A Study Of The Great Divergence Between The Economic Policies Of China And Europe From 15th To 18th Century

This dissertation is not a comprehensive study of differences between Chinese and Western governments in traditional times in their governance of economic activities,but a study the differences of the Path Selection against the backdrop of regional economic cooperation body on the basis of the Simithian Growth.It will trace the rationality of the decision-making process of the foreign trade administrations and address concerns over the transmission mechanism of economic policies among governments of different countries.The two ends of the Euroasia continent are similar in size and both have a multi-geological natural environment.Both of them have mutual independently developed into a complex system of material life.Marked by long distance trade,cities,and the precious metal mint industry,they had grown into regional economies on the basis of the Simithian Growth by the period between the 11th and 13th century.The regional economy on the basis of the Simithian Growth refers to a phase with relatively advanced economic development in traditional times.In the economy,the market mechanism functioned according to the differences of the areas within the economy and consequently it formed a structure of coexistence of developed and undeveloped parts.The developed centers enjoyed the advantages of exporting industries,dense cities,agriculture dominated by market principles,and abundant life.Their surrounding undeveloped areas acted as both raw materials purveyors and consumers of the industrial commodities.In the 17th century,Holland and the Jiangnan area of China played the role of the developed centers.The huge economy in the west end contained multiple political units while the east end was united under one political power.One political unit in the west end roughly amounted to a province of the east end.The producers and consumers of a commodity might belong to different political units in the West while more possibly subject to the same sovereign in the east.It means the flow of precious metals was transnational for the former and interprovincial for the latter.Against the background mentioned above,the dissertation examines the origin of mercantilism and argues that mercantilism was the result of the multiple political units system of the regional economy.The developed areas had more attraction to precious metals,which resulted in worries of social elites from the surrounding undeveloped areas.Consequently the worries led to more attention to trade balance,more consideration of protective policies,and more concerns of profits through added value and transit trade,which helped form the governmental strategies of commercial competition.However in the countries in the phase of the Simithian Growth,mercantilism was by no means the lone voice.As one of the rivals of Mercantilism,the early liberatist thinkers also played their roles in the rise of the economic rationality.In the 16th century Mercantilism gradually became systemized,but not immediately became the guides of national economic policies.It was a process that required not only reconciliations of interests between sovereigns and subjects,but also the participation of liberalists in the drive of territory economy.In the 17th century driven by England and France,where the economic liberalism prevailed,Mercantilism gradually got reconciled with the administration of economy by sovereigns.In the 18th century Spain,Prussia,Russia and others became followers of Mercantilism.Though the perspectives of them were the same as their predecessors,such countries adopted Mercantilism large because of the propagation of the economic rationality rather than their initiatives.If the developed and undeveloped areas coexisted in a united empire,the interprovincial flow of precious metals can hardly cause the economic ideas based on national egoism,though tensions and envies do exist among areas.From a broader horizon,foreign trade was not a business essential to all parts of the empire,but an important business to the developed areas along the coasts.The Jiangnan area,exporting its commodities to both domestic and foreign markets,seems to have had great radiant influence than that of England in the 18th century,but it was just a small part of the whole empire,the same as Min and Yue coastal areas.Though the empire sometimes addressed concerns over economy,such as the ban of exportation of coins and the measures to attract the importation of precious metals,the policy-making mechanism was based on the benefits of the whole empire instead of the sole interests of some certain areas.So the Mercantilism was hard to understand for the empire.In the international system dominated by the empire,the official trade was carried out in an irrational manner,such as the Tributary System and the Zheng He's expedition to the West.The economic growth made by typical Mercantilist countries England was a result of the dual influence of Mercantilism and Liberalism.Its late followers who also adopted Mercantilism achieved different consequences.Some achieved the same success as England had done and others not.Mercantilism,a helpful assistance to the Industrial Revolution,took part in the shaping of the economic activities of England and Europe.Many elements such as the scientific,technological and industrial ecology should be taken into consideration of the origin of the stem power revolution which first occurred in England.Since the 19th century,the old international system in East Asia gradually has gradually collapsed.External forces transformed China from an empire to a country among others and a member of the Global Europe.The Westernization Movement in the late Qing dynasty was the early efforts of China's Mercantilism.