4.4 : Sea-Based Empires Established: European Boss-Mode

Establishment of Maritime Empires

• European Trade Ascendancy

  • The Three G’s: Gold, God, Glory

    • Motives for imperialisms

      • 1. To enrich themselves

      • 2. To spread Christianity

      • 3. Be the greatest State

        • Once the Portuguese inserted themselves into this trading network, they weren’t as interested in participating peacefully as they were in owning and controlling it by force

          • Portugal establish small trading post while the Spanish establish colonies

            • Spanish ran their colonies in the Americas through tribute systems, taxation and coerced labor.

    • Continuity in Trade

      • The Middles Eastern, South Asian, East Asian, and SE Asian merchants who had been using the trade network for centuries before the arrival of the European continued to use it.

        • When the Europeans arrived, it only increased profits in the Indian Ocean Trade Networks.

      • Merchants like the Gujaratis in the Mughal Empire continued to make use of the Indian Ocean Trade even while European sought to dominate it, and in doing so they increased their power and wealth.

    • Asian Resistance

      • Japan → didn’t want Christianity because they wanted to stay united

      • Machu Empire (Ming China) →

        • And among the many motives for the voyages of Zhang He, among the most important was to essentially create a situation in which most of the maritime trade in the Indian Ocean was processed though the Chinese state. → resulted in a series of isolationist trade policy

• Expansion of African State

• Economic and Labor Systems

  • In order to maintain agricultural economy, Europeans made use of existing labor systems and new labor systems.

    • Existing Labor Systems:

      • The Spanish made use of the old Inca mit’a systems

      • The Inca developed this systems in which subjects of the empire were required to provide labor for state projects for a certain number of days per year.

      • The Spanish implemented the mit'a’s systems ;largely for their massive silver mining operations

    • New Labor Systems

      • 1. Chattel Slavery

        • Chattel: laborers were owned

        • Race-based

        • Slavery became hereditary

      • 2. Indentured Servitude

      • Encomienda System - Controlling the populations

        • Indigenous Americans into working for colonial authorities

        • Indigenous people were forced to work for them but in exchange for food and protection.

      • Hacienda System - Economics of food exports

        • Large agricultural estates owned by the elite

        • Indigenous laborers were forced to work the fields whose crops were than exported and sold on the global market.

• Development of slavery

  • Continunity:

    • 1. African Slave Trade

    • 2. Cultural Assimilation

    • 3. Domestic Work

      • Africans slaves became domestic servant with a high demand for enslaved women.

    • 4. Slaved held power

      • Enslaved people could significant military or political positions

  • Change:

    • 1. Agricultural work

      • Males were purchased 2:1 which impacted demographics of African States

    • 2. Trans-Atlantic Trade larger

    • 3. Racial prejudice

      • In the Americas, slavery became identified with blackness which justified the brutality of slavery