Tribute and Profit

Book excerpt: Tribute and Profit illuminates the conduct and maintenance of maritime trade under Siam’s tributary relationship with imperial China, and scrutinizes the momentous role of the Chinese in Siam’s overseas trade and domestic economy. Based substantially on historical Chinese, Siamese, and European sources, Sarasin Viraphol’s reconstruction of the tributary trade pinpoints the creative subversions, calculated risks, and clever contrivances that kept the wheels of the Siamese economy turning for centuries. Eventually, tribute missions and the junk trade were supplanted by European-style maritime commerce, free trade, and open markets. Nevertheless, the influences of these bygone relations are still present in Thailand today.