The Century of State Failure: A Fiscal History of China, 1850-1949

Hanhui Guan, K. Kivanc Karaman, Nuno Palma and Zhiyin Xu

Lewis Lab Working Papers Series from Arthur Lewis Lab, The University of Manchester

Abstract: We examine the fiscal trajectory of the Chinese state from the late Qing period to the founding of the People’s Republic of China. To do so, we construct the first continuous tax revenue and public debt series and interpret the trends in the context of the era’s political and economic developments. Our findings indicate that China’s state capacity remained low throughout this period, a pattern that reflects the central government’s failure to monopolize control over violence. This persistent weakness had lasting consequences, not only shaping the political landscape but also hindering economic modernization.

Keywords: State Capacity; Fiscal Capacity; Public Debt; Taxation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N15 N25 N45 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cna
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://documents.manchester.ac.uk/display.aspx?DocID=75731 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:man:allwps:0009

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Lewis Lab Working Papers Series from Arthur Lewis Lab, The University of Manchester Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Jordi Caum-Julio ().