In A.D. 1227, during the Southern Sung, the four hsien on the peninsula in Chekiang which is dominated by Ningpo supported twenty-six rural markets; six and a half centuries later, during the Kuang-hsü reign, there were approximately 170 rural markets in the same territory. Chin-t'ang hsien, Szechwan, had four rural markets at the beginning of the K'ang-hsi reign in 1662; by 1875 the number had increased to thirteen and by 1921 to thirty-two. Rural markets in Yen-shan hsien, Hopei, rose from twenty-three in 1868 to thirty-seven in 1916. By what principles and in accordance with what patterns do markets thus proliferate on the landscape?

Chinese history is bedevilled by a false image of the throne. With few exceptions the emperor remains in the thrall of his ideologists—a tired, familiar, synthetic figure whose range of attributes is limited to Good and Bad and whose portrait ignores the face for the robes. This is not a credible image, but it is a durable one. Only recently has its authenticity been challenged and its flatness rejected. Analysis has finally moved from acceptance of the one-dimensional, simple cliché to the two-dimensional, complex stereotype. The typological components of the “good first” and “bad last” emperor have been identified and isolated; the administrative components of the “organizing,” “normalcy,” “reforming,” and “ineffectual” emperor-types have been articulated. It remains to add a third dimension where we discern not a unified figure (however complex its components) but a composite figure made up of several images from quite disparate sources.

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that under at least one of the so-called “warlords” or military rulers who governed China during the 1930's, there occurred political, social, and, above all, economic changes of the utmost importance. These changes took place in the northwestern province of Shansi, where, beginning in 1932, the warlord Yen Hsi-shan undertook to modernize the underdeveloped economy of his domain by carrying out a “provincial Ten-Year Plan of Economic Reconstruction,” or Shan-hsi sheng-cheng shih-nien chien-she chi-hua. I have chosen to call Yen's scheme for promoting economic growth in Shansi “China's First Five-Year Plan,” since in addition to being cut short by the Japanese occupation of Shansi only five years after its inception, it was inspired by the success of Russia's first five-year plan. Throughout the 1930's, Yen and his supporters repeatedly lavished praise on the Soviet Union for its spectacular accomplishments in the field of industrial development and advocated adopting Russian methods in order to achieve similar results in China. Notwithstanding his hatred of the Chinese Communists, who invaded Shansi in the winter of 1936, Yen continued to praise the Soviet economy throughout the 1930'5, holding it up as a model for China and for Shansi. “The Soviet Union accomplishes in one year what it takes other countries five years to achieve,” he remarked.

In old Guntur District, as in other districts of South India, several different elite groups, arranged within a highly complex and segmented social order, were interlocked with corresponding elements of the political hierarchy. Each group was associated in one way or another with its own stratum in district government and, at times, with seeral different strata, from die Collector's Office at the top to the village at the bottom. Operating at its own level or in its own area of the district, each group was linked vertically with allied superior and subordinate groups and was often in conflict with another group of comparable and therefore competitive rank and function. Such a pattern of group relationships was further complicated by die fact that it was constantly changing. My purpose here is to look at the positions of diese elite groups in relation to each other and in relation to the administrative structure of one district, and to show how these groups behaved within a changing political system and how traditional processes of power continued under die “rule” of die East India Company.

Since World War II, the monopoly on Indonesian studies acquired by the Dutch as a consequence of the course of Western expansion has gradually been broken. The traditional barriers between geographical areas of study along the lines of their political frontiers are gone, and now the gap between continental and insular Southeast Asia may be bridged. This paper will demonstrate how data from the continental area may be used to solve a problem in the insular area.

Ce que dit le Professeur P. E. de Josselin de Jong d'après P. Arndt des conceptions des Ngad'a de Florès pourrait êtré applique presque mot pour mot aux Mnong Gar: “In the spirit world die deva, the spirits, keep buffaloes, just as men do on earth. These spirit buffaloes are each connected with a human being; and when a deva slaughters a buffalo in the spirit world, a man on earth must die.” Ces “spirit buffaloes” correspondent aux hêeng rpuh des Mnong Gar que j'ai traduit faute de mieux par “âmes-buffles.” Chaque fois qu'un sorcier (caak) ou un génie (yaang, ce qui correspond au deva du texte cité) capture une hêeng rpuh, I'homme qui correspond à celle-ci tombe malade, le sacrifice d'un animal—qui peut aller jusqu'à être un buffle—permettra de libérer le malade; lorsque les yaang immolent une “âme-buffle” l'homme qui lui correspond meurt. D'autre part on assimile la croissance sociale de l'homme à la croissance physique de son “âme-buffle;” et le terme même de kuang (que j'ai traduit en français par approximation par “puissant”) sert à désigner l'home puissant, celui qui a été capable d'immoler des buffles (signe suprême de la puissance, ou si i'on veut, de la richess, à condition de donner à ce mot sa connotation mnong: on n'accumule des biens que pour les engloutir dans de grands sacrifices), ce mot kuang désigne un animal adulte mâle, notamment dans rpuh kuang “grand buffle mâle” taille de l'âme buffle d'un homme puissant, d'un kuang. C'est dans ce sens, je crois, qu'il faut considérer le cas du cadavre cité par le Pr. de Josselin de Jong. Autre exemple de corrélation entre l'homme et le buffle: on sait que lorsqu'une épidémie a ravageé un village, les habitants de ce village l'abandonnent un temps, puis reconstruisent leurs maisons sur un autre rngool (emplacement de village). De même, après une grande Fête du Sol (Nyiit Döng) où la majorité des foyers a immolé un ou deux buffles les maisons du village doivent être démontées et reconstruites sur un autre rngool, car l'hécatombe de buffles produit le même effet que la mort de plusieurs hommes.