AP Syllabus focus: ‘Competition in expanding global trade generated economic disputes that fueled rivalries and conflict between states in the period 1450–1750.’
Expanding oceanic commerce after 1450 made trade routes, colonies, and maritime chokepoints strategic assets. States increasingly used diplomacy, law, and naval force to protect profits and deny rivals access to global markets.
Map of Spanish treasure-shipping routes in the Caribbean/West Indies, illustrating how bullion-rich flows were funneled through a few key corridors and ports. It helps explain why controlling chokepoints and intercepting convoys could translate directly into state revenue and wartime leverage. Source
Why global trade produced interstate conflict (1450–1750)
High-stakes economic motives
As transoceanic exchange widened, governments linked state power to commercial advantage, creating recurring flashpoints:
Access to luxury goods (spices, silks, porcelain) and later mass consumer goods (sugar, tobacco) promised revenue through customs duties and re-export.
Bullion flows and customs income helped fund armies and navies, so rivals targeted each other’s shipping and ports.
Exclusive trading rights and attempts at monopoly encouraged states to use force when competitors “trespassed” in claimed zones.
Trade disputes became security disputes
Economic competition often escalated because:
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FAQ
Insurance and credit spread risk beyond individual merchants, keeping trade moving during wartime.
War could still raise premiums and tighten credit, but stronger financial networks helped some states sustain long conflicts while targeting rivals’ commerce.
They concentrated shipping into predictable routes, making it easier to intercept merchants and levy tolls.
They also offered resupply and repair, so a fortified harbour could project power far beyond its coastline.
Neutral flags offered limited protection because belligerents often suspected neutrals of carrying enemy goods.
Disputes over “free ships, free goods” versus contraband rules repeatedly strained diplomacy and sometimes pulled neutrals into conflict.
Sea war targeted revenue: capturing cargo, disrupting convoys, and blockading ports to starve treasuries.
Because ships were expensive and mobile, sea power rewarded logistics, intelligence, and sustained financing as much as battlefield victories.
Overseas possessions became integrated into European power politics: colonies provided revenue, naval bases, and bargaining leverage.
As states coordinated multiple theatres, victories in one ocean could determine negotiations in another, making conflicts wider and more interconnected.
