量化数据库与历史研究

Quantitative Databases and Historical Research

历史学在今日仍被视为传统学科之一,但非历史学者借助大规模历史量化数据库进行自然和社会科学研究并取得重要成果的现象却有不断增长之势。不同于传统计量史学和以经济学为代表的社会科学学科所注重的"解释型学术",量化数据库推动的是"求是型学术",即通过统计分析从大规模系统数据中挖掘新事实、产生新认识。中国历史中长期存在规模宏大的户籍登记、土地分配和科考记录等系统材料以及海量文字记录,很多已得到收集和整理,有利于构建大规模数据库并开展定量研究。这种新的研究范式不仅有助于历史学科自身发展,更能够促进跨学科、跨国界的学术交流与融合,并为全面深入认识中国社会历史特征、平衡东西方学术发展作出贡献。

Historiography is still regarded today as one of the traditional disciplines.However,more and more non-historians engaged in natural and social science research are turning to large-scale quantitative historical databases,with important results.Unlike traditional quantitative historiography and the 'interpretive research' stressed by the social sciences,particularly economics,what quantitative databases promote is 'truth-seeking scholarship,' i.e.,unearthing new facts and gaining new understanding from a mass of systemic data by means of statistical analysis.Chinese history has long had a huge amount of systemic material on household registration,land distribution and the imperial examination system,as well as an immense number of written records.Many of them have been collected and organized,facilitating the construction of large-scale databases and the development of quantitative research.This new research paradigm not only encourages the development of the discipline of history itself,but also promotes inter-disciplinary and cross-border academic communication and integration;it thus contributes to a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of the distinctive features of Chinese social history as well as to balanced Eastern and Western scholarly development.