Introduction

The long nineteenth century was a period of imperial expansion also known as “steam globalisation”, as John Darwin (2020) stated. The technological revolutions in the maritime sector were also pushed by emergent global security, where steamship shipping and telecommunications played a major role (Fichter, 2019; Gray, 2018; Kaukiainen, 2012). Hence, the diffusion of technology was closely related to the expansion of colonial empires around the world (Miller, 2012). Steamship navigation is linked to technological revolutions and the consolidation and further expansion of global economic and political systems broadly analysed by the academic literature (Boyns & Gray, 2016; Curry-Machado, 2013; Ducruet & Itoh, 2022; Gray, 2017; Huber, 2013; Suárez Bosa, 2014; Williams & Armstrong, 2012). Thus, the global port cities we study in this book were connected by a complex network of shipping connections whose edges were coaling stations, as Suárez Bosa presents in his contribution (Chap. 2 ). Hence, the coaling sector—later oil companies—is a representative element explaining the functioning of these complex networks featuring Global North–South relations (see Chaps. 2 , 3 , 7 , and 8 ). Port cities and their hinterlands were also integrated into these international commercial flows, impacting their port facilities, geography, economic activity, and urban culture (Mah, 2014). As Prieto et al. stated in their contribution, port activity and coal business also influenced the daily narratives and local vocabulary of people living close to the port areas (Chap. 7 ).