A Bridge Between China and the West: Zhang Zhongli and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences

Abstract: This essay examines Chinese and American scholarly exchange during the 1980s and 1990s, following the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) and the establishment of US-China diplomatic relations (1979). The essay focuses on one of the period's leading academic figures—Professor Zhang Zhongli of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences (SASS)—who worked with American scholar Sherman Cochran to organize international research conferences in China and the United States. The scholarly exchange resulting from these conferences contributed to the opening of important archives such as the Shanghai Municipal Archives. The collaboration between Zhang and Cochran also led to the creation of a new archive funded by the Luce Foundation, the Center for Research Materials in Chinese Business History, at SASS. Today, as the Chinese Communist Party once again has tightened ideological control over China's academic institutions, it is time to reconsider how Sino-American scholarly collaboration was successfully achieved in the late twentieth century.