Comercio, patrimonio, nación y guerra.

Abstract

According to standard historiographical wisdom, the triumph of Amsterdam in the seventeenth century was no more than the culmination of a cycle of economic development protagonized by cities like Venice, Genoa, or Antwerp, which became powerful mercantile and financial centres but which lacked the support of a modern unified state. This opinion has been revised, and it has been shown that, despite the jealous defense of the provincial and urban particularism, the active network of cities around Amsterdam succeeded in creating the means necessary to defend their mercantile interests and to gain access to European and colonial markets. Much of the success of the Dutch model sprang from the scarce state supervision of the East and West Indies trading companies, founded in 1602 and 1621. Throughout the seventeenth century, colonial expansion encouraged the consolidation of the United Provinces as an independent state, but in the long run the relative importance of foreign trade led to the application of a fiscal policy designed to favour commerce at the expense of productive activities. Privileged trading companies engaged in constant patrimonial conflicts and contributed to strengthen the power of the patrician elite and to maintain an archaic and descentralized government structure, which was incapable of meeting the challenge of other European colonial powers.