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Three years ago in this journal, James Peck argued that “the professional ideology of America’s China watchers” has tended to blind them to certain approaches to modern Chinese history that might be labelled “revolutionary Marxist” interpretations.1 As an example, Peck argued that the China watchers have explained China’s nineteenth and early twentieth century difficulties (prolonged economic and military weakness, failed reforms and revolutions) by reference to internal factors (culture, social structure), while a revolutionary Marxist perspective would seek explanations in the effects of imperialism.2He provided several examples of the types of effects imperialism may have had on China: “The power of the metropolitan countries to block the formation of vital domestic industries in the dependent countries competitive with their own operations; the domination of mercantile over industrial capital; and the subordination of the economic life of a dependent nation to the severe fluctuations of the primary commodities market.” 3But he did not have space in his article, which was primarily concerned with a critique of existing work in the China field, to provide a fuller outline of what the imperialism approach to modern China might involve. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]