Thus, the ideas of mercantilism contributed directly to colonialism and a host of colonial wars and conflicts. No mercantilist state was averse to expanding into the markets of any other nation. Rather the goal was to contain as much of the production and trade within one's own borders. War was a natural consequence of each nation attempting to control as much of a finite supply of wealth as it possibly could. The nation that most successfully exploited these policies became naturally the most powerful. Spain with its huge resources of gold and silver failed in the control and production of other resources. France failed to maintain control over the territories necessary for production. Holland lacked sufficient native resources to establish effective control over enough territories to fully ground a mercantilist empire. Great Britain succeeded because it followed the mercantilist credo and was able to take control over each stage of the production of commodities and wealth in sufficient quantities that the system built naturally on itself. Great Britain became the wealthiest...
Fixed wealth denominated in gold and silver accrued to the one empire that exceeded all the others in extent and power. In a finite world, the biggest wins.
References
(1999). 4: Colonies, Enterprises, and Wealth: The Economies of Europe and the Wider World in the Seventeenth Century. In Early Modern Europe: An Oxford History, Cameron, E. (Ed.) (pp. 137-170). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ekelund, R.B., & Tollison, R.D. (1997). Politicized Economies: Monarchy, Monopoly, and Mercantilism. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press.
Inikori, J.E. & Engerman, S.L. (Eds.). (1992). The Atlantic Slave Trade Effects on Economies, Societies, and Peoples in Africa, the Americas, and Europe. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Magnusson, L. (1994). Mercantilism: The Shaping of an Economic Language. New York: Routledge.
O'Brien, P. (1999). Imperialism and the Rise and Decline of the British Economy, 1688-1989. New Left Review, a…
