1. Chapter 16
The World Economy

2. New Toys
• Deep-draft, round-hulled sailing ships,
loaded with heavy armaments
• Compass (China-ME-Europe)
• Gunpowder related toys – same chain
– European metalwork allows for first guns and
cannons
– HUGE advantage

3. The pioneering explorers
• Portugal – excitement of discovery, potential harm to Muslim world,
and craving for wealth “potent mix”
• Henry the Navigator
• Dias
-- Cape of Good Hope (1488) – will become a filling station
• Columbus’s voyage in 1492 causes Portugal to up their efforts
• Vasco da Gama reaches India in 1498
– Annual visits to India
– Sometimes use ship’s guns to intimidate
– Blown off course to Brazil – establish colony
– Set up Mozambique in E. Africa and Gao in India
– Islands of Indonesia
– China
– By 1542 even Japan

4. Spanish Explorers
• Christopher Columbus – origin?
– Sponsored by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella (Spain,
pushed out Muslims, reclaimed kingdom, Castille and Aragon)
– West Indies (Caribbean)
• Amerigo Vespucci (Italian) – “New World” and the
Americas
– Spain wins papal approval for control of land (Portugal will get
Brazil)
• Ferdinand Magellan – set sail in 1519
– Pass Southern tip of S. America
– Discover and name Pacific Ocean for Europe for “peaceful”
ocean
– Reached Indonesian islands in 1521
– Claims the Philippines and names them after King Philip II (will
remain a Spanish holding until 1898)

5. Spanish Conquistadors
• God, gold, and glory!
• Hernan Cortes – Tenochtitlan to Mexico City
• Francisco Pizarro – Inca Empire – Equador to Chile
• Soon all but Brazil of S. America all the way up to
California
• St. Augustine 1519
• Catholic Church and the Jesuits – chance to convert and
gain Catholic souls
• Silver and gold, silver and gold….FLOODS the European
Economy
• Glory! – Well, it’s obvious.

6. • Easily conquer the Americas
– Gunpowder
– Diseases
– Civil Unrest in the Americas

7. British, French, Dutch, Spanish
• Spanish Armada 1588
• French in Canada – 1534, Samuel de
Champlain – Quebec 1608, Great Lakes region,
Mississippi Valley
– Restrict protestants
• English – Jamestown 1607, Plymouth, 1622 (but
this one wasn’t economic)
– Restrict Catholics
• Dutch East India Company – 1602
– Taiwan
• British East India Company

11. Animals
Disease
Food

12. Mercantilism
• Economic concept –
• Import only from empire
– Import raw materials, manufacture at home,
export manufactured goods out
• Export as much as possible to as many as
possible
– Allow own colonies to only buy from your
kingdom

13. • Exploration
• Conquest when necessary
• Colonization
– Emergence of Coercive labor systems

14. Colonization Perks
• Precious metals and cash crops
– Sugar, spice, tobacco, and later on – cotton
– All very labor intensive
• Human labor becomes part of the exchange
• Encomienda and other systems used, but some
Europeans (Bartolome de las Casas) find these
systems morally appalling
– European kingdoms turn to Africans and enslave
them

15. Triangle of Commerce
Into Americas:
Axes, Cloth, Furniture, Muskets, Tools
To Africa:
Iron, Muskets, Silver, Textiles
To Europe:
Fish, Rice, Tar, Timber and Tobacco
Into Americas:
Slaves
To Africa:
Rum and Muskets

16. Ottoman Empire
• Established 1453
• Continues trading Arab trading
connections with E. Africa, India, and
China
• Loses B. of Lepanto in 1571 – setback
against Spanish navy in the E.
Mediterranean

17. China
• Participated less actively than Europe
• Benefits from world economy – excess of
American money a positive for China
• Avoid entering involvement of international trade
on anyone’s terms – limits trade to a trickle
– This just keeps China’s stuff in the “rare” category,
Europeans anxious to open China up
• Strong export pattern
• British government tries to get China to open up
– Effort turned down
– Haughtily inform Europeans that the Chinese have no
need for outside goods

18. Japan and Korea
• Japan – initially attracted by Western
expeditions in the 16th century
– Pulls back
– Show some openness to Christian missions
– Fascinated by Western gunnery and shipping
– Once they develop the ability to mimic W. weapons
they cut off contact
– Forbidden to travel or trade abroad
– Enter a period of near complete isolation from 17th-19th
century
• Exceptions? – Chinese contact (only a little) and Dutch
enclave in Nagasaki
• Korea – pulls back as well

19. India
• Mughal India – Persian for “Mongol India”
– Proceeded Dehli Sultanate
• Sold goods for New World silver
• British East India Company
• France
• Britain wins control after 7 years war

20. Russia
• Isolated by Mongols
• Open back up slowly – Ivan the III –
capital in Moscow
• Ivan the Terrible (IV)
• Time of Troubles early 1600s
• Michael Romanov appointed – establishes
Romanov line

21. Africa
• West Africa – become victims of the slave
trade
• East Africa – still trading with India, China,
and ME
• North Africa – still trading