Opium and Empire

Opium and Empire PDF Author: Richard J. Grace
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0773596828
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 473

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Book Description
In 1832 William Jardine and James Matheson established what would become the greatest British trading company in East Asia in the nineteenth century. After the termination of the East India Company's monopoly in the tea trade, Jardine, Matheson & Company's aggressive marketing strategies concentrated on the export of teas and the import of opium, sold offshore to Chinese smugglers. Jardine and Matheson, recognized as giants on the scene at Macao, Canton, and Hong Kong, have often been depicted as one-dimensional villains whose opium commerce was ruthless and whose imperial drive was insatiable. In Opium and Empire, Richard Grace explores the depths of each man, their complicated and sometimes inconsistent internal workings, and their achievements and failures. He details their decades-long journeys between Britain and China, their business strategies and standards of conduct, and their inventiveness as "gentlemanly capitalists." The commodities they marketed also included cotton, rice, textile goods, and silks and they functioned as agents for clients in India, Britain, Singapore, and Australia. During the First Opium War Jardine was in London giving advice to Lord Palmerston, while Matheson was detained under house arrest at Canton in the spring of 1839, an incident which helped prompt the armed British response. Moving beyond the caricatures of earlier accounts, Opium and Empire tells the story of two Scotsmen whose lives reveal a great deal about the type of tough-minded men who expanded the global markets of Victorian Britain and played major roles in changing the course of modern history in East Asia.

Opium and Empire

Opium and Empire PDF Author: Richard J. Grace
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0773596828
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 473

Get Book Here

Book Description
In 1832 William Jardine and James Matheson established what would become the greatest British trading company in East Asia in the nineteenth century. After the termination of the East India Company's monopoly in the tea trade, Jardine, Matheson & Company's aggressive marketing strategies concentrated on the export of teas and the import of opium, sold offshore to Chinese smugglers. Jardine and Matheson, recognized as giants on the scene at Macao, Canton, and Hong Kong, have often been depicted as one-dimensional villains whose opium commerce was ruthless and whose imperial drive was insatiable. In Opium and Empire, Richard Grace explores the depths of each man, their complicated and sometimes inconsistent internal workings, and their achievements and failures. He details their decades-long journeys between Britain and China, their business strategies and standards of conduct, and their inventiveness as "gentlemanly capitalists." The commodities they marketed also included cotton, rice, textile goods, and silks and they functioned as agents for clients in India, Britain, Singapore, and Australia. During the First Opium War Jardine was in London giving advice to Lord Palmerston, while Matheson was detained under house arrest at Canton in the spring of 1839, an incident which helped prompt the armed British response. Moving beyond the caricatures of earlier accounts, Opium and Empire tells the story of two Scotsmen whose lives reveal a great deal about the type of tough-minded men who expanded the global markets of Victorian Britain and played major roles in changing the course of modern history in East Asia.

Dragons

Dragons PDF Author: Liam Byrne
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1781857466
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 585

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Book Description
Britain's rise to global dominance from the 16th century owed as much to the vision and creativity of traders, industrialists and bankers as it did to wars of conquest fought by military men. DRAGONS tells the story of British business endeavour through the lives of ten titans of commerce. Beginning with the Tudor merchants who transformed England's economy via trade with the New World, Liam Byrne traces an entrepreneurial golden line through men such as Thomas Pitt, saviour of the East India Company; financier Nathan Rothschild, creator of the modern bond market; William Lever, brand-builder, philanthropist, and creator of Britain's first great multinational; and John Spedan Lewis, founder of the employee-owned John Lewis Partnership. At the start of the 21st century Britain remains a major economic power. DRAGONS is both a rousing celebration of British business genius and a fascinatingly informative narrative of a neglected but essential strand of our island's story.

Opium Traders and Their Worlds-Volume One

Opium Traders and Their Worlds-Volume One PDF Author: M. Kienholz
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 0595910785
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 411

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Book Description
Opium Traders and Their Worlds examines the opium trade with a detective's investigative approach. The author uses evidence to dismiss many of the false claims commonly held with regard to the so-called "legitimacy" of the Old China trade, presents proof of important figures who were deeply involved in all parts of the world and shows how world events were affected by famous men in opium hierarchies. Lateral contributors to the drug trade include shipbuilders who fashioned their craft to meet needs of the commerce, designing specially built Indiamen, clippers, and "fast crabs." Ms. Kienholz shows how vicious competition in the trade moved players like chess pieces, with winners and losers shifting positions. Her research into the production of the new "opioids" such as oxycodone is an area not previously probed.

The Thistle and the Jade

The Thistle and the Jade PDF Author: Maggie Keswick
Publisher: White Lion Publishing
ISBN: 9780711228306
Category : China
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Jardine, Matheson & Co. was founded in Canton in 1832, and built up to become an international trading house with business interests throughout the world. The Thistle & The Jade assembles contributions from both leading historians, such as Professor John King Fairbank and Professor K.C. Lui, and old Jardine hands, including Alan Reid and Sir John Keswick, to tell the story of how this happened. The result is a fascinating miscellany of scholarship and anecdote that tells an exciting tale of merchant adventure, of how wealth and influence were accumulated in the early days of trading, and of the special relationship forged by 'the Princely Hong' with China and her people.

Britain and Japan

Britain and Japan PDF Author: Hugh Cortazzi
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136641408
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 502

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Book Description
The continuing success of this series, highly regarded by scholars and the general reader alike, has prompted The Japan Society to commission this fourth volume, devoted as before to the lives of key people, both British and Japanese, who have made significant contributions to the development of Anglo-Japanese relations. The appearance of this volume brings the number of portraits published to over one hundred. The portraits cover diplomats (from Mori Arinori to Sir Francis Lindley), businessmen (from William Keswick to Lasenby Liberty), engineers and teachers (from W. E. Ayrton to Henry Spencer Palmer), scholars and writers (from Sir Edwin Arnold to Ivan Morris), as well as journalists, judo masters and the aviator Lord Semphill. In all, there are a total of 34 contributions.

Chinese Christians

Chinese Christians PDF Author: Carl T. Smith
Publisher: Hong Kong University Press
ISBN: 9622096883
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
Provided with a Western-style education and versed in the English language by missionaries, the 19th-century Chinese Christian was a man who stood between cultures. The author shows how this dual aspect of his thought and outlook enabled him to act as liaison with foreigners promoting trade and commerce.

Eurasian

Eurasian PDF Author: Emma Teng
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520276272
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
In the second half of the nineteenth century, global labor migration, trade, and overseas study brought China and the United States into close contact, leading to new cross-cultural encounters that brought mixed-race families into being. Yet the stories of these families remain largely unknown. How did interracial families negotiate their identities within these societies when mixed-race marriage was taboo and “Eurasian” often a derisive term? In Eurasian, Emma Jinhua Teng compares Chinese-Western mixed-race families in the United States, China, and Hong Kong, examining both the range of ideas that shaped the formation of Eurasian identities in these diverse contexts and the claims set forth by individual Eurasians concerning their own identities. Teng argues that Eurasians were not universally marginalized during this era, as is often asserted. Rather, Eurasians often found themselves facing contradictions between exclusionary and inclusive ideologies of race and nationality, and between overt racism and more subtle forms of prejudice that were counterbalanced by partial acceptance and privilege. By tracing the stories of mixed and transnational families during an earlier era of globalization, Eurasian also demonstrates to students, faculty, scholars, and researchers how changes in interracial ideology have allowed the descendants of some of these families to reclaim their dual heritage with pride.

Open Doors

Open Doors PDF Author: Christopher Bo Bramsen
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136847677
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Book Description
On one level, this is an intriguing account of expat life in Shanghai's International settlement in the early 20th century. On another level is charted the introduction and growth of new western technologies and companies in China. And the backdrop to these stories is early 20th century China itself: the hopes, fears, turmoil and grandeur of the age.

CultureShock! Hong Kong

CultureShock! Hong Kong PDF Author: Betty Wei
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish International Asia Pte Ltd
ISBN: 9814435708
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Despite the modern high-rise buildings, international brand names and many Caucasian faces, Hong Kong still retains much of its Asian character. Learn how fung shui influences the way of life and the importance of the concept of ‘face’, which affects interpersonal relationships and business transactions. Packed with practical tips and a comprehensive resource section, CultureShock! Hong Kong is all you will need to survive and succeed in this highly competitive society.

Liverpool China Traders

Liverpool China Traders PDF Author: Christina Baird
Publisher: Peter Lang
ISBN: 9783039109265
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
Perhaps the most enduring image of the China Trade is the clipper ship carrying tea from China. In 1869 the clippers were finally overshadowed by the introduction of steam vessels which could make passage through the Suez Canal, significantly shortening the length of the voyage. Letters, journals and order books have survived which tell us about the traders, their private trading activities, motivation, tastes and private lives. This book examines the role played by the port of Liverpool in this time of great change. The book examines Liverpool's early participation in the China Trade following the cessation of the British East India Company's monopoly of the trade in 1834 and maps the changes in artistic tastes that the commencement of free trade gave rise to. These new tastes represented a true fusion of European and Chinese cultural influences and replaced the pastiche of 'The Orient' that chinoiserie represented during the period of the monopoly.--Amazon.com.