Golas, Peter J.

East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine (EASTM - Universität Tübingen)

134 EASTM 17 (2000)
Donald B. Wagner, The Traditional Chinese Iron Industry and its Modern Fate.
Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Report series, No. 32. Richmond, Surrey:
Curzon Press, 1997. xii, 106 pp.
Peter J. Golas
[Peter J. Golas is professor of history at the University of Denver. His volume
on mining for Science and Civilisation in China has recently appeared and he is
currently researching the history of technological illustration in China.]
This solid little book, a revised and considerably expanded version of an article
originally published in this journal (Vol. 12 (1995), pp. 138-61), is a tour-de-
force. In a mere 79 pages of text, the author describes in some detail the Chinese
iron industry of late imperial times while also providing a nuanced discussion of
the changes the industry underwent in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in
response to foreign competition, war and revolution, and the resulting changes in
the Chinese economy. His main concern is to show "the ways in which techno-
logical choices interact with other historical factors" (p. 1).
As in his volume on the Dabieshan iron industry1 and in the monumental
Iron and Steel in Ancient China,2 Wagner insists on a thorough understanding of
the techniques of iron production as the necessary prelude to comprehending the
iron industry in its larger context. Even with his finely-honed ability to describe
technological matters with considerable clarity, there are points at which the
complexities of the technology might easily overwhelm the story. Here, Wagner
wisely relegates the details to boxes separate from the main text, a feast for those
keenly interested in the technology itself but easily skimmed by those whose
main interests lie elsewhere. (On the other hand, there are times when most read-
ers could have used a bit more technological explanation, as when we are told
that the "roundabout" "indirect process" is the most efficient way to produce
wrought iron (p. 13) but are left to wonder just why that is so.)
In a concise analysis that nevertheless displays considerable breadth and
depth, the author focuses on four regional components of the traditional iron
industry in China, each with its distinctive structures and techniques responding
to its raw material endowment, its labor force, and its market possibilities: (1)
the Dabieshan mountains at the intersection of the borders of Henan, Hubei and
Anhui, where a small-scale iron industry was crucial to an economy marked by
severe poverty; (2) Sichuan with its large-scale ironworks and the largest blast
                                                
1 Donald B. Wagner, Dabieshan: Traditional Chinese Iron-production Techniques
Practiced in Southern Henan in the Twentieth Century (London & Malmö: Curzon Press,
1985). The discussion in the present volume is able to benefit from sources not available
to him when writing that work (p. 15).
2 Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1993.
135 Reviews
furnaces in China, all made possible by a large but isolated market; (3) Shanxi,
whose considerable production for the north China market relied on the use of a
distinctive crucible smelting process by large numbers of small producers; and
(4) Guangdong, where one sees a unique dual-sector industry with large-scale
and small-scale ironworks. After three introductory chapters that describe his
aims for this book, discuss the changing "economic geography" of traditional
iron production during the 19th and 20th centuries (right up to the Great Leap
Forward), and provide a brief overview of traditional iron production techniques,
Wagner devotes a separate chapter to each of his regions. In these chapters, he
first discusses in some detail the technology of iron production in that region and
then moves on to relate the technology to the structure of the industry in the con-
text of the economic and geographical conditions in which it found itself. A
short concluding chapter neatly summarizes the main points of the story.
Wagner attributes the general decline of the Chinese iron industry during the
19th and early 20th centuries above all to competition from cheap imported iron.
What makes this book so useful, however, is his explanation of how and why
this happened in different contexts (and, indeed, largely did not happen in Da-
bieshan). Guangdong, for example, found its large, highly-capitalized ironworks
particularly vulnerable, as was true also in other parts of China. Wagner argues
persuasively that this rather counter-intuitive phenomenon can be explained in
large measure by the fact that big ironworks had to have access to an extensive
market that, in turn, was impossible without good transportation facilities. Those
very same transportation advantages, however, typically made possible the pene-
tration of the market by low-priced foreign imports, with which the Chinese
could not compete.
This book, despite its size, does not shy away from some very big questions.
For example, Wagner argues that technological "progress" need not be defined
exclusively by the implemention of innovations. Looking at the question "in
another, more detached, sense" (?), he suggests viewing as "progress" the aban-
donment of theoretically best practices when economic circumstances may call
for reversion to earlier, less "sophisticated" methods if these changes "make for a
more efficient iron industry in the specific context in which it must function" (p.
46). An interesting point, if not beyond question. One wonders exactly what is
meant by "efficiency," and what is the link between efficiency and quality. The
pressure of foreign competition, as the book notes, brought a decline in the qual-
ity of iron produced in places like Shansi which were forced to make technologi-
cal changes, usually leading to lower quality, in a struggle to reduce their costs.
One can also appreciate, while reserving assent to, some of Wagner's more
speculative suggestions. We learn, for example, that the small-scale technologies
of Dabieshan and Guangdong, well-adapted to the conditions in which they
found themselves and largely impervious to foreign competition, seem to have
undergone little change in the 19th and 20th centuries. Wagner suggests that, with
the loss of imported iron in World War I which sent iron prices in China soaring,
the large-scale industries based on production techniques of an earlier period
136 EASTM 17 (2000)
might have made a comeback but were unable to do so because the earlier tech-
nology had been forgotten. This is an interesting and plausible speculation, but it
relies only on the Guangdong case. We will need more evidence before we can
assess whether it can serve to describe what happened in iron production centers
such as Yunnan and Hunan (p. 30), which are not treated in this book.
Special thanks should also go to the publisher of this volume. Ample in-line
Chinese characters, notes at the bottom of the page; 29 illustrations; and a very
nice map including all modern place names mentioned, make the book a pleasure
to read, even in a rather small font. Would that the publishers had chosen a less
glossy paper, thereby sparing the reader that annoying glare in all but the most
ideal lighting conditions.


Donald B. Wagner, The Traditional Chinese Iron Industry and its Modern Fate

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