Navigating Semi-Colonialism: Shipping, Sovereignty, and Nation-Building in China, I860–I937

398 Pages·2018·38.011 MB·English

by  Anne Reinhardt

Navigating Semi-Colonialism
Shipping, Sovereignty, and Nation-Building
in China, I860-I937
Anne Reinhardt
Published by the Harvard University Asia Center
Distributed by Harvard University Press
Cambridge (Massachuseccs) and London 2018
© 2018 by The President and Fellows of Harvard College
Printed in the United States of America
The Harvard University Asia Center publishes a monograph series and, in coordination with the
Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, the Korea Institute, the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Stud-
ies, and other facilities and institutes, administers research projects designed ro further scholarly
understanding of China, Japan, Vietnam, Korea, and other Asian countries. The Cenrer also spon-
sors projects addressing multidisciplinary and regional issues in Asia.
Studies of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
The Studies of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute of Columbia University were inaugurated in
1962 to bring ro a wider public the results of significant new research on modern and contemporary
East Asia.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Reinhardt, Anne, 1968-author.
Tide Navigating semi-colonialism: shipping, sovereignty, and nation-building in China,
1860-1937 I Anne Reinhardt.
Orher titles: Harvard East Asian monographs ; 410.
Description: Cambridge, Massachusetts: Published by the Harvard University Asia Center,
2018. I Series: Harvard East Asian monographs; 410 I Includes bibliographical references
and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017029371 I ISBN 9780674983847 (hardcover: alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Sreamboat lines-China-Yangtze River-History. I Shipping-Government
ownership-China-History-20th century. ) China-Foreign relations. I Colonial
companies-China-History-19th century. I Colonial companies-China-Hisrory-
2orh century. I China-History-1861-1912. / China-History-Republic, 1912-1949.
Classification: LCC HE894 .R45 2018 J DDC 386/.350951209034-dc23 LC record available at
hnps://lccn.!oc.govhor7029371
Index by the author
-,
B Printed on acid-free paper
Last figure below indicates year of this printing
27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18
To My Family

Contents
Maps, Tables, and Figures ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction r
Sovereign Concerns: The Formation of a Semi-Colonial
Steam Transport Network, 1860-19u 21
2 Aligning Capital and Flag: The Steam Shipping Business,
1860-82 63
3 The Shipping Conference as Collaboration, 1882-1913 94
4 The Steamship as Social Space, 1860-1925 133
5 Shipping Nationalism: The Politics and Business of
Shipping in China's Early Republic, 1912-27 179
6 Nanjing and Chongqing: The Return of the State to
Shipping, 1927-37 217
7 The "New Steamship": Transformations of Social Space,
1925-37 253
Conclusion: Decolonizing the Steamship Network, 1937-56 295
Contents
viii
309
List of Chinese and Japanese Characters
313
Abbreviations in Notes
315
Notes
353
Works Cited
371
Index
Maps, Tables, and Figures
Maps
I.I Open Treaty Ports, 1860-77 36
1.2 Open Treaty Potts, 19n 57
2.l Major Steamship Routes of the Yangzi River and
Coast, 1870s 88
3.1 Treaty Ports on the Yangzi River, ca. 19n 120
6.1 Area of Minsheng Industrial Company's Services, 1935 240
Table
5.1 Lower Yangzi River (Shanghai-Hankou) Fleets, 19z7 193
Figures
4.1 China Navigation Company ship Wusueh 151
4.2 Steerage Accommodation, Wusueh 151
4-3 Saloon Accommodation, Wusueh 15z
4-4 Evacuation of Tianjin during the Boxer Uprising 173
7.1 Minsheng Company Teaboy, 1937 z73
7.2 Minsheng Company Sailors' Singing Group, 1937 290
7-3 Minsheng Company Advertisement, 1937 294

Acknowledgments
In the long years of working on this book, I have received much help and
accrued many debts. It is my pleasure to finally acknowledge them here.
First, my graduate advisor, Susan Naquin, provided most generous
guidance from the very beginnings of this project. I was also fortunate
to work with Ruth Rogaski and Sheldon Garon, whose examples and
mentorship have meant a great deal. Sherman Cochran, who served as
an outside reader, introduced me to Lu Zuofu and offered several impor-
tant research contacts in China. Moving further into the past, I am grate-
ful for the opporrunity to thank the many teachers who have helped me
reach this point, particularly Alan Wachman, Peter Bo!, Frederic Wake-
man Jr., and Lydia H. Liu.
Research for this book has taken me to many different places in
China, Taiwan, Japan, and the United Kingdom, and in each place I have
received much help and advice. Zhu Yin'gui, currently ofFudan Univer-
sity, was a most patient advisor during my time at the Chinese Academy
of Social Sciences in Beijing and beyond. Luo Zhitian, of Sichuan and
Beijing Universities, did much to aid my dissertation research in Chengdu
and continues to offer his help. Zhang Jin, of Chongqing University, has
been a great friend and interlocutor, and her advice over many years has
had an enormous impact on this project. I want to express my sincere
appreciation to the Minsheng Shipping Company in Chongqing, its gen-
eral manager, Mr. Lu Guoji, as well as Xiang Jingxi, Mu Li, and Cai
Ailing of its Historical Research Division, who hosted me on numerous
Acknowledgments
xii
visits to Chongqing and kept me in contact with a community of historians
interested in Lu Zuofu, particularly Zhao Xiaoling, Zhou Minmin, and
Liu Chonglai. Thanks also to Huang Hanmin at the Shanghai Academy
of Social Sciences and Fan Jin min of Nanjing University and to the
staffs of the Sichuan University Library and the Economics Library at the
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences for their kind assistance.
In Taiwan, Ch 'en Kuo-tung of Academia Sinica extended both help
and hospitality on two separate trips, and Chuang Chi-fa of the Palace
Museum offered expert guidance in navigating that collection. In Japan,
I was fortunate to get advice from Hamashita Takeshi and access to the
Toa Bunka Kenkyujo collection at Tokyo University Library. Tatuski
Mariko and Goto Mitsuya provided important introductions to Japanese
shipping companies. I thank Matheson & Co., London, for permission
to use the Jardine, Matheson & Company Archives at Cambridge Uni-
versity Library, and Julian Thorogood and Rob Jennings of John Swire
& Sons, London, for allowing me to use materials from the collection at
Swire House. The staffs at the Cambridge University Library and the Ar-
chival Collections Department of the School of Oriental and African
Studies also provided much help and information.
Closer to home, Nancy Norton Tomasko was kind enough to allow
me to use her private collection of Asian travel books and guidebooks.
The staffs of Princeton University's Gest Library, the Harvard-Yenching
Library, the University of Rochester Library, and the Williams College
Library all offered useful assistance.
The research for this book has been supported by the following grant
programs: Princeton University's James T. Liu Fellowship, the Chiang
Ching-kuo Dissertation Fellowship, the Committee for Scholarly Com-
munication with China dissertation grant, the An Wang Postdoctoral
Fellowship at Harvard University's Fairbank Center, and the Hellman
Fellows Program at Williams College. I also relied on research funds from
the University of Rochester and Williams College.
I have learned much from those that have read sections of this work
or commented on presentations of it: Paul Cohen, Henrietta Harrison,
James Hevia, William Kirby, Philip Kuhn, Elizabeth Perry, Ezra Vogel,
and Madeline Zelin. William D. Wray has been especially generous with
advice, contacts, and sources. Thanks to Robert Bickers for including me
in two projects that helped this book along, as well as for his generous