Sino-Japanese "Collaboration" in Shanghai during the Asian Pacific War : The Case of Raw Cotton Purchasing

Abstract

The present article deals with business ventures conducted between Japanese and Chinese cotton industry entrepreneurs during the Japanese occupation of Shanghai from the beginning of the Asian Pacific War on. Because the Chinese term for "collaboration" (hezuo 合作) was used during the Occupation to legitimize Japan's presence in China, those Chinese capitalists who collaborated in those ventures have heretofore been referred to as "traitors" among the Chinese masses. However, the present article puts aside such political ramifications in favor of the economic reality of Chinese capitalists making rational business decisions in dealing with their Japanese counterparts. It was the disappearance of foreign-produced cotton in Japan, due to the outbreak of the Asian Pacific conflict, that brought Chinese and Japanese cotton entrepreneurs together into the collaboration; however, their intentions differed greatly. The Chinese were concerned with the benefits that an increase in raw cotton production would have for the domestic spinning and weaving industry as a whole, while the Japanese were mainly interested in finding a stable supplier of raw cotton. It was such a conflict of interest that resulted in the ultimate failure of the transactions in the midst of overemphasis on Japanese interests and Chinese passive resistance to them. The cause of the failure was not only the irrationality of Japanese imperialism, but also because the purchasing ventures did not function sufficiently for either party. From the vision of Chinese capitalists concerning the collaboration and from their actual behavior after the projects were begun, it can also be seen that they did not blindly follow the instructions of their Japanese partners, but rather acted in their own interests as economically rational Chinese entrepreneurs.