The High-level Equilibrium Trap

Mark Elvin treats the problem of economic stagnation in the traditional Chinese rural economy as resulting from obstacles to technological innovation. In application to agriculture, Elvin's formulation may be put in these terms: why did the Chinese economy not succeed in introducing technological innovations into the process of cultivation, thereby increasing the productivity of agriculture? Elvin does not maintain that Chinese technology stood still during the medieval period. But he does hold that technical advances just managed to keep pace with population increase and resource depletion, with the result that welfare (per capita income) remained fixed (Elvin 1975:87). Technical breakthrough did not occur in spite of extensive commercial development, extensive production for the market, and considerable levels of scientific knowledge. Elvin proposes to explain the persistence of technical stagnation in the late traditional economy in terms of his notion of a high-level equilibrium trap. The following passage is formulated in terms of handicraft cotton production, but is equally applicable to farm technology.