Ricardo And China: Presentation And Historical Writing In Modern Chinese Literature

David Ricardo(1772-1823),as a classical British political economist,contributed his theory to reveal the economic antagonism between the landlord class,the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.As the economist who developed the classical political economy to the peak,his theory has important theoretical value,and later scholars mostly refuted his arguments and theories.The economic thought embodied by Ricardo’s theory still plays an important role and has great influence in today’s era.The spread of Ricardo and his theories in modern China can be roughly divided into four periods.In the late Qing Dynasty,Ricardo’s theory was introduced initially,but the spread of Ricardo’s theory was scattered and simple.During the period of Beijing Government,Ricardo’s theory was further spread,and the introduction of Ricardo began to appear,but generally speaking,the introduction of Ricardo’s theory was still scattered in various works,and there was no concentrated discussion.In the early period of the Nanjing National Government,the spread of Ricardo and his theories reached the climax stage in modern China.The main body of the spread was composed of complex personnel,the means of communication media were diverse,and the spread theories involved a wide range.Not only the frequent discussion of his theories in economic literature,but also the thematic articles on his theories kept emerging.During the period of Anti-Japanese War and the War of Liberation,the propagation of Ricardo’s theory was affected to a certain extent and went through the process of temporary stagnation to active again.The propagation of Ricardo and his theories in modern China has experienced a process from shallow to deep,from simple to complex.At the same time,the academic circle’s attention to and propagation of Ricardo’s theory has a strong reality-oriented,showing the characteristics of The Times closely connected with modern Chinese society.Modern scholars’ narration of Ricardo mainly focuses on his life,works and theories.The biographical narrative focuses on his Jewish identity,educational experience and transition to the field of economics.Modern scholars have combed and evaluated the major works and editions of Ricardo,and can introduce relevant information into China based on the research situation of Ricardo abroad.The interpretation and criticism of Ricardo’s theory is the key content of the modern academic circle’s narration of Ricardo’s theory.The academic circle appraised Ricardo’s deductive method and analyzed the origin and flow of Ricardo’s theory.The academic circle focused on the detailed interpretation of Ricardo’s theory of value,rent,wage and profit,and introduced the theory of money to different degrees.The narration of Ricardo and his theories introduced Ricardo to modern China,made Chinese people know the relevant works of Ricardo,showed the degree of modern scholars’ mastery of Ricardo’s theory,enriched the level of communication of Ricardo in modern China,and promoted the further dissemination of Ricardo and his theories in modern China.The writing of Ricardo’s image is a response to the deepening understanding of Ricardo.The modern scholar’s image cognition of Ricardo includes the image of Ricardo as a business genius,the image of many founders in the field of economics,the pessimist,the father of socialism,and the character image of rigorous,kind and generous.There are five images in total.Among them,the image of economists is concretely manifested as the great economist,the direct successor of Smith and the founder of economic science,the completion of the British classical political economy,the founder of the theory of land rent and the ancestor of abstract economics.The appearance of different images represents the different degrees of acceptance of western economic theories by modern scholars.Economists advocating different economic ideas have different interpretations of Ricardo’s images,which reflects the social environment in which Western economic trends of thought were popular in modern China to some extent.With the spread of Ricardo’s theory in modern China,the modern academic circle compared Ricardo with Smith,Marx,Malthus,John Mill,Thünen and other economists from the perspective of comparison.Through comparative view,this thesis explains the similarities and differences between Ricardo and other economists in academic theory,analyzes the academic inheritance relationship between them,and deepens the grasp of Ricardo’s theory.This is not only the inevitable research path experienced by modern scholars in order to understand western economics,but also contains the reflections made by modern scholars on China’s realistic economic problems.In particular,the comparison between Ricardo,Smith and Marx is not only an academic speculation,but also a profound representation of the thinking consciousness of modern scholars in the face of liberal economics and Marxist economics.From the 1920 s to the 1940 s,there were three landmark events in the propagation of Ricardo’s theory in modern China: Liu Binglin wrote Ricardo,the Chinese translation of Ricardo’s works appeared,and the undergraduate thesis of National Wuhan University studied Ricardo’s Theory.Through the investigation of these three individual cases,it shows the process of the modern academic circle from translation to research of Ricardo’s theory,and reflects the different concerns and research points of Ricardo’s theory in different historical periods.This is the result of the communication between Chinese and Western cultures,and also the response of modern scholars according to the social reality of modern China.Through these three cases,it shows the evolution of the propagation depth of Ricardo’s theory in modern China,and presents the inheritance and development of the academic research on Ricardo’s theory in modern academia.In a word,the emergence of Ricardo and his theories in modern China was introduced into China under the trend of the eastward spread of Western learning,based on the purpose of Chinese people’s pursuit of national prosperity.According to the special conditions of China,modern scholars spread Ricardo and his theories into China through different ways,media and channels,and studied and commented on his theories.The investigation of the situation of Ricardo and his theories in modern China not only helps to understand the status of the study of Ricardo by modern scholars and enrich the relevant contents of the academic history,but also reflects the profound changes of the political,economic and cultural environment of modern China.At the same time,it reveals the interaction between the western economic theories and modern China,and shows the research results of China on Ricardo to the world.It plays an important role in promoting cultural exchanges and mutual learning between China and foreign countries.