Abstract
No attempt is made here towards developing a framework of analysis of semi-colonialism and the phenomenon of the informal empire. This has already been attempted elsewhere.1 For the historian, an imposed framework is rarely satisfactory as it usually cannot cater for, or be easily applied to, the unique and the specific which, more often than not, preoccupy the historian. Nevertheless, two broad problems, partly methodological, arise in this context.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
J. Osterhammel, ‘Semi-Colonialism and Informal Empire in Twentieth-Century China: Towards a Framework of Analysis’ in W.J. Mommsen and J. Osterhammel (eds), Imperialism and After: Continuities and Discontinuities (London, 1986).
A.J.P. Taylor, Europe: Grandeur and Decline (Harmondsworth, 1967), p. 166. On this question see also Warren I. Cohen’s presidential address to the members of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, Diplomatic History, 9, No. 2 (Spring, 1985), pp. 101–12.
See N. Clifford, Britain’s Retreat from China (London, 1967).
D. Fieldhouse, ‘“A New Imperial System”? The Role of the Multinational Corporations Reconsidered’, in W.J. Mommsen and J. Osterhammel (eds), Imperialism and After: Continuities and Discontinuities (London, 1986).
See S. Cochran, Big Business in China: Sino-Foreign Rivalry in the Cigarette Industry 1890–1930 (Massachusetts,1980)
and R.W. Huenemann, The Dragon and the Iron Horse: The Economics of Railroads in China 1876–1937 (Massachusetts, 1984).
S.L. Endicott, Diplomacy and Enterprise - British China Policy 1933–37 (British Columbia, 1975), p. 2.
R. Robinson and J. Gallagher, Africa and the Victorians: The Official Mind of Imperialism (London, 1961, reprinted 1974), p. 465.
P.A. Cohen, Discovering History in China: American Historical Writing on the Recent Chinese Past (New York, 1984), Chapter 4.
I. Wallerstein, The Politics of the World-Economy — The States, the Movements, and the Civilization (Cambridge, 1984), pp. 81–2.
G. Lichtheim, Imperialism (Middlesex, 1974), pp. 141–2, 158.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1996 Aron Shai
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Shai, A. (1996). Introduction. In: The Fate of British and French Firms in China, 1949–54. St Antony’s Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230375628_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230375628_1
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-39747-1
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-37562-8
eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)