The World That Trade Created

The World That Trade Created C1 The people of the Fujian trade diaspora, out of Southeast coast of China, would spread across the world. For example, a son would be given an opportunity to travel abroad and make money then come back to a wife as a reward. While the Chinese tribute system focused more on culture, politics, and status, as opposed to economic gain, it still helped define a vast common market, giving it currencies, defining tastes that helped create markets worth producing for, and creating standards for its elite class. The Chinese monetary system originally used copper, bronze, and gold coins, but Chinaís growth caused a shortage of money. So, lead and iron coins as well as money notes (on paper) were used. The Asia centered world economy began to grow with the rise of Islam in the 7th century AD. The single power Islam guaranteed a safe passage between the two worlds. Slaves, gold, and iron were traded from Western Europe, Turkey, and Sub-Sahara Africa. Soon, Hindu and other traders joined the West as Islam spread. In addition, Marco Polo‚Äôs travels (although they were sometimes considered fantasy) led to an extensive trade between East Asia and Europe. This led to world-political changes and minimized Europe‚Äôs power. In central America, Aztec and Mayan civilizations‚ Äô economies came to a halt after the arrival of Spain due to Spain monopolizing the trade and global trade taking over. Increased trade brought with it the need for shared rules and laws that applied universally to everyone from locals to world travelers. As trade grew, a common set of legal codes were adopted in the 16th-17th centuries in Southeast Asia, the use of which spread to other areas of law as well. However, by the 1700s, this process was in reverse: the European traders wanted to keep administrative costs low, so they resorted to the most ancient processes they could find (which often involved such practices as torture and ordeals). Besides making laws, traders often became law enforcers as well, collecting taxes from rural areas that no one else regularly visited. This practice, too, died when the Europeans began taking over; as trade companies became more and more like corporations instead of small “mom-and-pop” businesses, controlling the tasks their employees could take on. The British mentality of merely wishing to make fortunes to send home instead of becoming wealthy, powerful local businessmen contributed to the efficiency of these corporations, allowing the British to rule many parts of Southeast Asia with ease. C2 Goods had to be moved from seller to buyer, and in the economics of trade, the cheaper the cost of transportation, the better. Nature provided many limits of trade. The weight of products made land transport very expensive, so water transport was vital before the invention of the train. The amount needed to feed the transportation animals also raised the cost. Despite the ease and low expense of water transport, many goods traveled by land due to the lack of waterways. Transport costs dictated city size, as well as the products that were traded, which were mostly products of high price-to-bulk ratio. Nature not only limited trade, but dictated trade patterns, such as the monsoons in the Indian Ocean trade network. Innovations were shaped by nature, built to not only better control and work around natural barriers, but to control the population that was shaped by nature. The steam engine and railroad are examples of improved control over nature. They allowed for land transport of heavier items over longer distances. This lowered prices of some items, and spurred newer innovations to improve the conditions and ease of the railroad. While the Chinese had the largest ships in the pre-industrial world, they never matched the naval power of the West. China’s innovation of ships all but halted due to lack of timber. They stuck to short water routes to travel to midway trading points. As this happened, the Europeans developed extensive trade patterns and established sea power. This sea power was used by Christopher Columbus in the discovery of the New World, although Columbus wasn’t as great as he was thought to be. He seemed to live by the saying “the end justifies the means.” He changed alliances and shifted opinions to get what he wanted. But he was on a mission to sail west, and though failing many times at his attempts for funding, he was able to get Queen Isabel of Castile to finance his voyage. Columbus’ calculations were off and there were doubts surrounding the success of his trip, and he reached the New World out of sheer luck and ignorance. Capital cities were limited in size by the amount of food and timber available. Cities that were too large had an immense food budget, and the surrounding farms took the toll.London had the farms who tended to focus on selling much of their crop, while Paris, which was not so lucky, had surrounding farms who kept over 80 percent of their crop. Not only the cities that were in juxtaposition with water transport thrived, but also cities with any “ingenious and unique transport system[s].” Warehouses transformed transatlantic trade by allowing bulky new-world products to be stored for long periods of time at ports, awaiting exportation. As immigrants came to the Americas, frontier lands were available for colonization, and warehouses provided economic stability for farmers by allowing for exportation to Europe. Because the Chinese Government provided incentives for migration, many people moved to Chinese frontier lands after the 16th century. Stamford Raffles was an Englishman who established the free-trade port of Singapore in southeast Asia. In 1824, both Britain and the Netherlands recognized Singapore as a British possession, and the British domination of Asia began. The Suez Canal 1869, connecting Europe and Asia more easily and starting a chain of reactions that led to both positive and negative effects. On the good side of things, shipping costs fell 30%, and it took only about 1/3 of the time to ship goods and people than it had previously. Indonesia was effected most significantly however, and not so positively. The Dutch East India Company became even more dominant there, but their presence led to divisions among the different Indonesian groups and among the Moslems, Chinese, Japanese, and Europeans and imported laborers who came to live there. In British India, a massive network of railroads was built, with the expectation that an economic boom would result. While there was no major economic boom, the railroads did succeed in strengthening Indian society. World trade succeeded in connecting parts of the world that were completely different in technological advancement. For example, in the jungles of Central America, coffee was grown and carried on the backs of coerced laborers to river ports, where it was eventually to New York. Thus trade linked two entirely different places. C3 The Cacao bean, loved for its pharmacological effects, was highly cultivated during the time of the Mayans. Due to its high demand, various other countries also started to grow the bean, as it was becoming a commodity throughout the world. Similarly, tea furthered transcontinental trade. China, the only country able to grow the tea plant due to its environmental conditions, established a critical trade contact, Britain, directly following tea’s rise in global market. Another product that put a rise in the global market was coffee. When coffee and other drugs were first introduced to societies, the government tried to ban these products from being traded, due to the fact that the populations were becoming addicted. Ironically, soon after that, coffee shops became political parties, men’s clubs, and respected organizations. Coffee was also another way America set itself apart from Britain and helped finalize a revolution. But coffee mania began through slavery, which made it a profitable business and helped it become one of the most imported goods into the US along with rum and sugar. Slavery became directly connected to coffee trade and slave revolts caused prices to spike. Sugar was another major import that relied on slavery especially from Haiti. Haiti ‘s demand of sugar led its slavery to become so intense that 6% of the population controlled the remaining 94% as slave on sugar plantations. Britain had a trade deficit, and in order to overcome this problem, they introduced Opium to the Chinese and got them addicted, which forced them to trade with the British Empire, drastically improving the British economy. Another highly addictive drug trade was cocaine, discovered in 1860 by British scientists. They wanted to find the chemical that stopped thirst, hunger, and fatigue. Today, cocaine is illegal because it is harmful for people’s health and well-being. In this case technology was not a good thing because isolating the cocaine chemical led to many people becoming addicted to this harmful drug. C5 In trade routes and otherwise greed led to violence. This was demonstrated through slavery, piracy, and control of ivory and opium. African slavery began from greed; Europeans needed labor to fuel their large trading productions and manufacturing of the traded goods. Mesoamerican slavery and destruction was caused by the Spanish conquistadors in their infamous quest for gold, god, and glory. Through greed the conquistadors decimated an entire civilization to obtain their gold. However the British and Dutch reaped many economic benefits of this perhaps even without knowledge of where their wealth had come from. Piracy, also fueled by greed, began as small bands, but eventually transformed into large companies of corporate raiders. The demanding trade of ivory and opium came from greed and addiction. They became key “luxury” items for wealthy Europeans, and it was the incentive for wars and violence. Pommeranz demonstrates throughout chapter five that greed led to violence. Gold, God, and Glory powered everything in the beginning. The Spanish enslaved the Aztecs when they conquered them to help them with sugar production rates, increasing their profit. The Spanish also attempted to convert the Aztecs to Catholisism, and if they rebelled, they were forced into slavery in the name of God. Lastly, they were immensley proud because they managed to conquer the Aztecs, claiming the land as their own while also beginning the use of slavery. Slavery was also pertinnent later in history when the Dutch, seeking revenge upon the Spanish while also being enticed by the wealth sugar trade brought, conquered a port in Brazil, controling the sugar trade. However, they did not have enough slaves to take advantage of the sugar, so although they opposed it at first, travelled to African ports and obtained slaves by exchanging luxury goods for human lives. Although the Portuguese regaiined control of the sugar production in Brazil, the Dutch still utilized the advantages of slavery in Africa and the exploitation of human lives that were not theirs to control. Lastly, Robinson Crusoe eventually learned to abandon his ideas of self sufficiency and rejection of luxury, and entered into the slave trade, enticed by the wealth it would bring him. Before corporations, there were family ties. Blood was the medium that bound together the many companies of the time. One example of such a family company was Samuel Rosenfelder’s fur trading house. As Rosenfelder added to his company, he also prepared his son Max to take over the company in the future. Eventually, Max would continue passing the company to his three sons. However, by the 1600s, there was an obvious advantage to using corporations to conduct business. Corporations were impersonal alliances that provided a logical and easy way to do business on a large—global—scale. The first corporations were anonymous with wide distributions of power and not really necessary until the railroad boom in the 1830s. However, these corporations gave birth to something useful at the time: corporate raiders. With the amount of sea trade that was happening, corporate raiders became the new pirates. Made of refugees, criminals, runaways, and mercenaries, corporate raiders are referred to as “multinational, multiethnic, democratic bands of sea rovers.” Although they had less dignity and were more violent than “traditional” pirates, corporate raiders were often favored in the eyes of the law, signifying government’s involvement in trade. After all, trade was a fruitful source of income. As the greed and available wealth grew, so did violence on the seas. The history of trade has taught us a lesson about greed, and the horrors it can lead to. Greed for products often leads towards violence. Two outstanding examples of this were the result of Great Britain’s greed for Chinese Tea, and King Leopold’s desire to begin an ivory market. Hooked on the imported Chinese Tea, British people had little to offer in return. Struggling to find compensation for their needed beverage, the British discovered the advantages of trading opium for tea. Easily seducing the Chinese with a cheep alternative for compensation, their greed for tea only grew. Becoming comfortable with their trading situation, the British were infuriated when the Chinese attempted to stop the Opium Trade. Finally resulting in battles between the British and Chinese, (know as the Opium Wars), the British were guaranteed their tea, and granted what they wanted, at the cost of violence. King Leopold II, the monarch of Belgium. Having a lack of colonies, King Leopold’s only hope for new territory would be in Africa. He began to show interest in Africa by becoming an advocate for illegal slave trade and other issues thus becoming popular among the African people. Building roads, hospitals, and other infrastructure the African population began to acquire a strong trust for him. Starting his turn on Africa, King Leopold began to use African mercenaries in 1879 to control the Kongo. His reasons for this were to control much land in Africa and declare the seized land “his” property. Gaining wealth from the trading the abundant ivory, his greed for land and tusks only grew. Natives were eventually brutalized, ears and limbs were severed off of those that opposed him. After leaving piles of dead elephants for the natives to discard, his soldiers sailed down the congo river shooting the Lunda, or Mongo for sport. King Leopold’s greed for wealth from ivory trade brought horrible violence to the people of Africa, and caused a decrease in the elephant population. Both the trade of tea, and ivory caused greed for those who desired it, and when the threat of a stop to the trade presented itself, violence was the only answer, today we can see the same pattern carrying out as it did hundreds of years ago, as greed for oil grows. C6 Because there were so many commodities, goods, capital, and technologies across the world it was essential that a set of laws and practices be set in place for a global market to thrive. Two major key conceptual changes were standardization and impersonal relations. For this major change to happen the consumer had to find the world market “natural” and be driven to sell and profit in new international institutions and a conceptual revolution. This change also consisted of time becoming a commodity, gold as money, a set of translatable and measurable standards, sacrosanct property rights, limited liability corporations, product packaging, and corporate trademarks. Even though trade has gone on without money for hundreds of years, a clear standard for money was never set. For the global market to take off it was necessary for the global market to get a clear set of value. Over time there were two precious metals that took over as the basis for value. Gold and silver took over as the world’s basis for value. With a clear set of value for products it was necessary to also set a clear basis for measuring weights, measures, and instruments that are used for trade, thus the metric revolution was born. The metric revolution brought an easily understood and accepted way to make sure that the entire world markets measurements were uniform. During the 19th century the transportation revolution caused a need for time to be unified as well. Because of the steam engine and all the trains had the ability to trade cross-country the different time zones created a huge problem to the trading industry. For the world market, with however many different time zones, needed to be able to know what time it is in China while in Massachusetts. Time had been around for hundreds of years already but it was only in local areas and time zones, so once the trade grew global it was hard for people in Massachusetts to know what time it was in China. The different time zones also created a massive problem for the railroad companies. Because they didn’t know the exact times everywhere they decided to meet and create a set of time zones to follow so that two trains wouldn’t be on the same tracks at the same time as another train. After a while farmers became decide that they wanted sell there crops before they came up so that they could have money to buy the crops and supplies. This was the start of investing. The start of investing was also made possible because the railroad companies were able to go around the country. This helped investing because people could put in orders in California for wheat in Kansas before it was grown. This new investing techniques starting with the farmers gradually progressed to the company world. Now instead of just the partners of a company owning it people could invest into it and gain a part of the company’s wealth. Not only did corporations develop their own juridical identities and lives to be traded on stock markets, but they also started bonds. Lending money had been around for hundred years but it was only between single parties. Now with the invention of bonds parties outside the original was able to buy off some of the debt. The governments liked this type of borrowing because it spread the liability and control among a multitude of lenders. Over the past it was always thought that buying products close to home was the only way to go, but when advertising combined with advanced packaging techniques led to the consumer being more comfortable with foreign products. With the new advanced advertising techniques the companies started to create brand names. This created trademark names and customer loyalty. This made it possible for owners to buy and sell different parts of companies. As goods became commodities, humans increasingly came to believe that the world existed to satisfy human needs and wants.