The integration of the global economy: 1700–1900

This chapter focuses on a wave of globalisation in the period, AD 1700–1900. It considers not just trade but international investment and migration, even the global flow of knowledge, technological and organisational. It describes the rise of the Atlantic economy, compared with the previously dominant trade in the Indian Ocean. It pays particular attention to the ghost acres made available to the land-hungry European economies, to slavery in providing a labour force in the Americas, and to the rise of gold and the gold standard. It describes two triangular trades which affected Britain – the Atlantic and Asian multilateral trading systems. The chapter shows how in Britain the international economy was partially responsible for the transition to a modern economy, making a number of valuable contributions, including the opening of market opportunities, the generation of investment funds as well as the provision of ghost acres.