Infrastructural Globalization

Lighting the China Coast, 1860s–1930s

Dados Bibliográficos

ID8959532
AutoresRobert Bickers (0000-0002-3663-7658, autor correspondente)
Ano2013
Volume56
Fascículo2
Páginas431-458
Data de publicação2013-05-03
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Historical Journal (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0018-246X • E-ISSN: 1469-5103
EditoraCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0018246x13000010
OpenAlexW2006810539
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas5
Referências citadas49

This article calls for attention to be paid to the infrastructures that underpinned nineteenth-century globalization, and the use of better-known technological developments and global patterns of professional migration. It does so by outlining the work of the Marine Department of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service after 1868, focusing on its development of a network of lighthouses along the coast of China in its political and comparative contexts. These lights were at once local sites and nodes within a developing national and global system, and evolving practices around circulation of data and best practice, accepted international standards, technology transfer, and maritime safety. The Customs Service was a Chinese government agency, albeit within the British orbit of influence, but acted as a buffer between China and foreign interests and pressures

Agency (philosophy · Business · China · Circulation (fluid dynamics · Economics · Economy · Geography · Globalization · Government (linguistics · International trade · Political science · Politics · Service (business · Social science · Sociology · Work (physics · Chinese history and philosophy · Engineering · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · Law