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Merchant Kings: When Companies Ruled the World, 1600--1900, by Stephen R. Bown
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Commerce meets conquest in this swashbuckling story of the six merchant-adventurers who built the modern world
It was an era when monopoly trading companies were the unofficial agents of European expansion, controlling vast numbers of people and huge tracts of land, and taking on governmental and military functions. They managed their territories as business interests, treating their subjects as employees, customers, or competitors. The leaders of these trading enterprises exercised virtually unaccountable, dictatorial political power over millions of people.
The merchant kings of the Age of Heroic Commerce were a rogue's gallery of larger-than-life men who, for a couple hundred years, expanded their far-flung commercial enterprises over a sizable portion of the world. They include Jan Pieterszoon Coen, the violent and autocratic pioneer of the Dutch East India Company; Peter Stuyvesant, the one-legged governor of the Dutch West India Company, whose narrow-minded approach lost Manhattan to the British; Robert Clive, who rose from company clerk to become head of the British East India Company and one of the wealthiest men in Britain; Alexandr Baranov of the Russian American Company; Cecil Rhodes, founder of De Beers and Rhodesia; and George Simpson, the "Little Emperor" of the Hudson's Bay Company, who was chauffeured about his vast fur domain in a giant canoe, exhorting his voyageurs to paddle harder so he could set speed records.
Merchant Kings looks at the rise and fall of company rule in the centuries before colonialism, when nations belatedly assumed responsibility for their commercial enterprises. A blend of biography, corporate history, and colonial history, this book offers a panoramic, new perspective on the enormous cultural, political, and social legacies, good and bad, of this first period of unfettered globalization.
- Sales Rank: #399841 in Books
- Published on: 2010-12-07
- Released on: 2010-12-07
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.72" h x 1.14" w x 6.21" l, 1.00 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 336 pages
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Bown (A Most Damnable Invention) has produced a magnificent description of the six great companies, and their leaders, that dominated the "Heroic Age of Commerce." Bown demonstrates how the corporations served as stalking horses for kings and parliaments while enriching shareholders and the powerful managers themselves. Jan Pieterszoon Coen of the Dutch East India Company was particularly noteworthy for cruel tyranny in what is now Indonesia. The English East India Company's Robert Clive, through genius and perseverance, rose to a position of near-absolute power in India. Aleksander Baranov of the Russian American Company, known as the "Lord of Alaska," was bound by ties of decency and responsibility to the company's men, but also had a deep strain of brutality. Cecil Rhodes of the British South Africa Company and of De Beers, the South African diamond monopoly, was dedicated both to the British Empire and to the success of his various enterprises. Bown presents a fascinating look at the men who exploited resources and native peoples while laying the foundations of empires. "Neither heroes nor angels," Bown says, their global impact was as great as that of any king. Illus.; maps. (Dec.)
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From Booklist
Monopolies, such as England’s storied East India Company, have inspired many popular histories and biographies. Bown synthesizes this material into a lively gallery of six men who built up their firms and enriched themselves. Motivations and character are in the forefront of Bown’s portraits, whose subjects viewed their employment as their main chance for ascending to status and wealth, manifesting traits of determination and ruthlessness along the way that posterity looked upon askance, to put it mildly. Take Cecil Rhodes, the racial-supremacist empire builder who organized a company to dispossess Africans from what is today Zimbabwe and Zambia. Bown compares Rhodes to Jan Coen, who in the early 1600s pitilessly monopolized the East Indies spice trade on behalf of the Netherlands and his company, the VOC, and counts Robert Clive in 1700s India as a comparable buccaneer of self-interest and imperial expansion. Additionally profiling Pieter Stuyvesant in New York, Aleksandr Baranov in Alaska, and George Simpson of the Hudson’s Bay Company, Bown ably deploys biography to present the successes, costs, and legacies of an era’s commingling of private money and state sovereignty. --Gilbert Taylor
Review
Bown has fashioned a chronicle perfectly relevant to our own time--and ultimately shows us that a market is free only when those who live and consume within it are protected from the powerful.
--NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS
“A masterful read.” ―The Washington Times
“Engagingly written and refreshingly conversational, Merchant Kings brings a cohesion to such a large and unwieldy historical period, a period that both led directly to, and remains an integral part of, so many contemporary economic and political struggles. And he does so commendably.” ―The Post and Courier
“A chronicle perfectly relevant to our own time--and ultimately shows us that a market is free only when those who live and consume within it are protected from the powerful.” ―New York Journal of Books
“[Merchant Kings] offers an easily digestible overview of the period and its major figures.” ―The New York Times
“Bown ably deploys biography to present the successes, costs, and legacies of an era's commingling of private money and state sovereignty.” ―Booklist
“Bown has produced a magnificent description of the six great companies, and their leaders, that dominated the 'Heroic Age of Commerce.' ... Bown presents a fascinating look at the men who exploited resources and native peoples while laying the foundations of empires. 'Neither heroes nor angels,' Bown says, their global impact was as great as that of any king.” ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Bown's well-researched text brings these remarkable men to life, his eye for detail and infectious passion transporting readers through this passage in history. Battles and brawls, ruthless vision, despair, folly, grandeur are all woven into an exciting and gripping tale of men who would 'command the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself'. An excellent historical study and a very engaging read.” ―Liverpool Daily Post
“Stephen Bown has ingeniously whittled this multinational history down to vignettes of six of its more notorious figures. . . . These characters are as familiar to us as evil storybook characters, yet as foreign to contemporary business standards as Genghis Khan.” ―Timothy Brook, author of Vermeer’s Hat on Merchant Kings
“Stephen Bown tells a fascinating story, one that provides a very different perspective on the colonial period than that which is to be gleaned from the usual grocery list of significant events.” ―The Right Honourable Paul Martin, former prime minister of Canada, on Merchant Kings
“[Bown]'s particularly good at penning provocative theories that link seemingly modest events to monumental changes in the course of history. . . . Bown also has a good eye for the unintended consequences, ironies, and contradictions that are the product of social and technological forces of great magnitude.” ―Publishers Weekly on A Most Damnable Invention
“A spirited, stimulating account of how the cure for the feared disease was found, lost, and found again. Splendid, popular history.” ―Kirkus Reviews on Scurvy
Most helpful customer reviews
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful.
Well done parallel history of six companies that acted like empires
By Jeff
Stephen Bown's Merchant Kings has a clever idea for a book and several ripping good yarns to tell. Like many books these days with subtitles, this one's "When Companies Ruled the World 1600-1900" is an overreach, but it still has quite the tale to tell.
In a nutshell, several European countries during this time frame established companies to be put together which effectively had governmental power over the territories they managed. This book covers six: the Dutch East India Company; the English East India Company; the Dutch West India Company; the Russian American Company; the Hudson Bay Company, and the British South African Company. Each story is quite interesting, although I found the first, third, fifth, and sixth companies to be considerably more interesting than the Russian or British East India company.
There are some pretty amazing and dictatorial characters in this book, and Bown is very good about sketching them with enough detail for them to be really interesting, but not so much they get bogged down. As one example, it took 9 months for the governor of the Dutch East indies to ask for instructions from home, and another 9 months for him to receive a reply. Not surprisingly, this leads to extremely autonomous governing, done by virtual tyrants. There are some amazingly cruel acts committed here against natives, and this is part of Bown's point. I'm not sure it was his intention, but whenever you hear about sweatshops in far off lands, pick this book up and you'll quickly remember what real exploitation is like.
This is a fine book for anyone interested in history in general, and the history of the corporation in general.
33 of 43 people found the following review helpful.
Globalization/Exploitation (101)
By R. A. Barricklow(Scaramouche)
So we cannot carry on trade without war, nor war without trade.
Sound familiar?
These are words expressed in a letter by Jan Pieterszzon Coen, who had assumed command of the Dutch East India Company(VOC), the first great global corporation, in 1622, to the company's governing "Council of Seventeen". This, his long-held conviction: violent force was necessary for profitability, would soon be put into action, sheding any pretence, that the corporation's true business practices would be peaceful. When these violent actions were called into question he fired back to the Council/...I swear that no enemies do our cause more harm than ignorance and stupidity existing among you, gentlemen! This he wrote to his superiors!
Needless to say Stephen R. Bown has found, not only a rousing tale to tell, but one that runs parallel today's ongoing wave of globalization. Indeed, Mark Twian's/History may not repeat itself, but it damn sure rhymes - was a continuing backdrop theme for me as the author's pages seamlessly turned. The simularities are striking, and quite frankly, frightening.
He tells the story of six Merchat Kings and the companies they commanded: Dutch East India Copany, Dutch West India Company, English East India Company, Russian American Company, Hudson Bay Company and the British South Africa Company. A story of how these companies ruled the world, that foreshadow today's transnational corporations.
I envy the reader, as he or she travels back with the Merchant Kings for the first time, even as stark backdrop echoes of an ever reverberabing present/future tense, put one on edge.
An extremely entertaining read and as important.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED !!!!!!!
P.S. For those wanting to continue with a Globalization/Exploitation (201) please read: Gods of Money/Wall Street and the Death of the American Century by F. William Engdahl.
Unlike the British Empire, which was based on military conquest and direct possesion of colonies, the American version of global domination was based on financial conquest and economic possession. It was complexly layered by refinement, one which allowed US corporate giants to veil their interests behind the flag of 'democracy and political rights' for 'oppressed colonial peoples,' support of 'free enterprise' and 'open markets'. These were the policies reflected by the Council on Foreign Relations task force, and they were antything but democratic. It represented the interests of an elite handful of American banks and industrial corporations that had developed global interests. The businessmen and their law firms were a breed apart from the rest of Americans, an oligarchy to themselves, an aristrocracy of power and money.
Not recommended for the feint of heart, or the dolled-up in red, white, & blue.
P.P.S. Exploitation 301 google: jim fetzer podcast. go to Friday, August 19 2011 Leuren Moret 1:36:28 clicks in, to 1:41:28 clicks in.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
six men who controlled large parts of the world
By K. Kennedy
"Merchant Kings" by Stephen Bown is the story of six very powerful men who built their own empires within the construct of colonialism and the rise of capitalism. Mr. Bown's writing is easy to follow, and he is able to describe the situations, difficulties, and temptations that each of these men faced, as well as how they fared during their lives. He also includes an honest assessment of the brutal conditions each man created for the majority of the people, so that others (i.e., shareholders, nobility, etc.) could profit. This is a very interesting book and it provides a good understanding of these men and their times.
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