ABSTRACT
THE present survey, though brief in relation to its theme and incomplete in many particulars, has, it is hoped, succeeded in pointing the contrast between the experience of China and Japan in their reaction to Western entrepreneurial activity. The Westerners came to both countries in search of trade, and trade remained their major pre-occupation. But even if they had wished to do so, they could not have limited themselves to that field. The economic activities of a people form an organic whole; an expanding commerce is dependent upon, and at the same time makes possible, the existence of novel types of financial institutions, means of communication and forms of industrial organisation. When, therefore, traders from advanced countries make their impact upon 'under-developed' societies, they cannot restrict themselves to a single type of economic activity, and since in the country of their new adventure there are seldom found native economic institutions and ancillary services adequate to sustain a large-scale foreign trade, they are impelled to import these also. Once these institutions and services have been introduced, they soon cease to be mere adjuncts of merchanting, for they come to exist, as it were, in their own right for ministering to the needs of the developing economy.
