The Big Divergence

Questions: How the West and China diverged in their modern development.

During Professor Kenneth Pomeranz’s lecture about the Great Divergence between China and the West after 18th century, he emphasized on the fact that China and Euro actually didn’t have much difference in terms of productivity level, calories per capital labor, and population growth rate. In order to explain the causes for the big divergence after the 18th century, Professor Pomeranz stated that the West, especially England, had very easy access to fuels like coal which enables the spread of internal-combustion engine. Moreover, England was able to avoid Malthusian trap through the expansion of new market in the new continent, America.

In addition to the external evidence, Chinese traditional philosophy, Confucianism, is the internal element that prevent the industrialization of China. While the western world started to embrace new technology and the benefits it brought, Chinese government were still protective about their own culture, and such reaction is a direct result of Confucianism idea that older is better. Moreover, the ruler of China at that time published very strict policy about civilians using foreign luxury items because they clearly recognized that fact that more exposure of such new technology will encourage the rebellious idea within the Chinese general public especially given the fact that they have been suppressed for over 18 centuries. For example, when optical glasses were first introduced into China, only the emperor and high level officials can use those. Although optical glass was later introduced to the general public, China overall was very strict about importing goods and ideologies.

Moreover, China could never experience capitalization during the 18th century because the merchants never successfully broke the supervision from the officials, and their social status was quite low compare to the social status of the rich man in Europe. For a long period of time,...