China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience: Historical McHange and the Limits of European Experience - Hardcover

Wong, R. Bin

 
9780801432545: China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience: Historical McHange and the Limits of European Experience

Inhaltsangabe

"This bold, intellectually ambitious, and wholly original book challenges the way in which Western social science understands China.... It will set the standard for all future comparative and theoretical research on China."—Timothy Brook, Stanford University"This is a most extraordinary book. Wong's approach is to explore carefully similarities and differences between Chinese and European development over the long term, highlighting themes related to state-making and popular action. This is by far the most sophisticated, extended discussion of imperial and modern China in comparative perspective that I have seen."—Peter C. Perdue, Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyThe assumption still made in much social science research that Europe provides a universal model of development is fundamentally mistaken, according to R. Bin Wong. The solution is not, however, simply to reject Eurocentric norms but to build complementary perspectives, such as a Sinocentric one, to evaluate current understandings of European developments. A genuinely comparative perspective, he argues, will free China from wrong expectations and will allow those working on European problems to recognize the distinct character of Western development.

The assumption still made in much social science research that Europe provides a universal model of development is fundamentally mistaken, according to R. Bin Wong. The solution is not, however, simply to reject Eurocentric norms but to build complementary perspectives, such as a Sinocentric one, to evaluate current understandings of European developments. A genuinely comparative perspective, he argues, will free China from wrong expectations and will allow those working on European problems to recognize the distinct character of Western development.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

R. Bin Wong is Professor of History and Director of the UCLA Asia Institute. He is coauthor of Nourish the People: State Civilian Granaries in China, 1650-1850 and of Societies and Cultures in World History.

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An assumption still made in much social science research, that Europe provides a universal model of development, is fundamentally mistaken, according to R. Bin Wong. The solution is not, however, simply to reject Eurocentric norms but to evaluate current understandings of European developments from a complementary perspective. A Sinocentric perspective, he argues, will free China from wrong expectations and will allow those working on European problems to recognize the distinctive character of Western development. Wong compares the growth of capitalism and the formation of national states in modern Europe with economic and political changes in China, and explains that a crucial rupture occurred when European industrialization set new conditions for material and social life. He contrasts Chinese and European political changes, and explores the implications of social protest, economic change, and state-making by comparing grain seizures, tax resistance, and revolution as they occurred in both areas. Only by evaluating where China and Europe appear to converge or diverge and by analyzing whether convergence reflects similar underlying processes, he argues, can we successfully situate the trajectories of both realms in world-historical development.

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9780801483271: China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience

Vorgestellte Ausgabe

ISBN 10:  0801483271 ISBN 13:  9780801483271
Verlag: Cornell University Press, 2000
Softcover