CHAPTER 20
DRIVEN BY GROWTH:
THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN
THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
FOCUS QUESTIONS
 WHY DID the world’s population rise in the
eighteenth century?
 WHY DID rising population stimulate economic
activity in parts of Europe?
 WHY WAS China’s position as the world’s richest
economy threatened in the late eighteenth century?
 HOW DID British exploitation affect India’s
economy?
 HOW DID imperial expansion stimulate economic
activity?
RISE IN GLOBAL POPULATION

China: population doubled between 1700 and 1800.

Europe: population doubled between 1700and 1800.

Americas: population increased six times.

Ottoman and Persian empires remained static.
URBANIZATION

More people moved to cities.
 London grew to 1 million; Paris had 500,000; Amsterdam had 200,000.
 Americas, especially in the Spanish Americas, developed significant towns and cities.
REASONS: BETTER MEDICAL CARE AND
EVOLUTION OF CERTAIN DISEASES

Western medicine remained mired in ignorance, but did develop cures/prevention
for scurvy and smallpox.

Plague becomes less virulent of its own accord.

Also better nutrition and an improved food supply
ACCESS TO RESOURCES

Europe’s situation was unique: with access to varieties of foods and different
climates around the globe a revolution in human cuisine was possible.

Centers in Madrid, London, Amsterdam, and Paris now collected, catalogued, and
experimented with different types and varieties of plants.

From these centers, new types of ventures could be tried in the far-flung empires of
Europe.
DEVELOPMENT OF WORLD EMPIRES

Creation of new sources of raw materials
 Coffee could now be grown in Java, thus breaking the Arabian monopoly.
 Tea could be grown in India, thus Britain could enjoy its national drink grown within its
own empire.
 Australia began to be developed to increase the availability of wool for British textile
factories.
 Control over Trade
 The development of commercial empires meant a shift and




an expansion in the control of global trade.
European control over the Americas gave it tremendous
access to the resources produced there: sugar, tobacco,
timber, furs, gold, silver, etc.
Dutch monopoly of trade with Japan: advantage in the silver
market
British dominance in India: control over revenues, cheap
labor, and a vast market
French, English, and Venetian merchants took control over
Ottoman trade and markets.
NEW TECHNOLOGIES
 Development, first by Britain, of steam power for
textile, ceramic, and mining industries
 Production of manufactured goods is faster, cheaper,
and often better
WHY NOT CHINA?
 For centuries, the world economic superpower
 Huge, cheap labor force
 Enormous internal market
 The “high-level equilibrium trap”
 No ability to increase output
 No incentive to innovate (develop new technologies)
 Europeans could now produce their own products.
 Tea, silk, ceramics, etc.
 Importation of opium into China by Britain, America, and other
European powers
 Millions of opium addicts led to a debilitated workforce, drain of
money.

Control over the Americas and global trade gave Europeans, especially Britain, an
edge that it had never had before. The economies of Asia were now slipping or
had slipped well behind.
TODAY’S QUESTION
Is unlimited growth possible?
Consider
 The eighteenth century was not the only one driven by growth: the global
capitalist economy has ever since been built on continued growth.
 Some have worried about infinite growth in a finite world, and called for either
sustainable growth or economic stasis.
 Others point out that basic commodities have become steadily cheaper since
1800, and claim market mechanisms will always find replacement resources
(solar for hydrocarbon fuels, for example) and production techniques.
 Is unlimited growth possible indefinitely into the future?
 Or will the global economy face a crisis of diminishing resources?