This is a study of the economic and financial history of the Paris Foreign Missions Society (Société des Missions Étrangères de Paris) in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong (formerly known as Canton) from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. It examines how missionaries acquired and utilized local properties, demonstrating how property acquisitions provided a testing ground for Sino-Western relations. While historians have typically focused on the ways that missionaries affected Chinese populations and policies, I instead argue that living and attempting to gain influence in Guangdong altered missionaries' tactics and strategies in ways that had far-reaching consequences. The government of China (which over the course of my study changed from an empire to a republic) consistently attempted to restrict foreign missions' right to purchase Chinese properties. I show that, by indigenizing its property acquisition methods the French Catholic mission in Guangdong was able to accumulate a large quantity of properties both in urban and rural areas, but doing so required negotiating with authorities and commoners, and assistance from both Chinese converts and French authorities. As a result, the Guangzhou French Catholic mission's economic activities were intertwined with both local society and high level diplomacy.

Local access. dig.pdf. [Xiang-French Mission Guangzhou.pdf]