Shanghai Brief History

As an ideal port, Shanghai is the gateway to the mighty Yangtze River. But when the British opened their first concession here after the first Opium War in 1842, it was little more than a small town supported by fishing and weaving. Change was rapid. The French followed in 1847 and it wasn't long before an International Settlement was established. By the time the Japanese arrived in 1895 the city was being parceled up into settlements, all autonomous and immune from Chinese law, creating China's first fully fledged Special Economic Zone. The world's greatest houses of finance and commerce descended on Shanghai in the 1930s. It had the tallest buildings in Asia and more motor vehicles on its streets than the rest of China put together. Shanghai became a byword for exploitation and vice due to countless opium dens, gambling joints and brothels. Guarding it all were the American, French and Italian marines, British Tommies and Japanese Blue jackets. However, with the Communist Party takeover of the mainland in 1949, the city's international influence declined. For the West, the party was over. But since the 1990’s, the economic reforms introduced by Deng Xiaoping resulted in an intense re-development of the city, aiding the return of finance and foreign investment to the city.