“Not a Club for Ethical Culture”: The Early Writings of Max Weber,Liang Qichao,and Kang Youwei on the Stock Exchange

This paper examines early discussions of stock exchanges by Max Weber, Liang Qichao, and Kang Youwei and considers their contemporaneity. Despite different contexts, the discussions shared a nineteenth-century preoccupation with global competition and Darwinian struggles for survival. All reveal the attendant anxieties of latecomer nations experiencing belated modernity. Weber, however, wrote from a position that embraced German colonialism, whereas Liang and Kang’s advocacy of stock exchanges was marked by concerns for the Chinese nation that emerged as a result of the experience of colonialism and economic imperialism.