POL208Y1 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Pax Britannica, Napoleonic Wars, Mercantilism
Frieden, Lake & Schultz Chapter 1: What Shaped Our World?
● The Emergence of International Relations: The Mercantilist Era
○ Mercantilism: a system by which imperial governments used military power to
enrich themselves and their supporters, then used those riches to enhance their
military power
○ Mercantilism’s principle mechanism was the establishment of monopolies that
controlled trade and other economic activities, manipulating them so as to direct
money into the coffers of the government and its business supporters
■ Controls on trade
○ Peace of Westphalia: The settlement that ended the Thirty Years’ War in 1948
■ Stabilized the borders of the belligerents and attempted to resolve some
of the religious conflicts that had complicated their relations
■ Often said to have created the modern state system because it included a
general recognition of the principles of sovereignty and nonintervention
○ Hegemony: the predominance of one-nation over others
■ The British defeated Napoleon during the Napoleanic Wars (1804-1815)
in Waterloo, sealing British international Hegemony
● The Pax Britannica
○ Pax Britannica: british peace
■ A century-long period beginning with Napolean’s defeat at Waterloo in
1915 and ending with the outbreak of WWI in 1914 during which Britain’s
economic and diplomatic influence contributed to economic openness
and relative peace
○ Free trade
■ To some extent, the reduction of barriers to trade among nations reflected
the more peaceful nature of relations among the principal powers
■ Much of the impetus for the reversal of mercantilism came from changes
in the economic interests of the major powers themselves
■ The economic interests created by Britain’s Industrial Revolution saw
mercantilist barriers to trade as irrelevant or harmful
○ The Gold Standard
■ The gold standard: the monetary system that prevailed between about
1870 and 1914, in which countries tied their currencies to gold at a legally
fixed price
○ Colonial Imperialism
■ There was a burst of territorial expansion after 1870 that left most of
Africa and Asia part of colonial empires
■ The European powers, and eventually non-European powers such as the
US and Japan, were interested in the poor countries of Latin America,
Africa, and Asia, for both security and economic reasons
■ The new powers that arose in and outside Europe saw colonial
possessions as a way of improving their military positions
● The result was a scramble for new colonies
● The Thirty Years’ Crisis
○ Tension in Europe
■ One source of renewed conflict was the changing European power
balance
■ The most striking change in the European power balance was the rise of
Germany
■ The Central powers - Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire,
and Bulgaria- were arrayed against most of the rest of Europe
○ World War I and its Effects
■ While it further weakened the bases of peace in Europe, the war
demonstrated the international economic and military predominance of
the US
● The entry of the US into the war in 1917 effectively guaranteed the
Allied victory
■ Treaty of Versailles: the peace treaty between the Allies and Germany
that formally ended WWI on June 28, 1919
● The US seized a dramatically increased share of global trade and
investment; the US changed from being the world’s biggest debtor
to its biggers lender
■ League of Nations: A permanent international security organization
formed in the aftermath of WWI.
● Supplanted by the United Nations after WWII and was dissolved in
1946
○ Interwar Instability
■ The French and British were weak in victory, Germany was bitter in
defeat, Russia was isolated in its Communist experiment, and the
Ottoman and austro-hungarian empires had dissolved into a series of
small states beset by constant diplomatic and economic tensions
■ The french and germans continued to clash diplomatically over issues left
unsettled on the battlefield
● Included control of the border regions of alsace, lorraine, and the
saar
■ The global great depression that began in 1929 was more severe, lasted
longer, and caused more hardship than any economic downturn in
modern history
○ World War II
■ WWII largely pitted the fascist governments that had turned against the
global economy against the democratic powers that remained committed
to some form of international economic cooperation (along with the Soviet
Union)
■ The three major fascist powers - Germany, Italy, and Japan - formed an
alliance, the Axis, aimed at restoring and increasing their military might
and territory
Document Summary
The emergence of international relations: the mercantilist era. Mercantilism: a system by which imperial governments used military power to enrich themselves and their supporters, then used those riches to enhance their military power. Mercantilism"s principle mechanism was the establishment of monopolies that controlled trade and other economic activities, manipulating them so as to direct money into the coffers of the government and its business supporters. Peace of westphalia: the settlement that ended the thirty years" war in 1948. Stabilized the borders of the belligerents and attempted to resolve some of the religious conflicts that had complicated their relations. Often said to have created the modern state system because it included a general recognition of the principles of sovereignty and nonintervention. Hegemony: the predominance of one-nation over others. The british defeated napoleon during the napoleanic wars (1804-1815) in waterloo, sealing british international hegemony. A century-long period beginning with napolean"s defeat at waterloo in.
