Self-Reliance, Internal Trade and China's Economic Structure

Abstract

Scholarly interest in a cellular model for sectors of the Chinese economy dates at least to G. William Skinner's “Marketing and social structure in rural China,” published in 1964–65, but based on his field work from 1949 to 1950 and on a theoretical foundation developed by Christaller and Löch in the 1930s and 40s. New interest was sparked by Audrey Donnithorne's 1972 article in this journal, in which she attempted to demonstrate that China had recently “experienced an intensification of the tendencies towards a cellular economy,” which she claimed had been strong even before the Cultural Revolution.