DEBIN MA
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  • Home
  • CV
  • Publications
  • Working Papers
  • Teaching
  • Chinese(中文)

Selected Publications

Journal articles


  • "Ideology and Economic Change: the Contrasting Paths to the Modern Economy in late 19th Century China and Japan" (co-authored with Jared Rubin), Journal of Government and Economics, Volume 15, Autumn 2024, 100122. 
  • "A Silver Transformation: Chinese Monetary Integration in Times of Political Disintegration, 1898–1933" (co-authored with Liuyan Zhao) Economic History Review. Volume 73, Issue 2, May 2020 Pages 513-539.
  • “The Paradox of Power: Principle-agent Problems and Administrative Capacity in Imperial China (and other Absolutist Regimes)" (co-authored with Jared Rubin). Journal of Comparative Economics. Vol. 47, Issue 2, June 2019, pp 277-294.
  •  "Financial Revolution in Republican China during 1900-1937: a Survey and New Interpretation" Australian Economic History Review. Vol. 59, No.3, Nov. 2019, pp. 242-262.
  • "Money, Finance and Commerce in Chinese History: an Introduction with Reference to the Special Issue" (co-authored with Cong Liu) Frontier of Economics Volume 13, Number 3, Sept. 2018, p.313-321
  • “What Makes Maddison Right, Chinese Historical Economic Data”, (co-authored with Jan Luiten van Zanden). World Economics. Vol. 18, No. 3 (September 2017): 203-213
  • “Introduction to the Special Issue: A New Economic History of China” (co-authored with Kris Mitchener). Explorations in Economic History. Vol. 63 (January 2017): 1-7
  • “The Development of Chinese Accounting and Bookkeeping before 1850: Insights from the Tong Taisheng Business Account Books (1798-1850)” (co-authored with Weipeng Yuan and Richard Macve). Accounting and Business Research. Vol. 47, No. 4 (2017): 401-430
  • “Discovering Economic History in Footnotes: The Story of Tŏng Tàishēng Merchant Archive (1790-1850) and the Historiography of Modern China” (co-authored with Weipeng Yuan). Modern China. Vol. 42, No. 5 (2016): 483–504
  • "State capacity and great divergence, the case of Qing China (1644–1911)." Eurasian Geography and Economics, Vol. 54, No. 5-6 (2014): 484-499
  • "From Divergence to Convergence: Re-evaluating the History Behind China's Economic Boom" (co-authored with Loren Brandt and Thomas G. Rawski). Journal of Economic Literature Vol. 52, No. 1 (2014): 45–123
  • “Wages, Prices, and Living Standards in China, 1738-1925: in Comparison with Europe, Japan and India”  (co-authored with Robert Allen, Jean-Pascal Bassino, Christine Moll-Murata and Jan Luiten van Zanden). Economic History Review Vol. 64, No. S1 (2011): 8-38
  • "Evolution of Living Standards and Human Capital in China in 18-20th Century" (co-authored with Joerg Baten, Stephen Morgan and Qing Wang). Explorations in Economic History Vol 47, No. 3 (July 2010): 347-359. [Chinese translation in Qingshi Luncong (Review of Qing History) 2011: 326-345]
  • “Economic Growth in the Lower Yangzi Region of China in 1911-1937: A Quantitative and Historical  Perspective.” The Journal of Economic History Vol. 68, No. 2 (June 2008): 385-392
  • “Real GDP in pre-War East Asia: a 1934-36 Benchmark Purchasing Power Parity Comparison with the U.S" (co-authored with Kyoji Fukao and Tangjun Yuan). Review of Income and Wealth Vol. 53 No. 3 (September 2007): 503-537
  • “International Comparison in Historical Perspective: Reconstructing the 1934-6 Purchasing Power Parity of Japan, Taiwan and Korea” (co-authored with Kyoji Fukao and Tangjuin Yuan). Explorations in Economic History Vol. 43, No. 2 (April 2006): 280-308
  • “Law and Commerce in Traditional China, an Institutional Perspective on the ‘Great Divergence’” Keizai-Shirin (経済志林) Vol. 73, No. 4 (March 2006): 69-96
  • “Japanese Unskilled Wages in International Perspective,1720-1913” (co-authored with Jean-Pascal Bassino). Research in Economic History Vol. 23 (2005): 229-248
  • “Between Cottage and Factory: the Evolution of Chinese and Japanese Silk-Reeling Industries in the Latter Half of 19th Century.”  Journal of The Asia Pacific Economy Vol. 10, No. 2 (May 2005): 195-213
  • “Growth, Institutions and Knowledge: A Review and Reflection on the Historiography of 18th-20th Century China.” Australian Economic History Review Vol. 44, No. 3 (November 2004; Special Issue on the Economic History of Asia): 259-277
  • “Why Japan, not China, Was the First to Develop in East Asia, Lessons from Sericulture 1850-1937.” Economic Development and Cultural Change Vol. 52, No. 2 (January 2004): 369-394
  • “Modern Silk Road: Global Raw Silk Market: 1850-1930.” The Journal of Economic History Vol. 56, No. 2 (June 1996): 330-355

Edited books & Special issues


  • "Special Issue on Chinese Economic History" guest-editor. Frontier of Economics Vol. 13, No. 3, (Sept. 2018): 313-530
  • “Special Issue: A New Economic History of China” Guest co-editor (with Kris Mitchner). Explorations in Economic History. Vol. 63 (January 2017): 1-106
  • Textiles in the Pacific, 1500-1900 (Volume 12 in Book Series: The Pacific World: Lands, Peoples and History of the Pacific, 1500-1900) Oxon, UK: Ashgate, 2005
  • Law and Long-Term Economic Change: An Eurasian Perspective (co-edited with Jan Luiten van Zanden). Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press 2011.

Book chapters


  • “Industrialization in China” (co-authored with Loren Brandt and Thomas Rawski) Chapter 9 in The Spread of Modern Industry to the Periphery since 1871  edited by Kevin O’Rourke and Jeffrey Williamson, Oxford University Press, 2017, pp.197-228.
  • “Chinese Money and Monetary System, 1800–2000, Overview” in Gerard Caprio (ed.) Handbook of Key Global Financial Markets, Institutions, and Infrastructure, Vol. 1 (volume editors: Charles Calomiris and Larry Neal), Oxford: Elsevier, 2013, pp.57-64. 
  • "Political Institution and Long Run Economic Trajectory: Some Lessons from Two Millennia of Chinese Civilization." Chapter 4 in Institutions and Comparative Economic Development, edited by Masahiko Aoki, Timur Kuran and Gerard Roland. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, pp.78-98
  • “Law and Economy in Traditional China, a 'Legal Origin' Perspective on Great Divergence.” Chapter 3 in Law and Long-Term Economic Change: an Eurasian Perspective, edited by Debin Ma and Jan Luiten van Zanden. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011 [See also the short piece on my chapter "Legal Origin, a Chinese Perspective" at VOX]
  • "The Great Silk Exchange: How the World was Connected and Developed" in Pacific Centuries: Pacific and Pacific Rim History Since the 16th Century, edited by D. Flynn, L. Frost and A.J.H. Latham, London and New York: Routledge, 1998. [Reprinted as Chapter 1 in Textiles in the Pacific, 1500-1900 (Volume 12 in Book Series: The Pacific World: Lands, Peoples and History of the Pacific, 1500-1900) Oxon, UK: Ashgate, 2005

Book reviews


  • Jean-Laurent Rosenthal and R. Bin Wong, Before and Beyond Divergence: The Politics of Economic Change in China and Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011. Review for Economic History Association. 
  • ​Avner Greif Institutions and the path to the modern economy: Lessons from medieval trade. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Review for Journal of Global History, Vol. 5, No. 01 (March 2010): 178-180.
  • The Resurgence of East Asia, 500, 150 and 50 Year Perspectives, edited by Giovanni Arrighi, Takeshi Hamashita, and Mark Selden. Review for Economic History Association, Feb 15, 2005.
  • China Maritime Customs and China Trade Statistics 1858-1948, by Thomas Lyons. Trumansburg, New York: Willow Creek Press, 2003. Review for Journal of Economic History, March 2004.
  • Economic Change in China, c. 1800-1950, by Philip Richardson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Review for  Economic History Association, June 2000.
Debin Ma   |   All Souls College   |   Oxford University
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