Colonial Empires And Colonies Flashcards
Hypotheses
Naval power was crucial to maintaining profitable colonies
EME were littoral empires
Authority was delegated
Colonial experience was based on the organisation of violence
Littoral empires
Iberian
Northern European
Caribbean
Networks and nodes
Guns, germs and steel
Colombian exchange hailed the collapse of Native American populations
European diseases wiped out large numbers of indigenous peoples - 50-90% of Amerindian populations died
Politics of biology
Biological argument makes us rethink military prowess of Europeans
Undercuts arguments about Europeans cultural supremacy
Presents a narrative of immunological superior your
Northern European American colonies
Early raiding and trading
Initial colony failures - Roanoke, Jamestown famines
Attempts to market colonies
Northern European American colonies growth
Post 1640:
1640 - 5-10,000 Europeans
1750 - 1,000,000 in British colonies
Imperial government
Composite monarchies
Delegation and negotiation of authority
Company control
Company garrison empires
Empires of private enterprise
Subcontracted colonisation
Unfree labour
Amerindian enslavement (technically forbidden in Spanish possessions) Forced labour used against POWs
Indenture
Form of contractual unfree labour - 60% British emigrants
Used as punishment
Used as social cleansing
Slavery
Portuguese and Spanish imported African slaves after collapse of South American population
English transported 3 million slaves to American from west Africa
Profoundly violent
Commodification of humans
Piracy
Empire building technique - to disrupt other nations trade
Treaty of Madrid - unravelled by 1690s
Around 5,000 pirates in Caribbean and beyond 1700 - undermined legitimate trade
Conclusion
Colonies established on land, but maintained at sea (littoral)
Authority delegated to private actors - rise of navy shows deep synergy between mercantile interest , states and warfare
Colonies were sustained through the organisation of violence
