Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-vfjqv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T22:21:57.424Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Integration of global commodity markets in the early modern era

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2009

KLAS RÖNNBÄCK
KLAS RÖNNBÄCK*
Affiliation:
Department of Economic History, Göteborg University, Göteborg 40530, Sweden, klas.ronnback@econhist.gu.se
Get access

Abstract

In this article, I test whether there is any evidence of price convergence on intercontinental commodity markets prior to the nineteenth century. I gather price data on eleven commodity markets important to early modern intercontinental trade. The main conclusion is that many of the commodity markets do show signs of price convergence even prior to the nineteenth century. The question of an early globalisation can thus not be dismissed as easily as has often been done so far.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Review of Economic History , Volume 13 , Issue 1 , April 2009 , pp. 95 - 120
Copyright
Copyright © European Historical Economics Society 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References

Acemoglu, D., Johnson, S. and Robinson, J. (2005). The rise of Europe: Atlantic trade, institutional change and economic growth. American Economic Review, 95, pp. 546–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bateman, V. (2007). The evolution of markets in early modern Europe, 1350–1800: a study of grain prices. Discussion paper no. 350, Department of Economics, Oxford University.Google Scholar
Berg, M. (2005). Luxury and Pleasure in Eighteenth-Century Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Berg, M. and Clifford, H. (eds.) (1999). Consumers and Luxury: Consumer Culture in Europe 1650–1850. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Blaut, J. M. (1992). 1492. The Debate on Colonialism, Eurocentrism and History. Trenton: Africa World Press.Google Scholar
Bordo, M., Taylor, A. and Williamson, J. (eds.) (2003). Globalization in Historical Perspective. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bochove, C. van (2007). Market integration and the North Sea System (1600–1800). In Brand and Müller 2007.Google Scholar
Brand, H. and Müller, L. (eds.) (2007). The Dynamics of Economic Culture in the North Sea and Baltic Region in the Late Middle Ages and Early Modern Period. Hilversum: Uitgeverij Verloren.Google Scholar
Brewer, J. and Porter, R. (1993). Consumption and the World of Goods. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Bulbeck, D., Reid, A., Tan, L. C. and Wu, Y. (eds.) (1998). Southeast Asian Exports since the 14th Century: Cloves, Pepper, Coffee, and Sugar. Leiden: KITLV Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chaudhuri, K. N. (1978). The Trading World of Asia and the English East India Company 1660–1760. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curtin, P. (2002). The Rise and Fall of the Plantation Complex: Essays in Atlantic History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dalgaard, C.-J. and Vastrup, J. (2001). On the measurement of σ-convergence. Economics Letters, 70, pp. 283–7.Google Scholar
Davies, K. G. (1957). The Royal African Company. London: Longmans, Green and Co.Google Scholar
Deerr, N. (1949). The History of Sugar. 2 vols. London: Chapman and Hall.Google Scholar
Dunn, R. (1972). Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624–1713. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Ejrnaes, M. and Persson, K. G. (2006). The gains from improved market efficiency: trade before and after the transatlantic telegraph. Discussion paper 06–19, Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen.Google Scholar
Federico, G. (2007). The first grain invasion: a study in the integration of European market 1750–1870. Preliminary working paper, September 2007.Google Scholar
Feinstein, C. and Thomas, M. (2002). Making History Count: A Primer in Quantitative Methods for Historians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Findlay, R. and O'Rourke, K. (2002). Commodity market integration, 1500–2000. In Bordo et al. 2003.Google Scholar
Findlay, R. and O'Rourke, K. (2007). Power and Plenty. Trade, War, and the World Economy in the Second Millennium. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Flynn, D. and Giraldez, A. (2004). Path dependence, time lags and the birth of globalisation: a critique of O'Rourke and Williamson. European Review of Economic History 8, pp. 81–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gills, B. and Thompson, W. (eds.) (2006). Globalization and Global History. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Hamilton, E. (1934). American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 1501–1650. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, E. (1947). War and Prices in Spain 1651–1800. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Hatton, T., O'Rourke, K. and Taylor, A. (eds.) (2007). The New Comparative Economic History. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoh-Cheung, and Mui, L. (1968). Smuggling and the British tea trade before 1784. American Historical Review 74, pp. 44–73.Google Scholar
Hussey, R. (1934). The Caracas Company 1728–1784: A Study in the History of Spanish Monopolistic Trade. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Inikori, J. (2007). Africa and the globalization process: western Africa, 1450–1850. Journal of Global History 2, pp. 63–86.Google Scholar
Jacks, D. (2004). Market integration in the North and Baltic Seas, 1500–1800. Journal of European Economic History 33, 3, pp. 285–329.Google Scholar
Jacks, D. (2005). Intra- and international market integration in the Atlantic economy, 1800–1913. Explorations in Economic History 42, pp. 381–413.Google Scholar
Johnson, H. (1973). A preliminary inquiry into money, prices, and wages in Rio de Janeiro, 1763–1823. In Alden, D. (ed.), Colonial Roots of Modern Brazil. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Lovejoy, P. (ed.) (1986). Africans in Bondage: Studies in Slavery and the Slave Trade. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Mauro, F. (1957). Le Portugal et l'Atlantique au XVIIe siècle 1570–1670. Paris: Université de Paris.Google Scholar
McCusker, J. (1970). The rum trade and the balance of payments of the thirteen continental colonies, 1650–1775. Dissertation, University of Pittsburgh.Google Scholar
Menard, R. (2006). Sweet Negotiations. Sugar, Slavery and Plantation Agriculture in Early Barbados. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.Google Scholar
Miller, J. C. (1986). Slave prices in the Portugese southern Atlantic, 1600–1830. In Lovejoy 1986.Google Scholar
O'Brien, P. (2006). Colonies in a globalizing economy, 1815–1948. In Gills and Thompson 2006.Google Scholar
O'Rourke, K. (2006). The worldwide economic impact of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, 1793–1815. Journal of Global History 1, pp. 123–49.Google Scholar
O'Rourke, K. and Williamson, J. (1999). Globalization and History: The Evolution of a Nineteenth-Century Atlantic Economy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
O'Rourke, K. and Williamson, J. (2002a). After Columbus: explaining Europe's overseas trade boom, 1500–1800. Journal of Economic History 62, 2, pp. 417–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O'Rourke, K. and Williamson, J. (2002b). When did globalisation begin? European Review of Economic History 6, pp. 23–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O'Rourke, K. and Williamson, J. (2002c). From Malthus to Ohlin: trade, growth and distribution since 1500. CEPR discussion paper 3394, London: CEPR.Google Scholar
O'Rourke, K. and Williamson, J. (2004). Once more: when did globalisation begin? European Review of Economic History 8, pp. 109–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ormrod, D. (2003). The Rise of Commercial Empires. England and the Netherlands in the Age of Mercantilism, 1650–1770. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Özmucur, S. and Pamuk, S. (2007). Did European commodity prices converge during 1500–1800? In Hatton et al. 2007.Google Scholar
Persson, K. G. (1999). Grain Markets in Europe: Integration and Deregulation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Posthumus, N. W. (1943). Nederlandsche prijsgeschiedenis. Leiden: Brill.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawley, J. (2005). The Transatlantic Slave Trade: A History. Revised edition. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Shammas, C. (1990). The Pre-industrial Consumer in England and America. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Sheridan, R. (1998). The formation of Caribbean plantation society, 1689–1748. In Marshall, P. J.. (ed.), The Oxford History of the British Empire, vol. II: The Eighteenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, F. (2005). Caribbean Rum – A Social and Economic History. Gainesville: University Press of Florida.Google Scholar
Vries, J. de (1993). Between purchasing power and the world of goods: understanding the household economy in early modern Europe. In Brewer and Porter 1993.Google Scholar

Unpublished sources

Data-files from the GPIH website (http://gpih.ucdavis.edu/):

Arroyo Abad, L. (2005). Spain 1351–1800.Google Scholar
Bassino, J.-P. (2006). Japan 1710–1871 (Mitsui Bunko).Google Scholar
Cuesta, M. and Arroyo Abad, L. (2006). Colombia, 1635–1809.Google Scholar
GPIH (2007). Japan rice prices 1620–1867.Google Scholar
Hoffman, P. (2005). Paris 1450–1789.Google Scholar
Jacks, D. (2006). Osaka 1600–1650.Google Scholar
Levin, P. and Arroyo Abad, L. (2005). Prices in Peru, 1627–1818.Google Scholar
Levin, P., Arroyo Abad, L. and Cuesta, M. (2007). Brazil, 1674–1769.Google Scholar
Lindert, P. (2006). China rice prices 961–1910.Google Scholar
Lindert, P. (2007). Mughal empire c. 1595 and later.Google Scholar
Lindert, P. and Deitch, J. (2006). Massachusetts, 1630–1883.Google Scholar
Lindert, P., Puente, S., Ambrosini, W. and Arroyo Abad, L. (2006–8). Pennsylvania spliced series, 1720–1896.Google Scholar
Pearson, M. and Lindert, P. (2006). Silver in North America 1649–1977.Google Scholar

Other data-files

Clark, G. (2007). English prices and wages, 1209–1914. Data-file available on the IISG-website, http://www.iisg.nl.Google Scholar
Zanden, J.-L. van (2007). The prices of the most important consumer goods, and indices of wages and the cost of living in the western part of the Netherlands, 1450–1800. Data-file available on the IISG-website, http://www.iisg.nl.Google Scholar