The Price of Collapse: The Little Ice Age and the Fall of Ming China

The Ming dynasty collapsed in 1644 due to the Manchu invasion of China, but the truth is far more profound. The Price of Collapse provides an entirely new approach to the economic and social history of China, exploring how global climate crisis spelled the end of Ming rule. Timothy Brook draws on the history of grain prices to paint a gripping portrait of the final tumultuous years of a once-great dynasty. He explores how global trade networks that increasingly moved silver into China may have affected prices and describes the daily struggle to survive amid grain shortages and famine.

Format: Hardback
Length: 256 pages
Publication date: 21 November 2023
Publisher: Princeton University Press

In 1644, after nearly three centuries of relative stability and prosperity, the Ming dynasty collapsed. While many historians attribute its demise to the Manchu invasion of China, the truth is far more profound. The Price of Collapse offers a fresh perspective on China's economic and social history, exploring how the global climate crisis brought an end to Ming rule. The mid-seventeenth century marked the most severe phase of the Little Ice Age, characterized by plummeting temperatures and rainfall, causing widespread economic instability. Timothy Brook employs the history of grain prices to vividly depict the final tumultuous years of a once-great dynasty. He delves into how global trade networks, which shifted silver into China, may have influenced prices and describes the daily challenges faced by people amidst grain shortages and famine. By the early 1640s, as the subjects of the Ming faced a deadly combination of cold and drought that defied all efforts to prevent disaster, the Ming price regime collapsed, leading to the collapse of the Ming political regime.

A masterful work of scholarship, The Price of Collapse reconstructs the experiences of ordinary people under the immense pressure of unaffordable prices as their country transitioned from prosperity to calamity. It demonstrates how the market mediated the relationship between an empire and the climate that turned against it.

Weight: 596g
Dimension: 165 x 242 x 25 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780691250403