As an old Chinese saying goes, no matter what the trade or profession, there must be a master.

In the modern history of Shanghai, many new professions have been introduced or created thanks to the city's prosperity. The trade of social investigation was one of these, focusing on conducting investigations and collecting information, then sorting out and compiling the information for publication and dissemination throughout society.

This was exactly what a growing commercial-minded society needed. Therefore, a group of people decided to commit themselves to this trade. Xu Wancheng was the one who made the greatest contribution to the field.

Born in the early 1900s, Xu's job was mainly connected with teaching and library work, which would come to play an important role in his future development. His working experience in education made him very familiar with the schools in Shanghai. Eventually, he compiled a book about these schools.

In his book, he classified schools into different types, for instance, there were 38 colleges, 199 middle schools and 1,275 primary schools. In addition, he wrote down their names and addresses. Although it was only a simple book, it did provide readers with information on Shanghai's educational situation at that time.

This book was published in 1933 and from then on, Xu was determined to explore a unique area of activity based on social investigation. Later, he resigned his teaching job and opened his own bookstore, where he could devote much time to social research and the compilation of related books.

Once this activity was started, it was hard to stop. During this period, Xu achieved great success. First he released a new book entitled "Life Discussion", based on the questionnaires he had published in different newspapers over the past two years. In accordance with the answers he had collected, Xu offered readers distinctive views on life, love, education, employment, marriage and the family.

What motivated him to compile this book was his belief that individual life problems were the atoms that led to wider social problems. If the "atomic" predicament was not solved, the social problem would inevitably occur.

Out of his special interest in books and libraries, Xu published an index of libraries throughout the nation in 1935. Xu listed their names, addresses, time of establishment and total collection. More importantly, he provided readers with information about the type of books constituting the majority in each library along with their classification methods and the number of visitors each day. This book took him, along with four colleagues, a whole year to finish.

Usually, Xu would undertake investigations into several topics simultaneously. However, just as he was about to reap the rewards from his talents he was stricken by financial and legal difficulties. From his personal experience, he had come to realize how much corruption existed in judicial circles and he published an article designed to disclose the problem to the public. This behaviour deeply irritated the court and he was imprisoned for 72 days.

In spite of this, Xu never gave up his investigative work. Even when the War of Resistance against Japan (1937-45) broke out, he still persisted in his investigations, which involved many fields, such as journalism, publishing, industry and business. Each year, he also published the revised and enlarged editions of previous works to update the information.

His devotion and persistence helped him establish his reputation as "the master of social investigation".

(The author is from the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences)