Aspects of Social Mobility in China, 1368–1911

Abstract

Social mobility in traditional China, particularly during the last two dynasties, Ming (1368–1644) and Ch'ing (1644–1911), for which ample data are available, deserves systematic study by both Chinese and Western historians and social scientists. It is remarkable to observe that in a meticulously “regulated” society such as traditional China's, there was probably a greater amount of vertical mobility, both upward and downward, than is usually found in pre-modern and modern societies of the West. What makes this more striking is the fact that it occurred in a society which for twenty-five centuries believed in the inequality of men. For this reason alone the question of social mobility in traditional China should be of more than usual interest to theoretical sociologists with a comparative approach to their subject. Owing to the author's limited knowledge of Western sociology and also because of limitations of space, this article deals mainly with China, although brief comparisons with pre-modern and modern Western societies will be attempted at certain points.