watersin thenext century" (McNeill, 1998: 229). Their terminationwas veryimportant since thesuccess of thePortuguese, and laterthe Dutch, in capturingvital emporiae and crucialstrategic locations throughout the Indian Ocean, was onlyfeasible because the huge Chinese vesselsno longerpatrolled the seas. In that sense, "China's abdicationwas Europe's gain" (McNeill, 1992: 113). When the Chinese naval power withdrew,the Portuguesehad a "clear technologicalsuperiority over all Asian competitors"(Ptak, 1999: VII, 105). The maritimesuperiority of the European powers, combined withtheir skillful exploitation of internalstrife among South Asian powers (Scammell, 1995: XI, 8), enabled the formerto reap enormous profitsin East Asia. Ironically,as Toussaintreminds us, "itwas theEuropean navigatorsfrom the other side of Africa,guided by the compass knownto the Chinese, and equipped witharms inventedby the Chinese" who were to establishtheir colonial thalassocraciesthroughout the Indian Ocean (1966: 79). 21 Especially Emperor Yung-lo,an early Ming usurper,felt the need to publicly demonstratethat the new dynastyhad obtainedthe Mandate of Heaven, and thetributes obtained fromdistant countries were centralin thisrespect (Chou, 1974: 128; Roberts, 1996: 185) whichexplains why "after his death themotivation of seekingrecognition no longer applied" (Roberts, 1996: 185-86). Moreover, the low returnof Zheng He's voyageseventually led to the abandonmentof the project(Deng, 1997b: 256).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 416 EricMielants order to ceaselesslyaccumulate capital from their peripheries (Mielants,2000: 254-55). The Chinese,however, thoughtin termsof ritual submission, ceremonial barter and formalrecognition as developedfor centuries in the context of a superior,powerful civilization condescending to a hostof distant,petty and relatively undeveloped principalities (Finlay, 1991:7). The Europeansof coursealso had notionsof religioussuperiority vis-à-visthe "infidels"they encountered, but in the Europeanin- tercity-statesystem- itself a productof the long-distance trade routes to theEast- territoriality was framed in thecontext of economic ex- ploitation(e.g., Balard, 1989). It is thereforestriking that the "the Mingexpeditions were not seeking territory toconquer or sea lanes to monopolize"(Finlay, 1991: 8) althoughthey could have easily done so (Mote,1999: 616). Thiswas in starkcontrast with the Eu- ropeanexperience where the Hanseatic city league fought wars with theDutch because it wanted to preserveits trade monopoly in the Baltic.The "pursuitof monopoly rent for its merchants" was central, ifnot almost its raison d'être (Spruyt, 1994: 123). The samewas true in theMediterranean, where city-states fought bloody wars for the monopolizationof traderoutes, markets, and themaintenance of "their"colonies (e.g., Balard, 1983; Budak, 1997: 166).22 The deathof a doge in Venicewould not have been able to re- versethis economic policy, given the situation of equally strong city- statescompeting for the access to theirlifelines to Easternmarkets. Yet,the death of EmperorYung-lo who initiated the naval expedi- tionsenabled the Confucianbureaucrats to cease furtherexpedi- tions(Wang, 1970a: 376). Onlyone moreexpedition, in 1433,took place,but when in 1435a childbecame Emperor,

22 It is truethat competition among merchantsinvolves "a need to eliminateothers, to winthe race forfavorable production factors-cheap labor, including women, children and slaves-and to increaseproductivity by enforcinglonger working hours and stricter supervision"(Sprengard, 1994: 17). But the usage of statelegislation and stateviolence to guaranteeand safeguardmonopolies is one of the mostprofitable practices, which is mostoften overlooked (Baratier, 1970: 338-39). Not surprisingly,Europeans were most successfulin Asia when theywere able to establishmonopolies (Wong, 1999: 228), and to achieve thisgovernmental support was crucial.

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the Confucianbureaucracy came to dominatepolicy even more,the Treasure-ships were allowed to deteriorateand the shipyardswere starved of labor. . . withina generation,the Chineselost the knowledge of howto buildTreasure-ships, and privateChinese vessels ceased venturingbeyond the straitsof Melaka (Finlay, 1991: 12).2S In theChinese Empire, merchants were not considered important enoughto be backedup bythe military power of the state, according toFairbank (1965: 51), because the Chinese state and its bureaucrats upheldthe agrarian sector at theexpense of the systematic develop- mentand supportof the merchants (see also Wong,2001: 28). The lattermay even be an understatement.As Needham pointed out: A pre-dominantlymercantile order of society could never arise in Chinesecivilization because the basic conceptionof the mandarinatewas opposed to the value-systemsof wealthy merchants.Capital accumulation there could indeed be, but the applicationof it in permanentlyproductive industrial enterpriseswas constantlyinhibited by the scholar-bureau- crats,as anyother social action which might threaten their supremacy.Thus, merchant guilds in Chinanever achieved anythingapproaching the status and power of merchant guilds ofthe city-states ofEuropean civilization (1969: 197; cf. South- all,1998: 149).24 Essentially,the military policy of theMing should be seen as a clearbreak with that of theSouthern Sung and theMongol Yuan, whichboth actively promoted maritime trade (Deng, 1997a;Hui, 1995:31-32; Ptak,1993: 8)-the Sung out of sheer necessity for its politicalsurvival, the Yuan fortheir military expeditions overseas againstJapan and Java.25 Indeed, by the mid-fifteenth century "the landlord-bureaucratfaction at theMing court was able to havethe

23 This had profoundconsequences in termsof theexisting balance of power:by the earlyseventeenth century Chinese junks wereno longera matchfor Dutch vessels, which contemporaryChinese considered"huge" fortheir standards (Chin-keong, 1997: 249). 24 The societalprestige of merchantscan be illustratedby the fact that from the Sung dynastyon merchantswere "still prohibitedfrom takingthe civil service examina- tions"(Ma, 1971: 125). This prohibitioncontinued until the Ming (Elman, 1991: 12). 25 The scale of these naval expeditionsis enormous:according to Xiyu,4,400 ships with140,000 soldiersinvaded Japan in 1281 (1991: 226).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 418 EricMielants operationsdiscontinued and the maritime activity severely curtailed" (Findlay,1992: 4). ZhengHe's maritimeexpeditions were thus exceptionalin thesense that, having expelled the Mongols, China wantedto reassert itself symbolically byuplifting its battered prestige throughthe entireregion (Xiyu, 1991: 226).26When thiswas achieved,there was little sense in pursuingthe matter, that is, from theperspective of theelite that was in charge(Wang, 1970a: 224- 25). "Thecosts of this expansion," notes Snooks, "far exceeded the benefits,and thereforeitwas brought to an end [as] Chinabecame increasinglyintrospective, isolationist, and relatively backward tech- nologically"(1996: 318). The lastis a definiteoverstatement: the ChineseEmpire was a formidablepower, certainly when compared to someof theweak emerging nation-states in Europe. Not thatit was able to conqueranything it wanted-thebloody battles which werevainly fought in Vietnam during the fifteenth century indicate thelimits of its strength (Lo, 1969b:60). Butthe main point is that the elite in charge,and especiallythe Confucianbureaucracy, stronglyopposed foreigninterventions (Mote, 1999: 615). Even whenmassive chain-migration from southern China (mainly Kwan- tungand Fukien)continued, the Chinese government did not offer the"overseas Chinese" any backing or protection, nor did there exist a politicaldesire to assistthe abandoned subjects of theCelestial Dynasty(Sun, 2001: 72; see also Hudson,1964: 354). Quite the contrary:after 1371 the Ming attempted to "reducethe size of the overseasChinese communities branded sea growing " [as it] private merchants'bandits,' 'thieves' (Hui, 1995:35) or "pirates"(Chang, 1991b:26).27 All Chinesewho wanted to buildships and venture overseasin pursuitof tradewere outlawed (Mote, 1999: 720). By 1410,the Imperial Chinese court even "requested a Javanese tribute missionto helpsend Chineseimmigrants back to China"(Chang, 1991b: 17). In contrast,European powers offered protection for

26 Rossabi goes as farto label ZhengHe's voyagesan "aberration"of Chinesehistory (1997: 79). Mote calls them"the greatanomaly" (1999: 616). 27 The illegal Chinese maritimediaspora and the extensivetrading network which reliedon it indicatesthat Chinese merchantswere very much prepared to takerisks and challenge governmentalauthority (Ptak, 1994: 36-37). It is thus unfairto state that Chinese commercialclasses "remainedso thoroughlysubject to an imperialbureaucracy as to inhibitlarge-scale independent enterprise on theirpart" (McNeill, 1992: 113).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 419 theirnationals, wherever they traded, and oftenused theirdistress as a pretextfor military intervention on theirbehalf.28 The logicalquestion is whatChina could gain from a policyof expansionto nearby surrounding tribes and kingdoms, all secondary in wealthand technologicalprowess. The Ming'sisolationist pol- icy-in1371 an Imperialedict banned overseas trade for private mer- chants-wasessentially a return to previous preoccupations with the nomadicthreats. The earlyMing dynasty, as it reinforcedroyal controlin the realm(Dardess, 1973: 169),expelled not onlythe Mongolsbut all otherforeigners as well(Phillips, 1998: 112).For- eigntraders did, of course, continue to travelthrough China, but it is importantto notethat the Chinese Empire reflected a different attitudetowards foreign merchants in itscountry during the Sung and Yuan dynastyon theone handand thesubsequent Ming and Ch'ingdynasties on theother (Lopez, 1943: 181). Butthe most important factor in terms of China's socioeconomic developmentis, in myopinion, the lack of adequatelybacking up Chinesemerchants with various forms of state support during both the Ming and Ch'ing dynastieswhen it was not permittedto "Chinesemerchants to travelabroad for trade [because] abroad the governmentcould not define normative or expectedbehavior pat- terns"(Mancall, 1968: 81). Bans were imposed against building ships and "a lot of merchantships were destroyed by the authorities" (Xiyu,1991: 226) sincethe early Ming "advocated a statemonopoly on foreigntrade instead of private foreign trade" (Xiyu, 1991: 226). Whileprivate maritime trade thus had to resortto illegal smuggling activities(Chang, 1991a), the Ming emperors "cut down on thecon- structionof warships and armaments.Along with the reduction of theprovincial fleets, large-size warships were gradually replaced by smallflat-bottom barges, which were inferior in construction" (Xiyu,

28 These practicesof territorialityas theywere used by European mercantilestates also find theirorigin in the intercitystate systemof the late Middle Ages, with the phenomenon of the bourgeoisiefouraine or buitenpoorterij.The city-statehad extra- territorialpowers beyond its proper walls in thesense thatits citizens who wereliving far away in the countrysidecould only be tried by urban magistrates.From the twelfth centuryon, thewell-to-do in thecountryside purchased city-state citizenship even ifthey neverlived there,precisely for all kindsof juridical and economic benefits.During the peak of the intercitystate systemin Europe (1250-400), many cities consistently implemented these extraterritorialprerogatives as instrumentsof their imperialist strategies(Uytven, 1982: 250-52; see also Fedalto, 1997).

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1991:227). Although in 1567the Ming government began to legalize someChinese civilian undertakings overseas (Chang, 1991a: 246), formost of the Mingdynasty, foreign trade remained outlawed (Huang,1969: 99; Lippit,1987: 39) andgovernment controls of laws on maritimetrade appeared to have been strictly enforced all along thecoastal areas (Ptak, 1999: III, 33; Demel,1994: 98; Chin-keong, 1997:224). Of course,because of China'simmense coastal littoral and the factthat an all-controlling,smoothly operating oriental despoticgovernment did not exist,the ban on seabornetrade appearedto be unenforceable,and thereforeillegal maritime trade continuedon a largescale (Deng, 1997b: 270). The main conclusion is notthat China was cut off from the world as ifit lowered an iron curtainover itselfor thatactual trade diminisheddramatically betweenChina and herneighbors, but that the exclusion policies: • deprivedthe government ofmuch revenue which might have beenobtained from imports and exports (Huang, 1969: 99); • seriouslyaffected the economy of the coastal provinces in a negativeway (Ts'ao, 1982:232);29 • madeit difficult for Chinese merchants and seamen to return homefor fear of punishment (Reid, 1999: 63); • limitedthe overall magnitude of maritime trade (Sun, 2000: 137);and moreimportantly • deprivedthe Chinese merchants of vital governmental sup- port(McNeill, 1998: 229). Thisis probablyrelated to thefact that, despite the growing pri- vate,illegal trade, Chinese merchants were from the mid-fifteenth centuryon largelyconfined to tradein theirown geopolitical back- yard,Southeast Asia, and ceasedto venturemuch further beyond thewest of Malacca (Ptak, 1999: V, 148).From now on, their com- mercialactivities were confined to a relativelysmall area of the globe (Hall, 1985: 197).This is in sharpcontrast with the previous Sung andYuan dynasties that actively supported their overseas merchants. Bothdynasties had implemented "policies to encourage oceangoing shippingand trade"(Xiyu, 1991: 218). The Sunghad builtware-

29 Withthe implementationof the exclusionpolicies under the Ming,a major port as Ch'uanchou "fellon eviltimes from which it never fully recovered. Though some trade was stillcarried on during the Ming and the Ch'ing, the cityas an internationalport declined" (Ma, 1971: 46; Clark, 1995: 73).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 421 housesfor merchants and lighthouseson thecoast (Dawson, 1972: 166),and providedvarious kinds of financial and technicalsupport toshipbuilders, who in return pledged military assistance with these shipsto the government when called upon (Lo, 1969c:68-91). Thus, commercialexpansion and stateprotection went successfully hand in hand.In addition,"the Mongolian nobility conducted a policyof 'financialaid and protection'to itsmerchants" (Schurmann, 1967: 6). Yet,after the defeat of theMongols in thelate fourteenth cen- tury,the Chinese (Ming) Imperial court did not need the merchants anymore.Moreover, the foreign merchants who had beenused by theMongols to collect taxes were now facing a backlashof xenopho- bia (Fairbank,Reischauer & Craig,1973: 178; Roberts, 1996: 175). Once again,the "withdrawal from the seas" was impossiblein Europewhere no centralauthority could impose such a measure upon merchants.This is nota matterof orientaldespotism. Many scholarshave statedover and overagain the importance of "the multiplicityof partly autonomous and competitivelocal economic powernetworks" (Mann, 1988: 18; Findlay,1992: 4, Chirot,1985: 183; Snooks,1996: 318) in orderto explainsocioeconomic and technologicaldevelopment in thelong run.30 Suffice it to saythat "politicalfragmentation was a necessary,not a sufficientcondition" (Hall, 1988:24) fora transitionto capitalismto occur.Pearson is convincedthat "the Chinese state, controlling a uniquely efficient ad- ministration,was able to enforce policies that did hinder innovation and economicchange" (1991: 68). Up to thispoint his statement is correct.This could not only be observedunder the Ming, but even duringthe socioeconomic"miracle" under the Sung dynasties

30 For Wong Europe (as a "conglomerationof smallunits with sometimes overlap- ping jurisdictions")and China (as a unifiedagrarian empire) are juxtaposed as two extremeswithin Eurasia (1997: 77). Holton for instance, notes that "capitalismof a modern kind developed ratherin the relativelydecentralized West, where political structureswere far from monolithic, allowing internal differentiation" (1986: 134). More importantis thatChina's impressiveand unprecedentedsocioeconomic (and cultural) developmentduring the Sung, coincided withthe exceptionalexistence of a multipolar politicalsystem (Snooks, 1996: 318; Modelski& Thompson, 1996: 151; Rossabi, 1983). Thus, it followsthat the commercialsuccesses of the Chinese Sung dynastywas an exceptionalperiod, "an episode ofextraordinariness, an epiphenomenonoutside China's mainstream"(Deng, 1999: 322). The SouthernSung was exceptionalin thesense thatthe imperialgovernment had to take revenuesfrom maritime trade seriously.In contrast, "for most of imperialhistory, the state's principalsource of revenue was land taxes" (Wong, 1997: 90).

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(Smith,1991: 308-12). However,as theChinese record indicates, therewas not only at timestoo much state power- as oftenhas been asserted-but too little!European city-states and emergingnation- stateswere fully backing up theirtraders with as muchpower as possible.Venice, for example, was a "commercialrepublic that sys- tematicallyused statepower, not merely to increasestate income, butalso to increase the income of the Venetian merchants as a socio- economicclass" (Curtin, 1984: 116). For ideal-typical city-states such as Genoaand Venice, "commerce and coercion were closely linked, if not inseparable"(Curtin, 1984: 116). In generalthe peaceful natureof Asian trade in theIndian Ocean prior to thearrival of the Portugueseand theDutch stood in sharpcontrast to theaggressive policiesof the latter (Lewis, 1978: VII, 264; Curtin, 1984: 128).31 The factthat in EastAsia thestate machinery of governmentitself was notcontrolled- or heavilyinfluenced- by merchants (Wang, 1990: 401-02; Pearson,1991: 76) had far-reachingconsequences in the longrun. While in Europemerchant-controlled governments pre- paredthe way for a systemof capitalismbased on commercialim-

31One should not idealize the nonviolentChinese maritimeventures in the Indian Ocean, since theyclearly did have an intimidatorycomponent to them(Wade, 1997: 154-56) and violencewas afterall occasionallyused by Zheng He's forces.But thisdoes not imply that the Chinese in the Indian Ocean were operating identicallyto the Europeans. Needham illustratesthis well: in dominating no principality,in settingup no fortsor bases, in treating peaceablyby and largewith all thepeoples amongwhom they came, theChinese were clearlythe inheritorsof, and participatorsin, a millenarytradition, which was brokenonly by the irruption of European capitalistimperialism in theAsian seas (1970b: 214). Because the revenuesof maritimelong distance trade were crucial to Europe's com- petingmercantile city-states and nation-states(Thompson, 1999:177), it was self-evident thatonce theypenetrated Asian watersthey "built fortresses and setup maritimetrading networksto claimwhole kingdoms, [while attempting] to excludeunwanted competitors fromaccess to overseasresources" (Sprengard, 1994: 8). Thus, thecolonization policies pursued by Europeans fromthe fourteenthcentury in the Mediterraneanup to the "scramble for Africa"in the late nineteenthcentury were essentiallypart of the same process, as internalEuropean competitionfueled the ongoinggeographical expansion of European monopolisticcontrol over scarce resourcesand key strategiclocations to these resources(cf. Sprengard,1994: 10). Essentially,prior to the arrivalof Europeans in the Indian Ocean in the sixteenthand seventeenthcenturies, the Asian seas could be called a "mareliberum" (Ptak, 1994: 36), and because of therelative lack of monopolies based on violence, most commercialties "were built upon a mutuallybeneficial and flexibleframework of 'tributeand trade' thatallowed participantsfrom either side to interpretthe nature of theirrelations in differentways to suittheir own purpose" (Chin- keong, 1997: 212).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 423 perialism,32this did not occurin China(Fairbank, Reischauer & Craig,1973: 195). On thecontrary, the economic growth and the monetarizationof theentire Southeast Asian region, from South Chinato East India,was embeddedin a interregionaldivision of laborwhich was "determinedmore by geographic and ecological considerationsthan by politicalor organizationaldesiderata" (Lieberman,1990: 86). Notbecause East Asians were fundamentally less proneto accumulatewealth, far from it, but, as Abu-Lughod pointedout, "unlike their European counterparts, [Chinese mer- chants]could not use thestate to advance their interests" (1989: 340) and thusforcefully impose upon theregion a highlyexploitative capitalistsystem. This is a veryimportant statement, yet she does not elaborateon thiscrucial factor. Was it a matterof Chinese ideology (Southall,1998: 155), culture, or religion? I think this is unlikely.33 In orderto explain why the Chinese Empire could give up itsinterest in maritimeforeign trade when it wanted to, and pretty much abandon Chinesemerchants, instark contrast to Europe, we have to compare Chinesecities with the Europeancity-state system, in whichthe oligarchyof merchant-entrepreneurs wielded significant power. Despitethe fact that Europe was notmore urbanized and not morecommercialized than China and that"the Asian economy and intra-Asiantrade continued on vastlygreater scales than European tradeand its incursionsin Asia" (Frank,1998: 184),the political power of the merchant-entrepreneurvis-à-vis the monarchwas entirelydifferent: Edward III could neverhave financed his war againstFrance without the support of the conditional financial aid of Italianbusinessmen; nor could Charles V everhad become Emperor withoutthe criticalsupport of Germanbankers. If international bankerswere vital to anyimportant military campaign a European monarchwanted to undertake,from the Middle Ages to the six- teenthcentury on (Brady,1991: 145; McNeill, 1992: 1 19), even more importantwere his citizenswho weretaxed. In mostplaces, this

32 In seventeenth-centuryEngland, for instance,"the central governmentcame increasinglyunder the dominance of the mercantileelite and itsassociated groupswho establisheda parliamentaryregime advancingtheir specific interests" (Baumgartner, Buckley& Burns 1976: 59). See also Rodinson (1970: 32). 33 1agree withElvin that "the attribution of virtually unchanging cultural characteris- ticsas the keyto discriminatingbetween China and Europe as regardspatterns of long- termeconomic growthmust be ruled out" (1988: 103).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 424 EricMielants taxingwas scrutinizedby local estates and assemblies34or city- leagues in whichthe merchant-entrepreneurial class wielded signifi- cant political-and even military-power. This was not the case in China: peasant revoltscould overturna dynasty,but the merchant class could not challengethe gentry's authority, let alone the Impe- rial one. Why?Because in China,unlike Europe, merchantscould notcarve out an institutionalniche which secured long-term political power.This was essentialfor the preservation of theirriches which had been obtained in theirquest for a ceaseless accumulationof capital.A crucialinstitutional niche is preciselythe city-state.35As Deng admits: the merchantclass was activelyinvolved in the establishment of European cities,while in China citieswere built by the authorities[so] China did not have a historyof city-states [whichwas] one of the main reasonsthat China did not pro- duce an independentbourgeoisie class (1999: 199). Althoughone shouldabandon theideal-type that Chinese cities were more politicalthan commercial, a largeChinese town generally was dominatedby officials who representedthe imperial gov- ernment,particularly insofar as judicial and fiscalmatters were concernedand (unlikeour towns)it did not embodythe idea of emancipationand of liberty(Balazs, 1969: 16). Fromthe Sung onwards,wealth, political power, and socialstatus in the Chinese Empirebecame virtuallysynonymous with the gentry, whereasin Europe the merchantclass was able to forgea coalition withthe monarchyagainst the landlordclass (Feuerwerker,1984: 301-16).

34 Fossier (1991: 335-36). For an overviewof "medieval constitutionalism,"see Marongiu(1968). 35 Everypowerful landlord in Eurasia was at some pointin debt to merchantsin his realm.Even the Mongol princes"incurred enormous debts to merchant-moneylenders" (Endicott-West,1989: 128). But mypoint is thatmerchants, with the exceptionof those in westernEurope, never had sufficientpolitical and militarypower to punish their borrower in case he wanted to default on the repaymentof his debt or engage in practicesof "confiscatorytaxation" (McNeill, 1992: 120) or "underhandexpropriation" (Epstein, 1997: 169). Thus, the urban-basedmerchant entrepreneur not onlyheld the European nobilityat itsfinancial mercy, but throughloans and pay advances"which tied workersto employersas much as peasants to landlordsby rigidbonds of povertyand debt,"kept controlover the workingpopulation in the citiesas well (Jones,1997: 251).

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It mayvery well be thecase thatin China"the advent of a city bourgeoisiecreated its own culture" (Shiba, 1975: 42), thaturban- basedmerchants and artisans constituted "the majority of the inhab- itants"(Shiba, 1970: 127; Lippit, 1987: 36) and thatforms of urban identitycame into existence in theMing period (Zurndorfer, 1983: 308-09),but crucial is that"unlike the guilds of medieval Europe, thehang [guilds] in Chinawere never very strong politically in the citiesand they were always under the control of the state" (Ma, 1971: 83).As a consequence,"the Chinese merchant guilds never achieved anythingapproaching the status and powerof the merchant guilds of thecity-states of Europeancivilization" (Needham, 1969: 197). Keyaoclearly spells out the consequences: becausethe [western] medieval town existed and actedas a politicalindependent entity, itreared its citizen. The burgher, as a socialgroup, played the role that Chinese town people did not . . . the craftsmenand merchantsin Chinawere weak strata,depended on themonarchy and werecontrolled by it (1992:66-67). In otherwords, despite China's advance on Europethroughout the MiddleAges, in thelong run the Imperial "centralized autocratic sy- stemexerted a negativeinfluence on historicaldevelopment" (Gan- quan,1992: 82). The notions Stadtluft machtfrei, burgerliche Rechtssich- erheit,or FrètesEigentum which were intrinsically interlinked with Westernurban institutions and subsequentcapitalist development, werecompletely alien to China(Schurmann, 1956: 516; Needham, 1969:185). Medieval Chinese towns, of gigantic size, in comparison to Europe,also dominatedtheir countryside socioeconomically (Ganquan,1992: 81). Yet,they did not foster the rise of a politically independentmerchant-entrepreneurial bourgeoisie (Wong, 1999: 221; Maddison,1998: 22)36 since they "were agencies of imperial powerand were very tightly controlled by the imperial court" (Shih, 2001: 32).37This lack of urban autonomywas to a certain

36 As Day puts it, "the spread of the marketeconomy should not be confusedwith the rise of capitalism,as the example of China- a countrywith an organized market networkbut withouta capitalistbourgeoisie- testifies" (1999: 113-14). 37 It is thereforelogical that urban identityand the importantlegal notion of citizenshipwas much strongerin westernEurope (see Boone & Stabel,2000).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 426 EricMielants extentalso apparentin CentralAsia withits majestic cities such as Samarkandor Bukhara(Ashrafyan, 1998: 340). It is thereforeimportant to emphasizewhether a merchantelite was in fullpolitical, economical, and militarycontrol of the (city) state,38capable of implementingimportant structural strategies of conquestsand reinvestmentsin respectivelythe political-military and commercialrealm withoutworrying too much about "extraeco- nomic coercion"and the impositionof variouskinds of tariffsand taxesby overlords, emperors, or evena ruralaristocracy which could limitits power. In China, however,city-states were totallyabsent (Needham, 1969: 185).39 When the Ming finallyreconquered China fromthe Mongols, China's focusshifted again towardsthe North, away from the South (and the maritimetrade that was associated with it). Afterall, throughoutmost of its existence, the Chinese Empire- in contrastto the various puny city-statesin Europe-drew most of its revenue fromthe taxationof land, and its economy-again unlikethe city- statesin Europe- was "basicallyself-sufficient" (Findlay, 1992: 159). The Chinese state thereforehad no intrinsicneed to supportits merchantsas did European city-statesand nation-states.40

38 1 tend to agree withPearson who assertsthat "controllers of smallpolitical units typicallyhave to takemuch more interest,for better or worse,in overseastrade than do rulerswith large peasant populationsthat can be taxed relativelyeasily" (1991: 69). This is again exemplifiedby the comparisonbetween China and Europe: "in contrastto the Chinese state's success with agriculturalrevenues, many European states could not extractmuch revenuefrom the land" (Wong, 1997: 134). 39 K'aifeng, the Northern Sung capital, was an enormous city. But it was the administrativeand politicalcenter of the Empire,and thussomewhat comparable with Constantinoplein the same century.It was absolutelynot a city-state.The citizensof K'aifeng"had no independentcity government as theirorgan of expression,and their guildswere subject to governmentsupervision" (Kracke, 1975: 53). This was also thecase in othercities:

unlikethe craftsmen in medievalcities in Europe, Chineseartisans never formed a viable economic force in the citybecause the most skillfulcraftsmen were forced to serve the governmentand its bureaucrats. . . virtuallyall lucrative businesseshad alreadybeen monopolizedby the state. Heavy taxation and other extortivepractices spared no one but the scholar-official,resulting in extremely scarcecapital for people to investin industrialor commercialventures (Ma, 1971: 137). Accordingto Elvin"cities played a limitedrole in pre-modernChinese politicalhistory [due to] themaintenance of a continuouscentralized imperial authority and theabsence of politicalfragmentation" (1978: 85). 40 Chinese coastal regionswere alwaysaffected by maritimetrade, but ifone looks

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Once the externalnomadic dangers had somewhatsubsided, merchantslost the relative importance they had enjoyedbefore the Mingdynasty came to power (Schurmann, 1967: 7). Underthe Ming and subsequentCh'ing dynasty, foreign trade became a "potential threatto thepolitical order and, given the size of Chinaand the extentof its domestictrade, [the government] felt little need to acquirethings unavailable domestically" (Lippit, 1987: 43). The Chineseimperial state, which continued to control"large-scale finance,production and muchforeign trade while the war-driven Europeanstate system allowed, enabled and required those activities to be controlledby privatepersons, thus producing capitalism" essentiallybrought about a situationin which"commercialization withoutcapitalism" occurred (Marks, 1997: 12). Since Chinese merchantscould not (unlike some of their European counterparts) controlthe state to use itfor their own goals- since it rather was the otherway around (Wong, 1983: 248-51)- Chinese merchants were facedwith an Imperialstate which acted more often as an annoying competitorin themarketplace than as a usefultool to furthertheir owncommercial interests (Dawson, 1972: 236).41 Moreover, whenever at China as a whole,its foreigntrade (with the exceptionof the SouthernSung period) "stillweighed insignificantlywith reference to the nation's total economy which was basicallyself-sufficient" (Chang, 1974: 357). 41 Lane spelled out the consequences of this policy: "merchantswho gained protectionrents frominternational trade and colonization,"had an advantage over others(1958: 418). In theentire history of thecapitalist world-economy, one of themain concernsof merchants in theirquest to ceaselesslyaccumulate capital is how to construct and maintaina systemwhich enables themto achieve"lower profits for governments and higherprofits for trading enterprises" (Lane, 1958: 413). In otherwords, the "maximiza- tionof corporatecapital and theminimization of corporaterisks and costs"(Sprengard, 1994: 17), are intrinsicallyinterlinked with how merchantentrepreneurs can use (or should I sayabuse) thestate to theirown advantage.As long as thePax Mongolica(which decreased protection,information, and transportationcosts) lasted, archivalsources clearlyindicate that most European merchantshad littleinterest to circumnavigateAfrica to get access to the wealthof Asia (Richard, 1970: 363). Yet when the Pax Mongolica broke down as the Il-KhanidEmpire disintegrated after the mid 1330's (Kwanten,1979: 244-46), the Chagatay Khanate split apart in the 1340's (Forbes Manz, 1983), and Mongolcontrol over China was deterioratingafter the 1330's, European merchants,once marketshad recoveredafter the initial onslaught of theblack plague,pursued a strategy to use their respectivecity-states and nation-statesto gain access to (and eventually conquer) the East (Sprengard,1994: 14). In contrast,the Chinese stateunder the Ming not onlydid not decrease costsfor its merchants, but actuallyeven increasedthem: since maritimetrade was illegal fromthe Ming dynastyonward (Wiethoff,1963), Chinese traders"could hardlydo withouta minimumof bribery"(Ptak, 1994: 41; McNeill,1982: 47). This is veryimportant since in the Early Modern Period "the most significant expenses of the long-distancetrader were transportationand protectioncosts" ( Allsen,

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 428 EricMielants politicaland military expansion of the Chinese Empire occurred, the incorporationof 'newfrontiers committed the government toa shift ofresources to theperipheries, not extraction from them" (Wong, 1997:148) as wasthe case in theEuropean mercantilist tradition of city-statesand nation-states(Mielants, 2000). Lastbut not least, one ofthe reasons why the Chinese were not capableof systematically developing, pursuing, and implementing a strategyof socioeconomic subordination, colonization, and exploita- tionvis-à-vis the non-Chinese, is the incessant warfare which drained theresources of the Empire, and made China the target of immense and continuousdestruction, forcing Chinese military activity to be "directedat defense rather than conquest" (Snooks, 1996: 320). This incessantwarfare- along the frontiers but even at timesin China itself-was generated by two crucial variables, which were hardly at play in Europe: the devastationand warfarebrought about by nomads(of whichthe Huns, Kitans,Uighurs, Jurchen, Tanguts Xixia,and the Mongolsare onlythe mostrenowned) for whom "Chinawas nearlyalways a target"(Reynolds, 1961: 364; Wang, 1970a:222) on theone hand,42and incessantpeasant uprisings on the other.The listof massivepeasant rebellions in Medievaland EarlyModern China is enormous (Deng, 1999: 363-76) compared to the relativelyfew uprisings in MedievalEurope. The latteris of courserelated to theoverall weakness of the West-European nobil- ity.The strongChinese state, however, provoked systematic armed rebellionsfrom its peasants who were subjected to heavytaxation, andthe vast political and military turmoil which ensued also contrib- utedto a strugglein whichmerchants could not play a significant politicalrole.

1989:97). In addition,"the lack of a reliablecommercial code andjustice in thecourt deprivedmerchants of legal protection for their enterprises" (Chang, 1994: 66; Maddi- son,1998: 14). This is againin contrast with the existent practices within the European city-states(North, 1991: 24-25). 42 McNeillclaims that in theearly fifteenth century a directlink exists between nomadicwarfare and theend ofChinese maritime activities in theIndian Ocean: Chineseimperial authorities prohibited sea voyagingon the groundthat it divertedvaluable resources from the more urgent tasks of land defense against a threateningnomad power across the northwest frontier (1992: 111). Linckconfirms this: "the Ming dynasty's self-imposed isolation occurred under the trau- maticimpact of Mongolian foreign rule and continuedMongolian harassments" (1992: 111).

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Repressionof peasantrebellions in itselfwas of coursenot an intelligentpolicy, since the peasant uprisings themselves could be interpretedthat the mandate of heaven would have been removed fromthe ruling dynasty. The concernof mitigating the possibilities ofpeasant uprisings was therefore a very serious matter: canals were builtand large scale commerce of foodstuffs was encouraged by the authoritiesto prevent famines and subsequent social unrest (Wong, 1983:248).43 Braudel once claimed that "the Chinese state showed constanthostility to thespread of capitalism" due toits "totalitarian control"(1977: 72). This statement has to be modified.The Chinese statewas not totalitarianin anymodern use of theword. What is crucialis that Chinese governmental officials "supported commercial exchangewithout promoting concentrations of merchantwealth" (Wong,1997: 137). It is thereforenonsense to claim that "the rulers ofMing China differed from almost all their west European counter- partsin that they positively discouraged economic growth" (Bonney, 1995: 3), or that"the role of the statein Chinaoverall was not positivewhen it comesto theactual stimulating and facilitatingof economicgrowth" (Vries, 2001: 418), since throughouthistory Chinesestate support for a marketeconomy and economicgrowth wasquite successful within the empire. This policy was, however, not synonymouswith the approval of "concentrations ofwealth through marketmanipulation" (Wong, 1999: 225). Essentially,the Chinese state"supported the principles of marketexchange and soughtto protectbuyers from monopoly power" (Wong, 1997: 139), thus resistingthe merchants' desires to accumulate wealth at the expense of others(Wong, 1983: 251) as theywere able to do in Europe.44

™ The policy of preventingpeasant uproars (while exploitingthem as much as possible) was thecentral preoccupation of anyChinese administration,since a failureto do so could (and regularlydid) resultin massivepeasant uprisingswhich might over- throwthe dynasty.Moreover, a close examinationof the Imperialbureaucratic system reveals thatsince the lower classes (i.e., peasants) "were able to be representedat all levelsof the bureaucracy"(Deng, 1999: 67), it is logical thatthe Confucianbureaucrats allied themselveswith the peasants in an antimerchantcoalition (Deng, 1999: 199). Furthermore,Chinese agriculturaldevelopment was highlysuccessful, and therefore "increasedland revenuesmade incomefrom other sectors of theeconomy less necessary, [which]reinforced Confucian prejudices in favorof agriculture"(Dreyer, 1982: 243). In the Chinese statethe gentrywas alwaysconsiderably more powerfulthan the merchantelite and thishad a considerableimpact on theway merchants were regarded throughoutsociety. For theChinese state "enrichment of merchants was viewedas having been achievedat theexpense of peasantwelfare and governmentrevenue" (Deng, 1999: 96). "Success in trade,industry, finance, science, and technology,which has forcenturies

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"The potentiallydisruptive consequences of both concentrated wealthand thepursuit of suchwealth" (Wong, 1997: 146) which cannotbe separatedfrom the construction ofa capitalistsociety, was successfullyopposed in Chinaby the ruling strata.45

CONCLUSIONS

It maywell be the case thattwentieth-century modernization theorylooks upon theorigins of the modern capitalist world-econ- omyas a "naturaloutcome" of economicprocesses and although economistshave oftenignored coercion and fraudas beingem- piricallyimportant elements in understandingeconomic success in history(Findlay, 1992: 159; Lane, 1958: 402), as partof their attempt at graspingthe preconditionsof recurringgrowth, the historical realityof capitalism proves otherwise (Day, 1999: 1 14). And political powerfor a wealthymerchant class, an urban-basedbourgeoisie, was a sine qua non forthe creationand maintenanceof a capitalist system.46 Of course,the length of urban networks, the flow-of-goods, the divisionof laborin cities,or thesize of citiesis notunique to Eu- rope. Surelynone of thiscan comparein size to the greatnon- Europeancivilizations. I tend to agree with Stavrianos's assessments that WesternEuropean cities were insignificant in medieval times comparedto thoseof China or India,both in populationand in volumeof trade.But theywere quite unique because of theirgrowing autonomy and politicalpower ... as thebur-

been socially esteemed in the west, was viewed in traditionalChina as a secondary achievement"(Ho, 1962: 259). Similarstatements were made byAbu-Lughod (1989: 332) and Needham (1969: 202). 45 Maddison praises the Chinese bureaucracy for its "verypositive impact on agriculture"and refersto theirhostility towards merchants, but does not elaborate on the link(1998: 23). 46 The existenceof "Chinesecapitalists" (e.g., McNeill,1982: 45) does not necessarily implythe successfulcreation of an endurablecapitalist system in the long run (Gottlieb, 1984: 16). Similarly,the factthat up to the nineteenthcentury larger cities were located outside Europe thanin it(e.g., Baghdad or Beijing)does ofcourse not implythat Europe "remainedinferior and peripheralto thelarge empires of theNear East and China until the late eighteenthcentury" (Chase-Dunn & Grimes,1995: 395).

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ghers/citizensacquired power and financial resources, towns- peoplecould usually get the king to givethem a royalcharter licensingthem to unitein a singlecommune. The commune had the rightto act as a corporation;to makeagreements underits corporate seal; to have its own town hall, court of law [withits election systems] and dependentterritory outside its walls(1999: 233). Ifa serfescaped and livedin a cityfor a yearand a daywithout beingapprehended, he becamefree (free to becomeexploited by the merchantentrepreneurs within the city,of course);and this possibilityaltered the structure of western European society (Riet- bergen,1998: 133) because that it undermined the historical cycle of tributaryextortion which had been primarilybased on extra- economiccoercive practices of the nobility. In addition,many peasants could, from the twelfthcentury onward,reduce, or evenabolish their services on thelord's land by payinga fixedsum to thelord (Cherubini, 1990: 124-25)47 which in thelong run made him even more vulnerable because of inflation (Bozorgnia,1998), and thusmore dependent on thefortune of the successfulurban-based merchant class. No wonderthe "noblesse de robe"dates from the fourteenth century (e.g., Crouzet-Pavan, 1997: 16;Blockmans, 1983: 68). Bythe early fourteenth century, a political structurewithin Europe had unfoldedin thelarger cities, "within whichthe legislative and executiverights that had been grudgingly grantedwere concentrated in thehands of mercantile elite" (Holt & Rosser,1990: 8). Ultimatelythis political structure of European city-states created thebackbone for political representation ofthe urban elite in "na- tional"consultative assemblies (parliaments) also knownas Estates, thatcame into existence all overthe continent (Rietbergen, 1998: 135-36;Smith, Alan K., 1991:61-62). Thisstrengthened the bar-

47 In China it was the otherway around. In theYuan dynasty,"the actual rentwas calculatedin percentagesof thecrop yieldrather than in absoluteamounts- a condition hardlyconducive to increasedproduction" (Schurmann, 1967: 26). In addition,since wet- rice agriculturalproductivity in China was much higherthan in drygrain producing Europe, it is likelythat this coincided withhigher levels of surplusextraction in China (Palat & Wallerstein,1999: 25). This maybe anotherexplanatory variable of the reason why the Chinese state and the Chinese nobilityin the Ming period did not pursue revenuesfrom maritime overseas trade (and conquests) as in Europe.

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 432 EricMielants gainingpower of its(urban-based) merchant bourgeoisie. In con- trast,as Rodzinksipointed out, the Chinese"political and social structuredid notfavor the development of capitalism" (1979: 162). In myopinion it was precisely the relative poverty of theEuro- peannobility (vis-à-vis the Chinese gentry), geographically located at the"fringe" of the Eurasian landmass, which restricted their political powerin thesense that their call on creditand financiers was struc- turallyunavoidable. Being militarily incapable of buildinga large empire(as in theChinese case), the "most common and benefitting thingto do fora prince,when in needof cash, was to borrowfrom histowns or burghers/citizens"(Uytven, 1996: 220), which in turn resultedin theweakening of his political power in thelong run, as chartersand concessions had to be givenin return for financial (and at timeseven political or military)support from the urban-based elitesin charge of their city-state (Blanks, 1998: 188).48 The latter was oftenconditional: ever more juridical autonomy in theforms of all kindof privileges became a quidpro quo forincreasing taxes (Bene- volo,1993: 60).49 In addition,the nobility's continuous wars of attri- tion(partly generated by the long-term decline of the feudal system) facilitatedthe bourgeoisie's increase of power, as city-statesbecame criticalagents in theexisting European balance of power(Block- mans,1983). One shouldavoid constructing a new imagery of non-European orientaldespotisms vs. Europeanfree market oriented and demo- craticurban based communities(Soullière, 1984; Sivers, 1993). It seemsunlikely that the European nobility as a wholewas less des- poticthan the non-European one.50 Yet theextreme diffusion of

48 One should not onlythink of the city-statesin the Low Countriesor in northern Italy,or in the variousurban leagues in the Holy Roman Empire,but also of a citysuch as thirteenth-centuryMontpellier: the overlord king "Peter II of Aragon owed the burghersenormous sums of moneyin exchangefor which he leftthem free to run their own affairs"(Caille, 1998: 68). As Rosenberg and Birdzell point out, "the common etymologyof burgherand bourgeois suggeststhe intimateassociation between urban- ization and a lateremergent capitalism" (1986: 50). 9 Because of theirrelative weakness, the European nobilityoften had to tolerateand legitimatethe monopoly activities of thewealthiest merchants, which is in starkcontrast withChina (Wong, 1997: 127-33). 50 Chang emphasizes the predatorynature of the Chinese state which meant merchantscould not continuetheir successful accumulation of capitalbeyond a certain point, since the state would "milkit away" fromthem, thus inhibitingthe growthof capitalism(1994: 68-73). Wheneverthey got away withit, the European nobilityalso attempted to confiscatemercantile wealth or default on their loans to them (e.g.,

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 433 powerin Europe51 can be interpretedas an importantvariable in the sense thatit was itsweakness (any major Asian army could have easilybeaten any European army, which is whathappened at the invasionof the Mongols) but also itsstrength: as Stavrianos(1999) and Findlay(1992) pointout, no Emperorcould have ordered the withdrawalof theIberian vessels out of theocean forthe sake of ImperialPolicy. The elitesin chargeof thecity-state system were capableof constructing and implementingstrategies that furthered theceaseless accumulation of capital (with subsequent reinvestments intheir companies), because of the nobility's weakness, division, and lackof power to adequately(re)generate tributary extortion.52 The exploitationof the population external and internal to thecity-state by its merchantelite was necessaryto feedthe city and to trade commoditieswith the East, which makes the trade connections so important. Throughoutmost of the thirteenth and early fourteenth century, thedivision of laborin theEuropean cities and theircountryside continuedto expand.Specialization in guildsincreased unabatedly.

Emperor CharlesV). AlthoughI mustagree withPomeranz that"it is unclearwhether big merchantsactually suffered more expropriationsthan their European counterparts" (2000: 169), itseems thatbecause ofa differentinstitutional structure in westernEurope, the European gentrycould do less damage than theirAsian counterparts:some cities "possessed privilegesstating that the property of theircitizens could not be confiscated" (Dumolyn,2000: 519). In addition,Chang makesthe same case forthe Chinese extended family(as opposed to the Westernnuclear family)which would have drained precious revenuesfrom the merchant (1994). But one could easilyreverse the argument and sum up the advantagesof extended familyhouseholds. FranklyI thinkit is impossible to assess the impactof individualisticor collectivisticcultural values on differentsocieties in the long run. But one should not forgetthat excessive spending on nonmercantile activitiesalso occurredon a large scale in Europe. Not thatthere existed anything like the betrayalof the bourgeoisie phenomenon,but the emulationof Chang's "parasitic rent-seekingliterati by the merchantclass" (1994: 71-72) is similarto the emulationof the Saint-Simonianparasitic rent-seeking nobility by the European merchantclass (cf. Pomeranz,2000: 170-71). It appears thatin everysociety merchants just had to invest resourcesin whatBourdieu aptlycoined "social and culturalcapital." 51 In thistext I emphasizethe powerful institutional space carvedout bymerchants, but in medieval Europe the Church was at least as powerful.This was also in sharp contrastwith China. As Adshead points out, in PlantagenetEngland "15,000 monks owned between a quarterand a thirdof the lands, rentsand dues of England [while] under the T'ang 350,000 monksowned only4% of the cultivatedarea of China" (1995: 57). Thus, the Churchwas also an institutionalforce that prevented the construction of an Empire such as in China (Spruyt,1994). 52 It is thusnonsensical to claim,as Frankdoes, thata distinctionbetween a world systemand a worldempire would be useless or irrelevant(1998: 335).

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Yetis ita coincidencethat these phenomena occurred at thetime of thePax Mongolicaover the Eurasian landmass (1250-1350)? The substantialdecrease of transactioncosts and protectioncosts re- sultedin an unprecedentedexpansion of themarket for western Europeancity-states, which in turn-as evermore Italian merchants venturedsafely into Asia-53 increased the division of labor in many Europeanurban industries (Ma, 1999:45).54 The internationalaspect of the textile trade in theMiddle Ages is sometimesoverlooked or underestimated. However, textiles were sometimesmore valuable than spices in theinternational market (Malanima,1987: 351) and bythe fourteenth century the export of textilesto the Middle East (and to a certainextent also East Asia) was vitalin orderto compensatethe constant loss of bullion to theEast becauseof the unequal balance of trade maintained by the western Europeancities (Day, 1978: 5, 39; Lopez,Miskimin & Udovitch, 1970:110; Deng, 1997b: 282). In otherwords: without the export of textilesto theMiddle East and East Asia (Lopez, 1943: 176), where- especiallyunder the Mongols- textiles were in high demand (Allsen, 1997)and oftenserved as meansof exchange(Serruys, 1982), the bullionflows to theEast would have created massive shortages of bullion,and impeded intensive recurring growth in western Europe (Stearns,Adas & Schwartz,1996: 468).55 Thus, the desire for ever

53 The fourteenth-centurymerchant Pegolotti testified that the traderoutes across Eurasia (fromthe Levant to Peking)were "perfectlysafe, whether by day or by night" (Lach, 1965: 45). From the Italian controlledcities on the Black Sea, a merchantwith pack asses would takeseven to eightmonths to reach the Chinese capital(Simkin, 1968: 135). 54 Thus, it is erroneous Eurocentrismto claim that "medieval development"in Europe was nothingbut "auto-development"(e.g., Delatouche, 1989: 26). The opening up of theEast Asian marketdue to thePax Mongolicawas ofan unprecedentedscale and provided enormous opportunitiesfor the Westerncity-states (Balard, 1983; Balatier, 1970: 340). The expansion of textileindustry in the Low Countries,for example, was intrinsicallyinterlinked with "the increased demand for woolen clothin interregionaland internationalcommerce" (Werveke, 1954: 237-38). Referenceto the "clothof Tartary" can be found in Chaucer, Dante, Boccaccio, and manyother less renownedEuropean authors(Allsen, 1997: 2). 55 Traditionally,one has assumed thatsince the Eurasiansilk route was an overland trade, it cannot have been as importantas maritimetrade and thus its impactswere probablyminimal. Yet, as Palat and Wallersteinstate, "it is unwarrantedto assume that land routes were alwayseclipsed by sea traffic"(1999: 33). Furthermore,the overland trade route to China did not startuntil the easternpart of the Caspian Sea since Italian shipswere activeboth on the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov, the riversDon and Volga, and the Caspian Sea (Richard,1970: 362).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 485 moreluxuries from the East, facilitated by the Pax Mongolica,gen- eratedincentive among the European urban-based merchant elite to implementstrategies of economic "self-sustained growth" based on colonialexploitation, exploitation of wage laborers and thesubse- quentcommodification, subjugation, domination, and exploitation ofthe natural realm (Mielants, 2000).°6 The fact remains that in East Asiamerchants were kept outside the structures of institutionalized powerand decisionmaking, and thisweakness was- although to a lesserdegree- also apparentin the EarlyModern Indian Ocean region.57The combinationof growing power over the proletariat at

56 On European "medievalcolonialism" see the recentimportant contributions by Balard (1998) and Torro (2000). 57 The lack ofmerchants' control over the labor processin thetextile industry (Palat, 1988: 263), in contrastto mercantilepower in westernEurope, is especiallyrevealing. Arasaratnam,in studyinglate eighteenth-century India, presents convincing evidence that even by thatperiod in timeweavers who had receivedcash advances fortheir work (as most did) retainedconsiderable control over the productionprocess (1980: 267). This findingwhich is confirmedin thegroundbreaking doctoral study of Parthasarathi (1992). In a more recent article, based on his dissertation,Parthasarathi summarizes his remarkableconclusions, very pertinent to our argumenthere: Both [Indian] weaversand merchantswere freeto cancel the contractsat any time.But whilethe weaver bore no cost forcanceling (he simplyhad to return theadvance to themerchant) the merchant forfeited his advance ifhe canceled . . . weaverspossessed thefreedom to acceptadvances at willand sell completed cloth to anybuyer [which] gave [them]great power to set clothprices, which, naturally,adversely affected merchant profits. The asymmetryof contractalso made it difficultfor merchants to enforcecloth quality standards . . . [and] the lack of institutionalizedand legallyenforced systems for debt repaymentmade it extremelydifficult for merchants to recoverdebts (1996: 97). In conclusion,Parthasarathi states that in the eighteenth-century"merchants were ex- cluded fromthe state withinthe south Indian political order. Unlike many parts of Europe wherethe economic power of merchantswas supplementedby political power, in southIndia merchantshad no access to thepowers of thestate" (1996: 98). Even Sub- rahmanyamand Bayly,the most ardent defenders of SouthAsian politicaland economic dynamismright up theearly nineteenth century, have to admitthat in South Asia "there is littleevidence to show thatmerchant guilds controlledproduction or defined and defendedregions of mercantileactivity against rivals" (1988: 406). Hall statesthat under the Colas "thereis no evidencethat merchants exercised wage controlsover artisansor for that matterthat production standards were set or thatfines were levied for poor craftsmanship"(1980: 115). Alavi is even more specific: therelationship between the creditor and theweaver inherent in the Indian sys- tem is quite distinctfrom that of the puttingout systemin Englandwhere the merchantwas directlyinvolved in the purchaseand provisionof materialsand even equipment(that he oftenhired) to weavers. . . [whereasin India] withthe systemof cash advancesthere was no suchinvolvement by the merchant in theor- ganizationof productionand provisionof materialsand equipment(1982: 49).

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 436 EricMielants homedue to a highlyunusual alliance between the state and the bourgeoisie(Crone, 1989: 167) and subsequent increasing revenues due toa financialwindfall by colonial conquests, first in the Mediter- ranean,and eventuallyin theNew World, as Pomeranzpoints out (20Q0),explains why western European core countries were capable of eventuallyachieving world domination. Although city-states can be foundon the littoralof the IndianOcean duringthe whole MiddleAges (Lombard, 1988: 15; Pearson, 1991: 70-74), they never experienceda transition to an interstatesystem in which merchants retainedso muchpolitical power. In fact,the European private (but statesupported) colonial enterprises stood in sharpcontrast to the more peacefulAsian free marketeconomy (Needham, 1970a; Thomaz,1988: 31; Chang,1991b: 24).58 Therefore, the qualitative shiftfrom an intercitystate system into an interstatesystem cannot be separatedfrom the transition from feudalism to capitalism. With- inthe emerging European nation-state, the merchant class could not onlyaspire to occupycrucial posts in the bureaucracyand the administration(Prak, 1992: 192; Glete,2000: 64),59but it could

Althoughthe political and-especially financial-power of EarlyModern South Asian "portfoliocapitalists" should not be underestimated(Pomeranz, 2000: 175), mer- chantswho wieldedsignificant political power should be seen as an exceptionrather than the rule, as the absence of European-typeputting out systemsdemonstrate (Pearson, 1998: 102). Furthercomments on thepath dependence of South Asia can be found in Mielants(2002). 58 Subrahmanyampoints out thatthere were plentyof portsand city-statesin the Indian Ocean regionwhose governmentsdepended on therevenues derived from trade and thatoccasionally even withinlarger polities merchants obtained "access to political power" (1995: 775). But it is the degreeto whichAsian merchantscould relyupon their state to intervene,which is important.When Indian merchants'demands forfull com- pensation forlosses sufferedat the hands of European pirates"turned out to be unen- forceablebecause of the superiornaval strengthof the European companies"(Prakash, 1979: 47) and because of the disinterestof theirrulers, they of course attemptedto withstandthe European onslaughtby a recourseto arms,but eventuallysuccumbed to European merchantswho could relyon statesupport. As Das Gupta remindsus, the attitudeof the rulersof Gujarat to sea-warfarecomes out clearlyin the remarkof Sultan Bahadur Shah that"wars by sea are merchants"affairs, and of no concernto theprestige of kings [indicative of thefact that] the Gujarati over- seas tradingsystem was defenseless[as it] lacked adequate naval and political backingin an age of expandingEuropean mercantilism(1976: 211). 59 This importanttheme has been insufficientlyaddressed both by Pomeranz (2000) and his critics(e.g., Vries,2002). In East Asia itwas mainlythe gentry which was effective- lyincorporated into the statestructure with offices, functions, and annuities,whereas in Europe it was urban merchantswho were capable of graftingthemselves in the power structuresof the most importantcapitalist states (Feuerwerker, 1984: 301-16; Isaacs &

This content downloaded on Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:37:27 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europe and China Compared 437 regularlyuse the mercantilestate's strength to supportits own colonialand as these had been capitaliststrategies, practices firmly60 rootedin the policiesof medievalcity-states (Wong, 2001: 27). Althoughmany Chinese ventured out in theentire Southeast Asian regionduring the Sung and Yuan dynasties,they were "unlike Europeanmaritime merchants who were large traders with state support"(Hui, 1995:28) notbacked up bythe Imperial state at all (Wiethoff,1963: 172; Wills, 1993: 87; Pomeranz,2000: 173).61Had

Prak,1996). Afterpainstakingly difficult prosopographical research, Bulst concludes that in late medievalFrance "la plupartdes officiersroyaux était issue de la bourgeoisie,parti- culièrementles lieutenantset les receveurs"(1996: 115). Accordingto Brady,"already in thelate 15thcentury Emperor Maximilian favored burghers over nobles in his admin- istration"(1997: 249). See also Hoppenbrouwers(2001: 59) and Dumolyn(2001: 83-84). 60 Merchantcapitalism was "an essentialpreliminary of thedecisive change thattook place withthe adventof European industrialization"(Goody, 1996: 223) whichin turn widened the gap betweenthe West and the non-West. This does not implythat Europe was the "onlyactive maker in history"(Washbrook, 1990: 492) since the technological and commerciallink with Asia was crucialfor its development.While one should pay attentionto the multiplicityof existing"colonial models" (Subrahmanyam,1988: 139), and pay attentionto how local structureswere "disruptedand dismantledin favorof the increasinghegemony of Europe" (Perlin, 1983: 90), while keeping in mind how the different"nature of statesand societies in the externalarena made a big differencein termsof how theyresponded to Europeans" (Pearson, 1988: 31), the point is thaiprior to theIndustrial Revolution- according to Pearson(1988: 45) longbefore 1750- Asia was on the road of peripheralizationas "European companies began to assume an increas- inglydominant role, graduallysubverting the Asian tradingnexus and local Asian econ- omies to an internationaldivision of labor and commoditycircuits centered in Western Europe itself (Perlin,1983: 60). This ultimatelyresulted in "theirmaritime economies increasinglyimposing their will, leading to de-industrializationin Asia" (Perlin,1983: 90). One of the questions I wanted to address is: whydid Europe eventuallydominate and colonize almostthe entireEurasian landmass (a processwhich lasted from the sixteenth throughthe nineteenthcenturies), with far-reaching consequences to its own "path of development,"while the far superior Early Modern Asian powers did not attemptto pur- sue such a strategy?The inter(city)state competition for commercial routes and access to as well as dominationof markets(the hegemonyover the space of flowsas well as outrightterritorial claims over a wide rangeof areas wherevertheir power could not be resisted)inaugurated the domination of theOceans in thelong run.Outright territorial notionssuch as theMare Britannicum speak forthemselves (Mollat, 1988: 16). Indeed, in the late fifteenth-centuryKing HenryVII of England gave John Cabot the advice to "discover,explore, conquer, occupy and takeinto possession" all thelands he would find overseas(Mollat, 1988: 17), quite a differentmission than Zheng He got fromEmperor Yung-lo. 61 That "the qualitieswe associate withcommercial activities, risk-taking, entrepre- neurial activities,the search for foreign markets,the mobilityand the desire to accumulateand reinvest,were widely distributed [throughout Asia] and cannotbe looked upon in the frameworkof European developmentsalone" (Goody, 1996: 222), is self- evident.But thisis not the same thingas being a professionalmerchant who can on the one hand use the advantagesof statepower on the one hand (by externalizingcertain

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Europeanmerchants lacked this state support as well,"they would haveprobably established connections with Asian traders in some of themajor emporia and thusparticipated in thenetwork of emporia trade"(Rothermund, 1991: 7), butwith state support behind them, thePortuguese and Dutchmerchants were able to actquite differ- ently.62This different policy can be explainedby the fundamentally differenthierarchical social structure between China and western Europe,which can shed light on whywestern Europe was the cradle ofcapitalism, in spiteof all itslesser achievements.

costs such as protectionrent on the nation-state)and on the otherhand have sufficient freedom (e.g., by institutionaland legal protection)from states and rulers.The full developmentof modern banking and creditfacilities, for example, was inhibitedin China because of "thelack of a legal and politicalframework which protected wealth from the state itselfand some of its rapacious officials"(Wang, 1970a: 222). That said, due to China's power it may have been plausible that if events in East Asia had occurred differently"Europe could have become verymuch a peripheryof a systemcentered in Asia" (Fitzpatrick,1992: 513), but not part of a capitalistone. 62 Indeed, unlike China the Portuguesestate "promotedoverseas trade and gave incentivesto its subjectsto participatein it" (Ptak, 1994: 44). Ptak does not hesitateto call the Portuguesestate "a kind of huge entrepreneurialinstitution which wanted to improveits position in internationaltrade and politicsby establishingthe Eastado da India" (1994: 44-45). Ironically,the Portuguesestate was in the long run not the real benefactorof itsactivities in Asia after"royal bankruptcies and debtstransferred control of exchequer and tradeto foreignmerchant-bankers" (Pearson, 1988: 34). These were- not surprisingly-Genoese capitalistswho attemptedto outflankthe joint Venetian-Mam- luk monopolyover traderoutes to East Asia byfinancing the Portugueseexploration of the Atlantic(Unger, 1997: 513). What is importantto note is that the Portuguese methodsof colonizationand subjugationrepresented a continuationof Italianpractices in theMediterranean (Pearson, 1991: 106; Scammell,1981). The wayEuropean merchant capitalistscould combine economic and politicalpower to theiradvantage is in striking contrastwith the non-western European powersthat had access to theIndian Ocean. The Karimimerchants, who duringthe late Middle Ages probablyaccumulated much more wealth than theirEuropean counterpartsin controllingthe profitablemaritime trade fromEgypt to South Asia, are a good example. Their lack of politicalpower, not their marvelouscapacities to accumulatecapital, was theirundoing in thelong run(Arenson, 1996: 117) as the Egyptianstate, which was not under theircontrol, eventually turned againstthem (Labib, 1970: 214; Fischel,1958: 172-73). The unwillingnessand at times impossibilityof several non-westernmaritime powers (e.g., Mamluk Egyptand Ming China) to back up their overseas merchants,enabled the weak and puny European powersto occupy"small posts of commercial and defensivepotential at selectedstrategic pointsall along the coasts of the Indian Ocean" (Keswani,1970: 544). These increment- ally small steps were, to the disbeliefof the great landbased empires of Asia, but a prelude to world domination.

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