1876年贝尔发明电话，次年，英国工程师毕晓普就将磁石式对讲电话带入上海租界。此后的六十多年，上海租界电话交换技术经历了磁石制、共电制和自动电话制三种制式发展阶段，管理模式从许可证经营发展到特许专营，电话经营公司主体也随着技术的演进而转换。本文在全球电话技术发展的背景下，以技术史和跨国史的视角，依托有关英商华洋德律风公司和美商上海电话公司的一手史料、同时期电信专业人士的专著和学术论文，以及上海租界工部局董事会档案、英国外交部解密档案和北华捷报等核心史料，探讨并重构上海租界电话技术与行业规制演进的历程，分析每一次技术升级和重大改造背后的多种成因及其得失。研究发现，在上海租界电话技术演进过程中，发明专利、设备制造商、跨国公司以及租界当局行业监管等内外因素对其最终技术路径的选择产生了重要影响。 在上海租界电话行业规制的研究中，英国外交部解密档案提供了非常有价值的信息。研究发现，1930年上海租界电话特许专营权的竞争中，以美国国际电话电报公司为代表的新兴跨国企业，依靠共电式电话向旋转式电话升级过程中对专利技术的垄断以及跨国资源整合优势，在租界“自治”行业规制下，通过干预本地工部局董事会选举和大英帝国海外殖民政治，巧妙规避了英国国内贸易保护主义的障碍，在这场没有硝烟的战争中，战胜了遵从于传统投资型的英国企业，最终获得上海租界四十年电话特许经营权。上海租界作为大英帝国的海外飞地，无疑为这场东-西方现代化历史进程中的冲击与回应提供了一个竞技场，脱胎于朝贡体系的国民政府，沦为多元利益诉求中的一个“棋子”，无力改变租界自治下的政治走向与结局。 论文共分为七个章节。绪论部分，首先阐述选题的意义，引出论文的主线— —从技术与制度两个层面来考证上海租界电话史，进而探讨西方近代科技文明在租界发展的历史遗存及对当代中国现代化的启示。在梳理学界研究现状和成果的同时，重点介绍文献分布情况，新史料的发现以及考证方面所做的工作，明确本论文的目标及其研究方法。 以中西交通史视角来看，近代中国科学技术的发展是人类历史长河中一次西学东进的过程，上海租界作为大英帝国海外殖民扩张下的一块“飞地”，在这场东西方文明碰撞中无疑充当着“桥头堡”，发挥了示范效应。正因如此，租界电话史已经不是一个单纯的科技“内史”，而应当将电话技术放在东西文明交汇的文化透镜下进行审视与反思。在第1章中，笔者用有限篇幅，简单介绍了上海租界形成与治理模式，探讨了上海租界与宗主国之间内在制度沿革与文化脉络，为后文探讨行业规制的发端、发展与演进提供了一个语境。其中，兰宁的遗著《上海史》让我们直接触碰到上海公共租界那段“隐蔽”的历史时空。 作为上海租界电话史研究，论文将对电话技术的研究限定在1877-1943这66年时间跨度内，对其技术和行业规制的演变进行梳理和考证。但从历史沿革来看，电话技术脱胎于电报，早期的电话线路即为电报线路，监管制度同样脱胎于电报的管理方式，这使得研究的范围不能仅仅局限在电话技术本身，而应将研究领域延展到电报，尤其是工部局电报公务网向电话网整体升级改造这一历史事件。在租界早期有关电话的报道中，电报工程师毕晓普是一个活跃人物，已有的研究对此着墨不多。笔者从史料出发，对其在上海租界电话技术引入、试验、应用推广及商业化运营方面所作出的贡献给予了客观评价；同时，重点介绍了上海租界在电话早期与电报共生时期的发展状况，考证了上海租界磁石式电话发展进程中所特有的两种技术形态——“简式”磁石式与“复式”磁石式。这是第2章的主要内容。 第3章探究的是上海租界电话发展的一个重要阶段，即英商华洋德律风公司三十年的发展期。在这段时期，租界电话经历了从磁石式、共电式和自动式三种制式技术的演进。文献的梳理和考证成为了本章的重要工作。研究发现，上海租界电话技术从磁石式向共电式演进中，华洋公司选择了一种由爱立信公司生产的“改进型”磁石与共电混合模式作为过渡。这一发现，颠覆了早期国内学者对我国电话技术演进形态的认知。同时，对变局中自动式电话技术的梳理，使得华洋公司电话技术演进的脉络以及每一次路径选择变得更为清晰。 尽管海外学者在上世纪八十年代就已经关注并深入研究跨国公司的全球影响力及其内在运作机制，但在中国租界史的研究中，跨国公司这条“巨鳄”却一直处于“潜伏”的状态，鲜有学者关注。第4章填补了这一空白，对两大跨国公司，即美国国际电话电报公司与爱立信公司的海外对决，及其对上海租界电话技术自动式升级中路径选择的影响做了探讨。《爱立信公司大事记》、《I.T.T.：The Management of Opportunity))等西方史料和外文专著，为本章的跨国史学研究提供了材料。 第5章租界电话行业规制的演进，将整个发展分为了三个阶段。笔者从工部局董事会会议纪要一手史料出发，考证了不同时期租界电话行业规制的特点与得失。最有价值的工作，是依托英国外交部解密档案，详细分析并再现了1930年租界电话特许权之争背后的国际政治因素、跨国公司的利益角逐以及工部局自治等多元利益的博弈，从制度上掀开了披在西方政治文明身上的神秘外衣。大英帝国殖民时期的海外贸易，仍然以维护本国利益为根本出发点。但是，由于租界自治的出现，原有的利益格局已经打破，多元利益的博弈已经形成，最终资本的力量在这一博弈过程中发挥了重要作用。 第6章是结语部分，通过对上海租界电话技术与规制演进的历史研究，给出对租界电话发展史的总体评价。 关键词：电话；技术演进；特许专营；租界自治；政治博弈

 Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, the next year a British engineer named J.D. Bishop introduced the magneto telephone to the Shanghai Foreign Settlement. After 60 years, the telephone exchange technology had experienced three stages, from magneto system, common battery system to automatic telephone system. Meanwhile, the management pattern has also experienced two different periods, from the license to the franchise. Earlier studies focused on the sociology of telephony, ignoring the multi-path selection and its inherent law in the development and evolution of telephone technology under the specific political, economic and social system of foreign settlement. This paper attempts to explore the new historical data in the context of the development of global telephone technology, discuss the evolution of telephone technology in Shanghai Concession from multiple perspectives, and analyze the causes behind with gains and losses. The latest study on the British Foreign Office's declassified archives of the United Kingdom shows that the competition in the telephone franchise of the Shanghai Foreign Settlement in 1930,which presenting a more real but not perfect aspect of the modern administrative system in the colonial era. The International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation,relying on the monopoly of rotary system's patents and the capabilities on integration of transnational resources during the telephone technology's upgrading process from common battery system to rotary system,by interfering with the local election of the board of the Shanghai Municipal Council and the overseas colonial politics of the British Empire, defeated the British company based on traditional investment mode,excluding the telephone sovereignty claim from national government and eventually obtained the telephone franchise for 40 years . The paper is divided into seven chapters. The introduction part firstly expounds the significance of the topic selection and draws the main line of the thesis from the two aspects of technology and regulation to study the telephone history of the Shanghai concession, and then explores the historical legacy of Western modern scientific and technological civilization in the development of the concession and its enlightenment to the modernization of contemporary China. While combing the research status and achievements of the academic circles, it focuses on the distribution of the literature, the discovery of new historical materials and the work done in the research, and clarifies the objectives and research methods of this paper. From the perspective of Chinese and Western communication history, the development of science and technology in modern China is a process of western learning in the long history of the human world. The Shanghai concession is an "enclave" under the overseas colonial expansion of the British Empire. Undoubtedly acts as a "bridgehead" and played a demonstration effect. The impact of the 1840 Opium War on the Chinese nation was enormous and far-reaching. The use of "patriotism" and "nationalism" under the traditional narrative could not solve the knot brought to the people by the "Question of Joseph Needham". To study the causes of the backwardness of China's modern science and technology, it is necessary to integrate Chinese civilization into the community of human destiny, and to be good at judging the success or failure and gains and losses in China's modern science and technology history from a more grand view of world history and culture. For this reason, the telephone history of the concession is no longer a purely "internal history" of technology, but the science and technology represented by the telephone is placed under the cultural lens of the convergence of Eastern and Western civilizations to examine and reflect. In the first chapter, with a limited space, a brief introduction to the formation and governance model of the Shanghai concession, explored the internal institutional evolution and cultural context between the Shanghai concession and the sovereign state, and provided a language for the later discussion of the origin, development and evolution of industry regulation territory. Among them, George Lanning's ‘The History of Shanghai' left us in direct contact with the ‘hidden’ historical time and space of the Shanghai public concession. As a study of the telephone history of the Shanghai Concession, the paper will set up a study on telephone technology in the time span of 1877-1943 in the 66 years' period. However, from the historical perspective, telephone technology was born out of telegraph, and the early telephone line was the telegraph line. The regulatory system was also born out of the management of telegraph. This makes the scope of the research not only limited to the telephone technology itself, but also extends the research field to the telegraph, especially to the major historical events of the Municipal Council's telegraph network upgrading to the telephone network as a whole. In the early days of the concession, the telegraph engineer J. D. Bishop was an active figure. In the early research, there was not much discussion about this. From the historical materials, this article gave an objective evaluation of his contribution to the introduction, testing, application promotion and commercial operation of the telephone technology in the Shanghai concession. Chapter 2 focuses on the development of the Shanghai concession during the early days of telephony and telegraph, and examines the two technical forms unique to the development of the magneto telephone in the Shanghai concession: simple switchboard and multiple switchboard. Chapter 3 is an important stage in the development of the telephone industry in Shanghai. The 30 years' development period of the Shanghai Mutual Telephone Co. (S.M.T.) has experienced the evolution of three types of technology: magneto, common battary and automatic. The combing and research of the literature has become an important task in this period. The study found that in the evolution of the Shanghai concession telephone technology from magneto to common battary, S.M.T chose a "C.B. Signaling with Magneto Calling and Transmission" model produced by Ericsson Co. as a transition. This discovery will overthrow the early domestic scholars' perception of the evolution of China's telephone technology. At the same time, the combing of the three types of automatic telephone systems in the changing period makes the evolution of S.M.T.'s telephone network and each path selection become clearer. Although overseas scholars have paid close attention to and deeply studied the global influence of transnational corporations and their internal operational mechanisms in the 1980s, in the study of the history of Chinese concession, the ‘great crocodile’ of transnational corporations has been latent”. The state has rarely attracted the attention of scholars. Chapter 4 conducts research on the impact of two major transnational corporations, namely, International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation (I.T.T.) and Ericsson Telephone Ltd., and its impact on the path selection of the automatic upgrade of telephone technology in the Shanghai concession. Western historical materials and foreign literature such as The Ericsson Chronicle' and ‘I.T.T.: The Management of Opportunity' provide materials for transnational history research. Chapter 5 about the evolution of telephone industry's regulation in Shanghai concession divides the entire development into three phases. Using the analysis method of industrial economics, starting from the historical data of the minutes of Shanghai Municipal Council, it has examined the characteristics and gains and losses of industry regulation in different periods. The most valuable discovery is to rely on the British Foreign Office's declassified archives to analyze and reproduce the international political factors behind the 1930's telephone franchise dispute, the interests of transnational corporations, and the multiple interest game of the autonomy of the Municipal Council. From the system, the mysterious coat worn on the western political civilization was opened. The overseas trade of the British Empire during the colonial period was still based on safeguarding national interests. However, due to the emergence of concession autonomy, the original interest pattern has been broken, and the game of diversified interests has emerged. In the end, the power of capital still controls the development of the world political situation. Chapter 6 in conclusion through the historical study of the evolution of telephone technology and regulation in the Shanghai concession, the overall evaluation of the history of the development of the concession telephone is given. Keywords: Telephone, Evolution of Technology, Franchise , Foreign Settlement Autonomy, Political Game