农业、人口与市场——再论波士坦的“新人口论”  

Agriculture,Population and Market:On Postan's New Population Theory

作　　者：谢丰斋[1] 

机构地区：[1]天津师范大学欧洲经济社会发展研究中心,教授天津300387

出　　处：《世界历史》2013年第1期15-27,157-158,共13页World History

基　　金：国家社科基金资助项目;批准号为10BSS007

摘　　要：波士坦的"新人口论"是西方经济史领域研究中世纪经济的一个非常有影响的理论,20世纪70年代末已经遭受过很多批评。批评者认为,它对同时期整个欧洲经济没有普遍的说服力,但是并没有指出其不足的原因所在。本文认为,如果将"新人口论"拿来检验中国传统社会、尤其检验中国清朝"康乾"时期的人地关系时,就会发现"新人口论"将面临崩溃的危险。人口因素的确是前近代社会经济发生长时段波动的关键性因素之一,但不是唯一的、甚至不是至关重要的因素;单纯从经济学的角度看,市场因素也同样重要。中西方传统社会因社会经济结构不同,市场机制也不一样。中国主要以"自然生成"的市场为主;西欧则以"法权驱动"的市场占多数,这样的市场会造成市场权的竞争。正是市场权的竞争加剧了人口变化的力度,否则,单纯的人口数量不足以造成经济出现周期性波动。如果将人口因素与市场因素合到一起,那么,"新人口论"就更有说服力了。M.M.Postan's New Population Theory is of great influence on the research of medieval economy affiliated to the study of Western economic history,which has,however,suffered a lot of criticism in the late 1970s.Critics said it had no universally convincing power on the European economy as a whole in the same period,but nobody identified the causes for its inefficiency.This paper suggests that,if applied to check the traditional Chinese society,especially the man-land relationship during the Kangxi and Qianlong reign in China,the ' New Population' theory is on the brink of collapse.The demographic factor is one of the key factors leading to the long-term socio-economic fluctuations in premodern period indeed,but it is rarely the sole or crucial one.From an economic perspective alone,the market factor is also of equal importance.Because of the different socio-economic structures,the market mechanisms vary in the Chinese and Western traditional societies.Chinese markets are primarily 'naturally generated',while the West European markets 'driven by legal rights',which will result in the competition of market rights.It is just the competition of market rights that intensifies the populationchanges;otherwise the population size alone is not enough to cause the cyclical economic fluctuations.If integrated with the demographic factor and the market factor,the ' New Population' theory will become more convincing.

关 键 词：“新人口论” 西欧 中国 市场机制 传统社会结构 

分 类 号：C924.2[社会学—人口学]