About Shanghai 上海
In a country with roughly five millennia of
continuous history under its belt, Shanghai is a
relative newcomer. During the first few
centuries of its existence it was a mere fishing
village. It wasn't until the year 1074 under the
Song Dynasty that it was promoted to "market
town" status. And it took almost another
millenium before the newly-established
Republican government would finally own up and
call it a "city" in 1927. Before then, it had a
lowly designation as "county seat" for the
Songjiang Prefecture.
Semantics aside, though, Shanghai didn't really
rise to the fore until the 19th century, when
the Treaty of Nanjing forcibly opened its ports
up to international trade and foreign
settlements. It was no doubt a humiliating stain
on the dignity of one of the world's great
civilizations. Nevertheless, with trade came an
unprecedented prosperity which reached its apex
in the 1920s and 30s.
When the Communists defeated the Kuomintang
in1949, they realigned China's trade relations
with other communist nations. Shanghai faded
from the global scene. It wasn't until the 1980s
with Deng Xiaoping's ascent to power and his
resultant reforms that Shanghai would again
become a player on the world stage.
Today, it is the show pony of China's booming economy. It's the country's financial and commercial center, its largest and busiest container port and its most populous city with the most comprehensive and advanced infrastructure. It is China's gateway to the rest of the world. Shanghai is historically a city of early adopters, a place full of people eager to welcome new ideas, try new things. This evident in the preponderance of international companies -- everything from cars manufacturers to coffee shops. You see it in the restaurants they eat in and the clothes that they wear. Or even in the radically eclectic skyline designed largely by international architecture firms. Suffice it to say, the world is once again coming to Shanghai, except this time it's on Shanghai's terms.