Medical Missions, Pharmaceutical Commerce, and Drug Consumption

Abstract

This article explores the arrival—and the use—of cocaine in China from the 1880s to the 1910s and argues that two groups were instrumental in the emergence of commerce in cocaine: Protestant missionaries who used modern medicines in their work as healers and agents for the burgeoning European and American pharmaceutical industries who were keen to build new markets in Asia. The article also demonstrates that cocaine was not simply sought for therapeutic purposes in the final years of the Qing Dynasty. Non-medical use of cocaine emerged in the 1900s, fed into the late Qing dynasty’s existing anti-narcotics discourse, and finally triggered an importation regulation in 1910. The history of cocaine and its early use in China suggests its role as a tool of the Western medical establishment and ultimately of colonialism and cultural imperialism. It also shows a more complex story than previous historians have acknowledged and indicates that more research about the history of psychoactive substances—beyond opium—is necessary.