Imperialism, globalization and public finance: the case of late Qing China

This paper reviews recent revisionist studies of imperialism that demonstrate the complexities behind the late Qing state's strategy to accommodate to new challenges born out of foreign conflicts exacerbated by domestic crises. These publications have pointed scholars away from the exclusivity of external agency to the making of modern China. But looking at the role of globalization adds another dimension to understanding how imperialism engaged late Qing China's public finance system and indigenous banking institutions. China's centuries-old experience with global trade previous to the nineteenth century did not prepare the country for world-wide recession, and consequently, foreign banks acquiring a hold on the government's purse by the last decades of that century. From a 'broad-brush' perspective, the paper argues state-sponsored attempts at reform of public finance came too late, and in the long-term had grave repercussions.