Fighting Famine in North China
Subtitle: State, Market, and Environmental Decline, 1690s-1990s
Edition: 1 edition
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Published: March 14, 2007
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 520
ISBN-13: 9780804753043
Subjects: Asian / Middle Eastern history; Social history; 20th century; c 1700 to c 1800; c 1800 to c 1900; History - General History; Social Science; Sociology; China; Asia - China; History / China; History; Disasters & Disaster Relief; Sociology - General; Disaster relief; Famines
Description: This monumental work provides a new perspective on the historical significance of famines in China over the past three hundred years. It examines the relationship between the interventionist state policies of the eighteenth-century Qing emperors ('The golden age of famine relief'), the environmental and political crises of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (when China was called 'the Land of Famine'), and the ambitions of the Mao era (which tragically led to the greatest famine in human history). In addition to a wide array of documentary sources, the book employs quantitative analysis to measure the economic impact of natural crises, state policies, and markets. In this way, the theories of Qing statesmen that have received much attention in recent scholarship are linked to actual practices and outcomes. Using the Zhili-Hebei region as its focus, the book also reveals the unusual role played by the institutions and policies designed to ensure food security for the capital, Beijing. -- Publisher description