China’s treaty ports and modern economic development: an analysis based on education, import and export trade, and capital agglomeration

The opening of treaty ports in modern China is a crucial historical process in China’s integration into the world economic system, and its long-term impact on China’s regional development is of significant research value. This paper utilizes panel data from 35 treaty ports in China from 1903 to 1910. For the first time, the paper obtains the latitude and longitude of these 35 treaty ports through the Chinese Historical Geographic Information System (GIS) and constructs a spatial geographic matrix. It also innovatively systematically considers the triple mediation effects of modern education, import and export trade, and capital agglomeration. Empirical results show that the location of treaty ports has a significant and robust positive pulling effect on regional economies; the closer a region is to a port, the higher its level of economic development. Ports promote economic growth through three parallel intermediary paths: accumulating human capital through overseas students and modern schools; expanding import and export trade through maritime advantages; and agglomerating local banks through trade funds. Spatial analysis results show that port economies exhibit a global positive spatial autocorrelation, with the spatial correlation strength fluctuating slightly from year to year.