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Ming Dynasty Trade
Andrew Paul Stokes

June 5, 2011

Ming Dynasty Economy
It’s growth and it’s decline.

By Andrew Paul Stokes
Beijing Union University

1|P a ge

Andrew Paul Stokes

June 5, 2011

Ming Dynasty Economy
The Ming Dynasty
The economy of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) of China was the largest in the world at the time. It is regarded as one of China 's three golden ages (the other two being the Han and Tang dynasties), the Ming is also the dynasty where the first sprouts of Chinese capitalism can be seen. The economic growth so evident under the Ming Dynasty continued under the Qing Dynasty, up until the time of the Opium War in the 1840s. During this time, China’s domestic economy was a dynamic, commercialising economy, and in some ways, even an industrialising economy. The Ming Dynasty, “one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history” 1, was the last native imperial dynasty in Chinese history, sandwiched between the two dynasties of foreign origin, Yuan and Qing. The Ming stand as the last attempt to hold Chinese government in native hands and the last dynasty run by ethnic Hans. As China was humiliated and oppressed by the rule of the Mongols, the Ming Dynasty rose up out of a peasant rebellion led by Zhu Yuanzhang to preside over the greatest economic and social revolution in China before the modern period. Trade was allowed between China and nations in the west, cash crops were more frequently grown, specialised industries were founded, and the economic growth caused by the privatisation of state industries resulted in a prosperous period that exceeded that of the earlier Song Dynasty. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, shortly before the Manchus overthrew the Ming and established the Qing Dynasty, China’s economy was a period of expansion. New markets were being founded, and merchants were extending their businesses across provincial lines and even into the South China Sea.

Establishment of the Ming under the



Bibliography: Atwell, William S. (2002) “Time, Money, and the Weather: Ming China and the Great Depression of the Mid-Fifteenth Century”, the Journal of Asian Studies, 61 (1): 81-113, Cambridge University Press Brook, Timothy. (1998) The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China, Berkeley: University of California Press. Ebrey, Patricia Buckley; Walthall, Anne; Palais, James B. (2006) East Asia: A Cultural, Social, and Political History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. Ebrey, Patricia Buckley; (1999) The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge University Press Fairbank, John K. and Goldman, Merle. (2006) China: A New History. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press Graham, James. (Unknown Date). “Quantitative Growth, Qualitative Standstill: From www.HistoryOrb.com China 's Economic Situation 1368-1800”. website. http://www.historyorb.com/asia/china_economy.shtml (accessed 03/06/2011). Heijdra, Martin. (1988) “The Socio-Economic Development of Rural China During the Ming”, in Mote, Frederick W. and Twitchett, Denis (eds.), Cambridge History of China: The Ming Dynasty 1368-1644, Part One, Cambridge University Press. Huang, Ray. (1988) “The Ming Fiscal Administration”, in Twitchett, Denis and Fairbank, John K. (eds.) the Cambridge History of China, Volume 8: The Ming Dynasty 1398-1644, Part Two, Cambridge University Press. Li, Bo and Zheng, Yin. (2001) 5000 Years of Chinese History, Inner Mongolian Peoples’ Publishing House. 13 | P a g e Andrew Paul Stokes Mote, Frederick W. (1988), “Introduction”, in Twitchett, Denis and Mote, Frederick W. (eds.) The Cambridge History of China, Vol 7, The Ming Dynasty, 1368 – 1644, Part 1. Cambridge University Press. Mote, Frederick W. (1988) “The Rise of the Ming Dynasty 1330 – 1367”, in Twitchett, Denis and Fairbank, John K. (eds.) The Cambridge History of China, Vol 7, The Ming Dynasty, 1368 – 1644, Part 1. Cambridge University Press. Reischauer, Edwin Oldfather; Fairbank, John King and Craig, Albert M. (1960) A History of East Asian Civilisation, Vol 1. East Asia: The Great Tradition, George Allen & Unwin Ltd. Spence, Jonathan D. (1999) The Search for Modern China: Second Edition. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. June 5, 2011 14 | P a g e

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