What Makes an Empire: A History of China from a Fiscal Perspective/何以帝国：从财政视角&#2 - Paperback

Follow the money, and see a different history of China. 跟着钱走，看见不一样的中华史。 In any time and space, the game of wealth can tear open a gap in history, allowing readers to see the contest of various forces from that cross-section and understand the true driving forces behind historical development. For the Chinese empire, the history of money is not just about "finance"-it is also about "governance." This book consists of thirty lectures, spanning from the early tax reforms of the pre-Qin period to the Ministry of Finance in the late Qing dynasty. By answering a series of historical questions, it re-examines the growth trajectory of ancient China through the lens of public finance, explaining many historical phenomena from the perspective of money. Each lecture revolves around three threads: first, the three elements of fiscal systems-revenue, expenditure, and management-and their evolving trajectories across historical time and space; second, the process of continuous growth of the Chinese state as seen through the lens of fiscal institutional change; and third, the historical progression of coercive power in the fiscal realm, from the private authority of the sovereign to its gradual publicization. 任何时空里，财富的博弈都可以把历史撕开一个口子，读者能从这个截面上看到各方力量的角逐，理解历史向前发展的真实动力。对于中华帝国来说，钱的历史，不只是"财"，更是"政"。 本书共三十讲，从先秦的初税亩，讲到晚清的度支部，通过解答一个个历史问题，用财政的线索重新梳理了一遍古代中国的成长历程，从钱的角度解释了众多历史中的现象。书中每讲皆围绕三个线索展开：，财政制度的三个要素，收入、支出、管理，在历史时空中不断变化的轨迹；第二，从财政制度变迁的角度，看中华国家不断成长的历程；第三，财政领域中的强制权力从君主私权一步步实现公共化的历史进程。