Rural market towns and farmer life on the Chengdu Plain in the Republican era: A theory on rural standard marketing communities

Abstract

Between late 1949 and early 1950, the famed American anthropologist George William Skinner conducted a three-month social survey of Kao-tien-tzu (Gaodianzi) in the Chengdu Plain, and wrote a three-part series of papers entitled “Marketing and Social Structure in Rural China.” He proposed the “standard marketing community” theory, which had a major impact on both American and Chinese Sinological studies. Many scholars have commented on this theory, raising either praise or censure, and some have adopted the theory as the basis of further studies. The author draws on archived materials and survey data on the Chengdu Plain in the Republican era to examine farmers’ family income, agricultural sidelines, and relationship with rural market towns, in response to the debate over Skinner’s theory.