An Economy Of Intermediate Form

This thesis tries to study the handicraft industry of modern China as an economy entity from 1840 to 1936, by the guide of the theory of Marxism's handicraft economic history and proto-industrialization in the contemporary Western academic circles. This thesis replies two questions on the whole. Why had the handicraft industry of modern China existed so long? What is the history position and function of it? The divergences had existed on the two questions in the past academic circles. We consider that many factors caused the handicraft existing so long, for example, the impoverishment of traditional peasants' economy, the interaction between handicraft industry and national machine industry, the government action in the handicraft economy, the influence of the international market, the reformation of productive forces of handicraft, the modernity vicissitude of the relations of production and so on.In my opinion, the handicraft industry of modern China was a middle economy between tradition and modern. ' The middle economy ' —this concept is not only the definition for the stage of vicissitude of modern handicraft, but also normalize the function between the traditionnal agriculture and modern industry. Inside the handicraft industry, first and foremost, we consider that the productive forces appeared the tendency of the middle technology, for example, the alteration of handicraft tools, the technological mode of "millstone + steam-engine", and began to transform into the machine product. Second and more importantly, the modernity vicissitude...