204 JOURNAL OF WORLD HISTORY, JUNE 2007 sight of the things that matter about Shanghai, this line of thinking suggests, as soon as you compare it. Some would modify this, while still holding the line against far-flung comparisons. according to this vari- ant of Wagner's argument, Shanghai can be contrasted with Beijing and compared to relatively nearby places, either other lower Yangzi Delta cities (Suzhou, Hangzhou, etc. ) other East Asian one-time treaty ports(Yokohama, Canton, and Tianjin), or a pair of former colonial territories(Hong Kong and Singapore) While there is a strong case to be made for Wagner's argument and the modification of it just described, this article argues that this is a good time for Shanghai specialists to enter the admittedly treacherous waters of far- flung comparison. And it will suggest a specific strategy for doing just this by proposing that we think of Shanghai as a reglob alizing post-socialist city that has interesting things in common with urban centers such as Budapest that were once part of the Soviet bloc-despite obvious differences relating to specific characteristics (such as, in the case of Budapest, size and political status). It is cer- tainly attractive to revel in Shanghai being a place like no other, as Millard did in I928 and many others did before that and have done since. Still, this article claims, general discussions of the global city experience can be enriched and our vision of contemporary shanghai made sharper by using the comparative frame proposed here n making the case for Shanghai being very good to think, this essay will pay special attention to the most recent stage in the city's history, as the terms "reglobalizing"and"post-socialist"indicate. It will focus more specifically on an era that began about twenty years ago and followed in the wake of three other main stages. First came long period, lasting from roughly the thirteenth century through the Opium War(1839-1842) that saw the city emerge as a trading center of first local and then regional import and eventually limited interna- tional signifcance, thanks to serving as a transshipment point for goods circulating between China's hinterland and Southeast Asia. Next came a roughly century-long treaty-port period, lasting from th arly I84os through the I940S, during which Shanghai underwent an intensive form of forced internationalization Then came several decades of socialist transformation(Igo through the early IgBos II Millard was an American journalist who helped reshape the English-language press in Shanghai in the second decade of the twentieth century by founding both a daily news paper, the China Press(in 1911), and a weekly, Millards Review of the Far East, which later changed its name to the China Weekly Review