Ji Chaoding, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

Ji Chaoding

economist (1903-1963)

Date of Birth: 09-Oct-1903

Place of Birth: Fenyang, Shanxi, China

Date of Death: 09-Aug-1963

Profession: economist, historian

Nationality: China

Zodiac Sign: Libra

Ji Chaoding (Chinese: ???; Wade–Giles: Chi Ch'ao-ting; 1903–1963) was a Chinese economist and political activist.
His book Key Economic Areas in Chinese History (1936) influenced the conceptualization of Chinese history in the West by emphasizing geographic and economic factors as the basis of dynastic power. Ji was educated at Tsinghua University in China, then in the United States at University of Chicago and Columbia University.
He became a member of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA) and secretly joined the Communist Party of China.
As an underground party member he was on the staff of the Institute of Pacific Relations in the 1930s before returning to China in 1939.
He became a trusted adviser to the Ministry of Finance in the wartime Nationalist government but remained in China as a well-placed official in the new government of the People's Republic of China after 1949.
Only after his death was his long-time Party membership acknowledged.Joseph Needham, author of Science and Civilisation in China, called Ji a "learned and brilliant writer" and Key Areas "perhaps the most outstanding book on the development of Chinese history among Western books in those days."