Man and land in Chinese history

Description

This interpretation of Chinese economic history emerges from this analysis of two millennia of economic development in traditional China. Rejecting dynastic, positivist, and Marxian views, the author argues that since 200 BC China was a market economy consisting of countless small production units - either freeholders or tenants. This market economy was characterized by mobility of labor, private ownership of land and other assets, work specialization, widespread exchange of goods, and a ubiquitous price system. The freeholders and tenants were subject to one dominant constraint, limited land for cultivation. The author shows how they had to adjust their economic choices and decisions to respond to an increasing man-land ratio as population pressure gradually increased through the centuries. He sees the twelfth century as the crucial turning point. Overpopulation led to far-reaching changes in farmland size, tenure and cropping systems, and farming technology as Chinese agriculture shifted to labor-intensive farming. Although it has often been labeled the culprit, it was not the unequal distribution of land but the increasing man-land ratio that produced China's impoverishment. He suggests overpopulation as an answer to the question of what caused China to stagnate technologically after a brilliant beginning. Overpopulation induced the adoption of more labor-intensive technology and labor-absorbing institutions, which in turn raised the tolerance for overpopulation. In a sense, there was a race between population growth and technological advancement, and population growth won.

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