Accumulation, Centralization and Decentralization of Chinese Capital

Yanan Wang ()
Additional contact information
Yanan Wang: Xiamen University

Chapter 12 in The Basic Theory of Chinese Economy, 2026, pp 81-93 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract This chapter examines how international capital shaped the accumulation, centralization, and decentralization of Chinese capital in the late Qing and Republican periods. It argues that foreign investment was not merely an external “pressure” but entered domestic circuits through treaty-port commerce, banking, public debt, and foreign-exchange mechanisms, thereby steering Chinese capital toward commercial and fiscal channels. Section 12.1 clarifies why “foreign” and “local” capital were often intertwined and identifies the common policy requirements shared by competing imperialist powers. Sections 12.2–12.4 distinguish capitalist accumulation from primitive accumulation and show that, in the absence of a strong industrial base, accumulation and centralization proceeded largely through commerce, land rent, usury, banking, and state finance, while decentralization took the form of speculative reallocations (land, real estate, public debt, gold and foreign exchange) rather than productive industrial investment. The chapter concludes that the overall movement of Chinese capital carried a predominantly commercial–financial imprint, helping explain the weakness of industrial accumulation and recurrent pressures for monetary reform.

Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

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:spr:sprchp:978-981-95-6330-2_12

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9789819563302

DOI: 10.1007/978-981-95-6330-2_12

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Books from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().