Lightning Wires: The Telegraph and China's Technological Modernization, 1860-1890 (review)

Reviews 353 Erik Baark. Lightning Wires: The Telegraph and China's Technological Modernization, 1860-1890. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1997. xii, 216 pp. Hardcover $69.50, isbn 0-313-30011-9. The telegraph transformed nineteenth-century commerce and statecraft, invigorating capitalism and giving advantages in diplomacy and war to the countries that possessed it over those that did not. China's early encounters with the new technology occurred in the context of struggles with the military and commercial incursions by the foreign powers into Chinese territory. The history ofthe adoption ofthe telegraph in China cannot be separated from China's encounters with capitalism and imperialism. Encounters with Western technology also sent shocks rippling through Chinese culture, the effects ofwhich emerged in realms as diverse as the philosophical ruminations ofthe literati and the fengshui worries of peasants. The telegraph was eventually accepted in China, but not before a series of rejections and conflicts that extended over several decades. Baark provides a well-researched account ofthe initial resistance to and eventual adoption of the telegraph in China between the 1860s and the 1880s. The book is able to offer a more in-depth account ofsome ofthis process than previous accounts by using material from the Copenhagen archives of the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Danish Great Northern Telegraph Company, which had participated aggressively in the development oftelegraph lines in East Asia. These Danish materials provide a valuable supplement to more traditional historical sources such as the archives of the Qing government's Office for Foreign Affairs (the Zongli Yamen). Chapter 1 deals with general theoretical approaches to the study oftechnology transfer and the social impact oftechnology. The main theoretical rivals in the literature are said to be technological determinism and contextualism (the social shaping oftechnology). Baark's own approach is less theoretical and abstract than some previous work, and more densely historical. He prefers a detailed examination ofevents and associated discourses to show the complexity of the process by which a radical new technology was finally absorbed into a conservative society. Chapter 2 describes the evolving conflict between what have been called the yangwu modernizers and various qingyi traditionalists, who "saw in modern technology the instruments offoreign aggression and a subversion ofthe Chinese political order and cultural values" (p. 21). We meet familiar figures such as Li© 1998 by University Hongzhang, Prince Gong, Zeng Guofan, and Shen Baozhen, along with a number ofHawai'i Pressoflesser officials, all struggling to promote or preserve various national or sectional interests. Admirers ofLi Hongzhang will be interested to see how quickly he perceived the importance ofthe telegraph, and how accuratelyhe foresaw the 354 China Review International: Vol. 5, No. 2, Fall 1998 pressures that would eventually force China to adopt it, despite initial resistance from some conservative officials. Chapter 3 provides a useful overview of the invention and spread of telegraph technology, its growing use in global commerce and diplomacy, and its spread into East Asia. Chapter 4 deals with the arrival oftelegraph companies in East Asia and their early attempts to introduce telegraph lines into China, the development of the submarine cable between Hong Kong and Shanghai, and the construction of selected lines in the foreign treaty ports, often with the acquiescence of local officials. Chapter 5, "The Telegraph Lines in Fujian, 1874-1877," describes the attempts to build the first land lines outside the treaty ports. In the 1870s, the attitudes of some early resisters changed as a result of the military incursion by Japan into Taiwan, when Qing officials found that the telegraph allowed foreigners in Beijing to know more about daily developments on the edges of the empire than the empire's own ministers. The defense of Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan was a prime consideration in changing the minds of some officials about the new technology . A short line was quickly constructed, with little overt opposition from the local population or local officials, and a second line was planned between Fuzhou and Xiamen, in what appeared to be a mutually beneficial agreement between the Great Northern Telegraph Company and the provincial government. However, disagreements among Chinese officials over the nature and desirability of the contract with Great Northern led to the...