Social and Economic History of Guangdong Province: State of the Field

Abstract

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY OF GUANGDONG PROVINCE: STATE OF THE FIELD Ye Xian'en and Chen Chunsheng Revised and Translated by Robert Y. Eng The Guangdong region has long attracted the attention of Chinese social and economic historians. As early as the 1930s, Chen Hansheng (1934), Luo Xianglin (1933), Liang Jiabin (1937) and other scholars conducted pioneering and authoritative research on rural production, the livelihood of the Boat People (danjia), the origins of the Guest People (kejia), the Thirteen Hong and the Guangdong Maritime Customs and other topics on Guangdong. From 1949 to 1979, Mainland Chinese scholars who worked on Guangdong maintained a long-term interest in the problem of embryonic capitalist sprouts, as exemplified by monographs on textile industries, the production of commercialized crops, merchants and mercantile capital, foreign trade and other problems ofthe Ming-Qing period (e.g. Li 1979; Peng 1957; Peng 1981). Especially noteworthy is Professor Liang Fangzhong who served as chairman of the economics department at Lingnan University beginning in 1949 and then as professor of history at Zhongshan University. His definitive research has influenced scholars of younger generations enormously. Today scholars working on the social and economic history of Guangdong during the MingQing period at Zhongshan University, Jinan University and the Guangdong Provincial Academy of Social Sciences (Guangdong sheng shehui kexueyuan) axe almost entirely his former assistants and graduate students and their students . Since 1979, China has carried out a policy of reform and openness, and Guangdong has adopted measures of economic reconstruction, such as the establishment of special economic zones, the opening up of the coastal cities and the creation of a delta economic zone. Guangdong's rapid growth, along with its special social and economic characteristics, which distinguish it from the interior provinces, have ignited the research interest of many scholars. They began to study the social and economic development of Guangdong in a comparative and holistic framework, with the view to explain present changes and derive lessons from a historical perspective. In 1983, the state Late Imperial China. Vol. 11, No. 2 (December 1990): 102-115© by the Society for Qing Studies 102 Social and Economie History103 designated "Studies of the Society and Economy of Guangdong in the MingQing Period" as a key research project in the social sciences, to be jointly undertaken by the history departments of Zhongshan and Jinan universities and the Guangdong Provincial Academy of Social Sciences. Tang Mingsui and Ye Xian'en were appointed as directors of this state-funded project. When the plan for the national research program in the social sciences during the 7th Five Year Plan was drawn up, the government further decreed that "Studies on Modern Rural South China" under the direction of Ye Xian'en would be a key project. Research on Guangdong in recent years has basically been carried out under the umbrella of these two projects. In the decade ofthe 1980s, investigators of Guangdong social and economic history in the Ming-Qing period have gradually moved beyond the "National Economy" model (guomin jingjishi tixi) centering on government finance, the tax system and the landownership system, and paid greater attention to local customs, social organizations, structure oflocal power, market networks, price movements, people's livelihood and other problems. There was also increasing use of field surveys for research on rural production organizations, kinship organizations, rental relations and social and cultural activities. Over 100 articles have been published, and the scope of research has touched on every aspect of social and economic fife. On the basis of research topics, theory and methodology, and the types of source materials, research on the social and economic history of Guangdong during the Ming-Qing period over the last decade may be subdivided into three stages. The first stage dated from 1979 to 1983. Researchers concentrated their work on the tenancy system, foreign trade, the commodity economy, "capitalist sprouts" and other problems that have long absorbed the attention of mainland Chinese historians. They attempted to derive fresh interpretations of these old problems by detailed regional investigations. In the early 1980s, various cities and counties of Guangdong Province engaged in large-scale surveys of cultural relics. Subsequently the localities established specialized institutions for the compilation of local...