近代手工业中包买商制度的再分析——基于交易成本理论与委托代理理论的视角

A Restudy at the Putting-Out System in Contemporary Cottage Industry——Based on the Transaction Theory and the Principal-Agent Theory

从原工业化向工业化过渡时,大多数原工业化地区在过渡的进程中都失败了,可称之为"工业化的解体"。从本质上看,这一转换的关键在于将技术进步应用于生产过程,进而实现从家庭手工业生产向工厂制机器生产的转型。由于小农阶级先天的不足,商人阶级在此转型过程中扮演了关键角色。本文着眼于从非传统的视角研究我国近代手工业中广泛存在的包买商制度。研究表明,风险偏好与交易成本在很大程度上共同决定了商人阶级所采用的生产组织形式。

For the transition from the proto-industrialization to the industrialization in history, most regions of the proto-industrialization in the world have failed, which could be named as the＂Deindustrialization＂. In essential, the key for this transition to the mechanical production system from the cottage industry production system lays in the application of the new technology to the production process. In this process,due to the innate limitations of the peasantry, the merchant class acted as a key role. Based on the transaction costs theory and the principal-agent theory, this thesis focus on the putting-out system widespread in contemporary China from a non-traditional perspective. The study shows that the risk appetite and transaction costs to a large extent mutually determined the organization form of production chosen by the merchant class. In contemporary China, the unstable domestic and international situations led the merchant class prone to be risk averse. Coupled with the sharp rise in agency costs caused by the asymmetric information along with the expansion of subcontracting ranges between merchants and small producers, the consequence is that, even in sacrifice of efficiency, most merchants were not willing to transit to the more advanced workshop or mechanical production system from the putting-out system when their production reach a certain large scale, which to a large degree impedes the development of the cottage industry in contemporary China.