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thesis africa before european arrival
commerce and trade 18th century
thesis africa before european arrival
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Maritime advances of the 1500s made Western Europe’s ambitions for global trade feasible and thus gave birth to Europe’s Age of Exploration. Through the combined use of caravels, compasses, and astrolabes, Europeans stumbled upon commodities in foreign lands known as “drug foods”. Consequently, this introduction would have a lasting impact on the Europeans, they became drug addicts. Furthermore, this addiction, the demand for these drugs, became permanently embedded into European culture. To please an everlasting demand, Europeans had to decide on how to frugally acquire these commodities. The decision taken was one of regarding profit over ethics. Moreover, this decision not only impacted the culture and economy of the exploiters, European countries, but also, reciprocally, that of the exploited. China and Haiti were two countries that were exploited by Europe’s immoral decision on capitalism.
China, due to its unique environment and legal codes, was the only country that held a monopoly on its “drug food,” tea. As the English sipped on something new for a change they became enlightened since tea actually had benefits unlike their once preferred drink, alcohol. Tea stimulated people to work longer hours, instead of being tired and thus going home early. They also began to gather at coffeehouses that had become the epicenter of the English people’s day to day interactions, whether to discuss business or politics. The daily consumption of tea became
mundane for the English and thus it became embedded in their culture; even presently the English are synonymous with tea. This surge in demand mixed with England’s sense of superiority pushed the English to break down China’s monopoly on tea. For the English, their str...
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...e’s sugar cravings, Portugal not only ruined an entire country, Haiti, but also became an advertisement for sin, slavery.
Prior to the Renaissance, Europeans yearned for religious salvation through moral deeds, however, during the Renaissance and the Age of Exploration, Europeans yearned, instead for profits through immoral business decisions; from the use of slavery to exploiting opium’s illicit uses. Though technological advances are supposed to help people, Europe’s case of maritime advances proved to the contrary. The trade and consumption of “drug foods” benefited the culture and economy of Europe, while it leached the cultural and economic vitality of other nations. Europe’s footprint is still evident in China, where opium is still a social and an economic problem, as well as in Haiti which remains crippled in every aspect of its economy and government.
Sara Rose begins her story For All the Tea in China by saying, “There was a time when maps of the world were redrawn in the name of plants, when two empires, Britain and China, went to war over two flowers: the poppy and the camellia.”(Prologue). The purpose of this book is to explain the growing tensions between Britain and China and how that tension then shaped the world. Sarah Rose stresses the importance of the opium and tea trade to the British Empire in this story. When the Chinese began the process to stop the sale of the opium to its citizens and closed the port of Canton to the India Tea Company, the British reacted with anger. They then decided it might would be a smart business move to create a source
In the first few months of 1773 the British East India Company found it was sitting on large stocks of tea that it could not sell in England. It was on the verge of bankruptcy, and many members of Parliament owned stock in this company. (USA, 1) The Tea Act in 1773 was an effort to save it. The Tea Act gave the company the right to export its merchandise without paying taxes. Thus, the company could undersell American merchants and monopolize the colonial tea trade. By October, the Sons of Liberty in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston threatened tea imports and pledged a tea boycott.
The West India Tea Company found themselves bankrupt due to the amount of smuggled tea America was buying. People were buying smuggled tea because it was so much cheaper than the tea England was forcing them to buy. The company's plan was to select three major cities in America to get rid of their competition. They would hire other handlers in Philadelphia, Charleston, and New York. By having the tea sold in America, they could avoid the high taxes of England. After they had eliminated their other competitors, they would charge much more for the tea that they were selling (Francis 1). When the colonists heard that the East India Company was selling tea to these cities, almost all of them were furious and wanted England to be aware of it. The patriots worried that they would start liking England because of the better tea prices (Maier 516). Soon tea was shipped to America for distribution to agents of the company, who ...
Imagine contracting syphilis—would it be more appropriate to lament having such a disease, or express the benefits—the European discovery of cocoa and dyes—that followed Christopher Columbus introducing the disease to Europe? Pangloss, rather than feel sorry for himself, speaks of the aforementioned benefits, “…For if Columbus had not in an island of America caught this disease… we should have neither chocolate nor cochineal (Voltaire 15).” This quotation emphasizes how entangled Pangloss was with his own philosophy, that he could not see his own torment—his syphilis—was unnecessary. See, neither Pangloss nor anyone else had to suffer in order for anyone to receive chocolate or cochineal; in a better world, Christopher Columbus would not have brought syphilis back with him after discovering the New World. However, Pangloss cannot conceive of there being a better world because he is enamored with pointing out that, where there is evil, there is also good—which is what he does by pointing out how because Columbus went to the New World and contracted syphi...
At the end of the eighteenth century, China’s goods were much desired by Britain. However, the Chinese saw Europeans as savages and did not want to trade with them. During trade, there was an imbalance in China’s favor, because the Europeans were forced to buy Chinese goods using silver. The Western Imperialists began to grow opium poppies from in India, and then smuggle them into China. China soon became addicted to the drug and spent most of it’s money on the purchase of it from the Europeans and Americans. This shifted the balance of power to be in Europe’s favor.
Salisbury, Joyce E. and Andrew E. Kersten. "Food & Drink in Victorian England." Daily Life through History. ABC-CLIO, 2014. Web. 31 Jan. 2014.
European colonialism was the period between 16th and mid-20th century. The triangle trade had emerged in the 16th century and slaves, sugar, furs, and cotton, enforced through military interventions, drew together the people, politics, economics, and even diseases of Europe, Africa, and the Americans in a triangle of previously unimaginable, highly unequal, and long-lasting relationships of exchange. Even today, we can find traces of many of these connections in the global economy for example, the French military operating in Côte d’Ivoire. So, the European colonialism played a pivotal role in establishing the framework for today’s global economic system.
In the beginning of 1773, the East India Company saw that they had large amount of tea in stock and could not get it to move or sell at all in England; they were on the track to bankruptcy. With the Tea Act, it was here to save this from happening. The Tea ...
“Catastrophe, riots, factories blowing up, armies in flight, flood - the ear can detect a whole apocalypse in the starry night of the human body (Cocteau).” China is the human body of this metaphor, as Cocteau points out the destruction and chaos opium can cause in the body of man; it does the same to the well-being of China during the early to mid eighteen-hundreds. The aim of this paper is to discuss a key issue in which plagued China in their opposition to opium trade leading up to and during the Opium War. While there are many important issues related to China’s opium problem, the scope of this paper will be strategic errors. It is important to note that if improvements were made in this field, it does not guarantee that the
With the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492, the eradication of the original Haitians through disease, slavery, and slaughter executed by the Europeans, did not take long. According to Farmer, author of The Uses of Haiti 2006, massive development in agricultural labor triggered transatlantic trafficking of humans and beginning in 1540 over 30,000 Africans had been forced into slavery on the island known today as Haiti (Pg.54). Human trafficking continued to increase over the decades as the demand for more
consuming tea. Due to this, by 1686 tea would be hit the markets and be sold to
The thought of opium as a topic of conversation in China throughout the late eighteenth century and nineteenth century brought about discussions that varied from arguments for its legalization and praise of its distributors to the complete ban of the drug and punishment for all users and smugglers. For those who acted as proponents of the narcotic, they sincerely believed that this necessary evil was one of the only aspects of the economy that could effectively propel China into the same class as that of the world’s supreme powers (Janin 6). Those who condemned even the slightest interaction with opium or its derivatives opted for the more “honorable” route, in that, they pledged to rid their country of such horrible vices in order to follow a purer path throughout their daily lives (Mackay 124). It was from these arguments that made these debates rampantly widespread throughout the country, with neither side effectively telling the truth about the future of China and ultimately being left to the voice of those in charge of the economy, since they are the ones who control what is worth importing and exporting. If the use of opium were permitted, then the impact would have been generally positive, in that, there would be fewer smugglers to worry about breaking the law, and more profit actually being given to the Chinese government since they would actually be included. On the other hand, basing this drug trade on purely moral and some economic terms, then the people of China will constantly be in a state of intoxication because they will no longer be able to think and process clearly, while the economy of the Chinese government might also not be able to possess the buying power that they would have previously had when they unc...
Concerned authorities have focused essentially on criminalization and punishment, to find remedies to the ever-increasing prevalent drug problem. In the name of drug reducing policies, authorities endorse more corrective and expensive drug control methods and officials approve stricter new drug war policies, violating numerous human rights. Regardless of or perhaps because of these efforts, UN agencies estimate the annual revenue generated by the illegal drug industry at $US400 billion, or the equivalent of roughly eight per cent of total international trade (Riley 1998). This trade has increased organized/unorganized crime, corrupted authorities and police officials, raised violence, disrupted economic markets, increased risk of diseases an...
Nunn, Nathan, and Nancy Qian. "The Columbian Exchange: A History of Disease, Food, and Ideas." Journal of Economic Perspectives. Yale University, 2010. Web. 12 Oct. 2013. .
...ition of spices into the market during the Middle Ages not only created an economic boom but also led to the change in social, political, and religious outlooks of society. The vast importance of the spice trade opened the doors for nations to expand and create new relationships with neighboring regions, but most importantly it allowed individuals such as Columbus, Da Gama, Polo and other explorers to be able to discover new domains that eventually led to the colonization of the Americas today. Paul Freedman’s book does an excellent job in enlightening the reader of how meaningful spices were throughout the centuries and with the help of numerous primary sources, the message was clear just after reading the first chapter. The book allows us to have a better understanding of the fundamental importance spices played in shifting the medieval times into the modern era.